“Hraaaaaaaaagh!”
Rumble!
A sound like cracking thunder tore through the air, followed immediately by a bloodcurdling scream. “DIIIIIIIIE!“
Third Young Master Yeon Jeok-gwang’s white hair whipped violently in the wind as he unleashed a barrage of sword strikes resembling a pitch-black storm.
Cl-cl-cl-cl-clang!
“Kh…!”
The center of the clash felt like the heart of a midsummer thundercloud, heavy with ozone and dark with impending lightning. With every explosive strike she parried, the Seamless Heavenly Robe, Yeon Seo-rin, found her footing pushed back inch by agonizing inch.
Occasionally she attempted to seize an opening for a counterattack, but her efforts were ruthlessly rebuffed.
Clang!
Yeon Jeok-gwang deflected her razor-sharp blade with the mere back of his hand, his face a mask of manic ecstasy as he roared, “Not enough! You’re so weak it’s almost pathetic!” Even in the midst of his relentless assault, he found the leisure to break into a cackling laugh. “Is this truly all the ‘Seamless Heavenly Robe’ amounts to? You’re absolute garbage!”
Despite his insults and the terrifying pressure he exerted, Yeon Seo-rin remained undaunted. Unable to launch an effective counter, her eyes stayed cold and analytical as she systematically neutralized his every blow with a frightening, steady certainty. To an observer, it was clear that suppressing her would be no simple task, despite Jeok-gwang’s sudden surge in power.
“Hey, sister! What’s the matter?! I thought you were going to teach me a lesson!”
It was a bizarre sight.
Yeon Jeok-gwang, who had always lagged significantly behind Seo-rin in terms of martial depth, was now effectively overwhelming her.
***
“What the hell do you mean…?”
Mount Hua Sword Dragon Gam Woo-hyeon stared at Grand Young Master Yeon So-hyeon, his voice trembling with disbelief. “If the former Alliance Leader, Wang Cheol-jin, isn’t a member of the Demonic Cult, then who else could have possibly given the Third Young Master that kind of power?!”
The logic was sound; Wang Cheol-jin had been the last person seen with Jeok-gwang the previous night.
“Look at his behavior, Grand Young Master! Do you not see it?! Do you not hear it?!” Gam Woo-hyeon pointed a shaking finger toward the clashing figures on the cliff. “The Third Young Master has completely lost his mind!”
Hehe… Hahahaha!
Jeok-gwang’s laughter drifted down from the heights, carrying a jagged edge of insanity he didn’t even bother to hide.
Rumble…!
The sheer intensity of the martial arts exchanged above caused the earth to vibrate, sending dust and pebbles showering down upon them, dislodged by the shockwaves of the duel.
“Dammit…!”
Gam Woo-hyeon instinctively raised his hands to shield himself, but the protection proved unnecessary.
Yeon So-hyeon, still standing in the deep shadows of the crevice, gave a casual flick of his wrist. The black Midnight Silk coat draped over his shoulders billowed outward, and with a movement that looked more like sorcery than martial arts, every falling pebble and speck of dust was swept away into the wind. Gam Woo-hyeon stared, dumbfounded by the effortless display of power.
“You are right about one thing,” So-hyeon said, his voice cutting through the sounds of battle.
“Pardon…?” Gam Woo-hyeon, still reeling from the display of ‘Daoist arts,’ struggled to focus.
“It was indeed Wang Cheol-jin who gave the Third Young Master that power.”
“Then he is—!”
“—And,” So-hyeon interrupted, his voice gaining a heavy, authoritative weight that silenced the Mount Hua Sword Dragon instantly, “it is also true that madness has seeped into the very marrow of his bones.”
“Then how—!”
“However.” So-hyeon raised a single finger, a simple gesture that nonetheless radiated crushing dignity.
Gam Woo-hyeon found his mouth clicking shut. There was an abyss-like depth in the Grand Young Master’s eyes that warned of dire consequences should he be interrupted again. Wisely, the Mount Hua disciple chose to remain silent.
“What the Third Young Master received from the former Alliance Leader was not the power of the Demonic Cult.”
***
“What are you standing around for?! Don’t let the enemy’s armored carriages fire their repeating crossbows!”
