Chapter 20: The Birth of the Primordial Strand
The moment Carson's fingers closed around the hilt of the First Blade, the laws of physics inside the Sahara Library didn't just bend—they shattered.
The hilt was made of a material that defied categorization. It felt like cold starlight and ancient bone, vibrating with a frequency that resonated directly with Carson's marrow. As the connection was made, the thirty strands of violet Saber-Qi in his heart began to accelerate, spinning until they became a singular, blinding disc of energy.
Then came the 31st Strand.
It didn't come from Carson's body; it poured from the hilt. It was a thread of pure, colorless light—the Primordial Essence. Unlike the violet Qi, which represented the pinnacle of mortal refinement, this new energy represented the "Origin." It was the "0" from which all "1s" were born.
Carson screamed—not in pain, but in the sheer overwhelming sensory input of a thousand generations of Saber-Masters' memories flooding his mind. He saw the birth of the first star, the cooling of the first blade, and the true reason the Solaris Hegemony feared the McCain bloodline. They weren't just engineers; they were the "Keepers of the Edge."
"He's absorbing it!" High Inquisitor Malphas roared, his calm mask finally cracking. "Stop him! If he integrates the Core, the Sector-Lock will fail!"
Malphas didn't hold back. He unleashed his ultimate technique: The Void-Casket. The air around Carson began to solidify into obsidian glass, meant to entomb him in a pocket dimension where time stood still.
But Carson McCain was no longer just a Level 14 Sovereign.
As the 31st strand settled into his heart, the world slowed down. He could see the molecular structure of the "Void-Casket." He could see the flaws in Malphas's "Perfect Order." With a calm that terrified even the air itself, Carson swung the hilt.
There was no physical blade. Instead, a "Ray of Intent" three hundred feet long erupted from the hilt. It wasn't violet. It was a terrifying, absolute white.
The white ray didn't just cut the obsidian casket; it erased the very concept of "The Void" from that specific coordinates in space. The library was bathed in a light so pure that the prisoners at the entrance fell to their knees, shielded only by the lingering warmth of Carson's original shield.
"The First Blade..." Malphas whispered, his eyes bleeding as he stared into the light. "It's not a weapon. It's a... key."
"It's a reminder," Carson said, his voice echoing with the weight of two voices—his own and a deeper, more ancient resonance. "A reminder that the Hegemony's 'Order' is just a thin layer of ice on a very deep ocean."
Carson stepped forward. With a single flick of the hilt, the white ray passed through Malphas. There was no blood. The High Inquisitor's Level 14 Peak cultivation simply evaporated. Malphas fell, his hair turning white, his skin wrinkling into old age in seconds. He was still alive, but he was now a "Mortal Level 0"—a man without a single drop of Qi left in his body.