Chapter 1
Chapter 1
"Damn my luck. It's a real bitch."
Dog of the Sichuan Tang Clan, Tang Woon-hyuk, thought.
'Is this something I can't escape after all?'
Swishaaaaa-!
As heavy rain poured down on the field, Woon-hyuk scrunched up his face.
"Ugh!"
His right arm was severed, and his leg bones were shattered.
Countless swords and hidden weapons were embedded all over his body.
'If it weren't for the Heavenly Net...'
The dog chasing its prey had become the hunted, being chased.
Today marked the hundredth day.
Despite already reaching his limit, Woon-hyuk struggled to raise his body.
'Get a grip. The moment you weaken, it's over.'
He had to escape quickly, or his pursuers would catch up.
Just as he took a limping step.
Figures in green cloaks surrounded Woon-hyuk in an instant.
'Have they already chased me this far?In the center of the figures' chests, the character for Tang was embroidered in gold thread.
As they cleared a path, a middle-aged man wearing a bamboo hat revealed himself.
"Long time no see."
The man who walked out leisurely slightly lifted his bamboo hat, revealing his face.
"Ten Thousand Poisons Mad Dog."
"...Tang Wi-hyun."
The owner of the hunting dog Woon-hyuk.
The current head of the Number One Clan Under Heaven, the Great Sichuan Tang Clan.
Tang Wi-hyun kicked Woon-hyuk in the face.
"Cough..."
"You dare show your teeth to your master, you son of a bitch. Do you know how many elites the main family lost trying to catch you?"
A whopping thousand warriors had fallen to Woon-hyuk's poison skills.
King Yama Squad, Soul-Reaping Squad, Shadow Squad, Poison Dragon Squad, and more.
It was hard to count them all.
"Heh heh heh..."
Woon-hyuk staggered and wiped the blood from his mouth with his sleeve.
"So you even brought the Seven Soul Poison King Squad, the head family's direct unit?"
"You even removed the Gu poison I planted in you myself. To beat a mad dog off its leash, you need to prepare accordingly, don't you?"
What an impeccable bastard.
Well, the reason why this collateral line bastard, who wasn't even a candidate for head family succession, became the head was because of Wi-hyun's personality.
Woon-hyuk glanced around.
'Damn it, I can't see any way to escape.'
Not only the Seven Soul Poison King Squad, but all the warriors Tang Wi-hyun brought were masters beyond compare.
If his body were in perfect condition, dealing with them would be a piece of cake, but in his current state, it was impossible.
'In the end, the only way is to break through head-on...'
In a hopeless situation, Woon-hyuk tried to buy some time to recover his strength by talking.
"This is ridiculous."
"?"
"Gratitude tenfold, resentment a hundredfold. Isn't that the Tang Clan's principle? How much did I slave away like a dog under you? And this is how you repay my gratitude?"
"You..."
"Let's be honest here. If I hadn't landed a blow on the Blood Calamity Heavenly Demon during the Central Plains Blood War, do you think the Tang Clan could have risen to the position of Number One Clan Under Heaven?"
About ten years ago.
The Blood Calamity Heavenly Demon, Chun Yeon-hwa, unified all of the Outer Realm martial artists and invaded the Central Plains.
They captured a third of the Central Plains with unstoppable force, and the Alliance of Justice recruited masters from all over the land.
Woon-hyuk participated as the representative of the Sichuan Tang Clan.
"Insolent bastard!"
Unable to listen any longer, the leader of the Seven Soul Poison King Squad, Tang Moo-yeon, held a sword to Woon-hyuk's neck.
"You have a mouth, so you spout nonsense. Do you want to die!"
"Stop."
Wi-hyun raised his hand, and Tang Moo-yeon took a step back.
Wi-hyun took a step toward Woon-hyuk.
"Then aren't you curious? Why I kept driving you into deadly situations."
"Heh heh heh. It's obvious. Isn't it because of your pathetic inferiority complex?"
"......"
"You always have to be the best. When I mastered poison skills and was called the best in the Tang Clan, you must have been seething with envy."
"...So you knew."
Wi-hyun pressed down hard on Woon-hyuk's wound with his foot.
"Aaaaaargh!"
"That's why you should have kept a low profile."
"You son of a bitch...!"
"Well, you were always like that. Always acting like you were above your master, even though you were just a dog. I never liked that."
Wi-hyun remembered.
Woon-hyuk was different from the start.
"I admit it. You were the best of the hunting dogs I raised. You were so useful that I couldn't just get rid of you."
So Wi-hyun came up with a plan.
To give Woon-hyuk tasks that were high-risk but high-reward.
"If you succeeded, all the credit would go to the main family, and even if you failed, I could get rid of you, so it was a win-win situation."
"So..."
Woon-hyuk took a breath.
"Is that why you told me to deal with the Poison Demon Sect alone during the Central Plains Blood War?"
