Along with his Call, Hadjar summoned all the knowledge he possessed about the Sword Spirit. Gathering them together, he released them in a single stream. To the spectators, it looked like a pillar of black energy had just cut through the water.
“He’s definitely gone mad.” Jean shook his head. “His understanding of the Sword Spirit can’t possibly be-”
The Mentor abruptly stopped speaking. Even he was impressed by what was happening on that dais. He’d seen dozens of these advancement exams and thousands of regular ones, but no one had ever tried to overcome the artifact using only their mastery of a Spirit.
The raging torrent of water was cut in half and, after rolling down the pillar of black energy, it retreated back into the gigantic sword and froze. The silhouettes of predatory fish disappeared, and the once turbulent water turned into drops that vanished in a rainbow spray. The ‘Dead River Slash’ Technique soon disappeared. The gigantic blade made of energy continued hovering in the air.
Hadjar’s gaze, despite being fixed on such an unusual opponent, was as clear and calm as ever. The previous attack had failed to break his will. It had left a deep gash on his chest, but that didn’t matter to Hadjar. He was used to decorating his body with scars, not gold, silk, or brocade. He’d kind of missed them after becoming a true cultivator. He wouldn’t mind getting some new scars to replace the old ones.
“That’s impossible!”
“Another Technique?”
The giant sword turned into a bright yellow lightning bolt. It was furious, buzzing and emitting sparks that burned the platform and even the ground. Streams of solidifying lava flowed beneath the Mentor’s and Einen’s feet. Its rampage was stopped by the shield, causing it to flare up even more.
“The Thunder God’s Sword Technique!”
“That’s a Heaven level Technique!”
Hadjar had already seen Ian Gorr use this Technique, but his hadn’t possessed even a third of the power that the artifact was demonstrating right now. While Ian’s lightning had covered only the very edges of his saber’s blades, the entire, gigantic blade was now surging with wild lightning.
The ‘Thunder God’s Sword’ was much faster than the ‘Dead River Slash’. Hadjar only saw a yellow flash before the power of the deadly Technique attacked him.
The spectators saw the enormous lightning bolt strike the pillar of black energy. It buckled, shook, and ended up covered in a web of white cracks, but it withstood the attack. However, while the previous Technique used by the artifact had retreated, the ‘Thunder God’s Sword’ only became more vicious.
“This is almost like… The level of a Heaven Knight?” Jean whispered, trying to define this oddly powerful attack that seemed to be bending the rules.
Technically, the exam rules hadn’t been violated. The amount of pressure wasn’t exactly equal to the Spirit Knight level, but the quality of it had clearly increased, bordering on that. The lightning had become denser, brighter, and the sparks no longer flew everywhere, but like a swarm of terrible insects, surged right into the cracks along the black pillar. Suddenly, Hadjar’s eyes flashed.
“So that’s it,” he said.
The spectators, who had managed to pick up their discarded betting slips by now, leaned forward again, forgetting everything else. The examinee suddenly transformed, but it wasn’t his appearance or Call that changed. Rather, it was the aura that the young man exuded. Earlier, everyone had been sure that he was a commoner — his shabby, cheap clothes and worthless artifact sword had screamed that this man was originally from a very far region of the vast Empire. And now… something had changed.
His clothes no longer looked like cheap rags. His worthless artifact sword that any blacksmith would’ve hesitated to even melt into a bar of metal seemed like a very formidable weapon.
Hadjar, immersed in the World River, suddenly realized that he no longer felt the pressure of the Sword Spirit. Or rather, it wasn’t as strong as before. He dashed forward, then kept going when nothing stopped him, and finally hit a wall. If Hadjar had taken even one more step toward the star that represented the Sword, he would’ve instantly been destroyed. However, even this much progress was enough to make all the mysteries and secrets of the Sword Spirit that he’d realized after mastering the Sword's Heart merge into one.
“What?”
