Chapter 210: Hapsan Sect-2
Chapter 210: Hapsan Sect-2
The old man was flustered.
The white-clothed young man had looked precisely at them as if he knew everything, even though they had hidden for a whole week without being discovered by anyone.
The old man had no choice but to consider fleeing for a moment.
'Can I grab I-rang and run from that guy?'
But the old man's worry ultimately became pointless.
Because the young man soon turned his head back to look at the main gate of the Hapsan Sect.
As if he did not care about the old man's presence, he simply approached the main gate without hesitation.
Then he slowly placed his palm against the main gate.
The next moment, accompanied by a great explosion, the main gate burst apart.
Kwaaaaang!
The people were completely horrified.
Now there was no further need to doubt the young man's intentions.
He truly meant to strike the Hapsan Sect.
A young man who appeared to be only in his early twenties had single-handedly, and head-on at that, charged into the Hapsan Sect, the strongest power in Guangxi Province.
The girl, completely excited, shouted at her grandfather.
"Look at that, harabeoji! That person really broke the Hapsan Sect's main gate! How can someone do that?!"
But the old man only muttered blankly with a shocked expression.
'The successor of the Hainan In Clan... was he alive? But why would he... the Hapsan Sect?'
Then he hurriedly spoke to his granddaughter.
"I-rang! Wait here! This old man is going to follow that young man!"
"What? No, harabeoji! I have to go too!"
"What? No, you little rascal! It could be dangerous!"
"He'll be the one fighting, so what's dangerous! I'm definitely going! Don't stop me!"
And then she launched herself toward the Hapsan Sect's wall even before her grandfather.
Pabak!
"I-I-rang! You little!"
The old man, Son Dae-su the Drifting Cloud Guest, shouted urgently and had no choice but to follow his granddaughter.
The girl clung to the Hapsan Sect's wall and peered inside.
Inside the wall, numerous warriors were already on the verge of clashing.
The girl clinging to the wall asked her grandfather who had followed and clung beside her.
"Look at that, harabeoji. Those are the Black Jackal Squad, right?"
The ones she spoke of were an armed force of about two hundred men clad in black martial uniforms.
They were growling at the white-clothed young man as if about to pounce at any moment.
Then her grandfather, Son Dae-su the Drifting Cloud Guest, nodded and answered as if groaning.
"Yes, the Black Jackal Squad. Black jackals indeed. All two hundred-plus warriors of the armed force that boasts being the strongest in Guangxi Province have swarmed out."
As he said, the Black Jackal Squad was the strongest armed force in Guangxi Province, one that had found no match in the region in recent years.
Even the Jun Family Estate, which had been the strongest sect in Hapsan before the Hapsan Sect, had been unable to stop their advance and collapsed in a single day.
And yet now, these two hundred-plus men, led by the Black Jackal Squad leader Ho Jo-young, a peak-level expert with eighty years of internal energy, were pressuring the young man.
Ho Jo-young glared at the young man with sharp eyes and shouted.
"Who are you?! Who dares to break the Hapsan Sect's main gate?!"
But even before the two hundred-plus Black Jackal Squad, the young man merely smiled derisively and answered.
"It is not a name to be told to the likes of you. Bring out the sect leader, Eo Jeong-gi."
At that arrogant answer, Ho Jo-young twisted his expression and shouted.
"You dare! It seems you have a death wish! Only after drinking a cup of punishment...!"
That was when it happened.
Cutting off Ho Jo-young's words, the young man spoke with an expression of annoyance.
"My, how noisily you bark. Was the name Black Jackal Squad given because you bark as well as jackals?"
At those words, Ho Jo-young could no longer hold back.
Enraged, Ho Jo-young shouted.
"You dare! Everyone, strike that bastard down!"
The Black Jackal Squad warriors were all bloodthirsty men.
Like water trapped behind a dam, they were murderous demons ready to burst out and see blood at any moment.
As Ho Jo-young's order fell upon such men, they began surging toward the white-clothed young man like a torrent that had burst forth in an instant.
"Kuahahahaha!"
"Eeyaaaaap!"
"Dieeee!"
Their momentum was truly like a tidal wave.
A violent torrent that seemed as if it would sweep away whatever stood before it in the blink of an eye.
