Peerless Sword Sovereign

Peerless Sword Sovereign is an Eastern fantasy web novel by Bai Muqing, completed on Qidian Chinese Network on October 9, 2015, with approximately 598 chapters and 1.746 million characters in total; it was also serialized on Zongheng Chinese Network. The story follows Xu Han, who in his previous life was a peerless powerhouse of the cultivation continent. While undergoing tribulation to ascend, he is ambushed by a mysterious figure and perishes beneath the heavenly tribulation. When he opens his eyes again, he has been reborn as a youth of the Xu clan of Beiming City on the Sword Dust Continent. In this life, Xu Han is born into the clan yet is repeatedly scorned; at fifteen he has reached only the fourth level of the Barbarian Realm and is regarded as trash by his cousins Xu Hai, Xu Fei, and others, and is even beaten publicly in the clan's martial training ground and left near death. After awakening, he discovers that he has become a rare sword-soul sword wielder, housing within him two sword souls, Thunderclap and Flameburn—hence the saying "one sword thunderclap, one sword flameburn." He cultivates the Nether Sword Ghost Step, breaks through in the bamboo forest behind the mountain, enters the Yuntian Pavilion for training, learns sword techniques such as One Sword Flash, and enters into a deep feud with inner sect disciple Xu Fei, using his sword to break through every impasse at places such as the Grudge Valley, the Imperial Capital Martial Tournament, and the sect grand assembly. The work establishes six realms of the sword way: Barbarian Realm, Qi Realm, Spirit Realm, True Void Realm, Grand Void Realm, and Soul Realm; sword techniques are graded from Yellow Rank to Heaven Rank, constructing a clearly tiered Eastern fantasy sword-cultivation system, with a revenge thread, a thread of secret origins, and a constantly escalating rhythm of battle. The book as a whole is a typical male-oriented passionate power-fantasy, with the protagonist rising rapidly by virtue of his past-life memories and dual sword souls, written in a blunt, fast-paced style. Note: this is a web-serialized work with no official print publication information available; what is found on the market is mostly online collections or electronically compiled editions.