Then Die
This was bad.
Pierce!
Yeop Pung snatched the dagger So So-un thrust toward him from the side. Golden radiance flared from his body, and he shot toward Sa Cheonseong as fast as a falling star.
The Falling Star Sword Technique was a sword art that condensed Profound Qi and detonated it in a burst, gathering energy to pierce a target with blinding speed. The single stroke of Yeop Pung — who had already reached minor accomplishment in the technique — closed on Sa Cheonseong as swiftly as starlight splitting the night sky.
This sword… it's strong!
Watching that golden flash race toward his eyes, Sa Cheonseong felt the frost Profound Qi throughout his body surge in alarm.
To think that brat had been hiding a sword technique this sharp! But this much still isn't enough to take me down!
Sa Cheonseong clasped his hands together. A stream of cold energy burst from between his palms, and a pale-blue long spear materialized in the air. A phoenix was engraved upon the spearhead. This was the Cheonbong Legion's standard-issue Profound Weapon — the Cheonbong Spear.
"Receive my spear!"
Gripping the Cheonbong Spear, Sa Cheonseong overflowed with the confidence of a man who had the world in his grasp. He drew up the frost Profound Qi in every corner of his body, poured killing intent into the spearhead, and hurtled at Yeop Pung like an ice phoenix beating its wings.
Clang!
Sword and spear collided, and a sharp metallic shriek rang out across the field. A heartbeat later came a dull, ringing impact, and Yeop Pung was launched into the air by Sa Cheonseong's spear, blood spilling from his lips.
The gulf between them was simply too vast — not a gap that a single Profound art could hope to bridge.
"Yeop Pung!"
The disciples of the Cheonun Sect cried out as one and started to rush toward him.
"Stay back!"
Still hanging in the air, Yeop Pung's face had gone deathly pale, blood running from the corner of his mouth. Even so, he gathered himself, tumbled through several revolutions, and clenched the dagger again in a trembling right hand. Then he put the full weight of his fall behind him and plunged at Sa Cheonseong once more.
Yeop Pung forced the words through bloodstained teeth. There was not the faintest hint of retreat or surrender in him.
That brat — how can he be that vicious?
The onlookers stood frozen, at a loss for what to do. The difference in strength was so overwhelming that Yeop Pung's chivalrous spirit alone could change nothing. As things stood, he was as good as charging to his death.
Head Peak Master Yeom Jin-ri secretly clenched a Profound Qi hand seal, ready to intervene the instant Yeop Pung took another blow. His life, at the very least, had to be preserved.
And she was not the only one whose gaze had turned unusual. Un Cheoncheon, who had been sitting throughout with that same icy expression, had begun drawing up Profound Qi without even realizing it, watching Yeop Pung — as if she might step in herself to help him. Did she, too, not want to see him badly hurt?
Meanwhile, as he watched Yeop Pung's descending strike, Sa Cheonseong's face filled with nothing but killing intent.
No one was permitted to take what was his. Anyone who broke that taboo would die — and it made no difference to him that this was the Cheonun Sect.
Like a wolf starved for blood, Sa Cheonseong murmured in a low voice.
"Yeop Pung. This strike will end everything. Die!"
He seized the butt of the Cheonbong Spear in his right hand and poured a tremendous surge of frost Profound Qi through the entire weapon, wrapping it from tip to shaft. An ice blade formed along the already keen spearhead. When he swung with all his strength, it was as if a phoenix's cry rang through the air. This was the Cheonbong Legion's secret spear art —
A secret spear strike of the Cheonbong Legion — an ice phoenix's cry, a blade of frost screaming for the brow.
Whoosh!
The terrifying frost-wreathed spearhead tore through empty air and flew straight for the space between Yeop Pung's eyes.
Watch out!
Everyone held their breath. This attack would kill him, or cripple him — there was no third outcome.
But in that instant, as the whole crowd watched with bated breath, a cold smile touched the lips of Yeop Pung, still falling like a meteor.
Now. This is the moment!
A familiar energy washed over Yeop Pung, and a familiar scene unfolded. In a single instant Sa Cheonseong was trapped inside a time barrier, every action and every reaction slowed by more than half.
At the same moment, the dagger in Yeop Pung's hand vanished, and a pitch-black longsword appeared in its place — the Black Frost Sword he had hidden in advance inside his Qiankun Ring.
He had been stalling deliberately, manufacturing that single instant in which Sa Cheonseong could not react. And now, at last, he had drawn a top-grade Profound Weapon.
Full-power strike — Cut him down!
