Chapter 225 - Radiant Genius Formula (5)

“Huh...?”

The Supreme Flame Dragon reacted at once from where he lay on the roof tiles. His eyebrows rose briefly, and then he stood without so much as bracing a hand against the roof.

Using only his feet and waist, he lifted his torso as though performing the principles of Iron Plank Bridge in reverse. He was upright in an instant. It was an exquisite display of lightness skill.

TAP.

Two black-clad figures alighted nearby, their Mobility Arts spreading like phantoms.

Their fluttering black hems attested to the two supreme masters’ identities: the Desolate Divine Spear, Ak Surim, and the Law Enforcement Squad Captain, Un Soyu.

Ak Surim frowned slightly toward the distance. Setting both hands on her hips, she looked down from the roof. Jin Myeongjo, the Supreme Demon of Divine Blood, stood motionless by the main training ground.

As always, his head was tilted down to one side. He showed no sign of coming up.

“What are you doing? Our junior may have gained an insight. The least you could do is hurry over and stand guard.”

“Pay me no mind. I intend to inspect the perimeter. Three captains guarding a single direction? We ought not deploy our strength that way. It serves little purpose.”

“You have a point, in your own way...”

Trailing off, Ak Surim glanced at the Supreme Flame Dragon.

“You there, young Hwangbo.”

“... Yes, ma’am?”

He answered while looking down at the white streams of force. These core-energy fluctuations resembled those of the Radiant Sword Art, yet were different.

The shafts of light rising now were somewhat denser. They pierced the hall in scattered places before dissipating like mist, a profoundly mysterious sight.

Ak Surim did not rebuke his discourtesy. Wherever his eyes might be directed, her concern lay with Jung Yeonshin inside the hall.

Nothing else particularly mattered. Lightning Genius’s safety was what counted.

She spoke.

“How many days has our Lightning Genius been at this?”

“About nine.”

“So it really is something close to secluded training. No wonder the acting captain answered my message. What about his meals?”

“We’ve brought them on time. He still has growing to do, doesn’t he?”

“Nothing insubstantial like fasting pills, I trust?”

“How’s he supposed to build his body on those? He’s no Daoist ascetic, and he’s still growing.”

“Quite different from my lot. The Radiant Demon Squad takes good care of its captain.”

Ak Surim smoothly lowered a hand toward the residual martial force seeping between the roof tiles.

White light scattered at the end of her black silk sleeve, like mist stealing into the gray of dawn.

The corners of her lips lifted.

“What an unusual wave of force. So distinctive. This isn’t core energy taking tangible form, either. The residue from releasing his forms remains as dense internal power and adds to the force? He was practicing strikes, not circulating his energy. There’s no real need to stand guard.”

Ak Surim lifted her head, having spoken almost to herself.

“So you weren’t standing guard? You simply didn’t want to disturb Lightning Genius’s absorption? Hardly what I’d expect from the Hwangbo young clan head. Didn’t you act like royalty back in Jinan?”

“What a fuss. This counts as standing guard, too.”

The Supreme Flame Dragon answered curtly, offended by her question.

Whatever measure of courtesy he had maintained vanished without a trace. Even the way he shifted his weight onto one leg seemed to lay his unconscious habits bare.

Ak Surim paid the change little heed.

“And what is that one doing?”

She pointed toward one side of the roof, at its gently sloping corner.

A presence lurked there whose breathing was difficult to detect even with the keenest energy detection. It was Heon Wonchang, clinging upside down beneath the rafters.

He was out of Ak Surim’s sight, plastered there like a cicada. She tilted her head slightly.

“He’s learned an assassin’s secret technique quite well. Is he planning to assassinate his own captain?”

“The opposite. Though he’s making an enormous production of it.”

“He’s guarding him? Why from the rafters?”

“Because of the rumors going around lately. Apparently, several halls in the Desolate Fortress have lost their roofs. He says an attack might come from above, and he’ll intercept it himself. He’ll be lucky not to get crushed along with everything else.”

“...”

Her lips pressed tightly together, Ak Surim lightly leaped down.

RUSTLE.

With scarcely a disturbance, she reached the center of the main training ground in a single leap. Such was the footwork of a supreme master.

