Chapter 1687: Tempering the Cold Spring

"However," the Emperor Cauldron's spirit replied, "while forty-nine days is the basic requirement for forging the Cold Spring Sword into shape, further enhancing its core quality demands additional external conditions as assistance. I wonder if you, Master, can meet these requirements?"

Xu Yang's soul realm was perfectly interconnected with the Emperor Cauldron's artifact spirit. Without needing extensive communication, both could understand each other's true intentions.

Xu Yang quickly grasped that the external conditions the Emperor Cauldron mentioned referred to the forty-nine-day forging period. During this time, Xu Yang would need to absorb the extremely dense icy aura from the surrounding space to the greatest extent possible.

In essence, it meant Xu Yang's own physical body would become part of the Emperor Cauldron's forging process. This would ensure that the Cold Spring Sword was entirely enveloped and condensed by the purest icy power during its creation, resulting in a weapon with even greater resilience.

Upon hearing this from the Emperor Cauldron, Xu Yang agreed almost without hesitation, as he highly valued this forging opportunity.

Ultimately, Xu Yang viewed this forging process as a significant milestone on his cultivation journey. After all, he had never before attempted to forge a top-tier magic artifact, complete with its own artifact spirit, entirely by his own power. This was Xu Yang's debut work, so how could he not be invested?

After all, condensing an artifact spirit to create one's exclusive divine weapon was akin to nurturing one's own child. This sword, conceived within his own body, would accompany him on his future cultivation path, battling across the world.

At such a crucial juncture, forty-nine days was merely a flick of the finger for Xu Yang. He never did anything that would jeopardize a greater outcome for a minor inconvenience. Since he had now been presented with this valuable opportunity, Xu Yang did not hesitate further and decisively agreed to the Emperor Cauldron's request.

"Rest assured," Xu Yang replied, "during the forging of this divine weapon, I will continuously absorb all the icy power from this forbidden space. Additionally, a portion of the aura released by my internal water-elemental energy will assist, guaranteeing you a constant supply of power throughout the forty-nine-day forging process.

If there are any other needs, just tell me. In short, for the next forty-nine days, our sole objective is to forge this Cold Spring Sword to the most perfect state possible."

Receiving such instructions from his master, Xu Yang, the Emperor Cauldron no longer hesitated and immediately began the forging process. During this time, within the core of the Emperor Cauldron's furnace, only the Cold Spring Sword's singular sword spirit remained. The other eight sword spirits were entirely sealed by the Emperor Cauldron's own dark-gold foundational aura.

This measure prevented the other eight artifact spirits from scattering the complete essence of heaven and earth that the sword's radiance should absorb during forging, thus safeguarding the Cold Spring Sword's quality. It must be said that when it came to artifact forging, the Weapon Master's artifact spirit, the Emperor Cauldron, was truly unparalleled on the entire main continent.

Not only in terms of capability, quality, and strength, but also in experience, even Xu Yang had to rely on the Emperor Cauldron to achieve his desires.

The incredibly fierce essence of the artifact spirit burned unrestrainedly within the Emperor Cauldron. This sky-burning blaze belonged exclusively to the Weapon Master's spirit; it was the most dominant forging flame, and the purest, most perfect fire power for creating divine weapons in all the world. Even Xu Yang's Nine Li Fire was far from comparable to this flame.

The two were simply not on the same level of comparison. The only regret was that this immensely powerful flame within the Emperor Cauldron could not be integrated with human cultivation techniques.

Otherwise, Xu Yang could probably incinerate all creation with just the Emperor Cauldron's inherent flame power, rendering any other magic artifact unnecessary.

After this formidable flame completely enveloped the Cold Spring Sword's artifact spirit, the two began to merge. Surrounded by an endless stream of dark-gold artifact spirit essence, the Cold Spring artifact spirit started undergoing further subtle transformations.

This process was more akin to raw iron being refined through a thousand hammerings and temperings, gradually taking its final shape. Concurrently, Xu Yang's mind remained intensely active, beginning to frantically absorb the icy aura's essence from the surrounding space.

Witnessing the surrounding icy, snowy landscape rapidly melt under the influence of Xu Yang's power and cultivation techniques, all the elements originally composing this space slowly dissipated under intense high-temperature refinement. They condensed into the most primal power essence, disappearing into Xu Yang's body and quickly flowing through his limbs and bones into the Emperor Cauldron within him.

After layers of filtering and tempering, everything Xu Yang absorbed into his body was the most potent essence of icy power in the world. Therefore, all the power sources currently being absorbed by the Cold Spring Sword spirit were preparing its artifact spirit to reach its most formidable state.

During this same process, as the artifact spirit's intensity further increased, the Emperor Cauldron also began refining the divine materials of heaven and earth used to forge the Cold Spring Sword itself. This included, most notably, the set of saint-level skeletal remains belonging to the Primeval Living Fossil expert. These were the most challenging materials to refine and also constituted the core essence of the Cold Spring Sword's body.

Relying solely on the Emperor Cauldron's flame power was too slow, so Xu Yang decisively joined the work of refining the saint-level skeletal remains, significantly boosting the forging efficiency.

In the blink of an eye, forty-nine days swiftly passed. The once icy, snowy, and incredibly pristine space had now been absorbed by Xu Yang, becoming like a ruin that had decayed for millions of years. All vitality and color within this sword energy space had completely withered and perished.

This place no longer held any exploitable value; all its power essence had been absorbed by Xu Yang's cultivation techniques and, after being tempered by the Emperor Cauldron's most potent flames, was integrated into the Cold Spring Divine Sword's body.

As the last original flame seed within the Emperor Cauldron completely merged into the Cold Spring Sword's nearly perfect body, Xu Yang's main body unleashed an incredibly powerful sword aura. The moment this earth-shattering wave was released, the entire space, with all its withered and decaying ruins, instantly shattered, torn into nothingness by the sword energy that swept in all directions.

The Cold Spring Sword's bone-chilling aura was naturally formed. Under the summons of Xu Yang's spiritual power, it surged out of his body for the first time, making contact and merging with the myriad energies of Kunlun Peak.

Every sword, upon its first appearance after being fully tempered, allows its sword energy to collide with the myriad laws of the heavens.

Yet, even Xu Yang himself had not anticipated that when the Cold Spring Sword, now fully tempered, merged with the myriad heavenly laws for the first time, an incredibly brilliant icy-blue halo would emanate from around its body.