The sword momentum finally reached its absolute end, and as it did, the Daoist of the Cross was riddled with injuries. Even as he fell, the Daoist of the Cross could not fathom how Lu Yuan had mastered a technique through mere study that he, after so long researching in the No-Force Sword Hall, could not: a technique that absorbed every last wisp of the elemental essence of heaven and earth. His final thought before heavy unconsciousness was that the sword strike had been too overwhelmingly dominant.

The Daoist of the Cross was the Guardian of this stage; defeating him meant passing this trial.

“Lu Yuan wins. Challenge of the Mana Sword Hall is successful,” announced the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable.

Two of the Five Great Sword Halls had now been conquered.

Exiting the No-Force Sword Hall, the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable stated, “There are three halls remaining: the easy difficulty Lying Down to Fight Sword Hall, the difficult Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall, and the super-difficult Sitting to Fight Sword Hall. Which one do you choose now?”

“The difficult Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall,” Lu Yuan replied.

“The difficult Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall? You don’t choose the easier Lying Down to Fight Sword Hall, which might be simpler to clear,” observed the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable.

“Boring. The Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall must be cleared eventually anyway,” Lu Yuan shrugged. “Clearing the easy Lying Down to Fight Sword Hall is useless if the difficult Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall remains unconquered.”

“That is true.” The Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable nodded, leading Lu Yuan directly toward the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall.

The massive gate of the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall was painted with two closed eyes.

Upon entering the hall, Lu Yuan noticed a faint glimmer of light, just enough to distinguish shapes. He also saw that this hall was crowded—perhaps hundreds of people, far more than in the previous No-Force Sword Hall. Lu Yuan scanned the hundreds present, but noted that not a single person stepped forward.

“Who is the Guardian?” Lu Yuan inquired. The Guardian of the No-Force Sword Hall had been the Daoist of the Cross; he wondered who held the post here.

“The Guardian is me.” A sinister voice pierced the air, one Lu Yuan found startlingly familiar. Looking over, he realized the voice belonged to the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable himself. The Venerable stood with his hands behind his back. “That’s right. I am the Guardian of the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall. I possess the mana of World Realm Tenth Heaven. Naturally, I will not bully you with my superior mana. Let me explain the rules of this hall.”

“In the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall, the light will completely vanish shortly. Furthermore, spiritual sense is entirely blocked here, preventing you from using it to perceive your enemy. Our flight will be utterly silent, making it impossible to locate an opponent by sound. What you can truly rely on is your own feeling, your own heart.”

“And concurrently, we will both fight using the mana level of World Realm First Heaven, and we may only use swordsmanship; no magical artifacts are permitted.”

“Finally, the one who first loses combat effectiveness loses the match,” the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable concluded.

Hearing the rules for the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall, Lu Yuan nodded thoughtfully.

He possessed the Gate of the Sword Dao, which should, theoretically, counter all sword techniques. However, in the Eyebrow Sword Hall, he was restricted to using his eyebrows, not the small Gate. In the No-Force Sword Hall, he couldn't activate his mana, naturally preventing the use of the small Gate. Here, the rule mandating only the use of the sword similarly locked away the small Gate of the Sword Dao. It was likely the remaining two halls—Sitting to Fight and Lying Down to Fight—would impose similar restrictions, forcing him to rely purely on swordsmanship.

Lu Yuan gritted his teeth, but realized he had no choice; the Evil Sword Civilization's structure was currently too vast for him to circumvent. He had to adhere to its regulations.

“Very good. Having watched you clear the Eyebrow Sword Hall, which is entry-level, and the No-Force Sword Hall, which is intermediate, my hands are itching for a match. Your arrival at the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall is opportune for me to stretch them.” The Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable radiated surging evil flames across his body. “If the Eyebrow Sword Hall was the easy difficulty, and the No-Force Sword Hall was intermediate, this one is definitively difficult. You can only fail here.” When guiding Lu Yuan, the Venerable had seemed composed, but now, as conflict loomed, his overtly evil and frenzied aura burst forth, revealing the terrifying power of a pinnacle Celestial Venerable within the Evil Sword Civilization.

Immediately, the last trace of light vanished.

Complete darkness descended.

It was an absolute, impenetrable blackness.

No light, no sound, and no spiritual sense to deploy.

Lu Yuan was prepared. He had studied the Heart Sword under Yan Cangtian. While he hadn't reached the zenith where the sword resided solely in the heart, he could, nonetheless, use his heart’s feeling to vaguely sense the opponent’s location. At this moment, Lu Yuan perceived a streak of sword light rushing straight toward his chest.

Almost instinctively, Lu Yuan summoned his Nourishing Myriad Immortal Sword to intercept the incoming light.

In the darkness, the two swords clashed hundreds of times in mere moments, and Lu Yuan took a strike to his shoulder.

Although Lu Yuan had practiced the Heart Sword to a degree, and his fundamental swordsmanship was superb, under blindfolded conditions, he was still no match for the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable, who was deeply immersed in this environment.

