Qian Fugui knocked on my door again the next morning.

"I will be escorting you to the Public Area, and afterwards, I will be refereeing the duel. Come."

And so we went.

It was not common for inner sect disciples to be in the Public Area, as it was primarily a place for outer sect disciples to settle grudges or compete for resources. Perhaps that was why most of the ongoing duels stopped as soon as their combatants caught sight of Qian Fugui, slowly making his way down the sandy paths with me in tow.

—"What is Senior Qian doing here?"

"Didn't you hear? Bai Chunxue and Wang Wujiu are having a duel today."

"What's the point? Even if Bai Chunxue is in Core Formation, the princess can't lose now that she's done a severing."

"Who knows? Maybe Bai Chunxue has done a severing too."

"When, though? Someone would have noticed the tribulation."

"I don't know, maybe during the thunderstorm the other week."

Qian Fugui led me to a large arena in the center of the Public Arena, empty but for some loose rocks and piles of sand. Wujiu was not yet there, so he sat in a corner of the arena and meditated, and I, seeing nothing better to do, did the same. A crowd began to gather, and though some of the outer sect duels continued unabated, nobody started any new fights. It was not out of fear or respect— it was just because they didn't know when Wujiu would arrive, and they didn't want to miss our duel.

Some time passed, and then a sole figure descended from the skies on a shining sword.

—"It's the princess!"

Wang Wujiu leaped down from the sky, slamming soundlessly into the center of the the arena. Only a moment later her sword came too, piercing some four inches straight down into the earth right in front of her.

It was a beautiful sword, its edge shining like the bevels of a diamond, its inscriptions glowing white with power. I could not read the inscriptions, but I could vaguely recognize them as one of the languages of Nalantuo, and it took me some time to understand why she of all people would have a sword with such an inscription.

The crowd, the crowd that had only whispered when I had entered, began cheering with full force. After all, just as with my previous duel, they were only here to see me get killed, if for no other reason than that I was an upstart, the crab that had escaped the bucket that was the outer sect. To them, the purpose I served was to be trash, so how could they ever accept my becoming a Core Formation cultivator? If they did anything other than call for my death, it could only ever be out of fear.

Who of the hundreds gathered here was on my side? Qian Fugui was neutral, I suppose...

—Natsuki, if I count her, her omnipresence in the shadows. She was always on my side. She was the only one here who would support me. And that was all I needed.

"That's not your usual sword," I called out to Wujiu.

"That's right." She pulled her sword from the ground and twirled it in an arc, then let the flat part of its blade come to rest on an outstretched finger. "This is Samudra's Lotus-Form Sword. It is not a treasure of this sect, but rather a treasure of the western provinces, a treasure that came to Xili many aeons ago together with the scriptures of Buddhism. It is a dangerous sword, unsuited for cultivation, but..."

She swung the sword in an arc down to her side, and in its wake the air itself froze into a thin paperlike layer of ice, which fell to the ground and shattered.

"I have already thrown away my hesitation."

Samudra. It was not a well-known name, but as a proper scholar of Buddhism, I knew the story of this sword. A monk named Samudra, meeting with the misfortune of being trapped in the torture chambers of the crazed emperor Ashoka, was thrown into a cauldron full of human flesh, boiling oil, and animal excrement. —Yet what is torture but another form of the suffering that pervades existence itself? This was his enlightenment! By the force of this enlightenment he froze over the cauldron, and let bloom forth from its filth a brilliant blue lotus upon which he meditated. And— most critically— by the force of this miracle, he convinced Emperor Ashoka to abandon evil and embrace Buddhism.

Samudra did not use his sword to preserve his life. That was precisely why it was so great. It was a weapon that he did not unsheathe even when faced with the worst possible suffering, because his enlightenment outweighed his pain. To wield such a sword, then, was at once to exert a power comparable to enlightenment itself, and simultaneously to foreclose on the very possibility of enlightenment itself.

Perhaps that is why she needed to discard her hesitation to wield it. Perhaps it was that very hesitation that she had severed the other night.

"Ahem." Qian Fugui cleared his throat. "It seems both contestants are ready. As are standard rules for Public Area duels, anything goes. I am only here to ensure that nobody interferes and nobody flees. As this is a sect duel, it is proper form to give introductions first, and then you may start."

Wujiu nodded. "I am Wang Wujiu, heir to the lands of the White Tiger," she shouted in a voice that made it clear she was speaking to the audience and not to me. "My Dao is the Dao of Kings. May life and death alike be the bricks with which I rebuild Xichuan up from the dust."

"I am—" I paused, then raised my tone. "I am Bai Chunxue. My Dao is the Dao of True Trust. No fear. No hope. Only belief."

Wujiu pointed her sword forward at me. "Do you have anything else you want to say before I kill you? I heard you were rambling for a long time before you dealt with the musclehead."

"No." I held my sword-hilt out in front of me and lit a deep black flame where its blade was not. "This duel doesn't matter to me, so I have nothing to say."

"That's too bad. This duel matters quite a bit to me. This is, in fact, the very last thing I must do before I return to the west."

"...Revenge for Gu Lianying?" I asked carefully.

"Rulers must not permit themselves to be driven by emotions so base as vengeance."

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She swung her sword upwards, and from its tip—

No.

I did not yield the first move to her.

