Cutting the Ties of the Past

If only life were as it first seemed...

Xiao Chen stood by the window, gazing in silence at the distant mountains. Years ago, he had left the mortal world from Red Dust Peak in the Kunlun Mountains, entering the World of Immortality. So many things had deviated from their original course because of that.

When he saw the carved words on the wooden bed, he felt as if struck by lightning.

"Everything... starts anew!"

Youth fades, beauty ages, gatherings and separations follow their fate. This world held too many disappointments, and everyone had sorrows they could not change.

Xiao Chen stood for a long time in silence. Then he walked out calmly, took one last look at the thatched hut, and resolutely departed.

Some things were fated to remain unchanged, and there was no need to dwell on them. He had come here to release the weight of loss, to use iron will to sever the past completely.

What had left was gone forever. It could not be changed, nor should it be.

Xiao Chen resolved to draw the sword and cut his attachments.

"Has my heart grown so cold?" he asked himself. Why did he seem so ruthless, resolved to cut away everything from the past?

If time had turned back eight years, and the same thing had happened, perhaps the wound would have struck him even deeper. But now, aside from a trace of bitterness, the tears that once threatened to fall had nearly vanished.

He glanced back at the person he used to be, and felt that he was vastly different now. Perhaps he had become more resolute—or perhaps truly more heartless.

The wind blew gently, scattering fallen petals before his eyes. He leaped into the air and landed atop a high peak.

Mount Emei was a place of breathtaking beauty—emerald peaks, drifting clouds, a scene like a painting.

It was also a place of many legends about sword immortals. Although those tales belonged to a distant past, Xiao Chen knew that the so-called sword immortals were surely cultivators. Now they had withdrawn from the mortal world and entered the legendary realm of cultivation.

Suddenly, he spotted figures flying through the air in the distance. They were using the distinctive flying-sword technique of cultivators. What were they doing on Mount Emei? A suspicion dawned on him, and he silently stalked closer through the mountains.

A thunderous roar split the air—a massive peak had been smashed open!

The sight was terrifying. A single sword-light had sheared off over a hundred meters from the top of a thousand-meter mountain. Such powerful flying swords! Even Xiao Chen was astonished. For the first time, he truly began to take these cultivators seriously.

The broken peak was hollow inside—a black, bottomless pit like a dead volcano.

"The legend is true! Those who entered the cultivation realm from the mortal world didn't lie. Their founder, the Elder with Long Eyebrows, once sat here. I wonder if the last martial artist's successor is still sealed inside."

"That martial artist's successor was killed; it's only the corpse that was sealed. By now, even the bones have likely turned to dust."

As they spoke, the dozen or so cultivators drove their flying swords into the hollow mountain, hacking and slashing until the entire peak shattered with an unending rumble. Finally, at the mountain's base, a sealed door appeared. Only then did they stop.

"It's our seal! After all these years, the energy fluctuations are still so strong. If we hadn't obtained the method to break it, we might never have opened it."

The dozen powerful cultivators worked together, dismantling the Five Elements, the Eight Trigrams, the Nine Palaces… It took them a full hour before they sighed in relief. "That Elder with Long Eyebrows was a real force to reckon with in his day."

"Let's hope we won't just dig up a pile of rotting bones."

With a world-shaking explosion, the broken mountain collapsed entirely, and the surrounding peaks shook for a long time before settling.

The cultivators flew back from a distance, covered in dust, their robes torn. They had suffered a strong shockwave and looked shaken.

"So much power..."

"Long Eyebrows was indeed a formidable man. And the martial artist's successor sealed here must have been a terrifying figure. Lucky for us he died thoroughly back then."

As the dust cleared, a massive stone platform emerged, like an ancient altar, a hundred meters high. On it lay a crystal coffin, shimmering softly in the sunlight.

What shocked and unsettled them was that a flying sword was nailed into the coffin, and bright red blood was still dripping from the gaps.

The cultivators gasped. This was too eerie. Hadn't the man been killed long ago? Even if a corpse had been preserved, it should have decayed after all these years. Yet fresh blood still seeped from the crystal coffin.

