Shaanxi Sword Assembly (3)
The examination spars had been nothing more than a preliminary taste of what was to come.
The true contest was about to begin—the sparring matches among the third-generation disciples.
These were formal disciples who had already moved beyond the introductory arts and learned the unique martial techniques of their respective sects, each steeped in its own profound principles. Nothing could better fulfill the purpose of experiencing entirely different schools of martial learning.
Zhongnan’s martial arts center on the Middle Way, balanced and free of extremes, with a heavy, deliberate character.
And what of Huashan’s?
Huashan’s sword arts were renowned throughout the Central Plains as the most dazzling of all. Their hallmark was swift, brilliant offense that blossomed spectacularly between illusion and reality.
It stands at the opposite pole from Zhongnan’s sword, which can be so upright it borders on stubborn.
The invited guests knew this well. In fact, they seemed to be quietly looking forward to the clash between two sects that pursued such diametrically opposed swords.
And so are we.
This was different from the earlier exchange with the Wudang Taoists who had come for the Righteous Path Journey. Then they had felt like distant guests; this time, facing Huashan, it was a true rivalry between equals standing shoulder to shoulder.
Will the Zhongnan martial arts we have polished so diligently hold up against Huashan?
The chance to answer that question lay right before them. Cheonhwa suppressed the swelling excitement in his chest and fixed his gaze on the sparring platform.
Zhongnan’s vanguard was Jeokhwa. It was her first time stepping onto so grand a stage, and a trace of tension showed, yet she soon met her opponent with clear, upright eyes and introduced herself.
“I am Jeokhwa, third-generation disciple of the Zhongnan Sect. I have trained in the Flame Heaven True Qi and the One Fire Sword Art.”
“Cheong-jin, third-generation disciple of Huashan. I have cultivated the Flower Seed Mind Method and the Wind Playing Sword.”
As if taking the cue from Jeokhwa’s introduction, her opponent answered in kind. At the mention of the sword art’s name, Myeonghwa, standing nearby, spoke up.
“The Wind Playing Sword is one of Huashan’s representative high-level sword arts.”
The core principles of Huashan martial arts were Illusion, Speed, Scatter, and Change. The Wind Playing Sword embodied the principle of Speed.
“The One Fire Sword Art that matches the Flame Heaven True Qi is also a fast sword. So this spar will be a pure clash of fast sword against fast sword.”
“Right. That means it’ll end quickly too. Fast swords are all about the speed contest.”
The two fighters on the platform knew this as well. Even without detailed knowledge of each other’s arts, the moment they saw the opening stances they would have recognized it as a battle between fast swords.
A taut tension stretched between them.
“Begin!”
The signal rang out. In that instant both shot toward each other like loosed arrows.
As expected of a duel between fast swords—no sword winds.
Martial artists who polished fast swords generally disliked long-range attacks such as sword winds, for a simple reason.
Swinging the blade itself is faster than launching a sword wind.
A fast sword, true to its name, pursued pure speed. Taking the initiative, stealing the opponent’s rhythm, and dragging the flow of battle—that was the fundamental strategy. Even the process of scattering true qi mist and flinging stored force felt too slow. Instead of sending out sword winds, they wrapped their entire bodies in force waves and became a single streak of wind.
While others fire arrows called sword winds, the fast sword becomes the arrow nocked on the bowstring.
The two living arrows thrust their blades at each other. The edge that reached first belonged to Cheong-jin of Huashan. The moment he seized the initiative, he began to press Jeokhwa hard.
The force waves coiled around his body turned into a sly, seductive wind that carried razor-sharp petals—his blade. Jeokhwa clenched her teeth and parried the cascading strikes.
In a duel of pure speed, once the flow was lost, reclaiming it was nearly impossible. If one simply lagged in raw velocity, the next attack arrived faster than any Stored Jin could overturn the board; one could only suffer helplessly.
That should have been the case.
Yet Jeokhwa, who at first had been desperately fending off the blows, gradually began to find her rhythm. It was not that Cheong-jin’s speed had dropped—quite the opposite. Jeokhwa herself was growing faster with every exchange.
Moreover, the heat radiating from her steadily intensified until heat haze shimmered around her.
