Chapter 169
Chapter 169
No choice, I suppose. Fine..." The First Elder shot a displeased glare at the physician before giving me permission, but he soon grabbed my hand and let out a scream as I placed it where it needed to go. "Y-You! Where are you putting your hand?!" "On the perineum. Didn't you give permission?" "N-No, that's not..." "Think carefully, Elder. Very carefully. If the Young Cult Leader's meridians get irreversibly damaged like this, will you take responsibility?" I pushed hard because I didn't have time for this back-and-forth, and the First Elder finally released my hand. "Can you guarantee results?" "No. And the longer we delay, the lower the success rate drops." "...
Damn it." The First Elder whipped his head away, as if signaling the others with his eyes: Quit looking away and do something. Sure enough, the rest pretended to bustle about while ignoring me, and I placed my hand back on the perineum—Young Ho-kyeong's groin. 'Urgh...' The moment I pushed my inner energy in, the demonic qi rampaging wildly through his body surged toward me. I had no intention of trying to suppress it head-on. Instead, I sent a thin, concentrated stream of inner energy into his meridians, careful not to disrupt the demonic qi's flow as much as possible. 'That should do it for the prep...' This much I could do from the start. The real problem was resolving the clash between the Ascending Immortal Art and the demonic art. "Young Cult Leader, can you hear me?" Young Ho-kyeong nodded with great effort. "I'll guide your inner energy using my heart method. When that happens, don't resist—just relax as much as you can." "G... Got it... Urk!" Alright, no time to waste. Without avoiding the clash, there was no guiding anything. So how do you connect two mutually repelling inner energies smoothly...? 'Is Reverse Generation not the answer?' Reverse Generation—a special flow derived from the five elements' generation and conquest cycles. The five elements—fire, water, wood, metal, earth—normally generate and conquer each other, but sometimes conquest reverses the generation flow. For example, fire normally generates earth. But if earth conquers water... The suppressed water weakens its conquest of fire, strengthening the fire in turn. Thus, earth generates fire—the reversal of fire generating earth. 'Last time, when only yin energy remained, this is probably why I withstood Kunlun Mountain's chill without issue...' No Peak Realm demonic cultivator circulates qi outside Earth's atmosphere; demonic arts accumulate and form from nature's qi too. They can't escape that principle. 'The problem is there's nothing to neutralize the repulsion between immortal qi and demonic qi...' Not that neutralization is even the right approach. Neutralization... fusion... unity... Ah, but they can't actually merge into one...? That line of thought sparked an idea. Profound Heaven Earth Qi. The encompassing name for the universe's 64 hexagrams of the Profound Heaven—eight trigrams doubled. I pulled the inner energy I'd sent into Young Ho-kyeong's body back into mine, dispersing everything except the Profound Heaven Earth Qi. Then I sent only the Profound Heaven Earth Qi into his meridians... 'Got it...!' Unlike pure yang or yin qi, Profound Heaven Earth Qi wasn't strictly immortal qi. It could take on yin or yang properties at will—an inner art that clashed with neither immortal nor demonic qi. 'This should work...!' As the faint Profound Heaven Earth Qi began circulating inside Young Ho-kyeong, the rampaging demonic qi started following it along the acupoints. Partly because Young Ho-kyeong was cooperating, the demonic qi quickly gathered around the Profound Heaven Earth Qi. 'Gotta hold out...' With such a minuscule amount of Profound Heaven Earth Qi, getting swept up in the demonic flow would prevent proper guidance and expulsion. On top of that, the Blood Spirit Pill's effects were still producing massive new amounts of demonic qi inside him. I had no idea how long it'd take to purge it all, but if I failed, Young Ho-kyeong could die or lose his martial arts. I endured the Profound Heaven Earth Qi being slowly eroded by the demonic qi, sensing and pondering the changes stirring within me. If I kept holding out like this, I could succeed. The First Elder had been skeptical when he saw a man place his hand on the Young Cult Leader's perineum. But once he sensed substantial inner energy swirling and gradually expelling the Young Cult Leader's demonic qi, he began to harbor faint hopes. "What do you think? Can the treatment succeed?" "I don't know... but it seems possible, though it'll take a long time." "Could I use that method too? When he tires, I'll..." "...
