pjbooks Chapter 57 Existence Analysis
Chapter 57 Existence Analysis
Zhou Tianze knelt on one knee in the void, drops of blood from the tiger's mouth of his right hand drifting in the weightless space, like red stars silently extinguishing. He lowered his head, his short, silvery-white hair falling down to cover most of his face, obscuring his expression, but his clenched left fist was trembling slightly—not from fear, but from anger and resentment.
He had lived for fifty years. Ten years ago, when he lost his left eye in the Seventh Apostle's Hall, he didn't tremble. Eight years ago, when he faced three Apostle Giants alone at the border, he didn't tremble. Three days ago, standing outside the Apostle's Hall, facing the unknown ninety-ninth floor, he didn't tremble either.
But now, he is trembling.
It wasn't because the thirteenth apostle's attack had wounded him deeply—the attack had indeed been severe, tearing the skin from his collarbone to his ribs with a blood-red light that appeared out of nowhere, revealing the dark red muscle tissue beneath, and blood flowing down his abdomen, dripping into the void. But he had suffered such injuries countless times, some even more severe.
He trembled because he sensed the gap.
"Tian Ce." Luo Qinghe's voice came from behind him, as cold as ever, but those who knew her well could hear a very subtle tremor in it. "Step back."
Zhou Tianze raised his head.
Luo Qinghe was already standing in front of him. Her ice-blue combat uniform stood out starkly in the void, her silver-white ponytail swaying gently behind her. The ice flower in her right hand was no longer the delicate and small one it once was; it had swelled to the size of a fist, its petals layered upon each other, each as thin as a cicada's wing yet as sharp as a knife. The color of the petals gradually changed from ice blue to deep blue, and then from deep blue to an almost black indigo—a spectral shift resulting from the extreme compression of ice-type spiritual power, similar to the lightning core of Zhou Tiance, but more restrained and more dangerous.
Her left arm remained motionless at her side, but her posture had changed. Her weight was no longer on her right foot, but on her left, her right leg slightly back, and her body slightly leaning forward—this was the posture she adopted when preparing to unleash her full power. The last time she adopted this posture was eight years ago on the fifth floor of the Eleventh Apostle's Hall, facing the apostle projection that had permanently robbed her of feeling in her left arm.
"Qinghe, you—" Zhou Tianze wanted to say something, but Luo Qinghe didn't give him the chance.
She made her move.
The ice-type spiritual power within her body surged from dormant to its peak in 0.2 seconds, causing the temperature of the entire void to plummet.
"Eternal Silence: Zero Degree Star Burial"
Luo Qinghe's voice wasn't loud, but every word seemed to echo from the depths of an ancient glacier. She raised her right hand, palm up, and the fist-sized ice flower slowly rose from her palm, hovering above her head. The ice flower began to spin, slowly at first, then faster and faster, until the outlines of the petals blurred, transforming into a bluish-green halo.
Within the halo, countless icy blue rays shot out in all directions. These rays were not straight lines, but curved, spiraling arcs, like the arms of a nebula. They passed through the suspended ice crystals, refracted, magnified, and amplified with each pass. One ice crystal refracted ten rays, ten rays were refracted by the next ice crystal into one hundred rays, one hundred rays into one thousand rays, one thousand rays into ten thousand rays.
In the blink of an eye, the entire void was filled with icy blue light, like a giant net woven from starlight, enveloping the thirteenth apostle.
The thirteenth apostle raised his head, his golden pupils reflecting an overwhelming icy blue light.
The corners of his mouth turned up slightly.
The light has dimmed.
The moment all the light converged to a single point, Luo Qinghe clenched his right fist.
"burial."
As the word fell, the icy blue light that had gathered on the thirteenth apostle's chest suddenly exploded.
An ice flower bloomed on the chest of the thirteenth apostle.
