The Weapon Genius: Anything I Hold Can Kill
Chapter 137: Steel Demands Purpose

Muramasa's mouth curled—not into a smile.

Into interest.

The clearing grew still.

Smoke curled in the air behind him, not from fire, but from presence alone. The spirit of the blade turned, finally facing Jin fully.

"You said," he repeated, "this war is greater."

Jin straightened. The weight of his earlier bow still grounded him. But now, he rose.

"It is," he said plainly.

Muramasa stepped closer, faint sparks flickering where his feet touched the moss. "Speak, then."

Jin drew in a breath.

"You were right," he began. "In your time, when you first looked at me—you said there wasn't a war worthy of your blade. That my era didn't deserve it."

He met the sword spirit's gaze directly.

"And you were right. Then."

Muramasa didn't reply. He waited.

"But things have changed," Jin continued. "Something's happened—something we call the System. It's not an enemy we can fight. It's not something we can touch. It arrived without warning and rewrote everything."

He stepped forward once, steady.

"It turned the world into a trial. A game. But the rules change when it wants. The monsters? Legends torn from our own history, twisted into things that kill without hesitation. Entire cities are gone. Millions of lives. And those of us who survived—"

He paused.

"No one saved us. No god. No sword. Just... the System. Giving us quests. Time limits. Objectives. Rewards, if you live. Punishment, if you don't."

Muramasa narrowed his eyes.

Jin's voice lowered.

"It's holding us hostage. And all we can do is play along."

A silence stretched between them.

Then Jin continued.

"I've seen things—things no one should ever have to see. I've survived monsters older than mountains. My team… we've lost friends. Family. But we're still here. And every day, we get stronger."

He closed his eyes briefly, then opened them.

"But I'm not strong enough. Not yet."

Muramasa tilted his head.

"And you think I can change that?"

"I know you can," Jin said. "I've read your title. Your legend. You fought through an age of war and blood. You ended chaos with your own blade. But you also…"

He hesitated.

"You lost yourself to do it."

A flicker passed through Muramasa's silhouette—like ash caught in wind.

"And still," Jin said, "you won."

For a long time, Muramasa didn't speak.

Then:

"There was once something not unlike your System," he said, slowly. "A shadow cast across kingdoms. Not seen. Not fought. But felt. It twisted the hearts of warriors and fed power to those who craved domination."

He lifted a hand, staring at his palm like he remembered holding something long forgotten.

"I killed them. All of them. The demon who fed that chaos. The masters who sought to rule through it."

His fingers curled.

"And in doing so… I became them. To fight it, I had to become less than human."

His voice dropped.

"Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Jin nodded. "You had to fall to end the fall."

"Yes."

Muramasa turned his palm outward, and faint trails of red light bloomed around his fingertips.

"So now I ask you: why would you want to learn from something like that?"

Jin didn't hesitate.

"Because I don't want to become you," he said quietly. "I want to be the one who learns from what you became—so I don't have to repeat it."

Muramasa's aura stirred.

The trees behind him bent inward slightly, not from wind, but gravity.

Then, at last, the sword spirit gave a slow nod.

"I will teach you," he said. "As my student. Not as my successor."

Jin bowed again—but didn't lower himself all the way this time.

There was no longer a gap of fear between them. Only respect.

Muramasa began pacing around him in a slow circle, smoke trailing at his heels.

"But first," he said, "answer one more question."

Jin nodded.

"You told me you possess a skill—something that lets you wield many weapons. What was it called?"

"Limitless Weapon Mastery."

Muramasa hummed faintly.

"A foolish name," he muttered.

Jin shrugged. "I didn't choose it."

Muramasa stopped his pacing.

"So. You adapt quickly. You learn as you go. You fight with what you're given. But now, you're asking me to pour a legacy into your bones. Into your style."

He stepped closer, so close that his voice no longer echoed—it just was.

"If you commit to me, to my techniques… you risk losing that edge."

Jin's mouth tightened.

"My style is aggressive. Direct. Born for battlefields, not showmanship. It favors movement over defense. Pressure over patience. There are techniques meant to end battles in one stroke. But very few to prolong them."

He turned.

"And you're not in a world where swords alone will save you."

Jin stayed still.

Muramasa glanced back once, red eyes glowing faint.

