The Bonds of Fate
"Why do you think that?" I stared at Jeon Gu-seok, my eyes asking what kind of bullshit he was spouting.
He glared back, his expression telling me to cut the crap.
"Why else... would you come all this way to find me... if not to kill me..."
"Ah, damn. Good point."
I couldn't logically argue with that. If I were the father and my suddenly-powerful son came looking for me out of the blue, I would have assumed the exact same thing: Ah, he's here to kill me.
"Is that human... actually human? Either way... did you bring her along to help kill me?"
"Just brought her along."
"Is that so..."
Seeing him respond in such a lifeless, dragging voice made my stomach churn. Was it just my imagination?
"For you... to just bring someone home... You wouldn't even bring your best friend... that Geon-su kid..."
"Why would I bring him here? You would've thrown a fit if he threw up in the house."
"Is that... so...?"
"And even if I did, you probably would've cracked his skull open with a liquor bottle."
"I suppose... I would have."
Jeon Gu-seok nodded blankly. His reaction was so nonchalant it was almost boring.
"Is there... any more liquor?"
"One left."
It was the very last bottle. Damn stuff tasted like absolute garbage, and the price was a total rip-off.
"Give me... that last one."
"Why should I? I've asked everything I wanted to know. No need to grease your wheels with booze anymore."
"I'll give you... something good."
"Here."
The last bottle flew through the air, tracing a neat arc.
Thud.
Jeon Gu-seok caught it and chugged it in one go.
Gulp, gulp.
His Adam's apple bobbed as he forced the harsh, foul-tasting liquor down into his stomach.
"Tastes good?"
"No..."
"Thought so. Honestly, after eating and drinking the good stuff at a rich house, I wonder how I ever drank this trash."
Crash!
He threw the empty bottle, shattering it, and stared at me blankly.
"Well? Hand it over. The good stuff."
"Something good..."
"Yeah, something good. Think of it as a father's final legacy to his son before he dies. Or think of it as giving it to Mom. I'll take it and pass it on."
"Sun-i..."
Should I just kill him now? No, he said he'd give me something good. Let's wait a bit.
Besides...
Time was on my side. I glanced at his throat and chest, raising my Dokkaebi club.
"You said you'd tell me. Do you really want to die as a father who lied to his son until the very end?"
"Whether I leave that kind of memory to my son... or not..."
"Ah, right."
"And..."
Squeeze.
He clenched his fist. At that moment, a shimmering light began to gather at his fingertips.
"Holy shit."
What the hell was that? Why was that coming out of his hands?
A brilliant, blood-red energy dyed Jeon Gu-seok's hands. It didn't stop at a faint, mist-like shroud around his body; it exhaled a metallic, bloody stench, exerting a physical force that literally began to grind the corners of the house to dust.
The pungent, overwhelming demonic energy drawn from his core fluttered its wings, taking on a sharp, ethereal form.
This was the stage of projecting energy outside the body, compressing it, and wielding it as freely as one's own limbs.
An emblem of overwhelming martial might that would earn respect as a true warrior even in the grandest sects—it was blooming from Jeon Gu-seok's hands.
Qi Projection. In other words, the Qi Circulation Realm.
A boundary of talent where many spent their entire lives striving, only to despair at the final step.
"A filial son who poisons his father's liquor... must be punished..."
"Son of a bitch."
My old man was a lot more talented than I thought.
His fingers curled gently.
Whoosh!
A terrifying wave of energy surged toward me like a tsunami. I raised my club.
Clang!
"Kuh!"
Demonic energy—no, judging by the smell and appearance, it was more like blood qi. The moment I blocked it for the first time, my immediate thought was: I shouldn't have done this.
Rumble!
The crimson energy instantly flattened the shabby house, leaving not a single pillar standing, and slammed directly into me, sending me flying into the distance.
Thud!
"Ugh."
Where am I? I vaguely remembered getting blasted by that red energy and soaring high into the sky.
"Master."
"Ah, So-wol. Are you okay?"
Fortunately, right before I was blown away, I had pulled So-wol behind my back to shield her. She was a woman who had trained in martial arts, even if it was just for a maid. She was stronger than an early-stage Core Condensation cultivator, but weaker than a middle-stage one. That was why I brought her along as support.
I brushed the dust and debris off my body and pushed So-wol's shoulder.
"Go."
"If you die, Master, I will be hunted down and killed by the pursuers anyway. The fate of a servant is always the same when their master falls."
"Well, damn."
So that was how it was? Then we both had no choice but to fight tooth and nail.
"Can we run?"
"Ah, your demonic energy detection is weaker than mine."
"So you were here..."
