Nothing at All Is Happening (1)
“Martial Uncle?”
“Hmm?”
“It’s noisy outside. Is something going on?”
At the question, Baek Cheon smiled faintly.
“Nothing at all is happening.”
“……”
The Mount Hua disciples exchanged doubtful glances and flicked their eyes toward the tightly shut window.
“An intruder!”
“Pursue him!”
They hadn’t exactly tried to listen, but their honed ears could still catch the voices drifting through the howl of the blizzard.
And yet he said nothing was happening?
With a hard look, Jo Gul stared straight at Baek Cheon and said, “Sure. Nothing’s happening.”
“Isn’t it?”
“Yes. I think I should rest a bit. I’m tired today.”
“So am I.”
That was when the two of them smiled at each other.
“Bring the Ice Blade Squad!”
“There! Don’t let him escape!”
Urgent shouts kept ringing out from outside.
And then, at that very moment—
Snap!
Hye Yeon’s expression turned stern as he sprang to his feet and hurried toward the place where their belongings had been stacked.
Then he pulled something from among them and headed for the window.
“Monk, what are you—”
Thud. Thud.
Everyone stared at Hye Yeon, dumbfounded and wide-eyed. He was carefully stuffing a cloth into the cracks around the window to block them off completely.
“Amitabha. If one is to sleep, one must not be disturbed by such noise.”
Ah…
Yoon Jong turned to look at Baek Cheon. Then he asked seriously, “Should we put out the lamp?”
“……”
Once again, Baek Cheon was painfully reminded that these people were Mount Hua’s disciples, through and through.
“Ah, damn it, I’m losing my temper!”
Bang!
Chung Myung kicked away the man who had drawn his sword and rushed at him, then started throwing a fit.
He’d been cold and had come down without checking properly, only to find someone right below him.
“Damn blizzard!”
The snow kept lashing down, turning the whole world pale and white, and on top of that those guys were running around in white clothes, so they were impossible to see clearly…
“Huh?”
Chung Myung’s eyes twitched violently.
Wait. The whole world was white?
His gaze slowly dropped downward.
It was black.
Completely black.
There was no way that wouldn’t stand out…
“There!”
“The black one’s over there! Catch him!”
Chung Myung let out a dry laugh.
“If your head’s empty, your hands and feet suffer for it.”
Who’d have thought the head in question would be mine?
Of course a black-clad man would stand out in a blizzard. No wonder those Ice Palace bastards all wore white.
But regret, no matter how quickly it came, was always too late.
Chung Myung shoved the pointless thoughts aside and scanned his surroundings with wild eyes.
I need to get out of here first.
Even if Baek Cheon hadn’t shut the window, getting back to their quarters in this situation would’ve been impossible anyway. So the best thing now was to run as fast as he could…
That was when it happened.
Whoooooosh!
With a chilling hiss, a blue sword aura sliced through the blizzard and shot straight toward Chung Myung.
Oh?
So there was a decent one in the mix…
“Ah, crap! My sword!”
Chung Myung reflexively reached for his waist, then gasped and rolled aside. Only then did he remember he had left his sword behind for the infiltration.
“Did the cold make me forgetful? I keep blanking on things.”
Considering his age, it was less forgetfulness than senility he should have been worried about, but at least his body was still young.
No, this is actually a relief.
If he had instinctively reached for his sword, it might have raised suspicion. After all, no matter what, he absolutely could not let them find out he’d come from Mount Hua.
“Surround him!”
“Get him!”
The Ice Palace warriors closed in, widening the encirclement around Chung Myung. The swords leveled at him made their intent perfectly clear—they had no intention of letting him escape.
“Tch.”
Chung Myung clicked his tongue and rolled his neck from side to side.
He’d been surrounded, but he wasn’t rattled. Back in the day, being encircled like this and cutting down dozens of men had been routine. If anything, it brought back memories.
There was a real thrill to running wild back then.
Back when he carved through those damn demonic bastards one by one, it felt like a decade’s worth of indigestion finally went down all at once.
Haa.
Lost in recollection, Chung Myung let out a long sigh inwardly. Then he looked at the men surrounding him with a weary expression.
What did these guys do wrong?
I should handle them lightly and slip away…
But then—
“That black clothing!”
“Huh?”
One of the men, who seemed to be their leader, shot Chung Myung a sharp look and barked, “Are you one of those from the cult?”
“The cult…?”
“What on earth were you thinking, infiltrating this place as a cultist!”
