Chapter 548: That Sword's Jianghu - Li Chungang

Before you turned thirty, you believed that with a single sword in hand, you could slay gods and demons. You trusted neither heaven nor earth, only the sword in your grasp. Riding your sword over rivers, standing with your hands behind your back—how could a simple word like "dashing" ever fully describe it? How many virtuous, beautiful women found their hearts pounding, tossing and turning over your image?

When those of the martial world spoke of the martial world, of that era's land, and that era's legendary swords, it seemed they were all just epithets to highlight your free-spirited elegance: the foremost under heaven, the greatest sword master. What was there that you didn't achieve? "Among all swordsmen in the world, there is only Li Chungang; among all famous swords, there is only my Wooden Ox." What kind of disdain for the world did that spirit convey?

You believed that half a year of venturing into the world would make you invincible. But how could you have imagined encountering the "Green Robe" of your life? You once thought that a true man born in troubled times should live a life where "raising a sword changes the sky, and drawing a sword leaves corpses everywhere"—that this was the only meaningful way to live. Yet, when you thrust that sword, the woman in green, equally skilled, didn't even try to dodge. You finally panicked. You didn't know why this woman loved you with such utter devotion. You thought you had never given her a promise, so why was she like this?

When she lay in your arms, smiling as she said, "If heaven hadn't given birth to you, Li Chungang, it would be truly dull," you finally understood that she had simply come to die. Dying in your embrace was her ultimate release and the purest expression of her love for both you and herself, because she knew how could someone with the world in his heart ever linger for just one woman? Did you ever consider that she spent countless nights intensely practicing swordsmanship just so you might one day truly look at her? But isn't such selfless love also a form of sorrow?

On the Demon-Slaying Platform, with your mind in turmoil, you yourself doubted your sword path. Your sword no longer advanced with resolve because of longing, and your cultivation plummeted repeatedly. You lost to Wang Xianzhi. At that time, you were no longer the Li Chungang who felt he alone was supreme under heaven. I can't help but wonder if you hadn't thrust that sword at her, would the one who died then have been Wang Xianzhi, who would later become the second greatest in the world? Was your severed arm a self-inflicted severing of all your past glory?

I don't know who had the power to trap you in Tingchun Pavilion for twenty years. I think it was just you drawing a circle on the ground and trapping yourself. A sword across the Guangling River bank, a divine leap with a sword among the reeds—it was as if you were still that same person, the supreme sword master who overshadowed all other swordsmen in the world. But time, besides turning you into a rough old man in a sheepskin coat who picked his feet, also made you realize that some regrets are truly heavier than this martial world itself. On the Great Snow Terrace, seeing that familiar scene of a person holding an umbrella, you finally understood why the woman in green felt such deep affection for you. In truth, she simply didn't want to have regrets; she didn't want to forever just watch you wielding your sword from afar. She wanted to enter your world, but the only way was to die that way. If heaven hadn't given birth to you, Li Chungang, what meaning would life have held for her? With a soft whisper, "Sword, come!", Li Chungang re-entered the realm of the Land Immortal.

Journeying to Wudi City with Xiao Fengnian felt like a reincarnation, an impossibly long cycle. "Wang Xianzhi, Li Chungang has come to visit the East Sea, to borrow all the swords in this city and fight you!" This martial world seemed to have been waiting for this battle since he left. The clouds of the nine heavens descended, the waters of the four seas rose, and when the sword opened the heavenly gate, that unrestrained smile as you asked, "Does this heavenly gate opened by this sword kill you, Wang Xianzhi?" At that moment, it was as if the martial world had not aged; at that moment, you seemed to be that same carefree swordsman, riding your sword and disdainfully looking upon all beings.

On the banks of the Guangling River, one sword left 2,600 corpses. Who in the world would still dare call Deng Ta'a the new Sword God? But time truly made this martial world age. "When beauty fades, how can one lament white hair in the next life?" If this applies to women, how much more so for an old man, weary and picking his feet, who had exhausted his strength?

In the very end, you returned to where you began. This life, this martial world, seemed to become so magnificent and extraordinary because of your existence. As you sat in the small thatched hut, looking at the pond where the red carp had long vanished, did you feel any regret? But I think there is no one in this world who could fill your sword with longing again; you must be without regret. In this martial world, you had a fellow friend like Wang Xianzhi, and you had that decisive love from the woman in green. How could you speak of regret? But you must have been lonely, right? Because there was truly nothing left in this martial world for you to linger over. "How could I, Li Chungang, decay and die of old age? How could there be a day when I cannot lift my sword? How could I abandon you and ascend? Is there anything more uninteresting than being an immortal under heaven?" Then your final sword strike was given to Deng Ta'a, as if a sword piercing clouds and crossing the sun was merely an effortless flick of the wrist. It was also as if, at that moment, you held no lingering attachment to the sword. How could such a life have any regrets? In truth, whether this martial world remembers you or not, you once made the sword path its master. Only you could embody a swordsman to such an extreme. I imagine that at the moment you closed your eyes, at the moment you grasped that small hand, you knew she had always been waiting for you, never truly leaving...

Riding his sword across rivers, contemplating vast seas; raising his sword to the cosmos, smiling as he questioned heaven—Li Chungang.