No one reacted to Heon Wonchang’s harsh words.

The deeds of Lightning Genius, captain of the Radiant Demon Squad, had shamed the martial artists of the righteous path. A clumsy response to the provocation would only make them look pathetic.

Everyone knew it. All around him, people either turned their eyes away or simply stared in silence.

‘Hmph.’

The great hero of Desolate Fortress lifted his chin with affected hauteur.

His words had been meant both to drive off the Alliance masters and to offer comfort: this subordinate understood his captain’s heart.

A funeral dirge was the right description. He had crafted the verse to sound like one. Yet its implications were peculiar.

Anyone who knew Lightning Genius’s constitution would hear it differently.

Heon Wonchang thought that only he and Jung Yeonshin could read between the lines here.

He was wrong.

“That young man’s words carry profound meaning. Our clan’s teacher sought to give his rival peace. It was an act of chivalry.”

The short-statured Poison Lord, Tang Unhwang, had stepped forward.

First, the aura of the little giant of mixed iron-race blood surged in swelling waves. It was immensely powerful.

He had come to repay a kindness—a seed sown by Jung Yeonshin’s travels through the martial world. He was a very reassuring ally.

With neither force nor justification lacking on their side, the Alliance would now have to sort out its own affairs.

“From this moment forth, the Tang Clan will place the Hidden King Among Blossoms’ safety above all else. The Zhuge clan head would do well to refrain from rash action and await the Alliance’s judgment.”

Heon Wonchang had been listening with satisfaction when an unusual gleam crossed his eyes.

Suddenly, he noticed the eyes of the girl beside his captain widen a fraction. Her clear gaze darted to and fro.

Thinking back, he realized it had begun immediately after his brilliant verse.

The spirit with which she had proclaimed her father’s disgrace before the crowd was gone. She kept stealing glances at Jung Yeonshin’s profile, her lips moving vacantly.

She seemed deeply shocked—and even more deeply moved.

At the sight, Heon Wonchang’s mind began working with extraordinary speed.

‘She examined the wounds closely enough to devise counters to our captain’s martial arts. If they call her the Zhuge Clan’s eyes, her mastery of eye techniques must be tremendous. She could see anything in those wounds. And now she makes that face after hearing my verse...?’

Damn it. Surely not...?

The instant Heon Wonchang’s eyes widened, his gaze met Zhuge Cheonga’s. Her face went expressionless in a flash.

She had swiftly recovered her usual composure. A noble clan was a noble clan, Heon Wonchang thought.

‘Devious.’

As the Desolate Fortress Sacred Warrior, he had a question to consider. Could he kill the Zhuge Clan’s treasured daughter to silence her?

Just then, Zhuge Cheonga, who had inherited her father’s extraordinary perceptiveness, gave a small shake of her head.

Sunlight rippled through her hair at the inscrutable gesture. Did she mean she would pretend not to know?

‘How am I supposed to trust that?’

Heon Wonchang furrowed his brow, filled with a deep, abiding distrust of the martial world’s great factions.

Meanwhile, events were moving rapidly. Matters began to fall into place around Jung Yeonshin, who stood supporting the Blue Qilin’s body.

What had happened would, in time, send great ripples beyond the Alliance and across the vast martial world.

“We must request a meeting of the leadership! The agenda will be the Zhuge clan head’s withdrawal for reflection!”

“Captain of the Forest-Treading Squad, please withdraw your forces. This Alliance will do no harm to the envoy.”

It was at moments like these that the power of prestigious regional noble clans revealed itself. The head of an illustrious faction with a long history had extensive, far-reaching connections.

Some wished to settle the incident gently. Stepping forward in feigned indignation, they spoke of reflection and seclusion.

Their intent was obvious. They meant to preserve the Zhuge clan head’s position—the standing of the supreme master who still perched like a crane upon the roof, silently surveying them all.

The Zhuge clan head, Sleeping Dragon Reborn, was shrewd.

He knew nothing good would come of speaking now. He hoped the seeds he had sown—his trusted followers—would do their part.

‘Reflection?’

