Chapter 216: Shenzhou Broken Sword Record (Part 2) Begins
Red Kite scanned the quiet room, her sharp gaze sweeping over her disciples before settling on an obvious absence. A slight frown creased her brow. "Where has Rovel gone?"
Su Mei stepped forward, bowing her head respectfully. "Senior Brother received word that monsters were ravaging the Northern Wilderness. He departed for the frontlines just two days after Master left."
Red Kite's frown deepened into a tight line. "Hmm..." She turned her attention to her eldest disciple. "Chaoyu, prepare an empty room for Suyi to stay in. You may begin instructing her in the Sword Form, but under no circumstances are you to recite the Sword Heart Mantra in her presence. I am leaving for the Northern Wilderness immediately to assist Rovel. I will teach her the mantra personally upon my return."
"Yes, Master." Lin Chaoyu nodded, her posture rigid and obedient.
"Master, I want to go too," Cheng Lingshuang suddenly spoke up, her usually placid voice carrying a rare edge of insistence.
Rovel had deliberately left her behind this time. The Northern Wilderness was simply too perilous. If the mission merely involved culling the Corrupted—those martial artists who had succumbed to Honkai Energy—Rovel wouldn't have worried. Taixu Sword Qi possessed an absolute, innate advantage over human internal energy. Once the Corrupted lost control of their flow, their combat prowess plummeted, making them easy prey.
But exterminating ancient monsters was an entirely different ordeal. Even Red Kite, the legendary immortal herself, had nearly perished at the claws of Huodou.
The beasts roaming Shenzhou were catastrophically dangerous, far eclipsing the threat of the Corrupted. This lingering nightmare was likely a direct consequence of the ancient Fire Moth Project, which caused massive monster tides to periodically erupt across the continent. These creatures didn't just boast terrifying physical resilience; they hoarded colossal reserves of violent internal energy within their massive frames. Against such overwhelming brute force, the refined elegance of Taixu Sword Qi lost much of its lethal edge.
Because of this, even though Cheng Lingshuang had already mastered the Form and Soul paths of the blade, Rovel had firmly refused to bring her along.
Red Kite looked down at the young girl. Though Cheng Lingshuang's martial prowess was second only to Rovel's among the disciples, the immortal slowly shook her head. Her reasoning aligned perfectly with Rovel's: it was a death sentence for a disciple.
Cheng Lingshuang possessed terrifying talent. Give her a few more years, and once her Sword Heart breached the [Taixu] realm, her sheer destructive power would likely eclipse even Rovel's. But that was a matter for the future. Right now, she was not ready.
The light in Cheng Lingshuang's eyes dimmed for a fleeting second, but her expression quickly smoothed back into its usual stoic mask. She offered no words of farewell or protest. Turning on her heel, she walked off alone toward the training grounds, her wooden sword gripped tightly in her hand.
'Senior Brother is so powerful. He will definitely be alright, right?' she thought, the rhythmic strikes of her blade against the training dummy echoing her silent anxiety.
Leaving the serene peaks of Taixu Mountain behind, Red Kite tore through the clouds, pushing her speed to the absolute limit toward the Northern Wilderness.
Meanwhile, amidst the desolate, blood-soaked dunes of the Northern Wilderness, Rovel leaned heavily against his sword. He stared up at the colossal, mangled corpse of the monster towering before him and let out a long, ragged exhale.
'I really didn't expect it to be this much of a nightmare to kill.'
The locals called this abomination [Taowu]. Based on the sheer devastation it had unleashed, Rovel estimated its strength sat firmly at the level of a Judgment-class Honkai Beast.
Slaying it had pushed this mortal vessel to its absolute breaking point.
He had mastered the Sword Form and the Sword Soul. He had even cultivated the [Liangyi Immortal Art] passed down by Red Kite herself. Yet, ultimately, he had never successfully formed a Sword Heart. For a mortal body, unrefined and unremodeled by the purifying nature of a Sword Heart, reaching this level of combat power was nothing short of a miracle.
Rovel gritted his teeth, pressing his weight onto the hilt of his sword to stand. But the moment his muscles tensed, his vision violently swam. His expression went slack, and his legs gave out, sending him crashing hard into the dirt.
He blinked, his breathing shallow. Disgusting, pulsating purple veins had silently crept up from his fingertips, winding around his forearm like venomous vines. The skin of his palm had already faded to a sickly, deathly white.
Slowly, Rovel turned his head. The massive corpse of Taowu was venting a suffocating, pitch-black mist. And that dense, corrosive fog was steadily, relentlessly seeping into Rovel's pores.
"...Is this really how it ends?" Rovel muttered, his limbs completely paralyzed. He lay flat on his back, staring up at the bleak, ash-choked sky. He had never anticipated that a dying Taowu possessed such a vicious final trump card.
