Chapter 255
Chapter 255
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 255
>Chapter Title: Archenemy (2)
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“You bastard!!”
As the masked man tried to slip away alone, the Blood Cult’s Fifth Elder hurriedly swung his blade through the air, unleashing a burst of blood-red saber energy.
Screeech.
But the masked man nimbly dodged it with his lightfoot skill, just barely.
“Haaah!”
While the Fifth Elder attacked the masked man, Chu-gae—who had steadied his turbulent inner energy—thrust out his twin palms toward the Fifth Elder.
“Fine! I’ll kill you bastards first!”
The Fifth Elder, his initial arrogant smile gone, swung his massive blade back at Chu-gae and shouted once more.
“Protect the Third Elder!”
Boom!!
Even as he collided with Chu-gae mid-shout, the Fifth Elder astonishingly held his own.
Screeech!
In that moment, the Flying Dragon Hall Leader’s covert sword strike aimed at the Fifth Elder’s vital point, forcing him to step back and barely evade the blow.
* * *
Meanwhile, explosions continued to erupt from the rear.
Having dumped the superhuman elder on his archenemy and the beggar, Il-mok advanced toward the altar, where a massive energy surged.
But those around the altar blocked his path.
“Earth Command Spirit, Subtle Change Spirit, Open Eight Blood Spirits, Come Forth, Hasten Yield Command!”
Some tossed talismans or swung ritual tools to unleash spells. Following their incantations, fiery birds flew toward Il-mok, or the ground turned into a swamp.
Whoosh!
Sensing the anomaly beneath his feet, Il-mok leaped into the air with his lightness skill. After cleaving through the incoming lightning and fiery birds mid-air.
“Die!”
Ones who closed in quickly swung swords or blades at Il-mok.
Though not comparable to the portly elder’s, their weapons were also laced with blood-red energy.
‘In color, it’s similar to Seon-a’s or the Demonic Path Academy Lord’s.’
But Il-mok could sense the fundamental difference.
Their energy was utterly turbid, reeking of sticky blood.
Inner energy gained by absorbing someone’s vital blood essence. It was undoubtedly a form of energy absorption technique.
With calm eyes observing their movements, Il-mok twisted his body with minimal motion.
A blood-energy-charged blade grazed past him.
Clang!
Il-mok’s swiftly thrust sword struck the flat of the Blood Cult warrior’s blade, shoving it aside.
Clang!
The deflected sword of the Blood Cult warrior clashed with another saber-wielding assailant attacking from the side.
Slash!
Il-mok’s follow-up strike, flowing like a dance, cleanly severed the Blood Cult warrior’s neck.
‘Their movements are crude compared to the energy they possess.’
They had gained vast inner energy through absorption, but their enlightenment couldn’t keep up.
Still, they weren’t pushovers by any means.
While he dispatched one, blood-red energy chains now flew to ensnare him.
Whoosh!
Il-mok boldly launched himself into the air, evading the blood chains.
At the same time, swinging his sword mid-air, a faintly red sword energy sliced through the void toward one of the sorcerers.
It was the blood energy absorbed into his Ascending Sword during the previous kill, now expelled.
“Heaven-Earth Six Paths, Metal Wood Water Fire Earth Blood, Recognize Six Paths, Rainbow Earth Formation, Hasten Yield Command!”
The sorcerer hurriedly chanted and thrust out a talisman, forming an energy barrier in front of him that blocked Il-mok’s sword energy.
Amid this, the remaining sorcerers chanted again, unleashing various spells toward Il-mok floating in the air.
“Whew.”
Il-mok, hovering mid-air with calm eyes surveying the incoming spells from all directions, relaxed his body and slowly swung his sword.
It was unbelievably fluid for a mid-air technique, as the Ascending Sword swam through the void.
Energy gathered on the Ascending Sword formed a soft barrier along the sword path, enveloping the incoming energies like a cloth wrapping them up.
Some clashed internally within the sword barrier, causing cracks or explosions.
Il-mok barely contained the spell energies in his sword barrier. The moment he landed, he whipped his sword straight ahead.
“Gaaah!”
The piled-up energies in the sword barrier engulfed the Blood Cult warrior charging from the front.
The warrior had timed his rush for Il-mok’s landing.
Il-mok succeeded in taking out two more warriors, but he had no time to relax.
“Die!”
More warriors still swung weapons at him.
“Hasten Yield Command!”
And from a short distance away, the sorcerers diligently chanted their spells.
* * *
While Il-mok clashed with the Blood Cult warriors.
The Flying Dragon Hall Leader and Chu-gae also continued their precarious battle against the Blood Cult elder.
Boom!!
“Urk….”
The Flying Dragon Hall Leader, blocking the elder’s blood-red beam, was flung back with a groan. Chu-gae formed energy with his twin palms and fired it at the elder.
“Uahaha!”
But the elder, now regaining his composure, swung his blood-red energy-coated massive blade to meet it.
Boom!!
Amid the explosion and rising dust, Chu-gae—the already ragged beggar—opened his mouth, looking utterly disheveled.
“What horrific inner energy. Just how much vital blood have you absorbed!”
Chu-gae had noticed too. That the man’s inner energy was built from absorbing others’ blood.
But the elder’s response to Chu-gae’s remark was a sneer.
“Hmph. How hypocritical. Martial arts are built by fighting and winning, after all. Didn’t you lot spill countless blood in growing strong? Killing enemies for enlightenment, or killing them for their blood—what’s the difference?”
At the elder’s bold shout, Chu-gae nearly let out a hollow laugh despite the urgency.
What nonsense. If he could use the Iron Beggar Staff Technique—reserved only for the sect leader and successor—he’d smash the bastard’s head right then.