“Left! Signal them to execute a wide rotation to the left!”
Amidst the frantic shouting of strategists directing the battlefield, Grand Strategist Sima sat alone in his private armored carriage, staring out the window. His gaze wasn’t fixed on the shifting lines of the main battle, but on the cliff where Yeon Jeok-gwang had vanished.
Rumble—!
K-K-K-RAAAAACK!
The edge of the cliff was perpetually wreathed in dark, roiling clouds, illuminated by frequent, jagged flashes of lightning and punctuated by the roar of thunder.
Creak—
“You certainly left the door wide open for me.”
A figure climbed into the carriage through the opening where the door had been torn away. Sima didn’t even turn his head; he had known the man was coming.
“You’ve finally arrived…?”
“You sound weary, Grand Strategist.”
“I am beyond exhausted,” the newcomer replied with a heavy sigh, sliding into the seat opposite Sima. “It has been a long time since I felt this drained. I feel as though I’ve become nothing more than an ordinary old man with not a single drop of internal energy left in his veins.”
“…Was it truly necessary?” Sima finally turned away from the cliff to look at the man. “Was that truly the only way, Alliance Leader…?”
Former Martial Righteous Alliance Leader Wang Cheol-jin sat there, his face a landscape of deep wrinkles and profound fatigue. He rubbed his eyes with his hands, looking more frail than he ever had during his reign.
“I had no choice…” His voice, once resonant and commanding, was now cracked and thin. “…Yeon Jeok-gwang was in a state of extreme danger.”
“Alliance Leader, I agree that the Third Young Master’s mental state was never ‘normal,’ but—”
“No,” Wang Cheol-jin interrupted, shaking his head. “It was more than that. Last night, he was being completely overwhelmed by a Grand Young Master he hadn’t even met yet. He was descending into a madness of pure inferiority.”
***
Rumble.
Another thunderous crack echoed from above, sending a fresh wave of debris toward the base of the cliff. This time, the debris didn’t even come near them; it seemed to slide off the empty air around Yeon So-hyeon.
“Wang Cheol-jin,” So-hyeon said, addressing Gam Woo-hyeon. “How much do you truly know about him?”
“He was the Alliance Leader! His accomplishments are the stuff of legends throughout the Central Plains. Even if much of his history remains hidden, who wouldn’t know the man who brought down the Demonic Cult?”
Wang Cheol-jin had been the man who oversaw the fall of the Cult, an event that had ironically led to the dissolution of the Alliance itself once its primary purpose had been fulfilled.
“I imagine you aren’t asking me this just to confirm what the common folk know,” Gam Woo-hyeon added.
So-hyeon gave a small nod, his gaze drifting toward the chaotic plains. “Wang Cheol-jin is the current sole successor of the Quanzhen Sect.”
“The Quanzhen Sect…? I thought that was a myth. I heard the former Alliance Leader was the only one in history to ever publicly claim lineage from them.”
Because it was a single-person succession, Wang Cheol-jin held no hidden armies. Conversely, it meant he held the entirety of the sect’s secrets within himself, making the Quanzhen Sect a mystery wrapped in a legend.
“The Quanzhen Sect…” So-hyeon spoke of the sect with a clarity that came from memories of a past life, knowledge from before his regression. “…has existed since ancient times for a single purpose: to protect the world from anomalies and entities that a mere human cannot resist.”
Had he not witnessed the horror of the Demonic Cult’s flesh-masses with his own eyes, Gam Woo-hyeon might have laughed. But now, he couldn’t even manage a smile.
“Anomalies and entities… you mean…?”
He suddenly connected the dots. “Then… that explains why a man of his lineage would reveal himself and climb into the filth of secular politics to become the Alliance Leader!”
“Precisely,” So-hyeon confirmed. “It was for the sole purpose of exterminating the Demonic Cult.”
***
The previous night.
“If you wish for a power that you could never obtain in a hundred lifetimes… then you must sacrifice everything!”
Wang Cheol-jin had stood before Yeon Jeok-gwang, mimicking the insidious, oily voice of the Demonic Cult. It had been a test, a high-level psychological probe developed in collaboration with Grand Strategist Sima and the greatest martial scholars in Luoyang, utilizing sophisticated sound-based arts.