Not even dust rose, for she had landed on the scattered weeds.

The grass tips beneath her leather shoes did not so much as tremble. It was the realm of Grass Flutter.

Un Soyu, the Law Enforcement Squad Captain, descended naturally beside her, without even a hint of her presence. She had mastered the noble race’s Mobility Arts to their utmost.

It was a fearsome command of the body for a martial artist. As always, her elegantly arranged martial attire stood out.

“I shall return home,” she said calmly.

Ak Surim glanced at her profile and smiled teasingly.

“Weren’t you hoping to learn the knack of devising counters so easily? That would be rather important to the Law Enforcement Squad.”

“I intend to visit again at noon tomorrow. I must show the new captain my sincerity. If I tell him I called three times while he was receiving no visitors, he will at least hear me out.”

Having spoken in her soft, measured voice, she turned away.

TAP.

Ak Surim glanced at the retreating figure, then turned her head. Jin Myeongjo stood ramrod straight, an aloof bearing surrounding him. He was speaking with the blue-robed experts he had sent away from the Blood-Preserving Squad: Asura Demon Soul and Blood Saber Demon.

‘That fellow’s mind is impossible to fathom,’ Ak Surim thought.

The Supreme Demon of Divine Blood was an odd one. His pallor, which made his thoughts so difficult to read, was only the beginning. He did not participate in official Desolate Fortress events such as Black-rank sparring matches.

While keeping his thoughts well hidden, he had amassed tremendous merit against the unorthodox sects in particular. Judging by his qi fluctuations, his level of martial prowess alone could not account for it.

Beyond his Famed Ultimate Technique, the Flashing Blood Claw Art, he was concealing some dangerous move. He seemed more steeped in sinister, heretical ways than most Underworld experts.

Even now, a chill seeped from the question he put to his former subordinates.

“He hasn’t examined your martial arts even once?”

Pung Ran and Na Ilcheon’s pale faces turned whiter still. The Blood-Preserving Squad was said to be a combat unit closer to a military command.

There was little of a blue-robed expert’s dignity in their expressions. Only a few days had passed since they joined the Radiant Demon Squad.

In temperament, they remained closer to the Blood-Preserving Squad. For now, at least.

“The captain of the Radiant Demon Squad must have had too much on his hands.”

“He cannot be blamed. Aren’t the Blacks burdened with countless affairs?”

“Your qi fluctuations have grown sloppy. The flow of core energy breaks off here and there. It is a condition common to fools who try to master unfamiliar martial arts from a manual alone. Neither one thing nor the other. Pathetic.”

Jin Myeongjo spat out the words.

The captains under the Divine Sword Squad were akin to sect leaders heading their own schools.

If those they had taken as disciples were making poor progress, the impact was bound to be particularly great. Even anger would not have been an excessive response.

‘I sent them away shedding bitter tears...!’

Jin Myeongjo recalled the letter he had written Jung Yeonshin. Time and again, he had nearly shed tears of frustration.

The new captain of the Radiant Demon Squad ought not treat Pung Ran and Na Ilcheon this way. It was truly too much.

It was hardly as though he had secluded himself to devise a system for educating his juniors, like some scholar of the imperial court.

“Have you even seen your new captain’s face twice?”

“...”

Pung Ran and Na Ilcheon did not answer rashly. Any answer would dishonor either Jin Myeongjo or Jung Yeonshin, but their silence was an answer in itself.

The Supreme Demon of Divine Blood’s eyes darkened.

“Show me something. Can you perform three consecutive strikes with your usual breathing? If not, I shall demand an explanation from my distinguished junior.”

Feigning indifference, Jin Myeongjo stole a glance at the captain’s hall. He was trying to think of an excuse to leave the moment its door opened.

Demand an explanation, his ass. He had forced himself to say it only because it was what a captain who had relinquished his subordinates ought to say.

He thought. It had to be something he could rattle off in a single breath.

The experts around them took his words differently.

He was asking whether they could unleash three forms between an exhalation and an inhalation. These were the words of a Black-ranked supreme master.

They had to assume he meant full-strength strikes. It would be no easy feat for anyone.

STEP.

Pung Ran, the woman with a thin, curved saber strapped to her back, stepped forward.