I brought my right knee up, encasing my leg in crackling golden qi. Then I slammed my heel into the ground, and in that moment, in that instantaneous moment, I flew forward like a lightning bolt, and I was there, right in front of her, my sword ready to thrust forward through her neck and kill her.

At that moment, I looked— I know I should not have, but I could not stop myself!— into her eyes, her eyes so wide open. In them I saw surprise— but that was not all, it could not be all. Beyond the surprise, what else was there? There was... pride. Ambition. Even greed. And...

As I had expected.

There was no hatred. Not in that cold, dark, distant glare.

Even now, I was nothing more to her than the guardian of that one dusty old almanac. Even now, my life held less weight than that tome.

My sword faltered. She brought her sword up to knock mine aside, then leaped back several meters to disengage.

She snorted and took an offensive stance.

"A nice trick you have there. But it doesn't matter. Even if I didn't block that, you wouldn't have been able to cut my flesh."

"We'll find out about that," I laughed, and as I laughed, I let the sword's flame go out and replaced it with a blue flame. I could not use that golden magic on my right leg in succession, or my leg would crumble. Until I was ready, I would have to play defensive and suss out her abilities.

She swung her sword upwards once more, and this time I could not stop her. A bolt of ice, like a giant hailstone, flew forth from the tip of her sword, arcing towards me and leaving a trail of ice in its wake. Wujiu jumped on this trail and slid along it as one slides down a frozen hill, following behind the bolt of ice, closing in on me. If I blocked the bolt of ice, she would follow by breaking my guard. If I dodged the bolt of ice, she would catch my dodge. In that case—

With two hands on my sword I swung it down, releasing a crescent wave of blue qi, that collided with the bolt of ice and sent it flying backwards!

Wujiu jumped off the trail of ice, avoiding my attack, then planted one foot into the ground before leaping towards me. She raised her sword over her head, then brought it down over mine. I stepped offline and swung my sword horizontally, blocking her sword and cutting towards her head—

but as soon as our swords came in contact, I found that I could not move my own sword! It was stuck in place— no, it was being forced back by the force of her cut! This force! It was ten times stronger than four of Guoqiang's dragons combined, and it was a mere sword slice! Was this the power of a severing?!

I knew that if I tried to stop her sword any further, she would cut through my sword and my throat in one slice. But this was why I had switched to blue flame! I spun my wrists and deflected the force of her swing to the side— but as soon as I did, she used the power of my deflection to spin her body, and slammed her foot into my back with a tornado kick!

"—Gkhaa—!"

For a moment the breath in my lungs was all forced out, and I went flying across the arena. I crashed into a pile of sand and tumbled along ten meters of rock before I finally stopped.

Grimacing, I brought myself to my knees, then stood.

"Is that all you can do, Bai Chunxue?" she called out, pointing her sword at me. "I had heard some impressive rumors, but ultimately, this turned out to be quite disappointing."

I straightened my breath, and tapped my left foot three times on the ground. I had been planning to keep my left leg free as a defensive measure, but I needed a trump card. My left leg glowed golden, and I relit my sword with black flame.

If I could not summon the will to kill her, then I would just destroy her sword arm.

I slammed my left foot into the ground, crushing the rock underneath my boot, and with the recoil flashed forward towards her. I swung my sword at her arm like one swings an axe into a tree!

Out of the corner of my eye I saw her expression.

A cruel, terrifying smirk.

And then I realized my sword had not cut through her arm. It had not even reached her arm. Her innate qi barrier had stopped it in place!

—With her fist Wujiu struck me in the chest, and I went flying back halfway across the arena before crashing to the ground.

"I told you," she cackled. "You can't even cut my flesh."

I was in a bad situation. I couldn't use the golden magic on either of my legs, and I no longer had any offensive options, as long as her innate qi barrier blocked my attacks.

"Natsuki..." I whispered as I struggled to my feet, "I need a way to... get past that qi barrier. I'm too weak as is."

—"There are ways to interfere with such barriers using combinations of wind, mountain, and marsh magic, but they are complex, and you do not know them. With all your force you could probably cut through it, but I would not recommend this. Perhaps one of your alchemy circles would work, like you used against Long Guoqiang."

I frowned. How could I use an alchemy circle to disrupt her innate qi barrier? The qi barrier around the body is formed because there is a large quantity of qi inside the body all flowing in aligned directions, something like how magnetic fields are generated by aligned electrical currents. If I could make the qi in her body flow with more irregularity, then it would drastically weaken the barrier, and it theoretically wouldn't consume too much qi on my part. The alchemical circle would be far more complicated, but I could envision it in my head. The only problems were— how would I get the chance to draw such a complicated circle, and how would I make her step into it?

—"Senior Wang, show us the Utpala!" cried out someone from the crowd.

"Yeah! It's a waste if you kill Bai Chunxue without using the Utpala!"

I winced. I did not know what technique they were referring to, but I knew what the word meant. Utpala, the sixth cold hell of Buddhism, so named because under its force one's skin would take on the chilling color of the blue utpala lotus, before finally cracking apart like shattered ice.

"Then let it be so!" she declared, her voice so loud it shifted the very clouds. "As my parting gift to this sect, I shall show you all the frost, and why not the flames as well? I shall show you my resolve, and if you find it beautiful, then come follow me westward."

Exhaling forcefully, she held her sword to her chest, its tip pointed straight up to the sky. The arena fell into shadow, and an odd chill began gnawing at my fingers.

"Eternal Frost, Sixth Form: Utpala."