“As you say, I’ve killed too. But never to grow stronger! And massacring the weak brings no enlightenment!”
“Uahaha! That’s why our Blood Cult’s arts are superior. We become greater by taking blood from worthless worms.”
With that, the elder smirked as if realizing something and added,
“Ah, now I see—you envy this body’s Heavenly Blood Heart Art and Reverse Heaven Blood Slaughter Blade Technique. Hahaha. Swear allegiance to our Blood Cult now, and I’ll bestow the divine art upon you.”
At the elder’s words, Chu-gae’s face twisted.
‘As expected, the Blood Cult is a public enemy that the entire martial world must unite to destroy.’
With that mindset, they must have casually committed massacres in the past.
The problem was the elder’s formidable skill, bolstered by inhuman methods.
Screeech!
The Flying Dragon Hall Leader, flung back moments ago from blocking the beam, struck with stealth arts.
Clang!
“Hahaha! Just like you righteous faction hypocrites who called us cowardly—rat-like martial arts!”
The elder easily blocked the strike and burst into mocking laughter.
‘Tch.’
Chu-gae clicked his tongue inwardly.
Pausing to chat mid-fight was also to give the injured Flying Dragon Hall Leader time to catch his breath and launch a sneak attack.
Whoosh!
With that ploy foiled, Chu-gae thrust his twin palms again to aid the endangered Flying Dragon Hall Leader.
They exchanged several more bouts with the elder alongside the Flying Dragon Hall Leader.
‘This won’t do. It’s dangerous.’
Chu-gae felt a chased, anxious dread.
Not just because of the elder wielding blood-red beams.
It was because of what was happening ahead, at the altar.
The Third Elder, called that, was orchestrating an absurdly massive energy flow.
Il-mok didn’t know the nature of the grand ritual, but he couldn’t imagine the horror if it completed.
Maitreya’s incarnation, moving to eliminate the elder, was diligently killing Blood Cult members, but one misstep and the ritual might finish.
‘No other way, is there.’
Chu-gae glanced at the Flying Dragon Hall Leader and made his decision.
Suspicious as the Flying Dragon Hall Leader’s actions were, Chu-gae’s priority was the martial world’s safety.
Screeeeech!
Toward the elder’s massive blade slicing to bisect him, Chu-gae boldly extended his twin palms.
One hand toward the blade’s edge, the other toward the elder’s hand wielding it.
Grasping Chu-gae’s intent, the elder grinned viciously and surged more energy from his dantian.
Trying to block a blade he could barely handle with twin palms using one hand—he planned to sever it in one go.
But things didn’t unfold as the elder expected.
Boom!!
With a massive explosion, the elder’s blade halted mid-air. Caught in Chu-gae’s left hand.
“!?”
Bewilderment flickered in the elder’s eyes for the first time.
An intensity incomparable to before surged in Chu-gae’s left palm.
It was innate primal energy.
For the martial world’s sake, Chu-gae chose mutual destruction.
Drawing up his life-force-like innate energy and forcibly pulling all from his dantian, blood endlessly poured from his mouth.
That wasn’t all. From overexertion, cracks formed in his dantian, sending excruciating pain from his lower abdomen.
As his dantian shattered like a dropped vessel, Chu-gae gripped the elder’s arm—swinging the blade—with his right hand to prevent escape.
“Thank you.”
The Flying Dragon Hall Leader’s sword pierced the elder’s heart without missing the chance.
“Guh….”
The Blood Cult elder let out a choked groan, collapsing limply to his knees.
“Cough….”
Spitting a mouthful of fresh blood, Chu-gae gazed at the Flying Dragon Hall Leader through blurring vision.
‘Please. I hope my judgment wasn’t wrong.’
* * *
By the time Il-mok had slain about half the Blood Cult members blocking him, a major shift occurred on the battlefield.
The explosions from the rear suddenly ceased.
Slash!
The Flying Dragon Hall Leader, now joined, covertly sliced a Blood Cult swordsman’s neck.
‘What happened to Chu-gae?’
Harboring that doubt, Il-mok first focused on clearing the Blood Cult members with the Flying Dragon Hall Leader.
It was a situation where the phrase “one plus one equals five” came to mind.
And for the Blood Cult members, it was no different from a catastrophe.
They couldn’t even handle one Il-mok properly, falling one by one. With the Flying Dragon Hall Leader joining, they were swept away helplessly.
Right then, a second upheaval struck the battlefield.
The massive energy surging at the altar’s center was rapidly sucked into somewhere.
“Damn.”
“Too late?”
Il-mok and the Flying Dragon Hall Leader muttered to themselves. Moments later, the Third Elder—who had been conducting the ritual—snapped his eyes open and rose.
But oddly, no further anomaly occurred despite the elder rising.
And Il-mok considered a possibility.
‘Maybe it was interrupted midway.’
Separate from the altar’s central energy flow, qi had been gathering toward this clearing from all directions since earlier. Blood-reeking energy.
Even now, as the elder halted the ritual, those energies flowed along engraved paths throughout the clearing.
To be precise, they converged toward the altar’s center but dispersed unable to proceed further.
Either the ritual had ended with residual energy, or it was stopped midway. Two main possibilities.
The elder’s words as he rose confirmed the latter for Il-mok.
“The energy you scattered—I’ll replenish it with your blood. Not a single drop left behind.”
Muttering in a eerie tone like chanting a spell, blood-red energy briefly surged around the elder.
His energy resonated like an echo, mingling with the scattered blood qi nearby.
In an instant, the swollen colossal blood qi engulfed Il-mok and the Flying Dragon Hall Leader.