Chapter 125: His Sword, My Sword
Lucian reached into his shadow storage, pulled out a black long-sleeved combat suit, and shrugged it on as he walked toward the crater where Yichen was climbing to his feet. Steam still rose from his body. His silver hair clung to his forehead, damp with condensation.
"You know," he said flatly, buttoning the collar with one hand, "those clothes were quite expensive."
Yichen snarled. Dragon scales rippled across his arms as he planted his feet and raised his fists. "You talk too much."
Lucian charged.
His body became a blur — Light Steps firing in rapid succession, each step leaving a fading afterimage. Yichen swung with a flame-wreathed right hook. Lucian ducked under it, drove his fist into Yichen’s exposed ribs. Crack. The dragon-blooded fighter grunted, staggered. Lucian was already behind him — another punch to the kidney. Crack. Yichen twisted, clawed at Lucian’s face. Lucian caught the clawed hand, bent it backward until something popped, then headbutted Yichen square in the nose.
Boom.
Yichen’s head snapped back. Lucian released his wrist and drove a knee into his stomach. As Yichen doubled over, Lucian grabbed the back of his neck and slammed his face into his rising knee. Bam. Blood and teeth sprayed. Before Yichen could fall, Lucian spun and caught him with a spinning backfist that launched him sideways into a boulder. The boulder cracked.
Yichen slumped. His dragon scales flickered, then receded. His eyes rolled back.
The bracelet on his wrist blazed red.
"Ryu Yichen — ELIMINATED."
The roar of the crowd hit like a wave. One hundred thousand voices, half screaming Lucian’s name, half in stunned disbelief.
Lucian didn’t hear it.
Because at the exact same moment his fist connected with Yichen’s temple, a sound cut through the battlefield — a high, keening ring of metal that made the air itself vibrate.
Across the field, Wei Chen stepped forward. His sword was drawn — a simple, unadorned blade that looked almost plain compared to the ornate weapons others carried. But along its edge, light gathered.
Sword intent.
Sword Spirit activated. Sword Intent blazed along the steel like captured sunlight.
"Celestial Severance Sword Art — Third Form: Heaven’s Divide."
He swung once.
The slash didn’t travel in a line. It traveled in three — three overlapping arcs of compressed intent that stacked on top of each other, each one deeper than the last. They tore through Arthur’s raised metal shields like paper. Tore through the A-Rank armor he’d reinforced with every ounce of his mana. Tore through the spear he’d crossed in front of himself as a last desperate guard.
Arthur’s body flew backward, tumbling end over end, blood trailing from a diagonal wound that ran from his left shoulder to his right hip. He crossed the arena boundary.
"Arthur Chevalier — ELIMINATED."
Lucian’s head snapped toward the announcement with a frown.
Arthur is down.
That meant—
He turned toward the EASA crystal. Three hundred meters away. Wei Chen was already walking toward it, sword still drawn, intent still bleeding from the edge.
Lucian moved.
An E-Rank beast exploded from the ground directly in his path — a massive serpentine creature with crystalline scales, summoned from whatever pocket dimension Li Yang accessed. Its jaws snapped at Lucian’s throat.
Lucian’s fist caved in its skull. The creature crumpled, twitched, and dissolved into particles of fading mana.
From fifty meters away, Li Yang watched with a smirk. His hands were still raised in a summoning pose, two more beasts — a wolf and a hawk — circling Carlos, keeping him pinned and occupied.
Lucian’s frown deepened.
It seems Carlos couldn’t stop him from summoning.
Wei Chen reached the EASA crystal. Rose stood before it, arms spread, teeth gritted.
He swung.
The sword slash was casual — a lazy backhand motion that still carried enough intent to split a building. It crashed into Rose’s first barrier. Shattered it. Second barrier. Shattered. Third. Cracked, held for half a second, then exploded.
Nadia’s voice cut through the chaos from the sidelines: "Ancient Amplification — triple stack! NOW!"
Rose felt the enhancement flood into her like boiling water — her mana capacity surging, her barrier strength multiplying, her reaction speed sharpening. But Wei Chen’s slash was still coming.
I won’t be useless.
Her eyes snapped shut. Then opened — glowing vivid green.
Bastion Bloodline. Full activation.
Her body radiated green light as she stepped directly into the path of the slash and crossed her arms. The intent struck her like a physical wall. Her feet carved trenches into the earth. She screamed through clenched teeth. The green glow flared — brighter, brighter — and the slash split around her body like water around a stone.
