Five Elements Shattering Destruction Wheel
When Yeomurin failed to withstand a single sword strike and dropped to one knee, shock swept through the hall.
For one stunned instant, everyone seemed to lose their souls—but Yeomurin himself was in an even worse state. His eyes had gone unfocused, and he began babbling as though he simply could not accept what had happened.
"How...? This is impossible...! What in the world did you do to become this strong?"
It was a raw, desperate cry, tangled with every emotion imaginable. But that was all it was.
Why should Jin Somyeong bother answering someone who had been trying to kill him?
He was about to ignore him outright when an old memory flickered through his mind.
Was it on Sky Island?
Someone had asked him a similar question once before. How had he become so strong?
What did I answer back then...?
Ah. He remembered.
"Because I staked my life on the edge of my blade."
That was his answer.
Focus returned to Yeomurin's eyes as he sat there weakly on the ground.
"Ha. Haha... That's all it was?"
His lips parted as if he meant to argue, only to close again. For a fleeting moment, Yeomurin shut his eyes, opened them, and let out a long sigh.
"Yes. You're right. Had I known it would come to this, I would have risked my life and challenged the Deity Transformation stage, no matter the cost... It is bitterly regrettable that I let myself be bound by rules and never even tried."
Having laid bare the regret in his heart, Yeomurin's gaze hardened.
In the next instant, flames surged from his dantian, and a vast, distant aura spilled out.
He was burning his own Nascent Soul and converting it into magical power.
Jin Somyeong narrowed his eyes as the Thunder Sense Insight Law-Breaking Eye instantly analyzed the secret art his opponent had unleashed.
He understood the moment he saw it.
That was a choice that invited death.
The Nascent Soul was, in effect, the source of a cultivator's power. Once it was burned away, even victory in this battle would not allow Yeomurin to preserve his life. Yet there was not the slightest hesitation in him.
Yeomurin clenched his teeth against the pain and rotated both hands like windmills, compressing the energy of the Five Elements into a single point.
Craaaack!
A terrifying suction force erupted from the pitch-black point that appeared between his palms.
The black dot created a momentary vacuum around them, trembling violently—
Booooom!
A flash of light burst forth like an explosion and arrived right in front of Jin Somyeong's face.
Jin Somyeong's response to the strike Yeomurin had unleashed at the cost of his life was much the same as before.
He turned the blade he had brought down and cut upward along an oblique line.
It was an utterly ordinary sword stroke. Yet the meaning contained within it was something else entirely.
Magical power detonated from his heart, swept through the five viscera in an instant, and transformed into light.
A single line drawn along the tip of his sword divided the world in two...
And then—
"Hah."
Yeomurin gave a hollow laugh, as though the sheer absurdity of it escaped him, and was reduced to ash by white flame.
Silently watching his opponent's end, Jin Somyeong released a thin, drawn-out breath.
As he steadied his breathing, he inspected the inside of his body. Considering he had used Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust, his condition was remarkably good.
It felt about the same as an ordinary person finishing an all-out sprint.
He was tired, but not so much that he could not keep fighting.
It really is different now that Ojangbaekryeongyeol has reached great completion.
At this point, he could use Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust with only a slight overstrain.
Of course, spreading his Blood Wings and continuously circulating Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust inside his body was another matter altogether.
Based on his experiments, using one full circuit through the five viscera as a standard, he could endure up to two cycles.
A third cycle...
He had tried it once as a test aboard the flying ship on the way here and had nearly died. Jin Somyeong shook his head as the memory resurfaced.
Setting aside idle thoughts, he first collected the storage pouch Yeomurin had left behind.
Then he looked over the rest of the group, only to find that, for some reason, everyone wore almost the same expression.
Their faces had gone slightly stiff and blank, all of them looking so identical that they might have been painted from the same mold.
A drop of cold sweat rolled down Ju Gwang's forehead.
"What the hell..."
In truth, Ju Gwang had been planning to use the moment when Jin Somyeong drew Yeomurin's attention to circle far around the battlefield and free the cultivators bound by the ropes of flame.
But he had not even been given the chance to try.
Without a shred of exaggeration, the battle had ended in the time it took him to think, Huh?
It was absurd.
And Ju Gwang was hardly the only one feeling that way. Everyone present was the same. They stared at Jin Somyeong as if bewitched, mouths hanging open like people who had witnessed something beyond comprehension.
A Nascent Soul Peak cultivator. A powerful expert from Seongdo, no less. And Jin Somyeong had cut him down with two sword strikes.
It was so shocking that no one knew how to react.
After swallowing dryly several times like something inside him had broken, Ju Gwang finally opened his mouth.
