Chapter 237 - The One Who Sent Me

Yelü Han unleashed his qi presence in full.

WHOOOOOSH!

An actual freezing wind blew. Its chill felt cold enough to freeze the lungs with every breath. And woven into it was unorthodox qi of the utmost wickedness. That immense unorthodox qi seemed to say:

'You dare challenge me?'

But Geom Mugeuk kept walking, his gaze fixed on Yelü Han's eyes.

"That may have worked on everyone else, but it won't work on me."

He, too, raised his qi presence to its utmost limit and unleashed it.

Their qi presences collided.

Yelü Han was shocked by Geom Mugeuk's.

A qi presence was not powerful simply because someone possessed abundant internal energy. It was bound up with the whole of a martial artist's nature and talents, personality and values, and the martial arts they had learned. Thus, it touched upon the very essence of that martial artist.

And the qi presence Yelü Han now felt from Geom Mugeuk was unlike anything he had ever experienced.

At first, it was gentle and refreshing, like gazing at an endlessly vast blue sky.

Indeed, Yelü Han stood alone amid that blue expanse. Everything around him was blue sky—the sky above, the walls, even the ground.

He reached out a hand.

SPLASH.

In that instant, he realized it was not the sky, but water so clear that he had mistaken the sky reflected in it for the real thing.

An unseen force dragged him beneath the water.

He kept sinking. When he looked down, there was no bottom in sight. The terror of the deep seemed to clutch at his heart.

'A brat that young has a qi presence like this?'

Geom Mugeuk, walking toward him, felt like a giant.

Geom Mugeuk, meanwhile, was confronting an immense qi presence of his own.

He was walking along a snowy path through a raging blizzard. He could see neither what lay ahead nor where it ended. It felt as though he were crossing a snowfield alone in the bitter cold.

Yet he felt neither fear nor loneliness. He simply continued walking in silence. He had walked this path before. This agonizingly lonely road was the one he had traveled all his life.

Once he passed through the fierce, snow-laden wind, Yelü Han stood before him beneath a clear sky.

Yelü Han, too, had barely managed to swim up from the bottomless depths and stand before Geom Mugeuk.

Yelü Han asked in a trembling voice,

"Who are you?"

"I am..."

Geom Mugeuk added in a near whisper,

"Didn't I say I'd tell you when you died?"

SHIIING!

Geom Mugeuk's sword suddenly cleaved the air.

CLANG!

Yelü Han barely blocked it. So engrossed had he been in Geom Mugeuk's qi presence that he had nearly lost his head.

The fear that he might die exhilarated him. Joy came before anger. Never before had he fought a battle this maddening.

CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!

Their swords began clashing again in flashes of light.

Their attacks were more powerful than before, but neither yielded an inch.

Geom Mugeuk knew full well where Yelü Han's strength came from. The medicinal elixirs purchased with money he had ruthlessly amassed through his four henchmen—the fruits of countless evil deeds that had driven so many people to their deaths—were stored in his dantian.

CLAAANG!

Sword met sword.

From beyond their blades, Yelü Han glared murderously and shouted,

"Who the hell raised a monster like you?!"

"You did!"

"What?"

"I was born to devour bastards like you."

Killing intent entered Geom Mugeuk's eyes.

For an instant, Yelü Han saw a vision. Within a figure as black as a shadow, only a pair of blood-red eyes glared at him.

His grip tightened around his sword.

"Then devour me if you can!"

Now emotion showed on Yelü Han's face.

Anger, fear, excitement...

Once the dam holding them back collapsed, every sort of emotion came pouring out.

In that instant, he unleashed tremendous power.

RRRRRUMBLE!

Yelü Han's immense killing intent became an avalanche that swept over Geom Mugeuk.

The Heavenly Demon's Body-Protection Art activated, preventing his body from shrinking back under the oncoming killing intent.

Otherwise, the attack now flying toward him would have been devastatingly lethal.

SHIIIIING!

It was Yelü Han's sword qi, but unlike any he had unleashed thus far. The blow evoked the illusion of an evil spirit made of ice flying toward him with a sword in hand.

Rather than evade it, Geom Mugeuk used Blazing Heaven, the fourth form of the Heaven-Soaring Sword Art.

Yelü Han's sword qi was so dynamic that it seemed alive. A careless attempt to dodge felt likely to make it pursue him relentlessly until it struck.

The two savage, overpowering bursts of sword qi tore through the air and collided.

BOOOOM!

The impact sent both men sliding backward.

Surprise crossed Yelü Han's face. He had blocked even that attack?

Geom Mugeuk answered with his own expression. I told you it wouldn't work!

WHIRRRRR!

PING!

The Blood Wheel and a blast of finger force crossed through the gap that had briefly opened between them. The Wicked Laughing Demon and the Blood-Wheel Calamity were still fighting.

