Chapter 303 : Shrine of Hundred Eyes
Chapter 303: Shrine of Hundred Eyes
Those who did not follow Yong Cheon-myeong quickly took control of the Divine Dragon Family.
Opposing forces still remained within the branch families, but they paid little attention to them. Without a central figure, they would naturally be absorbed over time.
After the family was reorganized, tedious negotiations continued.
Although they had spoken after defeating Yong Cheon-myeong, at the time they had only discussed broad matters rather than specific details.
Regarding compensation for the damages inflicted by the Divine Dragon Family and their future course of action, three members of the Divine Dragon Eight Swords including Yong Mu-hwi held a long meeting with Im Gwan-hwa and Dan Hong.
Since Jang Woo-hyun had little to do with those matters, he headed toward the Shrine of Hundred Eyes together with Yong Un and Yong Seo-hee.
“Grandfather, why is it called the Shrine of Hundred Eyes if it’s a place for storing records?”
“That place is somewhat special. You’ll understand once we get there. Captain Jang, this way.”
While talking with Yong Seo-hee, Yong Un guided Jang Woo-hyun.
The place the three arrived at was one of the caves within the mountain located behind the main house.
It was a shallow cave where the interior could be seen clearly even from the entrance.
However, when Yong Un stepped inside, one side of the wall vanished, revealing a staircase hidden by a sorcery formation.
“Even within the family, there are fewer than five people permitted to enter this place.”
At the bottom of the staircase was a massive spatial transfer sorcery formation.
“Seo-hee, come over here.”
As Jang Woo-hyun and Yong Seo-hee stood at the center of the formation, Yong Un activated it.
Wrapped in light, the three arrived moments later inside a gigantic canyon.
Jang Woo-hyun turned his head and looked around.
“This is a peculiar place.”
It felt as though he had entered a formation, yet at the same time it also felt like a real space.
Reality and illusion.
It seemed to exist somewhere in between the two.
“You’ve seen correctly. This place exists simultaneously within the Middle Heavenly World while also partially overlapping another dimension. It is also the pathway leading to the Shrine of Hundred Eyes. Seo-hee, walk slowly. The space is unstable and could collapse.”
“Can’t it be repaired or reinforced?”
“That’s beyond my ability. There wasn’t anyone within the family capable of repairing it either.”
While conversing, the three slowly walked forward.
After following the canyon inward for about thirty minutes, a wide clearing appeared before them.
At the center of the clearing—
There was a gigantic dragon statue coiled upon itself. Its appearance resembled a small mountain.
“That is the Shrine of Hundred Eyes. Though it’s called a shrine, it is a rather special place.”
As Jang Woo-hyun approached the giant statue, he immediately noticed something strange.
‘This…… it’s a dragon.’
It wasn’t carved from stone nor built by stacking rocks together. A gigantic dragon had petrified its own body.
The dragon peculiarly possessed many eyes. Three on the right side of its face, two on the left, and countless eyes covering its entire body.
All the eyes on its face were closed, but every eye across its body remained open.
“Shrine of Hundred Eyes.”
Upon seeing the countless eyes covering the dragon’s body, he instantly understood why it had such a name.
“One of our ancestors.”
A peculiar dragon born with countless eyes.
The ancestor of the Divine Dragon Family who abandoned his original name and left behind only the name Hundred Eyes possessed an especially dense dragon bloodline.
“Unlike us, who merely create the form of a dragon, he could transform into a true dragon.”
Possessing extraordinary abilities, Hundred Eyes had seen countless things through his many eyes.
“He wished to pass down all the things he had seen to future generations. That is why he became what you see now.”
Hundred Eyes hoped that all the knowledge he had discovered would help his descendants.
A place for storing records, yet called a shrine.
Though it did not house ancestral tablets, it was no different from a grave, which was why it received such a name. And what remained there was not merely records, but something closer to memories.
The memories of a single individual.
“I can go no farther, and neither can Seo-hee. Even within the family, only the Divine Dragon and the family head were permitted to enter beyond this point.”
Perhaps because of the information stored within, or perhaps for some other special reason, only a limited number of people could enter and obtain the knowledge inside.
Jang Woo-hyun approached the statue and drew Dragon King Scale.
‘If you swallowed that orb, then do something.’
As though it had read his thoughts, Dragon King Scale vibrated with a humming sound.
Moments later—
Dragon King Scale emitted a golden light, and one of the statue’s eyes flashed brilliantly.
Then Jang Woo-hyun disappeared.
---
The first thing he saw was Yong Cheon-myeong’s memories.
The difference between ascension and soaring ascension that he had learned by chance.
It was certainly something worthy of suspicion, and the more Yong Cheon-myeong investigated, the stranger the situation became.
“I don’t understand why you would think such things.”
