Chapter 164
Chapter 164
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 164
>Chapter Title: God is Great (1)
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Time passed, and I gradually adapted to the changes.
Of course, this meant adapting to the schedule, not the activities themselves.
"Now that you've gotten somewhat used to the paralysis poison, let's practice a new one."
Instructor Eun-ryeo recommended new poisons as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and the cadets lapped them up eagerly.
Some even...
"Gah... hack..."
...failed to neutralize the poison, showing paralysis symptoms or convulsing.
Watching them take more poison the very next day after such ordeals made my head spin.
Of course, if the others heard my complaints, they would've found it ridiculous.
After all, I was always the first to neutralize the poison every time.
The training had started with a tiny fragment of a paralysis pill and gradually increased in size each day. A few days later, I was swallowing half a pill whole.
As the concentration of the poison grew denser, some cadets struggled with neutralization, but I always expelled it in an instant.
In a way, this was a testament to the power of obsession.
'No way something like that was inside my body.'
In such revolting situations, I poured every ounce of effort into driving out the poison.
In any case, after completing several days of paralysis poison training, we moved on to ingesting new poisons.
"Muscle Dissolving Poison spreads through the body first, making it nearly impossible to counter with your own internal energy. But it's not directly life-threatening, so we'll start by experiencing its effects firsthand, then learn how to suppress it quickly before it spreads."
During the Muscle Dissolving Poison practice, a thought crossed my mind. With the demonic energy of the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword gone, maybe the side effects would disappear too.
The conclusion was the exact opposite.
Like withdrawal symptoms, being unable to handle demonic energy made the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword try to flare up.
We also ingested trace amounts of severe poisons that melted organs, skin, or bones, and even tried aphrodisiacs.
Eating aphrodisiacs as a group felt oddly bizarre, but nothing of the sort happened.
"Ugh... hack..."
Whenever someone seemed overcome by the aphrodisiac's effects, Instructor Eun-ryeo would knock them out cold on the spot.
We experienced all sorts of poisons like that.
Not just ingestion—absorption through the skin or breathing.
In an environment like a lab rat for a mad scientist, Il-mok seemed to grasp the nature of this world's 'poisons' to some extent.
'In the end, anything harmful to the body is just poison.'
They were called poisons, but each one carried a different energy.
That's why Instructor Eun-ryeo had us poison ourselves directly first.
Various energies entered and left the body through food or tea. Even breathing was the same.
The key was to detect and expel only the harmful energies among the countless ones that would pass through the body in daily life.
'Conversely, if you don't recognize it as poison, you could be exposed bit by bit without knowing.'
That was the case with Third Brother's black bean tea, or the mercury and cinnabar that shamans praised.
If it blatantly wrecked the body quickly, you'd notice. But if it worked subtly over years, or affected the mind instead of causing direct illness, it was hard to see as poison.
* * *
While Il-mok battled poisons day by day, subtle changes were occurring in the Meditation Club.
The number of cadets in the Meditation Club was dwindling, little by little each day.
The influx of new cadets had been solely because of Il-mok.
'This is my chance to get close to the Eighth Young Master in the club!'
'What kind of presence will the famous Eighth Young Master show in the club?'
'There must be a reason he joined the Meditation Club. Maybe he's seeking enlightenment through meditation.'
But their fantasies shattered within days.
"Zzz."
Thanks to Il-mok, who would cross his legs and fall into a deep sleep the moment club time started.
At first, everyone denied reality.
'Snoring?'
'Did I hear that wrong?'
Then came self-hypnosis.
'Y-Yeah, Father said it's important to rest deeply when there's no fighting during missions.'
'He's not sleeping! He's in such deep meditation it looks like sleep—chasing enlightenment!'
But self-hypnosis only lasted a day or two, and one by one, they faced the truth.
That the genius called Eighth Young Master Il-mok might actually be incredibly lazy.
Around then, peers from other clubs began tempting them away.
"Hahaha! Join the Body Sculpting Club! External martial arts are important too! As warriors of the Divine Cult, we must cultivate our bodies!"
Deung-ak, who had caught Dokgo Pae's eye and joined Body Sculpting, preached its importance.
"As Divine Cult followers, nothing is more important than doctrine."
The Doctrine Study Club was predictably popular.
"I'll personally reenact the Heavenly Demon's great achievements through acting. What an honorable task!"
Surprisingly, a few new cadets showed interest in the Drama Club too.
Of course, now that new cadets had joined, one senior female cadet felt suffocated every time she went to that clearing.
Around twenty days later,
only five cadets remained in the Meditation Club.
Before Il-mok and Instructor Chu Il-hwan arrived, Choi Woong and his friends subtly asked the junior sitting across from them. The only junior still left. To Cheon Su-ryong.
"Aren't you thinking of switching clubs, junior?"
"It's awkward to say, but we're stuck here with no choice."
"It's because of Eighth Young Master Il-mok."
The three couldn't bring themselves to say that quitting meant mental re-education from Il-mok. It was too embarrassing to admit to a junior.
At their words, Cheon Su-ryong nodded.
"I'm staying because of Eighth Young Master Il-mok too."
Even as all his peers realized Il-mok's truth and left,
"I will definitely spar with Eighth Young Master Il-mok once more. That's why I'm staying in the club."
