Chapter 59: Untethered Vessel
In that instant, the world before “Zhou Ziyin” collapsed into black and white.
When he opened his eyes again, the scene had abruptly changed.
“…”
The sect gate.
Sky-covering demonic clouds devoured the last sliver of daylight. Demonic flames surged and spread, and the sect’s floating islands crashed down.
Zhou Ziyin’s body swayed. Blood dripped from his lips—he no longer had the spiritual energy to command the ancient sword and could only hold it in his hand.
With a thud, he collapsed to the ground.
“The One Hundred and Eight Immortals of the Central Domain, the Sword Immortal Who Suppresses Evil…”
The demonic cultivator stepped over the corpses of his fellow disciples, one footfall at a time, and walked toward him.
“Truly impressive, to have fought until now…”
The demonic cultivator casually crushed the skull of a cultivator on the ground and looked at him with mockery. “Did you know? My favorite ones to kill are sword cultivators like you…”
He seemed to want to have a proper chat with Zhou Ziyin.
“To trample your so-called Dao Heart and Sword Intent beneath my feet, to watch the despair on your faces…”
“…”
Zhou Ziyin sat prostrate on the ground, the ancient sword planted beside him.
Just like hundreds of years ago, outside Xianyang Village, atop the Three Evils Mound.
“Hmph. Utterly boring.”
The demonic cultivator let out a cold snort.
“Die!”
Waves of black flame swept in. No miracle occurred.
Zhou Ziyin perished, his body dead and his Dao extinguished.
“Tch.”
The demonic cultivator let out a derisive laugh.
“What Central Domain genius, what prodigy of the immortal path? Under my Dao, you are nothing but lambs awaiting slaughter…”
“Hmm?”
The demonic cultivator’s expression shifted as he looked toward the cliff.
Though Zhou Ziyin’s corpse had perished, that ancient sword still stood in its place.
As the waves of flame receded, the blade remained as white and pristine as ever.
“…”
The demonic cultivator gritted his teeth. “These life-bound flying swords—just as stubborn and unyielding as those sword cultivators themselves!”
“So be it.”
The waves of flame surged once more.
“Then let the spiritual will within this sword suffer for eternity beneath the demonic flames!”
Boundless demonic intent surged toward him head-on!
BOOM!
…
Raging waves of flame swept through Song Yan’s vision.
A jolt of alarm—coming back to his senses, he found himself still standing in the Twin Jade World in the form of divine sense.
The noise and clamor at his ears were gone. Only silence remained.
“…Hah.”
What was that just now…
His scattered thoughts and memories slowly began to clarify.
“…”
It was as if he had lived a great dream, and in that dream, he was a cultivator named Zhou Ziyin.
From the mundane countryside, to stepping into the world of immortal cultivation, and finally being slaughtered by the demonic sect…
Everything else was hazy upon waking, like the fog of a dream. Only the memories of his redemption and the sect’s annihilation were vivid.
When he had faced that demonic cultivator’s heaven-defying power head-on, it truly was like a mantis trying to stop a chariot.
He lowered his gaze to the sword in his hand.
“From that era…”
“How many years have truly passed…”
After Senior Zhou Ziyin perished, his sword Dao will and Dao Heart were still preserved within this sword.
Yet they were swallowed by that demonic cultivator’s overwhelming demonic flames, scorched day and night, until today…
The spiritual will within had long since been ground away.
What was astonishing was that the blade itself showed not a single mark of wear.
No one knew what it was forged from.
Even if one asked the long-dead Zhou Ziyin himself, he probably could not have answered.
After all, he had obtained it from within the belly of that evil flood dragon.
Just as Song Yan was pondering, a wisp of milky-white spiritual light slowly drifted from the sword and circled gently along the blade.
Then came a second wisp.
A third…
Wisps of spiritual light flew forth, spiraling above the seed of Sword Dao, and then, led by one particular wisp, merged into it all together.
“Hummm…”
The phantom of the Dao seed seemed to become more solid, more complete.
Song Yan was taken aback.
“Formless Spiritual Will!” Both the Sword Planting Technique and the general principles of the Spirit Transformation chapter mentioned that as the life-bound flying sword gradually took shape and became more refined, it would elevate the grade of the Dao seed.
At its core, this was the growth and elevation of the heart that seeks the Dao and the will of the sword.
Therefore, beyond these methods, there existed another unconventional way to strengthen the Dao seed.
And that was Formless Spiritual Will.
Formless Spiritual Will was typically something that senior masters among sword cultivators would use when they wished to guide a junior. They would separate an uncondensed spiritual will from their own life-bound flying sword, refine it, merge it into a spiritual object, and bestow it upon their juniors.
