Demon Sword Maiden

Volume 12 - Yomi-no-kuni: Chapter 226 - Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi

Seeing that Rei was threatened ahead by Chiroku, and Ayaka was about to be overtaken by the giant hand from behind, a cold gleam like a ghostly moon flashed through Lily’s eyes.

“Sister Shimizu!” A ripple of black spatial energy surged forth.

Shimizu instantaneously teleported, appearing back-to-back behind Lily.

Lily passed Ayaka’s hand into Shimizu’s grasp, and with a synchronized push, the two women split in opposite directions. Lily flew toward Rei, catching the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi mid-air, while Shimizu took Ayaka and soared upward to evade pursuit.

Ahead, Chiroku loomed closer. Though all of this seemed complex, it occurred in but a moment. The demon’s massive claw gripped his weapon and turned, raising the other hand in a brutal swing toward Rei.

The pressure was overwhelming, Rei had no time to dodge!

Lily gripped the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi and swung it in a single, fluid arc. With a slicing sound, Chiroku’s powerful arm was severed cleanly in two! The demon’s head snapped toward Lily, his crimson eyes wide with disbelief. His pupils shrank as he stared in shock, unable to accept what had just occurred.

Lily’s strike had met no significant resistance. This was a Supreme God Physique, incredibly tough. Even though Lily had overpowered many Supreme Gods in battle, killing them outright was always extremely difficult.

And yet, now?

In the next breath, Lily reached Rei’s side. She seized Rei’s hand, and instead of fleeing, leapt into the air. The two spun mid-flight, aiming to strike Chiroku from behind once more.

At that critical instant, a mysterious resonance stirred between Lily and Rei. Their spiritual energies connected and flowed together, and Lily suddenly felt the boundless, profound sword intent within the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi.

“Hnn… ah…” For a fleeting moment, both Lily and Rei were overwhelmed by the sword’s will. A surge of indescribable clarity and battle fervor coursed through their bodies.

Lily saw fleeting visions flash before her eyes; ancient, shadowed worlds, and a solitary, radiant silver moon that severed all evil and corruption beneath heaven.

It was the power of the Silver Lunar Force.

In that moment, Lily truly and purely grasped the essence of that lunar force.

The divine sword in her hand seemed to awaken. The sword’s spirit, the pulse between her and Rei, and ancient memories dormant within its steel all began to stir to life.

“This is…”

Though both were Divine Artifacts, the power radiating from the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi was like the clear, bright moon, while the artifact once wielded by Lord Shikikai now seemed no more than a flickering firefly in comparison.

As a born Blade Maiden, Lily possessed an innate sensitivity to blades. Now that she had reached the Celestial Stage, she could more deeply perceive the infinite killing intent hidden within the icy gleam of this silver blade.

Countless mighty beings had perished beneath this sword. Over thousands of years, their lingering resentments drifted like a starry sea of vengeful souls. Lily could feel them all—sharp, sorrowful, relentless.

This was a sword of pure frost and ruthless destruction, a peerless divine sword that yielded to nothing.

“How dare you threaten my sister’s life!” Lily’s eyes burned like the frigid moon. Her killing intent surged without end. The slender blade of the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, shaped like a crescent moon hung in the lonely night sky, drew a graceful yet mournful arc of silver light.

With a single, unstoppable strike, the silver crescent cleaved into the thick, hardened hide of Chiroku. His back split open with a brutal crack. Even the bones beneath, strong as high-grade spirit weapons, were shattered.

Chiroku’s powerful Supreme God Physique was cleaved cleanly in two!

Even the crystalline core deep within his chest, the essence of his demonic soul and as resilient as any Divine Artifact, was sliced in half. The cut was as smooth as glass.

Chiroku’s two crimson eyes, one in each half of his now-split body, dimmed slowly before going dark. He was dead.

The Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, now in Lily’s grasp, radiated its innate Silver Lunar Force, a power that naturally countered Yomi’s demons. Combined with Lily’s overwhelming penetration force, it had cleaved through Chiroku, an entity whose strength was equivalent to that of a Supreme God, with a single strike.

At the same moment, on the other side of the battlefield, Shimizu slashed open a spatial gate using Murasame-Anko and pulled Ayaka through it. The two reappeared safely tens of thousands of meters away under a dark stretch of sky, narrowly evading the crushing strike of Kuroyodai’s massive hand.

“What!?” The Supreme Gods and demons who had been charging toward Lily came to a halt, stunned by what they had just witnessed. They momentarily ignored Shimizu and Ayaka’s escape through the Dark Lunar Force’s dimensional gate, their gazes instead fixed on the blade now held in Lily’s hands.

The Twin Oni were not true Supreme Gods, but rather beings formed from the filth, chaos, and evil desires of the Boundless Abyss, shaped by the natural laws of the world. They lacked divinity. A true Supreme God’s divinity, once attained, could not be destroyed by any external force and could exist for eternity. Only under very specific conditions, tied to the world’s own rules, could a divinity dissolve naturally and return to the heavenly path.

Another method to nullify a divinity was for the Supreme God to self-destruct just before death, refusing to allow their divinity to fall into another’s hands. This, however, required an intense will and resolve, and not every Supreme God could achieve it. Though externally indestructible, the divinity was still born of the Supreme God’s own advancement and connection to heaven. Thus, by destroying their own spiritual sea, it was possible for a Supreme God to obliterate their own divinity from within.

That said, the gathered powerhouses all understood a crucial fact: killing a Supreme God did not require destroying their divinity. One could instead deal a sufficiently powerful blow to affect the inner spiritual sea that protected the divinity. Alternatively, soul-based attacks, though exceedingly rare, could also kill a Supreme God. Another method was to repeatedly injure them until their divine energy was completely exhausted, resulting in death.

Even though Lily had just slain one of the Twin Oni, who lacked divinity, the implication was no less terrifying. It meant that the sword in her hand was powerful enough to sever the limbs of true Supreme Gods, and by either exhausting their divine power or striking directly at their divinity, it could potentially kill or seriously wound them.

“What… what is that sword!?” Kuralan, who had been closing in from only a few thousand meters away, froze on the spot, his expression filled with shock. He no longer dared to approach.

“This… this can’t be…” Wakarai’s eyes crackled with thunder as he stared at the chilling blade in Lily’s hand. His face twisted in both fury and disbelief. “That’s the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi! One of the three legendary Divine Artifacts!”

Among the gods still living, very few had seen the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi in person. But Wakarai, once one of the Eight Thunder Gods of Takamagahara, had seen it long ago. Though that memory had faded with time, the instant he saw Lily cleave Chiroku in half, he no longer had any doubt.

Now, it was undeniable.

Across the Three Realms, how many swords could sever the body of a Supreme God in one strike?

Wakarai recalled rumors that one of the other supreme swords was still in Takamagahara, but after the great war a thousand years ago, the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi had vanished without a trace.

“To think… the Kusanagi has fallen into the hands of Lily and her sisterhood? And that Big Dipper woman beside her… Who is she? She’s no ordinary adept… Somehow, she seems familiar…” A strange shiver ran down Wakarai’s spine. He couldn’t stop himself from trembling.

“What!? The Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi!?” Even the abyssal gods who had never seen it before were now shaken. Though they hadn’t witnessed it with their own eyes until now, they all knew the legends. Each one of them felt a rising dread.