Her epithet was Blood Saber Demon. Of the Blood-Preserving Squad Captain’s Flashing Blood lineage, she had learned the Flashing Blood Saber Art of Chaotic Traces.

Its central principle lay in relentless consecutive attacks. Even among blue-robed saber experts, she was often spoken of as a difficult opponent.

“I have made progress. It is merely slower than before,” Pung Ran said.

The Radiant Demon Squad’s main training ground fell quiet. The Blood-Preserving Squad Captain had revealed his anger, and attention converged on her in an instant.

Blood Saber Demon, Pung Ran.

She resembled the Supreme Demon of Divine Blood as though they shared the same blood. Her narrow jawline was blade-sharp against her snow-white face, yet her movement as she reached for the saber sheath behind her was exceedingly supple.

Already, irregular fluctuations of internal power spread with a keen edge. Like the Blood-Preserving Squad Captain, she possessed something uncanny.

SHING!

The blade’s dance began as she drew it.

The art she had learned from the Lightning Genius martial lineage was the Classic of Initiating Transcendence. Its principle was to momentarily increase strength by concentrating core energy.

That meant she had to demonstrate the power of her saber technique’s waves of force.

VROOM!

The combat path of the Flashing Blood Saber Art of Chaotic Traces uncoiled at length. The thin blade split the sunset’s halo.

Its blurring trajectory released a sharp wave of force. The humming was loud. With two swings, the very air seemed to tear.

The third was different.

SWISH!

Even the sound diminished. The wave of force weakened visibly. As she swept the saber horizontally, its tip dipped toward the ground and trembled slightly.

It was the same thing Kang Changmu and Wi Yeryeong had experienced earlier. She could not sustain her internal-energy breathing. The power in her fine meridians faltered on the third form.

She had reached a limit in an unfamiliar martial lineage that emphasized feel. Her nearly self-taught training was another problem.

It had not surpassed the original martial arts she had practiced for so long.

Continued training would resolve the issue. Yet the warriors of the Desolate Fortress could not lightly speak of some future day.

By blue-robed rank, an elite had to be ready for immediate deployment. Few words in the fortress were as shameful as “unfinished.”

In the sunset-dyed training ground, Pung Ran lowered her saber and bit her lower lip.

“...”

“You’ve regressed.”

Jin Myeongjo spoke with an impassive face.

“I can hardly even call it stagnation. Even the way you apply force has clearly grown clumsy...”

“...”

“You would have been better off concentrating on your original martial arts. Having witnessed it myself, I see this is no cause to reprimand my distinguished junior. It is simply your own inadequacy. You coveted martial arts beyond your station and lost your consecutive strikes. What more is there to say? Yes, Lightning Genius is not to blame. With his exceptional gifts, he bestowed extraordinary martial learning upon you, and the little birds simply could not follow the dragon.”

His cold words meant one thing: abandon the Lightning Genius arts she had taken up so late.

They also meant that these were not martial arts she could hope to emulate.

No one could refute him. The loftier the perspective demanded by advanced martial learning, the harder it was to master.

It was the same principle that made a well difficult to dig deeper. Indeed, it was even more arduous for blue robes than for white robes.

The only person who could properly use Lightning Genius’s martial arts was Lightning Genius himself. That failure would become apparent with time.

Silence persisted for a while.

Those watching the Blood-Preserving Squad members awkwardly turned away. Ak Surim said nothing either, merely watching the captain’s hall.

At some point, the light streaming between the roof tiles and through the door’s cracks had disappeared.

“Is there some way to teach the radiant demon arts more effectively?”

“Even if they learn them now, they’ll struggle to use them in coordinated attacks. I imagine they’ll start with small missions, like the other combat units.”

“We have problems of our own. We can’t handle opponents on the level of the Plum Blossom Swordsmen in group combat. If we had a suitable sword formation like the Suncheon Wing, replenishing our numbers would have been easier...”

The conversation continued without any effort to lower their voices. Blue-robed experts stood everywhere.

They knew that lowering their voices out of clumsy consideration would only deepen the humiliation.

The Radiant Demon Squad’s warriors offered comfort in the manner of experts, while worrying about themselves as well.

It was a noisy silence.