"So listen well, Jin. If you wish to walk this path—you must not let it become your prison."

"I understand."

"No, you don't," the spirit snapped. "But you will."

He paused.

Then, quieter:

"You must become more than a master. You must become a creator."

Jin looked up.

Muramasa's voice dropped to something like reverence.

"A swordsman who survives in this new world is not the one who remembers the most forms."

He turned fully now, facing Jin with both hands behind his back.

"It's the one who can make a new one… in the space between breaths."

Muramasa's hands fell to his sides, and the clearing dimmed around them—as if the grove itself understood silence was sacred now.

Jin didn't speak. He just listened.

"The sword," Muramasa said, "is not sacred. Nor is the one who wields it. Only the moment is."

He stepped forward.

"And a moment is not won by memory. Or repetition. It is won by purpose."

Jin absorbed the words like strikes to the chest. Not because they hurt—but because they landed.

"I can teach you every technique I forged. Every sacred form. I can show you where to place your feet, how to turn your wrist, how to kill in a single breath." Muramasa's gaze sharpened. "But if you never learn why you're swinging… you will die with your blade halfway drawn."

Jin's breath left slowly.

"I don't want to learn to kill," he said.

Muramasa didn't blink.

"I want to learn how not to die."

The air changed again.

And finally—Muramasa nodded.

"Then you are worthy of instruction."

The blade spirit stepped forward and placed two fingers on Jin's chest. The pressure was light. Almost symbolic.

But it felt like fire soaking into bone.

"I will teach you what was lost to time," he said. "And you will create what has never been written."

A pause.

"But you must promise me one thing."

Jin met his eyes. "Anything."

"Never call it mine."

Jin blinked.

Muramasa smiled—not cruel, not mocking. But clean.

"Because the moment you swing to honor me instead of yourself… you've already lost the edge."

Jin bowed one final time. Not in reverence—but in understanding.

And the forest shimmered.

The vision blurred.

The present returned in full.

Color slammed back into the world—dust, wind, grit, the scream of steel over steel.

The runes beneath Jin's boots flared—green, then gold, then something else entirely.

His fingers wrapped around Muramasa's hilt like it was part of him. But this time, the grip wasn't forged from repetition. Or muscle memory. Or tradition.

It was forged from choice.

Across the plaza, his clone charged again—its body flickering, cut through with old wounds that hadn't healed, and newer ones already stitching closed.

Jin didn't flinch.

Muramasa hummed—but softer now. Not a protest. Not a challenge.

A blessing.

Jin whispered, not for anyone else to hear:

"I've followed your forms long enough."

He lifted the blade. The air split.

"Ichi no Kata—" he started.

Then stopped.

"No."

He shifted.

Right foot turned. Left shoulder dropped. Blade angled just past vertical, tracing a slow, upward curve in the air.

This wasn't drawn from memory.

This was new.

His aura surged. Not red. Not black. But white.

A soft, searing glow rose from his shoulders, pulsed along his spine, and began to burn like distant dawn.

The clone didn't hesitate—it struck.

And Jin moved.

Not faster.

Just lighter.

He turned, pivoted, let his body flow with the attack instead of against it. He stepped in—not outside the rhythm, but above it.

And Muramasa responded.

Its steel turned pale, the black of its lacquered edge flickering into radiant silver. White cracks spidered through the surface like veins filled with light.

Then—

Jin struck.

One clean, rising arc.

Not a form born in the underworld. Not death chasing the living.

This was something else.

"Ten no Kata—Hōyoku."

Heaven's Form — Embracing Wing.

The blade soared upward.

It cleaved through the shadow clean—no resistance, no clash. Just purity. Like light parting mist.

The clone didn't fall.

It vanished.

Dissolved.

No smoke.

No reforming.

Gone.

The blade's arc didn't stop at the end of the clone's chest. It kept going—rising, cutting into the air above, slicing the side of a broken tower at the plaza's edge.

The structure didn't crumble.

It peeled.

The upper half tilted, cracked, then burst upward—split by a wound that didn't smoke or burn, but shone.

Silence followed.

The wind returned.

Jin exhaled and lowered the blade.

The white glow around him faded.

Muramasa hummed once—like a nod from something ancient.

And for the first time since the trial began, the plaza went still.

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