Chapter 57
Chapter 57
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 57
Chapter Title: Monster in the Darkness
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“What did he do?”
“He collapsed a mountain with his bare hands. And he massacred over five hundred experts from the alliance of nine sects gathered below the cliff. With a single palm strike, infused with his entire lifetime of internal energy.”
“...!”
It was riveting.
Heuk Do-san figured the wild tales would just keep going if he didn't switch up his questions.
“How does he compare to the Heavenly Demon?”
“Is the Heavenly Demon your friend?”
“Should I call him Cult Leader, then?”
Gong Cheon-ak scowled fiercely.
He wanted to rip the guy's mouth off, but now wasn't the time to discipline the unruly colt.
“The Cult Leader possesses the supreme divine art known as the Five Thunder God Palm. Compared to that, the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm is nothing more than a torch under moonlight.”
“You've mastered it too, haven't you?”
“...!”
“Well, you can't pour an entire well into a soy sauce dish.”
“That's not the point right now!”
“Sorry. Go on.”
“The Cult Leader once told me that in his life, he acknowledged only three people. One of them was the Snow Mountain Old Man. And the sole martial art that defines the Snow Mountain Old Man is the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm.”
“So, you're saying someone found the manual for the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm that the Snow Mountain Old Man left behind before dying on that great snow mountain long ago. They snuck away to this remote wilderness to evade the eyes of the martial world, kidnapped local nomadic tribeswomen, and are now training in it?”
“Exactly.”
Heuk Do-san didn't know what the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm was or who the Snow Mountain Old Man had been.
But the fact that even the Heavenly Demon, who had turned the martial world upside down, recognized him as a lifelong rival was truly astonishing.
A manual left by an absolute expert on par with the Heavenly Demon, and an unknown successor who had mastered it. No matter how he thought about it, the risks outweighed the gains.
But with Dang Yak-ran trapped, they couldn't just let it slide.
“This might turn into a blessing in disguise.”
“What?”
“A long time ago, a martial art called the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm made its way here from the Central Plains via a different route than ours. If we backtrack that path, we can return to the Central Plains safely.”
“...!”
Gong Cheon-ak was stunned.
He was warning of a terrifying demonic art, yet this brute was thrilled at the prospect of finding a way back to the Central Plains.
It wasn't wrong, of course, but now wasn't the time to think about that. If a monster cultivating the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm lurked in this underground cavern, they were as good as dead.
Knowing the way home after death was pointless.
‘How did I end up traveling with a guy like this?’
“So what do you propose?”
Even as they spoke, Gong Cheon-ak scanned their surroundings warily. His crouched stance betrayed his tension.
Heuk Do-san glanced aside.
Yeom Jin-sang was trembling too. He must have heard tales of the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm and the Snow Mountain Old Man.
As the head of the Black Island Sect, which collected every rumor in the martial world, it was no surprise.
“First, let's deal with the cold.”
Unable to endure the chill any longer, Heuk Do-san selected a corpse of suitable size and stripped off its fur garment. The dead woman's naked body was exposed starkly, but the dire situation left no room for stray thoughts. He only felt sorry for the nameless deceased.
“Sorry about this.”
Unlike the crude Blood Wolf hides, the fur garment worn by the Xiongnu woman was a proper article of clothing.
“Let's keep moving.”
Heuk Do-san proceeded slowly.
Gong Cheon-ak and Yeom Jin-sang followed.
He didn't know much about caves. Old Man Mu had once said that vast underground caverns were remnants from ancient times when waters had drained away.
True enough, pools of water dotted the floor here and there. More precisely, sheets of solid ice.
Even there lay corpses. Seeing one with disheveled hair, the back of its head half-embedded in ice, eyes wide open, made his hackles rise involuntarily.
“Do you even know where you're going?”
Gong Cheon-ak asked.
“How would I?”
“Then what makes you choose a direction?”
“Please, use your head for once, not just your hands and feet. That's why even after learning the Heavenly Demon's martial arts, you get looked down on by Hyeon-gak every day.”
“What?”
Gong Cheon-ak glared as if he could tear him apart.
Heuk Do-san pointed to the ceiling.
Bats clung thickly to it, flying off and returning in one direction repeatedly.
Gong Cheon-ak snapped to attention. In his extreme tension, he'd overlooked it, but they'd been following the bats from the start.
The same likely went for Hyeon-gak and the other two who had vanished ahead. In other words, following the bats would lead them to the three.
“But I've got one question. I heard the witches of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult commune with spirits. Do they still fall under hypnosis?”
“Ignorant nonsense. Spirit mediums are immune to hypnosis. No illusion technique works on them either. That's why they cultivate shrine maidens.”
“Then it's strange. There were three sets of footprints over the bat guano. Meaning Bing-seol was awake when they entered...”
At that moment, a 'drip!' echoed from somewhere. It was faint, but in the eerie silence, it boomed like thunder.
Whipping around, they saw the slender arm of a child corpse under Yeom Jin-sang's foot had snapped off.
“Watch it!”
Gong Cheon-ak barked.
“S-sorry.”
“You useless bastard. I don't know how you wormed your way into traveling with us, but shape up, or you'll get a piece of me.”
“Understood.”
Then it happened. The bats covering the ceiling, their pale blue eyes glowing, all shut their eyes at once.
With the light source gone, the luminous stone veins in the cavern walls went dark too.
