55: Baiyu Qingchen

Before the sword light even reached him, Di Qianjie felt as if his Divine Soul was being pierced by thousands of needles, causing immense pain!

"Nine Heavens · Soul Suppression!"

Boom!

A jet-black sword light slashed out, colliding with Yu Qingchen's sword light, forcefully neutralizing the attack targeted at his Divine Soul!

A flash of surprise crossed Yu Qingchen's eyes. "You actually managed to block my Soul-Extinguishing Strike?"

Di Qianjie praised him:

"Tai Xu Sword Body... You have some skill."

He slowly raised the Thousand Tribulations Sword in his hand. On the sword's edge, a faint wisp of blood-red color appeared.

"However, this is where it ends."

Yu Qingchen frowned. "Arrogant!"

He wasted no more words and charged forward again. The Supreme Void Sword radiated a blinding light, and the seven patterns on the blade actually detached, transforming into seven small dragons that coiled around the sword's edge!

"Tai Xu Seven Absolute Swords — Sixth Absolute · Seven Dragons Devouring the Heavens!"

The seven small dragons roared as they lunged toward Di Qianjie. Each one contained terrifying Sword Qi, enough to tear apart the Physical Body of a Heaven-Reaching Realm Cultivator!

Facing this fatal blow, Di Qianjie suddenly closed his eyes.

In the next instant, he snapped his eyes open, and a wisp of blood-red tribulation light appeared within his pupils!

"Twelve Forms of Tribulation Sword — Tribulation Breaking!"

Boom—!

A blood-red sword light soared into the sky, forcefully slashing and extinguishing the seven small dragons!

Yu Qingchen's expression changed drastically. Before he could react, Di Qianjie's figure appeared before him like a ghost, the Thousand Tribulations Sword thrusting straight at him!

"What?!"

Yu Qingchen hurriedly held his sword horizontally to parry, but—

Crack!

The Supreme Void Sword was actually snapped by the Thousand Tribulations Sword!

"Impossible!" A look of terror finally appeared in Yu Qingchen's eyes.

The Supreme Void Sword was a Heaven-Grade peak-tier Magic Treasure; how could it be broken so easily? Unless the opponent's sword... However, Di Qianjie's sword momentum did not stop, and the Thousand Tribulations Sword pierced directly into his shoulder!

"Ah—!"

Yu Qingchen let out a miserable scream. He was sent flying hundreds of feet by the sword's residual power, crashing heavily into a mountain wall!

The entire area fell into deathly silence!

Everyone stared wide-eyed, watching this scene in disbelief.

The Supreme Void Sword Son... was defeated?!

Di Qianjie slowly sheathed his sword, gazing coldly at the dust in the distance.

"Tai Xu Sword Body? Nothing more than this."

In the dust, Yu Qingchen struggled to stand up, his face as pale as paper. He glared fixedly at Di Qianjie, his eyes filled with venomous resentment and unwillingness.

"I will remember you!"

Before his voice could fade, he crushed a jade talisman, and his figure suddenly vanished.

Di Qianjie gave a cold snort and did not pursue.

"Twelve Forms of Tribulation Sword... as expected, it is domineering."

He put away his longsword and turned to leave.

Leaving behind a crowd of Cultivators staring at each other, unable to snap out of it for a long time.

After this battle, Di Qianjie's name would surely shake the entire Netherworld Secret Realm.

"Clan Brother Qianjie, you are too amazing!"

"That bullshit Tai Xu seven swords, they were still beaten into a sorry state by you!" Di Lingxiao said, putting his arm around Di Qianjie's shoulder.

"If you had gone, Yu Qingchen would have suffered the same fate."

Di Lingxiao smiled and said nothing.

"Qianjie, you will surely become famous in the Netherworld Secret Realm after this battle," Di Tianxiao praised.

"Uncle Tianxiao, becoming famous isn't important to me; what's important is my own strength."

"Hey, Clan Brother, that's not right. Since the Clan Chief is nurturing us like this, how can we let the reputation of the Di Clan fall?" Di Xingyun said happily.

He had heard of the reputation of the Taixu Sword Sect's seven swords in Tianxiao Prefecture while he was at the Carefree Sect in Lingxu Prefecture, but he had never had the chance to fight them.

The Prodigies from various prefectures watching from afar were silent. Xuemu's face was ashen, and Feng Qingwu's delicate body trembled—that was the Supreme Void Sword Son! A peerless Prodigy claimed to be able to slay those in the Heaven-Reaching Realm, yet he was actually defeated?!

