Chapter 29: The Roar Beneath the Jade Sky
The dawn over the Celestial Jade City did not bring peace, but the dull, anticipatory roar of hundreds of thousands of souls thirsty for violence.
The Jade Coliseum, a colossal and monolithic structure forged in the exact center of the floating plateau, was a masterpiece of martial architecture. Its immense stands, carved directly into the green stone, rose in concentric circles toward the sky, packed to maximum capacity. Cultivators from minor clans, merchant families, independent mercenaries, and disciples from the Hundred Sects filled the seats, creating a sea of colors and banners fluttering under the tense morning breeze.
The air inside the coliseum was thick, vibrating with a chaotic spiritual pressure generated by the sheer accumulation of so many experts in a single place.
High above the arena, suspended by anti-gravity formations, were the VIP boxes of obsidian and gold. There sat the Patriarchs, the elders of the region's most powerful sects, and the tournament judges. And in the central box, dominating the view of the entire battlefield, Valerius Valois, the Holy Son of the Purple Light Sect, watched the arena with a goblet of spiritual wine in his hand and a smile that dripped with exquisite poison.
Below, in the cold subterranean corridors connecting the waiting areas to the main arena, the Morningstar Clan advanced in sepulchral silence.
The heavy iron gates of the south entrance rose with a deafening metallic screech. When Samael and his heirs emerged into the light of the coliseum, the clamor of the crowd seemed to drown out for a second.
Dressed in their immaculate black and silver battle tunics, with the emblem of the Dragon and the Fallen Star gleaming on their chests, the legion radiated a murderous aura so dense that the disciples of other factions waiting in the arena instinctively stepped aside, like sheep making way for a pack of wolves.
Samael walked at the front. His pale face was inscrutable, his violet eyes scanning the immense battlefield of compacted sand and spiritual stone. Beside him, Cedric, his eyes glowing subtly, analyzed the environment.
"The matchmaking arrays on the central judge's panel are altered, Patriarch," the strategist murmured, his vision penetrating the Qi flows of the arena. "There is nothing random about this draw. The karmic flows of the runes are directed straight at our names. They have rigged the board to throw their worst attack dogs at us from the very first second."
Samael did not break his stride. A cold, almost imperceptible smile curved the corner of his lips.
"Let them set their trap, Cedric. A meat grinder works exactly the same no matter what order the pigs decide to go in."
A war horn, carved from the tusk of a mythical beast, echoed throughout the coliseum, silencing the crowd.
A judge dressed in purple robes floated to the center of the arena, amplifying his voice with Qi.
"Representatives of the Hundred Sects and Enlightened Families! Today, the blood of the young generation will water this earth to prove who is worthy of ruling tomorrow and claiming the treasures of the region!" The judge pointed to the immense floating jade board where names burned in golden fire. "The rules are simple! Surrender or death. Let the first match of Block C begin! Kael Morningstar, of the Morningstar Clan, against Torunn 'The Crusher', First Executioner of the Purple Light Sect!"
The stadium erupted in a roar of anticipation and morbid curiosity. Everyone in the region knew Torunn's name. He was a sadist, a giant who enjoyed shattering his opponents' meridians before crushing their skulls.
Kael stepped forward. His face was a mask of carved ice.
Samael placed a hand on his shoulder before the youth jumped into the arena.
"Listen to me well, Vanguard," Samael whispered, his voice only audible to Kael. "If you show all your cards in the first round, you will be predictable in the finals. Seal your Sword Heart. Do not use your seed. Do not let them see your aura. Use only steel and technique. Show them that our mere shadow is sharper than their brightest lights."
Kael nodded curtly. His golden eyes darkened. He voluntarily suppressed the beat of the Sword Seed in his chest, hiding the brilliance of his destructive power. He leaped into the arena, landing without kicking up a single speck of dust.
From the opposite gate, the earth trembled. Torunn 'The Crusher' entered the battlefield. He was a colossus nearly eight feet tall, with bulging, rock-like muscles covered in tribal tattoos that glowed with Earth element Qi. He wielded an immense black steel mace bristling with spikes—a weapon heavier than a warhorse.
Torunn laughed with a guttural voice that echoed throughout the coliseum, slamming his mace against the sand and instantly creating a crater.
"Is this the lapdog of the famous desert clan?!" the giant bellowed, pointing at Kael with a finger thick as a branch. "I got paid to make you scream, pretty boy! I'm going to break your legs, then your arms, and leave you alive so your Patriarch can hear you cry!"
Kael did not unsheathe his sword. His right hand simply rested on the handguard of the Whisper of the North. His posture was relaxed, almost bored.