"...That was an astonishing divine ability. You are no longer on the level of the Nascent Soul stage."
"Hm? Why are you suddenly speaking so formally?" Jin Somyeong asked as he sheathed his sword.
Ju Gwang laughed awkwardly and cleared his throat.
"Ah, sorry. I'm drunk out of my mind and not thinking straight. Ahem! More importantly, is everyone all right?"
Ju Gwang hurriedly moved to untie the one man and two women bound by the ropes of flame. Only then did they come to their senses and bow toward Jin Somyeong.
"I am Chae Yeonbi. Thank you for saving us."
Jin Somyeong waved a hand as if to say it was nothing, but the woman with short hair spoke with a grave expression.
"Yeomurin was the enemy of my family. I do not know whether someone of my ability can be of any help to a cultivator as powerful as you, Cultivator Jin, but if you ever need my aid, please call upon me at any time."
"Mm... I understand."
When Jin Somyeong nodded, the girl and the man beside her also expressed their gratitude.
"My name is So Yerin."
"I am Mu Hwirang. To be honest, I had heard plenty of rumors about you, Cultivator Jin, but... good grief. I never imagined you were this formidable."
No sooner had the introductions more or less ended than Ju Gwang cut in.
"Let's leave the greetings there and prepare to enter Hwanmongjingyeong. We don't know what kind of situation Fellow Daoist Hong is in, and Seongdo may send people to investigate this place. We'd best hurry."
"Let's do that."
Once they had erased the traces of battle and moved elsewhere, Ju Gwang handed out pentagonal wooden tokens engraved with the sun and a crescent moon.
"As you all know, if we want to enter Hwanmongjingyeong, we need to leave a marker outside."
"What is this?"
"Yin-Yang Tokens. They're made as a pair. No matter how far apart they are, each token can sense the location of its counterpart. Here, Fellow Daoist Jin, take one as well."
Jin Somyeong accepted the Yin-Yang Tokens and, as a test, threw the crescent-moon token far away.
When he infused magical power into the matching sun token, he could sense the exact location of the crescent-moon token buried beneath the snow.
So that's how it works.
When Jin Somyeong nodded in understanding, Ju Gwang said, "Good. Then let's each scatter and leave our markers behind. We'll meet back here in half a day."
"Understood."
If someone tampered with the marker left outside, escaping Hwanmongjingyeong would become difficult. They therefore decided to hide their markers in places only they knew.
Jin Somyeong pushed through the snowstorm to an isolated area, chose a suitable mountain range, and threw the crescent-moon token.
Ruuumble!
The token, driven by his tremendous physical strength, embedded itself deep underground and triggered an avalanche.
Seeing it naturally buried beneath thick layers of snow, Jin Somyeong nodded.
This should be enough.
The more obstacles there were, the less effective Divine Sense became.
Even with his Divine Sense now reaching fifty miles after consuming Gucheonyeongsimcho two more times, it was difficult to detect the token. Others would not find it easily.
After that, he crossed the sky in search of other remote places.
Rummaging through the miscellaneous items piled inside his subspace, he took out objects similar to the Yin-Yang Tokens and buried them here and there. He had no intention of relying solely on the Yin-Yang Tokens Ju Gwang had given him.
And one last measure.
Thuk!
He personally dug deep underground, created a cave, and squeezed true blood from his fingertip.
He did not forget to install a formation in the cave, one meant to prevent the aura emanating from his true blood from leaking outside.
Not enough.
He spent another five million units of Boundless Great Ability to strengthen the formation's concealment effect, and only then did he feel reassured.
Other items would be no great loss even if he misplaced them, but true blood was different.
The drop he had just squeezed out contained four months' worth of cultivation. He absolutely could not afford to waste it.
I'll retrieve it the moment I leave Hwanmongjingyeong.
Using the same method, he hid a total of three drops of true blood underground.
Then he took out the storage pouch he had collected earlier.
It had belonged to Yeomurin, a Nascent Soul Peak cultivator affiliated with Seongdo. Jin Somyeong was naturally curious about what might be inside.
The moment he absorbed the storage pouch using the power of the Mental Secret Realm, his eyes brightened.
Oh, are all of these spiritual herbs?
Spiritual herbs planted in fourth-grade flowerpots designed to preserve vitality appeared in great heaps.
A quick scan showed that most of them possessed special effects.
This one looks like it's used for detoxification.
Most were medicinal herbs used for treatment, but there were also poisonous herbs that damaged the divine soul or caused magical power to stiffen.
There are barely any cultivation herbs.
