It was a grueling battle. On the plain, two armies charged at each other, the battlefield transforming into a meat grinder. Long swords shattered one after another, their light dimming, and across the field, hundreds of thousands of swords clashed without cease.
One army was led by Yang Kai, and the other was commanded by another Gold Sword.
He had previously seized six outposts and assembled an army of three hundred thousand under his banner. It had taken four months of effort to locate a single Gold Vein, and after Yang Kai devoured the energy within it, he had successfully advanced to the Gold Sword rank.
That kind of efficiency was far too low. Who knew how long it would take to find the next Gold Vein. If Yang Kai wanted to continue strengthening himself, he naturally had no better option than to seek out trouble with other Gold Swords.
In this world of swords, Gold Swords were not especially numerous. Scout teams were dispatched one after another, and it took a full month before a single one was located.
There was nothing to deliberate over. Yang Kai mustered his forces without hesitation and launched his assault directly.
Hundreds of thousands of swords clashed in furious battle, the fighting blazing with intensity. Swords were constantly being destroyed, and just as constantly, swords absorbed enough energy to advance on the spot to higher tiers.
But the true deciding factor lay not among them—it was in the battlefield high above.
In the heights, two Gold Swords wove back and forth in dizzying trajectories, their blades dancing through the ninth heaven. Golden sword qi cleaved through the void, energy crisscrossing in every direction. Both swords moved at terrifying speeds, though one was unmistakably brighter in luster while the other was somewhat duller.
Down in the battlefield, Lang Qingshan craned his gaze upward, tracking the movements of the slightly dimmer Gold Sword. That was Yang Kai's transformed Gold Sword, and having only just advanced, it naturally could not compare to an established veteran Gold Sword. Whether in the toughness of its blade, the sharpness of its edge, or the might of the sword light it unleashed, it fell short of its opponent.
But he now possessed the qualifications to contend with a Gold Sword!
He would never again be powerless in the face of one, as he had been before.
And as long as he held those qualifications, he stood a real chance of claiming victory. This was precisely the reason he had dared to launch a brazen assault on the army led by a Gold Sword.
Yang Kai was keenly aware of his own shortcomings, and so from the very start he fought with reckless, all-or-nothing ferocity. The Gold Sword had likely not expected Yang Kai to be so savage, and despite its superior foundation, it was thrown off balance by the onslaught.
Still, it held the advantage in raw capital. Once it steadied itself and launched a counterattack, Yang Kai was put on the back foot repeatedly, taking hit after hit.
Over the course of half a day, nicks and chips had appeared across Yang Kai's blade. His opponent was in no better shape, but its condition was noticeably superior—every exchange saw Yang Kai inflict eight hundred points of damage while suffering a thousand in return.
If this continued, he would surely perish here. Yet even knowing this, he had no intention of changing his approach. He carried on as before.
Another hour passed, and the Gold Sword unexpectedly pivoted its blade and dove toward the lower battlefield. It still had the strength to fight, and its condition was better than Yang Kai's, but it too had sustained damage. To mend its wounds, the best method was to slay the swords on the battlefield and devour their power.
Yang Kai's eyes lit up, and he bellowed, "Qingshan!"
He had been waiting for this very opportunity, and at last it had arrived.
Through nearly a year of constant warfare, he had discovered that these swords were creatures terrified of death. Once their injuries exceeded a certain threshold, they would prioritize repairing themselves, only fighting to the bitter end when they had absolutely no other choice.
This Gold Sword's actions indicated that its damage had already reached that critical level.
In the span of a few breaths, the Gold Sword closed in on the battlefield. Its blade turned, and a sweep of golden sword qi slashed down into the dense formation of swords below, engulfing a vast area without distinguishing friend from foe.
This golden sword qi was incomparably sharp—nothing beneath the Gold Sword's rank could hope to withstand it.
"Not a chance!" Lang Qingshan roared, his face set in grim determination on the flat of his blade. Behind him, more than thirty Silver Swords charged forward in a grand procession with him at the forefront.
This was a squad specifically assembled to handle precisely this kind of situation. Every Silver Sword in the group had cultivated to the peak of its rank—one drop of Gold Liquid was all they needed to advance.
Beams of silver sword qi lanced out from the Silver Swords, transforming into over thirty streaks of radiance like bolts of silk that met the golden sword qi head-on.
Booming thunder rang out—
Gold collided with silver, and the silver shattered. The golden blade's glow dimmed ever so slightly.
Silver sword qi could not compare to golden sword qi, but when over thirty beams struck simultaneously, they could at least erode some of its might.
Hissing, tearing sounds—
Lang Qingshan led his Silver Sword squad in a second volley, then a third!
Three consecutive strikes, nearly a hundred beams of silver sword qi in total, were crushed by the golden sword qi. But the golden sword qi's power had been ground away by more than half, its luster considerably fainter than before.
There was no time for another volley. Lang Qingshan did not hesitate for an instant—he ordered the Silver Swords behind him to scatter in every direction, not daring to face the blow head-on.
Even with over half its power eroded, the golden sword qi was still far beyond what Silver Swords could withstand. A direct hit would mean utter annihilation.
Just as the golden sword qi was about to carve into the sword formation, another beam of golden sword qi lashed out from the side, slamming straight into the first and shattering it apart. The residual force carried onward, crashing into the sword formation.
In a single instant, thousands of swords were destroyed. Thousands of streams of light erupted from the wreckage and surged into Yang Kai's body. The damage across his blade began mending at once, slowly but surely.