Chapter 201
'?!'
It was an unprecedented, immense force.
A power like Mount Tai that could not be stopped by human strength...
Moreover,
'I couldn't see it!'
The Blood Demon couldn't see it properly.
The lightning-fast hand that rushed like a beam of light and grabbed him by the collar.
Above all,
—You're mine, old man Blood Demon.
At So-ah's bold words, the Blood Demon couldn't hide his bewilderment.
But that too was only for a moment.
The Blood Demon's body flew through the air.
'Why on earth...'
Why?
Why on earth was his body flying through the sky, caught in the grasp of a mere brat?
He could break free if he wanted to.
He could immediately shoot a palm strike into the brat's chest and absorb his energy with the Star-Sucking Great Art.
But for some reason.
The Blood Demon didn't want to.
He wanted to see what this thunderbolt-like disciple of the God of War would show.
What he would do.
'Hehehe... this will be interesting!'
Perhaps the Blood Demon had been hoping for such a situation to unfold.
'The disciple of the God of War... you have to die by my hands anyway!'
Even as he was being hurtled through the air like an arrow,
So-ah could see the corners of the Blood Demon's lips curling up into a sinister smile.
***
On the other hand.
Watching So-ah disappear, leaving a trail of afterimages while gripping the Blood Demon's collar, Baek In-hwa was engulfed in a sense of powerlessness.
'So-ah... So-ah...!'
The power of the Blood Demon that Baek In-hwa had witnessed was not human.
The killing power to slaughter dozens of lives at once just by emitting a radiance from his body and brandishing it.
No matter how much of a peerless master So-ah had become, surpassing the Profound Realm, could he subdue the Blood Demon?
No.
He couldn't.
At least, that's what Baek In-hwa thought.
Nevertheless, he could not chase after the figures of So-ah and the Blood Demon flying off somewhere.
Why?
It was because of So-ah's telepathic message.
—Elder! I must face the Blood Demon. You must protect this place. To defeat those numerous monsters, you, Brother Woo-chi, and the monks of the Heavenly Demon Cathedral must play your part. Please! I beg you, Elder!
So-ah was a person who was always full of mischief, and his words and actions were extremely light.
But this telepathic message was different.
His voice was endlessly heavy, his expression was serious, and his eyes, fixed on the Blood Demon, were boiling with a blazing fighting spirit.
That was why.
That was why Baek In-hwa could not refuse So-ah's request.
Besides,
—Kwaaaaaaaang!
At this very moment, unholy, malevolent creatures that should not exist in the world were attacking the subjugation force.
'I...'
I must protect this place.
I must protect the people from the monsters.
The goal is the complete annihilation of the Gansu branch of the cult.
For that reason, Baek In-hwa had to hold his ground.
At that moment,
A single sword, compressing the air and floating in the middle of the battlefield, came into view.
'That sword is!'
The sword...
...was the sacred relic of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult, the greatest weapon in the world.
The Heavenly Demon Divine Sword.
'The Young Lord!'
The eyes of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult members, who were continuing their battle with the White Lotus cultists, widened.
The moment the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword soared into the sky, didn't Wi-ji Chan also leap up and mount the body of the sword?
'It's Sword-Riding Flight!'
It was Sword-Riding Flight.
Long ago, in a time when Taoist arts were rampant in the Central Plains.
It was said that the immortals of the Taoist sects rode swords to cross seas and mountains.
Of course, now it was a story dismissed as a bygone myth.
But as such a Sword-Riding Flight unfolded before their eyes, the people could not hide their amazement.
—Great Chief Hyun. I will follow So-ah and face the Blood Demon, so I entrust this place to you.
Wi-ji Chan's Six Harmonies Telepathy echoed in the ears of the Heavenly Spirit Unit's Great Chief, Hyun Dong-hwa.
Hyun Dong-hwa nodded in response, and Wi-ji Chan, who had mounted the sword, chased So-ah's afterimage and flew through the sky like a phantom.
***
"[email protected]#$%%^^&*!"
As time passed, the battle escalated into a confrontation of sorcery versus sorcery.
The sorcerers controlling the demonic beasts from the rear used stealth techniques to continuously cast spells and attack the subjugation force, and the movements of the monsters, including the Great-Faced Spider, Golden-Armored Divine Tortoise, Three-Eyed Heavenly Poison Toad, Green-Scaled Poison-Horned Flood Dragon, Golden Spirit Snake King, Winged-Beast Demon Dragon, and the Double-Headed Flood Dragon, became even more bizarre.
