I swing my sword.
Holding the grudges of the past, envisioning the future we first dreamed of together, I swing my sword with a heart that has swallowed all of this.
Though the blade is broken, a pale white—as if forged by melting moonlight—clearly exists, tracing an elegant arc beneath the dark sky.
One might call it a leisurely sword path. But it was already carving into the Heavenly Demon's chest.
"Dangerous."
Realizing the sword had accelerated half a beat late, the Heavenly Demon swung both arms wide, striking the blade from both sides.
CRACK!
Though greatly weakened, the force behind it still far surpassed mine, and my sword shattered.
But it didn't matter. From the start, I had forged a blade from will upon a broken sword.
Whenever I fell and faltered, there was always someone by my side. Thanks to them, I could rise again.
So it didn't matter that the sword broke. It didn't matter that my will had been bent, unable to overcome the Heavenly Demon's.
All I had to do was raise it again.
Wooong—
The shattered blade, scattering into pieces, let out a familiar hum as it regained its original form.
The Heavenly Demon's fist struck through that brief moment.
The demon's fist, larger than my own body, filled my entire vision—a truly overwhelming sight.
Yet I calmly took my stance.
This was a fist honed by several Harmony Realm martial artists who had formed a connection with me. This much, I could handle with my own strength alone.
I swung my sword, carrying the expectations people had placed upon me.
KWAANG!
The Heavenly Demon's fist and my sword collided head-on. The energy wave that burst forth with a thunderous roar carved into the ground, shattering everything around us.
But this time, unlike before, the white blade held firm without breaking.
It was only natural—last time, I had infused my Intent with the desire to cut swiftly; this time, I infused it with the will to block solidly.
The Heavenly Demon, who should have been far better at handling Intent than I was, furrowed his brow as if he could not understand.
"I cannot fathom what trick this is. A rotation that is both strong and heavy? Yet, that which is firm and heavy should yield to that which is stronger and heavier."
"I cannot retreat here. Countless people are watching my back, and I too wish to move forward. That is why I can block."
"…Well, it matters not. Even if I cannot exert my full power, I can still handle a single Sword Demon like you."
With those words, the Heavenly Demon's body seemed to crouch for a moment, then sprang forth with explosive Aura, rapidly thrusting out his fists. And he did so in succession.
It was as if an ink-colored flower made of fists was blooming before my eyes.
I could tell at a glance. The crouched posture brought forth the Mystery of the Diancang Sect's Sa-il Sword Technique, and the blossoming of the flamboyant Fist Strikes was the Mystery of Huashan, dyed into Demonic Qi.
Originally, it was a righteous cause—to bring down the nine suns that troubled the world for the sake of the people. A praise of life that, even as it blooms and withers, blooms ever more brilliantly come the next year.
The Demonic Qi had corrupted the Heavenly Demon's mental image, emitting a sticky, clinging malevolence.
It bound, it crushed, and thus it dragged down.
The more one flailed, the stronger and more complex the clinging malice became—it seemed as though no one could shake it off.
And yet, I swung my sword.
The only reason I could stand here and wield my blade was because of the martial artists of the Orthodox-Unorthodox Alliance, who were keeping the Demonic Cultists at bay so that the Heavenly Demon and I could focus entirely on each other.
Even if I could not accomplish this alone, surely it could be reached if many hands joined together.
If they had shown me their devotion, then it was only right that I answered with my own devotion in return.
The tip of my sword, which began with a simple horizontal slash, trembled lightly before tracing dozens of arcs and seizing control of the entire plane.
The petals of Demonic Qi I had bloomed alone shot out like arrows, but dozens of different trajectories that began from a single sword pierced through them and brought them down.
The noble flow that continued without end, the fierce strike that crashed down like lightning, the arrogant sky that sought to melt every sword in the world into its own, the stubbornness that wished to become a sword itself.
Every sword I had ever seen. The sword's intent contained within them unfolded through my hands.
The heart is something that can be given and received. If so, then surely the remnants left by other swordsmen must be sleeping within me.
All I did was awaken them—a simple task.
The countless swords I had witnessed while traveling through numerous sword sects simultaneously embroidered the air, then scattered along with the fragments of Aura that had been cut and shattered.
The Protective Qi, which had visibly diminished from the Exchange just now. The Heavenly Demon's face, always so composed, hardened stiffly.
The Heavenly Demon Divine Art remained overwhelming. Though the size of the Aura had shrunk as his internal energy waned, it was still several times greater than mine.
The Aura forged from Demonic Qi is more powerful than any martial art I know.
Moreover, every technique the Heavenly Demon unleashes with his hands and feet contains a Mystery worthy of a secret art.
Simple strength.
That was the martial path the Heavenly Demon had built all along—a grudge that had reached the heavens.
But that alone cannot bring me down. It is a simple and obvious fact.
