Chapter 35
The exit of the prison, which seemed to be about to end at any moment, required a longer time than expected.
One fortunate thing for the exhausted Agong and the Butterfly Scholar was that after they had disposed of the sea serpent in the puddle, no beast more ferocious than that had appeared.
Of course, in the middle, dog monsters and beasts of unknown identity had attacked, but Agong, who had already seen many terrible things, was able to hunt them down without batting an eye.
Thanks to that, Agong was getting so skilled at skinning the hides of the attacking beasts that he was getting sick of himself.
Agong, who had been walking along the waterway flowing through the long prison, soon heard the thick smell of sulfur and the gradually growing sound of water.
"Finally!"
As the exit, where light was seeping in from a distance, came into view, a new strength surged in Agong's tired steps.
"Whoa!"
At the end of the long prison, a waterfall connected to the waterway was falling.
Swoosh!
Since it was the first time Agong had seen a waterfall, he could not hide his amazement at the magnificent sight and plopped down on the spot.
Agong's appearance, revealed under the bright light, was no different from that of a beggar.
His clothes and skin were dirty with blood, stains, and dust, and his hair, with blood clots stuck to it, was sticking out here and there.
His bloodshot eyes, perhaps due to the fatigue of the past, were the finishing touch. Moreover, not only at his waist, but also all over his body, the hides of beasts were hanging.
"Finally... I see the outside world."
The Butterfly Scholar also, as if his feelings were new, took a deep breath of the air of the Hermit's Valley, which was mixed with the smell of sulfur, with a trembling voice.
If it had been a normal day, he would have trembled with displeasure, but thinking that even this strong smell of sulfur was the smell of freedom, he could willingly endure it.
"It's all thanks to you."
"Or could it be thanks to me?"
The answer to the Butterfly Scholar's muttering echoed in the air, piercing through the sound of the waterfall.
The echo of the voice went up against the waterfall and covered the sky, and Agong and the Butterfly Scholar felt a pressure that was crushing their whole bodies.
"Tong. Tian. Cult. Master!"
The Butterfly Scholar gritted his teeth and chewed and spat out each letter.
Since Tongtian had played a significant role in him ending up in this state, the Butterfly Scholar's anger towards Tongtian was understandable.
"You came out too early than expected, so if I had been wrong, I might not have been able to come out to meet you."
Tongtian showed a kind smile and slowly revealed himself.
Tongtian, who had flown up lightly from under the waterfall as if a bird were flying, soared to the spot where Agong was standing and landed next to Agong with an elegant movement.
"It's been a long time, Butterfly Scholar."
The Butterfly Scholar looked up at Tongtian with an angry expression.
Since he had met one of the people he had not wanted to meet right now, it could not have been a greater misfortune for him.
As much as the grim atmosphere between the two, a fierce emotion swirled in Agong's head. Seeing Tongtian, the anger, resentment, and sorrow that had been dormant surged up in a complex way.
Although he wanted to explode his boiling anger right away, Agong, with Tongtian in front of him, could not distinguish from which part he should get angry.
"Did you have a hard time?"
"Do you... even call that a question!!"
Seeing Tongtian's nonchalant expression, Agong's voice shouted as if it would tear.
"You brat, but thanks to me, you've become able to hunt for sure. Hoho."
"What did you say?! I almost died!"
As Agong got angry at Tongtian's kind-looking smiling face, Tongtian lightly approached and patted Agong's shoulder.
"But I believed that you would get out of the prison safely. It seems you have made progress in your martial arts as well."
Tongtian, after checking Agong's condition, had a light glint in his eyes.
He had confirmed that Agong's middle dantian was slightly open.
"Indeed..."
Since Agong and the Butterfly Scholar had appeared together, Tongtian was convinced that Agong had obtained an opportunity with the help of the Butterfly Scholar.
Tongtian, with a faint smile, gave a light word of thanks to the Butterfly Scholar.
"You did very well. Since you are more of an expert in this area than I am, it was a great help."
It was a tone as if he had expected the Butterfly Scholar to help Agong.
The Butterfly Scholar, hearing Tongtian's words, twitched his sword-like eyebrows and did not hide his displeasure.
"Why don't you go back to the tavern and rest?"
At Tongtian's words, Agong panted and took a deep breath.
Even if he got angry, since the opponent was responding nonchalantly, it felt like he was getting angry at a wall.
"I'll never believe what you say, grandpa... no, master, anymore."
"You've really taken a dislike to me. What should I do about this?"
As Tongtian lightly raised his hand and moved, Agong's body, holding Tonglin and wrapped in hides, floated up into the air.
"Ah, ah!"
"If you follow the path under the waterfall, you will soon find the tavern. I have something to talk about with the Butterfly Scholar, so go back and relieve your journey's fatigue."
Agong, feeling the unusual atmosphere between Tongtian and the Butterfly Scholar, suppressed his unresolved anger and carefully opened his mouth.
"Isn't the Scholar going back with me?"
"You don't have to worry about the Butterfly Scholar. Now, go in."
"Aack!"
Tongtian, without even hearing Agong's answer, lightly dropped Agong under the waterfall with the technique of moving objects in the air.
However, perhaps because he had controlled the falling speed, Agong was seen shouting at Tongtian like a drowned rat under the waterfall.
"Isn't it fun? To feel this kind of fun in my old age in the valley."
Watching Agong, who was venting his anger for a while and then struggling to carry the wet hides back, the joy did not leave Tongtian's face.
Although there was a smile on the Butterfly Scholar's face, he knew well that that smile was an expression that would feel more frightening than anger to anyone.
"You knew I was alive..."
"How could I not know?"