Cheon Su-ryong's faith—once shattered by 'Eighth Young Master's truth' and then patched up—was unshakable.
That mysterious Golden Crow Hand Technique from that day still lingered in his mind.
How could a master who wielded such a technique be truly lazy?
Moreover, Eighth Young Master was a swordsman. For someone mainly practicing swordsmanship to display that level of hand technique made even less sense.
That was Cheon Su-ryong's conclusion, head patched up.
He couldn't see the truth right before his eyes, accepting only what he wanted to believe.
Like those who cling to false truths, Cheon Su-ryong's eyes sparkled as he spoke.
'...He wants to spar with Il-mok again?'
'After that humiliation at the sparring tournament?'
The trio stared at Cheon Su-ryong like he was insane.
* * *
Beyond the Heavenly Myriad Mountains to the west. In the grasslands called the Western Frontier in the Central Plains.
In a settlement of what appeared to be nomads, one man dismounted his horse in haste and entered the largest tent.
"Khan!"
The clan leader, Muhktar Khan, who had been praying to his sole god, calmly finished his bow despite the subordinate's urgency before rising.
Realizing too late he'd interrupted the Khan's sacred time, the man paled, knelt, and trembled.
"Rise."
"I-I've committed a mortal sin."
"It's fine. If it's truly important, won't the god forgive you?"
At Muhktar Khan's words, the man swallowed hard.
Interpreted inversely, it meant he'd be killed if it wasn't important.
But though tense, the man was confident.
Both the Khan and their god would forgive this level of information.
"There's been a change in the heretic cultists based in the Tianshan Mountains to the southeast."
"Change?"
"The frequency of them rampaging around Tianshan has decreased significantly, and most heretics are now moving around the Xinjiang area."
"...Their defenses have weakened, then. Do you know why?"
"Yes, my Khan! Apparently, it's because of the Heavenly Demon's final disciple, whom the heretics revere as a god!"
Muhktar Khan paused briefly at the name Heavenly Demon, then calmly asked as if nothing had happened.
"Heavenly Demon's final disciple? What has he done?"
"The heretics are pouring all their efforts into handling a proposal from that final disciple."
"Hmm. That final disciple must be quite capable."
A sneer crept onto the subordinate's lips at Muhktar Khan's words.
"It's because the foolish heretics are easily swayed. Word is, he's still a greenhorn who hasn't even finished their training academy."
"That weird place called Demonic Path Academy?"
"Yes. The recent changes came because that final disciple preached insights from his first field exercise."
"First field exercise..."
Recalling what he knew of the heretic cult, Muhktar Khan wore a strange expression as he spoke.
"Then, that final disciple will participate in a few more field exercises?"
"Yes, my Khan."
"Hmm... If a single word from a young disciple moves the entire heretic cult, the Heavenly Demon must cherish that final disciple deeply."
"Exactly. To be toyed with by a mere twenty-something brat—truly, the heretic cult is beyond foolish."
No matter how the subordinate badmouthed the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult and Heavenly Demon, Muhktar Khan stroked his beard, organizing his thoughts.
And no matter how he mulled it over, he reached the same conclusion: no better opportunity than this.
"Tell the warriors to prepare for holy war."
Muhktar Khan called it holy war, but he had no intention of warring with the entire 'Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.'
About thirty years ago, when he was a fresh warrior just recognized as such. He had witnessed it with his own eyes.
The power of the being the heretics revered as god. The Heavenly Demon.
It was utterly unreal.
Not just because a casual wave of the Heavenly Demon's hand tore his father and brothers apart like mosquito larvae.
It was a scene of power forbidden to humans, feeling like gazing upon not a man, but a god.
That day, divine repose came to Muhktar Khan's clan, who had sneaked into the Heavenly Myriad Mountains for plunder.
Impartial repose named death.
Amid the clan's annihilation, only a finger-count few escaped alive.
Muhktar Khan survived by sheer luck, but that day's events never faded from his mind.
A god who was a god, yet led all to death. The evil god gnawed at his spirit like a curse.
Wasting away day by day from that curse, Muhktar Khan one day had a special experience.
He encountered the doctrines of a western religion spreading in his region for decades.
Originally, like other nomads, he'd believed in Tengri. But their teachings freed him from the evil god's memory. Liberation from the curse.
From that day, Muhktar Khan was reborn. As a warrior serving a god greater than the evil one.
As a warrior of the one god, he waged holy wars at the forefront, spreading the faith.
Now, decades later, he had become Khan of a tribe as large as the one his father once led.
'This too is the will of god.'
God had granted this opportunity for the prepared him. A chance for vengeance.
Of course, they were merely warriors of god, not god itself. They couldn't dare oppose the evil god directly.
Thus, his target was not the Heavenly Demon.
"Let's see if even the evil god's eyes can shed bloody tears."
That day, as parents and brothers were slaughtered, he fled alone for survival, shedding bloody tears. He would make the evil god's eyes do the same.
By killing the most cherished youngest disciple, just as he lost his family.
He cared not how many tribe warriors died in the process.
This was holy war.
A god that shed bloody tears was no god—this war would prove only the one he believed in was the true god.