Geom Mugeuk could feel that the Blood Wheel's power had diminished considerably. But he could not rejoice. He had seen blood on it.

He did not spare the Wicked Laughing Demon a single glance.

The moment his concern for his companion became apparent, it would give his enemy a fatal weakness to exploit.

That was why he had not looked at their battle once since the fighting began. Not that he had had the leisure to do so.

That was when Cha Hwan joined the fray.

With Geom Mugeuk and Yelü Han both sliding backward after exchanging powerful attacks, he judged that this was his chance to strike. Throughout his vigil, he had waited for this one moment.

SWISH!

At the very instant he thrust his sword at Geom Mugeuk in a surprise attack—

SPLURT!

Cha Hwan's chest split open, and something shot toward Geom Mugeuk like a flash of light. It looked as though he had launched a hidden weapon concealed against his chest.

Blood spattered from Geom Mugeuk's arm. Had he not barely evaded it with Flicker Step, that terrifying attack would have pierced his chest.

Cha Hwan stared blankly down at the gaping hole in his chest.

Yelü Han had unleashed sword qi from behind him, piercing his chest and sending it on toward Geom Mugeuk.

Yelü Han was merciless. He had seized the brief moment when Cha Hwan obscured Geom Mugeuk's view.

Cha Hwan had never imagined that the man to whom he had given such loyalty would use him and discard him like this.

'What is this?'

The shock was overwhelming.

Others had only a small tattoo on their chests, while he had covered his entire body. He had served Yelü Han without taking a single day off. Had the man at least told him through sound transmission to sacrifice himself, he would have willingly given his life for him.

'This isn't right, is it?'

Yes, those who used others always did it this way.

But wouldn't dying so miserably shame the dragons tattooed on his body? Surely even a broom left standing in a corner would not have been used so contemptuously. With that final thought, Cha Hwan drew his last breath.

At the very moment Cha Hwan breathed his last, another battle was being decided.

Until then, the Wicked Laughing Demon and the Blood-Wheel Calamity had both been fighting with all their strength.

At first, the Blood-Wheel Calamity had chosen to draw the battle out. He had the advantage in internal energy, and his opponent was injured besides.

'If I hold out, I'll win!'

Rather than launch the Blood Wheel recklessly, he concentrated on blocking Blood Calamity Finger.

But the longer the battle continued, the more he became caught up in it without realizing. There were two reasons.

The first was an inexplicable fervor.

Whenever he looked at the fierce glare blazing from the eyes behind the mask, his internal energy surged involuntarily and his blood raced. Before he knew it, he was hurling the Blood Wheel at the Wicked Laughing Demon.

The second was the clear disparity in their skills.

The Wicked Laughing Demon never moved according to his opponent's wishes. A prolonged battle? Who said he would allow that?

Had the Wicked Laughing Demon not suffered internal injuries, the fight would already have ended. But he could not circulate his internal energy smoothly.

When the fight began, the Blood-Wheel Calamity had certainly been confident he could win. Yet the longer it continued, the greater his fear grew.

'Just die already! You demonic bastard!'

He drove the Wicked Laughing Demon back with the last of his strength.

WHIRRRRRRR!

As he unleashed his concealed secret techniques, the Blood Wheel danced a dance of death, and the Wicked Laughing Demon's movements grew increasingly precarious.

'I've got him! Just a little more!'

The Blood-Wheel Calamity brought even his final secret technique into play.

WHIRRR! WHIRRR!

Small blood wheels, used like throwing stars, cut through the air and joined the attack.

Just as the chaotic, dizzying, savage wheels were driving the Wicked Laughing Demon into a corner—

PING!

THUD!

The sound the Wicked Laughing Demon had long been waiting for rang out.

CRASH-CRASH-CRASH!

The Blood Wheel, which had filled the air as though alive, tore through the ground, smashed a wall, and came to a stop. The smaller wheels were likewise flung to the ground in every direction.

The Blood-Wheel Calamity watched in astonishment.

'Why can't I control them all of a sudden?'

Then something trickled down his face.

He absently wiped it away with his hand.

Blood. Blood was streaming from his forehead.

He raised the small blood wheel he held and looked at his reflection. He saw a hole in his forehead.

'When did that happen?'

That question was his last. The Blood-Wheel Calamity died and toppled forward.

Astonishingly, the Wicked Laughing Demon had fired Blood Calamity Finger through the tiny hole at the center of the wildly moving Blood Wheel. He had not missed the instant when that hole aligned perfectly with the Blood-Wheel Calamity's forehead. His opponent had never imagined such an attack, and with his own Blood Wheel obscuring his view, he had been utterly unable to block it.

The battle between Geom Mugeuk and Yelü Han was also reaching its climax.

