Dog-Beheading Sword Art

"Heh. What a curious weapon. A blade springing out of a staff…"

A foul-tempered old man, barely five feet tall, sneered at the steel edge that had just burst free.

Right. This wasn't a club for thrashing people. It was a cutting edge meant to take out organs and throats. A weapon with clear, murderous intent baked into its design.

And just as my old world would have hit you with aggravated charges for carrying something like this, my own conscience was doing the same. If I ever killed someone of my own free will, how much of itself would that red thing claw back this time? The worry flickered through my head.

You idiot… Think about surviving first…

Salsung's advice cut through it all—what mattered right now wasn't that. It was figuring out how to stay alive. If my head went flying like this, both of us were finished.

Well. I always figured a day like this would come.

Living with your life balanced on a blade's edge was the Murim way, wasn't it? I'd steeled myself to kill a long time ago.

At the same time, even if I opened a killing domain right now, my odds of walking away weren't great—so I kept quiet and listened to Salsung's counsel.

"Hmph. For a hypocrite, you've got some nerve."

When I flared my killing light and squared up against him, a cruel thrill spread across the age-spotted old man's face.

"Go on, then. Open that killing domain of yours. This old man will put some effort in—peel your skin, dig out your eyes, then slowly tear open your guts for you."

What a bloodthirsty bastard. The way he rolled those words off his tongue so naturally said he'd done that kind of torture-murder more than a few times before.

I thrust my left hand toward him in a hurry.

"Hold on a second. Let's talk, Hunchback Protector Ma Ryun-do."

The man who'd looked ready to throw his life away like straw suddenly wanting to negotiate made Ma Ryun-do eye me with open suspicion.

"Nine serpent heads. One flame."

"…Hm?"

At that abrupt, loaded phrase, his brows twitched. Whether he knew what it meant or not, the hunchbacked old man stared at me with wariness, doubt, and a touch of fluster all tangled together.

"What kind of trick is this now?"

He'd clearly heard every word, and still he was this suspicious. In truth, what I'd just recited was no more than a service creed—something any Demonic Sect martial who'd thrown himself into the armed corps would know.

I kept reading the red characters that were scrawling frantically across my vision.

"When a hundred flowers bloom, black night shall retreat. The hidden roots await the branches that will be revealed."

But what I'd just spoken on Salsung's advice was a cipher known only to a bare handful even inside the Demonic Sect—proof that you were a plant buried deep in the Central Plains Murim.

"There's no trick here, Protector Ma Ryun-do."

"…Mmm!"

The Hunchback ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Protector, who had never once dreamed I might be a Demonic Sect agent, stared at me in genuine shock. A moment ago I'd been an unbearably insolent righteous hypocrite, volunteering to face him alone. The instant I revealed myself as one of his own, he didn't know what to do with me.

"You… Where did you learn that cipher?"

Where did I learn it?

"Protector. What Ming Cultist would open his mouth under those righteous hypocrites' torture?"

Especially not a high-ranking one who knew a cipher like this—that was my claim. Whether he trusted the fanatical loyalty of Ming Cultists or not, Ma Ryun-do furrowed his brow deep and sank into thought.

"Then why crawl back to the Ming Cult after hiding among the righteous?"

If I were a sleeper agent, I should have stayed buried. He couldn't read my intent, so he pressed me for a reason.

"To deliver this to the Ming Cult—something I found in the Central Plains."

I drew a cloth-wrapped object from my robes as if it were something precious. A gift a certain woman had shoved into my arms earlier, while she was being dragged off by Jeok Un-yeop against her will.

"What is it?"

"Open it. See for yourself."

Ma Ryun-do snatched it off my open palm—then fixed me with a meaningful glare.

"Before that, I've got something to say myself."

The foul-tempered, age-spotted old man looked me straight in the eye. When I tilted my head as if to ask what, Ma Ryun-do clamped down on my palm—object and all—and glared hard.

"That cipher you just recited was used a hundred years ago. No one uses it anymore."

"…"

…

A deep, cold silence settled through the cave.

That damn Salsung. Looks like her intel hadn't been updated in a while.

Fine. No choice, then. I clenched Dang Yeohye's gift with everything I had.

"Then choke on this!"

BOOM!

The poison bomb burst, and a dark-green miasma swept over us in an instant.

"Kh—!"