Probably not. Adding demonic art to the mix might just cause the Young Cult Leader more pain." The First Elder's guts twisted in frustration. But soon, a good idea struck him. "The Blood Demon! We have the Blood Demon! He must have cultivated the same inner art as my disciple, so..." "It might even be more effective." By now, reports would have reached the Cult Leader too—the traitor was the First Elder, and the Young Cult Leader was in peril. They'd also reported Kang Yun's presence here, so the Blood Demon might accompany him. An insufferably prickly man, but if he could save the Young Cult Leader, the First Elder was ready to bow his head. But contrary to the First Elder's hopes, Blood Demon Lee Ja-seong wasn't traveling with the Cult Leader. "...
Why is that one here?" The First Elder had split from his four subordinates to escape the Demonic Cult's main headquarters. He'd then regrouped with a few who slipped out disguised as visiting merchants, and among their camels, one carried the unconscious Gyeonghyeon-dong. "Sorry. He insisted he had something urgent only for you, Elder..." "Unnecessary." "He begged, saying it was valuable info just for you..." At his subordinate's excuse that they couldn't just abandon him, the First Elder sighed. "Pursuers are coming. Hurry." "Yes, El—" Seeing his subordinate collapse mid-sentence, the First Elder immediately rallied his inner energy to prepare for battle—but it was useless. As his men dropped like flies, as if under some demonic spell, the First Elder stared in horror at the old man swooping down like a hawk to seize his throat. "Guhk..." "Did it feel good, beating up someone else's precious disciple like that?" The old man—the Blood Demon—asked indifferently, still gripping the First Elder's throat. Unable to speak with his windpipe crushed, the First Elder tried prying the hand loose, but those arms were like iron pillars, immovable. He tried kicking with his legs, but for some reason, not a strand of inner energy would rise. Reduced to merely a healthy old man of his age, the First Elder despaired. 'T-The world's greatest... So this... is the end...!' "You'll tell me everything you know." The First Elder glared with burning resolve—I won't tell you a thing—but the moment his eyes met the Blood Demon's eerily glowing ones, his mind was subjugated in an instant. Moments later, the First Elder's body slumped limply, and the Blood Demon nodded to himself, lost in thought. Dominating his mind was the image of his disciple shattering the Peak Realm wall in a single, life-or-death clash. "A mysterious faction lurking between the orthodox and unorthodox sects..." The First Elder didn't know much, but they'd clearly reached out to him. His mind had been filled with the eager belief that allying with them would let him raze the orthodox martial world in revenge. The Blood Demon's lips quirked up slightly before he vanished from the spot. Shortly after, the recovered First Elder and his subordinates departed in haste, utterly forgetting why they'd been lying there. I opened my eyes. "An unfamiliar ceiling..." "Of course it's unfamiliar. Are you coming to?" I turned at the cheerful voice beside me to find Young Ho-kyeong smiling down at me. "Young Cult Leader... are you alright?" "I remember that when I came to, your condition was far worse." According to Young Ho-kyeong, my injuries from getting brutally beaten by the First Elder hadn't even properly healed, yet I'd stubbornly performed qi therapy on him until I collapsed from exhaustion. "Fortunately, thanks to the good compatibility of our inner energies, you passed out after purging the demonic qi. My father—no, the Cult Leader—chewed out the physician for not treating you first." I felt Young Ho-kyeong's hand grasping mine in my half-dazed state. "Thank you. I survived because of you. And thanks to you, our cult avoided getting dragged into a pointless squabble." I didn't catch everything he said, but I got the gist that he was grateful, so I smirked. Young Ho-kyeong smiled too. "You're my benefactor. I'll repay you without fail, so tell me anything you want. For now, focus on recovering..." "Let me have sex with you." "Sex...?" As Young Ho-kyeong tilted his head in confusion, I snapped fully awake and screamed internally. Crazy, what the hell did this damn mouth just blurt out?!