As Quinn Shepherd's pupils contracted, the sword in his hand had already thrust forward—a thrust that transformed into the Taeming Equal‑Sky Sword!
This was a sword Dao, born from witnessing the world’s injustice—gods and demons rampaging, mortals suffering, unable to shape their own fate. It was forged in compassion for all beings’ pain.
Leveling Heaven—leveling all injustice, all unfairness, cutting down evil and treachery, slaying monsters and demons, upholding what is right.
The Pioneer Emperor had never expected that the first move against him would be the very sword technique with which he himself first entered the Dao.
When he first entered the Dao through the sword, the aftermath of the High-Emperor Calamity still lingered; the Pioneer Era had not yet begun. He was still a young man then, brash and full of heroic spirit, wandering the world with sword in hand while monsters and demons roamed unchecked.
He had seen the Yuan Realm twisted and sealed by overwhelming power, heavens vanishing one after another, silence descending, until only a small remnant of the Yuan Realm remained.
Though the Yuan Realm of that time was many times larger than the later Everpeace and Great Ruins, it was still far smaller than the true Yuan Realm.
To fold up the Yuan Realm, to seal it away—what boundless, majestic power that must have been!
He had seen the ruins of the High-Emperor, the towering remnants of the High-Emperor Heaven Court’s legacy—collapsed halls and palace walls, the bones of gods and demons buried beneath.
He often pondered the submerged history within those ruins.
He saw people weeping and wailing in the midst of war and suffering—husbands and wives, women and children, the elderly.
He saw gods and demons running rampant, saw fiends and monsters sowing chaos, saw divine beings driving the surviving High-Emperor commoners to build grand altars, then forcing them up to the altars as sacrifices to the gods of Heavenly Court.
He remembered with chilling clarity the sinister, sycophantic faces of those gods and demons as they offered up the commoners in sacrifice to the high gods.
Thus was born the High‑Emperor Leveling‑Heaven Sword.
His chest brimmed with chivalrous spirit; with sword in hand, he set out to bring justice to the world.
This was his earliest sword move. When he created it, he had not yet met Quinn Shepherd, nor crossed into the Dragon-Han Era.
Compared to the sword techniques he refined later, this move was rough, even crude. Yet among the Thirty‑Three‑Heaven Sword Dao, it was the most perfectly spirited, the most heroically unrestrained—bar none!
When Quinn Shepherd unleashed the High‑Emperor Leveling‑Heaven Sword, he wielded his blade with a hero’s resolve, repaying violence with violence. The sword Dao of a young, chivalrous soul erupted from his blade, and in an instant, Kaihuang was pulled back into memories of his youth. Unconsciously, the Worryless Sword in his hand seemed to carry him back to those days.
Kaihuang too performed the High‑Emperor Leveling‑Heaven Sword, using the same technique as Quinn Shepherd. As he did, he felt the wind howling, his body swaying within it.
It was the feeling of youth—passion surging, believing that world-changing power lay hidden in his small frame. No matter the storm or hardship, nothing could knock him down!
Every hardship, every trial and setback, only drove him forward, only made him stronger!
He vowed to protect the people of this disaster‑scarred land, to let them live unafraid of gods or demons, to let them stand tall and never again bow before the faces of gods and monsters.
Beneath their swords, the mountains and rivers of High‑Emperor Heaven crisscrossed and surged; sword‑light transformed into roaring rivers.
(Skipped: Author’s note, not part of the story)
Within Jade Capital City, inside the Kaihuang Heaven Court, gods and demons—old and new—stared unblinking at the scene before them.
Quinn Shepherd still looked like a youth, but Kaihuang had long become a middle-aged man, full of imperial majesty. Yet now, what they saw was as if two sword-bearing youths, brimming with spirit, stood before them.
Swords arced like rainbows, Dao painted like a masterpiece; with a single sweep of their blades, grand mountains and rivers surged forth for a thousand miles.
Within the landscape, sword-qi rose like mountains, sword-light shimmered like waves upon a lake, sword-energy billowed like rolling clouds, sword-beams split the sky like thunderous waves!
Their sword-lights overlapped and burst forth. Countless young gods and demons scrambled to flee from the inner city of Jade Capital.
Their sword-light swept through Heaven-Bearing Gate, cleaving a path from Vermilion Bird Gate to Black Tortoise Gate, from Anfu Gate to Yanxi Gate, from Hanguang Gate to Anli Gate, from Shunyi Gate to Jingfeng Gate, from Zhide Gate to Anshang Gate.