Alex stood within the illusory realm of the swordy trial. An elder materialized before him, robes stirring as though touched by an invisible breeze.


    "This is the Wudang Seven Moons," the elder said. He lifted his sword and began to


    move.


    Every arc of the de summoned seven luminous moons that hung in the air like palenterns, their light flowing with each strike. The forms were graceful yet merciless, a dance of moonlight and steel.


    When the demonstration ended, the elder lowered his weapon and met Alex''s gaze. "If you can defend yourself against seven times seven of those strikes-forty-nine in all-you will advance. You have one hour to study the art."


    Most who saw the technique only once would have needed rare fortune to grasp even its basics.


    Alex had Gaia. The system captured every angle, every shift of weight and breath, then reyed the sequence hundreds of times inside his mind with wless precision.


    He sat in meditation while the hour ticked away in the real world. Gaia pulled him deeper, into a quiet realm of pure thought where time stretched hundredfold.


    There, Alex let the sword art sink into his bones. He practiced the forms until they felt like his own, then sparred against phantom opponents who wielded the same


    moons.


    Each sh sharpened him.


    The hour ended.


    The elder attacked without hesitation, his de a silver blur. Alex rose to meet him. He did not simply survive the first forty-nine strikes; he answered them with the same art, his sword carving moonlight of its own.


    The elder''sughter died quickly. Their des rang together more than a hundred times, each collision sharper than thest.


    Alex felt the rhythm settle into his blood. Understanding turned to instinct. In one clean motion he cut straight through the elder''s illusory body.


    A calm, resonant voice filled the realm. "You are the first to strike back with the same sword art. Your score has been doubled."


    Alex''s rank surged to fourth ce.


    A new elder appeared. "Now witness the Wudang Seven Suns."


    The demonstration unfolded again, fiercer this time—each swing igniting seven zing suns that burned across the void.


    Alex studied them the same way, Gaia carrying him once more into the slowed realm of the mind.


    When the fight came, he met the elder''s fire with fire of his own. des shed in a storm of heat and light. Alex pressed forward, confidence steady and bright, until his sword found its mark.


    He rose to third rank.


    Outside the illusion, the crowd had gone dead silent. Then the whispers began— sharp, disbelieving, spreading like cracks through ss-as every eye fixed on the rankings that had just changed in ways no one had thought possible.


    Kuang Liang stared at the glowing stone stele, his face ck with disbelief.


    "Third rank,” he whispered. "He''s really sitting in third."


    None of it made sense. Thousand Herbs Peak trained its disciples to tend gardens, raise crops, and brew medicine.


    They were farmers and apothecaries, not warriors. A man from that gentle world should never have torn through the sword trial like this.


    It was as absurd as watching a simple farmer cut down a battle-hardened knight. Yet the proof hung there in cold, shining characters.


    His mouth stayed open, unable to close.


    He knew exactly how savage the climb was how many broke their spirits just trying to push past rank twenty-five. And now this man had stormed all the way to third.


    "How long has it been since anyone reached the third rank?" a nearby disciple asked.


    "Nearly five hundred years," another answered quietly. "Thest was Huang Jie. He was the only Wudang disciple in history to be Leader of the Murim Alliance— and he remained undefeated for a full century."


    "So Jun Jiu has that same kind of power?" someone breathed. "We''re looking at a living legend."


    Excitement crackled across Sword Peak.


    A momentter, fireworks roared into the sky, blooming in brilliant bursts of red and gold to signal the elders that the impossible had happened.


    Within minutes, several elders streaked through the air on their swords andnded in a swirl of robes. They crowded around the stele, eyes widening as they read the rankings.


    "Someone has finally reached the third rank?" one elder said, voice rough with shock.


    "Who is this man named Jun Jiu?" another demanded, a hungry light in his eyes. "I must im him as my disciple."


    No one felt the triumph more deeply than the disciples of Thousand Herbs Peak. Pride swelled in their chests until they could barely contain it, as though they themselves had climbed those ranks.


    They began to chant, voices rising together in a wave of joy and fierce belonging.


    "Jun Jiu! Jun Jiu! Jun Jiu!"


    High on the main peak, the Sect Master watched the scene unfold below. A long, quiet sigh slipped from him.


    "Even I never reached the third rank on that stele," he murmured. "And the monument has stood for ten thousand years." The Sect Master lifted his eyes to the sky, voice low but steady.