Before the dizziness of the spatial distortion had completely faded, Yu Qingchen crashed heavily onto a patch of jagged, strange rocks.

The wound on his shoulder pierced by the Thousand Tribulations Sword throbbed with excruciating pain, almost causing him to faint. The broken hilt of the Supreme Void Sword slipped from his palm, falling among the rubble with a sharp clatter.

He struggled to prop up half his body. Thick blood mixed with fragments of internal organs poured from his mouth, staining the greyish-white rocks beneath him red.

"Damn... it." Yu Qingchen's voice was hoarse and broken, every word sounding as if it were ground out from the depths of his throat, carrying bone-deep resentment and unbelievable humiliation.

One of the seven swords of the Taixu Sword Sect, a sword Dao Prodigy at the Tenth Level of the Purple Mansion Realm, was actually defeated head-on by a nobody at the Third Level of the Purple Mansion Realm! Even his Supreme Void Sword had been snapped!

This was not just a severe physical injury, but a complete shattering of his lifelong beliefs and pride!

The Tai Xu Sword Body he took pride in was as fragile as glass before that strange black sword coiled with blood-colored tribulation patterns.

Extreme anger and hatred were like poisonous fire, burning his sanity, yet strangely suppressing part of the sharp pain brought by his injuries.

He looked up with difficulty to survey his surroundings; what met his eyes was a deathly silence and desolation. The sky was a murky leaden grey, without sun, moon, or stars, only a heavy layer of clouds that seemed ready to collapse at any moment.

The ground presented a lifeless grey decay. Giant black rocks, like the skeletons of behemoths, stood in a disorderly fashion, forming a stone forest that stretched beyond the horizon.

The air was filled with a decaying, cold aura. Breathing it into his lungs carried a metallic, rusty scent, and deeper in, there was a heart-palpitating silence as if all things had come to an end.

"Where... is this?" Yu Qingchen's heart sank. This Secret Realm was vast and boundless, filled with countless dangerous lands, and the aura of this silent stone forest was far more malevolent than any area he had explored before. The strong spatial teleportation fluctuation had brought him here—was it a curse? Or a blessing?

Just as despair was about to consume him, an extremely weak yet exceptionally resilient and strange fluctuation, like a wisp of nearly extinguished starlight in the darkness, pierced through the heavy oppression of this silent place and quietly brushed over his body.

This fluctuation was not spiritual energy, nor was it ordinary vitality, but a type of... Sword Intent purified to the extreme! A sharp edge that had been polished through endless years, full of the true meaning of extinction yet still refusing to dissipate!

This wisp of Sword Intent was so weak it was almost undetectable. If Yu Qingchen did not possess the Tai Xu Sword Body and an extraordinary perception of sword Dao auras, he would have definitely overlooked it.

It was like a cold thin thread, pulling the remaining Supreme Void Sword Qi within his body, pointing toward a certain direction deep within the stone forest.

The instinct to survive and the extreme desire for power instantly overrode his pain and resentment. A fierce light flashed in Yu Qingchen's eyes. He struggled, ignoring the sharp pain of broken ribs piercing his internal organs, and gripped the hilt of the broken sword with his blood-stained hand, using it as a cane to support his broken body.

Every step he moved was accompanied by the light sound of bones grinding and the tearing of wounds. Blood meandered behind him into a broken, dark red stream.

He followed the guidance of that weak wisp of Sword Intent, trudging with difficulty through the hideous, strange rocks. The deeper he went, the heavier the aura of death became, almost condensing into substance, pressing against his Divine Soul and giving him the illusion of suffocation.

There were more and more fragments of Sword Intent remaining in the air. Though weak, they carried a terrifying will to cut down all things and end everything.

He didn't know how long he had walked, but just as he felt himself about to run out of life and his consciousness began to blur, the view ahead suddenly opened up.

A huge clearing appeared in the center of the stone forest.

In the center of the clearing stood an ancient altar made entirely of some pitch-black metal. The altar's design was archaic, its surface covered with countless deep marks—those were not runes, but pure sword scars!

Every mark contained a heart-palpitating Destruction Sword Intent, crisscrossing as if the most sharp-edged slaughter in the world had been frozen here. At the top of the altar, there was no idol or treasure enshrined, but a sword was stabbed into it.

It was a broken stone sword.