The ice flower was incredibly huge, exceeding ten meters in diameter. Its petals were layered upon each other, gradually changing from indigo to ice blue and then to almost transparent white from the inside out. Each petal was woven from countless ice crystals as fine as hair, and each ice crystal was a crystallization of Luo Qinghe's ice-type spiritual power, with a hardness exceeding that of diamonds and a sharpness capable of cutting atoms.
The moment the ice flowers bloomed, the entire void trembled. The suspended ice crystals shattered under the impact of this force, turning into countless ice shards that drifted through the void like stardust.
Luo Qinghe swayed slightly.
Her face was as white as transparent paper, and the last trace of color had faded from her lips. The fingertips of her right hand were slightly bluish—a sign of ruptured capillaries due to the depletion of her spiritual energy. Her left arm remained motionless at her side, but if someone could see inside it, they would find that the nerve endings, which had long since lost sensation, were now reacting—not to pain, but to a deeper, bone-chilling cold.
She gave it her all.
That strike concentrated eighty percent of her ice-type spiritual power, a final technique she had honed over eight years amidst the trauma of her time in the Eleventh Apostle's Hall. She had never used this move in actual combat before, because in any previous battle, it had never been necessary. But now, she used it.
The ice flowers spun slowly in the air, their petals shimmering with a cold, indigo light.
Then, the ice flower shattered.
The whole process took less than three seconds.
Three seconds later, the thirteenth apostle was still standing there.
On his chest, where the ice flower bloomed, there was a palm-sized patch of white frost on his black robe. The frost was so thin it was almost invisible, like the condensation on a window in winter. In the center of the frost was an extremely fine, needle-like crack—the mark from which the core power of the ice flower pierced through the dark golden aura surrounding him.
But nothing more.
There wasn't a single white spot on his skin.
The Thirteenth Apostle glanced down at the frost mark on his chest, then extended his right hand and gently brushed the area with his index finger. The frost mark vanished under his fingertip, revealing the intact black robe beneath. He hadn't even used any power to "resist" Luo Qinghe's ice—he simply stood there, letting the ice flowers bloom and shatter, nothing more.
"Ice-based," he said, his tone still calm but with a hint of appreciation. "Absolute zero, spatial collapse, matter frozen. Your attack, within your human system, has already surpassed the limits of SSS-level."
He raised his eyes, his golden pupils looking at Luo Qinghe.
"But do you know what? The essence of ice is slowing down, it's stillness, it's bringing all movement to a standstill. And my essence—"
He stretched out his hand, palm up, fingers slightly spread.
In his palm, an ice flower was condensing. That ice flower was exactly the same as the one Luo Qinghe had just released—its size, shape, color, layers, and even the texture of its petals were identical. It slowly rotated in the Thirteenth Apostle's palm, swirling with an indigo-blue cold light and radiating a temperature low enough to freeze the soul.
Luo Qinghe's pupils suddenly contracted.
"—It's a reversal."
The thirteenth apostle gently clenched his fist, and the ice flower shattered in his palm, turning into nothingness.
"Your ice can slow down time. My power can reverse time. Your attack was already reversed to a 'miss' state before it even hit me. The marks you see—he pointed to the black robe on his chest—were not caused by your ice, but by my permission for your ice to touch me. That's all."
He tilted his head slightly, and his long, silvery-white hair slipped down his shoulder.
"Like this."
The moment the words left his mouth, Luo Qinghe froze.
In the palm of her right hand, the ice flower was reforming. Petals grew out of her palm one by one, layer upon layer, growing larger and heavier, the color gradually changing from ice blue to deep blue, from deep blue to indigo, and from indigo to a deep purple that she had never seen before, almost black.
That was her spiritual power. It was the spiritual power that the thirteenth apostle had drawn from her body, which had condensed again in her palm into an ice flower that she had never seen before, far exceeding her limits.
"This one is bigger than the one I just had—"
"Ten times stronger." The thirteenth apostle finished the sentence for her. "It uses your spiritual power, but I've optimized the structure for you. Your ice flower has a 37-degree angle between its petals, and the spiritual power loss rate between the petals is 12%. This one, however, has a 41-degree angle, and the loss rate is less than 3%."