When the light faded, Rose stood bleeding from a thin cut across her chest.
Wei Chen lowered his sword slowly. A wry smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"She’s a fine lady."
Rose reached into her storage ring and pulled out her weapon — a jagged, two-pronged dagger connected to a long chain by a reinforced ring. The prongs gleamed with a dull metallic sheen. A-Rank. She’d bought it three months ago and never shown it to anyone.
Wei Chen’s eyebrows rose. "It seems you are also a fighter. I thought you were just good at defense."
Rose didn’t respond. She threw the dagger.
It flew straight at Wei Chen’s chest — fast, accurate, the chain unspooling behind it like a silver snake. Wei Chen casually raised his sword and blocked the charging tip with the flat of his blade.
Rose’s eyes flashed.
"Force amplification."
BOOM.
A concentrated surge of kinetic force erupted from the dagger’s prongs the instant they made contact with Wei Chen’s sword. The blast hit him square in the chest pushing with the force of a battering ram. Wei Chen’s feet left the ground. He flew backward fifteen meters, skidding across the grass, his sword arm numb.
His eyes widened. "What—"
The dagger was already coming back. Rose yanked the chain, redirecting its trajectory mid-flight. Wei Chen recovered just in time to fire three rapid sword slashes — horizontal, diagonal, vertical — each one deflecting the spinning dagger from a different angle. Sparks screamed off the prongs.
Rose pulled the dagger back to her hand and caught it by the grip.
Wei Chen stared at her. Then he laughed surprised.
"Wow. You ain’t just a fine lady. You’re also a fierce lady." He rolled his shoulder, shaking off the numbness. "I’m starting to like you more and more now."
Rose attacked.
She swung the dagger in wide arcs, the chain whistling through the air, and fired concentrated shockwaves from the prongs at the apex of each swing. Boom. Boom. Boom. The shockwaves ripped across the terrain — tearing up grass, shattering rocks, forcing Wei Chen to dodge laterally instead of advancing.
He deflected a shockwave with his sword and closed the gap. Rose anticipated it — she dropped to one knee, spun the chain above her head like a whirlwind, and released. The dagger spiraled toward Wei Chen’s face. He tilted his head — it missed by an inch, the chain whipping past his ear.
Rose yanked hard. The chain wrapped around his sword arm. She pulled with all her enhanced strength, dragging him off-balance, and fired a point-blank shockwave from the dagger’s prongs directly into his ribs. BOOM. Wei Chen grunted, stumbled — but his free hand grabbed the chain and pulled.
Rose was yanked off her feet. She hit the ground rolling, came up swinging. The dagger carved a line across Wei Chen’s sleeve — blood welled. He didn’t flinch.
They exchanged blows at close range — her dagger and chain against his sword. Shockwave after shockwave cracked the ground between them. Wei Chen deflected, parried, and analyzed. Rose was fast. Rose was creative. But her stamina was finite, and his wasn’t.
He stepped back. Rose pressed forward — another shockwave. Wei Chen sidestepped it cleanly, planted his feet, and raised his sword.
Sword Intent gathered along the blade.
"Celestial Severance Sword Art — First Form: Starfall."
A single downward slash. Compressed intent shaped like a falling star — narrow, concentrated, devastating. It sliced through Rose’s raised barrier, clipped her raised chain, and caught her across the torso.
Rose flew backward, the air knocked from her lungs, blood spraying from a gash across her stomach. The dagger and chain clattered from her grip.
She was still in the air when arms caught her from behind.
Lucian set her down gently beside the crystal. His expression was unreadable, but his crimson eyes were fixed on Wei Chen with undisguised annoyance.
"You’ve done well," he said quietly, not looking at her. "I will take it from here."
Rose coughed, pressing her hand to the wound. "Lucian—"
"Rest now."
He turned away.
Wei Chen stood fifty meters distant, sword at his side, watching Lucian with a calm assessment. The crowd had gone silent.
Lucian reached into his shadow storage.
Shiiiing.
The Moon Shattering Blade slid free — the slender crescent-edged longsword catching the stadium lights along its A-Rank steel. He held it at his side, the tip pointing at the earth, and began walking toward Wei Chen.
Wei Chen’s smile faded. For the first time in the entire tournament, something shifted behind his eyes.
"Finally," Wei Chen murmured. "Someone worth drawing on."