Chapter Thirty-One: Sword Scars

Page 1/3

In the cramped fissure of the rock, icy stone pressed harshly against the torn wounds on his back, every shallow breath tugging at broken ribs and sending waves of searing pain through him. The heavy scent of blood, the faint chill of Su Li's unique fragrance, and the choking dust of crumbling stone all mingled in the confined space. Outside, the cataclysmic roar of the blood-red shockwaves was finally dying down, leaving only the muffled, hissing churn of the abyssal death energy and the oppressive, venomous malice emanating from that monstrous cocoon of blood. Like a tangible force, its hatred seeped through the cracks in the rubble, pressing down on their hearts with suffocating weight.

"Why... did you come back?" Lin Mo's voice broke the darkness, hoarse and grating like sandpaper scraping stone, each word laced with the coppery taste of blood. He forced himself to turn his head, gazing at Su Li just an arm’s length away, her face half-lit by the faint, bloody glow filtering through the splintered entrance. In his crimson eyes there was no gratitude, only a cold scrutiny and a confusion so dense it could not be dispersed.

In the darkness, Su Li's ragged breathing faltered for an instant. She, too, was pressed tight against the freezing rock, the terrible wound at her temple even more ghastly in the blood-red light, ghostly death energy curling around the gash as if alive. It seemed she was looking back at him through the gloom, those beautiful, almond-shaped eyes flickering with an emotion too complex to name.

Several heartbeats passed before a woman's voice, equally hoarse and edged with pain and a subtle, nearly hidden exhaustion, finally sounded:

"You... swallowed it." Her words came softly, yet each syllable was a poisoned needle. "That shard... is very important to me." There was no explanation, no warmth—only naked, hate-tinged purpose.

Of course.

Lin Mo twisted his lips in a silent, bitter laugh, the movement pulling at the wounds on his face and sending a fresh stab of pain. He should have known. This woman of the Harmony Sect—her mind was too cunning to risk herself for his sake. She had returned only for the fragment of the Void Heaven Sutra he had swallowed by force. She was unwilling to let it go. She wanted to take it back from him—or perhaps wring whatever was left from his broken body.

A cold surge of anger, tangled with the absurdity of their shared predicament, churned within him. He said nothing more, simply closed his eyes and fought to master the raging agony inside, where two alien powers still faced off in a silent, deadly standoff.

Silence, thick as moss, crept through the narrow fissure. Only their ragged, pained breaths broke the stillness.

Time crept by under the weight of death and despair. Outside, the bloody glow seemed to fade a little, but the malignant will pressing from the blood cocoon did not recede, hanging overhead like a drawn sword. Lin Mo tried to summon the last reserves of his strength—whether it was the icy energy of the Void Heaven Sutra or the sinister, mutant vitality—their power now felt like exhausted wild horses, sullen and unruly, refusing to obey. His back wounds, numbed by cold rock, began to burn anew. The injury on his right arm, corroded by the Soul-Eating Rock Leech, had not worsened thanks to the forcibly suppressed mutant vitality, but an icy chill burrowed deep into his bones, a grim reminder that death was near.

He had to find a way out. Stay here, and he would either be crushed by the will of the blood cocoon or wither to a skeleton under the encroaching death energy.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, he began feeling along the rock wall with his still-movable right hand, searching for purchase. His fingertips met slick, cold stone, thick with moss.

And then—

A faint, razor-sharp ripple of energy, utterly unlike anything before, suddenly emanated from the depths of the fissure.

This energy was nothing like the venomous will outside. It was sharp, condensed, carrying an air of solitude and silence that had endured through ages—like a peerless blade, slumbering in endless darkness, now roused by chaos and emitting its first chilling gleam.

The very instant it appeared—

Page 2/3

The dormant fragment of the Void Heaven Sutra within Lin Mo’s chest suddenly throbbed violently—not with revulsion or fear as before, but with something indescribable, a tremor that seemed to echo from the marrow of his bones. It was as if a wanderer, long lost, had finally heard the call of home.

