Iron Calamity Mob (3)
“Ghh—uuurgh…!”
Jeong Cheol let out a moan of pure agony.
His right limbs had been blown clean off, and he had lost a considerable portion of his internal organs.
Even so, the only reason Jeong Cheol could force his eyes open was that he stood at the late stage of Core Formation.
His Golden Core, located at the center of his lower abdomen, had by sheer luck escaped the damage of the Black Lightning Severing Sphere.
Had his body been twisted even slightly further to the right, the Core would have been ground away along with everything else.
His heart, positioned on the left side of the body, remained intact as well.
The heart governs the blood vessels—that is what the old texts meant. The heart is the engine that drives the circulation of blood.
The same held true for spirit meridians. If one drew out the heart's yang energy to its utmost, even a half-ruined body like this could still circulate spirit qi.
“Uuuugh!”
The instant Jeong Cheol loosed his battle cry, lightning energy erupted from his entire remaining body.
He was using his Soft Body Art to clamp off his blood vessels and stop the bleeding, then channeling his spirit qi through his left half alone to generate the lightning.
Having caught on to this, Cheon Woo-jin immediately deployed a protective barrier with his Thunder Wheel Barrier.
KWAKWAKWA!
A colossal mass of lightning energy crashed down over him.
Having lost his right limbs, Jeong Cheol could no longer pull off a charge like before—but his raw destructive power had soared far beyond what it had been.
He seemed determined to squeeze out every last drop of spirit power, holding nothing in reserve, and settle the fight in one stroke.
“GRAAAAGH!”
Jeong Cheol radiated an overwhelming killing intent.
Raising a shield against the lightning would mean nothing.
I will swallow your barrier whole with sheer volume. That resolve was written into the way he spread his lightning wide.
But Cheon Woo-jin had no intention of accepting the attack politely.
He had already forged the mental image of a new spell within his spiritual domain.
Lightning wreathed in violet arcs splits the earth and vaporizes all in its path.
KWAKWAKWANG!
The explosively erupting lightning tore through the ground and vaporized everything in its wake.
But Cheon Woo-jin had already left that position.
Seeing him escape outside the blast radius using his newly created Thunder Flash, Jeong Cheol's face went rigid with shock.
“That technique…!”
Thunder Flash was a move Cheon Woo-jin had crafted anew, drawing on Jeong Cheol's own methods.
He had understood and reproduced the spell that wrapped the body in lightning for ultra-high-speed movement in every direction.
Unlike the lightning bolts of the Lightning Wheel Great Chain, it could move only in straight lines—but it was faster still, and capable of turning at razor-sharp angles.
“You bastard…!”
PAPAPAT!
Cheon Woo-jin streaked in every direction at vicious angles.
It was a movement nearly identical to what Jeong Cheol had demonstrated moments ago.
The difference was that by harnessing the lightning-amplification function of the Thunder Wheel Barrier, he achieved the same ultra-high speeds with comparatively little spirit power.
Now it was Jeong Cheol's turn to lose his grip on the fight.
Dragging his grievously wounded body along Cheon Woo-jin's trajectory, he hurled lightning in desperate, hurried bursts.
But Cheon Woo-jin slipped past every strike at blinding speed, as if mocking him.
And then, at last, he found the opening.
The lower right quadrant of Jeong Cheol's body—the half he had lost earlier.
Cheon Woo-jin carved through the snowfield in a sliding dive toward Jeong Cheol's rear, then unleashed the lightning shrouding his entire body in a single concentrated torrent forward.
A lance of condensed lightning drives through the vulnerable flank.
KWAKWAKWANG!
The spear of lightning swallowed Jeong Cheol's lower body whole.
The Golden Core that had survived even the Black Lightning Severing Sphere was, this time, shattered completely.
“Haah….”
Jeong Cheol, now reduced to a portion of his upper body alone, muttered with something like disbelief.
“A monster has appeared on the 6th Layer.”
It was the highest praise he could give.
