ONLINE: Blades of Eternity-Chapter 327: RESUME TRAINING

The light of dawn broke slowly through the dense canopy of the Deadroot outskirts, casting fractured beams through ancient stone arches and tangled vines. Under Naena’s guidance, Kaelen, Kelvin, Lila, Guinevere, Ethan, Morris, and the rest of their party quietly followed the aged Nullcarver matriarch along a winding, root-laced path that led deep beneath the living earth.

They were entering the true heart of the Nullcarver domain.

Soon, the dense forest gave way to a narrow, descending crevice carved into the mountain’s side. As they descended, Qi in the air grew thick—ancient, potent, and almost sentient. Every breath carried a weight of history, as though the mountain itself remembered battles fought and blood spilled in silence.

’Seems like she is taking us to a different location to the one Eirana took us to’ Kaelen thought with a curious look on his face. Even Kelvin had a perplexed look on his face as he continued his movements.

After half an hour of careful descent through winding stone steps and sacred glyph-lined walls, they arrived.

Naena paused at the entrance of a vast cavern.

The Hollow.

Unlike the one Eirana took Kaelen and Kelvin to, this one stretched before them in quiet grandeur—a colossal subterranean hall lit by luminous crystals embedded in the ceiling, glowing with soft blue and amber hues. Ancient pillars stood in concentric rings, carved with meticulous artistry, depicting warriors mid-flow in various martial techniques.

But the centerpiece was undeniable.

Seven massive statues, each carved from a single obsidian block, loomed over the chamber in a wide semi-circle. Each stood at least twenty feet tall, arms folded or raised in symbolic gestures of power, their eyes carved deep enough to hold shadows that never left.

The statues radiated pressure—not mana, but pure Qi resonance. Kaelen and Kelvin instinctively felt their skin prickle, their breathing slow, and their instincts sharpen. The others, even Guinevere with her fierce flame affinity, couldn’t help but feel insignificant beneath the watch of the ancient figures.

Naena turned, her voice calm but solemn.

"You stand now within the Nullcarver Hollow... the resting chamber and memorial of our ancestors. The origin of our legacy. Where the Seven Juggernauts once awakened the Qi sleeping beneath this world."

She raised a hand toward the statues.

"Each of these seven figures you see before you were once real—legends of the Nullcarver tribe. They lived during the Primordial Divide, before the rise of kingdoms and the fall of the Celestial Bridges. When man and world were still one. When Qi was not just power, but breath, life, and soul."

Kaelen stepped forward slowly, his gaze drawn to the third statue—its arms outstretched in a wide-open form that seemed ready to embrace battle. His fingers brushed the carved stone, and a pulse of dormant Qi vibrated up his arm.

Naena nodded at his curiosity.

"They are not merely statues. These are Qi imprints, left behind by the Juggernauts at the moment of their greatest clarity—when they each birthed a secret technique from their soul. These seven techniques are not learned... they are awakened."

Kelvin raised a brow, eyes narrowing.

"You mean... we don’t train for them?"

"But we kind of believed that we have to train to get this techniques since both you and your granddaughter told us to which we actually did in another location Eirana showed us" Kelvin continued with a confused look on his face.

Hearing this, Naena gave a simple nod before she stepped forward and gestured to the statues.

"You train to understand yourselves, and in doing so, you earn the right to touch what they once touched. Each technique aligns with a path—Destruction, Balance, Swiftness, Endurance, Illusion, Rebirth... and the last one, Transcendence."

"The ones you guys trained on with the help of Eirana were the ones that was created by our most prestigious tribesmen which is based on these statues here. They might seem potent, but they are not the real thing"

Ethan gulped, eyes darting between the statues.

"Sounds like we’ll be here a long time."

Naena smiled faintly.

"You’ll be here until the Hollow acknowledges you. Whether that takes days, weeks, or months... depends on the will of your Qi."

Lila stepped beside Kaelen, her arms folded, expression thoughtful.

"And if we master all seven?"

Naena’s gaze darkened slightly, a shadow passing behind her eyes.

"Then you will become more than warriors. You will become Juggernauts of the new age. You will not only be ready to enter the Aether Crucible, where reality itself bends, but you guys could even stand the chance against the frightening being known as Endless—But it is only those who have conquered their inner storms may survive."

"Which is why only Kaelen and Kelvin are allowed to take on the full seven statues since they have experienced similar training and their soul has slightly adapted to it" Naena continued.

"Huh? Are you belittling us right now? You have know idea what we have gone through" Ethan quickly said with a displeased look on his face.

"No I don’t" Naena replied, "But I do know that whatever you guys have experienced is no where near what you are a out to go through now since only the first step of this statues has ended entire bloodlines in our tribe out of only pain"

"....." Hearing this, Ethan instantly kept shut since he was dumbfounded by what Naena just said and frightened by what he is actually about to go through.

Meanwhile, Kaelen clenched his fists.

The image of his snapped Blade of Eternity flashed again in his mind. It had always been more than a weapon—it was a part of his journey, his soul, and his proof that he was rising beyond what the world once expected of him. And now... it was broken.

He turned fully to Naena.

"Then we start now," he said. "No more delays."

Naena stepped aside, revealing a circular ring of ancient runes carved into the Hollow’s floor.

"Then step into the Circle of Resonance. Let the statues weigh your intent. If your Qi matches even one of their paths... your training begins."