He looked at her, his golden eyes showing no mockery, no pity, only a pure, almost academic-discussion-like calm.
"Your talent is excellent, Luo Qinghe. But your understanding of power is still stuck at the stage of 'brute force.' You think that the more you compress spiritual energy and the lower the temperature, the greater the power. But you don't understand—the essence of power is not brute force, but rules. You don't understand the rules yet."
He flicked his finger.
The black ice flower in Luo Qinghe's palm broke free of her control and slowly drifted into the depths of the void. After drifting for about a hundred paces, it exploded silently. There was no loud noise, no light, only an almost invisible, transparent ripple spreading outwards from the point where the ice flower exploded.
The void itself began to collapse in the area swept by the ripples.
Luo Qinghe stared at the space that was repairing itself and remained silent for a long time.
She recalled eight years ago, on the fifth floor of the Eleventh Apostle's Hall, when she faced the projection of that apostle and felt the same sense of powerlessness. At that time, she thought that was the limit of the gap between humans and apostles.
Now she knows that was just the tip of the iceberg.
Chapter 58
Ye Wuhen stood there the whole time.
From the moment Zhou Tianze made his move to the moment Luo Qinghe made his move, and as he watched the thirteenth apostle effortlessly deflect their combined attacks, he remained standing in place, his left hand behind his back, his right hand gripping the longsword without a scabbard. The tip of the sword pointed diagonally at the ground, its blade gleaming with a cold, silvery-gray light in the air.
He didn't move, but his sword was.
His thumb pressed against the hilt, his fingertip feeling every vibration transmitted from the blade.
This was an opponent he had never encountered before.
He slowly raised his sword.
The sword tip changed from pointing diagonally at the ground to pointing straight ahead, aiming at the thirteenth apostle's brow. The movement was very slow, as slow as swinging a sword in water, so slow that Zhou Tianze and Luo Qinghe both sensed something was wrong—they had known Ye Wuhen for thirty years and had never seen him draw his sword so slowly.
Ye Wuhen's sword was always fast. So fast that it was invisible, so fast that there was no time to react, so fast that the enemy would not even know how they died.
But now, his sword is slow.
Because he was accumulating [something].
Zhou Tianze stared at the beam of light, his pupils contracting slightly.
He had never seen Ye Wuhen's sword emit such light. Thirty years ago, when Ye Wuhen first challenged the Apostle Hall, his sword light was silver-white, sharp and dazzling. Twenty years ago, when he beheaded that S-class demon god, his sword light was golden, fiery and domineering. Ten years ago, when he faced three Apostle giants alone at the border, his sword light was dark red, heavy and tragic.
But he had never seen this amber-colored, transparent, warm light before.
Luo Qinghe also stared at the light. Her lips moved slightly, as if she wanted to say something, but ultimately she didn't. The tip of her right finger was still turning blue, and she had very little spiritual energy left in her body, but she stood very straight, her eyes fixed on the tip of Ye Wuhen's sword.
Ye Wuhen closed his eyes.
The moment he closed his eyes, the entire void fell silent.
At this moment, Ye Wuhen severed all connection with the outside world. He couldn't hear Zhou Tianze's heartbeat, couldn't feel the flow of spiritual energy in the void, and even forgot where he was and who he was facing. Only one thing remained in his world—
His sword.
And that amber-colored light that condensed at the tip of the sword.
Then, he opened his eyes.
The moment he opened his eyes, the light from the tip of the sword exploded.
His first sword strike was at the age of seven. He held a sword for the first time and cut a tree branch in the yard.
At the age of ten, on his 100th sword strike, he defeated his first opponent of the same age in the training field.
At the age of fifteen, during his first thousandth sword strike, he injured someone with his sword intent, and his opponent didn't even know how he executed the strike.
At the age of twenty, the Ten Thousand Swordsman beheaded his first apostle.