The white-clothed young man standing before it looked as helpless and precarious as a pebble before a tidal wave.
The girl watching from hiding unconsciously let out a distressed sigh.
"Oh no!"
But the reaction shown by the young man who seemed about to be swept away was not fear, but a sneer.
The young man, who smiled with one corner of his mouth slightly raised, soon charged head-on into the torrent of Black Jackal Squad warriors.
"Haaaap!"
It was a sight that seemed as reckless as throwing a stone at an oncoming tidal wave.
But the next moment, the old man Son Dae-su and his granddaughter Son I-rang became unable to close their gaping mouths.
Because the young man's sword had split apart the tidal wave of Black Jackal Squad warriors.
Chwaaaak!
The young man's horizontally drawn sword split open the space before him.
Indeed.
It looked as if space itself had been split.
An incomprehensible sight, as if a crack had opened in the world itself and the abyss was visible through the gap.
Compared to that, the fact that the waists of the charging Black Jackal Squad warriors were all split apart seemed merely incidental.
The old man Son Dae-su muttered in horror with his mouth agape.
"Wh-what is that...!"
The next moment, the white-clothed young man, having broken through the front-line warriors and leaped in, began rampaging like a wild beast that had leaped into a flock of rabbits.
"Haaaap!"
Shuhyaaak!
"Kuaaaak!"
"Aaaaak!"
Now it was simply slaughter.
It was impossible to tell who was the jackal and who was the herbivore.
Shuhyaaaak!
Countless cross-shaped sword silhouettes appeared and disappeared around the young man.
Each time, the Black Jackal Squad warriors merely screamed and collapsed helplessly.
"Kuaaaak!"
"Aaaaaak!"
The Black Jackal Squad leader Ho Jo-young, who had been blankly watching the scene, suddenly snapped to his senses.
His subordinates were being slaughtered.
Because their formation had already collapsed, if he could not stop that momentum, the entire Black Jackal Squad might truly be destroyed by that single man.
Gritting his teeth, Ho Jo-young drew his blade and charged at the young man.
"Stop, you bastard!"
Above the blade of this expert with over eighty years of internal energy, a large green blade aura emitted a dense light.
He put all his strength into striking down at the white-clothed young man's back.
Shuhyak!
But even as Ho Jo-young's blade slashed toward the young man's back, his gaze did not turn toward Ho Jo-young.
He seemed completely unaware that Ho Jo-young was bearing down on him.
The startled girl Son I-rang involuntarily cried out.
"Look out!"
At the same time, Ho Jo-young's blade slashed across the young man's back.
Shyaaaak!
'Got him!'
Ho Jo-young laughed triumphantly.
To possess such skill yet not notice him bearing down — the bastard had to be extraordinarily dull-witted.
But the moment his blade was about to slash the young man's back, Ho Jo-young's face froze stiff.
Because the young man's body had moved as softly as air and narrowly slipped out of the blade's effective range by the margin of a single sheet of paper.
It was a precise evasion that seemed difficult even when watching it happen.
"?!"
And at that moment, without even looking back, the young man swung his sword horizontally.
Shuhyak!
Ho Jo-young could only be horrified.
It was a lightning-like sword strike completely beyond all expectation.
"Keuk!"
Ho Jo-young hurriedly raised his blade to block his front.
Then he barely managed to block the young man's sword strike.
Jjeoeong!
No, he had thought he had blocked it.
That was before his blade was pushed aside and, at the same time, the young man's sword came down vertically.
A sword strike drawn in the shape of a cross.
It was the Southern Cross Sword of the Southern Sea Sword King In Jeung-ho, the former greatest sword under heaven from long ago.
Shuhyak!
Faced with the young man's sword strike coming down like lightning, Ho Jo-young could only widen his eyes.
And with that, it was the end.
Chwaaak!
The Black Jackal Squad members could only mutter blankly, completely forgetting they were even in the middle of a fight.
"H-how can that be... ."
"Th-the Commander... in a single strike?"
They simply could not believe the scene that had unfolded before their eyes.
Their Daeju, who had always stood at the vanguard and delivered overwhelming martial prowess upon their enemies, had been split in two by this single sword strike.
It was the moment the Black Jackal Squad, the pack of black jackals who had always torn their opponents apart without fear, completely lost their will to fight.
