On the arena stage of the Xuantian Sword Sect’s grand tournament—
Annette Misthollow stood in plain blue robes, clean and sharp. Her brows lifted like drawn blades. Her face was bare of powder, bare of feeling too.
Her wrist turned.
Another sword seal slashed out.
The woman opposite her, a pretty young cultivator in goose-yellow skirts, was driven straight from the middle of the stage to the very edge. Step by step, breath by breath, she was forced back till her heels were nearly hanging over empty air.
Today, Annette did not give way.
Not one bit.
Every strike was hard. Clean. Decisive.
The girl across from her was crushed so badly she could barely lift a hand to answer. One more move, maybe two, and she would fall from the stage.
The result was already clear.
Then—
A streak of sword light ripped through the air from the high viewing platform where the sect elders sat.
It tore straight through the barrier above the arena and drove down into Annette’s chest.
Right through the heart.
The whole sect burst into uproar.
Annette lowered her head, disbelief frozen in her eyes as she looked at the blade buried in her chest.
This sword—
She knew it too well.
It was her master Edric Witherspoon’s natal spirit sword.
Lingtian Sword.
Across from her stood the one who had called that sword here—the sweet-faced female cultivator in yellow.
Rosalynn Deepvale.
Her master’s second disciple.
Her junior sister.
A natal spirit sword could only be controlled by its owner, or by one bound to that owner in true accord—heart to heart, life to life. To put it plain, aside from the sword’s master, only that master’s dao companion could command it.
Master and junior sister?
Blood kept pouring from Annette’s chest, hot and thick. She could not believe it.
Yet she had no choice but to believe.
Her master and her junior sister had long since forged a life-and-death bond in secret.
They were already dao companions.
A black hem swept across the air.
A figure drifted down onto the arena.
But he did not spare even half a glance for the one lying there wounded.
Instead, he went straight to the edge of the stage and gathered the panicked girl there into his arms, his movements gentle, his face full of concern.
“Master… Fuyao didn’t mean it. I really didn’t think I’d hurt Senior Sister…”
“I was being pinned down by Senior Sister the whole time. I only kept thinking I couldn’t fall off the arena, couldn’t let Master down. I never thought that, in a panic, I’d actually call Master’s Lingtian Sword to fight for me… and wound Senior Sister.”
“It’s not your fault. The Lingtian Sword was meant to protect you. Your Senior Sister was the one who struck too hard.”
“Master, don’t blame Senior Sister either. She just wanted to win too badly. You know how she is. She’s always been so hungry to come out on top…”
Above them, the barrier had long since sealed shut again the moment the man across from her stepped onto the arena. It cut off every gaze, every sound from outside.
The two of them held each other close.
Neither of them spared so much as a glance for the eldest disciple—their Senior Sister—who was still skewered by the sword.
The pain came late.
Then it hit all at once, savage and deep, ripping through Annette Misthollow’s whole body. It hurt so badly she went numb. And under that numbness, something colder rose from the bottom of her heart.
Absurd.
Too absurd.
The absurd ones were them.
The laughable one was her.
Everything that happened today had shown signs long ago. The trail had been there from the start. She had just been too blind, too stubborn, too foolish to see it.
Back then, she had entered the sect and spent five full years on Lingxiao Peak, working without complaint, handling every burden, every loose end, every thankless chore. Only after those five years did Edric Witherspoon finally come out of seclusion and formally accept her with a proper disciple ceremony.
And on that very same day, he took one look at the little junior sister who had come for the entrance examination and broke the rules to take Rosalynn Deepvale in as a disciple too.
What should have been Annette’s ceremony, what should have belonged to her alone, was split in half on the spot.
From then on, she trained hard, studied hard, cultivated with everything she had.
Edric Witherspoon rarely gave her guidance.
She wore herself out dealing with all the trouble the disciples of Lingxiao Peak ran into, and he never once gave her a word of praise.
Yet every time he returned from outside the sect, he always brought gifts back for Rosalynn Deepvale.
There was one time in particular.
He brought back more than a dozen treasures. Among them was a sword tassel set with defensive runes. Annette had liked it at first glance. Truly liked it.