Chapter 54
Chapter 54
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 54
Chapter Title: Joint Attack (2)
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Cheongun felt a twinge of bewilderment.
He had known this day would come eventually after striking the Flying Demon Squad.
But he hadn't expected it to happen so soon.
He had erased all traces, and there shouldn't be any solid evidence.
Moreover, this was the heart of Sichuan Province, wasn't it?
No matter how depraved the Heavenly Demon God Cult was, they couldn't just rampage like this in the Tang Clan’s territory without any justification.
It had to be one of two things.
Either they had already broken away from the Cult and gone independent.
Or the Cult, fed up at last, had ordered Cheongun's elimination.
Obviously, they wouldn't have split from the Cult so quickly.
That meant there was a high chance the Cult had sent that Black Ox—or whatever his name was—with a firm intent to kill him.
Something felt off.
Was it really worth getting this furious over?
Then again, from the Cult's perspective, it did make sense to be pissed.
They had taken preemptive hits three times in a row: Bloodline Pavilion, Darkwood Sect, and now the Flying Demon Squad. Their mood had to be foul.
With that realization, it started to make a bit more sense.
Anyway, Cheongun had plenty on his plate.
First, he needed to fully assimilate the new insights and realizations gained through the power of the Ice Crystal.
Then, break through to the Flower Realm, the Manifestation Realm, and beyond.
Once he reached an appropriate level, he would finally settle things with the Heavenly Demon Cult Leader.
He couldn't live peacefully without eradicating the Demonic Cult scum.
That was when it happened.
“Graaaargh!!”
Black Ox, his teeth shattered, suddenly flew into a rage.
His teeth weren't just broken—they had perfectly round holes drilled right through the centers, like prayer beads.
At that moment, another prayer bead unerringly flew toward Black Ox's forehead.
Whish—!
He jerked his head back to dodge, but Cheongun swung his fishing rod, unwilling to let the chance slip.
The swung fishing line rose, infused with qi.
Controlling the sword qi-laced line with telekinetic manipulation made it akin to a flying sword strike.
As the sword qi-laden line whipped toward him to bind him, Black Ox unleashed his claw technique to the extreme, slashing to deflect it.
But the line, empowered by Cheongun's will, wasn't about to follow such a simple trajectory.
It nimbly altered its path, evading his attack, then began circling him rapidly from all sides.
Black Ox inwardly clicked his tongue.
With the sword qi-infused line encircling him like a noose, his movement space for footwork was severely limited.
And to top it off, that damn monk far away kept relentlessly firing prayer beads, driving him to the brink of madness.
These weren't ordinary beads, either.
For some reason, these puny things carried the properties of demon-suppressing relics.
Unable to easily create distance with the line blockading every direction, whenever he tried to swat it away, a bead would fly in to harass him.
And then.
"!!!"
Scree—!
The Yao Sword lying on the distant floor suddenly floated up and shot toward Black Ox's nape with piercing intent.
Black Ox twisted his body sideways to evade, and the sword embedded itself in the wall, shaking the structure.
But in that instant, a bead arced in from another direction.
Ting—!
Black Ox angled his claws to bat it away.
Then the wall-stuck sword pulled free on its own and charged straight for his forehead.
Fortunately, his realm seemed freshly broken through, so the telekinetic power and precision were lacking.
Dodging wasn't too hard.
Black Ox whipped his head aside, evading the Yao Sword once more.
But it didn't end there.
Cheongun kept levitating the Yao Sword, launching it, levitating it again, and launching it relentlessly.
With each cycle, the trajectory sharpened and the speed increased.
And thanks to the joint assault from Bang Jongdae firing beads with Finger Force from afar, the paths grew even more intricate and lethal.
Dodge a bead, and the sword would surge in; barely evade the sword, and another bead would follow.
Even attempting footwork was impossible with the qi-infused line surrounding him on all sides.
'Damn it all...'
As time dragged on, impatience mounted.
Staying on the defensive like this would surely drain his stamina eventually.
Amid it all, Cheongun kept hurling the Yao Sword telekinetically while muttering nonsense like, “Oops, my bad,” and “Shit, you dodge like a pro,” fueling Black Ox's boiling rage.
Black Ox ground his teeth.
Cheongun's attitude—like he was using him as target practice for telekinesis—ignited his fury.