The Flame Heaven True Qi was a scorching yang energy that burned even the user’s own body to generate tremendous explosive power. The One Fire Sword Art was specialized in converting that explosive power into pure sword speed. Heart method and sword art meshed as one, producing a blade that grew faster the longer the bout continued.
“Haaaaaah!”
Jeokhwa let out a fierce shout and pushed her sword speed to the absolute limit. The wooden blade, dyed crimson by the Flame Heaven True Qi, began to overwhelm Cheong-jin’s Wind Playing Sword. It looked for all the world as though a raging blaze were consuming the wind that carried flower petals.
Cheong-jin, whose advantage had vanished in an instant, struggled desperately to hold on. Yet the flames only grew fiercer with time, and he could no longer stop them. At last, crushed by the overwhelming speed, he lost his grip on the wooden sword.
“Enough! The victor is Jeokhwa, third-generation disciple of Zhongnan!”
When the referee’s declaration fell, Jeokhwa offered a courteous bow to her opponent and walked back, somewhat unsteadily, to where her fellow disciples had gathered. Even after she ceased circulating her energy, heat still rolled off her body—the backlash of having drawn the Flame Heaven True Qi to its extreme.
The explosive power that granted such overwhelming speed was a double-edged sword that harmed the user as well. Had they traded five more exchanges, Jeokhwa herself might have collapsed first.
As she returned, Yeonhwa approached and gently scattered cold yin energy around her. Once the heat subsided, Jeokhwa’s face eased and she offered her thanks.
“Thank you, Junior Sister Yeonhwa.”
“You did well, Senior Sister Jeokhwa.”
At Yeonhwa’s praise Jeokhwa smiled bashfully, then looked around at the other disciples.
“We’ve taken the opening match. I’ll leave the rest to all of you.”
With those words she closed her eyes and settled into recovery.
“Senior Sister Jeokhwa risked her body to take that point. We can’t just sit still after that.”
“We ride this momentum and keep scoring no matter what!”
The third-generation disciples of Zhongnan surged with fighting spirit as they faced the next matches. Huashan, however, refused to simply endure the beating.
“We can’t keep losing and drag Huashan’s name through the mud!”
“We’ll win as many as we lost and pay them back!”
Huashan seemed to have taken the opening defeat hard; they fought with desperate resolve. The spars grew even hotter and settled into a deadlock of equals. On the eve of the tenth match the score stood at five points for Zhongnan and four for Huashan—a slight edge for Zhongnan.
If Zhongnan won the tenth bout they would claim overall victory; if Huashan took it, the contest would end in a draw. Cheonhwa stepped onto the platform for the decisive final spar and immediately studied his opponent.
This Huashan disciple possessed an unusually refined aura. His calm expression matched the well-tempered force he radiated.
That must be the third-generation who received the Jade Plum Sword.
Among all the third-generation disciples who had appeared so far, none surpassed the man before him. He was almost certainly the strongest of Huashan’s third generation.
“I am Cheonhwa, third-generation disciple of the Zhongnan Sect. I have trained in the Balanced Heaven Qi Accumulation Art, the Protective Qi Art, and the Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven.”
“Cheong-ha, third-generation of Huashan! I have cultivated the Wind Playing Sword, the Seasonal Rain Sword, and the Illusion Flower Sword!”
Cheonhwa offered the first bow; a bright, clear voice answered at once. The list of arts, however, made him doubt his ears.
Mentioning the Wind Playing Sword, Seasonal Rain Sword, and Illusion Flower Sword all at once… means he has mastered every high-level sword art?
Just as a Zhongnan disciple who reached a certain stage in the Balanced Heaven Qi Accumulation Art would learn a new mind method, a Huashan disciple, after the basics, studied the advanced Flower Seed Mind Method and then chose one of three sword arts that suited him best.
I heard the ultimate goal is to learn all three, but to have already mastered three sword arts at roughly my age…
Declaring them meant each was polished enough for real combat. Having witnessed through the previous nine spars just how dangerous each of those high-level arts could be, Cheonhwa could not even begin to gauge how difficult this match would prove.
“Begin!”
The moment the referee’s signal rang out, Cheong-ha moved first. A single stroke seemed to launch two streams of sword wind; when those two streams collided in midair they shattered into countless fragments that scattered like flower petals and poured down upon Cheonhwa.