Unfortunately, the Heavenly Demon seems to have realized that reason as well.
"…I see."
"What do you mean?"
"It seems I have not been looking at you, Sword Demon, all this time."
"Huh?"
"What I have been seeing is my own past. All my senses have been focused on the heavens beyond you. It is only natural that I could not deal with one who rushes at me with the sole intent of cutting me down."
"…"
That was right. The Heavenly Demon… the Heavenly Demon Divine Art had clearly surpassed my power. In normal circumstances, even if I did not fall by now, I would have suffered wounds both large and small.
But the Heavenly Demon had only broken my sword a few times, without inflicting any clear damage.
Rather, he had to watch his own Aura being sliced away in chunks.
There was no helping it—a fist thrown without properly seeing what it should strike loses its strength.
"From this moment on, everything I possess will be used to strike you down, Sword Demon… no, White Moon Sword Lord."
"A man's attention is a bit burdensome."
Ignoring my sneer, the Heavenly Demon took his stance. The form of a demonic spirit rose above his body.
A form created by fusing Force Qi Skill with Protective Qi, swelling it large and powerful—compressed again and again.
This was not a martial art meant to bring down the living natural disasters and divine beasts he had faced before.
Nor was it a martial art meant to shatter the heavens that had bound him in the shackles of the endless abyss, and open a new sky.
It was a martial art meant to fight a person.
More precisely, it was him tearing himself apart and rebuilding, all to break the wall named "me" that stood in his way at this very moment.
Crack.
With a sound of something being crushed, the mass of Aura—which, despite being shaved down again and again, had remained as large as an old tree—was compressed until it just barely covered the Heavenly Demon's body.
The overall form of the demon was still the same, but it no longer felt as imposing as the mural of the Heavenly Demon Hall.
Firm fists and sharp claws. Legs built to kick off the ground swiftly and to press down on an opponent… A form slightly closer to human.
However, the new demon's face wore an expression more inhuman than anyone else's.
"I admit it. You, White Moon Sword Lord, are the final obstacle standing in my way."
"That's quite an honor, then."
With that brief exchange, the Heavenly Demon's body vanished from sight in an instant. No—it was a footwork so swift that it merely seemed that way.
KWAANG!
The earth-shattering roar rang out belatedly. The Heavenly Demon, already right before my eyes, brought down a tightly clenched fist.
Perhaps because I had realized it was meaningless. After countless regressions, there was none of the flashy, complex mysteries of the various sects I had learned.
An attack that carried only the simple, clear purpose of bringing me down.
A movement meant solely to gauge me and defeat me—just like when I once faced a Spirit Beast that devoured my family's corpses with a body that had nothing to its name.
I swung my sword to meet the Heavenly Demon, who exuded a certain desperation.
CRACK! SNAP! KWAANG!
The ink-colored fist and my sword clashed, gnawing at each other, sometimes repelling and bursting with thunderous noise.
The Heavenly Demon still cannot understand my sword. But I, too, can no longer cut through the Heavenly Demon's Aura as I did before, and with each Exchange, I am pushed back a little further.
The shock felt through my sword makes every muscle in my body scream, and my internal organs are rattled, blood rising up through my esophagus.
He does not display any great Mystery, nor does he pour Intent into every single movement like I do. If anything, the Heavenly Demon's movements have become far cruder.
But this is precisely the clothing that suits the Heavenly Demon.
One who has gnawed away at his own heart, now wielding a martial art crafted with someone else's heart poured into it—that is no different from wearing clothes that do not fit.
Having abandoned his existing martial arts and returned to the days when he knew nothing, swinging his arms and kicking out his legs—this is what suits the Heavenly Demon best.
Having lost his means, his process, and even his original purpose, the Heavenly Demon is actually stronger now. At least when facing me.
And so, fists and sword, swung recklessly without any particular Technique, clash again and again.
Was it because they had pushed each other away, denied each other, yet cast aside all useless pretense? Or because they knew each other's pasts all too well?
The trajectory of the fist reaching for him, the movement of the leg striking toward his—from every single motion of the Heavenly Demon, the few things that remained within him flowed forth.
The rage that clawed at his own chest as if to tear the sky apart. The emptiness of not even knowing what he had forgotten, and the hollowness of knowing all of this would repeat for eternity.
A timeline that looped in circles. And the desperate desire to break through that shell and be truly born.
For the first time, the Heavenly Demon looked straight ahead, turning his gaze to face me. His usual expressionless mask was gone, replaced by a twisted scowl as he moved his limbs without pause.
Even if it was merely the remnant of something too faint to be called emotion, dregs that only inflated themselves in idle circulation.
Wasn't that everything the Heavenly Demon had left?
Without a doubt, the Heavenly Demon was throwing his all at me.
…And perhaps I was the same.
Even if the Heavenly Demon couldn't fully understand, he must have at least guessed what lay within my sword.