Their goal had been simple: to identify those susceptible to the Cult’s whispers.
Show me your spirit, Yeon Jeok-gwang…! Wang Cheol-jin had prayed silently as he pressured the young man. Show me that arrogant, heaven-defying monkey of a warrior you used to be…!
But the answer he received shattered his hopes.
“Fine! Fuck! I’ll sacrifice whatever it takes!” Jeok-gwang had shrieked, pinned by Wang Cheol-jin’s iron grip like a madman. “If I can just tear that Grand Young Master apart with my own hands…! If I can become the strongest…! I’ll do anything!”
Wang Cheol-jin had groaned inwardly. The Third Young Master’s obsession was far more deep-seated than he or Sima had anticipated, and the reason was clear.
…Yeon So-hyeon.
In Wang Cheol-jin’s eyes, Yeon Jeok-gwang was a once-in-a-century genius. His sister, Yeon Seo-rin, had already reached a level where she could absorb the entirety of Luoyang’s arts and still seem hollow, while his younger brother, Yeon Bi, had successfully mastered the poison-human arts of the Tang Clan. It was miraculous that such geniuses were born in a single generation to a single father.
Yet even combined, they were nothing compared to the existence that was Yeon So-hyeon.
Inferiority… and the crushing weight of inevitable defeat. Wang Cheol-jin wondered if he himself would have been able to withstand those feelings had he been Yeon So-hyeon’s peer.
…There is no other way.
“What are you waiting for?! Fuck!” Jeok-gwang had screamed. “You said you’d give me power! Give it to me!”
“Listen well.” Wang Cheol-jin increased the pressure on his shoulders until the bones groaned. “From this moment on, you will call me Master.”
***
“And so, that is how it happened.”
Grand Strategist Sima let out a long, weary sigh. Only now, with the battle in full swing, was he finally hearing the truth of what had transpired the previous night.
“…So you used the Quanzhen Sect’s miraculous Grand Rite to transmit your heritage to him overnight?”
“I did,” Wang Cheol-jin replied, nodding tiredly. “If I hadn’t, he would have undoubtedly succumbed to the first Cultist who found him.”
“And his current state? This… manic behavior?”
Wang Cheol-jin let out a dry huff. “He is simply drunk on a level of power he hasn’t earned. Sudden strength can be a potent intoxicant.”
“I see.” Sima paused, then asked, “So… is the Third Young Master now the official successor of the Quanzhen Sect?”
Rumble—
A distant peal of thunder echoed through the valley.
“No,” Wang Cheol-jin chuckled, shaking his head. “One does not become a proper successor in a single night. At best, the boy is a fledgling student, a mere chick who hasn’t even begun to peck at the shell.”
Mentally, Yeon Jeok-gwang was still far too immature.
“However,” Wang Cheol-jin added, “the Quanzhen heritage is now guarding his upper danjeon. He will no longer be susceptible to the whispers of the Demonic Cult.”
***
“You’re saying the Quanzhen arts protect the mind from the Cult’s influence?” Gam Woo-hyeon asked, his eyes wide with surprise.
Yeon So-hyeon shrugged. “It is merely a hypothesis. But…” He gestured toward the top of the cliff. “If that weren’t the case, do you truly think Wang Cheol-jin would have unleashed that loose cannon onto the field?”
It made sense when put that way.
“But then… why?” Gam Woo-hyeon asked. “Why would the former Alliance Leader go to such lengths to release him now?”
“For the same reason I did.”
“You…?”
So-hyeon grinned, a flash of white teeth in the shadows. “We have to draw out the Cultist who was coming to tempt the Third Young Master, don’t we? We need to catch the rat.”
“Ah…!” Gam Woo-hyeon gasped, then paused as a realization struck him. “But for that to work… doesn’t the Third Young Master have to lose? Even with the Quanzhen power, he has to experience the despair of defeat to be tempted, right?”
“Haha.” So-hyeon laughed. “Tell me, Mount Hua Sword Dragon… why do you assume my sister would lose to a brat like that?”
“…!”
Gam Woo-hyeon’s eyes bulged in shock.