The forest was silent—but not calm. It was the silence of bated breath, as if the world itself knew war was coming.
Jian stood still at the heart of the Spirit Grove, eyes closed, shirtless beneath the rising moon. His breath was low and steady, his skin shining with condensed Qi. Beneath his feet, the runes carved into the spiritwood glowed faintly.
He was meditating, but not for peace.
No, peace was a lie.
This meditation was for reconstruction. He was remembering what it meant to be the sword.
Inside his mind, thousands of images flashed—of cuts made in previous lifetimes, battles fought across galaxies, lessons etched into his bones. Every parry, every riposte, every final blow struck from impossible angles—they all returned to him in fractured glimpses.
But it was incomplete.
His Sword Dao—once sharp enough to split mountains and command the loyalty of heavenly generals—was now shattered. What he had was merely 25% of that supreme path. And even that was unstable.
> "The sword does not seek. It does not speak. It only follows its truth. And I... I have forgotten mine."
He breathed in deeply and let his Qi pulse through his meridians. It was faint compared to before, but clean. Pure. His inner world, though fractured, shimmered with floating sword shards orbiting a black sun.
He had lost everything—but Jian was not the kind of man who begged heaven for mercy. He would cut down heaven itself, if needed.
---
Across the grove, Frostveil was inside her own storm.
She knelt on a slab of jade. Her ice Dao world had grown larger—now a sprawling palace of frost, with flowing rivers of frozen light. But it was the second inner world that consumed her: the Soul Realm.
Within it were shadows—echoes of the dead. Not ghosts, but fragments of soul essence from before her time. She walked among them, training. Debating. Understanding.
The spirit of a broken child whispered to her.
The memory of a mother that never lived cried out.
The thought of the Spirit King... her father... still hung in the air, like frost that refused to melt.
> "I wasn't just born to avenge. I was born to remember."
She stood and clenched her fist. Dual Daos. Dual inner worlds. Her soul and her ice had become a tempest of contradiction. She had to master them both.
And Jian was her anchor.
---
Day 1 – Meditation and Clarity
They sat side by side. Jian spoke first.
"You breathe like a blade unsheathed."
She gave a short laugh. "And you meditate like a man who still thinks he's dead."
"Maybe I am."
"No," she said firmly. "You're too angry to be dead."
---
Day 2–5: Physical Combat
They fought. Every hour. Hand-to-hand. Swordplay. Dao-infused clashes that tore through the grove.
Frostveil's control of ice turned mist into blades. Jian's sword aura—despite its incomplete state—cut the wind into lines of energy.
Each spar pushed them to the brink. They broke bones. They cracked ribs. They healed.
They learned.
"You hesitate when striking my throat," Jian noted on the third day.
"I don't aim to kill you."
"You should. Heaven will."
---
Day 6: Dialogue in the Firelight
They sat beneath a violet moon, sharing a fire.
"Do you remember your old life clearly?" Frostveil asked.
"Too clearly," Jian said. "Every time I blink, I see the war. The blade. The people who begged me not to kill them."
"…Did you listen?"
"Once. I regret it more than the others."
She turned toward him. "Why do you fight them now?"
He hesitated.
Then answered, not with words, but with his aura—flaring and then vanishing.
> "Because I cannot live in a world where those with power decide who is allowed to exist."
---
Day 7–10: Emotional Growth and Dao Synchronization
They trained together inside their inner worlds. Jian allowed Frostveil to step into his—into the shattered realm of broken blades and silent screams.
Frostveil let Jian witness the frozen echoes of her soul, including the image of the Spirit King—his final moment, burned into her very being.
There were no words, only shared pain.
They sparred inside their minds. They shaped each other's Dao.
When they emerged, they were no longer just fighters. They were mirrors.
---
Day 11: Innovation
Jian developed a new subform of his Sword Dao: Phantom Requiem Blade. It was incomplete—only usable for a few seconds—but in that time, his blade flickered into dozens of afterimages, striking from all angles in silence. It required his soul to burn.
Frostveil, in return, created a soul-based technique that locked onto an enemy's spiritual core, freezing it in absolute stillness until it shattered—Eternal Silence of the Veil.
Jian saw it and simply said: "That's a technique that gods will fear."
---
Day 12–14: Final Training
They fought each other at dawn, dusk, and midnight.
They ate little. Slept less.
And in the final hour of the fourteenth day, they stood before one another again. No sparring. No attacks.
Just understanding.
Frostveil looked at Jian and said, "If we die tomorrow—"
"We won't," he interrupted.
"But if we do—"
"Then let heaven carve our names into the stars they try to hide us from."
---
End of Chapter 17
> Jian regained 25% of his Sword Dao. Frostveil stabilized both her Daos and created a soul-killing technique. Together, they became more than warriors—they became symbols of rebellion forged in pain, clarity, and mutual understanding.