Jeong Cheol had come out in person to see what manner of rising star this Cheon Woo-jin might be—and in their contest of lightning, he had been defeated, and in the end, lost his very life.
Here, too, ended the ambition of the man who had led the Iron Calamity Mob, built its strength, and dreamed of rising to become a titan of the cultivation world.
With the eyes of a man who had accepted his fate, Jeong Cheol closed both eyes.
“I lost, Cheon Woo-jin.”
Thud.
Jeong Cheol's remains dropped to the frozen ground.
Gazing at the corpse, already cold and stiff from the brutal chill, Cheon Woo-jin exhaled a rough breath.
I really do need to master that Soft Body Art.
After tearing across the field at ultra-high speed in sharp, violent angles, his whole body felt as if it were screaming.
Testing out the new spell had been worthwhile—but until he actually learned the Soft Body Art, he would have to seal it away.
“So that's the end of it?”
Just then, a voice came from behind him.
Na Chwi-ryang, spattered head to toe in blood, was dragging Dokgo Hwan—his torso punched clean through—across the snow toward him.
“Hey, don't you not even need that Soft Body Art? You can already zip around like that at high speed—why bother hunting for it?”
“You're saying that while looking at me half-dead?”
“Any ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivator would've been torn to shreds the moment he moved like that. Seeing you in one piece, your body must be plenty sturdy already.”
Trading that banter, the two headed for the makeshift building at the back.
The same place Jeong Cheol and Dokgo Hwan had emerged from earlier.
“We split it roughly down the middle, then.”
“Fine by me.”
Inside the building lay a mountain of plunder the Iron Calamity Mob had evidently amassed through their raids.
After agreeing to split it in half, Na Chwi-ryang turned to Dokgo Hwan, who was still barely clinging to life, and asked,
“Hey. Where'd you stash the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe?”
“You think, I'd, tell you, that…?”
“Ah, right. Fine, I'll find it myself.”
Na Chwi-ryang raised his fist over Dokgo Hwan's skull.
But at that moment, Dokgo Hwan let out a snickering laugh.
“Na Chwi-ryang… do you think you can, handle the consequences…?”
“Consequences?”
“We were planning to leave Ghost Head City soon, carrying the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe with us….”
Na Chwi-ryang faltered at that.
“Leaving Ghost Head City? Why?”
“The sect that was meant to receive the robe… it was obvious they'd storm into Ghost Head City hunting for us….”
There were those who had failed to obtain the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe because of the Iron Calamity Mob.
He was saying they would come to reclaim it.
“Who are these people?”
“The Flame Emperor Gate.”
“What?”
Na Chwi-ryang's eyes went wide.
“Did you just say the Flame Emperor Gate?”
“That's right… the Flame Emperor Gate, a branch of the Taiyi Inverse Principle Sect….”
One of the Three Great Sects of Weijin Country, the Taiyi Inverse Principle Sect.
The Flame Emperor Gate, one of its branches, kept its main hall near the imperial capital and wielded fearsome authority.
“The Taiyi Inverse Principle Sect can't meddle in Ghost Head City directly because of the old covenant… but the Flame Emperor Gate can storm this place whenever they please….”
“…!”
“Our Iron Calamity Mob are rootless loose cultivators, so we can just leave the city and vanish somewhere no one knows… but what about you, Na Chwi-ryang…?”
Dokgo Hwan chuckled darkly as he watched him.
“You'll be caught by the Flame Emperor Gate and roasted like a lizard on a spit. I'd pay good money to see that….”
Dokgo Hwan never finished the sentence.
Na Chwi-ryang's fist had already caved in his skull.
“Damn it all. The Flame Emperor Gate, of all people.”
Hurling Dokgo Hwan's corpse aside, Na Chwi-ryang spat out a curse.
“So what, we just hand the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe over to them? I'd rather never lay eyes on those bastards.”
Clutching his head in both hands, Na Chwi-ryang agonized.