"You shouldn't have come back alive from there."
The Six Demon Sects.
The six pillars supporting the Demonic Cult.
Among them, the Poison Demon Sect caused a lot of damage to the Alliance of Justice during the Central Plains Blood War.
Wi-hyun was certain that Woon-hyuk would die then.
But.
"You tenacious bastard. Not only did you survive, but you even earned the title of Ten Thousand Poisons."
Wi-hyun gritted his teeth.
"Even though I, the head of the Great Sichuan Tang Clan, was there!"
"So that's why you're so desperate to kill me? Even with the Alliance of Justice?!"
Woon-hyuk was a meritorious subject of the Central Plains Blood War in name and reality.
Even Tang Wi-hyun couldn't kill him without justification.
But Wi-hyun laughed so hard that he tilted his head back.
"Hahaha! You must be close to death. I even set up the Heavenly Net to catch you. Did you think I wouldn't have thought of that?"
"...What?"
"The nameless martial art you learned. The Alliance of Justice has recognized it as the Demonic Art of the Universe Poison Demon."
The Demonic Cult had invaded the Central Plains not just today.
Among them, there was an invasion that made the Central Plains people tremble with fear.
The 4th Heavenly Demon of the Heavenly Demon Cult, the Universe Poison Demon.
Surprisingly, Woon-hyuk's nameless martial art resembled his.
But Woon-hyuk had never learned a Demonic Art.
"Don't talk nonsense. Do you think people will believe such lies?"
"Does it matter?"
"What?"
"From the moment the Alliance of Justice decided."
Tang Wi-hyun pointed to the sky with his finger.
"This is the will of heaven."
In that moment, Woon-hyuk felt his heart sink.
What the hell was he talking about?
The Alliance of Justice also agreed to kill him?!
They were supposed to be a group that upheld righteousness and chivalry!
"You wouldn't even dream of how much effort I put into the Alliance of Justice."
"Ha!"
"With money. Or something equivalent."
Wi-hyun smirked.
"I thought my back would break paying for your life."
Those sons of bitches.
No wonder every sect he tried to ask for help refused.
Was it because of this?
Woon-hyuk felt an indescribable sense of betrayal.
After the Central Plains Blood War ended.
They praised him as a hero, saying that the world owed him his life, and spouted all sorts of sweet words.
Woon-hyuk gnashed his teeth.
'...The world has turned its back on me.'
Public Enemy of the Martial World.
Woon-hyuk realized.
That there was nowhere for him to set foot in the world.
Even if he was lucky enough to escape the Tang Clan's pursuit, he was destined to die in the end.
'Fuck.'
How funny must Wi-hyun have found it?
His struggle to survive.
'I've worked my ass off. And in the end, all that's waiting for me is being discarded after I'm no longer useful.'
Woon-hyuk hung his head.
Wi-hyun chuckled.
"So this day has come. You're finally giving up."
Swoosh-!
Wi-hyun raised his sword high.
"Accept your fate quietly and..."
Whoosh-!
Wi-hyun swung his sword.
"Just die!"
"Not if I can help it."
Stumble-!
Wi-hyun lost his balance because Woon-hyuk grabbed his ankle.
The sword was stuck in the ground.
"Useless struggle!"
"I can't die like this, not when I'm so wronged!"
Whoooooom-!
A green haze rippled from Woon-hyuk's body.
"This is..."
Wi-hyun frowned.
"Poison skills?!"
Panicked, Wi-hyun kicked wildly at the hand that grabbed his ankle.
"Let go!"
"You idiot. Would you let go if you were me?"
"Kuhhhhh-!"
Poison spread through his sweat glands.
The pain was as if all the blood vessels of the Eight Extraordinary Meridians and the Twelve Principal Meridians were burning.
Wi-hyun's face turned dark in an instant.
"Let's go together, Tang Wi-hyun!"
"You goddamn bastard...!"
Right then.
"You bastard-!"
Slash-!
The leader of the Seven Soul Poison King Squad, Tang Moo-yeon, sliced off Woon-hyuk's wrist.
"Aaaaaargh!"
"Head Family Leader, are you alright?"
Wi-hyun gasped for breath.
He tried to drive out the poison, but it was so potent.
Wi-hyun's poison skills were second to none in the world.
But Woon-hyuk's poison was on a different level.
The best he could do was suppress it.
"This won't do. Head Family Leader. Please recover your strength first. I'll finish him off."
"Let go of me! No matter what, I will take that bastard's life with my own hands!"
Wi-hyun shook off Moo-yeon's support.
He staggered and stood in front of Woon-hyuk again.
Thud-!
The cold sensation from the tip of the sword touched Woon-hyuk's neck.
"You worm. This is really the end."
Was it because he lost a lot of blood?
Wi-hyun's figure looked blurry.