    "If even one disciple reached the top five in our lifetime, it would be a blessing enough for Wudang—enough to lift our name once more across the Murim. But third rank..."


    His eyes glistened. “When the sect stood at its lowest, when the world had all but forgotten us, Heaven was kind. It sent us a savior."


    Beside him, Li Qingxue felt a quiet warmth bloom inside her chest, melting the long frost that had settled around her heart.


    The Sect Master had pulled her from


    the cold as an infant and given her a life. Every breath she had taken since belonged to


    Nudang


    Whatever it cost, whatever it demanded, she would give it dly if it meant the sect could rise again.


    A ripple passed through the air above Sword Peak.


    An illusion shimmered into existence-seven moons glowing with soft, silver light. Their radiance spilled across the gathered crowd like liquid starlight. Gasps rose on every side. The Sword Peak elders trembled where they stood.


    "That is our lost Wudang Seven Moons," one elder whispered, voice thick with disbelief. "Gone for five hundred years. I never thought I would see it before I died." While the elders remained frozen in shock, the Sect Master''s eyes sharpened with sudden, fierce hope.


    "Atst," he breathed. "Wudang''s most famous and long-lost sword art has returned. This boy will shake the entire Murim."


    Before anyone could draw another breath, the seven moons dissolved. In their ce, seven zing suns red to life, burning with golden fire.


    Every elder and the Sect Master alike stared with wide eyes and open mouths. "Wudang... Seven Suns," someone stammered.


    "That art has been lost for a thousand years," another elder managed. "How-how is it appearing now?"


    "Don''t tell me Jun Jiu has mastered both of the lost techniques..."


    The elders stood rooted, stunned into silence. Not one of them had dared imagine


    that in their generation-Wudang''s lowest ebb in the Murim-such miracles could


    return.


    Yet here they were, burning in the sky. Everything was about to change.


    Just as the wonder seemed to crest, the image shifted once more.


    Beside the seven zing suns, the seven moons reappeared serene silver light now glowing in perfect harmony with the golden fire.


    Both lost arts burned together, moon and sun, ancient and unstoppable.


    The elders stood frozen, eyes wide with disbelief. None of them had ever imagined such a thing was possible.


    Only the Sect Master trembled from head to toe. Then, without a word, he dropped


    to his knees before the vision in the sky.


    The seven moons glowed with cool,


    silver yin, while the seven suns burned with fierce golden yang. Slowly they began to turn circling each other in perfect rhythm until theiright merged into a wless yin-yang symbol-ancient, alive, and


    impossibly whole.


    A brilliant, multicolored radiance burst outward, flooding Sword Peak in hues no one


    had ever seen.


    The elders gasped, stunned into silence. They had never heard of this


    phenomenon, let alone witnessed it.


    Still kneeling, the Sect Master''s eyes filled with tears that spilled freely down his


    weathered cheeks.


    He was a boy again in his mind, standing before his own master, listening to the old


    man speak with quiet longing.


    "There is a legend," his master had


    said, "of a sword art created by Wudang''s founder himself. No


    one


    has ever seeded in recreating it.


    It exists only in stories now. If Kcould


    see that art with my own ey


    before I die, it would be the greatest gift Heaven could give me."


    Now the vision above him pulsed with life. The yin-yang turned in wless harmony,


    and within its center a heavenly realm seemed to open-pure light in perfect bnce with earth, sky, and existence itself.


    The Sect Master''s voice shook as he whispered the name he had waited his entire


    life to speak.


    "Wudang''s Heaven Sword Art..."


    He remembered the rest of his master''s words and spoke them like a prayer.


    "Undefeatable under heaven."


    Li Qingxue''s breath caught. She repeated the words silently, lips forming each syble as if afraid they might vanish.


    Undefeatable under heaven.


    Was it truly possible? Wudang currentlynguished at the very bottom of the seven


    great sects and five great ns.


    Yet here, in this single moment, everything had changed. With Jun Jiu and the return of the lost arts, the sect could finally rise within the Murim Alliance.


    More than that—-its name could echo across the entire Jiang Hu, the whole martial


    world.


    While every eye remained fixed on the sky, no one noticed the stone stele shift once


    more.


    Jun Jiu''s rank climbed from third to second.


    He now stood alone before the final trial.


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