“I'll have to give it back, won't I. Those bastards won't pay a fair price—hell, they might just take it for free.”
Watching him, Cheon Woo-jin spoke up.
“Na Chwi-ryang. Complicated thoughts can wait.”
“What?”
“Grab what there is to grab first.”
Cheon Woo-jin was already sweeping the Iron Calamity Mob's wealth into his storage pouch.
There was far too much to take everything, so he had to sort out only the items of real value.
“Heh. Look at this guy….”
“Here it is.”
Under Na Chwi-ryang's incredulous stare, Cheon Woo-jin picked up a single box.
“The Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe.”
“…!”
Inside the box lay a white garment, closer to a cloak than a robe.
When Cheon Woo-jin draped it over himself as a test and fed spirit power into it, his whole body turned transparent at once.
“It—it really does vanish completely. I can't even sense your presence.”
“It seems the real thing.”
Releasing the concealment, Cheon Woo-jin handed the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe over to Na Chwi-ryang.
“Here. Consider the commission fulfilled.”
“Ha… well, I'll be.”
What on earth am I supposed to do with this? That was the expression Na Chwi-ryang wore as he accepted the robe.
Now then, time to ease myself into the hot springs.
Having salvaged a good portion of the Iron Calamity Mob's wealth, Cheon Woo-jin headed behind the makeshift building.
There he found a spirit spring where hot spring water gushed up in a steady flow.
There were perhaps four vents where the water rose from the earth, and Cheon Woo-jin settled into the largest of them.
He stripped off his red demon robe, laid it aside, and lowered himself into the water.
At once, a potent sensation seeped into the muscles and bones of his entire body.
Water rich in spirit qi really is on another level.
For ordinary people, what mattered in a hot spring would be its mineral content—but for cultivators, what mattered was how much spiritual energy the water held.
As he drank in the hot spiritual energy born of the earth with his whole body, the spirit meridians throughout him came alive.
He could even feel the stale, harmful energies that had accumulated like waste in every corner of his body being purified away.
There are things that breathing exercises alone simply can't resolve, after all….
Feeling his body go pleasantly heavy, he tilted his head back and looked up at the sky.
Snowflakes drifted down without pause from the pitch-black night sky.
It wasn't a true night sky, so no stars glittered there—but the ceaseless falling snow lent the scene all the atmosphere it needed.
“Booze?”
Just then, Na Chwi-ryang's voice rang out.
Having flung off every scrap of clothing, the great lizard was climbing into a nearby spring.
“Here.”
Cheon Woo-jin produced the spirit wine he had prepared in advance.
He filled a cup first and passed it over, and Na Chwi-ryang thrust his snout in for a sniff.
“Damn, that's a good nose-burn.”
Cheon Woo-jin filled his own cup and set the bottle down between them.
Then, in time with Na Chwi-ryang, he drained it in one swallow.
A rush of heat bloomed instantly in his core.
The mellow spiritual energy steeped in the wine was spreading through him.
The spring's energy worked from without.
The wine's energy worked from within.
Savoring the sensation of his body being healed from both directions at once, Cheon Woo-jin let out a long, slow breath.
“Hoooh….”
For a moment, it felt as though a river of stars had appeared across the night sky.
But beyond that sky lay nothing more than the underside of the 6th Layer's ceiling.
What Cheon Woo-jin's eyes actually caught was the passage-trail left by Youguijiao, the Imoogi of the Nascent Soul realm.
It was a monster one must prepare to die upon meeting—yet watched from the safety of a warm spring like this, it was nothing more than a spectacle that made the view all the more magnificent.
Come to think of it….
He found himself remembering the days before he came to this world—when he had worked as an ordinary office worker in modern Korea.
Back then, there had been no time like this. Even on holidays he lacked the energy to travel anywhere far, and simply rolled around at home.
Living that way, year in and year out, it was no wonder his body and mind had withered.
If you want to live long and live well, this side really is better.
He was sunk in the water up to his shoulders, indulging such thoughts, when Na Chwi-ryang—who had been drinking alone in his own spring—called out to him.