The black pillar suddenly began to shrink and thicken. Many people threw their slips away again. The ‘Thunder God’s Sword’ wrapped itself around the black pillar of energy.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” the shocked Jean said. “If he survives, I will personally speak to Mentor Orune. Such a swordsman shouldn’t be wasted among ordinary disciples.”
What Jean saw was invisible to the rest of the audience. All they could see was the artifact gradually absorbing the remnants of the black energy. It seemed to them like the examinee was about to disappear in a flash of lightning. Instead, remaining absolutely silent, the black pillar suddenly flashed with power. The Black Blade swooped down to meet the lightning sword. It wasn’t very big, but, after only a second of clashing with the lightning, it cut through the latter with ease. Without stopping, the Black Blade sliced through the air and almost struck the artifact itself. The hieroglyph inside the sphere flashed. The sword in the sky disappeared, and was replaced by a wave of unbridled, pure energy rushing toward Hadjar.
“That’s enough!”
The Mentor’s command contained so much power that the spectators were shaken. The tsunami of power, as if resisting his command, still tried to reach Hadjar, but was inexorably drawn back into the artifact. After a couple of seconds, only Hadjar remained on the broken platform. Blood ran down his body, and there were several deep wounds on his chest, but his blue eyes were still firm. He hadn’t moved. His hands hadn’t left his knees. He hadn’t unsheathed his sword or summoned the Black Blade into the physical world. All he’d needed to repel and then destroy a Heaven level Technique equal to the peak of the Heaven Soldier level, and even a bit beyond it, had been his knowledge of the Way of the Sword Spirit.
“They made it impossible for me to become a Lord,” Hadjar growled quietly, “but that won’t stop me. I’m sure you’re somewhere around here, messenger of the gods. You can tell them that Hadjar Darkhan will come for them anyway.”
Chapter 488
“I’ve seen a lot of things in my life, disciple Hadjar, but that was truly incredible.” Mentor Jean spoke from the heart for once. He usually praised them simply because he thought that the disciples of the outer circle had a hard life. “Never before has that artifact been defeated by just the power of one’s Spirit. I promise you that as soon as the swordsmen’s Mentor, Lord Orune, returns from his solitary training, I’ll discuss what happened here today with him.”
A murmur of approval swept through the crowd. After seeing their ‘comrade’, a fellow ordinary disciple, do so well in the exam, the hearts of many other cultivators burned with the flame of excitement and a desire to fight for their own advancement.
Mentor Orune, who had secluded himself a year ago in a remote cave where he had been planning to finish his own Technique, had a bad reputation. He didn’t have any prestige among the other Mentors and Masters. Not because of his weakness. On the contrary, Orune was one of the ten strongest warriors in the whole Empire. He simply had a very bad temper. He’d never taught anyone unless he was certain that the disciple had an abundance of talent. In other words, he was rarely seen on the territory of ‘The Holy Sky’ School. In the span of a thousand years, he’d accepted only two personal disciples. Those two had left the School long ago to go on a journey and had never been heard from again.
“Thank you, honorable Mentor Jean.” Hadjar saluted and bowed low.
The wound on his chest had been covered up with a special ointment and the bleeding had been stopped by a special pill that he’d prepared in advance.
“Your Technique for Strengthening the Body is rather good.” Jean added. “If not for it, I don’t
think your... training would’ve been successful.”
Hadjar didn’t bother to explain that his Technique for Strengthening the Body had been made redundant back when he’d advanced to the Transformation level. The artifact hadn’t sent him to his forefathers only because the heart of his venerable ancestor, the dragon Traves, had helped him survive.
“I think that after such a demonstration of power, the second phase of the exam won’t be very difficult for you.”
Hadjar mumbled something unintelligible in response. He couldn’t take his eyes off the platform, which was gradually restoring itself. Of course, he had already seen dozens of different spells that could repair something. They were popular in Underworld City and in the Sea of Sand. However, those had actually repaired something. Here, it was as if someone had videoed the last few minutes and was now rewinding the recording. All the damage seemed to flow backward and almost disappear back into the artifact.
