Birth of the Demonic Sword

"Did his speech make any sense to you?" Sword Saint whispered.

"Divine Demon is crazy," Noah commented. "Don't try to learn how to improve your sword arts from someone who has to forget the very foundation of his existence to launch attacks."

"Forgetting doesn't sound bad if those are the results," Sword Saint announced while studying the horizontal cut on the creature's waist.

The white slash had damaged a body that had absorbed every attack that had flown in its direction. The sole fact that the monster could suffer injuries left both Sword Saint and Noah surprised.

"Maybe that's the last piece," Sword Saint exclaimed. "The last of the arts is the form that doesn't make sense!"

Noah massaged his temples when he heard those words. Divine Demon wasn't only going off with his challenge. He was even putting Sword Saint's law at risk with his actions.

'How do I even solve this?' Noah cursed in his mind while his eyes moved between his companions.

Noah wasn't underestimating Divine Demon. The expert's talent went beyond reason and labels. He probably was the only existence in the entire world who didn't need to learn how to step on the path that led to the ninth rank since he had always walked it.

Still, the abilities that Divine Demon could launch belonged only to his personal realm. They existed in a domain where everything had to work only because the expert needed them to work.

King Elbas had already tried to imitate his techniques, and he had even partially succeeded in replicating something. However, his path matched the potentially endless creation featured in Divine Demon's law.

King Elbas could implement the branch of creation that didn't feature materials or fuels because that was the natural evolution of his path. Divine Demon called them Miracles and forgot about them, but the duo's laws were quite similar, even if they had completely opposite requirements.

Sword Saint's situation could appear similar, but Noah saw the vast differences that the expert couldn't see due to his intense desire to improve.

The main issue was that Sword Saint was already on the right path. He was even closer than Divine Demon to the ninth rank. His law had reached the point when it could start pondering the idea of evolving into something more, and doubts only slowed down that process.

Noah eventually wore a resolute expression. He had found a way to prove to Sword Saint that imitating Divine Demon would only make him lose track of the true nature of his law.

"Divine Demon didn't find a sword art that surpasses your techniques," Noah announced as ambition flowed into his aura and gathered inside the Demonic Sword.

"Are you accepting my challenge too?" Divine Demon asked when he saw that Noah was preparing a powerful attack. "I can't wait to see what I'll learn to do after this battle!"

"I'm not challenging anyone," Noah snorted. "I'm just saving a future rank 9 cultivator."

The announcement made the whiteness in the sky intensify. The white halo naturally radiated by the Immortal Lands grew stronger and hid the empty creature that retreated inside the light.

Noah couldn't see his opponent anymore, even with the help of his companions inspecting the battlefield. Yet, he didn't need to see the monster to attack it. After all, he knew where it was.

Different faces appeared on the dark halo that had started to come out of the Demonic Sword. The unstable substance also flowed inside Noah's black vessels. He reached his peak state in a matter of instants, and even Sword Saint couldn't help but tremble when he sensed the danger that his figure radiated.

Noah had almost always been able to deploy a battle prowess that ignored the gaps among ranks and stages, but he was in the last step before the ninth rank now. Filling the distance from that realm wasn't easy, even for him, but the power that he could generate felt incredible nonetheless.

Noah glanced at his Demonic Sword before waving the weapon horizontally. The sky above him turned dark before his attack even arrived. The world simply reacted to the massive discharge of power that had to land on the white layer.

The sudden arrival of the darkness revealed the empty creature standing upside down on the sky. Black spots appeared on that dim white surface, and the monster didn't hesitate to absorb them.

The crack that had appeared on its torso had been nothing serious, but it still fixed itself far faster than Noah had predicted. It only had taken the monster a few absorptions to heal completely.

The creature started to inspect its surroundings after the darkness arrived. The suppression of the whiteness left it surprised, but it had yet to experience everything that Noah's team had in store for it.

Noah's attack became visible after a second passed. His slash had launched a small black sword that radiated his intense bloodlust and created a series of scarlet shades on the creature's body.

The shades spread inside the creature's body, but Noah detonated them as soon as the monster tried to absorb the marks on its skin. The small blade arrived at that point, and everything fell into pure chaos.

The Demonic Deduction technique couldn't come up with a way to destroy nothingness, but Noah had gone around that issue by deciding to shatter everything, including the creature.

A storm of raging darkness spread right below the sky and threatened to reach the three experts. Noah, Sword Saint, and Divine Demon had to retreat to escape the destructive wave of energy that filled the world and made space shatter.

Cracks that led to the void opened in the stable higher plane. Those fissures connected and expanded until void spread right below the sky. Even the whiteness failed to pierce the large layer of blackness that had covered Heaven and Earth's structure. Noah had given birth to the largest crack that those stable areas had ever seen.

Sword Saint's eyes widened at that point. The massive attack dispersed the delusions that had tried to invade his mind after witnessing Divine Demon's power. He even felt strange when he realized what had happened. He had lost control of part of his mind during the battle.

"How could I be so stupid?" Sword Saint wondered.

"It's not your fault," Noah explained as he withdrew his ambition and left only the unstable substance and Isaac's ability active. "Divine Demon's law makes him affect his surroundings. You have only fallen prey to his challenge."

Sword Saint opened his mouth to speak, but he eventually closed it and shook his head. Everything was in the past now, but his mind already started to develop countermeasures to Divine Demon to avoid ending up in the same situation in the future.

That event confirmed the sad truth of the cultivation journey. The various existences that strived for the higher ranks didn't isolate themselves out of a desire to create a peaceful environment for their training. One of the greatest enemies of their path was a captivating external influence that could make them forget about their true meaning.

Noah was partially immune to that natural pressure since he was his greatest enemy. His ambition alone already created enough problems for his journey, so Divine Demon's influence couldn't find room to add issues.

The same didn't go for Sword Saint. The expert had even grown used to be around other existences only recently, and his status as a being close to the ninth rank only enhanced the natural doubts that could appear inside everyone.