As a giant serpent-like creature resembling a dragon rammed the subjugation force with its body, dozens of figures were sent tumbling, vomiting blood from the single blow.
The transparent barrier of the Heavenly Demon Cathedral monks formed a defensive shield at the vanguard, blocking the collision, but it was not enough to defend against the inevitable blind spots.
And what about the Zombie?
Unlike the Blood Zombie, the Demonic Zombie were on a different level in terms of killing power and resilience.
Before climbing Mount Goha, the subjugation force had faced Blood Zombie and had learned their range of action and attack patterns, but the Demonic Zombie were malevolent creatures that thought for themselves and attacked their opponents in the most efficient way.
Moreover, each one possessed the true divine power to easily handle a first-rate master, so the subjugation force could not help but struggle in the black tide of the overflowing Demonic Zombie.
[Strategist! Alliance Leader! This won't do. Maintaining the formation to fight is actually working as a bad move. We should not be bound by the joint formation and should now engage in free combat!]
Baek In-hwa sent a telepathic message to the Alliance Leader and the Strategist.
As he said, the current tactic of gathering together and concentrating their power to fight was only creating a bad situation.
At that, Abbess Hongryeon and Zhuge Hyuk gave their hand signals, and,
—Everyone, do not be bound by the formation and fight in the most appropriate way for your own situation!!!
The commanders at the vanguard of each column imbued their voices with internal energy and encouraged the subjugation force.
Only then,
"Let's do this, you bastards!"
"Come on, come over here!"
"You filthy Zombie bastards!"
So-ah's friends, like fish in water, brandished their swords with a glint in their eyes.
Especially,
Myo-seon's performance was outstanding.
The Sunflower Manual showed a powerful aspect in one-on-one duels, but it was a martial art that shone particularly in many-versus-many battles.
Therefore, to the enemy, it was a risk factor for mass slaughter, but to the allies, it was a divine art with a wide area of attack and a trump card that could produce explosive firepower.
"Wow! Look at that... sword gleam! How many strands are there?!"
"Crazy... Myo-seon was the dark horse, the dark horse."
"I'm jealous..."
Even in the midst of the desperate struggle of Asura, Han-baek and the other two idiots were mesmerized by Myo-seon's martial prowess.
The sight of about 100 sword gleams stretching out in strands and crushing the heads of the Zombie was a marvelous move.
'We can't lose either.'
'Ah, what's the worst that can happen, death?'
'Fight! Cut! Kill!'
Myo-seon's strike became a catalyst that raised the fighting spirit of the young martial artists.
Also, the performance of Tang Il-gi and Tang Hwa-rin could not be ignored.
In the first place, the group that boasted the greatest firepower in a large-scale battle was the Sichuan Tang Clan.
The hidden weapons handled by the Tang Clan alone numbered in the dozens, so the hidden weapon techniques that leaped into the air and scattered over a wide area protected the allies while delivering a rain of death to the enemy lines.
In the midst of that,
The rain of hidden weapons covered the sky even more fiercely.
But looking closely,
"Ah... it's not hidden weapons!"
It wasn't hidden weapons.
A rain of death, made of thousands of strands of Gangqi that could not be deflected by any blade, bloomed profusely from the sky.
"It's... Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky!!!"
It was the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky, the greatest divine art of the Sichuan Tang Clan.
What was surprising was that the person who was casting the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky was not the clan head, Tang Mun-cheol, but,
'Brother Il-gi!'
...it was Tang Il-gi.
'My goodness... to cast Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky at an age not yet thirty!'
It was an incomprehensible event.
Anyone with the blood of the Tang Clan was given the opportunity to learn the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky.
While it was common for the divine arts of a sect or martial family to be passed down only to the leader or the head of the family in a single-line succession, the secret manual of the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky was unusually available for any member of the Tang Clan to freely read at any time.
The reason was simple.
「Those who can learn the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky, feel free to study and research it and use it at any time! If you can bring glory to the Tang Clan by doing so, is it not a joyous thing!」
It was because of this philosophy of the Tang Clan.
But despite that, the reason why there were so few who had learned the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky was that the nature of the martial art itself was extremely difficult, complex, and also tricky.
In short, the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky was a dreadful martial art that only one or two people in a generation could learn.
Therefore, the fact that Tang Il-gi, a branch member of the family who was not yet thirty, was using the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky had a special meaning.
'As expected... Young Hero Tang was also another supernova!'
That was right.
As long as he had unleashed the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky, Tang Il-gi was no longer a person who could be dismissed as a mere peak master.
