Birth of the Demonic Sword

"I didn't think Heaven and Earth would have sent you directly to me," Noah commented. "Are they afraid of what I was about to do?"

"Partially," June answered while inspecting her surroundings. "There are other reasons that I'm not allowed to share."

Noah coldly inspected June. She was exactly as he recalled but also different. A tidy white robe had replaced her usually torn clothes, and her hair had also lost its messiness. Her face also carried a calmness that he had never seen on her.

"Are you a copy?" Noah asked. "You aren't my June."

"You are partially correct," June stated. "Heaven and Earth have resorted to something different with my existence. I'm both me and not me. Still, I'm afraid you won't get the chance to understand anything else."

June's cultivation level surged as a white spear appeared in her hands. She was in the gaseous stage of the ninth rank, so her aura couldn't impress Noah. Even his robe made of dark matter remained still when a storm expanded from her figure.

"This can't be your world," Noah stated. "It's not even a copy of your world. This is something that Heaven and Earth have concocted without having any idea of how your power works."

June smirked without saying anything. She raised her spear and shot forward, stabbing it at the center of Noah's chest. Lightning bolts came out from the tip of her weapon after the impact, and an explosion followed.

The world was too frail to withstand that power. More cracks opened until all the area fell prey to the void. The weak sky in the distance tried to send its light, but most of it dispersed among the darkness.

"What are you even doing?" Noah sighed, and his voice dispersed the energy released during the explosion, revealing that the attack didn't affect him in the slightest.

June tried to push her spear into Noah's chest, but her weapon couldn't pierce his skin. She didn't even manage to make him budge, and the lightning bolts that she had released had also been useless.

June was stronger than the average gaseous stage cultivator, but that didn't mean anything in Noah's presence. He was too strong for that level. He was leagues above June.

"Why did they even send you?" Noah asked while grabbing the spear's tip. "I have killed privileged cultivators in the liquid stage before my last breakthrough. What can you do in this state?"

Light pressure from his fingers filled the spear with cracks before shattering it completely. June soon found herself without a weapon, but she didn't give up on her mission. She took a step back, and a stronger aura flowed out of her figure.

Noah sighed again. That scene filled his mind with sadness. He didn't know what had happened inside the weak sky, but that wasn't June. A simple increase in her power after a defeat wasn't enough to describe her ability.

June pointed her hands forward, and lightning bolts ran over her arms as she accumulated power. Her aura continued to intensify until she decided to discharge her energy.

The sparks transformed into white lightning bolts, but they didn't have the chance to shoot forward since Noah's hand appeared on their path. They did their best to pierce his skin, but they could only shatter and vanish when he closed his fingers to grab June's hands.

June tried to pull herself away, but Noah's grasp was impossible to break. He studied her hands, the sensations that they originated, and even their smell. Everything told him that they didn't belong to his lover, but he also felt that June was in front of him.

"Let go!" June shouted as lightning bolts flared out of her figure.

Attacks landed on Noah, but nothing managed to hurt him. June's power continued to increase, and the loud sound of her heartbeat also started to invade the area, but nothing could affect him. He was too strong for her.

Noah pulled June and let go of her hands to grab her head. She continued to struggle, but her efforts were pointless. Meanwhile, Noah's expression grew sadder as he called upon his anger and tried to disperse the effects of Heaven and Earth's power.

Cracks began to open on June's forehead, and energy seeped out of her skin as Noah's anger targeted Heaven and Earth's power. There was a lot that he didn't understand about her situation, but he would do everything in his power to solve his doubts.

June's current power told Noah that she had yet to step on the ninth rank when Heaven and Earth captured her. The worlds given by the rulers were usually good copies that tried to be as identical as possible to the original, but that didn't happen with June. She was similar to her previous self but weak compared to her actual potential.

Another stark difference was the change in her personality. The real June wouldn't care that Noah was far stronger than her. She would still face the battle with a smile on her face. Instead, the current version of her barely showed any emotion.

'What did they do with you?' Noah wondered as he tried to invade June's mind with his mental waves.

His dense mental energy wasn't something that June could stop. His anger opened a path that his mental waves crossed in no time. They entered her mind and started inspecting the memories that filled that ethereal environment.

June's mind mostly contained light. Noah had already seen similar scenes when he inspected cultivators in Heaven and Earth's system. June clearly belonged to the rulers now, but Noah found the complete lack of memories odd. She seemed to have nothing more than that radiance inside her mind.

'Where are her memories?' Noah wondered as he continued that inspection.

Lightning bolts, explosions, and various attacks fell on his figure, but nothing managed to hurt him. Noah remained still, with his eyes closed and his hand sealed on June's face as he continued inspecting her mind.

The complete lack of memories didn't make sense. Noah would have even believed that June's current form belonged to an avatar if his instincts didn't contradict him. She looked like nothing more than a vessel that failed to imitate his lover's power but succeeded in copying part of her essence.

The lack of memories almost made Noah hope that the real June was locked somewhere inside the sky, but orange shades eventually appeared in his vision and killed those thoughts. He could sense traces of his real lover deep inside that whiteness. It seemed that Heaven and Earth's reconstruction had simply been extremely thorough in her case.

Noah moved his mental waves toward the source of that orange radiance slowly. Those shades grew darker as they started to resemble the higher energy that June had created with him a long time ago. He needed to reach the core of that light to see what had remained of his lover, but he didn't want that moment to arrive too soon.

Noah knew the real June. She would prefer him to kill her instead of obtaining a world that didn't have any chance to follow him. Proving that she was gone would force him to destroy that copy, and he didn't want that moment to arrive.

The inspection continued until Noah reached the source of those orange and dark shades. He expected memories, but he felt surprised to see a spherical item that was far denser than the light in the surrounding area. It almost resembled a world, even if it was too little and weak to stand on the ninth rank.