The Degenerated Cult
His target was the Anhui Mo Clan martial artist still clutching his throat, coughing and wheezing violently.
Thud!
A dull impact echoed through the cavern. The Mo Clan swordsman, who had swung his blade at the chime of the bell, collapsed in a limp heap as another shriek tore through the air.
"Flicking Finger Technique? I thought the Namgung Clan was strictly a house of swordsmen. Not bad."
"You're surprised by just that?"
In a flash, Namgung Yun surged forward.
The masked man in black leaped backward, widening the distance between them. He's trying to keep me from ringing the Ghoul Bell. But did the boy truly think such crude pressure could thwart him? Shifting through his footwork, the cultist raised the bell before Yun's eyes, preparing to ring it in blatant mockery.
A sudden chill ran down his spine.
Instinctively, the cultist yanked his arm back—yet he was a fraction of an instant too late.
Slash!
Fabric frayed, and a thin red line bloomed across his forearm. It was a mere scratch, shallow enough to barely break the skin, but it was more than enough to crush his pride into the dirt.
"You little bastard!"
Whooosh!
A terrifying, oppressive aura erupted from the cultist's body.
The Peak Realm, is it? Yun thought. To him, the Peak Realm was nothing remarkable, yet masters of that caliber were supposed to be rarities in the Central Plains. Lately, however, he seemed to run into them at every turn.
"I'll hack off your limbs and feed them to the wild beasts!"
Spewing a laughably cliché threat, the man drew the weapons slung across his back. They were sharp, wheel-like rings, gripped firmly in either hand.
Qiankun Wheels. An unusual choice.
Yet that eccentricity made them all the more troublesome. Few in the martial world had ever faced such weapons in earnest, and in combat, unfamiliarity was an undeniable advantage. Naturally, that did not apply to Namgung Yun.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
The masked man's strikes were exceptionally fierce. Combined with the erratic, bizarre trajectories unique to the Qiankun Wheels, their lethality multiplied several times over. At least, it would have against anyone else.
Whoosh!
Yun bent his waist, dodging by a hair's breadth. Even with his profound experience, Sword Thread could not directly clash against Ganggi. Thus, evading the aura entirely was his only viable option. It was a pragmatic compromise born of necessity, but to an outside observer, flitting back and forth like that could look rather frantic—and such evasive dancing had a knack for driving an opponent mad with rage.
"You slippery little rat!"
A single clean hit would blow the brat to pieces, yet the wheel simply refused to land. Worse, every time Yun's sword slipped through the openings in his assault, the cultist felt a cold shiver crawl down his spine.
What the hell is wrong with this kid?!
He had assumed that hated bastard was the sole peerless genius under heaven, but this Namgung Yun was just as monstrous. In fact, though Yun's cultivation realm was lower, his combat instincts and technical mastery were arguably superior.
These damn brats! Every single one of them!
The cultist was not a man blessed with healthy self-esteem. He despised anyone more talented than himself with a burning passion—and now, Namgung Yun had earned a place at the very top of that list.
"Aaaargh!"
Bellowing a feral screech, the cultist swung his Qiankun Wheels with reckless abandon. Yun stepped back a few paces, giving ground before the wild, frantic onslaught.
"Dieeee!"
Pumping his internal energy to the limit, a blaze of Ganggi enveloped the wheel. With a violent thrust, he hurled the spinning weapon straight at Yun.
It tore through the air with a bone-chilling shriek, rotating at terrifying speed. While its destructive power was formidable, given Yun's nimble footwork thus far, landing a clean hit seemed nearly impossible. Yet Yun did not move an inch.
Stupid fool!
A cruel sneer spread across the cultist's face. His gamble had paid off perfectly.
Directly behind Yun huddled the kin and servants of the Anhui Mo Clan. Most of them were non-combatants—people who had never learned martial arts, or had only practiced the barest basics. There was no way they could dodge a flying Qiankun Wheel. In other words, if Yun wanted them to live, he had no choice but to take the blow head-on.
That is the fatal flaw of you righteous hypocrites babbling about chivalry and justice!
Yun swung his sword against the hurtling wheel.
Cl-cl-cl-clang!
"Urgh!"
