Chapter 588 - 344: Passing the Sword

"Xuantian, wake up, it’s your turn to take the stage."

Awakened by an old voice, Chen Xuantian groggily opened his eyes and saw the Black Hawk puffing out its chest right in front of him.

"...You finally learned how to talk?"

The hawk "pop" spat out a bubble, and the old voice roared in anger.

"Still dawdling around! Hurry, hurry! Dan is about to die again!"

"Sigh, well, why is it that every time something like this happens, you remember me..."

Chen Xuantian helplessly crawled out of the dorm bed and skillfully peeled off the skin,

"Speaking of which, why don’t you give Dan a dorm room too? Then he can resurrect endlessly like me?"

The hawk chirped, bubbles burst,

"Although you two are modeled and reconstructed based on the same genetic template, connected through the overlapping of memory strings, mirror images in a film, the core principles are different."

"Chirp chirp"

"Your ’spirit’ is recorded on the supreme Void Sword Intent, already refined to the endless End Realm. Crossing thresholds is nothing, disintegration, rebirth, reincarnation trials are merely to cleanse your Daoist Heart, restoring you to the level you’ve already reached. But on your side of the string, you cannot produce a ’body’ to match your ’spirit,’ so you cannot unleash even a fraction of your true ability..."

"Chirp chirp"

"Dan’s ’body’ is a completely new thing, coordinating an infinite Dao Body from scratch. Every gene of his is custom-made, capable of limitless completion, limitless evolution, limitless enhancement, enduring countless forging, surpassing limits, reorganizing and merging, coordinating breakthroughs without collapsing, created to slay the endless End Realm with a boundless sword..."

"Chirp chirp"

"But, after all, Dan is a newly born egg, the foundation of possibilities, yet ultimately still a being limited within four dimensions. His ’spirit’ has not yet reached the End Realm. The overlapping string has an upper limit of retroactive fusion. Each time he actively plucks the string, there’s a risk of breaking it, that’s called a trial..."

"Chirp chirp"

"In short, you’ll understand later! Dan is not fully forged yet! If he shatters, everything is gone! Don’t dally in such moments! When it’s time to die, you go up and die for him!"

Chen Xuantian just hung the peeled skin in the cabinet, dumbfounded,

"Wait... wait! With that chirping, did you just divulge a lot of unbelievable hidden settings??

Speak clearly! Use a keyboard! Aren’t you proficient in Wubi!?"

But the hawk, impatiently flapping its wings, grabbed Chen Xuantian’s shoulder, dragging him into the Void Abyss, chirping along,

"This time he triggered the Calamity of Fallen Body, if he passes, it’s someone else’s trial, if not, Dan will perish!

In short, a close call! Be mentally prepared!"

Chen Xuantian puzzled,

"Wait, didn’t you just say I wouldn’t die? What mental preparation should I make?"

The hawk gave him a sidelong glance,

"Dying doesn’t mean you won’t still feel pain, right?"

Then the hawk’s claw loosened, flinging Chen Xuantian into the void.

"Ah? Ah—!!!"

The next second, a piercing pain struck, like flames scorching, like insects biting, or like ten thousand swords piercing the heart.

The view was all void, nothing could be seen, only flame-like agony, as if someone had gouged out his eyes

Intense stimuli sent from nerve endings to his brain, turned into a tragic scream, erupting from the young man’s mouth, echoing among the peaks.

"Scared me, after bubbling so long, he still screams with such vigor, this Dao Seed is not bad, whose sword boy is he?"

"Not from the mountain, from Hidden Sword Manor."

"Tsk, so noisy."

Then a sword energy cut through the young man’s throat, turning the howling screams into the sound of rushing blood wind.

"Hey, don’t kill him. Not many are usable for sword casting."

"Since he’s for sword casting, why leave him a tongue, I’ll take it."

"Hmph, always causing me trouble. Child, add another spoon of the Elixir to this furnace."

Then came the sound of Dan Pills dropping into the medicinal oil, followed by someone closing the furnace lid.

And the young man lay in endless void and darkness, gasping and groaning, gradually losing consciousness, his spirit wandering outside his body.

Then scattering Divine Light converged, regrouping into Chen Xuantian’s Blood Soul, rising from the young’s tattered body.

Even though Chen Xuantian deals with death all the time, dying and reviving, with a strong Primordial Spirit, this sudden shock still took him a while to recover and see the young man’s form clearly.

Miserable, too miserable.

Eyes were blinded, limbs cut off, tongue and throat sliced, the chest split open, intricately linked with a sword along the spine, unable to bend or stand straight, only floating in medicinal oil, struggling to survive.

Yes, this young man before Chen Xuantian was indeed Tie... er, no, he seemed to be Gou Dan?

Chen Xuantian slightly probed his memory, looked at the heart of this Dan, indeed, the boy’s experiences were entirely different from Tie Dan.

This was the one who never joined Yanzi Cave, later taken in by Hidden Sword Manor, but eventually, powerless to stop, watched as the Shen Family was exterminated by the Sword Sect, and himself taken as a sword refining child.

Of course, Gou Dan is probably also Dan, different strings, different gates, different worlds, different possibilities, probably still the same person.

His Daoist Heart, his perseverance, his determination, nothing less than Tie Dan’s.

But a slight difference can lead to a massive disparity.

Tie Dan is cold like a piece of cold iron.

In three years, he attained the Thousand-Year Sword Power, slaughtered his way up to Nine Yin Peak, chopped down Sword Monarchs and Sword Masters, annihilated the Sword Sect, no one under the sky could block his edge.