Chapter 23
Chapter 23
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 23
Chapter Title: Jeok Hwa-ryeon
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Cheongun felt disappointed.
It had buckled much sooner than expected.
Why had he asked her name?
Because he was curious? As if.
What good would knowing a demon's name do?
He'd just asked to piss her off.
"Jeok Hwa-ryeon."
Fortunately, it was a name he knew.
She was quite the named NPC—impossible not to recognize.
In truth, he'd sensed something off from the moment he first saw her.
Her striking appearance and flashy attire meant she had significant weight in the story.
In that sense, Jeok Hwa-ryeon was a character meticulously crafted for game enthusiasts like him.
Cheongun eyed her with half-lidded gaze.
Perhaps due to the pent-up emotions, Jeok Hwa-ryeon's face was flushed as she huffed and puffed.
Tears were even welling up in her eyes!
Cheongun, uncharacteristically, smiled brightly and asked,
"You're a demon, right?"
"Can't you tell?"
"You've cultivated demonic arts too, I bet?"
"Yeah."
"What's the name of the demonic art you learned?"
"Hah! What do you need that for?"
As Cheongun raised his hand again to strike her Demon Seal Acupoint, Jeok Hwa-ryeon panicked and opened her mouth.
"W-Wait a second!"
"Hm?"
"No, why do you need to know what demonic art I learned? Are you planning to learn one now?"
"As if."
"Then quit fucking asking!"
Cheongun simply stared at her.
Suddenly, her attitude grated on him.
"You've been speaking casually to me this whole time?"
"Then should I use formal speech with trash like you...?"
Before she could finish,
Whoosh! Something sliced through the air, and in an instant, her face slammed into the ground.
"Aaaagh!!"
Excruciating pain tore through her body as her forehead split open.
Blood spread across the dirt floor.
The moment the thick scent of blood filled the air, Jeok Hwa-ryeon realized something had gone terribly wrong.
But it was already too late.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
Cheongun repeatedly smashed her head into the ground.
Amid the onslaught of horrific pain, Jeok Hwa-ryeon instinctively sensed death and immediately drew up her inner energy.
But Cheongun wasn't just going to watch.
He pressed his palm to her forehead.
A searing energy flowed through her acupoints into her body via his palm strike.
Demons fundamentally cultivated demonic arts, which carried yin energy.
Her extreme yin inner energy clashed with Cheongun's extreme yang inner energy.
Naturally, the basic demonic art she'd built up couldn't overcome the pure inner energy Cheongun had forged with the Heaven-Earth Primordial Unity Qi Art.
The energy she'd been gathering in her body was forcibly disrupted, and the backlash made her cough up a mouthful of blood.
"Y-You think you'll get away with this?"
"Yeah, I think I will."
"If I die, the God Cult will form a subjugation squad."
"Oh? That sounds good to me."
"......"
This bastard—is he serious?
His eyes said he was.
Jeok Hwa-ryeon suddenly sensed her own death.
A sliver of hope vanished.
Terror of death flooded in to fill the void.
Regardless,
Thwack-thwack-thwack!
Cheongun began striking her acupoints with his fingers.
"S-Sp... spare..."
"Ah, don't worry. I won't kill you. Just your dantian—no more, no less. You know what a dantian is, right?"
Jeok Hwa-ryeon's pupils filled with horror at those words.
"Just kill me instead!"
"Nah. Why kill a demon?"
"I'll get revenge!"
"Sure, but what can you do with a shattered dantian?"
Jeok Hwa-ryeon thrashed desperately, but it was futile.
Whatever he'd done to her acupoints made her insides churn every time she tried to gather energy, and no amount of struggling freed her from his grip.
"It'll sting a bit."
Cheongun placed his palm near her Sea of Qi Acupoint.
The moment he channeled his energy, she'd lose her dantian instantly.
Suddenly, Jeok Hwa-ryeon's eyes reddened.
From the moment she'd become a demon, she'd lived assuming death was always possible.
She'd brainwashed herself into fearing nothing, but now facing actual death, overwhelming terror surged.