The Sword Thread enveloping Yun's blade wavered violently. It was only natural; Ganggi and Sword Thread operated on entirely different tiers of density and raw power. If anything, the fact that his thread of qi could withstand Ganggi at all was nothing short of miraculous. It was possible only because Yun drew upon centuries of martial profundity and battlefield experience, deflecting and bleeding off the crushing kinetic force.
Boom!
Yun finally managed to knock the Qiankun Wheel away. Yet it had come at a cost.
Drip.
A thin trickle of blood spilled from the corner of his lips.
"Hehehe. Spouting nonsense about chivalry and justice is exactly why you end up in this pathetic state."
A thin, durable filament was tied from the cultist's fingers to the Qiankun Wheel, allowing him to effortlessly reel the weapon back into his grasp.
"...Let me ask you one thing," Yun murmured coldly.
"What? Don't waste your breath if you're trying to buy time."
"Are you of the Demonic Cult?"
The martial arts the man displayed were far too familiar.
"Indeed I am. So you have eyes to recognize it after all." The cultist puffed out his chest with arrogant pride.
To Yun, the sight was nothing short of nauseating.
"The Demonic Cult has truly degenerated into filth."
"...What did you say?"
Assuming it was an insult, the cultist's voice dropped to a sinister rasp. Yet Yun had no intention of merely provoking him. He genuinely meant every single word.
"Was the Demonic Cult not a faction that revered the strong, holding the clash of pure might as sacred? Yet here you are, taking hostages the moment an opponent proves troublesome. If that isn't decadence and corruption, then what is?"
"What does a dog of the Central Plains know?!"
"Even this 'dog of the Central Plains' knows enough to see that your cowardly antics disgrace everything the Demonic Cult stands for. Though I suppose this must be the decree of the current Heavenly Demon. Considering that, I can hardly place all the blame on you. When the water at the source is rotten to the core, the stream below cannot help but stink."
"You insolent bastard...!"
Whether Yun had struck a nerve or not, the killing intent rolling off the cultist surpassed anything he had shown before. Yet Yun met his glare without flinching. He would never back down before such filth under any circumstances, but facing a wretch who dragged the name of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult through the mud made him all the more unyielding.
So it has truly come to this.
Perhaps this was for the best. Had the modern cult faithfully preserved his teachings, he might have hesitated to stand against them. But if they had degenerated into this...
Perhaps putting an end to them with my own two hands is the cleanest closure.
"Spoken with utter truth."
A clear voice resonated from the entrance.
He's here too.
It was Yang Woo. His eyes swept across Namgung Yun and the Mo Clan kin before settling on the masked cultist.
"May I assume that fellow is the mastermind behind this affair?"
"I haven't had the chance to ask," Yun replied. Between shielding the Mo Clan and uncovering the cultist's origins, he hadn't confirmed whether the man was the true puppet master. "Though by all appearances, it certainly looks that way. I've already seen him manipulating the Mo Clan with that strange bell."
"...The Ghoul Bell," Yang Woo murmured, his eyes locking onto the sinister bell in the cultist's grip.
"Ghoul Bell? Is that what it's called?"
"Indeed. It is an insidious relic that ensnares the minds of those trained in specific arts, turning them into puppets."
"What an utterly foul contraption."
Even setting aside matters of chivalry and justice, it was precisely the sort of underhanded trickery Namgung Yun detested most.
"I must offer you my sincere apologies, Young Hero. It seems this entire plot was orchestrated with me as the target."
"Looks that way."
The only people with any motive to send assassins after Yun were the Mo Clan, yet they were dancing on the strings of this masked cultist. Having made no other enemies since his rebirth, it was obvious Yang Woo was the true target of this assault. It isn't as though the original Namgung Yun could have provoked such grudges either.
Yet why had Yang Woo incurred such venomous hatred? And from the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult, no less.
He mentioned performing many chivalric deeds. Perhaps he foiled one of the cult's schemes.
Given the cult's fallen state, running foul plots across the Central Plains was entirely within character. It was also possible Yang Woo's own sect was a sworn rival of the cult. Whatever the reason, it doesn't matter. What mattered was that the cult had rotted away, while Yang Woo was a fellow martial artist who genuinely championed righteousness and chivalry.
