Albus gestured with his sword finger, then uttered, “Go.” The crystalline longsword trembled slightly. Without any visible wind-up, it transformed into a streak of azure light, surging forward to meet the three terrifying lightning spears.


    rion watched in disbelief as the streak moved with a lightness that defied physics. It was so fast his divine sense could barely track its trajectory.


    Instead of shing head-on, the streak shed through the narrow gap between the spears in the blink of an eye. What happened next left everyone stunned.


    The three devastating lightning spears froze mid-flight as if caught in an invisible ice storm. The crackling cyan lightning on their surface rapidly dimmed and solidified.


    Three sharp cracks echoed simultaneously as the spears snapped in two. The breaks were perfectly smooth before the remnants dissolved into a mist of ice-blue light and vanished without a sound. They might as well have been fragile icicles rather than powerful lightning techniques.


    “What?” rion’s breath hitched, his voice cracking in a strangled cry.


    His full-force strike had been dismissed so casually. How was that possible? What kind of sword was that? What kind of technique?


    Albus hovered calmly in the air, but his sword finger moved again. The crystalline longsword traced an elegant arc and hovered before him, its tip locked onto rion with a soul-chilling focus.


    “You…” Every instinct in rion screamed in warning as an unprecedented sense of dread washed over him. He no longer dared to underestimate Albus.


    With a guttural roar, the golden core within him spun wildly and unleashed a torrent of raw spiritual energy. A set of emerald-toned te armor materialized over his body, glowing with a hard, ssy sheen.


    At the same time, his hands formed a rapid series of hand seals to summon his soul-bound artifact. It was the Stormbreaker, an ancient bronze mirror etched with jagged lightning symbols.


    The mirror rose into the air, its surface crackling with lightning before erupting into a massive pir of cyan thunder. It was a concentrated torrent of pure destruction that roared toward Albus with devastating force. This was rion’s trump card, a strike far more devastating than the previous lightning spears.


    Faced with the devastating roar of the oing strike, Albus’ gaze finally sharpened. He raised his sword finger in a slow, deliberate motion, and the hovering crystalline longsword thrummed in response.


    The light dancing along the steel swirled into a brilliant vortex as a surge of sword aura-vast and terrifyingly pure-erupted skyward in a pir of absolute frost.


    “Third Form-cial Sepulcher.”


    Albus’ voice was cold and detached, devoid of any emotion.


    This time, the crystalline longsword didn’t blur. Its path through the air was slow enough for every eye to follow. It left a shimmering trail of frost in its wake as if it were freezing the very fabric of space. The tip of the sword met the head of the roaring lightning pir with a gentle tap.


    Time seemed to stop at that moment. There was no earth-shaking explosion or blinding sh of light. Instead, the terrifying pir-with enough power to level a mountain-was overtaken by a surge of azure ice.


    Startling from the point of contact, the frost raced backward, swallowing the lightning in a crystalline casing. The freezing advance was irresistible, surging up the stream of thunder toward the Stormbreaker itself.


    “No!” rion screamed, his mind shattering in terror. He could feel his connection to the Stormbreaker being ruthlessly severed, frozen solid by a terrifying chill. He tried to recall the artifact, but it was already toote.


    A sharp, crystalline crack echoed through the marsh. In an instant, the Stormbreaker and its pir of thunder werepletely encased in ice.


    They became a massive, life-like monument, a tableau of a strike frozen in mid-air. The lightning was trapped within the ss, suspended in its final moment of fury.


    As his soul-bound artifact was neutralized, rion reeled as if he had been struck by a sledgehammer. He coughed up a mouthful of blood, his aura copsing instantly. His face turned a ghostly, papery white, his eyes wide with a primal, bottomless terror.


    rion’s mind failed him.


    Just what kind of monster was he looking at? Albus’ cultivation was clearly that of an Adept, but the reality before him made no sense. No one at that realm should have been able to freeze a Core-Forged Arcanist’s artifact in a single strike.


    Albus lowered his hand, and the crystalline longsword gave a soft hum as it flew back to his side. He didn’t even look at the frozen mirror. Instead, his gaze remained fixed on rion, who was now reeling from the bacsh in total terror.


    “Injuring my sister is an unforgivable sin,” he said. He slowly raised his hand, his fingers forming the sword-finger again. Terror seized rion. Any thought of revenge was gone, reced by a primal need to survive.


    Albus’ sword mastery was beyond anything he had ever encountered. If he stayed another second, he would be a dead man.


    “Run!”


    The thought screamed through his mind. Without even a nce toward his frozen soul-bound artifact, he bit down hard on the tip of his tongue. A mouthful of blood essence, mingled with fragmented specks of his golden core, sprayed forth. It coalesced into a thick, crimson radiance that wrapped around him.


    Blood sh was a forbidden technique that sacrificed one’s foundational cultivation to achieve an impossible burst of speed.


    In a blur of crimson, rion vanished. He moved so fast the air cracked in his wake, leaving only a jagged, hate-filled roar to echo over the marsh.


    “Stray of the Frost line! I will remember today’s grudge. The Jornells of Amethysius will hunt you to the ends of the earth. We will not rest until your entire bloodline is wiped out.”


    The streak of blood-light tore across the horizon at an impossible speed. In the blink of an eye, it was nothing more than a fading speck against the sky. And then it was gone.


    Albus didn’t chase him. He merely cast a cold, indifferent nce toward the horizon where rion had vanished.


    “Pathetic pretender,” he muttered. With a casual wave, the frozen Stormbreaker and the ice-sculpted lightning pir rapidly shrank to palm size and dropped into his hand. He casually tucked them into his pocket.


    Once that was done, the overwhelming sword aura radiating from him vanished.


    He transformed back into his youthful, handsome appearance, with a hint of boyishness. His figure shed as he descended to the ice-blue sword barrier protecting nche below.


    Once the barrier was gone, Albus rushed to nche’s side. Seeing her pale face and injuries covering her body, his eyes reddened, and his voice choked with emotion.


    “Are you okay?” he asked. “I’m sorry that I came toote.”


    nche looked at her younger brother, who felt both familiar and like a total stranger. Her heart was a storm of conflicting emotions-the hollow relief of survival, the sudden warmth of seeing family, and the staggering shock of the power he had just disyed.


    She forced a smile and raised her hand to pat his head, though the movement made her wince from her wounds.


    “Albus, you’ve grown up. And you’ve gotten so much stronger.”