Perhaps it was because Yeomurin had already reached Nascent Soul Peak, but he had not been carrying spiritual items useful for cultivation.
Jin Somyeong set aside his disappointment and ordered his clones to transplant everything into the Mental Secret Realm.
He then checked the next spoils, only to find the storage pouch emptier than expected. To put it bluntly, Yeomurin had been poorer than Jin Somyeong.
Rather than poor, perhaps it felt more accurate to say he had been frugal.
Or he may have left all his valuables behind before coming to fight me.
The few spiritual treasures he had possessed had been destroyed during battle. Only one remained intact.
Soul-Illuminating Return-to-Truth Mirror.
It was the mirror that forced a target to reveal their original form.
He had gone to the trouble of defeating a Nascent Soul Peak cultivator, yet the harvest was this small.
Clicking his tongue in mild regret, Jin Somyeong examined the jade slips.
This is...
There were more than ten jade slips polished smooth from frequent use, and all of them contained the same cultivation art.
The basic cultivation art Paseongjingun had distributed for Qi Refining cultivators.
Five Elements Qi Refining Art?
At first, Jin Somyeong thought there were multiple copies of the exact same technique, but on closer inspection, their contents differed slightly.
Did he gather every version of the Five Elements Qi Refining Art circulating in the market?
If Jin Somyeong had to guess the reason...
Perhaps Yeomurin had been trying to restore the complete original version that had first been passed down.
Not something I need.
He set the Five Elements Qi Refining Art aside and moved on to the other jade slips.
Five Extremes Revolving Heaven Art, Circulating Void Return...
A long series of spells that manipulated the Five Elements followed, and many of them were quite useful.
Five Extremes Flash. This one is similar to Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust.
It was a spell that gathered the energy of the Five Elements into a single point and released a momentary flash of light, a fairly powerful secret art.
Of course, compared to Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust, it fell short in many respects.
Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust allowed him to accumulate more magical power in normal times, and as the circulation continued, that power amplified without end. In destructive force, it was overwhelmingly superior.
Still, there was value in using it as a reference, so he read through it carefully.
Studying Five Extremes Flash would likely help him control Condensing Light to Extinguish Dust.
I'll look at the rest later. Time to head back... Hm?
While sifting through the jade slips, he found a spell he liked enough to want to register in the proficiency system, something he had not done in a long time.
Ohaengswaemyeolryun.
The Five Elements rotated to form a ring, creating a massive suction force at its center. It was a secret art that drew in everything within a radius of several miles and reduced it to nothing.
Using his vast Divine Sense, Jin Somyeong quickly skimmed through the jade slip and nodded.
This is worth spending Boundless Great Ability on.
He registered it in the proficiency system immediately, only to find that the cost required just to enter the first stage was considerable.
A full thirty million units of Boundless Great Ability.
Spell Art
Ohaengswaemyeolryun — Initiate Stage 1 / 1,000,000
He had registered it for the moment, but when he examined why the cost was so high, he discovered that the spell had changed quite a lot.
It was no longer cast with pure Five Elements energy. It could now be performed with Five Elements Divine Lightning. Since the presence of lightning qi would make it stronger, that was naturally a good thing.
Shall I try it once?
The moment he converted his magical power into Five Elements Divine Lightning and pressed his palms together—
Crackle...!
A pitch-black point appeared in the air, and a multicolored halo shimmered around it.
When he examined the rainbow radiance discharging around the point, he saw that it was lightning qi mixed with various attributes.
Whooooom!
The violently raging snowstorm was sucked into the vortex originating from the black point.
The instant Jin Somyeong cut off the magical power sustaining Ohaengswaemyeolryun—
Booooom!
The black point, which had been pulsing through repeated contraction and expansion, exploded.
The accumulated snowstorm and cold energy burst outward, freezing heaven, earth, and everything in all directions.
After practicing it a few times, Jin Somyeong understood Ohaengswaemyeolryun's strengths.
The closer the distance and the longer the spell was maintained—allowing it to absorb more—the greater its destructive power became.
Not bad.
As he imagined how he might use it in battle, he invested more Boundless Great Ability. At the initiate stage, it was too slow and weak to use in actual combat.
├─ Stage:Skilled 1 / 10,000,000
└─ Stage:Orthodox 1 / 1,000,000,000
The spell art he had only just begun learning reached the Orthodox stage in an instant. He had become as proficient with it as though he had practiced for several decades.
Snap!
When he flicked his finger, a black point appeared in the air.
Its instant activation at the very moment he willed it into being was satisfying. With this level of speed, it would be more than enough for real combat.
Time to head back.
The promised half day had nearly passed. It was time to enter Hwanmongjingyeong.