This should have been a sentence with some complexity hidden within it, but unexpectedly, after hearing it, Qu Zhengfeng showed not the slightest different reaction. He merely sheathed his sword and headed into the armory, saying coldly: “I also never imagined that after more than eighty years, entering the armory twice, Fellow Daoist Jian Chou still cannot take it away. This could indeed be called utterly useless.”

“…”

When she respectfully called him “Your Majesty the Sword Emperor,” he teasingly called her “little junior sister”; now when she recalled old times and changed to calling him “Senior Brother Qu,” he became distant and polite, calling her “Fellow Daoist Jian Chou” and coldly mentioning the word “useless.”

He truly wasn’t an easy person to understand.

When first meeting at Yashan in the past, this person gave the impression of being gentle and refined, seeming kind in nature, handling affairs thoroughly and appropriately, but later his face changed faster than flipping through a book.

Beneath his seemingly uncontentious exterior, things were hidden.

Jian Chou could neither say she liked nor disliked him. Even now, being so blatantly mocked as “useless,” her heart couldn’t generate much of a ripple.

She smiled faintly and replied: “Naturally it’s hard to compare with Your Majesty the Sword Emperor’s disposition of lying low before soaring high.”

The earlier appellations of “Senior Brother Qu” and “little junior sister” had vaguely brought people back to the years when everyone was still at Yashan, but when this equally distant “Your Majesty the Sword Emperor” was spoken, everything returned to its original state.

Qu Zhengfeng suddenly felt somewhat dazed.

But the Yashan armory was right before them, and the time for opening was limited, so he didn’t remain dazed for long. In the end, he still said “Let’s go” and first threw himself into the armory.

The Yashan armory was the same as in years past, covered in ice and snow.

Mountains and plains crisscrossed, most weapons were covered by layers of ancient ice, and the deep black mountain rocks also revealed blurred outlines beneath the ice layers.

Many long swords were also inserted in the cliffs, some new, some old.

Jian Chou landed behind Qu Zhengfeng, following him in. When she landed and looked up, she saw this vast, nearly boundless armory.

And the mountain peak standing at the horizon in the far east.

That was the highest ice peak in this armory, and also the most precipitous ice peak. Its very form was like a sharp blade, falling straight down from the ethereal void of the sky, inserted into the flat ice plain.

Qu Zhengfeng said not a word, barely glancing at any other sword in this armory, and walked directly toward this highest peak.

There lay Yashan’s sharpest sword.

Jian Chou’s memory of this was truly too deep. When she followed Qu Zhengfeng’s footsteps and stood together before this mountain, past memories uncontrollably flowed back from the depths of time into her mind.

They stood at the base of this precipitous peak, looking up.

The mountain reached the sky, the sword was in the mountain.

Years of ice and snow had solidified into a transparent, solid mountain body, refracting piercing skylight, yet unable to hide the lofty, hanging sword shadow within the mountain body!

A thread of crimson blood, a thread of immortal; a thread of immortal opportunity, a thread of sky!

Its slightly curved and sharp blade was sealed with ice and snow, like frozen ripples; on the three-finger-wide sword body, that startling thin red line rose from the sword tip, climbed along the sword ridge, and lonely sank into the sword hilt at the other end.

It was rust-stained and mottled, yet cold, lonely, and supremely aloof.

Like a guardian that had gazed for thousands of years in this armory, and also like a spirit and soul that had condensed but never dispersed!

This posture was no different from what Jian Chou had seen twice before.

Time pushed the vicissitudes of worldly affairs, yet only it remained unchanged from the beginning.

The first time she came, she was still just a Yashan disciple who had entered the sect not long ago, with only Foundation Establishment cultivation. She had taken a fancy to this sword at first sight, but at that time her soul was incomplete, and none of the swords in this entire armory could sense her spirit, so she couldn’t take away any sword, let alone this one that countless people had tried to draw away over thousands of years.

The second time she came, she was already a Nascent Soul old monster ranked first on the Nine Heavens Tablet. Though facing the mortal danger of questioning the heart during Spirit Severing, she still yearned for this sword and tried with all her might to forcibly take it. Who would have thought that no matter how she exhausted all her abilities, it remained unmoved.

Now, it was the third time.

She was no longer the newly entered Yashan disciple who understood nothing, having already crossed the most dangerous questioning heart tribulation for cultivators, having her own “Dao” she wanted to walk, and had even crossed two realms directly, standing at the very top of cultivators in these Nineteen Continents, becoming a Void Returning great power!

She had already passed through the Heavenly Dao tribulation.

She wondered how this A Thread of Sky, nurtured from blood and spirit, compared to the Heavenly Dao?

“What heart one has, what sword one draws.” Though Jian Chou didn’t speak, Qu Zhengfeng seemed to know what she was thinking. His gaze was fixed on A Thread of Sky in the center of the mountain body above, but his words were directed at her. “The three swords of Yashan, each one is extraordinary. Famous swords should choose wise masters. If one’s own strength is insufficient, what right does one have to make a strong sword submit? Previously you couldn’t obtain it, merely because compared to it, you were still too weak, far too inferior.”

Words that showed no mercy.