At the same time, the strange, demonic "mutant seed" clinging to that fragment flared with green light—but now its energy was not greedy, but tense and wary, as if it had met its natural nemesis.

What lay hidden in the depths of this fissure?

Lin Mo's eyes snapped open, a glint of clarity flickering in the red. Ignoring the pain, he struggled to peer into the darkness ahead, but the cramped space—blocked by his own body and Su Li—allowed only a glimpse into impenetrable blackness.

Beside him, Su Li seemed to sense the same sharp energy. Her body tensed, and he heard her stifled gasp.

"You... felt it too?" Lin Mo's voice was a harsh whisper.

Su Li did not answer at once. Her breathing grew even more hurried, and after a few moments, her voice, tinged with uncertainty and suspicion, came from the shadows: "A very strange aura. So sharp... but I sense no life. It's like... a sword that's been buried for ages?"

A sword?

Lin Mo’s heart gave a jolt. The depths of the Immortal Burial Abyss, the ruins of an ancient battlefield—could this be the remains of an immortal sword? If so, perhaps this was their chance.

The will to survive surged, eclipsing all wariness toward Su Li and the agony within. He hesitated no longer, bracing himself with his corroded right elbow and knee, inching with excruciating slowness toward the source of the energy.

Each movement sent his bones scraping and wounds tearing anew, sweat and blood soaking his tattered clothes and leaving dark streaks on the cold stone. Su Li, seeming to understand his intent, did not stop him but shrank back as much as she could, granting him the barest space, her own wounds making her stifle a groan.

One foot... two...

The deeper he went, the sharper the energy became. Even the air seemed to bite, and his exposed skin prickled as if scraped by a thousand icy blades. The Void Heaven Sutra fragment pulsed faster and heavier.

At last—

He reached a slightly wider spot at the deepest end of the fissure—a natural stone chamber.

A faint light from the entrance barely illuminated a patch of the space before him.

Lin Mo’s breath caught instantly.

Page 3/3

The corner of the stone chamber was not empty.

There, propped against the wall, was a skeleton.

Its bones, washed pale and gray by ages and death, were devoid of flesh. The frame was massive, seated cross-legged, back to the rock. Its right arm extended forward, the fingers splayed, as if in life it had clutched something with all its might—now only emptiness remained.

But what shook Lin Mo to the core was not the skeleton itself, nor even the scene before him, but what lay behind it.

At the skeleton’s chest, a gaping hole yawned, the edges of the bone twisted and shattered as if some unspeakable force had pierced straight through from behind. And in the rock behind, a terrible sword scar—wider than a man’s hand, unfathomably deep—ran the height of the chamber, gouged into the iron-hard black stone.

The edges of the scar were glassy smooth, as if cleft by the keenest immortal blade. Even after countless ages, the lingering sword intent within was as real as ice, seeping out from the scar’s depths, slicing the air and filling the chamber with the faintest, chilling hiss. This sword intent was the very source of the razor-sharp energy.

What tightened Lin Mo’s pupils even further was this—in the center of that immense sword scar, at the very spot where the skeleton had been pierced, there was a sword.

A sword of pitch black, ancient design, with a long, slender blade. Most of the sword was buried in the scar, only its hilt and a short length of the guard—engraved with mysterious patterns—exposed. Though thick with dust, the hilt still radiated an undying solitude and sharpness, forged and preserved through millennia.

Beneath the hilt, carved into the hard black stone at the edge of the scar, were two ancient characters—rough, powerful, as if chiseled with the last strength of a dying hand.

The marks were sunk deep into the rock, saturated with an inexpressible grief and defiance, echoing those blood-written words “Rebel Immortal, Slay the Emperor” found outside on the stone beam.

Lin Mo’s gaze locked on those two ancient characters, his heart gripped as if by an invisible fist.

Those two characters were—

Void. Heaven.