Flare!
Dazzling golden Profound Qi condensed along the Black Frost Sword. The blade shone as brilliantly as a sun rising out of pitch-black darkness.
For the first time in far too long, Yeop Pung detonated the golden Profound Qi throughout his entire body. A violent tide of energy roared along his meridians, and a hegemonic fighting spirit he had nearly forgotten flooded his mind once more. His pupils were stained a pale gold.
In that instant, heaven and earth felt like mere specks of dust. Everything in the world seemed to lie beneath his feet. It was a dominance beyond words.
The Cheonbong Legion? Don't make me laugh. Sa Cheonseong? Do you even know who I am?
Twice now — including Taibai Peak — this man had tried to kill him. A shameless bastard like that could not be forgiven, no matter who said otherwise. He had to die.
Yeop Pung raised the sword in a flash of black steel.
"With that spear just now, you tried to kill me…"
Sa Cheonseong spat blood, his eyes blazing with fury.
"That's right — I tried to kill you, so what? If it weren't for that Black Frost Sword, you'd already have been run through!"
Yeop Pung's voice was ice, and everyone who heard it went rigid with shock.
No! Yeop Pung, you can't kill Sa Cheonseong!
But Yeop Pung's mind was filled with nothing now except a boiling combat instinct. He charged at Sa Cheonseong without the slightest hesitation.
"Stop!"
The Cheonbong Legion warriors beside them shouted in panic, drawing their long spears and throwing themselves in front of Sa Cheonseong.
"Out of my way!"
Yeop Pung swept the Black Frost Sword, and Falling Star sword-qi, swift as a meteor, punched straight through the warriors in an instant.
Wherever the Black Frost Sword passed, spears snapped and armor crumbled to iron dust. The killing power of his golden Profound Qi, joined to the Black Frost Sword's terrifying edge, was enough to bring even Sa Cheonseong to his knees. In close combat, Yeop Pung was all but invincible.
"Gaaaaah!"
A chorus of wretched screams tore through the air. A dozen or so Cheonbong warriors crumpled miserably to the ground.
Yeop Pung's hegemonic aura swallowed the battlefield whole. It was as if he were speaking directly to Sa Cheonseong.
If you want to kill me — Yeop Pung — then you'd better be ready to stake your life.
All of it happened in a blink. The distance between Yeop Pung and Sa Cheonseong was scarcely sixty feet. From the instant his killing intent erupted to the moment he punched through the Cheonbong Legion, everything passed in the space of an eye-blink. Even Yeom Jin-ri, standing at the rear, had no time to check that killing intent.
In the next instant, the dreadful Black Frost Sword had closed on Sa Cheonseong's brow, poised to punch straight through his skull.
"No!"
From behind, Yeom Jin-ri desperately drew up Profound Qi, trying to stop Yeop Pung. But she was the farthest from the fighting of anyone on the field, and it was simply not enough.
She knew it with terrible clarity, though. If Yeop Pung killed Sa Cheonseong here today, it would be a crime beyond imagining. If that happened, not even the Cheonun Sect would be able to protect him.
Sa Cheonseong was truly afraid now.
He actually means to kill me! Has this bastard gone insane?
But the terrifying sword tip was already at his eyes, and a ghastly thread of sword-qi had already nicked his forehead.
"No!"
He howled in bitter grievance, and at last, facing the terror of death, he squeezed his eyes shut.
In that moment, he regretted it. He should never have laid a hand on Yeop Pung — a monster even worse than himself.
And in the same breath, he cursed him.
Yeop Pung. If you kill me, the Cheonbong Legion will have its revenge. They'll flay you alive, strip the flesh from your bones, and stab you to death ten thousand times!
A cold energy grazed his forehead. Sa Cheonseong's whole body shook, his teeth chattering with terror. Before death, he too was nothing more than an eighteen-year-old boy.
But the agony he had braced for never came. Time itself seemed to freeze.
I'm… not dead?
Sa Cheonseong opened his eyes in disbelief. What waited for him was Yeop Pung's smile, brimming with mischief. Yeop Pung looked at him with the gentle eyes one might turn on a child, and said,
"You…!"
Only then did Sa Cheonseong realize that the lower half of his body was soaking wet.
"Yeop Pung, you bastard…!"
"You…!"
Around them, even in that grave atmosphere, people began struggling to hold back laughter. Whether it was because the tension had been too heavy, or because they needed some way to bleed off the pressure, no one could say.
Rage and shame sent the blood rushing backward through Sa Cheonseong's veins. He coughed up blood once more.