Chapter 282 – The Weaponsmithing Contest, Masters Showing Their Flair - Part 1

Yin-wind Cliff, Peeping‑Eye Gorge, it was near the frontline, where Silkfloss Province met Hidden River Province.

Few living souls ever went there, and fewer returned, yet two figures made the climb. Their footholds were nothing more than a slanted strip of earth. However, a path untrodden was still a path.

Swaying shadows of evergreen locust trees concealed the leading man. Behind him came a weather‑worn, sharp‑eyed escort—Jing Ruyi, a fifth rank elder of the Jing Clan.

The Jing Clan were known for courting fortune and dodging danger. Because Master Gong had ties with their faction, Jing Ruyi drew the escort duty to Yin‑Wind Cliff—and the job of supplying him with source blood.

Fending off enemies? That chore had gone to the recently slain Elder Hua of the Gu faction, which only deepened the Gu Clan’s contempt for the cautious Jing Clan.

Even so, this trip was no cushy post. A fifth rank could skirt a fledgling ghost domain but never fight its core. Yet today Jing Ruyi had to do exactly that and guard Master Gong.

“Master Gong, think twice,” he whispered, already wavering. “As long as the mountain stands, we’ll always have firewood.”

Master Gong halted, tightened the bundle of forging gear and the furnace chained to his back, and said, “Then leave me a vial of source blood and go home, Elder Jing.”

“I can’t walk away while you stay!” Jing Ruyi protested. “You’re forging my spirit artifact, remember? But...must we really do it here?”

All of Master Gong’s reasons shrank to a single word. “Yes.”

“Fine, fine,” Jing Ruyi sighed. “I’ll tag along. We’re just poking around a proto‑ghost domain, right? Honestly, I’ve never been in one of these areas of extreme Yin. Why are we here again?”

“According to my smithing lineage’s manual that explains Earth Appraisal,” Master Gong explained, “a ghost is born when Yin energy coalesces. Once formed, it’s untouchable until that Yin energy is exhausted.”

“So the Yin energy can run dry?” Jing Ruyi asked.

“It also says Heaven and Earth are a mill‑stone; Yang above, great Yin below. This place connects straight to that great Yin. You might drain what’s here, but could you drain the great Yin itself?”

Jing Ruyi chuckled. “I’ve heard the saying. Every meat field breeds a ghost domain, and the stronger the ghost domain, the richer the meat field. Yin and Yang keep each other in check.

“So ghosts are our world’s by‑products, nursed by Yin. Right now, the Yin here hasn’t fully condensed or latched onto any ghost, so you want to grab that raw Yin energy to forge a spirit artifact, is that it?”

“Exactly,” Master Gong replied.

Jing Ruyi scratched his head. “Feels like we’re asking to die. Smithing weapons at a vent about to spawn a ghost is like lowering a bucket into a volcano for fresh lava. No one knows when the Yin energy will erupt, or whether smithing will set it off.”

Still, a land of extreme Yin was a once‑only chance. Today, it was simply raw Yin energy; tomorrow, it might already transform into a ghost domain; and yesterday, it didn’t even exist. Master Gong would never get another shot.

˙·٠✧🐗➶➴🏹✧٠·˙

They soon reached Yin‑Wind Cliff. Everything was pitch‑black; hills, trees, even moonlight twisted like seaweed in deep water.

Without a word, Master Gong located the heart of the cliff with Earth Appraisal, set down the furnace, packed it with bone‑white charcoal, and laid out his tools. A spark flared, then a chill gust snuffed it out.

Jing Ruyi raised a tortoise‑shell shield; green light flowed over its surface, shielding them both. He drew his blade, eyes sweeping the dark, while the shadow blood within him roared like a river.

Master Gong struck again. The ember caught and landed on the charcoal, but the flame was a pale shadow of normal. far too weak for smithing. Earth Appraisal alone wasn’t enough; another skill was needed. Still, he wasn’t deterred.

“Elder Jing, a little blood,” Master Gong called.

“On it.” Jing Ruyi flicked a finger. A few drops of blistering hot extreme Yang blood shot into the charcoal, and the forge began to blaze.

BOOM!

The forge erupted. The flames flared scarlet, long and twisted, their glow no longer warm but like a ring of flayed, bleeding dancers.

Master Gong ignored the eerie flames. His blood‑shot eyes bulged with a craftsman’s fervor as he began to work. At his level he needed no warm‑up; the instant his fingers closed on the hammer they found their perfect rhythm.

The fire was up, so he went straight to hot‑forging, burning off dross and folding in his pre‑measured alloys.

Judging by the mold, he was making a blade, almost as if he were trading blows at a distance with Li Yuan and Zhu Ban, for Zhu Ban’s gift to Peng Mi had also been a blade.

Moments later, the metallic embryo was formed, an ordinary‑looking long blade.

Master Gong squared his shoulders and hammered fast. He did not summon Yin‑energy; he simply trusted it would come.

Klang! Klang! Klang...!

In the sea of Yin mist that filled the gorge, the lone puff of Yang flame became the eye of a storm. Endless Yin energy rushed toward the embryo like moths to a flame, drilling into Master Gong’s body in a thousand icy arrows. Elder Jing’s barrier was useless; the pair might as well have been a skiff in a typhoon.

“Not hot enough, Jing Ruyi!” Master Gong barked.

The embryo was cooling too fast; his window for listening to the Quickening was cut in half. Forging was always a race against the seconds. Now, even the seconds were gone.

“Jing Ruyi! Blood, now!”

Jing Ruyi flicked more droplets of blistering blood.

BOOM!

The flames flared higher. Master Gong grinned like a madman and brought the hammer down.

𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

Klang! KLANG!

“Source blood!” he roared.

Jing Ruyi grunted, forced a marble of heart‑blood from his chest, and shot it into the embryo.

Master Gong panted, hands steady, eyes clear. With every blow an emerald thread raced through the steel, while pale green

corpse spots

blossomed across the blade. It looked nothing like a textbook quasi-domain weapon, yet he knew it already surpassed every spirit artifact he had ever made.

Suddenly, he unleashed a hailstorm of strikes, quenched the blade amid splintering cracks, fitted the hilt, and flung the weapon aside—all in a blur.

Then he froze, that usual devil‑may‑care face gone solemn.

Jing Ruyi caught the blade and stared.

What an ugly thing...

Sewer‑water green, mottled with corpse blotches; the emerald light trapped in the steel winked like a ghoul’s eye. But the moment he bonded with it his face changed. “Master Gong...this blade—”

The weaponsmith was already seated, legs folded, furnace sputtering. He burst into booming laughter.

“Jing Ruyi! Go ask that greenhorn Li Yuan how many points of panache this blade earns. Ask that punk Zhu Ban whether Gong Lang has lost even half a step! Haha, ha—” The laughter broke off. His head sagged; the hammer slipped from dead fingers, the furnace’s flames snuffed out.

Yin winds howled, and black mist thick as tar layered over Gong Lang’s corpse and the cold furnace. Likely, this phenomenon was the backlash from not following the proper procedure when smithing a spirit artifact of this calibre.

Jing Ruyi gripped the blade. No nine month warming needed; it was battle‑ready. With a complicated look he bowed deeply to the fallen weaponsmith, then leapt away, fleeing the storm.