Chapter 158
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 158
Chapter Title: Seo Dohee (1)
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Deep in the Ten Thousand Great Mountains.
“Keuk...!”
In an unfamiliar body, the Phantom Demon awoke amid excruciating pain.
He had survived.
From a rational standpoint, one should be thrilled that their one fairly allotted life hadn't ended but continued on.
“Damn it, damn it...!”
But he had lost far too much.
Not only his original body, meticulously inscribed with spells.
But most of the vengeful spirits he'd painstakingly accumulated by massacring countless people over the years.
Inner energy could be rebuilt without much trouble.
But vengeful spirits? No.
To recover what was lost, he'd need to devour an entire castle, at the very least.
Crunch—
Unbearable rage surged forth.
Kicking open the coffin where his new body had lain dormant, the Phantom Demon rampaged madly through the cult's interior.
And then.
He spotted Hong Sundok in the garden, pulling goofy faces while snapping selfies.
“Huh? What, you're dead?”
“Hong Sundok, you mangy bitch...!”
Her face twisted into a demonic grimace the instant he spat her name laced with curses—striking right at her reverse scale.
“That damn pimp of yours killed my true body. Your doing?”
“What? Pimp? What do you take me for!”
“You can't feign ignorance of Geum Sihyeon!”
“Oh my, did my baby give you the full lap treatment too?”
The moment Geum Sihyeon's name dropped, Hong Sundok's face split into an ear-to-ear grin utterly unfit for her age.
The Phantom Demon ground his teeth once more.
In his memories, those cursed letters he desperately wanted to scour from his mind still flickered hauntingly.
Kyaa
Today my baby killed me off for the second time!
World's spinning 'cause I'm so thrilled!
Having blocked Hong Sundok's messages right after in sheer revulsion.
He had no way of knowing that her world had truly spun after her demon head parted from her body.
“How is it? More handsome now? Muscles bulked up a bit? Martial level? Hit Transformation Realm yet? Gotta be, he's my baby!”
Unable to stomach her bubbly glee, the Phantom Demon stomped over and yanked her up by the collar.
No, tried to.
“Touch me with those filthy hands?”
Aura whipped up in an instant, crushing him down.
His original body could've shrugged it off easily.
“Keuk—”
But to the Phantom Demon, halved in power, it was an overwhelming force he could scarcely endure.
Thud!
His knees slammed into the ground.
“Oh my?”
Gazing down at him, Hong Sundok smacked her lips.
He'd once matched her in strength, so she'd grudgingly tolerated his irritations.
But now?
Hesitation was brief.
Resolution, bold.
Hong Sundok's hand clamped onto the Phantom Demon's skull.
“W-Wait! What're you doing! We can't turn on each other like this!”
Instantly grasping her intent, he bellowed.
“Might makes right.”
Hong Sundok intoned the incantation with a radiant smile.
“Grrraaagh—”
The moment his death rattle ended.
His body slumped limp as a corpse.
He'd regain consciousness soon enough—but as something else entirely, a faithful limb of Hong Sundok.
For one who'd unleashed bloody storms across the martial world time and again, it was an utterly pathetic, anticlimactic end.
“Take that.”
Today too, one more bloodsucker felled in service to the martial world's peace and safety.
Though his final spasm had given the vibe of ditching his body for soul flight, like Hong Sundok.
Having burst her once before, he'd roughly gauged how that sorcery worked.
The result.
Right now, vengeful spirits were ascending one by one before his eyes.
Impossible to count how many lives this thing had devoured; his body crawled with that many souls.
Could've absorbed them with inner energy, but no desire to.
How agonizing and resentful must they have been, fueling their enemy's power all this time.
“May you achieve paradise rebirth...”
Not so callous an atheist as to deny spiritual phenomena despite direct experience of Shaolin's martial arts.
Palms pressed together, he offered a brief prayer for their souls.
Nothing more.
He might make proper offerings here later, but no leisure now for prolonged sentiment.
The moment the formation lifted, he'd unleashed Soul Moon Divine Eyes at full power, yet Master's energy sense wasn't all that clear.
Fortunately, the foe was weakened too, but still, he needed to rush to the rescue.
“Hyup.”
Slinging the still-unconscious Baek Liyeon over his shoulder.
Hm.
Doesn't she train external martial arts?
For a man, solid pecs are the core, after all.
Hyeokryun Kwang was losing his mind.
The Phantom Demon's betrayal had drained quite a bit of his vital energy—that was tolerable.
Thud, thud!
“Haa, haa.”