“……”
Slowly, veins began to stand out in Chung Myung’s bulging eyes.
The cult?
The Demonic Sect?
Did this bastard just call me a Demonic Sect bastard?
“No, but this bastard—”
Crack.
A strange grinding sound echoed from Chung Myung’s clenched fist. Those who heard it flinched instinctively, chilled by something they couldn’t name.
“Cult?”
Chung Myung’s voice seeped out very slowly.
“You guys… don’t seem to know something…”
His eyes, visible through the mask, began to roll back.
“There are things you can say to a person, and things you can’t.”
And you just said the one thing you shouldn’t have.
You’re all dead, you bastards.
With his eyes completely white, Chung Myung shot like a madman into the Ice Palace warriors.
Bang!
“……A fist.”
Crash!
“……Was that a kick?”
“Looked like he took it with his head.”
“No. That was an elbow, an elbow. Definitely an elbow.”
The Mount Hua disciples listened with fascination to the sounds coming from outside the window and tried to reconstruct the scene.
Watching those martial brothers and sisters with a complicated expression, Dang Soso finally voiced what no one else dared to say.
“Martial Uncle.”
“Yes?”
“……Is this really okay?”
Baek Cheon smiled brightly at the youngest disciple.
“How could it possibly be okay?”
“……”
A bead of sweat slid down Dang Soso’s cheek.
“Then… shouldn’t we do something?”
“Do something?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“……”
Baek Cheon shook his head with the look of a man who had already abandoned everything.
“Soso.”
“Yes.”
“You know perfectly well why are you asking me that. How is a person supposed to stop that lunatic from causing trouble?”
“……”
Yoon Jong, listening from the side, nodded as if he agreed with Baek Cheon. Baek Cheon said in a grave voice, “This is a natural disaster. People can’t stop a typhoon.”
“At least there are places to hide from a typhoon.”
“That’s true too.”
But Dang Soso couldn’t stop the cold sweat forming on her back.
As someone from the Sichuan Tang Family, she knew all too well how enormous the consequences could be when someone made a scene in another sect’s territory.
Just imagine a stranger breaking into the Tang Family estate and beating people up in the middle of it. The whole family would be turned upside down.
What exactly is Senior Brother Chung Myung thinking?
No, wait—does that person even think?
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
“He’s even climbed on top of him.”
“Ugh. I don’t even want to imagine it.”
The Mount Hua disciples shuddered and looked toward the window.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Chung Myung, eyes rolled white, had climbed onto the man who had fallen in the snow and was hammering both fists down on him.
“Cult? Cultooo? Say that again, you punk!”
Did these bastards lose their minds?
What?
The Demonic Sect?
You bastards, if I were from the Demonic Sect I’d crawl up from my grave doing three somersaults in the air.
And you’re calling me what?
Cuuul~tist?
By now Chung Myung’s eyes had completely turned over, leaving only the whites visible.
“I’ve lived a long time, and this is the first time I’ve heard an insult like that! Hey, you bastard! I may have used all sorts of foul language in my day, but I still kept a minimum standard! How can you say something that vicious to another human being!”
Bang!
The force generated through his twisting waist drove perfectly into his fist. Channeling all that power through his blow and smashing the downed man’s jaw aside, Chung Myung mercilessly followed up with repeated strikes.
“Die! Die! Die, you bastard!”
The man being beaten had his head snapped left and right over and over.
“T-That lunatic!”
“What are you doing? Swarm him!”
The Ice Palace warriors, so stunned they had forgotten they were supposed to attack, finally came to their senses and rushed at Chung Myung in a panic.
Whoosh!
Chung Myung turned his wild eyes toward them as they charged.
“Good!”
Leaving the fallen man behind, he sprang up and grabbed one of the incoming swords barehanded.
A cold chill surged into his fingertips, but such a thing was nothing to Chung Myung, who burned like lava.
Clang!
The blade snapped cleanly in two.
The warrior’s eyes bulged so wide they seemed ready to tear, and his jaw dropped open.
H-How?
Grabbing a sword wrapped in sword aura barehanded was already unthinkable, but breaking it too?
Was there any sense in that?
But his thoughts didn’t last very long.
Pow!
Once a fist struck your jaw, thinking became impossible. Having sent one warrior flying with a single blow, Chung Myung scanned the area like a predator searching for prey.
At that ferocious, unhinged gaze, the Ice Palace warriors—despite having the numbers—couldn’t help flinching and stepping back.