In that moment, Woon-hyuk sensed that his end was near.
'Tang Wi-hyun, you won't die peacefully either.'
He broke his poison core with the determination to die.
He was confident that no one in the world could detoxify the extreme poison he had created throughout his life.
Even the White-Clothed Doctor, one of the three great doctors in the world, could never cure Wi-hyun in his current state.
'I may be going first. But you'll follow soon.'
And he would experience the same terrible agony as if his whole body was rotting away until just before he died.
It might be better to die in one go like Woon-hyuk.
But Woon-hyuk didn't feel relieved at all.
"...Damn it. There are so many people I have to kill..."
Eyes wide open.
Woon-hyuk engraved the faces of Wi-hyun and the Tang Clan warriors in his eyes.
But it wasn't just them who betrayed him.
'The Alliance of Justice, and the entire Central Plains.'
Those who agreed to his death.
Those who remained silent as bystanders.
To Woon-hyuk, they were all targets for revenge.
"The world has abandoned me?"
Woon-hyuk let out a low laugh.
"Heh heh heh-!"
Rumble crash-!
Woon-hyuk was briefly illuminated by a flash of lightning.
His face was twisted in a demonic scream as he spat out blood.
"Then I will abandon the world as well!"
You're the heavens?
You're telling me to obey because what you decide is fate?
'Eat a dick.'
I will definitely defy the heavens and turn everything upside down.
"If you're going to kill me, kill me properly."
If not.
"I'll crawl up from the bottom of hell and shove poison down your throats."
Thwack-!
With that, Woon-hyuk's head flew off, and his vision went dark.
A feeling of floating in an empty space.
'Is this death?'
Then his consciousness was suddenly sucked into an unintended place.
"...Huh!"
Woon-hyuk's eyes snapped open.
A strange ceiling in front of him.
"Where the hell is this...? Ugh..."
He grabbed his throbbing head and raised his body.
Looking around, he saw a messy table with drinks and women lying around with their clothes disheveled.
Woon-hyuk knew where he was right away.
"A... brothel?"
No, is there even a brothel in the afterlife?
Woon-hyuk was dumbfounded.
He had clearly lost his life at the hands of Tang Wi-hyun.
But suddenly he opened his eyes, what was going on?
'Let's figure out the situation first. I need to know what's going on...'
The moment he struggled to raise his body.
A full-length bronze mirror in one corner.
His eyes met the face reflected in it.
"Wh-what...? Why is my face...?!"
"Ugh, ugh..."
The courtesan next to Woon-hyuk rubbed her eyes.
"Young master. What's wrong? Why don't you stay in my arms and sleep more... Ack!"
Woon-hyuk pushed the courtesan away and stood in front of the mirror.
He touched it here, touched it there.
He even pinched himself.
It hurt?!
"Th-this is..."
A body as thin as a dry twig.
Pale skin and a decadent atmosphere.
Woon-hyuk immediately recognized who the man in the mirror was.
"Dok Woon-hyuk?!"
In the past, Woon-hyuk had gathered all the information about the Poison Demon Sect in order to fight them.
At that time, he had only seen the wanted poster of Dok Woon-hyuk, the disgrace of the Poison Demon Sect.
The Woon-hyuk reflected in the mirror looked exactly like him.
'Why did I open my eyes in this guy's body?'
As far as Woon-hyuk remembered, Dok Woon-hyuk had died before the Central Plains Blood War even began.
The cause of death was alcohol and opium addiction.
Judging by how vivid his senses were.
'For now, it doesn't seem like a dream.'
Just as he was wondering what was going on.
Bang-!
The door of the brothel opened as if it would break, and a fierce-looking man came in and shouted.
"Dok Woon-hyuk, where are you!!"
Who the hell is that guy?
At that moment, Woon-hyuk felt a severe headache.
But the splitting headache soon disappeared.
Memories that were not his own, the original owner of this body, all came flooding back.
"Found you."
The man puffed out his chest and strode towards Woon-hyuk.
"You son of a bitch. You haven't even paid me back, yet you dare to play around at the Moonlight Pavilion!"
"Uh...?!"
Woon-hyuk, grabbed by the collar by the man, dangled in the air.
I see.
Who the man in front of him was.
'Black Bear.'
A loan shark famous for being ruthless even in the Yonggeum Room.
Thanks to Dok Woon-hyuk's memories, Woon-hyuk knew who Black Bear was even though he was seeing him for the first time.
"Can't you pay me back right now!"
A shout that made his mind flash.
Now Woon-hyuk could accept it.
'I'm alive again.'
At that time, Black Bear shouted, even spitting.
"If you don't pay me back today, you'll die by my hand!"
That couldn't happen.
How could he waste this opportunity he had gained?
'Just you wait.'
Woon-hyuk's eyes burned like flames.
'Central Plains, I will return soon.'