“Hey.”
“What is it?”
“What should we do with the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe?”
Cheon Woo-jin answered the question flatly.
“That's yours to decide.”
“You think that'll fly? The Flame Emperor Gate will come to bury both of us at once.”
That much was certain.
This time, Cheon Woo-jin had entered Wolhongnu together with Na Chwi-ryang to obtain information on the Iron Calamity Mob.
The ones who had fled earlier would spread the word as well, and the news that Cheon Woo-jin and Na Chwi-ryang together had annihilated the Iron Calamity Mob would soon be known to the world.
And then the Flame Emperor Gate would move to crush both of them.
“Hey, Na Chwi-ryang.”
Splashing hot spring water over his face, Cheon Woo-jin asked,
“Is there really anything to agonize over?”
“What?”
“And here I didn't know the Na Chwi-ryang of the Yin Scale Spirit Needle Sect was such a timid man.”
Stung, Na Chwi-ryang rose half out of the water.
“What did you just say?”
“Sit down, Na Chwi-ryang.”
Cheon Woo-jin said it while deliberately turning his gaze away from Na Chwi-ryang's lower half.
“What's the point of pacing around in a panic just because the Flame Emperor Gate might come?”
“What?”
“If they come sniffing around, we simply beat them back. Isn't that enough?”
“…!”
Na Chwi-ryang's eyes flew wide open.
“You bastard—are you saying you want to fight the Flame Emperor Gate?”
Na Chwi-ryang's voice was hoarse with disbelief.
“Jin Si-hyeok, the master of the Flame Emperor Gate, has mastered the Flame Prison Fierce Yang Art, the pinnacle of fire-attribute cultivation. The man takes the field in person every single campaign—he could very well storm Ghost Head City himself. You'd fight him too?”
“Is there some reason I can't?”
“Wh—what did you say?”
Before Na Chwi-ryang's bulging eyes, Cheon Woo-jin simply raised a hand.
He drew the wine bottle to him with spirit power and filled his cup.
“This bastard….”
Watching Cheon Woo-jin drink with perfect composure, Na Chwi-ryang clicked his tongue.
“Fine. You're the one who killed Baek Shin-yeong of the Ten Thousand Nights Ice Palace and survived a direct encounter with the previous Palace Lord. And before that, you went up against the Ten Thousand Poison Six Deaths Sect….”
Muttering thus, Na Chwi-ryang looked up at the sky and sighed.
“So the Flame Emperor Gate doesn't scare you either. You really are a man without fear.”
“….”
“Well, I suppose this is the same man who swallowed the Cut-Gut Five Ghost Wine without a moment's hesitation.”
Splash.
Na Chwi-ryang sank back down into the water.
“All right, Cheon Woo-jin.”
Snatching the bottle from Cheon Woo-jin, he filled his own cup.
“My junior's standing up this tall—I can't be showing him an ugly sight, now can I.”
Na Chwi-ryang's pride had been stoked, just as it had been the day he watched Cheon Woo-jin drain the Cut-Gut Five Ghost Wine.
Raising a brimming cup of spirit wine, he declared in a ringing, lionhearted voice,
“When the Flame Emperor Gate comes, we smash them ourselves.”
“That's the spirit.”
Cheon Woo-jin clinked cups with Na Chwi-ryang and drank down the spirit wine.
Then, still soaking in the hot spring, Cheon Woo-jin thought to himself:
Everything has gone exactly according to my plan.
With this, I can pull Na Chwi-ryang into the fight against the Flame Emperor Gate.
That was right.
Ever since the day Na Chwi-ryang had come to Seo Seol-ryeong's shop and brought up the matter of the Heavenly Silkworm Shadow Concealment Robe, Cheon Woo-jin had thought of one thing and one thing only: the battle with the Flame Emperor Gate.
The stage beyond Foundation Establishment—Core Formation.
It was a battle he would have to pay for, one way or another, to reach that realm.