Chapter 249: Reunion of Twelve Sword Cores
The avatar of Gu Mo had burned nine sword cores to push his true body's Grand Golden Core into breaking through. At this moment, three sword cores still remained within the avatar—these were Gu Mo's trump cards for facing the heavenly tribulation.
The power transformed from the burning sword cores poured into the GoldFiend Sword. Combined with the true essence of the avatar, who was now at the Nascent Soul Realm, this was enough to unleash sixty to seventy percent of the power of this top-grade spirit weapon.
"What was that just now? I think I saw a sword core. But hasn't he already broken through? What's with these sword cores?"
Gu Mo's act of burning sword cores and channeling that power into the GoldFiend Sword naturally did not escape the eyes of the disciples of the Yin-Yang Sword Sect watching from afar.
Countless questions flooded their hearts—this scene was simply shattering all conventional understanding.
The only one present who knew the truth was the sect master of the Yin-Yang Sword Sect. Yet even he, upon seeing Gu Mo's avatar burn another sword core, felt his heart skip a beat.
If his calculations were correct, this was already the tenth sword core that youth had burned. From the very beginning with six sword cores, this young man had been breaking past his expectations, one step at a time.
"Rumble!"
As Gu Mo's avatar channeled the power of the burning sword core into the GoldFiend Sword, the pitch-black tribulation clouds roared. The sixth heavenly thunderbolt crashed down, laden with terrifying heavenly might.
Just as the Yin-Yang Sword Sect's sect master had suspected, the force of this sixth thunderbolt had already stepped firmly into the mid-stage Nascent Soul level.
Such thunder power, for an ordinary tribulation-taker, would absolutely mean certain death.
But the sect master knew this bolt could not harm that youth. Sure enough, with a sword radiance brighter than the thunder's light, the sixth heavenly bolt was cleaved apart and destroyed.
"Then how will you handle the remaining three thunderbolts?"
By burning the foundation of sword cores for strength, Gu Mo's avatar had weathered the sixth strike. But three more bolts remained before the tribulation was over—and they would be even stronger. The sect master's gaze locked onto Gu Mo's avatar, intent on seeing how that youth would deal with the thunder still to come.
Under the sect's watchful eyes, another sword core appeared in the avatar's hand. He burned it, channeling the power once more into the GoldFiend Sword.
"The eleventh one," the sect master murmured inwardly. At this point, there was no shock left in his heart—he had been numbed by astonishment.
As for the other disciples of the Yin-Yang Sword Sect, the question marks above their heads were piling into mountains. Yet no one had answers for them.
Thus, they could only keep watching, questions swirling endlessly in their hearts. Still, witnessing such a rare special tribulation with their own eyes was a fortune in itself.
Though the crowd could not understand Gu Mo's repeated act of producing and burning sword cores, all could clearly sense the terrifying pressure of the tribulation clouds above.
If they themselves were to face such thunderbolts, death would be inevitable.
"Rumble!"
The tribulation clouds brewed for a moment, then another thunderbolt—thicker and fiercer than before—descended. At the same instant, Gu Mo's avatar swung his sword.
Sword light and thunder light collided midair, holding for a breath before both vanished. Unlike before, when the sword strike had held the advantage, this time Gu Mo's burning sword-core strike could no longer suppress the heavenly thunder.
This meant that the eighth thunderbolt's power would completely surpass the avatar's full-force sword strike. If Gu Mo had no other methods, he might not survive it.
As for relying on his body to endure—his avatar's physique was only at early Nascent Soul level, while the thunder's power had already reached mid-stage Nascent Soul. The eighth strike might even touch the peak of mid-stage. Such a strike, if it landed directly, his body would never withstand it.
Thus, Gu Mo's avatar used offense as defense. This was a common method sword cultivators employed when crossing tribulation.
In addition, the Heaven and Earth Nascent Soul within his body continuously gathered the surrounding spiritual energy, replenishing his true essence quickly. This was the crucial reason the sword-cultivator avatar could maintain such explosive force throughout.
If it had been another cultivator, two full-force strikes would already have left them utterly drained.
"Hahh~~"
Exhaling a long breath, Gu Mo's avatar drew out the final sword core, igniting it and pouring its power into the GoldFiend Sword, preparing to face the eighth heavenly thunder.
"The twelfth!"
The sect master noted silently, his gaze turning back to the sky. If that youth had no other means, then even burning sword cores would not let him withstand the eighth strike.