"You talk too much for a dead man," Kael replied, his voice so flat and devoid of emotion that it echoed in the crowd's sudden silence.
Torunn roared in fury. His aura erupted, revealing a cultivation at Transcendent Stage 6. His body was covered in a layer of hyper-dense spiritual rock. He charged at Kael like a runaway rhinoceros.
The arena floor cracked with every one of his steps. At ten meters away, Torunn took a titanic leap, raising his immense mace with both hands. Earth Qi condensed into the weapon, creating the illusion of a mountain falling onto the sand.
"SEISMIC CRUSH!" the giant howled.
The mace struck where Kael was standing. The explosion of stone and dust was deafening. A shockwave swept the front rows of the stands, forcing spectators to cover their faces.
In his box, Valerius smiled, raising his goblet.
But when the dust cleared, the Holy Son's smile froze.
Kael was not beneath the mace. He had slipped away a millisecond before the impact, moving with ghostly fluidity through the storm of rocks. He was now standing exactly one meter behind Torunn's massive back.
The giant, surprised to have missed, spun quickly, raising his weapon for a horizontal sweep that would have cleaved a bull in half.
Kael did not retreat. He did not use his aura. He did not release the Sword Seed. He simply executed the purest, most lethal foundation of his training.
[Sword Art: Phantom Gale Slash].
His fingers closed around the dark leather-wrapped hilt. The bubble of Acoustic Void formed instantly.
The giant launched his attack with a deafening roar. Kael unsheathed.
To the hundreds of thousands of spectators in the coliseum, what happened defied their senses. They saw the movement of Kael's arm, they saw an arc of silver light draw a perfect crescent moon in the air, but they heard absolutely nothing. The "click" of the draw, the whistle of metal cutting through the air—it was all erased from existence.
Torunn's immense mace stopped mere inches from Kael's face.
The giant blinked, confused. His entire body paralyzed. He tried to speak, tried to curse, but only a wet, gurgling sound escaped his lips.
A thin red line appeared on Torunn's thick neck, just above his rock armor. The line widened. The massive head of the First Executioner slid off his shoulders and hit the sand with a dull thud, followed moments later by the collapse of his gigantic body. Blood stained the green stone.
Kael was already sheathing the Whisper of the North with a crisp motion. The entire exchange had lasted less than ten seconds.
The Jade Coliseum plunged into a silence so absolute that the dripping of Torunn's blood onto the sand could be heard. The Patriarchs in the VIP boxes leaned forward, eyes wide.
"He didn't even use a Qi externalization technique!" an elder from a neighboring sect muttered, pale with terror. "He decapitated him with sheer physical force and drawing speed! What kind of monsters are they raising in that desert?"
Kael didn't look at the crowd or the judges. He turned around and walked calmly back toward the iron gates.
Up in the VIP box, the wine goblet in Valerius's hand shattered into a thousand pieces, the glass cutting his palm, but the Holy Son didn't seem to feel it. His eyes were locked onto the corpse of his best executioner.
The Paradox of Calamity
The tournament could not stop. The judges, sweating cold and receiving hurried telepathic orders from the high command, quickly changed the matchmaking panel. If brute force didn't work against the Vanguard, they would try a war of attrition and poison against the link they considered "weak".
"Next match of Block C!" the judge announced, his voice trembling slightly. "A double match! Violeta and Eris Morningstar against the Vena Brothers of the Poisonous Beast Sect!"
The twins exchanged a sideways glance and walked to the center of the arena under the scorching sun.
From the opposite gates emerged two skeletal men, dressed in robes made of snakeskin. They did not come alone. Slithering and hissing around them were six monstrous spiritual beasts: three Giant Iron Scorpions, whose pincers could cut steel, and three Shadow Basilisks, scaly creatures that exhaled a toxic vapor capable of melting a Transcendent's lungs in seconds.
Samael, from the shadow of the entrance, issued his second tactical order via Qi transmission.
"Violeta. No Space. No dimensional jumps. Do not reveal your dual affinity. Eris, no need to play. Show this continent what true calamity means."
Violeta nodded subtly. She suppressed her spatial talent, locking that power deep within her core. She only let the cold flow.
The Beastmasters laughed, confident in their numerical superiority.
"Beautiful little girls!" one of them shouted, cracking an acid-soaked whip. "Surrender now and maybe my pets will only eat your limbs!"
The brothers gave the order. The scorpions charged like living tanks, while the basilisks opened their maws and expelled a dense cloud of green toxic fog that advanced rapidly toward the twins, covering a large portion of the arena.
Violeta did not retreat. Her heterochromic eyes shone with an icy blue light. She took a single step forward and stomped the ground with her boot.