“Haha, what obvious nonsense you speak. It seems even the Divine Dragon requires rest. You have pushed yourself too hard lately.”
Only when Yong Cheon-myeong questioned his subordinates—those who unconditionally supported and followed him—about ascension and soaring ascension did their expressions change.
Everyone he met disagreed with his thoughts, and as time passed, Yong Cheon-myeong’s frustration only deepened.
‘So that’s why he gave me that orb.’
Jang Woo-hyun had been suspicious when Yong Cheon-myeong suddenly handed him the golden orb as if gifting it to him, but after seeing his memories, he understood why he had done so.
A story no one had acknowledged throughout his entire life. Thoughts no one had ever agreed with. Then suddenly, someone appeared who understood them.
Beyond being enemies, Yong Cheon-myeong may even have felt a sense of camaraderie.
Jang Woo-hyun had Kim Min-soo.
But Yong Cheon-myeong had been alone in this vast Middle Heaven.
A truth known only to himself. People looking at him as though he were strange.
Even the clan he loved and the subordinates who worshipped him like a god. No matter how much he explained, no matter how much he spoke, they never understood.
‘But how did he first learn about this?’
There were no memories revealing how Yong Cheon-myeong had initially discovered the abnormalities surrounding ascension.
‘If I knew where he learned it, it might help.’
Ignoring Jang Woo-hyun’s regretful thoughts, Yong Cheon-myeong’s memories continued.
Jang Woo-hyun could feel the loneliness of Yong Cheon-myeong as he uncovered everything by himself, while the things he had investigated unfolded before his eyes.
It was almost as if he wished someone would continue after him and uncover the truth of the world.
‘The True Immortals and Martial Gods are gone.’
Most traces of the True Immortals had vanished. The same applied to the Martial Gods who had originated from the Martial World.
Even Yong Cheon-myeong had failed to discover the exact reason. There were limits within the Middle Heaven.
Then came memories of meeting the Ascension Cult, some somewhat useless information, and finally the memories concerning Yong Cheon-myeong’s plan.
Believing ascension itself to be abnormal, Yong Cheon-myeong searched for another method.
“Unify the Central Plains Murim and rule the Middle Heavenly World with that power.”
‘This lunatic…….’
Yong Cheon-myeong intended to gather all the power of the Middle Heaven and ascend directly to the Upper Realm. Instead of ascension, he intended to open the gate himself.
‘Would that even work?’
At first Jang Woo-hyun doubted it, but when he recalled the power Yong Cheon-myeong had shown at the end, it suddenly seemed possible.
The Boundless Ten-Thousand-Li Dragon.
A being so gigantic its end could not be seen, and one difficult to oppose even with the power of the Unfathomable Realm.
After witnessing the Ten-Thousand-Li Dragon’s power, Jang Woo-hyun had thought of the Martial Gods of the Upper Realm. Yong Cheon-myeong’s final strength had been that extraordinary.
He had displayed such power alone, so if he had truly united the Middle Heaven according to his plan, he might have produced even greater strength.
While Jang Woo-hyun contemplated Yong Cheon-myeong’s plan, the memories continued.
Following his plan, Yong Cheon-myeong attacked the Heavenly Sword Family and acquired his first target, the Sword of Creation.
‘Come to think of it, I don’t know where that sword went.’
The Sword of Creation might have shattered, or perhaps it vanished together with Yong Cheon-myeong during their fall.
Since he hadn’t paid much attention to it, only now did he realize the sword had disappeared.
As he briefly considered the sword’s whereabouts, Yong Cheon-myeong’s memories suddenly ended.
After all the scenes had passed—
Jang Woo-hyun found himself standing within a space filled with the blue light of dawn.
Before he could do anything, Dragon King Scale flashed with golden light once more, and at the place where the light struck, a gigantic oval-shaped stone appeared.
Rumble.
The center of the stone split open horizontally. The oval stone had been shaped to resemble a human eye.
The surface resembling eyelids lifted upward. A stone eyeball appeared, and at its center was a familiar planet.
It was a planet Jang Woo-hyun knew very well.
“Earth…….”
The place he had come from.
Even without explanation, he recognized it immediately.
Rumble.
The stone eyeball rotated in place. The next thing he saw was a fully opened gate floating in the sky.
Then the pupil rotated again, revealing a person riding clouds while holding a sword in one hand and a fireball in the other.
‘If the gate is open, people can fly through the skies and wield power.’
Even without words, Jang Woo-hyun immediately understood what he was seeing.
Rumble.
The pupil rotated once more.
This time he saw a half-closed gate, while the clouds had vanished and the person only held the sword and fireball.
Then came another scene where the gate was completely closed, and the person held nothing at all.
‘When the Heavenly Gate closes, power disappears.’
