The Epic Tale of Chaos vs Order

225  Developing swordplay

Cain stared at the red orb and picked it up before sending his Ego Wave into it. He immediately noticed the immense blood vitality and pure Life Wave inside. The quantity was small, but the quality was superb.

After making sure there were no other Sword Monsters around, Cain focused on the red orb and began to absorb its energy. Awe and shock appeared in Cain's eyes as he felt how the power purified his Astral Wave and tempered his flesh and blood.

The effect of training with the red orb was better than anything Cain had used before. Not only was the energy overwhelmingly potent, but it was also very serene so he could use it non-stop.

Unfortunately, Cain drained the red sphere in less than three minutes, and this one crumbled into dust, just like the red of the Sword Monster's body.

Cain began to smile as a red light emerged in his eyes. The red spheres were what he needed to temper his body so he could rise above Flawless Marrow.

'I will need thousands of these red spheres to generate a qualitative improvement in my constitution.'

Killing intent emerged in Cain's eyes as he focused on the forest. Logic stated that the closer he got to the center, the more numerous and stronger the Sword Monster would be.

Cain took a deep breath as he began to walk faster and faster into the forest. Despite his speed increasing, his presence grew weaker and weaker until it practically vanished.

He was not going to wait for the Sword Monsters' attacks and intended to be the hunter, killing those monsters so the machete would fight off the weakening force and collect the red spheres. If he was a normal cultivator, following that path would have been complicated, but he had the Absolute Life Form System working as a scout.

It did not take long for another Sword Monster to appear in the [Basic Scan Force Field]'s range, and Cain did not hesitate before silently approaching the beast.

Unlike the first Sword Monster that Cain battled, this one was nearly three meters tall, with huge arms holding two massive swords. Like Wave Champion Beasts, it seemed that the monsters were not the same and had unique features.

The Sword Monster was on a tree's branch, over fifty meters above the ground, waiting for the presence of a human to attack when suddenly, a figure appeared behind it.

It raised one of its swords, stopping the machete from cutting its head, but that careless defense broke its stance, making it easy for Cain to send it crashing into the ground with a single kick.

"¡Boom!"

Cain saw how the Sword Monster stood up from the ground without much problem, but the fall broke one of its arms, and it could no longer hold two swords simultaneously.

'Its battle power equals that of a Level 2 Wave Warrior, but while its defense and strength are formidable, it has very low agility.'

"AWWWW!" The Sword Monster roared with rage as it focused its Life Wave on its sword and legs before escalating the three in order to reach Cain.

'There is no wisdom in them, only killing intent.'

Cain shook his head at the foolish behavior of the Sword Monster. He charged his Astral Wave into his legs and jumped toward the monster. Taking advantage of the fact that it could not move freely with the sword buried into the tree's trunk, he cut its head off.

The Sword Monster fell to the ground, and just like the other, a dark mist emerged from its decaying corpse, leaving nothing more than a red sphere.

Cain picked up the red sphere as the machete devoured the dark mist. He smiled at realizing that the amount of energy in this sphere was more than in the last one, reducing the amount he would need.

---

For the next two weeks, Cain advanced into the forest, facing more and more Sword Monsters. Although all the monsters had humanoid forms, their battle styles varied. Some Sword Monsters use multiple swords, while others use only one. There were those that focused on speed, others on strength, and even those whose swordplay focused solely on defense.

Cain slowly regained his strength due to the dark mist the machete consumed, and his constitution and energy pool kept improving due to the constant use of red orbs.

However, the fights were not getting easier since not only were the Sword Monsters growing more powerful, but their swordplay began to evolve alongside their cultivation.

---

Three thin swords and a machete clashed again and again. The swords displayed much greater skills, but the one wielding a machete was faster and could predict the enemy's movements.

Cain's eyes were extremely sharp as he deployed the full power of his Ego Wave and Virtual Sight to face the Sword Monster. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

There was not much difference between Cain's current strength and the monster's, yet it took everything he had not to lose. For the first time since he started this cultivation journey, Cain found himself pressured by an opponent with similar cultivation.

21:18

The reason was that Cain could not let go of the machete, allowing him only to use one arm free and that the Sword Monster displayed truly superb swordplay. Cain saw how those swords could change from incredibly fast to immensely strong, and every attack he used was either blocked or redirected. If it weren't for his Ego Wave improving his speed of thought, he would have been forced to run away a long time ago.

A sharp light appeared in Cain's eyes as he pulled back to avoid the Sword Monster from cutting his neck. He then took a deep breath and pushed his focus to the limit in order to unleash his secondary energy pool.

Blood Energy was not accessible to Cain when he first appeared in the forest, but after strengthening the machete over the last few weeks, he was able to unleash a very small amount of it.

Cain generated a small blast of Blood Lightning that covered his arms and machete, allowing him to hack toward the Sword Monster with so much strength that he pushed the three swords out of his way before severing.

The machete made a diagonal cut on the Sword Monster's chest, spitting this one in two and killing it.

Cain did not feel happy when he saw the Sword Monster's death. He had to deploy a greater cultivation stage than the enemy to defeat a single monster, which meant that he could not advance deeper.

He stared at the machete, and since he could not stop holding it, there was only one real path forward.

'I need to learn how to use this weapon.'

That thought appeared with the notion that those who had already mastered the sword had a serious advantage in this place. It was a problem considering that one of Cain's enemies showed immense dexterity with a broadsword.

---

Over the next few days, Cain no longer advanced deeper and instead chose to fight Sword Monster strong enough to push him, but not so much that he could not divide his attention.

The battles took a while as he no longer fought with the intent of just killing the Sword Monsters but learning from their swordplay.

The Absolute Life Form System also analyzed all that Cain saw and learned. Although the focus was on figuring out a way to handle the weakening force, developing swordplay took less than 5% of its computational power.

In only three days, Cain's domain over the machete went from a complete lack of it to one that did not fall too much behind his control over his own arm.

Cain's swordplay focused on speed and strength, exploiting the enemy's blind spots and openings to land decisive strikes. Every strike sought to sever limbs and leave deep cuts that reached the internal organs. After those few days of training, Cain faced another Sword Monster that was as powerful as the one welding three weapons. It had two large swords and a very thin body that seemed to exude speed.

The Sword Monster flashed at Cain and hacked from above and to the right, aiming at the young man's head and waist.

Just as those swords were about to reach their target, Cain used his machete to push one away and block the other. Next, he twisted his machete in a small circle, cutting the Sword Moster's wrist and severing that hand!

Now that the machete was no longer a handicap and could use it as intended, Cain became much more powerful.

"AWWWW!"

The Sword Monster unleashed a roar of pain of rage as it hacked with his remaining hand, but Cain countered it. Cain's machete flashed toward the left but did not aim at the sword.

"AWWWWWWWW!" The Sword Monster screamed with greater strength this time since the machete cut his elbows, severing his only arm left. It could not yell for much longer as the machete separated its head from the rest of its body. Current schedule: 7 chapters a week.

5/7

Bonus chapters:

Over 400 power stones: 1 extra chapter.

Over 800 power stones: 2 extra chapters.

Over 1200 power stones: 3 extra chapters.

Redsunworld

Creator's Thought