Thousand Generations Cherry Blossom Dragon
“This… this is impossible! How can it be Mother’s lost martial art?!”
Thunder Emperor of the Eight Demon Dragons roared.
“Every trace was erased! It vanished into the distant past long ago!!!”
I piled acceleration upon acceleration. In the wake of my body streaking forward with godlike speed, black afterimages like ink with white cores dyed the world in every direction.
—Kwa-kwa-kwa!!
The forgotten footwork of the White Lotus Demon Sect—the ancient mother of the two great outer forces among the current jianghu’s four great powers of righteous, evil, demonic, and blood, the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult and the Blood Cult. Before me as I unleashed that very technique, the Patcheon Hyeolma Gunrimbo, everything shattered.
The air itself shattered. Every stretch of earth I trod cracked like thin ice.
—Jeong! Jeong! Jeo-eong!!
Straight lines carried the form of curves, and those forms transcended form itself to leap across space. The five branching streams of rigid killing qi that had been pursuing me were swept up into my ink-black afterimages with their white cores. They shuddered in the shockwaves. They collided with one another. They burst apart on impact.
My black martial robes hung in tatters. Meridians throughout my body had ruptured. My muscles were locked rigid as if about to explode. The shockwaves in the air had slashed both my cheeks horizontally, as if a great beast had clawed them open.
I closed the distance to Thunder Emperor. Gripping the Demon-Slaying Spears in both hands, I spat black blood and roared.
“Thunder Emperor!!”
Thunder Emperor cried out.
“Even protective true qi…!”
He poured every last scrap of power into summoning his protective true qi.
—Jja-ung! Jeong-jeong-jeong!!
With a thunderous crash like a massive iron gate slamming straight down, five walls of protective true qi—each more than a span thick—unfolded before him.
“Crash into them like a rat and die!”
I wrenched the hands gripping the Demon-Slaying Spears as far back as they would go.
—Kku-deuk, kku-deu-deuk!
Lightning crackled from the spears clenched in those hands. Pressure that felt as if every bone in my body were being crushed coiled around me. The walls of Thunder Emperor’s protective true qi filled my vision.
Thunder Emperor’s eyes flew wide.
“You mad bastard, you’re not slowing down at a—!”
“Pierce through!!”
I poured every last scrap of acceleration from the Patcheon Hyeolma Gunrimbo into the spears and drove them forward like a battering ram.
—Jeo-eo-eong!!!
A spear of black lightning stabbed into the shield of protective true qi wreathed in yellow lightning.
—…!
A hemispherical shockwave bloomed from the point where the tip of the spear met the protective true qi. Every sound was sucked away. As if my eardrums had burst, all noise was devoured.
And one beat later, a colossal roar erased every remaining sound.
—Kwaaaaaang!!!!
Earth heaved upward. Trees were ripped free. Stones were pulverized. Waves of air tore the surroundings apart as they exploded outward. Lightning tangled with lightning and surged into the night sky.
—Chwaak!
My grip on the Demon-Slaying Spears burst open from the palms outward.
—Wa-deu-deuk!
Thunder Emperor’s five fingers, thrust forward, snapped backward one after another. The entire world flickered madly with crimson light. Yellow lightning and black lightning writhed together, each trying to tear and devour the other.
“Uwaaa!!”
—Jjeok.
—Jjeo-jeok…!
The protective true qi began to crack and split. The Demon-Slaying Spears started to drive deeper. Like a sturdy ancient tree bending as a whole, the five walls of protective true qi swelled as if about to burst and bowed backward.
—Ku-gu-gu!
As the blocked spears and my body shoved forward, the ink-black afterimages of the Patcheon Hyeolma Gunrimbo thrashed like a black dragon in its death throes, and heaven and earth ruptured.
“I-impossible! My protective true qi… my protective true qi with every ounce of power poured into it…!”
—Jjeok…!
The cracks grew wider. I adjusted my blood-slick grip. I held my breath. With bloodshot eyes and the last of my strength—
—Cheok.
I took one additional step.
With a battle cry that was pure scream, I thrust my arms forward.
“Uwaaaaa!!!”
That was the period at the end of the sentence.
—Jeong-jeong-jeong-jeong!!!!
Like sugar candy shattering, the protective true qi exploded outward. Even the final wall crumbled. The iron spear Thunder Emperor had thrust forward was smashed to pieces as well.
