Boundless Ocean (2)
Several days had passed since the great uproar that had engulfed all of Dang-ga-ta.
As scheduled, the finals of the Dragon and Phoenix Gathering resumed. Crowds gathered near the sparring stage to watch the decisive match.
Yet the throng was considerably smaller than before the attack. Many of the martial artists who had come to observe the tournament had left to deal with the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace affair, and among the common folk, more than a few had fled simply to escape the lingering terror of the assault. That so many still remained, even after such chaos, was remarkable in its own right.
"Which side do you favor?"
"Cheonhwa, of course. Look at his record so far—he will not fall easily."
Cheonhwa's path through the Dragon and Phoenix Gathering had been nothing short of spectacular. In the preliminaries he had defeated Paeng Gun-ak of the Hebei Paeng Family and Beomhye, the Peak Expert of Shaolin known as the Iron Fist Dragon. In the main tournament he had overcome Yeonhwa, the greatest prodigy of the Zhongnan Sect, as well as the previous gathering's runner-up and champion—Paeng Mu-jin, the Tyrant Blade Dragon, and Namgung Myeong, the Heavenly Sword Dragon. Against a mere First-class Taoist of the Huashan Sect, most assumed victory would come easily.
Not every voice agreed.
"Tch. You see one thing and miss two. Yes, Cheong-ha is only First-class—but never forget he is of Huashan."
No major sect shared deeper ties with Zhongnan than Huashan. The two schools knew each other's martial arts intimately. That knowledge was not the private possession of any single person; it was the accumulated fruit of generations of history.
"Which is why this bout will be nothing like ordinary matches. It is like playing go when both players know every one of the other's techniques inside and out."
"So a single mistake will weigh heavier than usual?"
"Exactly. This will come down to who makes fewer errors."
The spectators offered their own assessments of the two fighters' strengths, some sharp, some wildly off the mark—proof enough of how closely they were watching.
Listening to the murmur of the crowd, Cheonhwa stepped up onto the stage. From the opposite side, Cheong-ha climbed to meet him. Their eyes met. Cheong-ha gave a bitter little smile and shrugged lightly.
"I knew that if the bracket brought us together it would be in the final, but I never imagined it would happen like this."
"Agreed."
Cheonhwa nodded in quiet assent.
"You hear them talking? Most of them are writing me off. Looking at the brackets you've faced, I can't exactly blame them."
Where Cheonhwa had clawed his way through a gauntlet of formidable foes, Cheong-ha's path had been almost gentle. The only name of any note had been Dang Pae-ho of the Sichuan Dang Family. In the semifinals he had faced Mangya, the rising star who had turned out to be a spy for the mysterious power—and who had fulfilled his mission to the letter. The result was a bye that had carried Cheong-ha to this stage, and the undervaluation that came with it.
"Any other day I'd be grumbling that I'm not that weak. Strangely enough, today I don't feel angry at all. If anything, the whole situation is so enjoyable I almost want to laugh."
The wry twist left Cheong-ha's lips, replaced by a genuine smile.
"What the crowd thinks doesn't matter anymore. Let them chatter. What matters right now isn't other people's words."
Two young martial artists stood face to face. They had crossed swords once before. One had won; the other had lost. Now that they met again, the urge to settle the score was only natural. Cheong-ha rested a hand on his hilt and made no effort to hide the competitive fire rising in him. In answer to that pure fighting spirit, Cheonhwa let his own presence flare outward.
Just as Cheong-ha sought victory to wash away past defeat, Cheonhwa had reasons of his own that would not allow him to fall lightly. Faces from every match of the gathering flashed through his mind. He did not stand here alone. He carried the honor of his sect—and the hopes of every opponent he had overcome. Defeat now would be something he could never forgive himself for.
The two young men locked eyes and prepared to draw. The tension stretched taut as a drawn bowstring. What snapped it was the referee's signal.
"Begin!"
At the cry, Cheonhwa and Cheong-ha moved as one. Cheong-ha seized the initiative. His blade left its scabbard in a sweeping arc; along its path, streams of sword force erupted, collided in midair, and shattered into a rain of fragments—the scattered sword of Huashan, the Seasonal Rain Sword Art. Yet something set it apart from the technique Cheonhwa had seen before.
The shards are flying far too fast!
They came on like a true swift-sword assault. Cheonhwa pushed the Six Harmony Sensory Path to its peak and tracked every trajectory.
Thirteen that are dangerous. Of those, eight on a direct line.
Too many, and too swift, to bat them all aside one by one.
So I redirect them.
Seventeenth form of the Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven: Heavenly Wind Flow. Successive blasts of sword wind claimed the space around him and shoved the oncoming shards aside; they scattered like autumn leaves caught in a gale. The sight gave Cheonhwa one certainty.
Fast—but he hasn't woven in the principle of Flying Sword.
Had the mystery of the flying blade been present, the fragments would never have dispersed so readily.
Has he truly mixed in the principle of Swift Sword?
There was no leisure for further thought. The moment Cheonhwa cleared the first volley, Cheong-ha unleashed Seasonal Rain again. Branched streams of sword force crashed together overhead and spilled a second storm of shards. Cheonhwa almost doubted his own eyes.
There are more of them.