"We already agreed not to care about who their target was," Yun said with a faint shrug. "Don't pay it any mind."
"I thank you for your generosity. Though it hardly suffices as compensation... allow me to handle this scoundrel."
A brilliant sheath of Sword Ganggi erupted from Yang Woo's blade.
"Should you really be lingering here?" the cultist sneered. "If you care so much about that precious chivalry you fawn over, shouldn't you be out there saving the people being slaughtered?"
"I wondered why those controlled puppets were butchering innocent folk. So that was your doing as well."
"Was there any better way to draw you out?"
Yang Woo's face darkened with boiling fury. "You spilled the blood of so many innocent lives for something so petty?!"
"Had you simply died like a good little boy, none of this would have happened."
"Bullshit," Namgung Yun cut in flatly.
"Had you quietly rolled over and died, none of this would have happened either. Trying to pin your own crimes on someone else—you truly are the most pathetic kind of coward. If you wanted Young Hero Yang dead that badly, you should have come for his neck yourself instead of hiding behind demonic trinkets. For someone prattling about 'Respect for the Strong,' you're as spineless as they come. Tsk, tsk!"
"Pfft!"
Yang Woo burst into a hearty laugh, the suffocating knot of anger in his chest melting away at Yun's sharp-tongued rebuke. In contrast, the cultist's glare turned venomous enough to freeze blood.
"...I've decided. Once I slaughter him, I'll carve you apart next. And I will make sure you suffer the most agonizing torment imaginable."
"Oh, please do. I'm begging you."
Yun didn't bother adding that in his past life, not a single person who made that exact promise had ever lived to see it through.
Step!
Yang Woo lunged forward, and the cultist rushed to intercept him.
KABOOM!
Steel met steel in a deafening clash.
In an instant, the gap between them became glaringly obvious.
"Gah!"
Despite all his arrogant jeering moments earlier, the cultist was blasted backward several paces.
Yun did not miss the opportunity. "Idiot."
The cultist glared daggers at Yun, but Yang Woo gave him no room to breathe. Frantically parrying a relentless storm of sword strikes, the cultist was pushed to the brink; it seemed only a matter of breaths before Yang Woo's blade separated his head from his shoulders.
Then, the intruders arrived.
Thud!
New silhouettes burst through the cavern entrance.
The cultist's face lit up in savage delight, while Yang Woo's brow furrowed.
"Tsk. So I couldn't shake them after all."
"Hahahaha! They are renowned masters from prominent clans of the Central Plains! Even you couldn't outrun them forever!"
Mo Seok-heon and Mo Seok-won strode into the cavern, flanked by a swarm of Mo Clan martial artists. Their hollow, unfocused eyes made it painfully clear that their minds remained shackled. Even a Peak Realm master like Yang Woo could not afford to take such opponents lightly, and his muscles wound tight with vigilance.
"What is this place?"
"To think the Anhui Mo Clan hid a cavern like this..."
Fortunately, those who had been holding them back had pursued them as well. Among the newly arrived crowd were members of the Shaolin Sect who had linked up along the way.
"So the Little Chivalrous Hero and Young Hero Yang were here!"
"You wretched boy, Yun! Acting on your own again?! Just wait until we return to the clan—I won't let you off lightly!"
"Amitabha! Let us set aside internal clan disputes for the moment. It appears we have found the true culprit behind this calamity."
Every eye in the cavern snapped onto the masked cultist.
"Bald monks, filthy beggars, Namgung dogs, and Zhuge runts... Every nuisance under the sun has gathered in one place. Good. That saves me the trouble. I'll slaughter every last one of you right here!"
The cultist raised the Ghoul Bell.
"Damn it!"
Yang Woo sprang forward to intercept him, but an onslaught from Mo Seok-heon and Mo Seok-won forced him back.
Jingle!
The chime resonated through the cavern.
Instantly, the movements of the Mo Clan martial artists shifted.
They no longer targeted Yang Woo. Nor did they lunge at the other orthodox factions.
Their hollow, lifeless gazes turned toward the defenseless kin and non-combatants of the Anhui Mo Clan.