"You knew I had been enduring in that state for five years, and you just left me alone!"
"Otherwise, did you wish that I would go down to the prison and cut off your breath? Do you have that kind of value now?"
Tongtian naturally dropped the honorifics and looked down at the speechless Butterfly Scholar.
A gaze as if looking at an insect.
He had continued his miserable and terrible life, dreaming only of revenge and hope.
He had imagined the scene where the enemies of the Sea Isle Sect, who knew that he had returned alive, would be surprised and fall down.
But thinking that all of this was a futile act, the Butterfly Scholar's chest was so painful that it felt like it would burst.
"But thanks to you, Agong's training went well, so it was a help. I was very worried because the child's bones and muscles were stiff, and his progress was slow in learning the supreme martial arts."
Although Agong was young, considering the rising stars of martial arts families who did things like washing their marrow and bones to learn martial arts from birth, it was a situation where he was far too late to learn martial arts.
Moreover, since there was a lot of turbidity accumulated from his life in the secular world, it took even longer to accumulate pure internal energy, and he was not familiar with martial arts.
If he had to, there were other ways to remodel Agong in a hurry, but as is often the case with demonic martial arts, there were cases where the side effects were even more severe.
"If you thank me, can you just let me go?"
"If a person who has broken the taboo of the Sea Isle Sect leaves the prison alive, who will keep the rules? A favor is a favor, and business is business."
"Damn it! I was framed by that witch!"
"Whatever your intention is, that is not important. The fact that you helped the Non-Duality Gate and threatened the balance of the Hermit's Valley is what's important."
After the Butterfly Scholar had stayed in the Hermit's Valley, he had met the peerless beauty of the Non-Duality Gate, called Miss Mu.
He, who had once enjoyed the ways of the world, had fallen for this mysterious woman, and at her request, he had taught her the concept of martial arts, including the basics of martial arts that accumulate qi in the dantian.
Although he had only taught her a basic internal energy cultivation method, not a supreme martial art, this incident had become a trigger that had turned not only the Sea Isle Sect but also the Mountain Peak Sect upside down.
The Butterfly Scholar, who was one of the main pillars of the Sea Isle Sect at the time, the Ten Heavenly Lords, was immediately sentenced to the prison, which was no different from death, and he had actually lived a life that was no different from being dead.
"By the way, did you teach your Heaven and Earth Fist to Agong?"
"Are you thinking of taking away the essence of my unique martial art? To think that I would have taught my Heaven and Earth Fist to your disciple is truly foolish!"
"That's good. It's unbearable for that child to learn any more miscellaneous martial arts."
"You bastard!"
At Tongtian's words, which treated his martial arts as miscellaneous martial arts, the Butterfly Scholar's body swelled up greatly in an instant.
A single strike.
It was clear that his heart would burst and the blood and qi of his whole body would be shattered.
But the reason he had practiced the Crouching Frog Art without rest for five years was to reserve the strength to display the Heaven and Earth Fist for a time like this, just once.
Tongtian, as the Butterfly Scholar's body swelled up hideously, clicked his tongue briefly.
The end of the man who was once a master of the evil path and was compared to a butterfly was truly pitiful and sad.
Crouching Frog Art.
Invincible Heaven and Earth Fist!
In an instant, the two fists of the Butterfly Scholar, which had bounced out towards Tongtian, had a shining ring-like energy rotating fiercely.
The power of the Butterfly Scholar's single fist, which was fading like a flame with his life as collateral, became a huge river that even Mount Tai could not block, and it was flying as if to crush Tongtian right away.
"You shouldn't have come out of the prison."
As Tongtian naturally shook his body. The Heavenly Demon Reigning Steps of the Manifest Demon True Art was displayed, and as he stretched out his hand, the waterfall water shot up backwards and filled the sky. And soon, the waterfall water that was falling like rain poured down on Tongtian's hand.
The fist containing the energy of the Butterfly Scholar's Heaven and Earth Fist, which was said to break even steel, was shattered into pieces by Tongtian's hand movements, which numbered in the dozens or hundreds in a fleeting moment.
His wrist was bent, and the broken bone tore through his flesh and protruded, but the ring of the Heaven and Earth Fist was not broken.
But the momentum of the Heaven and Earth Fist that had flown towards Tongtian had decreased, and there was no focus in the Butterfly Scholar's eyes.
He had died as a price for the martial art he had displayed with his life as collateral.
"An ugly and shabby obsession."
How great could a single move displayed after death be?
In an instant, the Tongtian Cult Master's leg rose high and struck the Butterfly Scholar's head directly.
Thump!
With the gushing fresh blood, a huge shock that was enough to bend the waterfall stream for a moment shook the arena.
"It took too much effort to catch a frog, but considering that he was once a master of the martial world, I did not show any mercy in my hands."
Tongtian's expression, as he wiped the blood on the sole of his shoe on the dirt, did not look very pleased either.
Paaat!
At that moment, when everything was over, a ball of light shot up into the sky from the dead Butterfly Scholar's body in an instant.
Tongtian, at first, reflexively turned his body and raised his protective qi, but the bright ball of light that had shot up from the Butterfly Scholar's body flew away somewhere like an arrow.
"..."
The light disappeared into the thick fog of the Hermit's Valley in an instant, and even with Tongtian's eyesight, he could not easily grasp its location.
"God-Sealing Platform..."
Tongtian, leaving behind his complex emotions, spread his hand, and a flame arose in Tongtian's grasp and burned the Butterfly Scholar's corpse.
The Butterfly Scholar's corpse, which had turned to ash, scattered in the air on the strong wind of the waterfall.
(End of Chapter)