Rumble.
Like an eye blinking once before reopening, the eyelids descended and rose again.
This time, the pupil changed. Scenes unfolded within the massive iris.
Inside the pupil existed countless worlds.
There were planets, but also worlds shaped like discs or flat planes. Their common trait was that every world was wrapped in brilliant five-colored light.
‘The Lower Realms.’
Jang Woo-hyun immediately understood what the scene represented.
A short while later, from the place where countless worlds had gathered, one planet suddenly broke away. It was as though it had crossed into an entirely different dimension.
As the separated planet lost the five-colored light surrounding it, it became a form Jang Woo-hyun knew well.
The planet stripped of its five-colored light was Earth viewed from outer space.
“Ah…….”
Watching that scene, Jang Woo-hyun understood everything.
‘Earth was also one of the Lower Realms.’
When the Heavenly Gate closed, power vanished. The connection with the Middle Heavenly World was severed, and the world became an entirely separate dimension.
A place no one could influence or even travel to.
And once the gate closed, people could no longer use special abilities. Not the cultivation arts of cultivators, nor the martial arts of martial artists, nor the sorcery of spellcasters.
‘A closed world.’
Only now did he finally understand what Yong Cheon-myeong meant by a closed world.
Earth had once been a Lower Realm connected to the Middle Heavenly World, but now it had become an independent world of its own.
“Earth had originally been connected too.”
Only today did Jang Woo-hyun finally understand why the stories of the Seven Great Sages, the monsters of the Classic of Mountains and Seas, the nine suns, myths and legends, and even the tales of the Martial World were connected to this world.
“Yong Cheon-myeong wanted to show me this.”
Startled by the newly learned truth, Jang Woo-hyun turned his body to one side.
Where his gaze landed—
The blue light of dawn split apart, and a woman appeared.
“Who are you?”
The moment the differently colored eyes turned toward him, Jang Woo-hyun instinctively flinched.
He had met people from the Gigantic Kingdom with one arm and three eyes, beastmen, people of the Flame Flower Kingdom covered in fur, and even tree people, but the woman before him possessed the strangest appearance of all.
The woman’s long hair was tied up, making her face clearly visible.
Three eyes on the right side including her forehead and cheekbone, and two eyes on the left with one placed upon her cheekbone. Astonishingly, the woman possessed five eyes.
There was also one eye on the back of each hand.
“How did a human enter this place?”
“Yong Cheon-myeong sent me here.”
“That child?”
The woman’s eyes all moved independently as she examined Jang Woo-hyun. Two eyes fixed upon Dragon King Scale, while the remaining three stared at Jang Woo-hyun’s face.
“I see.”
As though she had realized something, the woman nodded.
“So you are one who possesses the qualifications. Welcome. I am Hundred Eyes. A lingering thought-form left behind by the dragon born with a hundred eyes who witnessed countless things.”
Hundred Eyes was essentially no different from a clone of the many-eyed dragon that had now become a statue.
“I am Jang Woo-hyun.”
“Upon seeing you, I understand why that child came seeking answers about other worlds. You are connected to a closed world.”
Jang Woo-hyun’s body instantly tensed. This was the first person who recognized where he came from without being told.
“Yes. I came from a place called Earth. The planet shown in the scene displayed by the great eye earlier.”
“I do not know what it was that you saw. Nor do I know where you came from. To me, you are merely a human.”
“Excuse me? Then the scenes I saw earlier……”
“They are merely records concerning closed worlds. Are you certain the world you saw was your own?”
“That was definitely the Earth I know—”
“How foolish to think that among countless Lower Realms there cannot exist another planet with a similar appearance.”
“Ah…….”
Hundred Eyes was correct.
There existed countless worlds and countless planets among the Lower Realms. One of them could easily resemble Earth.
Snapping out of his daze, Jang Woo-hyun spoke again.
“Is a closed world truly a place that was once connected to this world but later separated entirely?”
“You understand correctly. When the Heavenly Gate closes and the lifespan of the world ends, the connection is severed. Such worlds then become independent dimensions entirely.”
“When you say the lifespan of the world ends, do you mean the world is destroyed?”
“No. It is different from that. It is more accurate to say the world’s power has been exhausted. The power possessed by a world is not infinite. When its end approaches, the Heavenly Gate closes and the connection is severed. That merely means the energy between heaven and earth weakens. Nothing at all happens to ordinary people living within the world.”
“Do you know why worlds become closed?”
“I do not. It is merely the natural order of the world. I simply happened to uncover one of the world’s secrets. Though I know many things, I do not know everything.”
After falling into thought for a moment, Jang Woo-hyun asked if he could pose a few more questions.
“You may ask as many as you wish. If it is something I know, I shall tell you everything. Because you possess the qualifications.”