The fight raged on. Lu Yuan constantly shifted position in the dark while trading blows with the Venerable. This was a battle fought entirely without sight. Occasionally, the clang of colliding swords created sounds, but spiritual sense offered no purchase. This peculiar form of combat was entirely new to Lu Yuan.

To encounter someone of the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable’s caliber in his first experience with such a battle was a significant disadvantage.

Hoo! Lu Yuan took a deep, steadying breath. He had already sustained three wounds.

None of these injuries were minor.

If the fight continued like this, he would surely lose in the Blindfolded to Fight Sword Hall. He needed a strategy, but formulating one under duress was not easy. As he continued engaging the Venerable, Lu Yuan pondered his options. One path was to elevate his Heart Sword to a higher plane, allowing him to adapt to this environment relying entirely on the heart, thereby nullifying the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable’s positional advantage. The second path was to elevate his swordsmanship to such an extreme level that even with the positional advantage, the Venerable would have to yield before the absolute gulf in their skill. It was a choice between the two.

The first option—improving the Heart Sword—offered no immediate solution, as the Heart Sword was Yan Cangtian's technique, not his own creation, and thus not perfectly suited to him.

The second option required advancing his swordsmanship cultivation. At this moment, an idea struck Lu Yuan. Among the Iron Principles he currently commanded, four were fully mastered: Yin-Yang, Reincarnation, Time, and Space. Two were nearly mastered: Karma Iron Principle lacked only the Cliff of Liberation, and Order Iron Principle lacked the Sword Intent of Glory and the Sword Intent of Descent. He was only in the initial stages of mastering the Adaptation Iron Principle, achieving only 20% mastery related to warfare.

That made seven Iron Principles in total. Excluding the less-mastered Adaptation Principle, could he fuse the remaining six into a single sword strike?

Previously, while learning the Myriad Manifestation Myriad Forms Sword Dao, he had mastered the Three Extremes Unification Style used by the Son of the Sword. Even this partial style was astonishingly powerful. Within the domain enveloped by its technique, the Wheel of Reincarnation would manifest, Time would stagnate, and Space would solidify—the convergence of three. If he could execute the Six Extremes Unification Style, the power would surely be far greater. Even an incomplete version of the Six Extremes Unification Style might be enough to defeat the Heretical Extreme Celestial Venerable.

However, achieving the Six Extremes Unification, especially when two of those poles—the Karma Iron Principle and the Order Iron Principle—were incomplete, made the task exponentially harder.

What should he do? Lu Yuan sank into deep thought.

This was an exceedingly difficult problem.

He resolved to attempt the Four Extremes Unification first. He already mastered the Three Extremes Unification; now he needed to incorporate Yin-Yang. Lu Yuan’s body instinctively parried his opponent, while the majority of his consciousness plunged into the Sword Space, meditating on how to meld Yin-Yang into the existing structure. In the void, the Wheel of Reincarnation, the River of Time, and the River of Space converged.

Lu Yuan conjured the Wheel of Yin-Yang with a subtle movement. The Wheel of Yin-Yang hovered at a distance from the first three, failing to connect.

How could the Wheel of Yin-Yang integrate?

Yin-Yang represented the flaws and vulnerabilities in all things under heaven. Reincarnation was the path all things must tread. Time was the medium in which all things existed, as was Space. The true confluence point for the Iron Principles was creation itself—Heaven and Earth. Whatever the Iron Principle, it was universally shared by all things, whether animate or inanimate.

Once he grasped this concept, the Wheel of Yin-Yang instantly merged with the Wheel of Reincarnation, the River of Time, and the River of Space.

Now the hurdle lay with the incomplete Karma Iron Principle and the incomplete Order Iron Principle. If he could fuse these two principles, he could forge the very first ultimate sword strike of his life.

Fusing Iron Principles was no simple feat. At this point in Lu Yuan’s Sword Space, the characters for “Epiphany” (Dun) and “Enlightenment” (Wu) glowed, and his Daoist Doppelgänger also emitted light, clearly aiding Lu Yuan’s comprehension of the Dao.

He had to complete this strongest sword strike of his life!

Gradually, within the void, a complete small Wheel of Karma materialized. Outside this small wheel resided an incomplete, translucent greater Wheel of Karma, representing the true essence of causality—the causes of today and the results of yesterday manifested within this vast plate.

Simultaneously, a River of Order appeared in the void—a flowing current representing endless structure, through which all things in heaven and earth were arranged. However, this river of order was intermittent and semi-transparent, clearly not the complete structure.

He had finally manifested the incomplete Great Wheel of Karma and the River of Order.

The next step was the Six-in-One convergence: the Six Extremes Unification Style.

This was a profound contemplation even for many Celestial Venerables, perhaps even Civilization Realm experts—the integration of Iron Principles was anything but simple.