When even his ploy using Cha Hwan failed, Yelü Han's eyes changed. His black pupils vanished completely, and both his irises and the whites of his eyes turned blue. They did not glow blue—they had actually become blue.

Geom Mugeuk knew instinctively that he was about to unleash his final secret technique.

Considering the extraordinary might Yelü Han had displayed thus far, it was time for him to unleash his own final move.

The final sword form of the Heaven-Soaring Sword Art was unleashed.

It was the eighth form, Return to Heaven, which he had never used in actual combat, even after achieving twelfth-level complete mastery.

Return to Heaven was a technique consisting of forty-four consecutive strikes.

It was powerful, but had one fatal weakness: its enormous consumption of internal energy. It required nearly all the internal energy the practitioner possessed.

Thus, if it failed to kill the opponent, even by the slimmest chance, the practitioner would be in peril. It truly was a last-resort form.

Now not only Yelü Han's eyes, but his entire body began turning blue.

Primordial Extreme Cold!

It was the final secret technique of the Primordial Light-Splitting Sword Art, drawing upon every ounce of qi in the body to slay the opponent. It unleashed power beyond the practitioner's normal capabilities, and it, too, was an ultimate secret technique whose failure could cost the user their life.

Geom Mugeuk unleashed Return to Heaven, the eighth form of the Heaven-Soaring Sword Art.

SWISH! SWIISH! SWISH!

With sounds like wind brushing clothing, lines traced by his sword began appearing over Yelü Han's body.

Radiating extreme cold, Yelü Han swung his sword and began blocking them. If he blocked every strike of Return to Heaven, Geom Mugeuk would die.

SWISH! SWISH! SWIIISH!

The sword lines were traced faster and faster.

Yelü Han's sword kept pace, blocking the attacks.

HUMMM—

The Black Demon Sword sang.

This was the first time it had ever sung in the midst of an attack.

Geom Mugeuk felt the Black Demon Sword becoming one with him, emitting demonic qi to protect him from the vicious unorthodox qi Yelü Han was releasing.

'Yes, let's finish him together!'

Geom Mugeuk poured in every ounce of his mental strength.

SWISH-SWISH-SWISH-SWISH!

CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!

The fifteenth strike, the sixteenth, the seventeenth...

Yelü Han blocked them doggedly.

The twenty-third strike, the twenty-fourth, the twenty-fifth...

"Is that all you've got?!"

He even shouted.

The sword lines were traced still faster.

The thirty-fourth strike, the thirty-fifth, the thirty-sixth...

Using Primordial Extreme Cold, Yelü Han was blocking attacks so fast they could not even be seen.

If this continued until the forty-fourth strike, Geom Mugeuk would lose.

But he felt no anxiety. He trusted himself. Yes, you must have worked hard to rise to that position. But you could never have worked harder than I did!

The thirty-seventh strike, the thirty-eighth, the thirty-ninth...

At the very instant they raced toward the end—

SCHLUK!

With the sound of tearing flesh, the flashing sword light stopped. So did the clash of their blades. It was the forty-second strike.

Geom Mugeuk's sword was embedded in Yelü Han's heart. In the end, Yelü Han had failed to block Return to Heaven.

His blue body began returning to its original color.

Looking into Yelü Han's eyes, filled with shock, anger, and fear, Geom Mugeuk said,

"The one who sent me is a father who had to watch his family die before his eyes."

Yelü Han looked uncomprehending. He must have believed he was dying for some grand reason—a conspiracy by the leader of the Unorthodox Alliance, or a plot by the Demonic Cult.

That might make this moment an even greater punishment for him. I'm dying for a reason like that? It would feel all the more unjust. He would die with all the more anger.

"Even after he saved your subordinate, you killed the physician's entire family because he continued treating a patient whose life he was trying to save."

For an instant, Yelü Han's gaze wavered. He seemed to remember, yet he also seemed to demand whether he was dying for such a trifling reason that he did not even recall it.

"I hear you had a rule that anyone who disobeyed your orders had to die. This is the Demon Physician's answer to that pathetic rule of yours. The answer of a husband who lost his wife, and a father who lost his children! Go to hell!"

SCHLUUUK!

As the Black Demon Sword was pulled free, blood spurted from Yelü Han's heart like a fountain.

SPLAAASH!

"Aaaaaaaargh!"

Yelü Han let out an agonized scream as blood gushed from him.

His blood poured down like rain.

Geom Mugeuk did not dodge it. Beneath the rain of blood, he slowly turned toward the Wicked Laughing Demon.

Having finished his own battle, the Wicked Laughing Demon stood watching him.

Geom Mugeuk looked at him and smiled brightly.

"It's all over, Laughing Demon."

At the very moment he took a step toward him—

The Wicked Laughing Demon began slowly collapsing, as though his body were giving way.