Chapter 247 : Jaseung, Fights Again
Chapter 247: Jaseung, Fights Again
Lee Jaseung and the man stood facing each other in the yard.
The aura the man emitted just by standing there was immense.
His heart began to beat even faster than when he first met the man. It beat as if someone were striking a drum with a fist.
This was the first time his heart had pounded like this before a fight.
The body knew. Exactly how strong the opponent was.
Let’s be calm. Let’s be calm.
He struggled to steady his mind.
However, the passion would not subside easily.
The man drew his sword from the scabbard. It was truly a clean movement without a single unnecessary action. He did not try to look stylish, nor did he deliberately relax his strength. It was as if he were showing what the posture of a warrior drawing a sword should be.
His presence was already immense just standing there, but once he drew his sword, that aura became truly terrifying.
His heart beat even faster, and strength entered the hand gripping Asura.
This won’t do!
There was no telling when the opponent would attack. In this state, he wouldn’t be able to demonstrate his usual skill.
As his mind grew urgent, his heart beat even faster.
At the worst moment, his crisis instinct found a solution.
So what if the heart beats fast? It’s fine to fight in an excited state.
The idea that one must maintain a mind like a Still Mirror or Calm Water when facing a master was perhaps just a prejudice.
He would fight with this thumping heart.
Confidence that he could fight better was what mattered.
Yes, beat faster! Beat even more as if you might explode!
Once he thought that, the heartbeat actually slowed down.
It became a pleasantly appropriate heart rate.
It was a solution created by his instinct, and it produced a very excellent result.
Admiration flashed in the man’s eyes.
Was he happy about the man’s admiration? Not at all!
Because it was a reaction as if looking down from above at an inferior, he felt a surge of anger instead.
He used that anger as the driving force to initiate the attack.
In a flash, he vanished. It was a movement that literally compressed space. By the time one felt he had disappeared from where he stood, Asura was already piercing toward the man’s shoulder.
It was the maximum speed he could produce.
A move that no one had been able to block.
Shweeeek.
With the sound of wind, Asura stopped in midair.
The moment had come where the word ‘until now’ had to be added to the significance of that attack.
Surprisingly, the man avoided this decisive move.
“You are being conceited.”
At first, he couldn’t understand why the man was saying such a thing.
But he soon realized. Why the man said those words.
What he targeted was not the heart, but the shoulder. It was because of the thought that somehow he shouldn’t kill the man in a single strike.
The man’s words were correct.
Yes, there was conceit deep inside his heart. Fearing that the man might die from this one move.
The man chuckled and provoked him.
“Your skill isn’t at a level where you can afford to be conceited, is it?”
The man’s subsequent counterattack proved it.
Swaaaaaek.
The man thrust his sword toward him.
At the tremendous speed, he instinctively stepped back.
Since he had mastered the Limitless Steps, it was the fastest and most dazzling execution of it.
The man’s attack turned that speed and dazzle into urgency.
Shik-shik-shik-shik!
Lee Jaseung dodged the man’s attacks frantically. The sword grazed his entire body narrowly. It was the kind of attack where the body would be pierced if concentration wavered even slightly.
Of course, he did not just take it. In the midst of it, he found a gap and tried to counterattack with Asura.
Chang!
The man’s sword and Asura collided.
Lee Jaseung felt a pain as if his wrist would snap. He had truly never imagined that the man’s fast attack would be this heavy.
Even with a hundred and eighty years worth of inner Qi, and the highest grade of it at that, he could not block that pain.
He thought that this must be how the enemies facing him had felt.
However, he did not back down. He knew better than anyone that if one’s momentum was broken in such a fight, it would lead to defeat that very moment.
Chang-chang-chang-chang-chang!
In a word, it was insane speed and power. Even though Asura was infused with inner Qi that felt like it might burst, the man’s sword did not break. It had clearly been nothing more than an ordinary iron sword. It meant the opponent’s martial arts were that great.
Every time Asura and the sword collided, it was unbearably painful, but he fought on, gritting his teeth.
He truly fought like a madman. Had he ever fought someone like this, pouring out everything he had without regret? He could swear he hadn’t.
Through that alone, he was having an incredibly precious experience.
However, experience was experience, and skill was skill. The man was far more relaxed than he was.
And the natural result created by that difference in skill followed.
Thud.
He was knocked down by the man’s fist.
He had been hit only once in the chest, but his body would not move.
His body felt heavy as if he had been struck thousands of times with an iron hammer.
If there was one bit of luck, it was that the man did not rush in immediately. Well, if killing had been the goal, the man would have used a sword instead of a fist.
The man walked over slowly and looked down at him.
“Back then and even now, you are too half-hearted.”
He felt the word half-hearted was a great disgrace. It would have been better if the man had said he was weak. Because there could always be someone stronger.
But being called half-hearted was not a relative evaluation; it was an objective one.
He gritted his teeth.
How hard had he worked from then until now? He had truly worked without resting for even a single moment.
“Don’t make me laugh.”
He gritted his teeth and stood up. It felt as if his entire body were being shattered into pieces.
But he endured. What killed him was not pain. It was the enemy’s mockery and the sense of defeat.
“I don’t care who you are. I will surely prove that your evaluation is wrong.”
He glared at the man.
The man stared at him with a calm gaze.
He could not read the meaning in his eyes. A gaze with a strange emotion. At least it wasn’t murderous intent. The following action was unexpected.