Hearing this, Jian Chou laughed, but she also knew this was indeed the truth, so she didn’t refute him, only saying: “Then does Your Majesty the Sword Emperor think that the current me has the qualification to draw a sword?”

He turned to gaze at her, seeming to weigh her strength and consider her question, but ultimately didn’t answer her. He only cast his gaze back to that sword hiding a thread of blood red, saying: “It will give you the answer.”

Without trying, how could one know!

Qu Zhengfeng suddenly smiled, but what surged up in his eyes was an indescribable solemnity. All the experiences at Yashan in the past flashed quickly through his heart.

His gold-woven black robe was extremely conspicuous in this snowy wilderness.

He soared into the air, instantly reaching a position level with A Thread of Sky in the mountain body. Looking down, countless long swords throughout the entire armory were all silent in the ice and snow.

All were Yashan swords!

All were Yashan souls!

And A Thread of Sky stood alone in this high place, as if overlooking all other ten thousand swords. But Qu Zhengfeng knew this wasn’t a condescending overlook—

It was here only because the ten thousand swords hoped it would be here!

The Yashan Giant Sword and the Nameless Iron Sword were Yashan’s spirit and intent; A Thread of Sky was Yashan’s divinity and soul!

In those past hundreds of years, nearly a thousand years, in those days before betraying Yashan, as a Yashan disciple, Qu Zhengfeng wasn’t without some longing for this sword.

But ultimately it wasn’t suitable.

A Thread of Sky was the most evil, sharpest, and most murderous of Yashan’s three swords. The hatred and past he harbored in his heart were already heavy enough; adding this one thread more, he couldn’t bear it.

Famous swords should choose wise masters.

And he, who had already betrayed Yashan, should by no means take away Yashan’s strongest sword.

So, the right person should take the right sword!

“Boom!”

Wild wind suddenly reversed!

It was at this moment that he drew the Yashan Giant Sword in reverse, its stone blade appearing dull and edgeless, yet the instant he held the sword and thrust downward from the air, it rapidly grew and extended!

Like a mountain suddenly rising!

The sword tip instantly struck the ground below with a “bang,” breaking through the hard ice layer and penetrating deep into the armory’s underground!

Spider web-like cracks instantly spread across the entire ice surface!

With a “rustling” sound, heaven and earth shook, the entire massive armory trembled violently, along with countless swords that existed lying horizontally, inserted diagonally, or standing vertically inside and outside the ice layers!

That was a mysterious resonance.

All weapons in the armory were either forged by Yashan cultivators or used by Yashan cultivators, taken from here in life, returned here in death.

When the heart was in Yashan, the sword returned to the armory!

The Yashan Giant Sword was one of Yashan’s three swords, nurtured from Yashan’s lofty mountain body, gathering the spiritual essence of heaven and earth, stained with the elegant intent of Yashan disciples, originally part of Yashan itself.

All swords in the armory, all souls of Yashan!

Who, upon seeing this sword, could not be touched or feel something in their heart?

“Clang—”

The sound of sword humming between heaven and earth grew from small to large, as all the swords in this armory lit up, various colored sword lights bright, various sword qi surging!

All swords awakened in an instant!

Jian Chou stood below, looking in all directions, seeing the entire massive armory covered by magnificent sword light and sword qi!

From the towering Yashan Giant Sword came a familiar intimacy.

That was the aura emanating from Yashan, which all Yashan disciples held dear in their hearts, the place that had nurtured and cultivated them!

It was where their hearts yearned, where their aspirations pointed!

Even A Thread of Sky in the highest and most precipitous peak was no exception!

It was forged from the lifeblood and souls of countless Yashan cultivators who had fallen over thousands of years, born at the moment of death, growing in regret, originally having countless connections with Yashan. How could it not be moved by this Yashan Giant Sword?

The long sword hum, at this instant, overwhelmed all other sword hums!

The thin red line on the sword body finally lit up!

Between heaven and earth, it seemed a towering shadow suddenly stood up, shouldering an unyielding desolation and proud defiance!

The body may die!

The soul shall not perish!

The instant the red line on the sword body lit up, all ten thousand swords fell silent, only the red dot on their sword tips extended through the ice layers on the ground, near or far, connecting to the tip of A Thread of Sky!

One red dot was the condensed blood from ten thousand swords!

The vast armory, at this instant, seemed to possess living veins, starting from these ten thousand swords and ending at the tip of A Thread of Sky!

That was sharpness that could no longer be suppressed!

That was killing intent that could no longer be suppressed!

The six-foot sword’s jet-black blade made the red line on the sword ridge even redder, actually shaking the entire mountain that wrapped it!

In an instant, blood light surged to fill the sky!

Qu Zhengfeng shouted urgently, crying out to her sternly: “Take the sword!”

As his words fell, A Thread of Sky had already transformed into the deepest, most intense ray in that endless blood light, rushing upward, toward the mountain peak, toward the gloomy sky!

In the blink of an eye, it burst through the mountain body!

Jian Chou’s heart swayed with it, and at this moment she only felt a surge of indomitable heroic courage. She transformed into a streak of swift lightning, directly chasing the sword light upward, reaching out toward this six-foot lonely blade!