A voice cut rudely through our brief conversation. As if to prove it wasn't just words it was cutting, a crimson energy flickered like a serpent's tongue and lunged at me.
I wasn't going to fall for the same trick twice.
A serpent of wind binds the targets together, launching them away from danger at extreme speeds.
Shortly after, a terrifying sound of destruction echoed from the spot we had just occupied.
"Hmm... You are fast."
"Whoa."
Fragments of the blood qi, which had instantly devoured the house we landed near, flew toward us.
Screeech!
The sound it made was as disgusting as its appearance. My blood ran cold as I watched it open wide, top and bottom, swallowing and grinding everything in its path.
Yugo really went easy on me, didn't he?
I couldn't help but feel grateful for the kindness shown by Yugo, my sister's bodyguard.
But just as my father was no longer the drunkard of the past, I had changed a lot too.
For a split second, I thought about running, but it didn't seem like a good idea. A Qi Circulation cultivator would have far more demonic energy and stamina than me. A beast is most vulnerable when it shows its back. If I turned my back on that monstrous energy, I felt like I'd be swallowed whole, bones and all.
Besides, I had a few cards up my sleeve.
"But Dad. Is your body okay?"
"...No."
Jeon Gu-seok's dark-evolved state was far from normal. His mind was already gone, but his body was in even worse shape. As I saw earlier, his scalp was torn open to the bone, his entire body was swollen from the beating Kang Baek-jin gave him, and his arm and leg bones were visibly misaligned.
Honestly, I wondered how he was even moving. It should have been anatomically impossible. If the medical world of my old world saw this, they would have rejoiced at a new discovery of human anatomy.
"...."
He's coming.
Rumble!
At his gesture, the blood-red energy charged forward, opening a massive crimson maw. It advanced, grinding the alley walls and buildings to dust.
It was an absurd, unrealistic level of destruction. If a person had any conscience, they shouldn't be allowed to do this.
A sudden, violent gust of wind sweeps up the targets, instantly pulling them out of harm's reach.
The ominous maw, having swallowed everything in front of it, suddenly veered and lunged toward us again.
Whoosh!
I dodged again. By this point, confidence was starting to swell within me.
"Hey, Dad."
"Hmm..."
"Your aim is absolute trash. Don't you think so?"
Being able to manipulate and move energy didn't necessarily mean one had good aim. Aside from that terrifying power, his actual skill was abysmal.
"And it looks like you're running out of steam."
Screech... screech...
The terrifying maw that had been swallowing entire houses just moments ago had shrunk significantly.
"I guess you don't have talent for this."
The Qi Circulation cultivators I knew weren't like this. Granted, the only Qi Circulation cultivators I'd ever encountered were Yugo—who hadn't fought seriously—and this guy, but I still knew enough.
"Everyone else is using a calculator, and here you are doing addition on your fingers."
Splat!
The sound of tearing flesh and bursting blood echoed. Of course, it wasn't mine.
"Kuh...?"
In an instant, Jeon Gu-seok's entire body—especially his lower jaw—was shredded as if put through a blender. He stared at me with disbelieving eyes.
Whoosh!
A cold wind, carrying a sharp, lethal edge, rushed toward his ear.
"...!"
Slash! Screeech!
The gale attempted to grind his flesh and bone once more, but it was scattered by the blood-red energy. His eyes widened in sheer horror.
"H-How...?"
He asked, his broken lower jaw clicking. I guess he was truly curious.
"Even if I told you, you couldn't do it. Your brain gets stiff when you get old."
Now I was certain. He would never be able to detect the sorcery hidden by the Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art.
Detection, manipulation, control, transformation—he had none of it. He was purely throwing his superior weight around. His skill tree was stuck at level one, but his level was ridiculously high.
The Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art was on an entirely different level compared to the market-alley martial arts Jeon Gu-seok had learned. Unlike his crude, haphazardly cobbled-together techniques, the Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art was the essence of centuries of refinement, established by masters of martial arts and sorcery.
Their foundations were fundamentally different. Even if he knew it was coming, he couldn't block it.
The efficiency, power, and handling of the sorcery—there was a gap of several centuries between our techniques. It was like comparing a crossbow to a machine gun. It was just that the raw power Jeon Gu-seok possessed was so massive that his crossbow had become as large as a ballista.
Screeech! Clang!
As proof, to block the blades of wind closing in from all directions, he was forced to divert all of his blood qi into defense for the first time.
Because the difference in our raw power was too great, I couldn't pierce that blood qi, but this was more than enough.
How to conceal demonic energy. How to wrap it around the body like armor and weave complex spells. Jeon Gu-seok knew nothing of this. Even if he wanted to know, he couldn't. He might have had a chance to learn once, but it was meaningless now.
