Chapter 1190: Brothers Act in Unison!

The moment that dust mote appeared, the heaven and earth of the Sword Immortal School began to shake. A terrifying pressure began to weigh down, like the might of heaven itself. The world stilted. The air shattered.

The countless cultivators present were all reacting with visible shock. In fact, they were so terrified that they immediately turned and fled. In the face of that mote, all things and beings had no choice but to flee. It could not be defied!

After order came balance. And from that came this, which was part of the power of an immortal!

The former number one Shining Star, Sir Star Ring, had relied on a lifetime of resources and destined opportunities, as well as reserve powers from the Star Ring Pagoda, to acquire this precious treasure at the moment he became a Quasi-Immortal! You could even call it a corroboration of Sir Star Ring’s dao of immortals.

There weren’t even enough words to describe its grandeur. As it fell, it was only natural for dramatic things to happen!

All onlookers felt like they were looking at an entire starry sky! That was especially true considering that nothing like it had ever appeared in the north before. Actually, the only people who had ever seen it were the Quasi-Immortals in the fifth world of the immortal palace, who had witnessed the fight between Xu Qing and Sir Star Ring.

But now, it was here in the north, at the Sword Immortal School, right above Hordeslayer and Rampart. And thus, it was an absolutely astonishing development that shook everyone down to their soul.

That was particularly true of Hordeslayer and Rampart. All of their advance preparations were child’s play. The trap they had laid was nothing more than a joke.

The two enormous swords that had appeared, one above and one below, couldn’t continue to exist. Their sword might was broken. The swords... trembled and emitted sounds that resembled wailing. After that, the two enormous swords... crumbled into pieces. The cloud of thousands of storms whipping around Xu Qing also collapsed.

When facing a mote of heaven’s principle, sword energy ceased, and sword light went dim. The tempest of swords... disappeared. None of it existed any longer.

As for the two immortal swords by Xu Qing, which Hordeslayer and Rampart had tried to seize back control of, as they inched closer to Xu Qing, they began to tremble violently. And then, they tumbled away.

Hordeslayer and Rampart in fused form were bleeding profusely, and finally, their killing intent turned into nothing as they tumbled backward.

This level of force was unstoppable! A dust mote might not seem like something very heavy, but to Hordeslayer and Rampart, this dust mote was as heavy as the entire starry sky. The terror they felt had reached a peak.

And yet, in the face of a mote of heaven’s principle, fleeing was useless. Heaven’s principle could bury anything and cause it to cease to exist!

As they reeled mentally, their combined fleshly body couldn’t stay together any longer, and they exploded apart. After separating, blood sprayed out of their mouths like mad, and their bodies were disintegrating. Their souls were also starting to fall apart. A sensation of death slammed into them like a wave.

However, just as the mote was about to completely wipe Hordeslayer and Rampart out of existence... a sigh drifted out of the tallest building in the Sword Immortal School.

“Could you give me some face....?”

Along with the sigh flew a stream of sword energy that appeared beneath the mote. Because of the sword energy, the mote stopped in place.

Taking advantage of that moment, Hordeslayer and Rampart fled with all the power they could muster toward the tall building. They had recognized their Master’s voice, and were now convinced that he was interfering on their behalf. They had been terrified out of their minds by the sensation of impending doom, and knew that their only hope of survival lay with their Master.

Though they fled at top speed... space-time ripples suddenly appeared in front of them, blocking their path. And that tall building became like something that didn’t even exist. The space-time ripples overlapped, creating a space-time tempest. Then time flowed like a river, and a time wave swept over Hordeslayer and Rampart.

When the foam cleared, the two of them were gone. They had been swept up by the wave and sent into a time that wasn’t the present!

Then Xu Qing stepped forward onto the wave before disappearing without a trace. He... was entering the same space-time where he had sent Hordeslayer and Rampart. Xu Qing had appeared, Hordeslayer and Rampart had launched their trap, then tried to flee. Then Xu Qing sent them into space-time and followed with the intent to kill....

All of that happened in only a few short breaths of time!

All of the organizations in the north were shaken to the core. This was an unforgettable event the likes of which rarely occurred.

For one thing, Hordeslayer and Rampart alone were very famous, so to see the tables turned on them was shocking. Even more shocking was that nobody knew who attacked them. All they knew was that he had terrifying canon.

This battle between Shining Stars surpassed the Imperial Sovereign level. Even Quasi-Immortals were shocked by what they were seeing. In fact, it was no surprise that some people even assumed that Xu Qing was actually Sir Star Ring.

“Who was that guy...?”

“Sir Star Ring?”

“It didn’t seem like it....”

Inside the Sword Immortal School, in the Sword Pavilion, Sword Immortal Blue Mallard sighed, took a step forward, and seemed about to say something.

Before he could, the man in red chuckled and said, “Oh, kids. They’ll surpass us in time, I’m sure. Not even willing to give face to a Lower Immortal.”

Sword Immortal Blue Mallard stopped in his tracks and looked at the man in red who annoyed him so much. After a moment of thought, he was about to say something, but again, the man in red spoke first.

“But since they’re your apprentices, it would be reasonable to step in at least to save their lives. And you could also make sure that lad understands that face should be given to Lower Immortals.”

Sword Immortal Blue Mallard said nothing. This person was being more annoying than ever. He really was just blurting out everything before Sword Immortal Blue Mallard could say it, leaving him somewhat at a loss for words. He was currently frowning, and was so irritated he was about to let loose a harrumph.

The man in red snorted coldly.

Sword Immortal Blue Mallard snapped at that point. “This is ridiculous! I can’t even snort coldly without you beating me to the punch!”

