The Heavenly Demon Copies Martial Arts

Crash!

What stopped me as I kicked off the ground to sprint was Eun Seollyeong.

"Commoner, have you lost your mind?!"

Under the blood-red sunset, a stream of water like gore began cascading down like a waterfall.

Rumble...!

With a tremendous roar, one side of the dam twisted and tore free. The iron-hide sheets that had sealed that section of the embankment were ripping apart one after another. The collapsing section grew larger by the second. Right before my eyes the hide was bursting open.

It had only ever been a stopgap, yet five layers of iron hide had been stacked and lashed tight with chains and logs. The executioner's blade hurled by the Jeomchang Sect's Guardian had started the collapse, but it had not brought the whole thing down in a single blow. That, however, was only a matter of time.

Thung! Thuthuthung!

The strain concentrated; the ropes and chains could no longer hold and snapped. Robbed of their supports, the tough iron hides were shoved outward and ruptured. Water was already spilling through. For the moment the outflow still followed the channel prepared at the foot of the dam, but that would last only an instant.

As the dam gave way, a storm-like wind whipped water spray in every direction. Eun Seollyeong's silver hair streamed as she seized my wrist and screamed.

"It's already too late! Commoner! No one who comes can stop that!"

"If we leave it like this everyone dies!"

I looked down at the village at the foot of the mountain.

"They'll die!"

People were beginning to emerge one by one from the wreckage of the earlier collapse, drawn by the enormous noise. When I tried to run again she caught my shoulder.

"I will not let you go! We have to flee now—if we miss this chance we both die!"

"If we can just hold the hide dam somehow—!"

I pointed desperately at the crumbling embankment.

"Of the two earthen barriers sealing the forked gorge, if the iron hide on this side only holds until the dam on the other gorge collapses, the villagers can live!"

"Does that even make sense?! Stop spouting nonsense and leave at once!"

I shook off her hand and shouted.

"You're a Guardian and you're telling me to stand by while ordinary people who have nothing to do with this die—!"

Slap!

Eun Seollyeong's palm cracked across my cheek. Bloodshot eyes glared into mine.

"You—!"

"Come to your senses! It's far too late to do anything! We cannot stop the dam!"

She cried out, voice raw with passion.

"Your body isn't even whole, Commoner!"

She never called anyone by name. Even with me she had always kept her distance with the title "commoner." Always cold, always rational, always maintaining a measured space. The earring that hung from one ear had always been black.

She shouted,

"Do you think I don't want to save them?! I want that too! But this is their fate! For a hundred years and more I denied it, yet in the end I had to accept it. Every person has a destiny already set. And ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠for those who try to defy it—!"

Beneath her wildly streaming silver hair her eyes were full of old grief.

"There is nothing to gain. At the end of all that thrashing only torment remains."

Thung!

Even as she spoke the iron hide burst outward like an explosion.

"Even for one who held ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the power of a Guardian, there was no exception!"

"..."

Without yielding an inch, silver eyes and black eyes locked under the burning crimson sunset.

KWA-AAAANG!

A massive boulder and an entire section of the dam came crashing down.

"Aaaah!"

"The dam's collapsing!"

"Heaven above!"

Distant screams rose as people farther down finally saw what was happening.

"Waaah!"

A toddler fell while running. A young couple fled with hair flying wild. Every scrap of peace was shattering. A woman who had been dragging her unconscious husband—his leg pinned under rubble—gave up escape and simply held him close.

My fingertips trembled.

"..."

I drew a breath. Let it out. At the end of the breath I tasted the metallic tang of blood. My entire body was already ruined. I had poured everything into the clash with Gang Chisang. Once again I had burned my innate true qi. Mumyeong had tried to stop me that time too.

One day Mumyeong had said: when a porcelain vessel cracks, no matter how perfectly you mend it the scar remains. No matter what peerless elixirs I swallowed, no matter what fortune followed me, the cracks in myself would only keep spreading.

Why is my life... my reality...

For a moment I thought I was simply exhausted. Exhausted down to the soul, ready to melt away. If I stepped forward again now I felt I would cross a river from which there was no return.

