Chapter 12
The void trembled.
Nyxen's crimson eyes stared into his reflection's silver glow. The hand reached for him, promising power without limits, survival at any cost.
And for a moment… he almost gave in.
But then, a memory surfaced. Not of this world—but of his first life. The empty graveyard where his body was abandoned. The whispers that called him a failure. The loneliness of dying without a name, forgotten by the heavens.
If he fused now, if he surrendered, then he would no longer be Nyxen. He'd simply be swallowed again—by his past, by fate.
And wasn't transmigration supposed to be a chance to choose differently?
His hand clenched into a fist.
"I won't be you," Nyxen spat, voice steady despite the cracks spreading across his soul. "I'll take your strength, but not your chains. You said I'm just the flame you left behind? Then I'll burn brighter than you ever could."
The reflection's smirk faltered. The silver eyes narrowed. "Foolish vessel. Without me, you cannot—"
Nyxen roared, tearing through the void itself. The black cracks across his body blazed white-gold, forcing the reflection back.
"I'm not your vessel," he growled. "I am the transmigrant—and I'll forge my own Dao."
The throne shattered. The reflection screamed as its form split, collapsing into shards of silver light that seared into Nyxen's chest. Not erased. Not fused. Bound.
The power of his former self sank into him, chained, locked deep—but still his to command.
Nyxen gasped awake.
The sword forest was burning, black fire and holy light spiraling into the sky. His body glowed with intersecting cracks, but they began to mend, threads of white stitching them shut.
Liuying staggered back, shielding her eyes. "You—what did you…"
Nyxen rose to his feet slowly, his crimson eyes now streaked faintly with silver. His aura had changed—no longer purely demonic, no longer purely mortal. Something new, unstable, forbidden.
The shattered sword marks around him hummed in resonance.
Then it happened.
The fragments of Sword Dao that had resisted him before suddenly bent, submitting. His own qi surged, breaking through the barrier that had held him back.
Stage Two.
A fresh Sword Intent bloomed from him—neither righteous nor demonic, but balanced on the edge of annihilation. His first true comprehension since transmigrating.
He raised a trembling hand. From his fingertips, a blade of black-and-white light formed, humming with enough force to cut through heaven itself.
The jade beauty's eyes widened. "…Impossible. To touch duality in the Sword Dao at the second stage… what monster are you?"
Nyxen smirked weakly, blood still dripping from his lips. "Didn't I tell you? I'm just someone who refuses to die."
The trial's light descended then, bathing him in its glow. The Sword Dao World had acknowledged him—not as a disciple, not as a successor, but as a threat.
The jade beauty looked at him one last time, unreadable, before the realm's power swept her away in light.
Nyxen reached out, but his fingers only grasped empty air.
Her voice lingered, faint, carried by the dissolving realm.
"We will meet again, outsider. When your blade is worthy of being crossed with mine."
And then she was gone.
When the light faded, Nyxen stood alone. His body still broken, his soul still screaming—but his path, for the first time, felt clear.
He looked at his cracked but healing hand, silver light faintly glowing beneath the skin.
"Stage Two," he muttered. "Sword Intent born from corruption and purity both. My Dao isn't heaven's, and it isn't hell's. It's mine."
The wind carried away the last embers of the Sword Dao World.
Arc One had ended. But Nyxen's true cultivation journey—the journey of the transmigrant who defied both fate and himself—had only just begun.