That would not do. Heon Wonchang signaled the Supreme Flame Dragon with his eyes. The Radiant Demon Squad’s oldest unranked disciple smirked and reached into his robes.

“Everyone, take a look at this.”

He drew out a letter, a document obtained from the dead corrupt official.

It was proof that the Zhuge clan head had curried favor with the prefect in exchange for turning a blind eye to the Martial Alliance’s military forces.

Holding up the letter, the Supreme Flame Dragon formed a delicate, invisible blade.

SWISH.

The seal parted. The written sheet unfurled before everyone.

Every person present had cultivated martial arts of a lofty order. Reading small writing from a distance was a simple matter for them.

They could see both the calligraphy, like a living dragon in motion, and the Zhuge clan head’s official seal stamped at the bottom.

“...!”

SNAP.

The Zhuge clan head abruptly closed his fan.

An attack born of that small gesture left an afterimage.

A storm of martial force shot from the fan’s ribs, threatening to shred even the Supreme Flame Dragon’s hand, only to be scattered by Ak Surim’s long-reaching spear strike.

The faces of those who had spoken of the Zhuge clan head’s “reflection” twisted miserably.

“Who do you think you are, you pedant, trying to diminish the Radiant Demon Squad’s merit? Stay still.”

Her hair, ruffled by the wave of force, fluttered briskly. Beside her, Xiahou Weizhen bared his teeth in a grin.

He repeatedly clenched his fists as though daring the man to try again, as though he could scarcely restrain his savage nature.

Those supporting the young captain established a domain of the Desolate Fortress in the very heart of the Alliance.

It was the finishing touch.

Lightning Genius, holding his worthy rival’s body, now had both justification and force behind him. His subordinates’ assistance stood alongside his seniors’ protection.

At last, Jung Yeonshin, captain of the Radiant Demon Squad, could lay the Blue Qilin to rest.

“That is indeed the chief strategist’s handwriting. And the sorcerous power imbued in the official seal...”

“He cast dignity aside to fawn upon the prefect.”

“Conduct worse than the Desolate Fortress’s...”

For all a federation’s slowness in making decisions, it had the advantage of making it easy to shift responsibility.

Alliance elders who had never thought kindly of the Zhuge clan head stepped forward. An alliance of righteous factions it might be, but it was still a place inhabited by people.

Political strife existed here too. It had merely been difficult to stretch their limbs beneath the weight of the Zhuge Clan’s influence.

The events set in motion by the Radiant Demon Squad captain were coming together to reshape the balance of power.

With a long sigh, as though truly imitating Marquis Zhuge, the Zhuge clan head closed his eyes. He was the head of an orthodox clan of the righteous path.

He was different from the leaders of evil and unorthodox factions. Even in ruin, he maintained his dignity, sinking into the mire with a detached expression.

Yet no one showed him sympathy. No one dared.

At the boundary between silence and clamor, the Alliance’s affairs passed out of outsiders’ hands. After paying his respects to his clan’s young teacher, the Tang clan head began bringing order to the gathering.

Jung Yeonshin stood silently, feeling Namgoong Sejin’s chill.

A few maple leaves carried on the late-autumn wind brushed their faces and fell.

They were red and translucent. Sunlight broke faintly over the leaves, each like a child’s palm.

The young man who had died unable to resist the hierarchy of the turbulent martial world now rested in the arms of a rival whose reach had come to extend even to its great coalitions.

* * *

Sword Star Hyeon Sobaek was from Zezhou in Shanxi Province, born to a family with no ties to the martial world.

Shanxi had no major sect of particular note.

Only recently had it become a land for fortune seekers, following the discovery, a dozen or more years earlier, of an unknown Heavenly Demon’s tomb.

By then, Hyeon Sobaek was already roaming the martial world of Henan.

He was like the heroes of so many tales.

At twelve, he had suddenly wanted to command all under heaven.

He left home with nothing but a purse of money. By good fortune, he found a place under a wandering swordsman called the Everlasting Spring Swordsman.

He became a page who tended and carried his master’s sword—a sword boy.

Hyeon Sobaek had been trustworthy from childhood. Even his rough-tempered master and companions soon opened their hearts to him.

