The sky within Haoran's inner world hung in still, golden silence.
The fragrant scent of blooming spirit herbs and the gentle whisper of primeval trees did nothing to soften the brutal coldness permeating the air.
Down on the lush, emerald lawn, the Sword Emperor knelt in the dirt, his breath trembling in his chest like an old, worn-out bellows.
The celestial laws established by Haoran's declaration weighed upon him like iron mountains.
His grand cultivation had been forcefully sheared away, crushed down until he was nothing more than an ordinary youth at the first stage of the Spirit Ascension realm.
He looked at the pristine, unblemished black and gold robes of the young master, at the golden hair catching the light like spun sunlight, and at those radiant golden eyes that looked down upon him not with hatred or fury, but with the flat, emotionless detachment of a master observing an ant beneath his heel.
