The Incomplete Heaven and Earth Great Shift
With a crack, I snapped a piece of charcoal left smoldering from the torch.
I began writing across the floor.
“To get out of here, the only way is a frontal breakthrough against those wooden men. Roughly a hundred of them, by my count.”
I kept scrawling.
The martial arts I currently possessed—copied through the Heavenly Demon’s power—numbered five in total.
Kongtong Sect’s Hwan-yeong-dae-sin-bo.
Mount Hua Sect’s Plum Blossom Spinning Dagger.
Moyong Family’s Ssangryong-seonpung-geom.
Shaolin Temple’s Vajra Demon Subduing Fist, basic twelve forms.
And last, incomplete and impossible to realize: the Heavenly Demon Cult’s Heaven and Earth Great Shift.
“Of these, the ones with the greatest destructive power—Ssangryong-seonpung-geom and the Blood Demon Four-Wheel Chain Sword—are out of the question no matter how I look at it.”
There’s a chance the secret cave could collapse, and the earth-shaking roar could call back the other wooden men that have already gone down the hole.
I drew thick black lines through Ssangryong-seonpung-geom and the Blood Demon Four-Wheel Chain Sword.
“In the end, all I can rely on is the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist grounded in Hwan-yeong-dae-sin-bo. But at my level, the fist art isn’t even an ascending martial art to begin with. It’s only good for trading blows, never for unilaterally punching a path through. I need something stronger.”
Then there’s only one answer.
I nodded.
“There’s only one martial art that can make this possible.”
I jabbed a period at the end of the charcoal-scrawled sentence.
“Incomplete first-rate ascending martial art—Heavenly Demon Cult’s Heaven and Earth Great Shift.”
Heavenly Demon Cult first-rate martial art: Heaven and Earth Great Shift.
A demonic art that used the internal energy in one’s dantian as a fuse to explode the body’s latent potential.
Jeokmaryeong’s interference had played a part, but it was an ascending martial art I had failed to copy completely the first time, overwhelmed by the sheer vastness of its information. I had been notified it was impossible to activate. Because it remained incomplete, no matter how many times I tried with the red eyes, something always tangled midway and the art cut off.
Using the Heavenly Demon’s power, one first takes a rubbing of the target’s martial art, then brings over the skeleton, and adjusts the musculoskeletal system and meridians so it can be implemented without issue. Currently the Host has completed the rubbing process and brought over the large framework of the skeleton, but the mental and physical transformations and meridian arrangements based on experience and practice have not yet been done.
I picked up one of the three rusty iron swords lying on the floor and infused it with internal energy.
The blade hummed and trembled.
For a master who already possessed a full jiazi of internal energy, this would have been child’s play. But I had suddenly gained a massive amount through Cheonbaeksam. Applying internal energy with nothing but my own raw skill—without leaning on any copied art—was endlessly clumsy.
Once I blew the sword apart.
Fortunately I yanked the energy back just before the explosion and barely avoided being shredded by the fragments. After carefully feeding power into it for a full shichen, I finally succeeded in lodging a faint amount of energy in the blade.
Mumyeong continued speaking into my mind.
It’s not complete, but in any case you’ve absorbed the knowledge of that martial art. If you endure the massive side effects and prepare the physical foundation through bone-grinding practice, a path will open. Just like how if you keep poking at a clogged bamboo tube, the brush might get mangled but it’ll eventually clear.
The brush might get mangled.
That analogy sent a chill through one side of my chest.
“….”
Slowly feeding energy into the sword, I cut the rim at the tip of the iron spear.
Internal energy leaked out in streams. Any action that did not rely on a copied art was ultra-high difficulty for me. I could only attempt it because of the sheer volume of energy I now possessed. Condensing that power and gathering it on the edge felt like trying to fill a fist-sized gourd by pouring a waterfall into it. For that single small act I wasted nearly a full jiazi of internal energy and panted for a long time afterward.
After several attempts I finally severed the spear. I tore long strips from my clothes and lashed the broken sword fragments to the end, fashioning a crude spear.
“Hoo. Then.”
I swung the weapon I had made. It settled into my grip as if it belonged there. Feeling the cool touch of metal, I stared at it for a long while. It would have been a lie to claim I felt no reluctance. But this was the only method left.
A giant rat scuttled past. I had no idea what it had been eating, but it was far from ordinary size. Taking advantage of the quiet, the creature poked its head out and darted into one side of the cavern. I hurled the spear with everything I had. It punched straight through the middle of the forearm-thick body.
