The path of the cave began.
From the very first step, Jin noticed that the walls were not silent. Cracks. Sword marks. Deep, intersecting scars—some straight, like a final judgment, others jagged, as if the hand that made them hesitated for a brief moment… then died. They were not random. Every mark was carved with intent.
Jin stopped and reached out, touching one of the cracks. It was cold and ancient, yet the intent was still clinging to it. He understood instantly: this was not a training cave. This was a sword manual carved into stone.
He moved forward. His steps were not continuous; each step took two minutes, sometimes more. He would advance one step, then stop, his eyes tracing the marks on the wall while his mind reconstructed the strike—the angle of the wrist, the tilt of the shoulder, the slight delay in the waist. He simulated the movement within his mind, not with his body, but within a semi-mental domain where he could fail without dying. And there, he realized the true horror.
Some strikes ended before they even began. Invisible attacks, not dependent on trajectory, but on the moment of emptiness before it. And among them were flawed movements—but they were not random mistakes. They were traps. Movements deliberately placed to lure you with logic, yet if executed, they would destroy the body at the moment of release—torn tendons, shattered joints, collapsed internal balance. Whoever carved them… was a killer.
Jin continued onward. The corridors branched, traps emerged—arrows firing soundlessly from the walls, poisonous mist spreading like a thin fog, odorless yet lethal. He did not run or jump. He saw before he moved. He spread his perception, dismantled the space itself, and walked through death as if reading it.
Thus, an entire month passed. A month without battle, without screams, without victory—only training in the art carved into the walls.
During that month, Jin did not learn a single complete strike. Instead, he learned how not to err: how to reject a wrong movement, how to distinguish true intent from deception, how to let the sword move when it should move, and keep it still when stillness was deadlier. What he saw on the walls was the Lesser Heavenly Demon Art—a terrifying art refined purely for destruction. Jin could hardly believe this was merely a preparatory style meant to qualify one to learn the Heavenly Demon Sword Art. Upon mastering it, sudden enlightenment struck him, and his body underwent reconstruction once more.
Without realizing it, Jin stepped into the threshold of the Seven-Star Realm—the realm of the Sword Master.
Then everything changed.
He took one step, and the space around him shattered. He found himself inside an illusion—but not a cave, not a trap, not a conventional trial. It was… a person.
A young man stood before him, black hair, crimson eyes, killing intent so dense it crushed the air itself. This was no hollow illusion; it was an overwhelming presence—so real that anyone seeing it would believe it to be flesh and blood. More disturbing still… he did not appear older than twenty-two.
No words were exchanged. The opponent moved first. A sword strike—but it was not a strike. It was disappearance. Jin felt the cut before seeing the blade, retreating half a step as the air split where he had stood.
The battle began. Consecutive strikes, no flourish, no mercy. Every attack sought death, not victory. The illusion before him was terrifyingly powerful, and more cunning still—its talent surpassed Jin's own. It perceived every technique Jin used, countered it within seconds, sometimes even altering the very foundation of the art itself, as if seeing its essence and reshaping it.
Jin unleashed the Lesser Demon Art. Dark energy surged, twisted footwork, twin blades moving like separate shadows. But his opponent knew it. He anticipated strikes by half an intent, shattered rhythm, struck where the body should never be. They fractured, retreated, then clashed again. The battle dragged on long enough for time itself to break within the illusion—perhaps three full hours.
In the end, Jin won—not through strength, nor speed, but through decision, and by unleashing his inner energy, which had surpassed even veteran masters. The opponent fell and faded away.
Then a spiritual memory appeared—the same person, perhaps closer to thirty now, performing the Lesser Heavenly Demon Art with terrifying refinement. Every movement was flawless, every transition perfect. Jin noticed a thread of difference, a minute detail—precise, subtle—but he did not understand it.
Then a door opened.
A room. Five energy pills, each equivalent to thirty years of cultivation. Another room followed—illusory training, massive combat, dozens of martial artists attacking without pause. Jin fought them for another month, not to win, but to endure. Then came the final room: a sphere of strange material, unbreakable except by aura. He tried—it did not break. He stopped, observed, noticed a tiny crack, an infinitesimal weakness. He withdrew his energy and struck with all his strength—without energy. The sphere split apart.
He received a single pill. Fifty years of energy—far purer, by an overwhelming margin.
When Jin emerged from the cave, he opened his eyes. The sky above was calm. But inside him… nothing was the same.
End of Chapter.