Volume One: Scroll of New Rain Chapter Twenty-Eight: My Sword Is Not Alone

“You are forbidden from teaching him anything of cultivation—such is an ironclad covenant that cannot be violated. Yet today, you have taught him the way of the sword!”

The most resplendent divine radiance drew near the bamboo hut, thunder in its voice.

“Yes.”

Jian Nantian sat in his wheelchair, raising his gaze to meet the towering, mountain-like beams of divine light that encircled him with an unruffled calm.

“Do you intend to break the covenant?”

The godly lights seemed incensed by Jian Nantian’s placid expression, pressing forward. The courtyard blazed with an intensity as though a great sun had fallen from the sky, its brilliance searing, blinding.

Yet the patch of night within the courtyard remained untouched. Darkness endured as darkness; the dazzling light could not penetrate, forming a stark and unwavering divide.

“Yes,” Jian Nantian replied, the same tranquil word.

“Insolence!”

“You dare mock the majesty of the heavens!”

It was as if a hundred thousand thunderbolts exploded overhead. The divine lights shook with wrath, seeking to tear away the last veil of night that shielded the little courtyard.

Sensing danger to its master, a clear sword cry rang out across the small town. A piercing beam of sword-light, keening sharply, soared up from the mountains behind the bamboo house.

With a resonant clang, it drove itself into the earth beside Jian Nantian, quivering faintly. When its radiance faded, it revealed an unadorned, broken sword—plain, incomplete.

Yet it was this very ruined blade that halted the advance of the divine lights.

“Heh.”

A soft laugh sounded in the night—not thunderous, but as casual as everyday conversation.

“The Sword Sovereign’s name is clearly well-deserved. To seal the Supreme with a sword, peerless across the six realms. But I wonder, Sword Sovereign, with only a solitary sword—how many of us can you withstand?”

“My sword is not solitary.”

Jian Nantian sat upright, his words slow, deliberate, solemn.

“Can’t anyone get a proper night’s sleep? So noisy! Are you trying to frighten children with those voices?”

From the neighboring courtyard, Long Yinling flung open her door, yawning and grumbling.

“Yes, I’m talking to you—the loudest one up there.”

She squinted disdainfully up at the brightest divine light in the sky.

“And don’t bother to ask on whose behalf I speak. I speak on behalf of your own mother!”

The divine light was not provoked, but thundered on.

“So you add a little dragon—what difference does it make?”

Before the words had faded, the huge banyan tree where the great white beast resided began to shake violently, wreathed in dense black mist as it tore itself from the earth. With a rasping roar, it reared up, and in the swirling darkness, a pair of immense, blood-red eyes flared, fixing on the assembly of divine lights.

“To think there’s even a half-man here, that is unexpected.”

The divine lights fell silent for a time.

Then the brightest among them spoke again, coldly.

“But what of it?”

A deep, sonorous gong sounded at the far end of the street, and the measured tread of footsteps, soft but clear to all, approached.

A hunched figure carrying a gong appeared around the corner, head bowed as he walked step by step toward the gathering of divine lights.

“The town’s night watchman?” one divine light inquired.

“Ahem, the night watchman, yes. I have struck this gong for so many years, I’ve almost forgotten that these hands once struck down immortals.”

With every fit of coughing, the old man’s body seemed to curl more tightly, stooping ever lower, but the shadow he dragged behind him grew taller, more massive.

At last, that great shadow pressed to the earth, then rose upright, shrouded in fog a thousand yards thick, standing as tall as the sky, glowing with two blood-red eyes.

“I, too, have nearly forgotten myself, after so many years as a mason. Once, however, I was a craftsman of the heavens.”

A stern-faced elder carrying a bucket walked up behind the watchman. Reaching his side, he let the bucket drop with a sharp smack.

As the bucket struck the ground, countless specks of mud leapt into the air. Instead of falling, they twisted and danced, defying gravity as they flickered with strange, dim flames.

Amidst the fire, the mud specks warped, each sprouting limbs, transforming into little clay figures wreathed in fire, hopping to the earth, clambering onto the old man’s shoulders, chirping in a language no one could understand, crimson light gleaming in their tiny eyes.

At that same moment, black mist welled up from homes all across the town. Enormous shadows rose from the darkness, pairs upon pairs of blood-red eyes flickering like beasts hidden in the night, encircling the divine lights before the bamboo hut.

Above, a mass of red, monstrous birds descended, layer upon layer, blanketing the town, while beyond its borders, countless withered corpses silently stood, their hollow sockets gazing at the lights in the sky.

When heaven stirs to slaughter, the stars are shifted, and their places changed.
When earth stirs to slaughter, dragons and serpents rise from the land.
When man stirs to slaughter, heaven and earth are overturned.

Heaven, earth, and the human realm—everywhere, the air is thick with the intent to kill.

Even the gods must tremble before this.