One cultivator cautiously tossed a magic artifact—a dark-golden hammer that rapidly grew to the size of a small hill and smashed toward the coffin.

The crystal coffin shattered, revealing a set of white bones inside.

"False alarm. This martial artist was indeed fearsome—sealed for ages, yet the bones remain and the blood hasn't fully dried. Incredible."

"Of course. I heard many cultivation experts fell before he was finally killed and sealed here."

"Disappointing. Nothing valuable except the flying sword on the coffin."

"Be grateful. That sword is our real prize. Getting it is already luck."

They walked over and claimed the gleaming sword, its energy surging. One of them gave the skeleton a hard kick.

But at that moment, something horrifying happened.

The white skeleton sat bolt upright. With a crack, its bone palms slammed into the cultivator's legs, shattering them instantly.

A scream tore through the air as the cultivator's upper body flew upward, his face twisted in agony. The others immediately retreated, unleashing their flying swords at the skeleton.

Sparks flew. The swords, which could split mountains, struck the bones with a clanging sound, leaving not a single mark. The sight stunned the cultivators.

"Could it be... that the martial artists of old really were that powerful?"

"How is this possible? If he still lived, how terrifying would he be?"

"At least there are no true martial artists left in the world now."

Feeling the place was too eerie, and unable to destroy the bones, the cultivators eventually cut off a mountaintop and buried the skeleton beneath it. Then they hurried away.

Only after the group had left did Xiao Chen emerge from the shadows. He had to admit that those dozen cultivators were far beyond his ability to fight—truly powerful.

He swung his Golden Divine Halberd, cleaving away the rubble and revealing the white bones and bloodstains once more.

So even the last martial artist's successor had fallen. Though Xiao Chen possessed divine abilities, he had always considered himself a martial artist. Seeing these bones, his heart surged with sorrow and grief for his lineage.

The skeleton sat up abruptly. A faint, struggling will rippled from it. The scattered blood on the ground floated up, gathering back onto the bones.

"You... have come... The bearer of the Martial Imprint has finally arrived..."

Xiao Chen was startled at first, but quickly calmed, standing silently before the bones.

"Martial arts... never die... Martial artists are the strongest. They exhausted themselves to destroy us because... they feared us." The faint psychic fluctuation seemed on the verge of breaking off.

"You mean the cultivators?" Under the circumstances, Xiao Chen remained calm, neither afraid nor shocked.

"No... They include the cultivators... All cultivation systems... joined hands to annihilate us martial artists."

Xiao Chen asked quietly, "They said martial artists are the weakest, eliminated by history."

"Lies! Slander! History is always written by the victors... They can distort it as they please." The faint fluctuation paused for a long time, then continued: "Martial arts... early on are indeed at a disadvantage. But once you achieve something, when facing opponents of the same level, you are invincible! Their so-called magic treasures are nothing but scrap iron before us. Our bodies surpass all the world's sacred artifacts. I, a Half-Ancestor, destroyed seven Half-Ancestors from other systems..."

Xiao Chen listened in silence, not interrupting.

"The reason we were destroyed... was because our Ancestral God fell unexpectedly... All cultivation systems attacked us together." As it spoke, tears rolled from the hollow eye sockets—a most uncanny sight. Where did tears come from, from mere bones?

Xiao Chen felt the despair and grief in that will, his own heart rising and falling with it, as if tears were about to fall.

Despair, loss, anguish—all intertwined.

"There is no time... I cannot speak further. I am but a stubborn remnant of will, holding on until now only to personally ignite the battle-blood of the Martial Imprint's inheritor..."

With that, the blood gathered on the bones exploded outward, all of it splashing onto Xiao Chen's body.

In that instant, Xiao Chen felt his blood boil. A heroic spirit blazed within him. The dormant martial bloodline awakened, his battle-blood surging. He had the urge to laugh at the heavens. He felt that all things in heaven and earth were within his grasp, a power to swallow mountains and rivers!

"Yes! A true martial artist must have this spirit—to look down on the cosmos, to dominate the world. Martial arts... never die. The true holy warriors of combat are us!" The faint psychic fluctuation cut off completely. In an instant, the white bones turned to ash and scattered.