His entire goal in this instance had been to prevent the tragic future where the seven disciples murdered their master. But looking at the creeping rot on his skin, it seemed he wouldn't even live long enough to see that fateful day.
He had tried everything. He had failed to soften Lin Chaoyu's rigid, rule-bound personality. He had failed to ease Su Mei's twisted state of mind. And he had been utterly powerless to cure Jiang Wanru's deteriorating physical condition.
Looking back, it felt like he had accomplished absolutely nothing.
Yet, he had poured every ounce of his knowledge into Lingshuang. He had taken her out to test her blade early, trying to expose her to the harsh realities of the world. If, after all his efforts, she still eventually decided that a Demonized Red Kite deserved execution... then Rovel truly had nothing left to give.
He reflected on his short, exhausting life in this special instance. He had spent every waking moment frantically cultivating his strength, ruthlessly enforcing the decree that 'the Demonized must be executed', never once allowing his blade to hesitate or his heart to soften. He had desperately hoped that when the time came for the disciples to turn on their master, he would have amassed enough power to force a different outcome.
Instead, he was rotting away in the dirt, transforming into one of the very Demonized he had spent his life hunting.
'Irony really is a cruel mistress,' he thought, a dry, humorless chuckle escaping his lips.
He had to hand it to the monsters of Shenzhou; they were built different. The catastrophic hidden dangers left behind by the ancient Fire Moth Project still poisoned the earth to this day.
Chiyou could devour entire landmasses to endlessly expand its mass. Huodou could bestow apocalyptic flames upon Yan Shiluo, wielding a power dense enough to suppress the [Garuda] active Honkai factors burning within Red Kite's own veins.
And now, this Taowu. Even in death, its residual energy had mutated into something terrifyingly similar to the [Power of Erosion], burrowing straight into Rovel's defenseless body.
He and the [Power of Erosion] truly were a match made in hell.
'Should I just kill myself now to protect my spotless reputation as the Butcher of the Demonized?' Rovel mused, wincing as a fresh wave of agony spiked through his chest. Even in his own mind, the title sounded absolutely terrible.
But before he gave up... Rovel forced his jaw shut. Drawing on the very last dregs of his willpower, he dragged himself up from the dirt. He couldn't just leave the beast here. Grabbing the massive corpse of Taowu, he hauled it toward a deep, uninhabited desert ravine, burying it under tons of sand to ensure its rotting miasma wouldn't erode the land or mutate wandering travelers.
The physical exertion accelerated his doom. More of the black mist surged into his lungs, flooding his meridians. The jagged purple veins rapidly climbed past his collarbone, creeping up his neck.
"Tsk. Regardless, I should at least struggle a bit," Rovel spat out a mouthful of blackened blood.
He collapsed into a seated lotus position right there in the wasteland. Closing his eyes, he centered his fracturing spirit, desperately circulating the [Liangyi Immortal Art] to forcefully condense the rampaging Honkai Energy and internal energy clashing within his core. He had no idea if this would actually work, but dying without a fight wasn't in his nature.
Not long after, a lone figure descended from the sky, tracking the massive, violent spikes of Honkai Energy radiating across the wasteland.
When Red Kite landed and laid eyes on Rovel's state, her pupils shrank to pinpricks. Her breath hitched, an invisible vice crushing her chest.
They had spent years side by side. She had long since come to view this clever, stubborn boy as her own family. Never in her longest nightmares did she imagine she would find him drowning in Honkai corruption.
She had forgotten. Because he was always so capable, so brilliant, she had forgotten that Rovel had never formed a Sword Heart. His overwhelming combat prowess stemmed entirely from his monstrous innate talent and combat intellect. But without a Sword Heart, his physical resistance to Honkai Energy was merely 'decent' at best.
An unremodeled mortal body simply could not survive this level of raw, concentrated erosion.
'If only I had flown faster...''If only I had arrived just a moment sooner...'
Her hands trembled.
[The Demonized must be executed...]
[The Demonized must be executed...]
[The Demonized... must be executed!]
The ancient, unyielding decree echoed in the deepest recesses of her mind. The voices multiplied, overlapping into a deafening, mechanical death-knell that drowned out her grief.
The warmth vanished from Red Kite's eyes, replaced by a chilling, absolute void. She stepped forward, her movements stiff and robotic. Slowly, she reached down and picked up the Xuanyuan Sword lying discarded beside Rovel.
She raised her arm high, the golden blade catching the dull light of the wasteland, and then—without a shred of mercy—brought it swinging down toward his neck.
[Item detected: Fenghuang Down · Part 2. Automatically activating for Host. Special Instance: 'Shenzhou Broken Sword Record (Part 2)' has begun.]
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