Birth of the Demonic Sword

Noah felt vague sensations reaching his mind and spreading through his body. His sea of consciousness was too powerful to leave him completely unaware of his surroundings, but he couldn't understand much anyway.

White light slowly appeared in his vision as his mind forced itself to wake up. His destruction felt at home when his senses regained some clarity and allowed him to inspect the environment.

The new dim whiteness of the sky filled his surroundings, but black patches tainted it. Space had shattered in multiple spots, but Noah couldn't see any storm around him. They were nothing more than vague images far away in the distance, but even his powerful eyes couldn't study them.

Still, Noah could see how those storms felt unable to fill the massive empty area that had formed due to the detonation of the three swords. It was as if the attack carrying solid stage power had created a new dead zone among those regions, and the reason behind that emptiness felt close to Noah's existence.

Destruction and sharpness filled the sky. That dead zone seemed perfect for Noah's existence, but he didn't feel any happiness when gazing at it. His group had just faced one of the strongest attacks that the cultivation journey had to offer. It sounded strange for him to be alive.

His body was a mess of torn flesh, shattered bones, and missing organs, but his centers of power were fine. Those severe injuries would annoy many cultivators and even some hybrids, but they were only a matter of energy for Noah. That damage felt too little for what he had to face.

A second inspection of the environment and the words of his companions revealed how he had accomplished that. It turned out that Noah didn't do much. His empowerments were already boosting his body when his consciousness turned dark. His black hole and companions had to handle everything from that point.

The black hole had given birth to a unique layered dark world meant to weaken the cultivator's sharp energy. The technique didn't do much, but it managed to taint a small part of that array of power with Noah's destruction.

Duanlong and Shafu had activated their pulling force to draw as much energy as possible from the sharp waves engulfing Noah, and the parasite had even decided to throw roots forward relentlessly. His chest was even in the open, so the plant didn't have skin to pierce.

The sharp energy managed to get past that almost in perfect state, but those abilities didn't just disappear. Shafu, Duanlong, and the parasite continued to apply their weakening effects whenever they found a chance to expand their power. The same went for the dark world, which never stopped sending dark matter forward.

Snore became part of the main offensive there, even if its power fell short too. The raging dark matter coming out of its mouth and contained in its feathers tried to stop the wave of sharp energy, but it crumbled in less than a second. It managed to gain an instant for the other abilities and spread Noah's destruction even more, but that was it.

Night and the Demonic Sword were willing to come out and die if the situation required it. Their lives wouldn't have made Noah gain much, but delaying the main force of the sharp wave by even an instant felt worth it. Luckily for them, the struggle didn't require their sacrifice.

Noah's abilities didn't allow him to face a solid stage attack head-on, but he had just gotten a powerful item from his previous battle. Shafu didn't hesitate to throw the maimed brown avatar out of its separate space and use it to shield its Master from part of the sharp energy's power.

Those abilities expanded and crumbled in an endless cycle that pushed Noah high in the sky as the middle tier avatar worked as a shield. Yet, the brown giant eventually shattered, and his body had to endure the remaining power discharged during the detonation of the immense swords.

Noah could only be happy about the outcome of that exchange of abilities. He had faced something that he didn't have the power to survive, but he was still alive. Everything accumulated until then and the nature of the sharp energy had given him the chance to overcome that challenge.

Noah had been lucky that the sharp energy had expanded in every direction. He wouldn't even come close to surviving it otherwise. Still, he was aware that even monsters among monsters would struggle to live through that threat if they didn't have his accumulation, and that made him think about his companions.

The area around Noah was full of primary energy. It contained part of the power that the sharp wave dispersed in the attack and the brown avatar had released during its destruction. The storms didn't even dare to fly there, so most of the fuel was still around him.

His consciousness expanded and dragged even the slightest brim of energy inside him. Noah didn't spare even the shattering space. Every trace of power in his surroundings had to belong to him.

The shards of space and the vast cloud of primary energy contained enough power to restore most of his body. Noah almost went back to his peak, but he felt weak, especially mentally. His muscles could fight, but his mental sphere felt heavy after that near-death event.

'Where are they?' Noah thought once he managed to stabilize his condition and trigger his innate recovery.

King Elbas and Sword Saint had been relatively far away from the center of the explosion, so Noah believed them to be quite fine. They probably were farther away even, so he soon stopped looking for them.

Divine Demon was a monster, memories or not. Noah didn't know if he could actually survive the sharp wave, but the expert had his complete trust.

His other companions were an issue. Wilfred would probably survive due to his hybrid status, but that wouldn't prevent him from suffering serious injuries. A quick look at his previous condition would have been enough to explain how deeply that energy had affected him. It was only normal for those with weaker bodies to suffer more.

Instead, Robert and Steven were among the weakest in the group, and they probably didn't have enough advantages of items that could give them a chance to survive the threat. They weren't even in the ninth rank, so damages to their centers of power could put an end to their cultivation journey.

Noah descended at full speed while checking every corner of the environment. The dead zone appeared immense, but he didn't have problems making sure that everyone was safe. His body had just recovered, so his consciousness expanded even past its normal limits. He had overcome the attack of the solid stage cultivator in the end. His ambition had intensified, and that forced his other centers of power to express more energy.

Nothing interesting had entered his range even when he was about to reach the ground, but he eventually noticed a familiar face. He found Robert, and his poor condition made him wear a dark expression.

The expert was a gory mess, and a side of his head had completely disappeared. Noah checked how deep that injury was with his consciousness, and his expression darkened even more when he saw a mental sphere with cracks and holes.