Whenever they could, those wanderers, who could never be sure they would live to see another day, taught him qi circulation, controlled breathing, and practical swordsmanship.

A terrifying talent revealed itself.

He combined the Three Powers Heart Method, widely promulgated by the Ming imperial court, with the Everlasting Spring Swordsman’s Five Elements Heart Method.

He transformed a secret art of the noble race—which imparted strength to body and earth, producing mighty men and making fields a little more fertile—and a crude wanderer’s mental cultivation method into the Myriad Phenomena Heart Art of Freedom from Wrath.

His was the talent of a founding master who could establish a school all his own.

[“Don’t drift through life. Swing your sword in the direction you mean to go.”]

Years later, these were the last words the Everlasting Spring Swordsman left him amid the bodies of their companions.

The wanderer’s sorrows were contained in those coarse words. They pushed the sword boy, now a young man, out into the martial world of masters.

Martial arts were a power that turned people into beasts of prey.

Even with government troops and the Desolate Fortress, the martial lineages of evil and unorthodox paths multiplied like insects.

It was a world where a single sword could fill a belly, and mobility arts could carry one away from death. The endless breadth of the land made it so.

Hyeon Sobaek fought countless fierce battles and helped the common people.

Fighting an insignificant band of unorthodox martial artists sometimes made him an enemy of the Thirteen skies. By then, he was refining the wanderer’s sword into a swordsmanship uniquely his own.

His swordplay grew more profound with the years. In time, it became a supreme art that few could rival.

It was thanks to what was commonly called sword talent. His gifts lay even more heavily in wielding a blade than in mental cultivation methods.

The Heaven-Reaching Martial Net Sword Art.

The Sword Star had emerged.

Achievements followed wherever he went. After one fierce battle, he even took the head of the leader of the Martial Alliance.

Experience and fame accumulated in tremendous measure. He lacked nothing that might qualify him for acclamation as leader of the orthodox Martial Alliance.

He accepted, though he knew they intended him to be a figurehead.

Wandering the continent with other itinerant fighters, he had seen a world sunk in misery. He believed the orthodox factions ought to live up to their name.

And now—

“There is much I owe you an apology for. My shame is no small thing, either.”

Hyeon Sobaek had accomplished a great feat.

Having completely ousted the Zhuge clan head, he stood facing the Radiant Demon Squad captain. Because the powerful man with the fan had belonged to the orthodox path, he had been obliged to leave it.

His lover, the Eon Clan’s Foremost Fist, went with him. Unable to contend with the Alliance Leader allied with the Zhuge direct line, the Murong clan head had gone into seclusion.

At the heart of it all stood the Desolate Fortress captain before him.

“On the contrary, I am grateful. Had you sided with the Zhuge clan head, Sword Star, matters would have become complicated.”

“No. My prestige has already been crushed by the ways of the world. I even joined forces with the Zhuge clan head to examine the Divine Sword Squad Leader’s martial arts. Keep company with ink and you turn black—I am already a hypocrite myself. Even after gaining control of the Alliance this way, I cannot escape the need to keep the Desolate Fortress in check. To reassure and lead the anxious righteous sects... Hmm. I have certainly grown long-winded.”

It was a conversation between a rising master and an old master restored to youth. Calm, and bitter.

In a garden carpeted with maple leaves more brilliant than flowers, the Radiant Demon Squad captain stood with his sword held low. Amid the scenery spreading from the reddish ground at his feet, he wore black robes sleeveless only on the left.

Sharp ripples occasionally flashed through his composed presence. Each time, red leaves at his feet split of their own accord.

The waves of force from his whole-body Burst Discharge were exceedingly sharp. He was using his body as a swordsman.

Those present marveled.

“Our Lightning Genius has changed again, hasn’t he? He’s progressing even faster than that old predecessor of his. The old man will split his face grinning when he gets back.”

“I cannot speak for his progress, but his opening stance has considerable elegance. Perhaps one of his ancestors belonged to our clan.”

Desolate Divine Spear Ak Surim and Thousand-Fist, Dragon-Strength Retainer Xiahou Weizhen watched, perched casually on rocks.

Behind the Sword Star, the Alliance representatives stood straight in a semicircle.