“Half-men, Shadow Sovereign, Demon Craftsman... and the other remnants left after the collapse of the Demon Realm—who would have guessed so many lingering souls still survive, clinging to the black tide.”

The brightest divine light’s tone was mocking, but as the divine lights subtly shifted to form a tight circle, their wariness was evident.

“But you possess only the last flicker of will, a handful of wretches clinging to life. How many more times can you fight? Dare you challenge the heavens? Are you not afraid of becoming nothing more than the rotten corpses outside the town?”

“Though the Demon Army is dead, our resolve burns brighter than ever. We still dare to strike against heaven!”

The old watchman’s frail frame shuddered, and the great demonic shadow behind him stepped forward, releasing a thunderous roar.

“And you are not the heavens, merely their avatars—avatars of gods whose spines were already broken by the Celestial Court.”

“Cringing sycophants—how dare you shame the Demon Army?”

The towering shadow advanced, joined by the blood-red eyes in the darkness and the rolling demon mist, all pressing toward the divine lights.

“You no longer have time to summon reinforcements from the heavens.”

Jian Nantian spoke quietly, but both demon and divine were stilled by his words.

“Withdraw! There is no need for you to bear the cost of the Demon Army’s last stand.”

Jian Nantian’s sword-like brows drew together as he gazed at the divine lights above, his voice calm but heavy with commanding authority.

The divine lights were silent.

“To die unyielding—the Demon Army’s reputation is well-earned. We are in awe.”

The divine light rising from the Academy spoke in ringing tones.

“But, Sword Sovereign, do not forget—the Body of Chaos is more than a matter of realms and the Celestial Court. Be wary. Be exceedingly wary.”

Then, turning to the rest, the divine light said,

“Let us all withdraw for now.”

The divine lights formed a circle, and, surrounded by countless blood-red eyes, gradually retreated from the bamboo hut, their brilliance dimming. One by one, the scarlet eyes in the night closed.

Both sides, vigilant and wary, withdrew their powers in tandem.

As the brightest divine light passed the night watchman, the old man did not stir, but the immense shadow behind him suddenly moved, spreading a vast, featureless hand to seize the divine radiance.

The deepest darkness clashed violently with the most dazzling light. The giant, shadowy hand thrust against the light and plunged deep within. The divine light darted away, but a great swathe of its radiance was torn away by the shadow’s grasp.

“So, a descendant of the Green Emperor is nothing remarkable.”

“Let all remember: gods may be deceived, buddhas provoked—but the demons must not be insulted!”

The watchman lifted his head for the first time, his ancient voice resonating with power.

At his attack, the divine lights, once dimmed, flared to life again; in the night, every blood-red eye snapped open. The killing intent between the two sides drew taut to the breaking point.

At last, it was the clear, gentle voice from before that shattered the stalemate.

“Withdraw! At once!”

The divine lights flickered, then sped swiftly away, their glow fading to nothing. The blood-red eyes in the darkness closed once more; the birds on the rooftops, in the trees, and on the earth rose up, dissolving into drifting crimson clouds.

Outside the town, the endless ranks of withered corpses turned away in formation, marching with measured steps. Their hollow eyes wandered blankly, as if searching for something.

What were they searching for? Their shriveled sockets held no eyes.

At times, their mouths gaped wide, as if crying out for a charge, but no sound issued forth—only silent shapes of words.

Still, they marched, onward and onward, never retreating, ceaseless until the end.

“How many years has it been? We are still here. The Demon Army still endures.”

The colossal shadow behind the watchman slowly turned, watching the departing backs of those still clad in familiar armor.

That armor, though worn and nearly crumbled to dust by the ages, was etched into his memory. His memories persisted—why, then, had the once-indestructible armor so utterly decayed?

“We have slumbered too long. Yet we have returned.”

“Returned to rejoin this war, doomed though it is,” the mason added, his voice heavy.

“No. The Demon Army may perish, but it is never defeated. Even should we die anew, our embers will spread and someday set the world aflame.”

When they finished, both men turned to Jian Nantian, still seated in the courtyard, and bowed deeply.

“Sword Master, you have borne hardship alone for so many years.”

Jian Nantian returned their salute with equal solemnity from his wheelchair.

“My sword is not alone.”

These words echoed through the high, moonlit night where the red birds drifted, through the darkness in which the little town had grown silent once more, across the wilds where the corpse army marched away.

A tribute, to all the undaunted spirits who would not yield this night.

...

Rumbling thunder rolled across the unsettled winter night, as if the clash of divine light and darkness had shaken the balance of the world.

In the courtyard of the town’s dyehouse, flashes of stark lightning illuminated a lone girl in white, standing with eyes tightly shut beneath the night sky.

She did not open her eyes, as if still lost in dreams, yet two crystalline trails of tears traced silently down her cheeks.

“Is it... time to leave already?”