“How is that possible?” Hadjar and Einen croaked in unison.
“The Time Spirit.” The Mentor replied, as if that were a common occurrence. “There are mysteries of the Time Spirit in any shield-spell of this level.”
Hadjar swallowed noisily. What kind of person... no, what kind of monster had created ‘The Holy Sky’ School if he’d been able to cast a spell that freely controlled time itself! Even if it was limited to a contained, separate piece of space, it was still controlling time itself, damn it!
“Don’t think about questions that you can’t answer.” The Mentor said with a slight smile. Every time someone saw shield-spells for the first time, their faces showed exactly the same emotions: a mixture of surprise and denial. “No one currently living in the Empire has gotten anywhere close to the level of the founder of our School.”
Hadjar looked down at his hands. After consolidating his knowledge about the mysteries of the Way of the Sword Spirit, he’d felt like he had taken another step on the path of cultivation. Apparently, it had been a tiny one. Even so, no matter how far he still had to go, he would walk that path with honor.
“The second part of the exam is a battle.” The Mentor said, waving his hand in a sweeping gesture. The hieroglyph inside the artifact flashed in the dark. Instead of a tsunami of power, it conjured several pillars of energy on the platform. When they disappeared, five human-like stone golems were left behind. “You need to defeat these constructs. Each of them has the power of a peak Heaven Soldier.”
Hadjar arched his right eyebrow skeptically. His last test seemed more difficult. Of course, if he’d drawn his blade, he could’ve easily dealt with it, but even so…
Golems? This would be easy!
“Wait, don’t be in such a hurry,” Jean said, stopping Hadjar as he started for the stairs. “There are some additional rules in this test.”
“What rules, honorable Mentor?”
“You can’t use more than two attacks to destroy each golem. If at least one of them touches you, you will immediately fail the exam.”
Hadjar nodded. The test seemed a lot more difficult now.
“You have time to prepare, just like last time.”
When he returned to the platform, Hadjar, shocking not only the spectators, but also Mentor Jean, sat down in the lotus position and put his blade in front of him.
Waves of whispers erupted all across the stands.
“Is he crazy?”
“Maybe his understanding of the Sword Spirit is on par with the inner circle disciples, but fighting against five golems isn’t the same as facing a single Technique!”
“Don’t forget that he is one of the people who returned from the Valley of Swamps! That means he survived the battle against the disciples of the ‘Meltwater’ and ‘Quick Dream’ Schools!”
“Damn it, you’re right! I think I made the wrong bet.”
Hadjar didn’t hear the spectators’ conversations. He was sinking back into the World River. This time, his gaze wasn’t directed at the star of the Sword Spirit, but at the depths of his own consciousness. He felt that it was absolutely necessary for him to meditate on the image of the Black General. Opening the scroll in his mind — only the memory of the real manuscript — he looked at the attack made by his distant ancestor. Still dealing with the same deadly pressure from before, he couldn’t figure out what he was missing. The answer, the key to the mystery of this sword strike, seemed to be waiting on the surface, but Hadjar couldn’t see it. Well, the fact that Hadjar had finally been able to discover that the image even contained some kind of secret was real progress. It wasn’t a simple Technique in the usual sense. The scroll contained something quite different.
“Begin!” Mentor Jean ordered.
The spectators didn’t have time to gasp, Jean didn’t have time to utter a curse, and the golems didn’t even get a chance to move. Shards of stone landed noisily on the platform. Bouncing along the elastic material, they rolled to the edges of the shield-spell. Hadjar, still sitting in the lotus position, mentally dispelled the Black Blade.
“With one attack... Five golems... Mentor Orune will definitely be interested in this disciple.”
The Mentor was the first to recover. However, even he could hardly believe what he’d just seen. With just one slash, a disciple of the outer circle had created a long crescent, not as dense or defined as Tom’s and Anise’s, but for a commoner, this was an indicator of unprecedented talent. The crescent hadn’t been gray, as it usually was for ordinary swordsmen, but black, and it had easily broken all five constructs.