In that mutual-suicide ambush, Ma Ryun-do inhaled a mouthful of poison dust; his face went livid blue almost at once. He cut his breath and staggered back, but it was already too late. Dang Yeohye's specialty toxin twisted your organs with the lightest inhalation.

"Gah—you son of a bitch…!"

"Says the fucking bastard!"

When a curse flew, firing one straight back was pure back-alley instinct. I brushed the poison grit from my body and checked his condition.

"You madman…! Are you trying for mutual annihilation?!"

The hunchbacked old man stared at me like I was insane, his face gone pale. But I was fine. This body had already proven, against the Human-Faced Spider's ultimate venom, that ordinary poison wouldn't kill me.

The skin of both hands and my upper body, caught in the blast, melted for a moment—then muscle and flesh writhed and knitted themselves back together for the sake of my survival.

"What… What kind of monster…"

Ma Ryun-do reeled at the absurd regeneration. Even for a man who'd seen every grotesque art and secret technique the Demonic Sect had to offer, this body's performance was grotesque enough to unsettle him.

"You—what the hell are you…!"

If he wanted to know who I was, the least I could do was answer.

"Your reaper!"

With that, I drew out sword force like lightning and charged. Now—while the poison slowed him—was the perfect chance.

Shhk!

Something parted under the tip of my blade. But all the edge had sliced was a fold of pitch-black martial robes. Even poisoned, he was still a master of the Transcendent Realm; his monstrous reaction speed carried him clear of the cut.

"You righteous hypocrite!"

Ma Ryun-do twisted aside, letting the blade skim past at an angle, then answered with a lightning counter. His right hand crooked like a raptor's talon, sheathed in gang qi, and tore for my throat as if to rip it out.

"Hup—!"

I snapped my head back. His nails grazed the tip of my nose by a hair's breadth.

KRRANG!

Gang qi sparked in empty air. The blade I flung up just in time barely turned aside the claw technique that had come screaming after.

Poisoned or not, a Transcendent Realm master was still a Transcendent Realm master. Gang qi poured from every direction, red trajectories carving one after another. I met them with formless, rootless motion, stringing together a razor-thin exchange, and Ma Ryun-do's face twisted with incomprehension.

"What kind of sword art is that?!"

"The kind that rips a son of a bitch apart!"

I clenched my teeth, batting and bleeding off his attacks. A sword for cutting down bastards who'd abandoned their humanity—the Chamgu Sword Art. Dog-Beheading Sword Art. A style whose very name carried not a scrap of ornament, pure practical lethality, began to bare its true face in my grip.

I twisted my waist as I shouted the blunt form name. The instant Ma Ryun-do raised his arms against a high-line attack, I snapped the blade's path aside. The pure-white tip folded onto a bizarre trajectory and drove for his lower abdomen.

Shhk!

This time the sensation in my fingers was solid. Ma Ryun-do twisted just enough to escape a fatal wound, but a fistful of red blood burst from his side.

I shouted a heart thrust, shuffled both feet in a noisy blur to sow feints and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠confusion, then brought the blade down from overhead in a sudden cut.

KRANG!

But gang qi sheathing his hand-blade stopped it—Hell-Cleaving Demon Sword failing, by a hair, to split his skull. It had been a feint loaded with the Heavenly Killing Star's full murder-will, and still. A Transcendent Realm martial artist, after all.

"You…! What a rootless, deranged sword art…!"

He shouted it, having flinched for real. And he wasn't wrong. The Chamgu Sword Art had none of orthodox martial arts' standardized forms and postures. No constraints. Hard to predict. Pure practicality and endless variation—a sword art assembled solely from the most efficient ways to kill, made for the Heavenly Killing Star.

"Hunchbacked geezer—you're fucked!"

Fourth Form: whatever-the-hell sword technique. No bluster, no flourish—only the Heavenly Killing Star's body, reading the opponent's killing intent and flowing with it like water. My blade slanted aside a shot of gang qi, rode the current, and cut into his shoulder.

"Kh—!"

Ma Ryun-do flung protective gang qi around himself, but he was a beat late. Red blood sprayed for the price.

"You despicable righteous dog…!"

A Transcendent Realm master, face still poisoned, roared it. Alternating the Heavenly Killing Star's arts with poison, carving wound after wound—his rage had clearly hit its peak.

"You're fucked!"

I piled on the pressure and drove him hard.

Good. If I can just cut his throat like this…!