Yet the texts never mentioned that such a thing could be obtained from a sword left behind by a predecessor…
“Could it be the effect of the Twin Jade Pearl?”
Song Yan frowned, realizing this matter was not so simple.
A bold guess and a daring idea took root in his heart from that moment on.
“However, for now, the priority is to refine the flying sword…”
Pulling himself from his contemplative thoughts and calming himself for a moment, Song Yan left the Twin Jade World.
Retrieving the flying sword from the Twin Jade Pearl posed no obstruction.
For an ordinary cultivator, refining a flying sword required infusing spiritual energy and activating a technique.
But Song Yan did not intend to use it as an ordinary flying sword…
He would make it the blade of his future life-bound flying sword!
Thus, from the Dao Repository, he drew out wisps of Sword Dao seed qi and slowly infused them into the sword.
Oh right…
Come to think of it, after this sword fell into the hands of the demonic cultivator, it had been called “Heart Demon.”
But now that the overwhelming demonic flames had been dissipated by the Twin Jade Pearl, that name no longer seemed fitting. Yet in that memory, Senior Zhou Ziyin had never mentioned what name he gave this sword…
“The Sword Immortal Who Suppresses Evil…”
Song Yan suddenly shook his head slightly and let out a soft sigh.
“In the past, you drew the demon-suppressing blade, and in the end, you were left to endure a thousand years of scorching, your spiritual will obliterated.”
“Now that you follow me, don’t shoulder such a heavy burden anymore.”
“The so-called work of rectifying the world and saving the masses—let the great masters of the Dao find the way.”
“I’ll be an ordinary cultivator, and you’ll be an ordinary flying sword. We’ll be unbound and free, observing the myriad phenomena of the world, roaming between heaven and earth.”
“As long as the mind is at peace and the spirit flows freely, that is enough.”
Thinking this, Song Yan’s gaze grew clear as he looked at the flying sword in his hand, and he found he could not bear to part with it.
“Is there not the ambition for longevity, yet bound and constrained…”
He murmured softly, reciting an anonymous poem he had heard somewhere.
“One day I return to the Wei River, drifting like an…”
Then let it be…
“An Untethered Vessel.”
…
The refinement did not take many days. In two and a half days, it was complete.
Song Yan channeled his spiritual energy, and the sword responded as smoothly as moving his own arm.
Using Sword Qi to refine a flying sword for the first time—the feeling was wondrous.
Compared to refinement with spiritual energy alone, the “Untethered Vessel” was noticeably more nimble than the Green Wood Refined Gold Flying Sword he had previously received from the sect.
“Hmm…”
As a mid-grade artifact, its grade was already sufficient to carry Song Yan through the entire Qi Refining Stage.
Furthermore, as the blade of his future life-bound flying sword, there remained room for its grade to improve. The future held promise.
After a brief practice of sword flight techniques, Song Yan returned to his cave dwelling.
In the days that followed, he cultivated and performed breathing exercises as usual, but was surprised to find that not only had his cultivation advanced slightly, the speed at which he absorbed spiritual energy had also increased considerably.
“This Formless Spiritual Will elevating the Dao seed grade—the effect is truly immediate…”
At this rate, in roughly three more months, he could begin attempting a breakthrough to the sixth level of the Qi Refining Stage.
The first and middle stages of the Qi Refining Stage, up to the sixth level, presented no real bottlenecks.
As long as one had sufficient talent and cultivated daily to accumulate spiritual energy, it was simply a matter of course.
It was only in the later stages of Qi Refining that the path truly became difficult.
In the days that followed, Song Yan continued his cultivation and breathing exercises methodically, commanded his flying sword, and practiced sword techniques.
Occasionally, he would think of that predecessor named Zhou Ziyin.
If his story were adapted into a tale and brought to a storyteller at a theater in the mundane world, it would surely be a great hit.
Perhaps it would even be passed down through the ages.
But Song Yan was an ordinary person—he had always believed so.
Indeed, Senior Zhou Ziyin’s moment of awakening was admirable and rare.
Yet when Song Yan considered how, before that, he had brought calamity to the villagers and bullied and destroyed the lives of others, he no longer felt quite the same admiration.
That this senior had later taken up chivalry and sword to suppress evil and slay demons was indeed worthy of respect and reverence.
…
Then again…
Where did those demonic flames, dissipated by the Twin Jade Pearl and the nascent Dao Heart, go?
Did they become the ink-dark pools within the Twin Jade World?
Or were they truly consumed by this wondrous pearl?
Song Yan did not know.
(End of Chapter)