The Supreme Flame Dragon lay back down on the roof, and Heon Wonchang’s presence remained utterly still.

Chung Myung and Baek Miryeo, seated at an angle against the training ground’s wall, likewise focused on observing the white-robed warriors.

Until the door to the captain’s residence suddenly opened.

RUMBLE.

Ak Surim sprang atop the wall, her face full of delight.

In an instant, her black trouser hems swept up as she planted her feet on the wall’s corner. Dust rose beneath her.

“Our Lightning Genius! What have you been doing shut away in there? You weren’t sulking because I called you my nemesis, were you?”

“A moment.”

The brief reply rang out in a somewhat hoarse voice.

STEP.

Before all the Radiant Demon Squad’s experts could even cross the wall, their captain swept through the air with the wind.

Like a phantom, he abruptly alighted in the center of the main training ground, a mysterious sight. His whole body held a weighty balance, and only his black robes fluttered. It was his movement technique, Wind Body.

Jung Yeonshin’s appearance came into view.

He still wore his long black robe with his left arm bare.

His hair, now beginning to fall below his shoulders, was like ebony. The sunset’s light rippled serenely across it.

“Captain! Did you make a breakthrough?”

“You have no idea how long we’ve waited! You never once came to the training ground, yet somehow you look even fitter.”

Amid the enthusiastic greetings, only Jin Myeongjo was elegantly backing away, but no one paid him any mind.

Radiant Demon Team One—including Chung Myung, Baek Miryeo, and Heon Wonchang—and the squad’s veteran experts gathered around Jung Yeonshin.

They numbered nearly thirty. The clear air of early winter warmed in an instant. The experienced experts who had recently transferred in also moved awkwardly closer.

“So you’re a well-loved captain. Say, Lightning Genius! We...”

Ak Surim was calling out with a bright smile when it happened.

The Radiant Demon Squad’s experts each stepped back several paces. Jung Yeonshin had barely moved his lips.

The distance gradually widened. Their extended line formed a large circle.

With a smooth movement, the new captain planted both feet naturally on the ground.

First came a straight punch.

It was not fast. He extended it naturally, with crisp precision. A wave of force arose near his shoulder and scattered like snowflakes.

Some of the core energy filling his feet had raced to his hand. The overlapping energy grew denser.

The qi fluctuations around his body were not strong, yet his fist erupted at the limit of its reach.

WHOOOOSH!

The sensation of air tearing apart washed over them distinctly. It resembled the Infinite Blossom Hand’s Formidable Wall, yet was different.

Harmonizing with the footwork of Evading Swift Step, it extended with the long, flowing motion of a current. A fierce shock wave spread.

The second form was the same. As his hand continued sideways, the air lurched and warped.

It was Vortex’s wave of force. Light streamed from the rotating fluctuations gathered over his knuckles.

THUD! WHOOOOSH!

With every Burst Discharge, the martial force drew closer to tangible form. Scattered sunlight struck the waves of force and distorted into white light.

White radiance flashed here and there across his black-robed body, with a mystery so sharp it was frightening.

“That...”

Even as someone murmured, the forms continued. His third punch had already brought a hazy radiance into full bloom.

Before the aftereffects of the Infinite Blossom Hand’s Fist Blossoms could settle, a click came from Jung Yeonshin’s waist.

SHING.

With a prominently veined hand, he drew Northern Radiance. The cool air of early winter curled upward from the snow-white blade.

A crystalline quality spread in every direction, accompanied by a thickening silence.

One sword moved.

HUMMM.

Jung Yeonshin danced with his sword. Trajectories of radiance blossomed into countless streams.

The traces of his sword paths spread as rays of light and faded very slowly, while new trajectories filled their places.

It was as though he were awakening dawn within the darkening sunset. His black sleeve billowed with his sword-bearing right arm.

The denser the fluctuations of internal power became, the deeper the radiance surrounding his body like a heat haze grew.

Power impossible to produce with the qi fluctuations he had first revealed cleaved the air. His movements were founded on the Classic of Initiating Transcendence.

The Infinite Blossom Fist Strike, Evading Swift Step, and Radiant Sword Art melted into a single dance. Not one person present was anything less than an expert.

They all recognized it.