Volume Two: The Mortal World Chapter Seventy-Four: The Woman Who Bears the Weight of All Humanity

She stood behind the massive iron sword.

Even wrapped in a thick, heavy cotton coat, it was clear she was a slender woman. Her delicate hand, gripping the weighty blade, was traced with faint blue veins from the strain. Yet this frail figure—shabby cloak, wild hair, heavy sword—stood in the wind and snow like a crouching beast, gazing indifferently at the so-called immortal before her.

The chill of murderous intent swept aside the drifting snow, making the richly dressed man before her feel as if needles were pricking his entire body.

“No, you can’t kill me! Any who defy an immortal—will see their entire clan exterminated!”

Under the suffocating killing intent, the man in fine clothes couldn’t muster the will to resist. He shook his head and retreated step by step, voice raised in a desperate attempt at intimidation.

But the woman in the tattered cloak only regarded him coldly, her voice clear and detached. “My entire clan has already been slaughtered. No matter what, I will kill you.”

The man’s face turned deathly pale. The terror in his eyes was swiftly overtaken by the madness of one pushed to the brink.

“I’ve learned immortal arts myself! It’s you who should die!”

Wild-eyed, he stared at her, hastily forming seals with his fingers. The falling snow around them suddenly surged and swirled with his incantation.

The woman’s gaze dropped to the ground. With a muffled crack, her right foot shattered the thick snow beneath her, and she lunged forward in a crouch.

With a resonant clang, the heavy sword flew up with her movement, smashing ahead, twin black shadows tearing through the blizzard, aimed straight at the man in elegant robes.

“Thousand Thorns!”

He completed his incantation, bellowing in rage. Pale blue light spread rapidly from beneath his feet, and the wind and snow howled more fiercely. Countless razor-sharp icicles erupted from the ground before the woman and her sword.

For a brief moment, the slender woman’s charge slowed, while the heavy sword hurtled forward at full speed, overtaking her. She reached out her thin hand, grasping the sword’s hilt; as her fingers closed around it, she swung. The massive blade became a storm of blackness, swirling around her.

Clang. Clang. Clang...

A rapid, crystalline din rang out as sword met ice thorns, the blade shattering the icicles into a spray of fragments.

Then, again side by side with her sword, the woman charged forward, coming within thirty feet of the man in fine clothes.

Even in the raging snow, sweat beaded on the man’s brow. He retreated rapidly, hands ceaselessly weaving new spells.

More and more densely packed ice thorns sprang up before her, and behind her the snow shivered—dozens of long, snow-formed arms burst from the ground, reaching for the slender woman.

Her fierce assault suddenly changed. She still moved forward, but her steps, once straight and forceful, became light and elusive, her form swaying with the wind and snow.

At the same time, she stretched out her slender hand, fingers splayed as if plucking at a zither, flicking one by one across the blade.

Whoosh—

The snow-arms whistled toward her from every direction, but she seemed a butterfly weaving through a blizzard, gliding onward.

The heavy iron sword was not in her hand, but responded nimbly to her touch, darting like a fish among the ice and snow-arms.

Step by step, she advanced, spinning atop the ice thorns, even climbing the flailing snow-arms to rise above the man in fine robes, her cold, distant gaze full of killing intent as she looked down upon his face, twisted in despair and madness.

She reached out, seized the iron sword that circled her, and in that instant the snow-arms below her, directed by the man’s spells, collapsed completely. She plummeted toward the man, sword in hand.

“No!”

He screamed in hysteria, staring up at the descending blade. Blood suddenly gushed from his nose, mouth, and ears, while blue light flared beneath his feet.

Splat. Splat.

From the snow behind him, a dozen snow-arms surged up to block the falling sword, while a similar number swept toward the woman from behind.

She watched without changing expression. On the second heartbeat after grasping her sword, she crashed into the snow-arms before her, cleaving them apart in a flurry of snowflakes.

More snow-arms lunged from behind, but her blade was already poised above the man’s head. He howled in rage, blood spurting faster from his wounds as layer upon layer of ice shields formed between him and the sword.

The third heartbeat.

Suddenly, the black iron sword glowed with a deep, searing red, smashing down upon the shields, shattering them to dust, sending the man flying backward, his body breaking apart in the air and leaving a trail of blood across the snow before crashing to the ground.

Snow billowed high, settling once more.