She did not conjure ice spears or shields. She invoked the pure concept of her primary affinity.
"Absolute Zero," Violeta whispered.
A wave of white cold—a temperature so extreme that light itself seemed to refract around it—expanded from her foot in a 180-degree arc.
When the wave collided with the toxic fog cloud, the gaseous poison froze in mid-air, instantly transforming into harmless green crystals that fell to the ground like hail. The cold wave continued its advance at the speed of sound. Upon touching the three immense Iron Scorpions and the Basilisks, the moisture in their thick shells and their blood froze all at once. The six massive beasts stopped dead, turned into opaque ice statues in mid-charge.
The Beastmasters paled, their whips falling from their trembling hands upon seeing their supreme summons immobilized in a single second.
"Sister!" Violeta called out, her breath forming dense clouds of frost.
Eris vaulted over Violeta's shoulder. Her red hair burned like a torch amidst the sudden winter her twin had created. She did not wield her spear. Her bare hands were wreathed in black and bluish fire, thick and chaotic. It was the Flame of Ruin.
Eris didn't aim at the tamers. She aimed at the frozen beast statues.
She landed in the middle of the immobilized creatures and extended both hands, unleashing a torrent of destructive fire in all directions.
The impact of the Flame of Ruin against Absolute Zero did not create steam. It created a thermal annihilation.
Eris's black fire didn't burn flesh; it devoured and disintegrated matter. The extreme clash of temperatures caused the beasts' dense shells to shatter. In less than a heartbeat, the six majestic spiritual beasts were blown to pieces, pulverized into a mixture of black ash and ice crystals that rained down upon the sand.
Eris slowly turned toward the two terrified tamers, the black fire licking her forearms. Her eyes reflected the controlled madness of destruction.
"You wanted to feed your pets?" Eris asked, her voice raspy and dangerous. "Come get their remains."
The Beastmasters did not hesitate. They fell to their knees, pressing their foreheads against the ash-stained ground.
"We surrender! Mercy! We surrender!"
The Jade Coliseum crowd was in a state of shock. The minor sects gulped. Those two "little girls" had just erased an elite team in a terrifying display of elemental manipulation that bordered on perfection.
Valerius, in his box, clenched his jaw until his teeth creaked. His traps were being dismantled with insulting ease. He turned to the head judge, his voice hissing with rage.
"Bring out the big dog. Now. Throw him into the arena."
The Steel Bastion Crumbles
The judge nodded frantically. Minutes after the twins victoriously retreated, the referee's voice trembled as he announced the next bout.
"Star Match of Block C! Samael Morningstar against Kaelen 'The Steel Bastion', Supreme Commander of the Unyielding Mountain Sect!"
The crowd held its breath. Kaelen was not a young talent. He was a veteran mercenary the Mountain Sect had hired specifically for the tournament—a giant who stood at Stage 5 of the Origin Realm. His specialty was absolute defense.
Samael walked to the center of the arena. Unlike his subordinates, he did not walk with haste. He walked with the arrogant slowness of a king inspecting his backyard. His hands were hidden beneath the sleeves of his black tunic.
From the north gate, Kaelen emerged. The man was a walking fortress. He was completely encased in armor made of tungsten alloy and dark spiritual iron, so thick he looked like a metal golem. He wielded two tower shields with sharpened edges on each arm. Every one of his steps made the coliseum stands vibrate.
Kaelen clashed his shields together, producing a thunderous sound.
"I have crushed dozens of self-proclaimed 'Sovereigns' in my life!" Kaelen roared, his voice reverberating inside his closed helm. "Your sword won't even scratch my paint, brat!"
Samael stopped fifteen meters from the giant. His mind reviewed his self-imposed restrictions.
No Odachi. No dimensional jumps. No revealing the true Law of Space. And of course, none of my absolute Void.
Samael tilted his head slightly, stretching his neck muscles. This will be an exercise in pure brutality.
"Attack," Samael ordered, his voice devoid of interest.
Kaelen roared, his Origin Stage 5 aura erupting and tingeing his armor with a coppery glow. He charged like an avalanche of metal. The giant's speed contradicted his size. Reaching three meters from Samael, he brought both tower shields together and lunged forward with all his weight—a ramming attack designed to turn his opponent's bones into fine dust.
Samael did not move. He did not dodge.
He raised his bare right hand, palm open, and placed it directly in front of him.
The impact of two tons of metal propelled by Origin Stage 5 Qi clashed against Samael's bare palm.
BOOM!
A circular shockwave swept the arena, kicking up a massive curtain of dust.
