The horizon of the Hubei plains was no longer a landscape of rolling green hills, but a jagged, silver scar of humanity. High Lord Jo Mu-Sang stood atop the command pavilion of the Silver Vow Organization, looking out at the remains of his dream. Behind him, the Twelve Honored Officials of the Murim Alliance—once the proud arbiters of "Justice"—stood in a tense, sweating silence.
The "million-man" army was now a ghost of its former self. Following the merchant's embargo and the North Sea's refusal to engage, the Alliance had been forced to cannibalize its own foundations. The Jo Family's Grand Chamber of Commerce had been liquidated, its gold used not to buy grain, but to procure the final, forbidden components for the Imperial Divine awakening.
"They have taken the river, the mountains, and our reputation," Mu-Sang said, his voice a low, gravelly rasp. He adjusted the Alliance Seal on his belt, which felt heavier with every passing hour. "But they have not taken our blood. If the Yun Clan wishes to be the new law, then they must first walk through the graveyard of the old one."
The Harvest of Shadows
The command pavilion was thick with the scent of the Blood Refining Pellets. These were not the common medicinal herbs used to soothe meridians; they were high-grade catalysts refined from the Blood Lilies of the forbidden zones.
Down in the ranks of the infantry, the "3rd Rate" conscripts and "2nd Rate" squad leaders were being force-fed the pellets. In the Murim Alliance's theology, this was called the "Great Blessing of the Ancestors." In reality, it was a biological death sentence. The pellets didn't grow the Dantian; they "ignited" it, forcing the body to consume its own lifespan to produce a temporary burst of Transcendent level Sword Force.
"Look at them," whispered an official from the Inspectorate, gesturing to the front lines where the soldiers' eyes were turning a milky, luminous white. "They are no longer men. They are wick-candles, burning through thirty years of life in thirty minutes."
"They are martyrs for Justice," Mu-Sang replied, though even he could not look at the trembling hands of the young disciples. "General Chu Seong of the Namgung has fallen. The Shaolin are broken. We no longer have the luxury of mercy."
The Call of the Sarcophagi
The final mobilization began as the sun touched the edge of the world. At the center of the Alliance formation, six massive, spirit-jade sarcophagi were carried by teams of thirty oxen each. These were the Imperial Divine ancestors—warriors who had achieved the "Unfathomable" stages of the Absolute Realm centuries ago and had been preserved through forbidden stagnation alchemy.
As the seals on the sarcophagi were cracked, the air over the Hubei plains didn't just grow cold; it grew heavy. It was a manifestation of Sword Force so concentrated it turned the atmospheric moisture into physical pressure.
One by one, the "Lords of the Past" stepped out. They were youthful in appearance—a hallmark of the Unrestrained Realm's rejuvenation—but their spirits were ancient, corroded by the stagnation of their long sleep. They wore the pre-Alliance robes of the Five Great Families, their very presence suppressing the "Peak" masters of the current generation.
"The board is set," Mu-Sang declared, drawing his own sword, the Azure Heaven Martial Dominance. "To the Heavenly Pillar! We shall drown the West in the blood of its betters!"
The March of the Dead
The Alliance army moved not with the rhythmic thunder of a military unit, but with the haunting, synchronized silence of an avalanche. At the front, the Ancestors glided across the earth, their feet never touching the dirt—a demonstration of Wind Walking that consumed no Ki, as they were drawing energy from the very life-force of the martyrs marching behind them.
The "Silver Vow" warriors followed, their bodies steaming with the heat of the Blood Refining Pellets. They didn't feel hunger anymore. They didn't feel fear. They felt only the jagged, artificial power of the ignition.
Far to the West, at the threshold of the Anhui Sovereign Zone, the Yun Clan's reconnaissance units—the Swift Spears—watched the approach. For the first time, they didn't see an army they could dismantle with geometry. They saw a tidal wave of entropic energy.
"The Alliance has abandoned the Dao," the Yun captain noted, his voice carried by Sound-Transmission back to the Heavenly Pillar. "They are no longer fighting for legacies. They are fighting to take the world with them into the void."
The stage for the final confrontation of the Hundred-Day War was set. The Alliance's "Last Stand" was a declaration of total nihilism, a clash between the Nature Realm's harmony and the Imperial Divine's parasitic hunger. As the two forces prepared to collide at the base of the Yun mountains, the very stars seemed to withdraw their light, as if refusing to witness the end of an era.