Impatience clouded his judgment.
Maintaining protective qi over his entire body consumed immense internal energy and mental focus.
The moment he briefly dropped it to catch his breath.
“Gahk!”
Pak—!
A bead flew in from a blind spot, embedding precisely in Black Ox's forehead.
The sudden shock shattered his focus for a split second, and the incoming Yao Sword pierced straight through his shoulder.
“Kuhk!”
As the sword punched through his shoulder, Cheongun's lightning energy surged along the blade, ravaging his acupoints.
Blood trickled from his mouth with every attempt to muster internal energy.
Seeing this, Cheongun shouted.
“Beat him down!”
As if on cue, Bang Jongdae blinked, then kicked off the ground and lunged forward.
He slipped the prayer beads from between his fingers to his wrist, then opened his palm wide.
It was the Shaolin secret art's stance for the Tiger Subduing Palm.
As Bang Jongdae extended his palm to unleash the palm strike, Black Ox thrust out his own in response.
The moment their palms were about to clash.
Paht—!
Bang Jongdae, with a grim expression, suddenly shot upward into the air.
"???"
Black Ox blinked in stunned confusion.
What the hell? He looked ready to clash palms, and now this?
But for Bang Jongdae, it was the obvious choice.
He was merely at peak Pinnacle Realm at best, while his opponent was a wall-breaker.
When palms clashed, the one with superior internal energy won—that was basic common sense.
So he opted to evade.
Black Ox, caught off guard by the sudden move, couldn't help but lose focus.
And that's when Cheongun's voice rang out from behind.
“Black Ox bastard. Falling for it again?”
Whish—!
He whipped his head back, and Cheongun's sword strike sliced through the air toward him.
He immediately jerked his head aside and infused his claws with qi to parry the blade.
Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang—!
Black Ox's claw qi and Cheongun's sword qi clashed in five exchanges.
Black Ox couldn't believe the situation as they traded blows.
'I'm being pushed back?'
He had mastered the Black Corpse Demon Claw—called the Heavenly Demon God Cult's strongest claw art—to the 6th stage.
Unlike minor demonic arts, it grotesquely transformed the hands, but its destructive power surpassed them all.
Its might could slice rocks like tofu with the claws and tear steel like paper.
The hands themselves carried an ultra-lethal poison called corpse toxin; even a graze meant instant death by poisoning.
Infused with qi, it had no equals in the same realm.
Yet that flashing blue lightning qi was overpowering his pitch-black qi.
The opponent's realm was merely early Transcendent at best.
And he was just a young punk not even in his thirties.
Yet he was matching a veteran with decades of infamy in the jianghu?
“You filthy mutt!”
In that instant, pitch-black energy erupted from Black Ox's entire body.
His true qi was so intense it whipped up gusts of wind.
At that moment, the fishing line that had been floating in the air, encircling Black Ox, shot toward him.
The qi-infused line pierced through seven points—shoulder, collarbone, navel, ankle, thigh, philtrum—like stitching him up.
“Gulk...!”
With his Demon Seal and Mute Acupoints pierced in an instant, Black Ox groaned, paralyzed, mouth flapping uselessly.
As the black energy surging from him dissipated.
Shluck—!
Cheongun's sword severed his body from his head.
“Young Hero Cheong!”
Bang Jongdae, who had watched from afar, approached Cheongun.
“Are you alright?”
“What about the others?”
“The others? When this little monk arrived, there was only this one.”
“That can't be right.”
Cheongun shook his head.
The Flying Demon Squad's purge method was always the same.
One insanely strong guy sneaks in first to assassinate the target.
Then they wipe out anyone connected or who witnessed it, without exception.
Any who flee are ambushed by pre-positioned squads from all sides.
It was the kind of insane tactic only the powerhouse-obsessed Heavenly Demon God Cult would pull.
This guy and several others were surely lurking in every nook and cranny.
They had to catch them all before anything else went down.
That was when it happened.
“Heh heh.”
A man came strolling over from beyond.
It was Yi Gun-baek, the head of the Myriad Dragon Escort Agency.
Blood-soaked, he dragged along a string of men bound like sausages.
Cheongun knew at a glance.
Those were Demonic Cultists.
Yi Gun-baek spoke.
“These seem to be the vermin the Vice Head was looking for.”