As soon as Alex's eyes fell on the Black Stele, he unintentionally read some of the words that were on it. As that happened, an Intent seemed to enter his mind to fight him.
Alex fought back with his own Intent and easily defeated it. Still, feeling how strong the Intent of the god that had created this black stele was, he couldn't help but feel nervous about what would happen when he seriously decided to read it.
For that, he first needed to pull the black stele out of the ground first.
Alex had yet to check just how large this black stele was underneath the ground. Because of the Intent, he didn't dare use his spiritual sense recklessly around it. He would just have to pull it out and check for himself how large the black stele actually was.
He flew up and grabbed the black stele with his Qi. Fortunately, the Intent didn't attack in this instance. It seemed it was designed to only fight back when someone was trying to learn the technique that was written on it.
Alex grabbed it tightly and pulled it upward. The ground shuddered as for the first time in over a thousand years, the black stele was being moved.
Alex immediately felt the weight of the object he was holding and was surprised. It was so dense and heavy, that it was a surprise it hadn't sunken even more in the ground.
Alex exerted all the force in his body and pulled on the black stele. He even used his weaker blood aura to wrap it around the stele to pull it better.
While pulling it up, he also simultaneously started moving around the dirt near the stele. The looser the ground became, the easier it became to pull the stele upward.
Bit by bit, the stele started lifting itself from the ground. The weight of stele was heavy, but just enough so that Alex could handle it.
The weight didn't surprise him, but the side of the stele definitely did.
As he pulled the stele upward, he realized that it wasn't just a large piece of rock that was stuck to the ground. It was a long piece of rock.
Not only was it long, it was also in the shape of a sword, which surprised Alex. What was above the ground all this time was nothing more than just half a hilt of the massive sword.
There was no cross guard, but the design of the sword was clear enough that even with half of it still in the ground, Alex could tell what it was.
"What are you doing?" a voice spoke in his head.
"Later, I need to focus," Alex said, ignoring Godslayer for the moment while he continued pulling on the sword.
"Hmm… I was wondering what disturbed my sweet sleep," Godslayer spoke with a hint of hatred in his voice. "It was this thing."
Alex could hear Godslayer, but he ignored it the best he could while he continued pulling. Finally, minutes later, the entirety of the black stone stele, which was actually a black stone sword was revealed.
The massive stone sword was about 2 meters in thickness, 4 meters in width, and nearly 80 meters long. Made with some very dense material, the black sword was a very heavy object that shook the ground as it lay flat.
The sword seemed to have words on only one side, so Alex was free to admire the beauty and craftsmanship of the object in front of him.
"Wow!" he couldn't help but say. "It's not an actual sword, is it? It looks fake, but I don't know much about the gods to accurately tell that."
Having come alongside the senior Yang, this thing was definitely in the Sky God's treasury. Meaning, it was something very important, most definitely belonging to either a strong faction or someone important.
"I can't feel any Qi. It must be fake," He spoke softly.
"Of course, it's not a real sword," Godslayer said. "What are you, an idiot?"
"Go easy on me. I'm not very knowledgeable about the immortal realms. I've seen books eat blood and wells that accurately predict the future. At this point, anything is possible," Alex said.
Godslayer couldn't retort that. "Well, it's not a weapon or an artifact. It's no different than a piece of paper that someone wrote on," he said. "Except that someone is a god and gods like being fancy for no reason."
"Is that so?" Alex asked while he touched the side of the sword. "Maybe there was an advantage to using this."
"Well, he probably chose this material because it was long-lasting. Turning it into the shape of a sword was entirely unnecessary though," Godslayer said. "Well, what could you expect from him."
"Him? This belonged to a man?" Alex asked. "What was he? What was his title?"
"Hmm… was it the Sword god? No, the Weapons god. It was the Weapons god that was always together with the Sword god," Godslayer said. "He was one of the ones I hated the most."
"The Weapons god? How does one become a weapons god?" Alex asked. "Do you have to learn every single weapon?"
"Pretty much," Godslayer said. "Well, gods can simply claim to be a god of something, which can be proven after a few tests. Unless there is someone to counter their claim, they usually end up being named as one, so we can't tell if this person was really as good at using every single weapon or not."
"For all we know, nobody could have claimed they could win against him and he got the name as such," Godslayer said.
"That makes sense, I suppose," Alex said. "He was your enemy too?"
"Yes," Godslayer said. "One of the ones I most despised."
"Do you know why?" Alex asked. "Why you despised him?"
"I—"
Godslayer paused as a few memories flashed through his mind. Not a single one of the images was any bit intelligible, but somehow the emotions they had had still came through and the hatred Godslayer felt increased tenfold.
"I don't know why," Godslayer said. "I simply hate him."
"You hate every god," Alex said.
"No, this one is different," he said. "I don't know why… but this one feels personal."
Alex was surprised to hear that. Personal was not a word that he expected Godslayer to use to describe his hatred. After all, his hatred towards the gods was always irrational.
However, hearing that it was personal, Alex couldn't help but wonder if it was in fact rational hate.
"I want to kill him all over again," Godslayer said with an angry voice.
"Again?" Alex was surprised. "This god is dead?"
"Most definitely," Godslayer said. "I can't remember much from those times, but if what I am thinking is correct, then he was one of my first victims."
"Wait, didn't you say he used to be with the Sword god a lot? If he died ages ago, then did the Sword god live long enough to capture you?" Alex asked.
"Capture me? No," Godslayer said. "I killed that Sword god. The one that captured me is a different one."
"Ah, different one, I see" Alex nodded. "You've really killed quite a lot, huh?"
He wanted to learn more from Godslayer, but Godslayer didn't have anything more to say about the Weapons god. After all, there wasn't much he remembered anyway from that far back.
"Is there going to be a lot of Intents attacking your spiritual world soon?" Godslayer asked. "I want to go back to sleep."
"I'm sorry," Alex said. "But I plan on learning whatever technique lies in here as soon as I can. You might have to stay awake for a little longer."
"Hmm, this thing has a technique in it, huh?" Godslayer asked. "I'm curious what sort of technique it is for the Weapons God to personally write it into something near indestructible while filling it with an immense amount of his Intent."
"So am I," Alex said. "Hearing that he's the Weapons god scares me a bit since he must have a very strong Intent. However, given that he died many years ago, I can only hope that his Intent has faded enough that I can read the words on this without worrying."
"Dammit!" Godslayer grumbled. "I just got some of my powers back, and I already have to use it for you once again, don't I?"
"Hopefully not," Alex said with a slight chuckle. "Hopefully I can learn it all on my own without needing your help."
He turned around and jumped, landing on the massive stone. He was standing on the hilt of the sword and looked down to read the words that were carved onto it.
He had read this part of the stone years ago, but still, he reread it. Not only did he want to see if he missed something, but he also wanted to make sure there wasn't anything here that was hidden behind the Intent.
In case there was some important detail that could only be unlocked once he defeated the Intent, he couldn't skip over the stuff.
So, from the very start, he started reading.
The moment his eyes fell on the words and he read them, he felt the Intent fly out of the text and attack him. He struggled to keep himself straight as the power of the Intent was stronger than what he was prepared for.
Still, just because it was strong, he didn't look away. Instead, he fought back and within seconds destroyed the Intent with his own.
Seeing that defeating the Intent was only difficult and not impossible, Alex started to work faster and faster, reading through everything that was written on the hilt of the sword in just the first 15 minutes.
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