Her head buzzed, her stomach burned like melting, and her legs trembled.
"Urk..."
Her throat tightened, tears plopping down.
Jeok Hwa-ryeon had lost her parents before she was even ten.
Righteous faction warriors and unorthodox ones got into a quarrel, fought without regard for their surroundings, and her innocent parents nearby died as collateral.
No apology, no compensation—of course.
They left, and she lost her parents in an instant before her eyes.
Powerless and weak, she hadn't even had a chance to demand justice.
She wandered the streets, dreaming of revenge.
But how could a girl with nothing achieve vengeance against martial artists?
No strong backing, no master to teach her arts—revenge was a mere illusion for such a girl.
Then, by chance, she caught the Heavenly Demon God Cult's eye and learned demonic arts, gaining the inner energy she'd so desperately wanted.
She was just taking her first steps toward revenge.
To advance further, to impress the God Cult, she'd volunteered as a mere tax collector to prove her worth.
And now.
It was all about to crumble in one go.
"Hey, crying?"
"......"
"You're really crying?"
"......"
Jeok Hwa-ryeon's eyes were stained with fear and regret.
This was all part of Cheongun's plan.
He hadn't spent days methodically breaking her spirit for nothing.
Only when she wouldn't spout lines like 'Kuh! Kill me!' even on the brink of death did he proceed leisurely.
He'd pondered it carefully.
Even with a shattered dantian, a demon was still a demon.
No issue activating the ability.
So why not shatter every demon's dantian?
No.
The amplification was greater against stronger demons than weaker ones—much greater.
Thus, he needed a way to control them without shattering their dantians.
Cheongun paused and asked her,
"Want to live?"
"......"
Jeok Hwa-ryeon nodded, tears streaming.
Cheongun nodded back in satisfaction a couple times and pulled something from his bosom.
It was a pure white silk cloth.
Unwrapping it revealed a single pill glowing red.
Blood Gu Poison.
A treasure stored in the Bloodline Pavilion headquarters' elixir room.
"It's a deadly poison. Specifically, Blood Gu Poison."
Jeok Hwa-ryeon froze for a moment.
Blood Gu Poison—a name she'd heard before.
An infamous toxin where, without an antidote once a month, the heart poison burrows in and devours your organs, leading to death in agony.
Moreover, each recipe's antidote method varied slightly, making it impossible to detox without the one provided by the maker—Cheongun.
Thus, Cheongun thought,
The moment she ingests it, won't she become my enemy regardless of her feelings?
This would allow him to keep a demon as an ally while activating the ability.
"Eat it."
"......"
"Not gonna? Oh well, then straight to the dantian..."
Before he finished, Jeok Hwa-ryeon gulped down the poison.
"Do you know what Blood Gu Poison is?"
"......I do."
Cheongun continued,
"I'll give you the antidote once a month."
"What do you want from me?"
"Loyalty."
"......Understood."
Cheongun shook his head.
"Words alone mean nothing. Tell me—how did you become a demon?"
Cheongun asked.
Jeok Hwa-ryeon hesitated, then sighed deeply and summarized her life story in a rush.
"So, you learned demonic arts for revenge?"
"Yes."
This much he knew.
His response was predetermined.
Cheongun nodded a couple times and parted his lips.
"Then I'll handle that revenge for you."
"Pardon?"
"I'll do it. That revenge. So from now on, you're not with the God Cult—you're mine."
"......"
She was utterly dumbfounded.
Honestly, caught off guard, she was speechless.
"...Are you serious?"
"What, don't trust me?"
Jeok Hwa-ryeon was at a loss.
He'd abruptly asked about her backstory, then offered to handle her revenge.
The situation was absurd, yet relief at surviving washed over her, and above all, his promise of revenge sparked faint hope amid her doubts.
In that tangle of emotions, her eyes reddened again, a single tear dropping.
Seeing it, Cheongun spoke with a wistful expression.
"...It was summer."
"???"
Jeok Hwa-ryeon stared at him like he was insane.