Judging the momentum mine, I stepped clean into the Demonic Protector's range.

That was the moment.

A red trajectory flashed at the edge of my vision. At the Heavenly Killing Star's spine-crawling warning, I ducked my head like a turtle. At the same instant, something at Ma Ryun-do's waist flashed like lightning and came for me.

Shhk!

Hair sheared free and hung in the air like blood-drops. A hair's breadth. A fraction more delay and both eyes would have been cut out together—and even the Heavenly Killing Star might not have been able to restore that.

"You—dodging every which way like a damn rat!"

Ma Ryun-do shouted, voice laced with scorn. The weapon that had shorn my hair revealed itself: a soft sword, a flexible blade that bent and whipped every way. Its elasticity made the line endlessly mutable—and it could still bind gang qi hard enough to shear steel and sword-qi alike. A thoroughly lethal blade.

Shhhk! Shhhk!

The sword that had been coiled at his waist flicked its tongue like a viper. At once his waist snapped and the edge came in on a grotesque angle.

Unpredictable Chamgu Sword Art and a soft sword that could bend anywhere collided in midair.

Cha-cha-chang!

Sparks of steel sprayed in a chain. Every clash of blade on blade filled the cave with a ringing crash.

But something was wrong.

The more our swords mixed, the more my grip went numb and prickling. Proof that Ma Ryun-do's strength was coming back. He didn't have regeneration like mine, and he hadn't taken an antidote—so why was the ultimate poison's effect fading this fast? Dang Yeohye's toxin shouldn't lose its teeth so quickly.

Whirrr—!

Five-foot Ma Ryun-do leapt like a diving swallow and flung soft-sword trajectories in every direction. It felt like dozens of vipers rushing me from all sides. Red paths carved without pause across my vision, and my body couldn't keep up.

Shhk!

"Kh—fuck!"

I twisted to dodge, but it wasn't enough. The flexing edge whipped across my shoulder, my side, my thigh in turn. Before I knew it I was driven back, spine slamming into the cave wall.

"Die, dog of the righteous!"

Poison as a tool. Cutting along the grain of the optimal path to kill. And I was still being pushed this hard. Maybe a lone Transcendental Peak martial artist taking on a master at the full maturity of the Transcendent Realm really had been reckless from the start.

And stranger still—every time one of his attacks landed, I felt a trickle of my internal energy being siphoned away. It was the same feeling as when I'd faced the Soul-Draining Demon Lord.

That Ming Cult Protector… He's using demonic arts…

At that, the red fingers twitched, almost in disbelief.

"Demonic arts…?"

Whether he'd heard my mutter or not, he gave a short laugh and answered kindly.

"That's right. After you lot persecuted us as the Demonic Sect, we truly took demonic arts into our hands."

No wonder—from the first clash I'd felt something that wasn't internal energy. By unfolding demonic arts he was burning his own lifespan, and he meant to suck my true core energy dry to fill the gap.

"Look upon this power. The new path we reached after you persecuted and despised us…!"

After the long war, the Ming Cult had truly become the Demonic Sect.

…

And Salsung seemed to regard what the Ming Cult had become with a thoroughly complicated feeling.

I'd meant to walk out of this alive and go back to my sisters. At this rate, there was nothing for it.

Thud!

I kicked off the ground and hurled my whole body at him.

Shhk! Skhk!

Sword-strikes poured over my frame at once. A blade drove deep into my chest. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I missed the vital organs, but for a stretch I couldn't draw breath. Even so, I planted a fairly deep wound of my own in his chest.

"Kh—what?!"

At the sight of me genuinely going for mutual annihilation, Ma Ryun-do flinched. I took the rain of cuts on my body and fought him like a yaksha.

Cha-cha-chang!

"Kh—what are you?! Have you gone mad?!"

Blood and scraps of flesh sprayed from every direction. In an instant the cave became a slaughterhouse painted raw red. Even so I never stopped advancing. Shallow wounds I trusted to regeneration; deep ones I trusted to this body's durability—and I charged him as a living Heavenly Killing Star.

I was trying to bury him under a coat of blood before he fully recovered his strength when—

"What kind of impossible regeneration… Wait. A cipher only certain people used a hundred years ago—and this exploding killing intent—you can't be…?!"

The long-surviving old man of the Demonic Sect cried out as if something had just struck him, pure shock in his voice.