Necropolis Immortal

Lu Yun spent three days inside the Army Pagoda. Upon determining the proper approach for his path, he carefully avoided biting off more than he could chew and focused on practicing Dragonrise after erasing Dragonsoar.

Dragonrise had been created in the chaos—it was a technique that contained a bit of the Dragonquake Scripture, but was also wholly Lu Yun’s own sword dao.

This stroke was perfect from the perspective of the second realm, but too awful and weak to consider from the heights of the Hongmeng. The two realms were on completely different levels of existence.

When Dusksnow Morningstar deployed it, just the move’s meaning alone had overcome Hua Fengwen with awe. Since Lu Yun’s true level was in the fourth realm, any techniques he created were superior to the plethora of combat arts in the Hongmeng. However, a more sophisticated level didn’t mean that it was flawless.

In Lu Yun’s journey throughout the third realm, he’d never truly cultivated. All he relied on was his fearsome preexisting level. Without his level in the fourth realm, the flame of order, and the incredibly mysterious Tome of Life and Death, he didn’t have the right to walk the Hongmeng.

He composed his mind and reflected over all of his gains to date, turning them into his own. In doing so, he gradually perfected Dragonrise’s details and corrected its flaws.

“I’ve finally really defeated the ten soldiers.” Panting heavily and drenched with sweat, not a single wound marred his skin. This was cultivation, not a fight to the death.

Cultivation was a process to identify and shore up one’s weaknesses, not a single minded focus on lethality and killing the enemy. If one solely focused on slaughter as a way of training, they would be able to easily dispatch their peers or weaker opponents based on experience alone. But if they met an expert or an opponent whose combat arts were practiced to the heights of perfection, they would be defeated by the flaws in their own techniques.

Experiences of life and death as well as a bloodthirsty way of cultivation were equally necessary in cultivation, but Lu Yun’s current method was the most important!

“The Army Pagoda is a wondrous cultivation treasure indeed! If it wasn’t for this pagoda, I would have to seek out a high level king to feed me moves, so as to complete the combat arts for my sword dao.” A trace of a smile appeared on Lu Yun’s face.

“I’m just one tiny step away. When I defeated the last soldier, it managed to hit my left arm before it vanished. It looks like there’s still an opening there, which means that my opponent can use it if this was a fight to the death and cut off my arm!”

Lu Yun recalled his last stroke and employed formula dao to finally perfect the new and improved version of Dragonrise.

Though this tiny opening didn’t seem worth mentioning, it would be a gaping hole to true geniuses and they would defeat, or even kill Lu Yun through it.

Within the Army Pagoda, his greatest advantage wasn’t his plethora of purple crystals, but that his formula dao could derive combat arts at any time. After all, he and Qing Yu had first invented formula dao to use in theorizing new combat arts.

“That should do it… These are the only flaws I’ve been able to find, at least,” he murmured with a frown. “Let’s try again!”

He called upon the Army Pagoda once more and summoned a new round of trial. A familiar face appeared before him—the soldier who’d nearly killed him twice!

There was a longsword glowing with hazy purple light in his hand this time, plainly not an ordinary weapon.

Lu Yun’s pupils contracted violently. He finally noticed something different about this soldier—there was a tiny, indistinct purple “king” character imprinted on his chest.

A king soldier?

That didn’t really matter to Lu Yun.

“Make your move,” said the soldier. “If you defeat me head-on, that will mean the combat art you’ve pioneered is a perfect and flawless combat art.”

“You talk?” Lu Yun blinked.

“Who told you that we don’t talk?” The soldier smiled faintly. “We are indeed formed by the rules of the Army Pagoda, but we were once living beings. Our death brands were collected by the pagoda, which then turned us into the soldiers here. As you can see, I am the king of the first level.”

He pointed to the tiny “king” character on his chest.

Lu Yun nodded, he’d guessed as much. When he’d purely killed the soldiers, that resulted in gains outside of the true way of cultivation. After he set foot on the right path, the pagoda began tailoring its reaction to help him locate his flaws and force him to correct his form.

Fueled by a mammoth amount of purple crystals, the entire pagoda’s rules were activated to help Lu Yun train his sword dao. After the final flaw in his Dragonrise was erased, the inordinately strong soldier appeared once more.

“There are mountains beyond mountains and heavens beyond heavens! Defeating you doesn’t necessarily mean that my combat art has reached the peak of existence. Just because you or the pagoda can’t identify weakness in my combat arts doesn’t mean that none exists.” None of Lu Yun’s previous arrogance could be seen now.

“You’re very right, there are mountains beyond mountains and heavens beyond heavens… A fourth realm exists outside of the Hongmeng, so might there be a fifth realm beyond that as well?” murmured the soldier.

Whoosh!

He suddenly shifted into motion and slashed at Lu Yun with a long arc of sword light from his purple longsword.

“Whether your sword dao combat art is perfect or not, this ultimate treasure of the realm—the Purple Sunrise sword—will be yours if you defeat me!”

An ultimate treasure of the Hongmeng!

The soldier had brought out a weapon of this caliber against Lu Yun! His moves were fast and furious, leaving no breathing space for the young man. His opening move was a swift stroke to the head.

Lu Yun reacted extremely quickly and took a slight step backward, unsheathing the Stellar Sword with a flash of cerulean light and forming it into a dragon that hovered protectively in front of him.

Clang!

Lu Yun shuffled three steps back, but the soldier remained where he was. He took a dozen steps forward and split his sword light into thousands of rays, rushing for Lu Yun’s left arm.

The left arm was the final flaw in Lu Yun’s Dragonrise.

“Dragonrise!” Lu Yun suddenly roared. “Let me tell you why this stroke is called Dragonrise!”

Boom!

He didn’t rush to defend his left arm—with the aid of formula dao, he’d long since resolved the weakness there. A cerulean blue dragon sword shadow probed out of his body and slowly lifted its head.

Dragonrise was the initial stroke of his sword dao and the move in which he accumulated strength for his next action.

Only when a dragon lifted its head could it see the apex of the multiverse and rise into the nine heavens! The dragon’s head was lifted now, its eyes all-embracing and seeing through everything in the world.

Lu Yun then followed up with his second stroke.