They included the Tang clan head, Mount Hua’s Sword Saint and Yoo Hyun, the Young Sword Empress, Zhuge Hyeon and Zhuge Cheonga, Ak Yerim, Murong Mingjun, Gongsun Min, and the head of the Namgoong collateral lines.

Only Lady Ye, the chief strategist for internal affairs, occupied an oddly different position. Though an Alliance member, she stood closer to Jung Yeonshin than even those from the Desolate Fortress.

She stood gracefully with her hands clasped behind her back and ebony hair hanging loose. Her distance and angle were so exquisitely chosen that it was difficult for anyone to object.

“What do you think, Clan Head? Will the Radiant Demon Squad captain gain instruction?”

“How could my eye for the sword compare with that of Mount Hua’s Sword Saint? I am merely concerned for his safety.”

“As your junior, I would like to hear both your insights. I’ve only trained in the Sun-Shooting Sword Art, so my knowledge is limited... I’ve never seen a sword stance like that. Are the rumors true? They say Captain Jung creates martial arts. Lady Ak, the Spear Phoenix, said so before too...”

Several rising disciples of the martial lineages’ direct branches attended as representatives of their great factions.

Their leaders were absent, so they had gathered to witness the final item on the founding ceremony’s program.

A founding ceremony was a school’s most treasured occasion. The ritual itself symbolized the sect’s legitimacy.

One upheaval could not be allowed to ruin it completely. At least a single sword exchange had to take place.

The Sword Star and Lightning Genius.

The old swordsman with the young face had looked forward to this day.

Even as he humored the powerful for the greater good, he had welcomed the emergence of a new talent.

The moment he recognized Jung Yeonshin’s gifts and heavenly affliction, he had sighed deeply. He hoped that one who could become a guiding star for the people would not perish in vain.

Enough to think that, had their paths crossed sooner, he would have taken the boy as his disciple.

‘Desolate Fortress Master, I cannot fathom your heart.’

Sword Star Hyeon Sobaek had never taken a disciple. The Everlasting Spring Swordsman’s untimely death before his eyes was the reason.

The martial world was cruel. He feared passing that same grief on to someone under his tutelage.

Now, encountering the reverse situation, he wondered what the Desolate Fortress Master felt. What thoughts occupied a teacher with a disciple who might die young?

“Come at me.”

Hyeon Sobaek spoke as he quietly drew his sword and lowered it. It had long been the case that his draw was so natural it made no sound.

The hilt, fashioned from a piece of wood, exuded a tranquil dignity.

Anticipation had risen within him before he knew it.

Hyeon Sobaek tried to recall the last time another person’s swordplay had stirred his interest.

Perhaps the storms of time had worn his memories dull; nothing came to mind.

Or perhaps it was because he himself possessed the sword talent to rise from wandering martial artist to orthodox Alliance Leader.

Finding inspiration in an inferior fighter’s methods was harder still. The sword path itself needed to contain some striking ingenuity.

Even the former Martial Alliance leader’s swordsmanship had inspired nothing but displeasure in him. He could not burden the new Radiant Demon Squad captain with such expectations.

That remained true no matter how extraordinary the young man’s gifts were. He was glad he had said nothing further.

‘What a foolish thought.’

Hyeon Sobaek set his expectations aside. He would act as a senior of the martial world.

“Let us refine your swordsmanship to its fullest.”

Just as the assembled upper ranks of the martial world fell silent—

STEP.

Lightning Genius silently stepped forward. Northern Radiance, was it called? He raised the divine sword, said to have been reforged for him by the Tang Clan, above his head.

Its path traced a high guard. The snow-white blade touched the clouds and stopped.

For a moment, a chilly silence settled.

‘Something is different.’

Hyeon Sobaek sensed it instinctively. A pale current was unfurling from the Radiant Demon Squad captain’s blade.

Meeting the air, the wave of force took visible shape like smoke. It shrouded the blade, descended to the hilt, and passed over his right hand, playfully stirring even the hems of his black robes.

Wind wreathed his entire body. A bitter northern wind.

The nameless sword art stood on the verge of receiving its name.