Chapter 627: Chapter 627: The Golden Board

Before turning the corner to fully vanish down the mountain path, Ethan halted his steps and glanced over his shoulder at the three sisters.

"If you ever find yourselves truly struggling with your martial foundations or require direct guidance with your sword training, you may seek out my standalone courtyard," said Ethan, his voice smooth and entirely reassuring. "If I am present on the peak, I will assist you if I am able."

The three women gasped, their faces instantly illuminating with pure, ecstatic excitement. They nodded their heads with frantic, vehement gratitude, watching his back with glowing reverence until he finally disappeared into the morning mist.

The moment he was completely out of their sight, the warm, approachable demeanor Ethan had maintained entirely evaporated. His handsome features hardened into an expression of freezing, calculated apathy, his piercing amethyst eyes radiating a predatory, dark light.

He hadn’t offered them aid out of the goodness of his heart. Ethan never forgot his ultimate, absolute mission on this mountain: to thoroughly conquer, bleed, and sweep this entire sect until nothing remained. To accomplish that level of destruction, he needed to increase his raw cultivation pool dramatically and rapidly. There was no finer tool for that task than the unholy, restricted art sleeping within his soul—the Nine Body Yin Devourer technique. The three sisters of the Sterling House were merely resources he had neatly filed away for the future; it was finally time to begin the feast.

To kickstart his true ascension, Ethan directed his path toward the grand Missions Pavilion. Unlike the lower frontier sects, rookies of the Heavenly Sword Pavilion who achieved a top ranking were not forced to waste their time sitting through basic, mandatory lectures; they were granted absolute freedom to move as they pleased. Ethan needed Sect Points to aggressively climb the hierarchy and force the elders to transfer him to the sacred central headquarters.

He stepped through the massive copper doors of the Missions Pavilion, the heavy scent of burning incense and metal instantly filling his senses.

The primary mission board was entirely different from the crude wooden walls of the borderlands. Standing over ten meters tall was a colossal slate wall divided into distinct tiers. Hanging from ancient iron hooks were not paper scrolls, but shimmering, solid sheets of polished metal—bronze, silver, and radiant gold. The pavilion didn’t utilize ink; the requests were etched directly into the precious metals with sharp sword qi, presenting an incredibly ostentatious display of external wealth.

The requests varied wildly across the board, ranging from the brutal hunting of high-tier mountain beasts, the recovery of hidden spiritual herbs, to complex alchemical refining and the medical treatment of rare internal afflictions.

As Ethan’s eyes methodically scanned the glittering rows, a specific golden metal sheet hanging at the absolute top of the medical section caught his attention. It was a high-tier royal request, demanding an exceptionally capable physician to immediately diagnose and treat a mysterious, highly volatile illness striking a core member of an affiliated clan.

Etched clearly at the bottom of the gold leaf was a detailed, specific list of the patient’s severe, worsening symptoms:

...The patient suffers from sudden, uncontrollable freezes of the primary meridian paths, accompanied by an intense, burning internal heat that causes the skin to flush a deep crimson. During the midnight hour, the spiritual core experiences a violent backflow of negative energy, inducing severe, hallucinatory tremors, an insatiable thirst that water cannot quench, and a profound, chaotic corruption of the vital essence that leaves the physical body completely weak yet hyper-sensitized to the touch...

Ethan’s lips slowly curled into a dark, incredibly dangerous smile as he finished reading the elegant script. To a common alchemist or an ordinary sect physician, these symptoms would look like a bizarre, contradictory poison or a rare spiritual parasite.

But to the master of the Nine Body Yin Devourer, the diagnosis was absolute, simple, and beautifully perfect.

"An extreme, catastrophic excess of pure, unrefined Primordial Yin energy," whispered Ethan, his consciousness vibrating with an ancient, dark hunger as he reached his hand up toward the hook. "A magnificent treasure, completely gift-wrapped and disguised as a lethal disease."

However, Ethan was anything but a reckless fool. He knew that simply ripping the golden metal sheet from the board, marching up to a high-ranking elder or a powerful core family, and loudly declaring ’I am a physician, open your doors for me’ was an absolute stupidity. To those arrogant elites, a newly admitted outer disciple from the rugged frontier making such a claim would look like nothing more than a delusional, opportunistic charlatan trying to scam his way into their inner circles. He would be cast out or executed on the spot before he could even lay a hand on the patient.

It was time to initiate Phase B of his absolute infiltration plan.

Phase A had already been thoroughly and flawlessly executed. He had successfully embedded himself deep within the foundations of the lateral branch under the perfect cover identity: a peerless, overwhelming martial genius from a completely devastated frontier clan. He had passed their brutal selection trials with the absolute highest score possible and instantly made a formidable, dangerous name for himself across the peaks.

Now, the mechanisms of Phase B needed to grind into motion. He didn’t just need to be a powerful swordsman; he had to show an even greater, indispensable utility to the higher-ups—something so profoundly rare and valuable that the pavilion would have no choice but to fast-track his ascension straight into the sacred central headquarters of the core world.

Ethan slowly lowered his hand away from the golden board, leaving the metal leaf hanging from its iron hook for now. He turned his back on the bustling crowd of the pavilion and walked back out into the misty mountain air, his gaze fixed on the highest, most restricted peaks of the inner sect.

"Are you ready, Crul?" said Ethan, his voice dropping into a low, predatory murmur as he communicated directly through his consciousness. "It is time to begin. We have an immense amount of work ahead of us."

[Keke... my soul has been itching for this, Master.] hissed Crul unholy glee deep within Ethan’s mind space. [Let the old fools keep their little secrets and their precious points. With the entire archive of their foundational techniques already digested in our library, we will reshape their concepts of medicine and alchemy entirely. Let us show these mountain dogs what a true god of creation looks like.]

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From this moment forward, to avoid confusion regarding cultivation ranks, I will include this footer with the current established levels.

Note: These are only the ranks mentioned so far to avoid spoilers.

Body Refinement Realm

Skin Refinement / Bone Refinement / Organ Refinement

Spiritual Gathering Realm

Spiritual Perception / Spiritual Mist / Spiritual Condensation

Spiritual Core Realm

Core Solidification / Core Awakening / Spiritual Collapse (Half-step Spiritual Core)

Spiritual Soul Realm

Spiritual Soul Awakening / Soul Nourishing / Soul-Core Fusion

Golden Core Realm

Prime Fusion / Core Perfection / Core Destruction

Spiritual Sea Realm

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

Dao Manifestation Realm

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

Spiritual Transcendence

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

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Sword mastery levels

Sword Intent.

Sword Aura.