“One blow...” The spectators whispered.
“Five golems at the peak Heaven Soldier level. Gone…”
“Damn it all…”
“Is he really an ordinary disciple? Are we being deceived right now?”
Everyone was whispering about something, and only a few people remained calm. One of them looked at Hadjar with interest. Another — with approval. The third was disgusted, and the fourth had so many emotions flitting across his face that it was almost impossible to understand what he was thinking.
Anyway, Hadjar had passed his advancement exam.
“Congratulations on successfully overcoming all the challenges. You are now a fully-fledged disciple of ‘The Holy Sky’ School, Hadjar Darkhan.”
Chapter 489
Hadjar received a gold token after handing his silver one over to Mentor Jean, who had brought two fully-fledged disciple tokens to the exam with him, as per regulation.
“I wonder how your friend will handle the test.”
Surprisingly, Jean actually looked interested in what was happening. Hadjar’s performance had impressed him greatly and he hoped that the friend of such an outstanding person would also turn out to be someone worth keeping an eye on.
“Again?”
“Maybe they’re both crazy.”
“No, they probably found some special Technique!”
Hadjar, who was able to hear all the conversations perfectly this time, only smiled. He was well aware that Einen wouldn’t miss an opportunity to train for free. Especially when ‘The Holy Sky’ School had been so kind as to provide the best possible Technique for him to train with and had even created ideal conditions.
The islander, following his friend’s example, had placed his spear-staff in front of him and then sat down in a lotus position. He always kept his eyes nearly closed, so that part didn’t look as impressive as Hadjar closing his eyes had.
“Begin!” The Mentor ordered.
From the outside, the exam was even more exciting than when Hadjar himself had been in the arena.
He could hear the spectators’ voices as they discussed the action unfolding on the platform and he could observe the artifact carefully. Once again, obeying the Mentor’s command, a cloud of power shot out of the sphere that had a hieroglyph enclosed within it. It was pristine and pure. It was easy to imagine what such a concentration of energy could’ve done to a simple practitioner. Furthermore, none of the cultivators Hadjar knew, including the Lords, could’v
e resisted this kind of power. He now understood this even more clearly than before.
“Technique!”
After the second command, the cloud began to thicken, until it assumed the form of a spear-staff, one of the rarest weapons. In all his life, he had only met a single wielder of such a weapon, and that was Einen. Well, him and Traves, but he had been a dragon, so that didn’t count.
“What a strange Technique!”
“I have no idea what that is!”
“I’ve never seen anything like it!”
Hadjar watched the spear-staff assume the form of a winged serpent. The energy and mysteries of the Spear-Staff Spirit circling around the weapon created from pure power turned into a wild monster.
“Damn it,” Hadjar breathed out.
Even through the spell-shield, he could feel the incredible pressure of the Technique. He didn’t think even high level, full plate armor could’ve protected him from that serpent.
The unknown Technique had such a lethal, hidden speed and piercing power that even Emperor level armor was like a simple sheet of iron before it.
Einen didn’t move.
Still sitting in the lotus position, he raised his hand in front of him. A vortex of rainbow energy swirled around it, gleaming like fish scales in the sun.
The Serpent Technique flapped its wings and soared into the sky. Its movements radiated feather-shaped echoes. They easily pierced the platform and burrowed three feet into the ground, hitting the shield and causing it to flash with energy before burning them up.
The Technique swirled in the air, coiling as it got ready to strike. On top of everything else, it could attack from any angle, making it almost impossible to predict.
The moment of impact went by too quickly for any of the audience to see, except Mentor Jean himself. Everything happened so fast that simple cultivators couldn’t keep up. One moment, the Technique had been hovering over Einen’s head, and the next — the spear-fangs of the serpent were digging into the rainbow pillar of power that surrounded the islander.
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