Beneath the white, blood flowed in crimson rivulets, spreading and blooming like a sinister flower upon the snow.

With a heavy thud, the slender woman planted the iron sword into the snow again, sending up a cloud of powder.

Silence fell over the battlefield.

No applause. No cheers. No thanks.

She bowed her head slightly amid the drifting snow-dust, facing the old beggar who sat not far away, staring indifferently at the dim sky. Her face, half hidden by tangled hair, was smeared with snow and dirt, unreadable.

The old beggar seemed finally to have tired of the unchanging sky. He lowered his gaze to the dirty, disheveled woman standing silently by the heavy sword.

She seemed to be waiting for something. As she felt his eyes upon her, her body tensed involuntarily.

“Hahaha.” Suddenly, the old beggar burst out in manic laughter, pointing at the sky and then the earth, cursing loudly.

“Useless! All of you are useless!”

“Making the Emperor’s sword as dainty as an embroidery needle—useless! Even struggling to face a mere beginner in immortal arts—useless!”

“Hahaha! The Way of Martial Arts?”

He scrambled up from the snow, laughing wildly, stumbled, and turned to walk into the swirling blizzard.

Even hunched, his towering figure was apparent.

This once-mighty, now aged man laughed maniacally as he staggered through the snow.

“The Way of Martial Arts? The Human Emperor is dead, the Way of Martial Arts is dead, and this mortal world... is nearly dead as well.”

His swaying figure left a winding trail of chaotic footprints in the snow.

The woman in the tattered cotton coat slowly drew the heavy sword from the ground, slung it across her back, and wrapped her scarf higher to cover half her face against the wind and snow.

Then, step by step, she followed the old beggar’s fading figure into the distance.

At first, her footsteps left ordinary prints in the snow. But as time passed, each step pressed deeper, until each stride sent a shuddering tremor through the ground, accompanied by a muffled rumble.

The greatsword named "Mortal Realm" on her back quivered with each movement.

Behind her, all was silent. Only a few pairs of terrified, shocked eyes followed her departing form.

No applause. No cheers. No thanks.

Any mortal who slew an immortal became the world’s greatest criminal, dooming their entire clan to destruction.

...

“And after that?”

“You say there were no more martial heroes, no more swordsmen? Why?”

On the bed, Ye Mingke leaned forward anxiously, his eyes fixed on the heavy sorrow in Li Han’s face.

“The Sword Offering at Yangjing was the last resistance of mortals against the Edict of Immortal Reverence. After that, there were no more tales of heroes gathering to challenge the immortal scourge.”

Li Han shook his head with a bitter smile and sighed.

“Heh, the Sword Offering at Yangjing—that’s just the name I gave it. The official account from the court was that it was a gathering of bandits causing chaos in the capital.

I doubt it will ever be recorded in the official histories. Even among those present that year, who still remembers?

After all, when the authorities hunted down the heroes who had scattered through the city, it was the common people who played the greatest part in their capture. People always forget their own evil quickly—it’s the only way to live.”

Li Han’s face darkened as if recalling some old, bitter memory.

“The common people? The arrests?” Ye Mingke echoed the words, asking heavily, though he could already guess the reason.

“The Sword Offering at Vermilion Bird Gate was doomed to fail. The mortal heroes took the immortals by surprise, but once the immortals in the capital rallied, the heroes could not withstand them. Most were killed or wounded. Only a few escaped into the city’s alleys.

Afterward, the city was scoured. It’s said all the heroes were quickly denounced, captured, and executed with their clans, none escaping.

In the ten years that followed, the martial world lost its greatest champions, and the imperial court increased its persecution of martial artists. Mortal heroes faded into silence.

Meanwhile, the immortal sects grew ever more powerful and ruthless. The immortal scourge worsened. Who knows how many suffering under it now remember that, when the Edict was first proclaimed, there was once a band of heroes who fought for the mortal world?”

Li Han finished his tale, his voice heavy with sorrow.

“They’ve all forgotten, I suppose. Even I, who witnessed it with my own eyes—who would believe now that mere mortals could stand against the immortals?”

He stared blankly at the pages of a book fluttering in the cold wind, murmuring to himself.

...

“How can you believe?”

With heavy sword on her back and footsteps echoing dully, the woman in the threadbare coat looked ahead to the stooped figure, her voice hoarse.

But the hunched figure simply stumbled forward, never looking back.