The man in red laughed quietly.

Fuming, Sword Immortal Blue Mallard took a step forward and vanished.

***

Meanwhile, in another space-time was a desert.

Hordeslayer and Rampart were fleeing wildly in the hopes of finding their way out of it. A space-time wave had swept them up and taken them away from the real world, delivering them to this space-time. When they popped out, they had no idea where they were or if it was real. This space-time, and this desert, seemed real.

But the intense sensation of deadly crisis in the two brothers made it impossible for them to analyze the situation. They were overwhelmed with anxiety and bitterness.

“Dammit, dammit, DAMMIT! This is all your fault!”

“What are you blaming me for? You were the one who came up with that idiotic plan. You wanted to lay a trap and ambush him. Now how stupid do you feel, huh??”

“Me? Stupid? It was all because

you

said nobody could help us, not even Master. You said to lure him out and kill him to negate the karma that resulted from bonding with him!”

𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

“You make it sound like I’m the only one who got bonded. You did too!”

“It’s all your fault!”

“It’s all

your

fault!”

As the two brothers raced along, they were arguing with each other so heatedly they were yelling.

“Master’s also a useless piece of trash!”

“That old codger! He’s an actual immortal and he just sat around watching us about to get killed!”

“That’s right. That guy obviously doesn’t care about giving face to Master!”

“That’s why Master has always been so shameless!”

“You are absolutely, positively correct. Now, if he was the Immortal Paragon, then maybe that guy would give him some face.”

“And that means...”

“It’s all Master’s fault!!”

Now that they had found a way to vent together, they were back to being in each other’s good graces. After venting for a while, they felt better, and even managed to speed up a bit. It looked like they were about to break free of the desert.

But that was when a wind kicked up. Sand grains flew through the air, filling the world, and buffeting the fleeing brothers and slowing them down to a standstill. No matter how they launched attacks or howled in rage, they were helpless. Eventually, the sand formed a huge face that filled half the sky.

It was Xu Qing. He opened his mouth to devour them.

Hordeslayer and Rampart shared a despairing glance. Then they gritted their teeth, and their eyes shone with defiance. Then they quickly communicated with each other via divine will.

“I’d rather die than surrender, lil’ bro!”

“Even if it means dying while standing up, big brother, I refuse to bend the knee!”

“Let’s just fly up there and self-detonate!”

“Okay, sure. We’ll fly up and detonate at the same time!”

Howling, they were about to fly up into the air when... they simultaneously dropped to their knees.

“Young Lord....”

But then they sensed something had changed. The two of them instinctively looked up, whereupon shocked expressions appeared on their faces. They opened their mouths to speak... but before they could, brilliant blue light appeared in the sky.

It was like a raging sea that spread out rapidly, and caused the huge face of Xu Qing to hesitate for a moment. An enraged voice echoed out from the blue light.

“You disgraceful fools!”

Hordeslayer and Rampart were delighted, and quickly jumped to their feet as Sword Immortal Blue Mallard appeared out of the blue light. Not interested in hearing anything from them, Sword Immortal Blue Mallard slapped both of them hard. The brothers shivered as their Immortal Capital permission medallions were ripped away from them.

Sword Immortal Blue Mallard threw the medallions up into the sky. Then he waved his hand, and an indescribably terrifying energy surged off him, causing the surrounding space-time to shatter.

Ripples spread through all of the space-time instance. All it took was a single thought, and he could reduce the space-time to ashes.

Having accomplished that, he coolly said, “Can you give me some face, lad?”

Xu Qing stepped out into the open, put away the two permission medallions, and then bowed at the waist.

“I’m happy to comply with your orders, Senior.” With that, Xu Qing took a step back and vanished. The instance of space-time also vanished.

Everything blurred, and when it became clear again, the surroundings had once again become the Sword Immortal School. They weren’t in the central square, but rather, in the Sword Pavilion.

Hordeslayer and Rampart looked around, stunned. Then, they jubilantly prepared to bow to their Master.

However, Sword Immortal Blue Mallard just glared at them and then kicked each of them, sending them flying over to the corner of the room. As the two of them howled in grief, he walked over and proceeded to kick them several more times.

“Disgraceful moron! Shameless fool! I must have been drunk back when I said you had amazing potential. You don’t have any freaking preheaven sword bodies! You have preheaven whored bodies!”[1]

Sword Immortal Blue Mallard gave a cold snort, and then looked at the man in red without saying a word.

The man in red also didn’t say a word.

Sword Immortal Blue Mallard frowned and waited a bit longer. “Why aren’t you saying what I’m about to say?”

“I don’t feel like it,” said the man in red, smiling.

Sighing helplessly, Sword Immortal Blue Mallard said, “Elder Brother... these two imbeciles are your Sect Nephews. You have the right, so why not... give them two new permission medallions?”

1. In Chinese, there is a character that means many things, including inexpensive, lowly, base, whore/whorish, slut/slutty etc., and has the

exact

same pronunciation as sword. By chance, the word whored rhymes with sword, so I used it. In reality, this joke wouldn’t work in spoken Chinese dialogue, as the pronunciation of the two is exactly the same. The English equivalent would be something like “they weren’t

bred

bears they were

bread

bears.” It only works when you can see the character/word, so it’s a “written” joke. Although, to be fair, most TV shows and movies in China have subtitles anyway, so I guess it could work visually as well. But it definitely wouldn’t work in audiobook format. I supposed I could have done something with “sored/sword,” but the slutty/whore aspect is what makes it really funny in Chinese, so I’d rather go with something like that. ☜