For a long time, Xiao Chen could not calm himself. He chiseled a boulder with his own hands and buried this Half-Ancestor here.

The tragedy of the martial artist. The elegy of the martial artist. The desolation of the martial artist. Thus ended the last pure warrior.

Xiao Chen felt that perhaps now he must truly cultivate the Martial Imprint.

Through the Martial Imprint, he knew that to become a supreme martial artist, he needed a heart as hard as iron.

Perhaps this was his chance.

Cut away the relationships of the past. Erase all memories of former times. This might be his first trial—to forcibly remove a person's shadow from his heart.

Three days later, Xiao Chen appeared at the Confucius Temple by the Qinhuai River in Jinling. Laughter with Ruoshui had once echoed here. He had come to remember, and to say goodbye. Since there was no turning back, he resolutely chose to forget. This final memory was the blade he would use to sever the past. Only by truly facing the past could he truly cut it away.

Before the temple, the crowd flowed. Xiao Chen felt as if an entire lifetime had passed. The joy and the everyday moments seemed so near. He walked aimlessly, until the confusion on his face slowly faded and the light of determination grew ever more intense in his eyes. He cut away everything in Jinling.

Three days later, Xiao Chen arrived at the northern city of Yanjing. On the lively snack street, he ordered a table full of local delicacies—some his favorites, some Ruoshui's. He sat there alone for an entire day. The shadow in his heart gradually faded. He forgot everything in Yanjing.

This was no self-deception, but a purification of the heart through a will that was almost unimaginable.

Days later, Xiao Chen reached the northern grasslands. Riding a horse-king he had tamed from a wild herd, he galloped across the endless steppe, recalling the memories he had made here.

Just as he was about to cut away the grassland memories, a pain stabbed through his heart. For a moment, the thought crossed his mind: Had he become utterly heartless? His former lover had become a furnace for his ascent to the supreme martial path. To coldly sever her to test himself—would there come a day of regret?

Riding the horse-king across heaven and earth, Xiao Chen laughed up at the sky. Then he resolutely cut away everything here, erasing it from his heart forever.

In the three months that followed, Xiao Chen's shadow appeared in many places across the Nine Provinces. He retraced every place he had been with Ruoshui. He faced the past, and extinguished the past.

Today, he would go to his final stop: the Yellow Crane Tower. To cut the last thread completely.

The shadow in his heart was nearly gone. He seemed to have undergone a transformation, stepping leisurely up the Yellow Crane Tower.

"Xiao Chen..." At a table by the window on the fifth floor, a young man among a group of friends stood up in shock, staring at Xiao Chen with disbelief. Xiao Chen turned and recognized him—an old friend, Chen Fang of the One-Sword Gate.

Xiao Chen strode over to meet him.

"It really is you, Xiao Chen... Where have you been for eight years? Ruoshui waited for you for seven whole years!"

"Who is Ruoshui?"

"You..." Chen Fang pointed at Xiao Chen, speechless. Finally, he shouted in rage: "How can you be like this?"

A woman beside him stopped the furious Chen Fang. She had a third vertical eye on her forehead. Though not especially beautiful, she had a unique aura that seemed to purify the soul and bring calm.

Her third eye opened and closed, shedding a faint, soft light. She sighed. "This is a man without feelings, a man who breaks hearts. Just now, I glimpsed a scene of him swinging a sword to cut himself... but he is too strong now. I cannot see the truth."

In that moment, Xiao Chen coldly completed his final transformation. He swung the sword and utterly severed the phantom of Ruoshui.

When the last trace was completely erased, he felt as if he had fallen from a lofty height into a void. An emptiness gripped his heart, as though something precious had been cast away forever.

But then, two beams of dazzling light shot from his eyes, filled with immense self-confidence. He had wielded the sword of wisdom to cut away the fetters of his heart. This was not forgetting, but a complete severing—the eradication of a former lover. It required a will that ordinary people could hardly imagine. And he had truly succeeded.

Martial arts.

That single word rose in his heart, and his entire being felt filled with power. He would advance to the supreme martial path!

He looked at the people before him and asked, as calm as still water: "Who is Ruoshui?"