The Black Jackal Squad warriors now stopped their swords and their feet, staring with terror-filled gazes at the corpse of their commander split in two, and at the youth who had made him that way.
But the youth did not stop his sword just because they had lost their will to fight.
The moment he took another step forward, he appeared among the Black Jackal Squad warriors as if he had teleported through space.
And he drew his sword.
Shaaak!
"!"
Puhahak!
After that, it was nothing but slaughter.
Chwaaak!
"Guaaaak!"
"S-spare me!"
Son I-rang, who had been staring blankly at the scene, suddenly asked her grandfather Son Dae-su.
"Grandfather, just how strong do you have to be to do that? Is that orabeoni a transcendent peak master?"
"......."
Son Dae-su could not answer.
Even for him, possessing over eighty years of internal energy, it was a martial prowess he dared not measure.
At a glance, it seemed he had not surpassed the transcendent peak realm, yet the occasional strike he revealed was so terrifyingly formidable that he wondered if even a transcendent peak master could do such a thing.
Moreover, the fact that the one displaying such martial prowess appeared to be merely in his early twenties made it utterly impossible for Son Dae-su to open his mouth.
It was then.
The white-clothed youth, who had finally annihilated the Black Jackal Squad single-handedly, shouted in a resonant voice filled with internal energy.
"Where is Eo Jeong-gi, sect leader of the Hapsan Sect, the lackey of the Hengshan Sect and the Hainan Sect?! I am Inparang, successor of the Hainan In Clan, come to avenge my father!"
Those words were delivered with absolute clarity, not only to the disciples of the Hapsan Sect, but also to Son Dae-su and Son I-rang who were secretly hiding and watching, and to the martial artists who were cautiously peeking from outside the gate.
And the martial artists who heard those words could only look at each other with successively shocked expressions.
"...What did he just say?"
"Th-the successor of the Hainan In Clan?"
"He said avenge his father?"
"Th-then, the sudden disappearance of the Hainan In Clan's family head back then was...?"
"And didn't he just say they're the lackeys of the Hengshan Sect and the Hainan Sect? If those words are true, then the ones who harmed the Hainan In Clan's family head are precisely...!"
While the watching martial artists buzzed in startled chatter, the mind of the hidden observer, Son Dae-su the Drifting Cloud Guest, began to turn rapidly as well.
And the deduction that rose in his mind was on a level far higher than what the other martial artists were chattering about.
'The intelligence that the Hapsan Sect is a subordinate organization of the Hengshan Sect was something we had already obtained. But the Hainan Sect? Then the Hainan Demon Sword Jin Tae-do?'
His mind spun quickly, piecing the story together in an instant.
'That's it! Come to think of it, back then, after In Gye-un, the family head of the Hainan In Clan, disappeared and Jin Tae-do became the sect leader of the Hainan Sect, the Hainan Sect suddenly began taking steps to renounce their orthodox faction status, which allowed the Hengshan Sect to easily ascend to the Nine Great Sects. Could it be that all of that happened under mutual agreement? As a condition for handling the Hainan In Clan? And they've been secretly communicating ever since, creating puppet sects to occupy Guangxi Province?'
He didn't know if it was true, but Son Dae-su felt as if his mind had suddenly become clear.
It felt as if all the stories had suddenly snapped perfectly into place.
Son Dae-su turned his gaze back to the white-clothed youth, still advancing as he slaughtered the Hapsan Sect warriors, and to the pure white sword he was wielding.
In his youth, Son Dae-su had once seen the White Tiger Sword, the sacred relic of the Hainan Sect, from a far distance.
It was a sacred relic passed down since the time of the Namhae Sword King In Jeung-ho long ago, but it had vanished when In Gye-un, the family head of the Hainan In Clan, went missing.
But in this moment, looking at the youth's white sword, Son Dae-su could be certain.
'That sword is definitely the White Tiger Sword.'
Though it was a distant, fading memory, Son Dae-su could be certain that the sword the youth held nearly perfectly matched the image of the White Tiger Sword in his memory.
The White Tiger Sword had revealed itself to the world once more.
'If that's the case....'
If that sword was indeed the White Tiger Sword that had vanished back then, then at the very least, the fact that this youth was the successor of the Hainan In Clan seemed to be a clear truth.