The wooden men seemed to react only to me—the one who had touched the swords. They paid no attention whatsoever even when the rats swarmed, gnawing at their feet and feeding.
The exact name of the wooden men before your eyes is Manryeonmok-in—Myriad Lotus Wooden Men. Made by mixing ten thousand kinds of medicinal herbs and drying them for a thousand days. They usually use corpses or animal carcasses… Looking again, that one was carved from an animal carcass.
“Ten thousand kinds of medicinal herbs means almost spiritual creatures… Rat meat that grew fat on such things.”
I opened the iron door set into one side of the bars. As if it had been waiting, a single wooden man standing right in front stepped inside. Bracing for my whole body to be raked, I threw myself forward and slammed the door shut again.
“Kyaaaa!”
The wooden man that had entered the cavern raised its hands and charged. Gripping the spear, I fought a desperate life-and-death struggle. It was grueling, but there was only one of them. Somehow I won. I used the fallen wooden man as firewood—to roast meat and to warm my body. In the damp underground, it was the only way to solve both food and body heat.
Drinking Amjeongcheongsu—Dark Pure Water—as your water and eating rat meat raised for hundreds of years on Myriad Lotus Wooden Men as feed. Though not intentional, I guarantee it’ll help nourish the body to the level of an ordinary spiritual creature.
Mumyeong spoke while I chewed for a long time on a piece of moldy roasted rat meat. I drank the Dark Pure Water and survived on the rat flesh. That solved the problem of food.
From then on I devoted every remaining moment to a single purpose.
My body heat climbed until sweat poured. The chains—each as thick as a fist—were massive iron weights in themselves. I wrapped them around my limbs.
Heaven and Earth Great Shift was a trait that maximized basic physical ability in order to amplify the destructive power of other martial arts. To acquire this incomplete art that had not yet fully permeated my body, I had to use a martial art I had truly mastered as a guide, gently drawing the incomplete technique out so it could seep into me.
Among everything I currently possessed, the only art that was approachable and whose overall flow I already understood was the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist, basic twelve forms. Even if I had to endure the side effects, even if I had to force it, even if I only reached one star—I would apply the incomplete Heaven and Earth Great Shift to this fist art. To do that, I first had to master the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist beyond the level of mere copying, engraving it into my very soul.
I stepped the footwork hundreds of times, thousands of times, while swinging my fists. It was not simply following like a puppet whatever rose in my mind. Beyond the mental image, I repeated the movements infinitely until they truly became mine. The number of repetitions required for that:
A minimum of a hundred thousand practices is needed.
That was not all.
Physical training of the body itself is needed. It’s an incomplete Heaven and Earth Great Shift. The reason the martial art fails to manifest now is because the body blocks the activation midway in order to survive. Unlike the complete version, if you force-activate something that was never even fitted to the Host’s body, there will be tremendous external burden. So you need to forge a body that can withstand it.
“Got it.”
And the completion of Heaven and Earth Great Shift needed to break through those wooden men is at least—
I picked up the last remaining iron sword.
—estimated at two stars.
First: perfect mastery of the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist beyond mere copying.
Second: physical training sufficient to endure the incomplete Heaven and Earth Great Shift.
Those were the realistic training goals Mumyeong and I set.
I sacrificed the final iron sword to cut free a protruding rock. The eight weeks of training under Pahwanggun had been the only basic regimen I knew how to perform—the proven method the strongest master I knew had confidently drilled into me. Swimming up a waterfall. Sitting and standing while hugging a boulder. Rolling a log.
This alone isn’t enough.
I spent another two full days carefully loading internal energy into the sword tip and carving a continuous groove into the cavern wall that ran all the way to the ceiling. Because of the way the chamber narrowed almost into a circle as it rose, beyond a certain height you were forced to hang almost entirely by your hands; almost no strength could be put into the toes. After my internal energy was completely drained and I lay feverish for a full day, I was finally able to begin the real training.
I tightened the chains that had slipped down my arms and legs. In that state I shouldered the rock, wrapped the remaining chain around my body, and fixed it in place. Then I attempted to carry out Pahwanggun’s training method exactly as before.
I collapsed without completing even a single movement.
I can’t even do this.
I had grown weak. Perhaps I had grown lazy for a short while. Or perhaps the thin air here made everything harder. Or I simply hadn’t eaten properly or rested properly. Or the combined weight of chains and rock was simply too much for reckless effort. I had taken pride in finishing Pahwanggun’s eight weeks of hellish training. Yet falling after failing to climb the wall even three times struck me like a blow.