He would never have been able to cast the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky if he had not opened his Ren meridian and experienced the state of harmony.
'Wow! Even Brother Tang. Do these people have no limits, what's going on?'
Han Baek was so dumbfounded that he was at a loss for words.
He himself had become quite strong.
Therefore, he had assessed himself as one of the strongest rising stars of the Orthodox Path.
But it was a delusion.
So-ah was needless to say, and then there was Myo-seon, who had instantly become as strong as the leaders of the Nine Great Sects, and now even Namgung Mun, who was casually spewing out the Emperor's Invincible Sword Gang, the ultimate art of the Namgung family.
As if that wasn't enough, even Tang Il-gi, who was always evaluated as being behind Namgung Mun, was now producing the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky...
'I'm a third-rate forever, sigh!'
Han-baek engraved the proverb "There's always someone flying above the one who runs" into his soul.
Just then.
"Amitabhul!!!"
The Wisdom-Light Heart Words that resounded throughout Mount Goha once again made the hearts of the people sink.
'This... this crazy monk is at it again?'
'What the... is Wisdom-Light Heart Words the name of a neighborhood dog, what's going on?'
'Does that person have no limit to his internal energy? Geez!'
The source of the voice was Gwangwon.
The moment the Ten Thousand Flowers Filling the Sky unfolded from the hands of his peer, Master Tang Il-gi, Gwangwon Daesa's eyes rolled back.
He was already feeling a strong sense of rivalry towards Wi-ji Chan, who was said to be stronger than So-ah.
Now that another monster named Tang Il-gi had revealed himself to the world, how could his heart, which dreamed of becoming the number one martial monk in the world, not be in turmoil...
Therefore.
"Amitabhu!"
As if to say, "Follow me if you can," the sight of Gwangwon, who was abusing his internal energy without limit, breaking the opponent's spirit with the Wisdom-Light Heart Words, and crazily unfolding the Hundred-Pace Divine Fist, was imprinted on everyone not as a monk serving the Buddha, but as a Yaksha from hell.
'Scary, so scary.'
'I had forgotten.'
'That that old man is worse than Brother Jin.'
***
With a huge explosion, the bodies of So-ah and the Blood Demon simultaneously slammed into the ground.
The impact was so great that the ground caved in by nearly five feet.
But the bodies of So-ah and the Blood Demon, which had been buried underground, were raised like lightning, as if nothing had happened.
For a while, the two stared at each other without a word.
The one who broke the heavy silence first was the Blood Demon, Tae-ho-gong.
"Impressive. Disciple of the God of War."
Surprisingly, his tone was formal.
Of course, the answer that came out of So-ah's mouth was not like that at all.
"Look at that tone. Ugh! I'm going to puke."
"Kekeke. How far do you think your useless provocations will work on me?"
"Provocations? What's the point of provoking a dying old geezer? I just need to beat him up."
"Kehahahahahaha!"
Despite So-ah's sharp tongue, the Blood Demon only burst into a loud laugh towards the sky.
'This... is not human...'
Looking at the Blood Demon, So-ah's heart sank.
In fact, a moment ago, when So-ah had grabbed the Blood Demon's collar and slammed his body into the ground, he had used the mystery of the Taesan Yeokrip, the most destructive of the Ten-Second Invincible Arts.
What kind of martial art was the Taesan Yeokrip?
It was the ultimate art that had killed the Heavenly Rain Demon Sword, No Yeong-myeong, and was strictly So-ah's greatest secret technique.
Moreover, So-ah was in an awakened state.
Even though he had raised his awakened state to the maximum and unfolded the Taesan Yeokrip, he could not find any trace of injury on the Blood Demon's complexion.
Although his words were sharp, So-ah's heart was twisted in complexity.
Fortunately,
...into the desolate forest where So-ah and the Blood Demon had arrived...
...a single figure appeared, cutting through the sky on the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword.
"Let's fight together. You can't handle that guy alone."
With the corners of his mouth curled up, Wi-ji Chan, who had re-gripped the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword, stood firmly next to So-ah.
"Wow! Old man Blood Demon. What are you going to do? I was going to crush you one-on-one, but I guess not. My brother is here too."
"Kekeke. Just one more piece of trash has been added, so why are you making such a fuss?"
"Brother Chan. The old man is calling you trash."
"Haha. Don't mind it, So-ah. It's natural for everyone to have their own plausible fantasies."
"Right?"
"Yes."
"Until they get beaten up."
(End of Chapter)