—Chaang!
The Demon-Slaying Spears that had broken through everything spent the last of their strength. They failed to reach Thunder Emperor’s heart and could hold no longer; they snapped.
—Chaeng-gang.
The broken halves clattered across the ground.
Thunder Emperor and I shouted at the same time.
“It went through?!”
“Damn it! Not enough power!!”
I no longer had the strength left to lift a spoon. Every last scrap of demonic energy was exhausted, and the black lightning that had wrapped my body vanished. Before me stood Thunder Emperor, his bare body exposed.
I flung the remaining half of a Demon-Slaying Spear.
“Kh, distance…!”
Thunder Emperor hastily twisted his body and groped inside his robes.
“You think I’ll just let you?!”
I launched myself. Even as my legs gave out and I toppled, I latched onto Thunder Emperor’s body. Blood spraying, I locked my fingers together like a padlock.
“Let go! You damned bastard!”
“I’m never letting go!”
I clenched my blood-slick teeth hard and, even as I was shaken like a madman, clung to Thunder Emperor’s frame.
“You will never see the end of this night…! That’s right—you…!”
I roared through a mouthful of blood.
“Today you die with me for certain!”
Thunder Emperor flinched. He looked at me.
—O-ssak.
Beyond the red glow of his demonic eyes, a faint thread of fear stirred.
“Th-this…!”
Thunder Emperor shouted.
“You insane bastard…!”
“Eun Seollyeong!”
I squeezed my eyes shut and yelled.
“Finish it already!!”
“What? Don’t tell me—!”
Thunder Emperor whipped his head up in panic.
“No.”
A full moon hung in the sky. Beneath that full moon lay a lake that rippled as loftily as the sea itself. That lake was boiling like lava.
—Bu-geul-bu-geul!!
It was as if every scrap of life force were being sucked away. Even the mere concentration of qi made clothing flutter.
“Th-this can’t be possible…!”
“Good heavens, oh sky above!”
The surviving martial artists of the Jegal family sank to their knees.
—Ku-gu-gu…!
There stood Eun Seollyeong, raising a massive spear formed from every fragment of the Demon-Slaying Spears toward the heavens. All internal energy was concentrating around her. It was like a silver plum tree that had taken root in the sky, using the vast lake as its soil.
“Moyong Bi! Get clear! If I release it like this, you’ll be caught in it too!”
And Eun Seollyeong was hesitating. She was wavering on the very brink of unleashing it.
I bared bloodstained teeth and shouted.
“Damn it…! Don’t worry about me—just shoot, woman!”
Thunder Emperor sensed it as well. His thrashing to throw me off grew fiercer. His elbow drove into my gut.
“Keuaak!”
Blood sprayed from my mouth.
“E-even now!”
My locked fingers were about to come apart. After smashing even Thunder Emperor’s protective true qi head-on, I had no strength left.
“Let go of this!”
“D-damn it…!”
Thunder Emperor was weakest in close combat, and he was exhausted as well. But my condition was far worse. Even emergency recovery had not yet recharged. I had to hold on like this.
“Th… this…!”
My entire arms trembled as I tried somehow to endure, but my hands were slipping free. The moment the lock broke, Thunder Emperor would escape somehow. Then everything truly would be finished this time.
“I’m never letting go…!”
I did not know whether he still had jewels left for spatial transfer, but Thunder Emperor was clearly trying to pull something from his robes. It was reasonable to assume he had some additional contingency.
I gritted my teeth and forced the words out.
“Eun… Seollyeong! Please…!”
—Kku-gu-gu-guk…
The locked hands came apart. Now only the tips of our fingernails were barely hooked together.
Thunder Emperor ground his teeth and muttered.
“If… if I just get free of this…. If I just get free…! I absolutely cannot die like this!”
“Eun Seollyeong…!”
Every muscle in Thunder Emperor’s body swelled as he tried to pry my locked hands apart.
“Kh, kkeueuk…!”
Yet Eun Seollyeong’s eyes were still shaking violently. She was still hesitating. Blood trickled from her tightly bitten lips.
“I…! I…!”
I could feel it. For her this was not simply a matter of whether or not to release the technique. Driven from the imperial court, she had fled into the jianghu, and everyone in the Mount Hua Sect who had warmly welcomed her had been annihilated by her ultimate secret art. In a way, the single step she was about to take now was an act of open rebellion against the nightmare that had tormented her across countless ages.