It was Huashan’s high-level Seasonal Rain Sword—an art of Scatter that created force shards by clashing sword winds and then rained them upon multiple vital points at once.
Cheonhwa pushed the Six Harmony Sensory Path to its limit, reading every force fragment that flew like hidden daggers. Most of the shards were spent residual traces that merely drifted; the true danger lay in the razor-sharp force pieces hidden among them.
Five real ones. Three of them head straight for me.
While tracking their trajectories he poured internal energy into his wooden sword.
A technique of Riding Qi to Fill the Sword that injects true qi mist, reinforcing the weapon as an extension of the body itself.
The wooden blade, stiffened further by the Vast Heaven Qi Art, struck the force shards aside. In that same instant Cheong-ha, who had been far away, closed the distance until he stood right before Cheonhwa’s nose.
A movement Cheonhwa had already seen—without question a form of the Wind Playing Sword.
He was swinging a scatter sword a moment ago and now he’s switched to a fast sword?
Sword arts of completely different principles linking together without the slightest pause. Cheonhwa’s mind reeled, yet his body continued its defenses with perfect diligence—the fruit of training drilled into his bones so that he could react the instant danger was sensed.
He barely turned aside the fast sword and tried to recover his stance, but Cheong-ha gave him no such luxury and poured out the next attack. Force waves wrapped around the wooden blade created afterimages.
Huashan’s high-level illusion art that weaves dazzling sword shadows like sunlight teasing the eyes with false silhouettes.
Five sword images came crashing down. Only one of the five phantoms was real, yet even the Six Harmony Sensory Path struggled to distinguish it. Cheonhwa hastily retreated to evade the illusory blades.
Then Cheong-ha performed the astonishing feat of inserting a fast-sword strike in the middle of the illusion forms. Cheonhwa blocked it once more by a hair’s breadth, but the force drove him sliding backward. The moment the distance opened, Cheong-ha unleashed the scatter sword again.
From that point on Cheonhwa was completely swept along by the flow Cheong-ha created. The slightest increase in range brought a rain of force shards; the slightest opening invited a piercing fast-sword thrust; at close quarters the illusion shadows rose and made every exchange treacherous.
There’s no doubt. He can switch freely among scatter sword, fast sword, and illusion sword.
Easy to say, yet changing between arts of entirely different principles in an instant was extraordinarily difficult. From the circulation of internal energy demanded by each principle down to the control of the body’s center of gravity, one had to master the unique traits and the gaps between every art completely before such a feat became possible.
So this is the principle of Change that Huashan pursues.
It went far beyond merely varying forms within a single art; he could switch entire sword arts at will. It felt as though Cheonhwa were facing three swordsmen at once.
If this continues I’ll only be dragged around by his tricks.
He needed to cut through that offensive somehow. The more urgent the situation, the more one should take the long way around. Even while pressed, Cheonhwa calmly sought a method—and at last found it.
If he keeps changing the type of sword art, then I simply use an attack that cannot be stopped no matter how he changes.
The principle best suited to that purpose was already contained within the Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven.
Heavy Sword.
A grand, weighty blade that stacked force layer upon layer was precisely what the situation demanded. The moment he reached that conclusion, Cheonhwa moved.
Drawing power to its peak, the Vast Heaven Qi Art of the middle dantian creates the flow while the Balanced Heaven Qi Accumulation Art of the lower dantian supports it from below. Two streams of energy merge into a single current that courses through the entire body, flooding it with unprecedented vitality.
Using two kinds of energy separately is impossible—that would require a divine art like Wudang’s Two Principles Divine Art. But combining both energies into a single flow is possible.
The double-layered current of Vast Heaven Qi and Balanced Heaven Qi circulated through him, pouring vitality he had never known before. Cheonhwa loaded that overwhelming flow straight into his sword stroke and unleashed it as a sword wind.
A fierce gale roared along the trajectory of the blade, forcing even Cheong-ha—who had been pressing the attack—to shift into defense. Yet Cheonhwa’s offensive was only beginning.
Using the momentum of the first stroke he drew up force once more and layered a new sword wind atop the true qi mist already scattered through the air.
An overwhelming tide of force waves that crashes five times in succession, each surge heavier and more relentless than the last.
Five successive waves of crushing force roared across the platform.