All I had ever wanted was to be happy. Yet that path was so unbearably hard. Why was the world so merciless? Why so cold?

Once, half-complaining, I had said as much. Mumyeong had answered:

That is the clearest proof that this is reality, not imagination.

I had cursed and sighed, calling it nonsense. He had added,

Because reality is so cold... only very rarely. Very rarely, you understand.

The crimson sunset blazed before my eyes.

When Heaven grows capricious and works a miracle, it looks that dazzling.

With the burning twilight at my back the villagers' screams echoed through the gorge. I gasped for air. The world spun. I planted a hand on my knee and muttered,

"I haven't lived a hundred years like you. I haven't even lived a few decades."

"What?"

"I'm not especially clever either. My emotions are endlessly clumsy—I just get stupidly angry."

I spoke while looking straight at Eun Seollyeong.

"I received a heavenly opportunity, yet even after that reality never went easy. I wanted to live the life storytellers always talk about—the carefree life of the greatest under heaven, surrounded by beautiful women, drinking and singing, cutting down ten thousand men with a single sword and making fools of schemers. But..."

Under the red sunset I moved lips caked with dust and blood.

"Unfortunately I've lived a life far too distant from the jianghu the storytellers describe."

Faint lightning began to boil beneath my feet.

"...Commoner, why are your eyes turning red?"

Eun Seollyeong stared into my pupils.

Kiiing.

Deep inside me the power of the Heavenly Demon began to awaken. She had lived long. Beyond my reddening eyes she saw something surging.

"This... this aura...! It can't be..."

Confusion filled her gaze. Then she sensed the unconcealable demonic qi and the inner power boiling up from the Heavenly Demon Jade itself.

"This is—!"

Her eyes flared with burning rage.

"H-how dare—!"

Her voice was thick with fury.

"A demonic creature, and you brazenly deceived me with those red—!"

"Shut your mouth!"

She froze.

"That status, that origin—from the bottom where I stood they all looked the same! A person's appearance doesn't define him. His status doesn't define him."

I shouted with a voice thick with blood.

"The actions I take—right now—those alone gather to define who I am!"

Woooooom!!!

Almost no internal energy remained. Every wound that had barely begun to close tore open again. Black lightning mixed with crimson blood-lightning began to pour out.

"I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠have always drawn my own life with my own hands. Even if the end of that drawing was neither more...!"

Trickle.

Black blood ran from the corner of my mouth. Blood vessels burst in both eyes. My meridians twisted.

"...nor less than that!"

Gush.

My body was a wreck. In this state reaching the fourth stage the way I had earlier was impossible. Even so I dragged every last scrap of power to the limit and, when that was not enough, scraped up the final dregs of my original true qi. The crystallization of all of it—the martial art into which I had poured my entire life—raced through my body!

KWA-AAAANG!!!!

"Commoner!"

Eun Seollyeong staggered back, shielding her face from the flying dust. The first verse activated and black lightning wrapped my entire body. I clenched my teeth hard enough to crack them and leapt in a single bound. Everything receded into the distance. I stepped my final footwork of this life against the crimson twilight and climbed against the current of water.

Yes. And I swear—

When Asura of the Eight Legions had transmitted Sura-dae-myeol-geop-jin to me, he had said clearly:

The moment you learn this you will think of a certain way to apply it. I beg you—do not do that one thing.

From the very beginning he had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠known. Asura had known it would come to this.

I kicked off the dam and climbed.

Ping! Ping-ping!

Chains and ropes were snapping. Beside me the dam facing the opposite gorge—the one leading away from the village—was also beginning to collapse, but the iron-hide dam was failing faster still.

"...!"

Hesitation lasted only an instant. I threw my body.

Chwaaak!!

One hand seized a chain. The other grabbed a thick bundle of rope.

"Ah... aaaah!!!"

Kwachik, kwajijijik!!!

I held on while jet-black lightning mixed with blood-vessels erupted from my whole body.

Chwaaaak!