I looked at the silver plum blossoms. I looked at her.
“….”
I opened my blood-soaked mouth.
“…Unlike that bastard, I absolutely will not die.”
—Heum-chit.
Eun Seollyeong flinched as if struck by lightning. Immediately she roared.
“Don’t spout such ridiculous nonsense! This is the crystallization of my grudge! Nothing in front of this can survive—if I fire it, you will die for certain—!”
I gasped for breath and shouted toward the sky.
“I promise you—I absolutely will not die! I…!”
I shouted toward her.
“I am the man who will become the Heavenly Demon…! You think I’d die to something like this?! I absolutely will not die! No—I cannot die! I cannot die before I become happy!”
“…!”
Tears welled in Eun Seollyeong’s silver eyes.
“So, so!”
With the last of my strength I clung to Thunder Emperor and roared.
“So damn it, please just shoot! Eun Seollyeong! Do you want us all to die like this?!”
“Uwaaaa!”
Eun Seollyeong screamed. She thrust her pure-white index finger high toward the heavens.
"Plum Blossom Waves Filling the Heavens—"
"The waves and ripples of plum blossoms fill the sky to the brim—!"
The Demon-Slaying Spears, now formed into one colossal spear, rose into the air. Plum blossoms scattered around the spear. Droplets from the lakeshore shot upward. Her internal energy detonated. Waves began to rise. Clouds gathered. With peals of thunder, a silver blizzard converged as one upon her spear. Gripping it in the form of a throwing spear, she was disaster itself descended from the heavens.
Thunder Emperor let out a death-throes scream.
“N-no!”
Eun Seollyeong wailed.
“Uwaaa! Moyong Bi!!”
Her cry was a sob that seemed about to burst from guilt. With a true-word chant and every last scrap of her power, Eun Seollyeong hurled the spear.
The ultimate secret technique of Eun Seollyeong.
—Sswae-aek!!
The colossal spear shot toward Thunder Emperor and me. Mid-flight the spear shattered into countless pieces in midair. Brilliant silver ice crystals scattered across the entire world.
And then—
—Deu-deu-deu-deu…!
With the sound of the entire world collapsing, what came crashing down over my vision was as if the winter sky of the whole world were falling.
—Ku-gu-gu-gu…!!
If one of the ten great hells said to exist in the underworld—the Sword-Tree Hell of forests made of blades—were inverted and poured down from the heavens, it would feel like this.
—Kwa-jik, kwa-ji-jik.
It was disaster itself, more than anything else in this world. Before the tidal wave of plum blossoms that radiated a chilling killing intent like white blades, everything was devoured.
“Haha.”
The entire world turned white. I spoke weakly.
“See? When you decide to do it, you can do it we—.”
The white storm of plum blossoms swallowed me. Before that storm of blades, everything was ground to nothing and returned to void.
“Damn it!!!”
Thunder Emperor, who had finally broken free of my lock a moment too late, thrust both hands forward. He tried to form and fire formless rigid killing qi once more.
“I cannot die so meaninglessly—.”
—Kwa-jik.
Like a kite string snapping and flying away, Thunder Emperor’s fingers were ground to shreds.
“My fingers?!”
Thunder Emperor’s entire body was ground away by the storm of blades.
“No, this cannot be! I, I…!”
Thunder Emperor screamed in terror.
“I cannot die so meaninglessly—.”
—Pyut.
Even Thunder Emperor’s final handful of screams was buried beneath the silver storm. Thunder Emperor was erased as if he had never existed in this world from the beginning.
The colossal tidal wave of snow completed the form of a vast dragon in a coiled posture. Scattering plum blossoms, it swept everything away with its tail. It soared into the sky.
—Ku-gu-gu-gu!
Cleaving the great full moon in half, the silver dragon rose into the heavens. It became a single slender flash of glittering light. It scattered into the void.
—Huuuung….
What filled the sky were silver plum blossoms drifting down like snow.
“Haa, haa….”
Beneath those scattering silver plum petals, Eun Seollyeong stood alone. Everything before her had been reduced to scorched earth. Mountains, trees, water—everything had been ground together, mixed, and turned into a quagmire. Not a single living thing remained there.