The Green Forest Bandit King ahead was worn out too.
Only natural.
No matter the ambush, they couldn't underestimate this side's numerical edge.
Sure, plenty of weaklings' heads had exploded before reaching shore, but that was on them.
The survivors who'd set foot on land were more than enough to hound the Bandit King.
No, had been.
“Gaooo!”
“Kraaaagh!”
What manner of monster lurked on this forsaken isle?
Body massive enough—slight exaggeration—to make tigers look like cuddly pets.
Hide so tough sword qi couldn't even scratch it.
Yet its speed was insane, steadily chomping his minions one by one and hurling them back to sea.
“Foolish wench! Truce for now—deal with that monster first!”
“Pfft.”
What the hell's so funny?
Empty-headed?
A deep furrow creased Hyeokryun Kwang's brow.
To take down that beast, they'd need full-power radiant qi blasts while strength remained.
But this mad bitch acted like life meant nothing, relentlessly slashing only at him.
Subordinates who should've been crushed together? Swallowed one by one, sent sailing mutely through the sky.
So what gains could Hyeokryun Kwang reap?
Evaporating in real time.
Clang—!
Blocking the axe swing cleaving for his skull with his crescent blade, Hyeokryun Kwang instinctively scouted retreat paths.
The lake surface still bobbed with boat wreckage from the earlier blast.
Maneuver like Yi Wei Crossing the River, and his remaining inner energy would suffice for escape.
“Haaap!”
Calculating with utmost precision—reserving just enough to cross the lake—Hyeokryun Kwang unleashed a fierce strike.
Boom, thud...!
The shockwave from blade and axe clash was so massive it beggared belief, violently shaking the surroundings in that instant.
“Urk...!”
The moment Seo Dohee failed to hold, spewing black blood and rebounding.
“Retreat! Fall back now!”
Hyeokryun Kwang bellowed with his last shred of conscience, then bolted straight for the lake.
Tack, tack, tack.
His all-out footfalls kicked up sand briskly.
And at the shoreline's edge, as he leaped high.
Puk—!
“—!”
No presence sensed.
No killing intent, no threat felt.
Something invisible pierced Hyeokryun Kwang's heart dead center.
Head drooping, he stared at his chest, blood fountaining out.
“—”
Throat forcibly clenched, but no sound emerged.
For a colossal villain who'd lorded over the waterways for decades, far too pathetic a demise.
“Master, Master!”
After arrow-felling the fiend cornering Master, he'd helped the wolf pup swiftly mop up remnants.
But.
Master's condition wasn't good.
“Si, Sihyeon, is that you...”
“Your disciple was a touch late. Just hold on a moment.”
Left arm long broken, dangling limp.
Thigh gashed deep enough to expose bone.
Breath and pulse erratic, vital energy leaking away.
No matter how kindly phrased, his critical state was dire.
Without prompt measures, death loomed near.
Of course.
He fully intended to administer those measures and save him.
Hastily doffing his robe and spreading it on smoothed ground, he laid Master down.
“Fi, ne...”
“Don't speak.”
No time for propriety; he stripped Master to fully expose and assess the wounds.
From his pouch: needles, moxa, sundry sundries.
“Humble as I seem, I'm not just your disciple but the Life and Death Divine Doctor's too. If he revives the dead, how could I fail to save you?”
True enough.
Who dares check out before this Geum Sihyeon?
Over his dead body.
Left hand on lower abdomen, stemming the vital energy leak, infusing his own to smooth meridian flow.
Right hand swiftly tending external wounds.
“Kyau...”
The wolf pup's anxious growl barely registered.
Now, even 100% focus must condense to two.
Save him.
Without fail.
.
.
.
“Phew...”
After over half a shichen of desperate struggle.
“Mm...”
Some danger lingers, but...
Master had crested the crisis of life and death.
However, the internal injuries were so severe that at his current level, he couldn't properly treat them.
One misstep, and Master's cultivated prowess could crumble overnight.
“Phew...”
The moment he began pondering vessel transfer sacrifice.
A cloth grazed his forehead.
Lifting his gaze.
Baek Liyeon's face, half worry, half guilt, on the verge of tears.
“Seo Instructor is...”
“No threat to his life.”
“Ah...”
Sharp as she was, she grasped the implication fully, face darkening.
But.
Seeing Baek Liyeon sparked a sudden thought.
The spot where he'd severed the Phantom Demon's nape.
Where she'd writhed, wailing.
...Northern Bright Secret Vault.
If it was the vault's interior, spirit medicines surely waited.
Potent enough to fully heal Master.