Not one or two more. Through the Six Harmony Sensory Path he counted thirty-nine fragments—nearly three times the previous scatter. And threaded through that storm was a subtle wrongness he recognized at once.
Illusion Sword. He's layered it with the scattered art to birth phantom shards.
Real and false mixed so thoroughly that even the Sensory Path struggled to tell them apart. Given time he could sort them—but before that, the blade-wind sweeping the stage like a net would shred him. Again he raised Heavenly Wind Flow, weaving a wall of sword wind. The two currents met head-on; the indeterminate shards exploded across the stage, each catching the light in a dreamlike scatter that drew gasps from the stands.
"To use Illusion Sword with such variety…! He didn't reach the final by luck."
"And the one taking it all? The Southern Barbarian Beast Palace itself couldn't break that Taoist!"
While the crowd murmured in admiration, the two Taoists fought on. Through the glittering rain of light came the shadows of blades. The thirteen sword phantoms Cheong-ha had birthed traced paths too intricate for a single strike. Illusion Sword already difficult to defend, now accelerated by Swift Sword, left no room to block. Cheonhwa stamped out the Nine Palaces Footwork, trying to slip past the phantoms—only for Cheong-ha's art to shift a heartbeat sooner.
The charging illusions vanished in an instant. True Swift Sword came for him. Reflexively Cheonhwa raised Okgyeong to meet it. Wooden blade and steel crossed—and Cheong-ha's sword vanished with a soft whoosh. Not only the steel: Cheong-ha himself blurred and was gone.
Form-shifting displacement? No. This isn't residual afterimages from sheer speed!
He had turned not merely the blade but the man wielding Swift Sword into an illusion. By the time Cheonhwa understood, the real Cheong-ha's strike had already landed.
Boom!
Cheong-ha's qi surge rippled once; every scrap of condensed Jin Release he had stored detonated. The internal-energy barrier wrapping Cheonhwa's body shattered, and he was driven staggering backward.
"Kh—!"
Blood mixed with the ragged breath he spat. The force of the release had torn through his insides, leaving internal injuries. Dark Heaven True Qi had already begun its slow healing work, yet the shock would take time to fade. Cheonhwa steadied his breathing, eyes never leaving Cheong-ha.
He had suspected it from the moment scattered and swift arts were first woven together; the last exchange confirmed it.
It's akin to the layered, overlapping formula that binds multiple sword principles into one.
Scattered: Seasonal Rain. Swift: Wind Playing. Illusion: Illusion Flower. Pairing them two at a time, Cheong-ha had forged entirely new sword arts. Even the same pair, handled differently, became different arts. The swift-and-illusion combinations alone proved it: center on Illusion and add Swift, and the phantoms charge at blinding speed; center on Swift and add Illusion, and something near form-shifting displacement is born. Three arts, six completely distinct techniques depending on the combination.
Where I focused on the Middle Way and fusion into one, he has fixed his gaze on transformation itself?
Not merely shifting freely from art to art, but organically linking them so that new sword arts are reborn—Transforming Sword. It had been impressive before; now it was almost absurd enough to draw a dry laugh.
Under Cheonhwa's gaze, Cheong-ha simply grinned. It was the look of a child showing off a treasure to a friend—clearly eager to display the realm he had reached.
He must have taken inspiration from my layered formula… but how is something like this even possible?
The overlapping formula of Zhongnan sprang from the Middle Way Sword at the heart of the Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven—unbiased, and therefore capable of becoming anything. Just as those thirty-six forms rested on a foundation, Cheong-ha must have built his art upon some root of his own.
The foundation of Huashan swordsmanship is the Six Harmonies.
Six Harmonies: a term encompassing heaven, earth, and the four directions. Even Huashan's basic sword art was named the Six Harmony Sword Method.
The Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven likewise revere the Six Harmonies.
There was a reason one of its core formulas was called Six Harmonies Under Heaven. Thirty-six directions, six branches of heaven and earth—hence Thirty-Six Swords. How, then, did Huashan express the same principle?
Zhongnan's Six Harmonies are self-protection. Huashan's are expansion.
Zhongnan's Six Harmonies were resistance against the world turning upon the self. Huashan's were vitality radiating outward from the self into every corner of heaven and earth. Same root, opposite orientation—and therefore opposite logic in the sword. Zhongnan's blade rested on defense and wore the air of offense and defense as one; Huashan's rested on offense and painted space with dazzling color.
Opposite directions, yet still the same Six Harmonies.
Cheong-ha's newborn Transforming Sword was living proof.
Just as Cheong-ha was influenced by my polar formula… could the reverse be possible as well?
Honestly, he had no confidence. He was no prodigy born with genius like Cheong-ha or Yeonhwa. Yet he had built the martial lineage of Zhongnan more diligently than anyone. When it came to Zhongnan arts—and especially the Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven—his comprehension would not fall short of Yeonhwa's or any other expert of the sect.
In this bout, I will forge the second formula of mid-stage polarity.
Cheong-ha, having stepped into that realm, had clearly transcended the level of a First-class martial artist; only a Peak Expert could hope to answer him. If Cheonhwa failed to create a new move here and now, his chances of victory would grow ever thinner.
He adjusted his grip on Okgyeong, eyes bright with resolve, and charged straight at Cheong-ha.