The Ten Thousand Swordsman, thirty years old, emerged alive from the First Apostle Hall.
Bai Wanjian, forty years old, killed an S-class demon god with a single sword strike at the border.
At fifty years old, Qian Wanjian's swordsmanship had reached a point where even he himself could no longer see them.
All the swords, all the insights, all the reflections, are condensed in this one sword.
"The Way of the Sword - Return to Oneness".
Ye Wuhen drew his sword.
There was no sound. There was no light. There was no warning whatsoever.
How long did it take for the sword tip to move from its starting position to the thirteenth apostle's brow? No one knew. Zhou Tianze couldn't see it, Luo Qinghe couldn't see it, and neither could the billions of viewers in front of the live broadcast. They only saw Ye Wuhen's sword still pointing at the ground, and the next second, the sword tip was already pointing at the thirteenth apostle's brow.
It manifested emotions other than laziness.
It's an interest.
"Interesting," he said, his voice still soft, but his tone rising slightly. "Your sword strike wasn't meant to hurt me, but to understand me. To analyze the rules, find the weakness, and then deliver a fatal blow. That's a very clever tactic."
He raised his right hand and gently pinched Ye Wuhen's sword blade between his index and middle fingers.
"But you forgot one thing."
He applied slight pressure with his fingers, and the blade emitted a low, metallic hum of fatigue.
"You can analyze me, and I can analyze you."
He was reading everything about Ye Wuhen.
His swordsmanship, his combat experience, his spiritual energy circulation, his weaknesses, his limits, his memories of every battle over the past thirty years, and even the fears and hesitations deep within his heart that he himself was unaware of—all of this was seen through, read, and analyzed by the golden eyes of the Thirteenth Apostle.
Ye Wuhen tried to draw his sword, but the blade was held firmly in place by two long, pale fingers. He tried to loosen his grip on the hilt, but the fingers seemed welded to it and wouldn't budge. He tried to back away, but his body wouldn't obey him, as if he were nailed to the spot.
Seeing this, Zhou Tianze, ignoring his chest injury, struggled to his feet, gathering the last bit of lightning spiritual power in his right hand, and charged towards the thirteenth apostle. Luo Qinghe also forced himself to raise his right hand, the icy blue light flickering at his fingertips.
The thirteenth apostle didn't even glance at them.
With a casual wave of his left hand, a transparent, almost invisible ripple spread from his palm. Zhou Tianze and Luo Qinghe were simultaneously struck by the ripple, as if they had been slammed head-on by an invisible mountain, flying hundreds of meters backward and tumbling countless times in the void before barely regaining their footing. A trickle of blood escaped from the corner of Zhou Tianze's mouth, while Luo Qinghe's right hand split open, and icy blue spiritual energy seeped from the wound like melting ice water.
"Don't rush," said the thirteenth apostle, his tone still calm. "Let me finish reading."
His gaze returned to Ye Wuhen, his golden pupils reflecting Ye Wuhen's thirty-year swordsmanship career.
Three seconds later, he released his fingers.
Ye Wuhen staggered back two steps, the sword tip moving away from the thirteenth apostle's brow, the amber light fading. His face was pale, fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead, and his hand holding the sword trembled slightly—not because he was exhausted, but because he knew that everything about him had been seen through.
He raised his right hand, his index and middle fingers together, loosely forming the shape of a sword. Then, he made a movement—drawing the sword.
That movement was exactly the same as Ye Wuhen's earlier one.
Ye Wuhen's pupils suddenly contracted.
"you--"
"Return to One." The thirteenth apostle uttered the name, his tone as flat as if reciting a textbook, "Your swordsmanship, what you took thirty years to comprehend. I only took three seconds."
He flicked his finger, and an amber light shot out from his fingertip, grazing Ye Wuhen's left arm and striking a void meteorite a hundred paces behind him. Enveloped in the amber light, the meteorite neither exploded nor shattered, but instead—
It has been analyzed.