It was a strange thing.
The more sword and fist clashed, the more time around us seemed to slow.
After thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of regressions, the Heavenly Demon stood in this place.
I had only regressed once, but with countless wishes as my heart, I had raised a body that should have died.
A reckless, almost stubborn technique raked through the air, and a straightforward vertical slash pressed down upon it.
The years he had built himself, and the years I had willingly chosen to bear, collided.
What remains at the end of countless pasts and countless futures is only me and the Heavenly Demon. Only the two regressors.
"Ah."
Without beginning, without end.
In this place, there is neither start nor finish. Only the present exists… only the self swinging one's own sword and fist.
The moment I realize this, the sword—which had grown heavy, grown fast, and sometimes split apart according to the Intent it carried, regardless of posture—comes to an abrupt halt.
If the present is a future that once was, and the present is a past that will someday be.
Then what is my sword, cutting through the present without hesitation?
Seizing the opening of my pause, the Heavenly Demon's Leg Technique lashes out like a whip.
I watched this quietly. And the moment the Heavenly Demon's toes touched my forehead.
Boom!
A sword, swung before I even realized it, strikes away the foot wrapped in Ink Color Aura.
As if sensing something was amiss, the Heavenly Demon's eyes flew wide open. But faster than that, my mind… my Intent burned hot.
Since the heart knows no limits, there is nothing a sword swung by the heart cannot cut.
Future and past are but other names for the present, so they cannot be distinguished from each other.
…Then where is the reason that a single sword cannot cut through the entire world without any distinction?
Where the Heavenly Demon's fist was thrown, the sword had already been swung.
The hand that reached out to grab had long since been knocked askew by a sword blade striking its wrist.
The gap between swords widened and narrowed with each distance adjusted by pushing off the ground.
With a single sword capable of commanding the entire world, I finally knew what name to give my martial art.
"One Sword Under Heaven."
A single sword. Yet an inevitable strike that could neither be dodged nor blocked flew toward the Heavenly Demon.
He was a being who, through countless regressions, possessed the ability and obsession to seize even the most improbable chance so long as it existed.
But before a sword that sealed off every possibility, perhaps there was no way at all.
He paused for a moment, then assumed a conventional—yet undeniable—fist stance that no one could ignore.
The Protective Qi that had enveloped his entire body—all the energy built through the Heavenly Demon Divine Art, and all the power sustained through the Karmic Sin of Killing—concentrated into a single fist.
If the current world denied the existence of the Heavenly Demon, then he would shatter it and open a new world. That was the Heavenly Demon's wish.
"Heavenly Demon, Heaven-Splitting."
Demonic Qi seethed like the pent-up hell of someone long buried, tearing the world apart through its own self-destruction.
And then—
————!
A roar loud enough to ring in the ears. Along with it, the surrounding time, which had seemed frozen, began to flow again.
The white sword and the ink-colored fist, neither fully swung, strained against each other as if locked in a contest of pure strength.
…But perhaps even incomplete martial arts have their differences.
My sword fails to cut through the Heavenly Demon's fist and slowly begins to be pushed back.
Even as I muster my last ounce of strength, all that comes out is a cough tinged with blood.
"Kuhuk…"
"…Impressive. Thanks to you, White Moon Sword Lord, my fist has been able to reach the heavens."
Even knowing it was a meaningless struggle, it was the moment I tried to ignite even my Innate True Qi.
Thump.
Suddenly, my heart pounded violently, as if trying to tell me something.
Before I could even register that sense of unease, a wisp of poison ashes, creeping in as stealthily as a hidden weapon, wrapped around the Heavenly Demon's fist.
Sizzle!
It was a poison that burned even as it melted away the Protective Qi of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art.
"Hah."
I knew exactly whose poison that was.
The Poison Lady. The only woman who had ever wounded the Heavenly Demon before the regression.
And Tang So-wol, who had inherited her legacy, had completed her Bone-Exchange Rebirth and lent a hand.
"Of all times…!"
His face twisted in frustration. This time, it was his turn to try to withdraw his fist, but it was already too late.
Thunk.
The blazing white sword blade melted through the softened Protective Qi, piercing straight through the Heavenly Demon's fist.
Amid the aftermath of the Heavenly Demon's Heaven-Shattering Strike scattering in a storm of Demonic Qi, I curled the corner of my mouth into a grin.
"Heavenly Demon. Do you know my alias?"
"White Moon Sword Lord…"
"No. There's one more."
The sword that cut through the fist, then the arm, and then crossed his upper body, sliced at the Heavenly Demon's neck.
Squelch.
"The Unorthodox Sects' number one."
Even if they had joined forces in a life-and-death duel, there would be no shame in it.
Winning was all that mattered, wasn't it?
The Heavenly Demon's head, spinning through the air, let out a hollow laugh and closed its eyes.