In the blink of an eye, the cavern plunged into pitch blackness.
“I knew it.”
Gong Cheon-ak groaned. Simultaneously, a grinding sound like rocks shifting rang out.
Krrrggrrr.
It was darkness where open eyes or closed made no difference.
But humans had senses beyond sight.
‘The stone door is opening.’
Heuk Do-san was certain.
A door in the cavern's edge wall had just opened.
His body hair stood on end. Though unseen, Gong Cheon-ak and Yeom Jin-sang were surely frozen too.
Yet, strangely, nothing happened. No footsteps, no bats reopening their eyes.
“What is it?”
Gong Cheon-ak whispered, voice like a mosquito's wingbeat.
“Shh!”
Then, from somewhere came a stench unlike anything he'd ever smelled—indescribably foul. It was so vile it threatened to bring up everything he'd eaten the day before.
The smell, like a cold draft or mist, emanated right in front of his nose. Along with it came immense pressure.
‘Someone's ahead!’
Overwhelmed by the unseen presence, Heuk Do-san couldn't twitch a finger.
It was a warning from deep instinct: any movement meant instant death.
The stench-emitting entity didn't budge either. It just hovered, as if probing him.
‘What the hell is it doing?’
Moments later, the stench that had lingered over Heuk Do-san slithered aside—to where Gong Cheon-ak and Yeom Jin-sang had stood before the lights vanished.
Dead silence persisted. Now Gong Cheon-ak and Yeom Jin-sang endured the fear and pressure he'd just felt.
He couldn't see them, but they pierced him.
Anyone with guts or brains would wait to gauge the enemy's intent rather than act rashly against a foe they surely couldn't beat.
Unfortunately, Yeom Jin-sang lacked the guts, and Gong Cheon-ak the brains.
“Argh!”
“Die!”
Yeom Jin-sang screamed and attacked; Gong Cheon-ak roared and struck.
“You idiots!”
Heuk Do-san had no choice but to swing his dagger and axe alternately.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
The blade winds slicing empty air sounded like tearing drumheads. The three unleashed frenzied assaults at the presumed monster in the void, even employing footwork.
But there was no sensation of cutting flesh or the sound of severing. Instead, in the unseen chaos, axes and swords clashed wildly.
Clang! Krrrang!
“Die!”
“You die!”
“Who the hell are you?”
“Who are you!”
“Stop it, all of you!”
Heuk Do-san bellowed.
The stench had vanished, leaving the three panting like madmen who'd snapped out of a frenzy.
“Where are you? Stop hiding like a coward and face me fair and square!”
Gong Cheon-ak bellowed in rage, his voice echoing thunderously.
But the monster gave no response. Fear grew, pressure mounted.
“Argh!”
Unable to bear it, Yeom Jin-sang screamed and fled, seeking the entrance seen before the lights died. It was utterly foolish.
Human senses deceive, and having already dashed while swinging blades meant he'd lost his bearings long ago.
Sure enough, a thud! and something heavy fell. He'd slammed into a wall and collapsed.
Yet Yeom Jin-sang sprang up and ran again. Then sparks flew.
Szzzzt!
He scraped his blade along the wall while running, gauging its position by feel.
‘Smart idea, but...’
Yeom Jin-sang got no chance to exploit it.
“Gah! S-save...”
A short cry, and his flight halted. Followed by a clatter—the sword hitting the ground.
Crisis for him was opportunity for others. Gong Cheon-ak shot toward the sound like a gale.
“Go!”
With a mighty shout, his curved sword rent the air.
But the sound wasn't flesh parting under blade—it was like a cannon firing.
Boom!
An ear-shattering roar.
Then, from over ten paces back, a thud like a bull plummeting off a cliff.
Thud!
“Guh!”
The dying gasp was unmistakably Gong Cheon-ak's. He'd taken a palm strike head-on and flown ten paces before crashing.
A split second earlier, from where Yeom Jin-sang fell, came a 'thunk!'
Heuk Do-san's hurled dagger embedding in the monster's body as Gong Cheon-ak flew back.
‘Got it!’
No time for second thoughts.
Heuk Do-san pursued the dagger's impact with lightning-fast movement—his swiftest lightness skill ever, channeling every ounce of strength into a downward axe chop.
“Die!”
Instantly, a dark shadow struck like lightning.
Boom!
It felt just like being hit by actual lightning.
His bones seemed to shatter outright. Against his will, Heuk Do-san was hurled backward, sucked by some irresistible colossal force.
Thud!
A secondary impact to his back.
In that moment, the ceiling bats all opened their eyes at once. The luminous veins blazed anew.
Glancing aside, Gong Cheon-ak stared at him, eyes rolled back white. He trembled like a whipped dog, unsure where or how he'd been hit.
Blood frothed from his mouth with every attempted word.
‘Internal injuries!’
Only then did Heuk Do-san realize his own body was failing. Agonizing pain, starting from his chest where the force had struck, spread everywhere.
He opened his mouth, but no words came. He tried to breathe, but his throat clogged like something was lodged there.
Blood was surging upward.
‘So this is the Hundred Thousand Great Heaven Palm...!’
Then the ceiling bats took flight en masse, weaving eerie patterns. The luminous veins flickered along their path—the exact scene from when they'd first entered.
“Urk...”
Spewing a basin's worth of blood into the air, Heuk Do-san lost consciousness.