After all, burning sword cores could grant immense power, but that power still had a ceiling.
"Rumble!"
The tribulation did not keep anyone waiting. The eighth thunderbolt fell swiftly. Compared to the seventh, its force had leapt up an entire grade, reaching the peak of mid-stage Nascent Soul.
If the eighth strike was already at the peak of mid-stage, then the final one could only be expected to reach late-stage Nascent Soul.
Of course, such thoughts were premature. The immediate task was to overcome the eighth thunderbolt. If he could not pass this gate, there would be no chance at the last.
"Metal Escape!"
Fixing his gaze on the falling thunder, Gu Mo's avatar transformed his top-grade flying sword into a beam of golden light. At the same time, he invoked the wisp of Metal Escape he had comprehended, merging his figure into the blade itself. Man and sword as one, he shot up toward the thunder.
As sword light clashed with thunder light, the avatar within the GoldFiend Sword felt a tremendous impact shuddering the blade. The GoldFiend Sword, being of top-grade spirit weapon level, could never be damaged by such force. But the avatar, merged within, nearly lost hold of the escape technique under the pressure.
Fortunately, now that the avatar had advanced to the Nascent Soul Realm, his cultivation realm allowed him to maintain the escape technique without it being broken so easily.
After several breaths, the force dispersed. Gu Mo's avatar released the escape state, and thus the eighth heavenly thunder was officially overcome.
With the eighth thunder passed, the tribulation clouds began to contract. The pitch-black sky gradually lightened as they drew inward.
To those who did not understand, it might look as though the tribulation had ended. Yet the ever-mounting pressure radiating from the condensing clouds made it clear—the heavenly trial was not over.
During this brief lull as the tribulation gathered for its final strike, the Heaven and Earth Nascent Soul within Gu Mo's avatar exerted itself fully, pulling in vast quantities of spiritual energy. Luckily, this place was the mountain gate of the Yin-Yang Sword Sect, where spiritual energy was abundant. Thus, the Heaven and Earth Nascent Soul could gather immense energy with ease.
That energy was swallowed down, refined into true essence, and channeled into the twelve sword shadows circling around the Heaven and Earth Nascent Soul.
These twelve sword shadows were the source imprints left behind by the burning sword cores. When Gu Mo burned each sword core, he had not consumed them completely, but preserved a wisp of their origin imprint.
Back during the Heavenly Chosen Battle, in order to make the act convincing and avoid being seen through by the Nascent Soul Sovereigns in the heavens or those sect masters of the demonic path, Gu Mo's avatar had burned away even the source imprints of his sword cores. Only that way could he fool everyone.
But now, his avatar no longer needed to act. He only needed to burn the sword cores' power—the source imprints could be preserved intact.
Every sword core within the avatar contained Immortal Power. Using Immortal Power to substitute for the source imprint would not affect the power gained from burning the sword cores.
As long as a single source imprint was preserved, the re-condensation of the sword core would become far easier.
Sure enough, as vast amounts of true essence poured into the twelve sword shadows, those twelve shadows quickly solidified, transforming into twelve sword cores.
Only now, the cores no longer contained golden core-level power, but rather Nascent Soul-level true essence. This allowed their might to rise to the level of the Nascent Soul realm.
The price, however, was that these twelve cores could no longer condense into sword infants through the normal path. But that was of little concern—his true body was even now nurturing a new golden core dao-seed. When the time came, the true body could pass that dao-seed to the avatar, and that would serve as the proof needed for stepping into the Nascent Soul stage.
Moreover, this dao-seed could be cultivated with the avatar's path as a sword cultivator in mind, for instance by adding the genes of Sword-Heart Bamboo, or of metal-element spirit plants.
As for these twelve sword cores, they would henceforth be the avatar's twelve natal flying swords. Each one possessed the might of the Nascent Soul stage, and when combined into a sword formation, they could absolutely stand against even a mid-Nascent Soul opponent.
This was also the method Gu Mo had prepared to face the final heavenly tribulation. The last bolt's might might very well reach late Nascent Soul power. Could the twelve sword cores withstand it?
If not—then he could burn them with the secret art of Demonic Dissolution. That should barely be enough to block the last tribulation bolt. As long as the source imprints of the sword cores remained intact, with the Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul's capacity for drawing in spiritual energy, he could swiftly re-condense the twelve sword cores once more.
Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul + twelve sword cores + Demonic Dissolution—these three together gave Gu Mo's avatar an exceedingly powerful trump card.
"What a terrifying speed of spiritual absorption… what secret art is he using?"
The Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul gathered heaven and earth's spiritual qi on a massive scale, forming a whirlpool of qi above Gu Mo's avatar's head. The disciples of the Yin-Yang Sword Sect were all stunned by this horrifying speed of absorption.
Cultivation was the process of drawing in and exhaling spiritual energy. The stronger a cultivator's spiritual root, the faster they could draw in qi, and the faster their cultivation advanced.
Spiritual roots, spiritual roots—what spiritual root could compare to a Heaven-Earth root? The Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul within Gu Mo's avatar could practically be regarded as a Heaven-Earth spiritual root itself, innately possessing unrivaled affinity with qi.
One breath from the Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul equaled several days of cultivation for an ordinary Nascent Soul true lord. Of course, at the Nascent Soul stage, the influence of spiritual roots diminished. Comprehension of one's arts and understanding of the Great Dao became the main factors allowing Nascent Soul cultivators to continue progressing.
Even so, a superior root and faster cultivation speed could save enormous amounts of time otherwise spent in dull seated meditation, freeing more time to study arts and the Dao.
And spiritual absorption was only the most basic ability of a Heaven-Earth root. Gu Mo sensed that this Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul should still hold other powers not yet awakened.
As for what those were, he could ask Qi Chunde. After all, the genes his Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul had fused with came from that fragment of Heaven-Earth spiritual root given by Qi Chunde. Theoretically, the Heaven-Earth Nascent Soul's abilities should match those of that spiritual root.
While Gu Mo's avatar re-condensed the twelve sword cores, the tribulation clouds in the sky had already gathered into a single black dot. Yet the pressure emanating from that dot was greater than the vast cloudbanks before it.
"Then come!"
The twelve sword cores in his body swiftly arranged into the Heavenly Twelve-Sword Fiend Array, then ignited together, sending its power soaring.
At the same time, Gu Mo's avatar's aura surged wildly. In that instant, his aura had already touched the late Nascent Soul stage.
Then, as twelve bamboo-sword artifacts laid out a second Heavenly Twelve-Sword Fiend Array, his aura fully stabilized at the late Nascent Soul stage.
Though this was only temporary power, the fact that such strength could be wielded by someone who had just broken through to Nascent Soul was already shocking enough.
"Th-this is…"
Far off, the Yin-Yang Sword Sect's sect master felt the avatar's skyrocketing aura, and the twelve blazing points of power hidden within his body, and could not help but be shaken.
"What a brilliant method!"
All at once, he realized the truth, and let out a heartfelt exclamation. He had perceived that those twelve eruptions of power were the twelve sword cores that had previously been burned.
By means of that heaven-devouring spiritual absorption secret art, Gu Mo had re-condensed them. As a sword cultivator himself, the Yin-Yang sect master's understanding of sword cores surpassed even Gu Mo's.
He knew very well: as long as a sword core's source imprint was not destroyed, then with sufficient spiritual energy, it could indeed be swiftly re-condensed.
It was no exaggeration to say that Gu Mo had utterly erased the usual losses of burning sword cores and sacrificing potential. What would normally take centuries of accumulation, he had skipped entirely, stepping straight into the realm of Nascent Soul True Lord.
No wonder even a late Nascent Soul like the Yin-Yang sect master could not help but utter "What a method!" This truly was a stroke of genius.
Of course, the risks were enormous. The slightest misstep would have meant death. This was a miracle that could not be repeated.
The requirements to achieve such a feat were far too demanding. Miss a single step, and the whole thing was impossible.
And every one of those steps was something a normal cultivator could never dream of.
Take those twelve sword cores, or rather thirteen sword cores, for example. After all, twelve were burned for breakthrough power—but one still had to be left to transform.
"The final trial… if he passes this, it will be a meteoric rise!" The Yin-Yang sect master gazed at the black dot in the sky. This was the last ordeal for that monstrous young man.
Under countless watching eyes, the black dot in the heavens slowly descended, transforming into a pitch-black lightning bolt that struck down toward Gu Mo's avatar.
At the same instant, a dazzling golden radiance rose from the earth like a blazing sun—the late Nascent Soul power was enough for Gu Mo's avatar to unleash the full might of the supreme spiritual artifact, the GoldFiend Sword.
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