The skin of my palms peeled away completely. From the start the first verse of Sura-dae-myeol-geop-jin—Geuk—was nowhere near enough. Even the final stage, Ryu, would not have guaranteed success. There was no way Geuk alone could hold. Yet the meridians this art used were already burned and shriveled; applying a higher verse of the same lineage was physically impossible now.

Gugugu...

My body was being lifted. Before the colossal force of the water, no single person could hold a bursting iron-hide dam.

"Uwaaaah!!!!"

My arms were wrenched outward as if I were being torn apart by horses and oxen in the ancient punishment of quartering.

Kiiing

Crimson light exploded from both eyes. I had expected this. I had prepared for it. If I was to turn even a fraction of the impossible into the possible in this situation, there was only one path left.

"Namsang Samadhi!"

The voice of the Heavenly Demon that always echoed in my mind screamed in a damp, gloomy tone.

Something shattered inside my skull.

Crack.

Overload slammed through my mind. Every meridian boiled. Things that should never coexist collided violently. I vomited blood.

Crack.

Memories broke apart one after another. The memory of waiting endlessly for someone on a vast plain. The memory of being beaten and driven out. Days of starvation, a broken sword clutched while I wept. Begging for even a scrap of teaching, rolling through the mud, pretending the mockery never hurt.

Crack.

I had endured by believing a better version of myself must exist somewhere. Abandoned by my father, I endured. Watching my mother freeze to death before my eyes, I endured. I swallowed humiliation as if it had never happened. I apologized even when I felt no guilt.

Crack.

I broke my dreams and worked simply to eat, scraping together coins. When I lifted my head the glittering life I had dreamed of was nowhere; only I remained, crawling on the ground and enduring. Yet I comforted myself that this was simply the process of becoming an adult. That was reality, and everyone shouted that it was only natural. Even so I kept walking. No matter how hard it became I would keep walking. I had done so until now, and I would do so from now on.

Because I had done that—

I moistened my lips with blood and forced the words out.

"The me of this moment exists."

Kwarururung!!!

I burned everything. My entire body began to rupture. Onto a body already dying under the first verse of Sura-dae-myeol-geop-jin—Geuk—the Heavenly Demon Cult's Heaven and Earth Great Shift was overlaid. Two martial arts tangled and threatened to explode inside a single flesh.

"Guaaak!"

Charruk!

Blood sprayed in every direction as I held the rope.

"Uwaaaah!"

The speed at which the rope slipped through my grip slowed.

Jijijik!

It nearly stopped.

"Euk...!"

I wept. Weeping from the agony I poured every last scrap of strength into both hands. The length of rope still left was less than a handspan. The collapse of the iron-hide dam slowed dramatically. Far below, villagers who had been fleeing began to stop one by one and stare.

My hands were already soaked in blood. They slipped little by little.

"Th-this... no! Please!"

I clenched my teeth and tried to hold. My whole body shook. The rope continued to slide out—slowly, but without stopping. If I lost this line the collapse could no longer be prevented. I tried to adjust my grip, but there was no margin left. The moment I let go even for an instant everything would fall.

"I... I can't..."

Jijijik...

The end of the rope was vanishing. Even as I felt it leaving my palm I could do nothing.

"I can't hold on any longer...!!"

I ground my teeth. Even as my molars cracked, the helplessness was so bitter that tears welled. Blood poured from all seven orifices; through that blood the tears gathered and ran down my chin.

Ping!

The blood-soaked rope snapped free of my hand—

Whirik!

—and a hand wrapped in silver bandages snatched it out of the air.

Kwaak!

The rope stopped.

"...Ah!"

Whiik!

Eun Seollyeong's other hand clamped over my own blood-slicked grip.

"Keuk... for this seat... for this seat to help a filthy man of the Demonic Cult like this...!"

Everything was dyed the color of blood—the twilight of a crimson lotus. Beneath that twilight the Guardian of the Mount Hua Sect stood before me and looked me in the eye.

"This humiliation...! I will most certainly repay it later."

Eun Seollyeong declared coldly.

"So do not die. Hold on! Moyong Bi!"