"And it looks like you can't use more than one of those weird mouths at a time."
The tables had turned.
"So-wol."
"Yes, Master."
Clap!
So-wol, who had been watching without doing much until now, proved she hadn't just been idling. She spat out a small runic character from her mouth.
A powerful field of gravity and magnetic force constricts the target, dragging them violently to the earth.
After acquiring the Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art, I had handed this technique to So-wol, telling her to master just this one. She might be a bit dim-witted, but it would be stranger if she couldn't master a single technique after digging into it for months.
Zzzzt!
A violet magnetic field slammed Jeon Gu-seok's body, which had been hovering in the air, straight down into the ground.
Crack. Crackle.
The downward gravitational and magnetic forces constricted him from all sides, crushing the red energy. It was as if his outer shell was being peeled away.
Zzzt... zzzt...
Not enough.
I felt it instinctively. The firepower was still lacking to shatter his shell.
Should I just wait until he exhausts all his strength?
No, that wasn't it. No matter how incompetent, he was still in the Qi Circulation Realm. The sheer volume of energy he possessed would be on a different level. Had I already forgotten his attack from earlier, which I hadn't even dared to block? How much demonic energy did it take to unleash that kind of destructive power?
I had to end this now.
"Master... My strength is lacking... I cannot hold him much longer..."
So-wol, who had pinned him to the ground, was starting to struggle. Unlike me, she didn't possess an abundant pool of energy.
I will kill him.
Whoosh!
A fierce gale gathered around my sturdy Dokkaebi club, which remained completely unscratched despite blocking the blood qi.
Rumble!
An armor of heavy stone wrapped around my body. I felt my physical capabilities rise by a level.
Rumble!
A heavy, violet gravity infused the club.
Wind, Earth, and Metal. The Dokkaebi club, imbued with three distinct attributes, roared savagely in my hands. At the same time, the wind, stone, and gravity flowing along the club's spikes seemed to strengthen and blend harmoniously.
So this is why she recommended it so highly. This is what it can do.
I had never pushed myself this hard before, so I hadn't known. But it was still not enough.
Rumble!
Combining the sorcery of the Demonic Wisdom Art with the martial arts of the Great Mountain, I wrapped myself in a massive, bizarre pressure.
The Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art was originally designed to wield both the martial arts of the Great Mountain and the sorcery of the Demonic Wisdom Art simultaneously. The two, which should never have mixed, locked together violently due to the unique demonic energy and nature of the cultivation art.
"Master?"
"What."
"How are you... wielding all of them at once...?"
"I just tried, and it worked."
Didn't I tell you? I might not know the advanced courses, but I've always been good at what's written in the textbook.
The trick I was showing now was nothing special. I was merely boosting the output of basic elemental sorcery using the massive pool of demonic energy my sister had gifted me, and the club was helping to blend them harmoniously.
Creak! Crack!
"Ugh."
The club in my hand felt beyond heavy—it actually hurt. It was as if even my enhanced physical abilities under the Great Mountain Armor were struggling to bear it.
At the same time, I realized.
The Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art...
Only upon reaching the Qi Circulation Realm, or perhaps the Three Extremes, would one be able to freely draw upon all of its power.
What I was doing right now was no different from Jeon Gu-seok—just mindlessly cramming raw power into it. I was merely using a precision machine tool like a chipped stone hand-axe.
The knowledge and experience I had gained while practicing the Great Mountain Demonic Wisdom Art whispered this to me as an intuition.
"Ah..."
My head ached. I felt dizzy.
I wanted to unleash this somewhere, anywhere, immediately.
What did it matter if I was swinging a smartphone like a chipped stone hand-axe? Right now, smashing the head of the man in front of me was more than enough.
I kicked off the ground and charged at Jeon Gu-seok, who was still disoriented.
Just like when I fought Yugo, this was the optimal move I could make.
"Aaaaargh!"
Having brushed off the last of the wind blades, Jeon Gu-seok roared. He controlled the crimson maw, now much smaller than before, and launched it toward me.
Would this attack work against a powerhouse of the Qi Circulation Realm?
If so, I would be thrilled. It meant my months of effort could stand against a Qi Circulation cultivator.
It meant my single step was equal to Jeon Gu-seok's entire lifetime.
Not bad, right? After all, there was nothing more amusing than forcing one's own unfair advantages onto others.
The monstrous maw of blood surged forward, poised to swallow me whole. The blood qi flickering inside the maw rushed to tear me apart.
But I had a damn strong club in my hand.
And then.
The tearing maw and pure destruction clashed in midair.