Kaelen walked forward without hesitation, Kelvin just behind. The others soon followed, forming a loose ring around the stone floor.

As soon as they crossed into the ring—

The statues’ eyes began to glow—each with a different hue. A subtle hum filled the Hollow. The Qi density doubled. The air became thick. The Hollow was responding.

Naena stepped back into the shadows, voice echoing like wind through deep valleys.

"Welcome to the path of the Juggernauts...

May your Qi be loud enough...

To shake the bones of the world."

–––––

The twilight sun cast golden light across the tall, lush canopy marking the southern border of the Elven Territories, where the woods kissed the outer edge of the infamous Deadroot Forest. Birds chirped softly in the canopy. A calm, serene wind rustled the emerald-green foliage, and the smooth white stone walls of the Elven Outpost of Velun’thir gleamed like moonlight.

Atop the high guard tower, Captain Thalrion, an elite Elven warrior with braided silver hair and emerald eyes, scanned the horizon. His posture was elegant yet alert, one hand resting on the handle of his dual curved blades.

A patrol of twenty Elven warriors moved gracefully below, dressed in enchanted leaf-weave armor that blended into the surrounding forest. For centuries, this border had seen nothing but silence. But tonight... the silence broke.

A loud crack echoed through the air—like reality splitting.

The sky shimmered unnaturally. And then, with no grand display—only a pulse of inky black pressure—two figures stood at the edge of the forest path.

One was cloaked in dark robes laced with chaotic runes, his eyes a swirling storm of violet and shadow: Alen, the Dark Magi.

The other was far more terrifying.

Tall, laced in shifting obsidian robes that seemed to warp the very air around him, Endless stood with hands behind his back. His face, a hollow void beneath a sinister looking mask, emanated a calm that felt colder than death.

Seeing this, the Elves reacted instantly.

"INTRUDERS! RAISE THE SIGIL—!"

But they didn’t get far.

Alen, without lifting a hand, merely murmured a single word in an ancient tongue:

"Spheral Rend."

The space between him and the Elves exploded into spiraling vortexes of chaotic mana. The entire front rank of the patrol was erased—not burned, not wounded, but completely disintegrated, their bodies swallowed by unstable dimensions of null matter.

Captain Thalrion leapt down from the tower, blades unsheathed, eyes blazing with fury and disbelief.

"You dare bring Chaos to the Elven homeland?!"

He dashed toward Alen with blinding speed, the wind warping behind him with his momentum. But Alen didn’t even turn to face him.

With a subtle flick of his wrist, a blade of dark mana pierced Thalrion mid-charge, lifting him off the ground. The elf’s body convulsed as his life force was drained in an instant and fed directly into Alen’s sigils, which burned brighter with each kill.

"Foolish elves... still clinging to honor."

In seconds, the entire outpost was nothing but scorched ground and bloodied earth. Not a single elf remained. frёeweɓηovel_coɱ

And through it all, Endless had not moved.

He stepped forward now, boots crunching against the ashes of the fallen elves.

Alen turned toward the treeline of Deadroot and bowed slightly.

"Shall I burn the forest down for you, Lord Endless?"

But Endless raised a hand and shook his head ever so slightly.

"No. This forest is mine."

Alen paused, surprised. Endless walked toward the forest’s edge, inhaling deeply. Though it looked like any other corrupted woodland, the air here held something different.

No mana. Not even the faintest trace.

Only the thick presence of Qi, and the low whisper of stillness. To others, it was a dead zone.

But to Endless, it was home turf.

"This place... I built it," Endless said quietly, as though reliving a memory. "When I first crafted the Leech, I feared those bastards would trace its origin through mana signature. So I erased mana here entirely. Every tree, every rock—stripped of arcane energy."

He placed a hand on the bark of a blackened tree.

"I created Deadroot not just to hide the Leech... but to train it. To test its ability to evolve without magic. Only the strong, the patient, and the hungry would survive here. And it did. Which am highly satisfied for since he can now fulfill the purpose which I created it for"

Alen furrowed his brow.

"But the Leech was defeated."

Endless’s smile was hollow, empty.

"It cried to me before it died. A telepathic echo, weak but potent which shows it hasn’t been erased yet. And it showed me something..."

He turned his head slightly, black light glowing faintly from the hollow of his helm.

"Of cause I have told you before, but those two which holds the Magic Pandora, Kaelen and Kelvin are at the heart of this forest"

Alen’s eyes widened.

"Then the Pandora..."

Endless nodded slowly.

"It is obviously there. In the heart of this manaless tomb."

He stepped across the forest’s threshold. The moment his armored boot touched the soil, the trees bent ever so slightly, as if they remembered their creator.

"I’ll walk the path I paved with my own hands," Endless whispered, more to himself than anyone. "And when I find them, I will retrieve what is mine—and bury what dares to hold it."

Alen opened a rift to the outer perimeter, vanishing to prepare for the next wave.

Endless, however, disappeared into the mists of the forest on foot—his figure dissolving into the unnatural fog of Deadroot. Each step he took sent subtle tremors through the forest. Trees decayed in his wake. Roots shriveled. Shadows stretched.

He was coming.

And he was coming with full force.

R𝑒ad lat𝒆st chapt𝒆rs at f(r)eew𝒆bnov𝒆l.com Only