The light in Shadow's eyes flickered before they completely lit up. Still in his somewhat languid state, Shadow regained consciousness and started to observe his new surroundings.

Large black trees with a dense black mist surrounded him. Shadow immediately became alert of his new environment and started to circulate his Dark Qi.

'Hmm?' When Shadow glanced at his waist, he could see a vortex of black mist coiling around him, as if they were sucked into a black hole.

Upon discovering that the black mist contained a large amount of Dark Qi, Shadow immediately sat down and started gathering more Dark Qi.

Woosshh!

The flow rate increased and Shadow's body became darker and darker. Just when Shadow felt that he was about to explode from the amount of Dark Qi in his body, he imagined that the large amount of Dark Qi was compressed into a tiny dark core.

When the Dark Qi gathered into one small area, the pressure increased sharply, causing the the core shaped Dark Qi to dispel. Again! This time round, Shadow increased his concentration and forced the Dark Qi together again.

Hong!

As the pressure from the gathering of Dark Qi was subdued, the Dark Qi was forcibly formed into a core. The residue energy was then released into the surroundings which caused the loud sound.

A core was formed. However, it was still unstable with a few cracks here and there.

'It needs more Dark Qi!' Shadow immediately utilized his cultivation technique again to absorb the Dark Qi.

As the Dark Qi began to fill up the cracks, an extremely round dark core with a tinge of golden and red glow was formed.

For normal cultivators at the Core Formation stage, the color of their core determined the quality of their core. Of course, those with a higher quality are naturally stronger. Starting from the lowest quality was white, followed by purple and red. As for golden cores, it was extremely rare such that it only appeared once in history.

After spending all of the Dark Qi to form a core, the Dark Qi in Shadow's body was once again, extremely lacking.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Sensing that there was not much Dark Qi left in the black mist, Shadow greedily replenished his body with the remaining Dark Qi.

"Huuu," After the whole process, Shadow breathed out of a breath of putrid air. After advancing to the Core Formation stage, Shadow felt that his body and soul is now cleaner and purer.

When the excitement died down, Shadow carefully evaluated his surroundings.

The black mist was much lighter now which allowed Shadow to see further. A small waterfall could be seen at a distance and large tress stretched as far as he could see, causing the surroundings to be quite dark. Occasionally, thundering roars of ferocious beasts could be heard accompanied by sounds of laughter.

This forest was extremely dark and creepy!

Shadow shivered at the laughter as he could feel his scalp tingling incessantly. Shadow knew one thing for sure, it definitely wasn't human.

Taking out his map, Shadow started to find his location. 'By starting from the west gate of Phoenix City, I've walked across an endless stretched of dessert, which leads to...'

Shadow traced his finger on the map until he came to a large patch of dark-colored area. When Shadow saw the name of the place, he stared at it for a while longer before his gaze turned serious.

Lands of Despair. Yes, he has came to the demons' territory.

Upon seeing that there's no telling which was the way out, Shadow sighed before heading towards the waterfall.

Using his Dark Qi in his body and the rotation of the core, Shadow steadily rose up and flew towards the waterfall.

Thud.

Shadow conveniently landed on a small stone in front of the waterfall. When he saw his own reflection in the waterfall, Shadow's eyes immediately turned cold. Instantly, the previous tragic memories invaded his mind.

The more he thought about it, the more erratic the Dark Qi in his body became. With a surge of killing intent, Shadow struck out at his own reflection.

Instead of hitting a rock surface, a large cave was revealed when the water was dispersed.

Shadow immediately came back to his senses and jumped through the waterfall.

If one did not look carefully, they wouldn't be able to realize that there was a cave behind the waterfall. The cave was about thirty meters deep with a height of around 10 meters.

Walking along the cave, Shadow noticed that there was a lot of scratch marks on the rock wall made by a sharp object. Bracing for danger, Shadow advanced further.

When he reached the end of the cave, Shadow saw a skeleton seating there. Observing the skeleton, Shadow saw that it was a skeleton of a male and a simple black cloth was draped over it. On the walls beside the skeleton, Shadow saw a few writings. It went like this:

To whoever that find this place,

To meet me here is fate itself and to learn from me, is a privilege. You must be thinking how laughable it is that a skeleton has such big words. Really laughable.

I've existed countless eras ago, when the world was still in its primordial stage. Since you have met me here, I shall impart my sword skills to you.

Sword Devil.

Shadow's gaze lingered on the name at the end. Next he turned to the other side of the wall, surprisingly, there was 3 swords and a wooden tablet planted into the ground.

Shadow went to the first sword and read the words below it. "This was my first sword. It was so sharp and powerful such that I defeated all the geniuses from all the sects around the world when I was in my teenage years".

The next item was a wooden tablet, when the Shadow saw the words, his eyes lit up. It went "The next sword was my second sword. This sword was extremely flexible and could cut enemies at various angles. However, I have used this sword to injure righteous men during my 20s which caused me to feel extremely remorseful. Hence, I cast it into a deep canyon".

The next sword was a large metal sword that seemed incomparably heavy, below it was "This was my third sword. It emphasized on simplicity; killing with one strike. With this sword in hand, I roamed unparalleled under the heavens in my 30s".

The last sword was a wooden sword. "My last sword was no sword. When I reached the age of 40, I have attained the highest comprehension of Dao of Swords. Anything can be my weapon, grass, leaves, rocks... With just a thought, a battle was over. Ever since then, I have never tasted defeat such that I longed for defeat. My wish was granted when I was defeated by the flow of time".

Shadow let out a breath of air. One word. Domineering! Too domineering!

When Shadow was about to explore the cave carefully, he saw a few words carved below the four swords. "Now. Which sword would you choose?"

Shadow's looked at the four swords and his heart skipped a bit.