Thud!
The man’s fist, rushing in quickly, struck his abdomen once more.
Flying through the air, Lee Jaseung crashed onto the ground.
Soon after, the surroundings grew dark, and he lost consciousness.
* * *
Dan Woobin set up a strategy room in a safe house located not far from the Guizhou branch, which had been taken by the Dark Noble Clan.
Subsequently, the Divine Sword Regiment arrived and was deployed around the area. Because the Guard Hall led by Mook Young and the Divine Sword Regiment were deployed, the security of the safe house boasted an ironclad defense. Dan Woobin even deployed the Virtuous Heroes in a place not far from there.
Dan Woobin, Mujin, and Ma Young-gi were all busy with their respective tasks.
Baek Seolyoung went into the mountains near the safe house.
Her dreams last night were unsettling. She had dreamed that Lee Jaseung was hurt. Because it was the first time she had such a dream, she was inwardly nervous. Moreover, since he was away, her mind was even more anxious.
Baek Seolyoung steadied her breathing and stood before a large boulder.
The training she intended to do today was somewhat dangerous and difficult.
Wooooong.
A blue Sword Qi dwelled on her sword.
Her figure seemed to fly lightly into the air.
Swaaaaek!
Her sword, imbued with Sword Qi, sliced the boulder clean through.
Seeing the boulder split in half, she showed a satisfied smile. She was now using Sword Qi freely.
Swaaaaaek!
Her sword, again holding Sword Qi, embroidered the air.
Everywhere the sword aimed was cut neatly.
Originally, using Sword Qi was a very dangerous and difficult task. Also, because it required massive inner Qi, ordinary masters would not even dare.
However, she was freely emitting Sword Qi based on her Transcendent Peak Realm skill and massive inner Qi.
Her Sword Qi had the color of a blue sky.
It was said that the color of the Sword Qi differed slightly depending on a person’s inner Qi or temperament.
Come to think of it, what was his Sword Qi color?
Because he always fought with such flashes, she couldn’t tell what color his Sword Qi was.
Swaaaaek!
Having finished a bout of Sword Qi training, she retracted the sword.
The training ended wonderfully, but her mind still felt uneasy.
She looked up at the blue sky that resembled the color of her Sword Qi.
“You are coming back well, right? I don’t have to worry, do I?”
* * *
He tried to open his eyes, but they wouldn’t open.
His whole body was in pain. He tried to raise his body, but it wouldn’t budge. Instead, a groan escaped his mouth.
He despaired at the thought that he had lost again.
If there was one consolation, it was that he had faced such a fast and strong attack. He thought it was perhaps the most meaningful fortuitous encounter he had obtained so far.
Or so he thought.
He was startled while checking his internal state.
His inner Qi was not moving. The Dantian was tightly blocked by something.
He focused his mind. He tried to move his internal power somehow, but the Dantian remained stationary.
Clearly, the inner Qi was still there in the Dantian. However, he could not use even a handful of that inner Qi.
Dantian closure.
It was truly the first time he had experienced such a case.
The problem wasn’t just that. For some reason, his body was not functioning properly either.
He could not understand.
Why the man had left him in this state and departed.
Is he really the first Heavenly Demon?
Is that why he is trying to protect the Demonic Cult from him?
But the Demonic Cult he intended to strike was not the Heavenly Demon Sect he created, but the Asura Demon Sect.
He certainly wasn’t trying to protect the Demonic Cult. If that had been the case, he surely would have killed him.
Even if he didn’t kill him, he wouldn’t have just closed the Dantian; he would have completely destroyed it and crushed the bones of his entire body so that inner Qi could never be used again.
But for now, it was merely in a state of being sealed.
It felt like the man was telling him this.
Try to undo this if you want to regain your martial arts.
If that was the case, why was he performing such a test?
In this urgent situation where war had broken out, when he had to return quickly. Just why?
The day he first met the man came to mind.
Whatever his intention, the defeat to him had been a great help to his life.
Is the man truly trying to help him?
By the way, where on earth is this?
It didn’t feel like the place where he fought him yesterday. It was just when he felt a somehow unfamiliar sensation.
An urgent voice was heard from afar.
“It’s over there. He suddenly collapsed while heading to the training ground.”
In an instant, he was startled.
Training ground? Was he talking about him?
Two men were walking this way. Although his physical condition was a mess, he could roughly grasp the opponents’ skill. Skills fluctuating between Second-rate and First-rate.
He acted as if he had lost consciousness with his eyes closed. When one doesn’t know who the opponent is, it is better to do this. Because they might kill him just because he saw them.
“He suddenly collapsed?”
The second voice felt quite aged.
The man placed his hand on his neck to check his breathing, and soon slapped his cheek.
“Get up! Get a hold of yourself!”
Only then did he open his eyes as if regaining consciousness.
Two people were looking down at him.
One was a young man in his early twenties, and the other was a middle-aged man in his forties.
“Are you feeling okay now?”
“Yes.”
Then, the young man beside him spoke.
“My heart nearly dropped because you suddenly collapsed.”
Lee Jaseung could not say anything.
Clearly, both of them were faces he had never seen before.
Just what happened?
The young man helped him stand up.
Lee Jaseung looked around the surroundings. The place where he stood was in the middle of an unfamiliar training ground he had never seen in his life.