The crowd gasped, many leaping to their feet. Had the Morningstar Patriarch been crushed in the first second?
The wind slowly cleared the dust.
Samael was still in the exact same spot. His feet hadn't retreated a single millimeter in the sand. His right hand, pale-skinned and without a single scratch, firmly gripped the edge of Kaelen's tower shield.
The iron giant was frozen in his charging posture, his boots sinking into the ground, pushing with all his might, unable to advance a millimeter further. Absolute terror seized Kaelen's eyes behind his helm.
"That armor is thick," Samael whispered, his violet eyes glowing with a lethal light. "It must be suffocating in there. Let me help you ventilate it."
Samael tightened his fingers over the shield's metal. His grip, empowered by the Dragon Physique and the sheer overwhelming strength of Origin Realm Stage 9 (Peak), dented the tungsten alloy as if it were wet clay.
With a violent yank, Samael ripped the shield off the giant's arm, breaking his wrist in the process, and hurled the immense piece of metal out of the arena.
Kaelen screamed in pain and stumbled back, trying to bash with the other shield, but Samael was already in his personal space.
The Patriarch did not use the Void. He awakened his Blood manipulation.
Samael struck the center of Kaelen's breastplate with his bare fist. The blow was not designed to pierce the metal. The kinetic force of the impact traveled through the spiritual iron directly into the giant's flesh, while Samael's Blood technique infiltrated through the pores of the metal.
Kaelen spat a torrent of blood inside his helm. He felt his own blood, inside his veins, begin to boil and churn at an unnatural pressure, commanded by the will of the monster in front of him.
Samael grabbed the giant's iron breastplate with both hands. His blood manipulation forced Kaelen's blood to pool in his chest, creating massive internal pressure, while Samael exerted a crushing external pressure with his dragon strength.
The shriek of bending metal filled the stadium.
Before the astonished eyes of hundreds of thousands of spectators, 'The Steel Bastion's' indestructible armor began to collapse inward, crumpling under Samael's brute force. Kaelen screamed in pure agony as the metal meant to protect him became his coffin, crushing his ribs and piercing his lungs.
When the armor was dented to the point of almost completely immobilizing the giant, Samael let go of the breastplate, took a step back, and launched a spinning kick connecting directly with the side of Kaelen's head.
The sound was like a cannon firing. The two-ton giant was launched into the air, flying in a parabolic arc across nearly sixty meters of sand, until he crashed brutally against the thick jade wall separating the arena from the lower stands.
Kaelen's body was left embedded in the wall, deeply unconscious and bleeding from the cracks in his crushed armor.
Samael shook his right hand, dusting off imaginary dirt, and did not look at the referee. He slowly looked up, fixing his inscrutable violet eyes directly on the central VIP box, where Valerius Valois stood, his face white as wax.
Without using any amplifier, but with a Qi density that carried his voice to the ears of all the leaders of the Hundred Sects, Samael spoke five words:
"Is this your best?"
The stadium remained plunged in an icy silence. The arrogance of the Sovereign of the Void had just trampled the pride of the regional elites.
As Samael turned around and walked back toward his generals, a golden notification flashed in his retina.
[Patriarch System: Combat Evaluation: Absolute Suppression.]
[Secret Mission Activated: 'The Tyranny of the Dragon'.]
[Objective: Ensure the survival of the Morningstar Clan in the impending purge event. Publicly humiliate the organizers.]
[Progress: The enemy has been pushed to the edge of desperation. Massive destiny alteration detected.]
The Trap Springs
Up in the VIP box, Valerius Valois trembled. Not with fear, but with a murderous fury that bypassed all rationality. The individual duel format was turning into a massacre against him. That Patriarch and his heirs were monsters who broke all the rules of common sense.
He turned to the panel of senior judges, composed of trembling elders.
"Change the rules," Valerius hissed, his voice poisoned with hate.
"But, My Lord Valerius... the rulebook dictates that the duels..." an elder tried to protest.
Valerius grabbed him by the collar of his robes, lifting him off the floor.
"I said change the damn rules! Advance the Second Phase immediately! Throw them into the Closed Hunting Realm. Them, and the three hundred sects and clans allied to us, at the same time. Put a bounty on the head of every single one of those Morningstar bastards."
Valerius dropped the judge, his bloodshot eyes glaring down at Samael in the arena.
"I want to see how arrogant and powerful that Dragon is when a hundred elite cultivators attack his family from behind, in the darkness of an isolated forest, with no rules or referees to stop them. We'll see how they bleed in the shadows."
The true tournament, the death hunt, was about to begin. And the trap had just snapped shut.
END OF CHAPTER 29