Chapter 492: Illumination of Ada’s Sword

The wind blew high, so high that the end was in sight.

There was Ada, sitting on a jagged rock, atop a place that seemed boundless. The Never-Ending Peak had no true summit: each step she took only raised it higher, as if the mountain grew with her determination. It was a place made for losing oneself in infinity, and for reflecting until the silence of one’s own soul was more deafening than the roar of the storms.

Ada was alone. Unlike Katharina, who bathed in the living power of fire in a hellish lake of lava, Ada’s environment was not a field of direct evolution. There was nothing she could absorb from it. There was no energy to devour, no strength to steal. There was only emptiness, the wind, the height, and the silence.

And perhaps, that was exactly what she needed.

The young woman breathed deeply, her hands resting on her crossed legs. Her long, dark hair swayed in the icy currents, and her red eyes glowed with a restlessness that wasn’t physical—it was internal, a conflict that never ceased.

The question always returned. Follow the sword, or follow the blood?

Her mother, Raphaeline, had made her choice long ago. One of the most feared and respected demons of her era, she had abandoned the path of the sword. She left the blade behind and followed the path of blood, becoming a master manipulator of this vital essence. She created weapons, shaped creatures, destroyed entire armies with a wave of living hemoglobin. It was respect. It was power. It was tradition.

Ada, however, hesitated.

She had trained with swords since she was young, but she had never felt a true obsession with them. The blade was an extension of herself, yes, but it had never been everything. Likewise, blood didn’t seem like something to be revered. She had, of course, a unique power—it was part of her mother’s heritage, something that ran through her veins, both literally and metaphorically. But the idea of relying solely on it didn’t appeal to her.

So what was left?

It was this doubt that had kept her sitting for hours, meditating.

The wind whipped her face, cold and sharp. Echoes of the past swirled in her mind. The memory of Raphaeline saying that the sword was limited, that blood was eternal. The memory of battles she had seen. The metallic taste of her own strength, mixed with sweat and doubt.

Ada closed her eyes.

Images of ancient warriors flashed through her mind, not demons, but humans who lived centuries ago. She had studied their writings, absorbed their philosophies. Musashi Miyamoto, the invincible duelist, who believed that the true sword was but a reflection of the mind. Sasaki Kojiro, the crane swordsman, whose blade danced with lightness and silent mortality. Other names, legends that arose and disappeared like dust in the Earth’s wind.

It was strange. A demon pondering mortals. But deep down, perhaps that was what she sought—not to repeat her mother, not to drown in inheritances, but to find her own path.

“Blood or sword…” she murmured, her voice light, almost swallowed by the wind. “Maybe… neither. Maybe… both.”

Her fingers touched the ground. The mountain seemed to breathe beneath her hands. With each breath, Ada felt infinity respond to her.

And then, slowly, she opened her eyes.

There was no sword in her hands. Only a twig she had picked up along the way, a dry, brittle piece, incapable of wounding even an insect’s skin. Ada held it between her fingers as if it were a katana.

She took a deep breath.

The silence around her seemed to expand. The wind died. The clouds stopped swirling. For a moment, Never-Ending Peak seemed to hold its breath, as if waiting for what was to come.

Ada stood, her posture firm, her body straight, her feet firmly against the rock. The twig, light as nothing, became heavy as a universe in her hands.

She didn’t think about Raphaeline. She didn’t think about Musashi, or Kojiro. She didn’t think about blood, or the sword.

She only thought of herself.

And then, she moved.

The blow was simple. There was no flourish, no excess. Just a clean, natural cut, as fluid as breathing.

And the world responded.

The Peak trembled.

A straight line appeared on the mountain, a line of pure clarity that stretched for miles. The rock, the ice, the snow, the very air—everything was split in two. The rumble came afterward, like a late thunderclap, as the mountain groaned in pain.

The crack grew. The ground shook. And before her eyes, the mountain split in half. One side slid slowly, dragging snow and stone in a colossal avalanche. The other side remained firm, proud, but marked forever by the scar she had created.

Ada stood still, the twig still in her hand. There was no pride in her face, no surprise. Only calm.

“So that’s it…” she murmured.

It didn’t matter if it was blood or sword. That blow belonged to no path. It didn’t come from Raphaeline, nor from the ancient human masters. It came from her.

The wind blew again, stronger than before, carrying fragments of ice and dust from the avalanche echoing below. But Ada didn’t move. She stood firm, staring at the horizon.

Deep down, she understood that this wasn’t the final answer. It was only the beginning. Cutting a mountain with a twig was a demonstration of potential, but the real challenge would be understanding how to move forward, how to carve it into identity.

And perhaps that was what the Never-Ending Peak wanted from her.

Not ready-made answers. But the courage to create her own.

Ada let go of the twig. It fell and shattered into pieces, useless once more.

But the cut in the mountain would remain.

An eternal scar, silent testimony that Ada…

Ada stood there, motionless, staring at the immense scar that cut through the mountain.

But something inside her had also been split—what had been doubt, hesitation, conflict, had split into two halves.

What remained now was clarity.

She took a deep breath. The cold air burned her lungs, but it didn’t matter.

Her mind felt light.

And then, she realized.

“I…” she murmured, the words coming out on their own. “…experienced an enlightenment.”

That was it. What she had sought in endless meditations, in reading ancient masters, in reflecting on blood and the sword. It wasn’t about choosing between the two, but about accepting both.

Not as opposing forces, but as tools of the same spirit.

The sword, the blood, the will.

All united. All part of Ada.

Her red eyes glowed brightly, no longer carrying only the reflection inherited from her mother. There was something new, something pulsing with its own identity.

Ada raised her right hand, opened her palm, and slowly closed her fingers.

The air trembled around her, as if distorted by invisible heat. The veins in her arm throbbed, and then blood began to flow out, without any apparent wound.

It was strange. It wasn’t painful, it wasn’t a weakness.

It was natural.

The blood came out in a crimson thread and, instead of falling, hovered before her, swirling, shaping itself. First, it was just a line. Then, a thicker line. The wet sound turned into a metallic snap. The liquid color crystallized.

And when she closed her fist, the blade was there.

A sword of blood.

Long, thin, curved slightly like a katana, but with the texture of pulsing red crystal, as if every fiber of the blade were alive. The energy emanating from it was strange, a fusion between the calm of a sword’s cut and the latent violence of blood longing to be spilled.

Ada stared at the weapon, raising it before her eyes.

For a moment, she said nothing. She simply stared.

The blade seemed to breathe with her.

Blood dripped down its surface, but didn’t drip—it flowed back in, like an eternal cycle.

The hilt had molded perfectly to her hand, as if it had been made for her.

“So…” she murmured, a small smile appearing on her face. “…I’ve become stronger.”