“……Is, is that demonic art?”
“……”
No, seriously, you bastards?
This is Daoist martial arts, famous all over the Central Plains, you idiots!
— Doesn’t look that way to me either.
“Ah, why do you have to show up now? Get back in there!”
With a furious shout, Chung Myung lunged forward and began beating down everyone in reach.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Warriors struck by his fists or kicked in the side flew away shrieking through the swirling snowstorm.
“St-Stop him!”
“Damn it, what the hell kind of guy is this…!”
The Ice Palace warriors did their best, but Chung Myung was perfectly proving why he was called the Mount Hua Divine Dragon—no, the Mount Hua Mad Dog.
But just then—
“Send reinforcements!”
“Who goes there!”
The tightly shut doors of the Ice Palace flew open, and warriors began pouring out in a rush.
Blood surged to Chung Myung’s head. He twisted around to check the sight, his body briefly jolting despite its relentless frenzy.
Quickly sweeping over the men spilling out, he grinned.
The ones coming out now were different from the random patrols outside. These were the Ice Palace’s true elites, streaming out like an ant swarm with killing intent blazing in their eyes.
Damn. This won’t do.
There was a time and place to get angry.
Time to run!
He’d stirred up enough chaos already; it was time to withdraw before things got any bigger.
He couldn’t die like some dumb stray dog in this foreign land!
Scanning the area with a sharp eye, he found a gap in the encirclement and hurled himself at it.
“Gah!”
The moment Chung Myung shot in like a ray of light, an Ice Palace warrior panicked and reflexively thrust out his sword.
But Chung Myung’s hand moved smoothly. He casually pushed away the side of the blade aimed at him.
Thunk.
The sword was knocked aside with its own momentum. Chung Myung slipped into the warrior’s wide-open chest and slammed his shoulder straight into the man’s solar plexus.
Crack!
The warrior’s mouth flew open.
Chung Myung seized the man’s shoulders, which were shaking violently as he couldn’t even breathe. Then, in a flash, he twisted his body to switch positions with him and drove a kick into the man’s body.
Bang!
Using the recoil of the kick, Chung Myung launched himself into the air and began riding the wind out of the Ice Palace.
“See you later, you bastards!”
Of course, he wasn’t really leaving for good.
That was when Chung Myung laughed and shot away through the air.
Whoooom.
A faint piercing sound brushed his ear. Chung Myung snapped his head around.
And then—
Booooooom!
With a roar like a giant wheel turning, a massive white pillar of force shot from the entrance of the Ice Palace at terrifying speed.
Ice White Divine Palm?
The Ice White Divine Palm, the martial art emblematic of the North Sea Ice Palace and famed as one of the world’s greatest yin techniques.
The force of it was now flying straight at Chung Myung. Just looking at the energy contained within it made it obvious this wasn’t ordinary. It was too much to take head-on with his bare body.
“Tch!”
With a slight frown, Chung Myung twisted his body and poured inner power into both hands. But he instantly flinched and stopped himself.
Shit! No good!
He had reflexively been about to use the Plum Blossom Scattering Hands, but that would stand out too much.
With snow already whipping this fiercely, if red plum petals started fluttering through the air too, there’d be no need to check anything at all.
Damn it, why’d they have to make martial arts like this?
With an annoyed expression, Chung Myung changed the flow of his inner power.
Soon, a blue-green energy gathered in his hands. Instead of the Plum Blossom Scattering Hands, he unleashed the Bamboo Leaf Hands and drove all the power he could muster straight into the incoming Ice White Divine Palm.
BOOOOOOOOM!
“Damn it!”
Seol Cheon-sang, who had fired the Ice White Divine Palm the moment he stepped out through the door, bit his lip hard and cursed under his breath.
That masked man had collided with the Ice White Divine Palm in midair and been hurled away into the sky like a pebble struck by a hammer.
“Pursue him!”
“Yes!”
“He was struck by the Divine Palm; he can’t have gone far! Bring him back alive before he freezes to death!”
“Yes!”
The Ice Palace warriors surged forward with murderous looks in their eyes.
Watching silently, Seol Cheon-sang narrowed his eyes.
Did he use my own inner power against me to escape?
“A bold one, isn’t he. Let’s see if he knows what cold yin energy is.”
A thin, nasty smile appeared at the corners of his mouth.
But even he did not know what kind of man the masked figure who had just flown away really was.
To his great misfortune, that was.