No. This is my current level. I have to acknowledge it.
Blood welled from under my nails. Panting, I stared up at the ceiling. The line I had carved high above looked as thin as a single hair.
I can’t give up.
I gritted my teeth. Sitting there, I felt the cold of the floor seeping through my backside.
If I give up, I die here. Nothing more, nothing less.
That cold raised goosebumps so sharp I could not remain lying down even for a moment.
“Haak! Haak!”
I vomited while training with the rock in my arms. I fell while crawling toward the ceiling. My legs screamed and I rolled across the floor. I thought they were broken. But the body strengthened by the Heavenly Demon’s physique refused to let the bones snap.
I can’t die here!
It would have been a lie to say it did not hurt. It would have been a lie to say I did not want to stop. It would have been a lie to say I did not want to give up right then.
Get up. Move! If you don’t want to die!
In the darkness where no one watched, I flared the red eyes and performed the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist like a madman, still wrapped in chains. Traces were gouged into the floor. The same footwork, dozens of times, thousands of times, carving deeper and deeper. Beyond the iron bars the wooden men stared in silence like crows waiting for death.
After thousands of repetitions I thought it might be enough. I tried applying Heaven and Earth Great Shift to the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist. No—before that, ignoring every warning my body screamed, I forced myself to follow the formula and stimulate the latent power within.
My entire body turned itchy and stinging at once. Then violent cramps twisted every muscle and I vomited hard. I brought up the Myriad Lotus Wooden Man meat I had eaten. Beyond the meat came dark-red clots that looked more like shredded innards than blood.
I understood with my whole body why it had refused to activate.
Still far. A long way yet.
Mumyeong’s voice was dry and flat.
“Haa…! Haa!”
How long did I have to keep doing this? I hung alone in the darkness. I trained. I rolled. I sat and stood. I performed the forms over and over until I collapsed exhausted in a corner. It felt like wandering an endless cave with no exit in sight. How much longer?
The overwhelming, hope-crushing despair was heavier than anything I could have imagined. The wooden men’s gazes—staring piercingly through the dark as if wishing for my death—only dragged that despair higher.
I cried. But making a sound felt like losing, so I jammed my fist into my mouth, gritted my teeth, and wept in silence.
Don’t act spoiled. The Host may feel wronged, thinking he voluntarily chose this hellishly harsh training and therefore has the right to feel sorry for himself. But that isn’t true. This is not special training at all.
My mouth filled with the taste of iron. The time spent breathing blood-flavored air that felt ready to burst my lungs was longer than the time spent breathing normally. In the sparse fragments of memory that remained, Mumyeong’s voice continued.
The masters recorded in the history of the jianghu—where only the strong survive—all went through training of this intensity without exception. Get up! If you don’t want to die, do it! It isn’t a question of whether you can. Do it! Absolutely do it! Pull it off!
After crying silently for a long time, I flared the red eyes again and trained like a man screaming, like a man howling. My fingernails tore free. My toenails tore free. They grew back. They tore free again. They grew back once more.
The groove I had carved to the ceiling grew wider and deeper with every ascent and descent—hundreds of times, thousands of times. The places where the chains rubbed against the rock on my back were ground down until deep channels appeared. On one side of the cavern, rat bones piled higher than my own height. Later I crushed even those bones and ate every last fragment. Everything that could recover or strengthen the body, I consumed without leaving a scrap. I drank the Dark Pure Water; when that was not enough I pressed my tongue to the rock and licked for a full shichen. At Mumyeong’s word that the moss growing nearby had a slight effect on internal power, I scraped it off and ate that too.
The chains restraining my limbs finally wore through from friction and snapped. The rock floor, gouged by the endless footprints of the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist, could no longer hold and broke away in chunks. The boulder I had rolled, hugged, and dropped over and over finally split in two under the repeated impacts.
The final form of the Vajra Demon Subduing Fist basic twelve forms: front stance, straight punch.
At the tip of the shockwave that burst the air, red lightning flashed together with black lightning.
The momentum accelerated. At first only a single straight punch was wrapped in lightning. Then the kicks. Then the footwork itself. The impact sounds and clusters of light that shook the cavern grew stronger and more frequent.
“Haa… Haa!”
In the darkness I tore at rat meat, licked mossy stagnant water, and continued training that bordered on self-torture while the death-wishing gazes of the wooden men pressed in from the side. Because I trained with bloody tears in my eyes, I never heard the final words Mumyeong muttered almost too faintly to catch.
…Of course, the masters who endured this kind of training all the way to the end appear only about once every hundred years.