And if he was truly the successor of the In Clan, then the tragic tale he spoke of regarding the In Clan family head's disappearance was also highly likely to be true.
'As expected, the Hengshan Sect was behind the Hapsan Sect after all! And those Hapsan Sect bastards were also collaborating with the Hainan Demon Sword Jin Tae-do!'
It was then.
His granddaughter Son I-rang, who had been gazing at the youth as if entranced, let out a soft exclamation of admiration and spoke.
"Wow! Grandfather, did you know that orabeoni hasn't stopped walking even once so far? Ah! Look! He must be a peak-level expert! Three peak-level experts are rushing at him all at once!"
Son Dae-su, too, was watching that sight.
The three peak-level experts rushing in together were undoubtedly the Hapsan Three Swords, the famous peak-level masters of the Hapsan Sect.
Though all three were individuals who had never breached the eighty-year wall of internal energy, they were known as masters who could perhaps even face a transcendent peak master with their combined attack technique that was close to divine.
But Son Dae-su shook his head.
No matter how strong they were, their opponent was the youth who had single-handedly annihilated the Black Jackal Squad.
Unless one was a true transcendent peak master, it was certain they would not be able to stop his advance.
And he could confirm the accuracy of his prediction immediately.
Because the moment the youth's sword carved several cross-shaped sword images into the empty air, all three of the Hapsan Three Swords collapsed, spraying blood.
Chwaaak!
"Kuaaak!"
"Guaaak!"
"M-my brothers! No! Aaaaak!"
Watching that scene, his granddaughter Son I-rang burst out in admiration and spoke.
"Wow! That sword technique is really amazing! What did you say that sword technique was called?!"
Then Son Dae-su answered with a wry chuckle.
"The Southern Cross Sword. It's the sword technique used in the past by the Namhae Sword King In Jeung-ho, the greatest sword under heaven and the number one under heaven."
Indeed.
The sword technique the youth was using was unmistakably the Southern Cross Sword.
The very sword technique known to have had its lineage severed after the disappearance of In Gye-un, the family head of the Hainan In Clan.
So there was no way that the youth wielding the Southern Cross Sword with the White Tiger Sword was not the successor of the In Clan.
'I've obtained intelligence I never even imagined.'
Son Dae-su could realize that he had achieved results from this reconnaissance that far exceeded his expectations.
He had to convey these facts to his comrades quickly.
His heart urgent, Son Dae-su spoke to his granddaughter Son I-rang.
"Let's go back quickly, I-rang. We must hastily relay the intelligence we've gleaned here to our comrades."
Then Son I-rang asked with puzzled eyes.
"You mean to deliver this news? Hmm... but is it really necessary for you to deliver it personally? Even if you don't relay it, Grandfather, it seems like it'll spread all on its own. So many people saw and heard it, didn't they? Wouldn't it be more helpful for us to keep watching beside that orabeoni instead?"
Son Dae-su could tell that his granddaughter was making excuses because she didn't want to leave this place.
But....
Son Dae-su suddenly looked toward the direction Son I-rang had pointed at with her finger as she spoke.
Then he could see the martial artists who had gathered to protest against the Hapsan Sect exchanging opinions with excited expressions.
And seeing that, Son Dae-su could finally realize that he had been too agitated himself.
Indeed, his granddaughter's words were correct.
This rumor would surely spread in an instant, not only throughout Guangxi Province, but to Guangdong Province where the Hainan Sect was located, and Hunan Province where the Hengshan Sect was located.
'And it will likely cause great waves.'
He had openly pointed out two giant sects as the backers of the Hapsan Sect and the murderers of the Hainan In Clan family head In Gye-un, so there was no way they would sit still.
They would surely try to resolve the problem of this youth called Inparang by any means.
Probably even by killing that youth.
And that youth, who was destroying the Hapsan Sect alone, would not be able to face those two sects alone either.
Because facing the Nine Great Sects and a giant sect of equal power simultaneously, all alone, would be impossible unless one was an absolute being of the martial world.
'That's right. That youth certainly won't be able to face them alone. But... what if that youth is not alone? What if he has allies to help him?'
An unbearable sense of anticipation and a smile rose on the face of Son Dae-su as he thought of a certain possibility.