Chapter 275
Chapter 275
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 275
>Chapter Title: King of the Ratlings (4)
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Il-mok gazed down at the Hao Mun Leader's vacant eyes for a moment.
He turned to look behind him.
"You've had a tough time, Third Senior Brother."
Seo Wan-pyeong was approaching, having dealt with the Shadow Phantom Unit Leader who had ambushed Il-mok.
"It was nothing. I handled it easily thanks to you."
It wasn't humility.
The Shadow Phantom Unit Leader was the Hao Mun Leader's trusted confidant and second-in-command, a considerable expert. Not far behind Seo Wan-pyeong in skill.
Yet their battle produced no special noises or flashy exchanges visible to the eye.
Both had cultivated martial arts specialized in assassination and stealth.
They clashed endlessly in unseen struggles, deploying concealment techniques against each other.
Feinting auras to mislead the opponent in the wrong direction, or seizing opportunities amid shifts in other battles.
That grueling contest of wits ended in quite an anticlimactic fashion.
As Il-mok's duel with the Hao Mun Leader reached its final stages, and the Hao Mun Leader began getting pushed back unilaterally, the Shadow Phantom Unit Leader acted first out of impatience.
That was why Seo Wan-pyeong said he'd won easily thanks to Il-mok.
Il-mok had vaguely sensed as much, but he shook his head.
"If you hadn't held that man back, Senior Brother, I wouldn't have been able to focus entirely on the Hao Mun Leader, would I?"
"It was just what needed to be done."
"Accomplishing what needs to be done—that's what makes you competent, Senior Brother."
"Is that so?"
"Yes."
"Heh heh heh."
A gloomy smile crept onto Seo Wan-pyeong's lips at the praise from his master's most trusted youngest junior brother.
No sooner had Il-mok finished speaking with Seo Wan-pyeong and taken a few steps than people began surging up through several holes in the floor.
Ju Seo-yeon and Hyeok-ryeon Seon-a, followed by Jeong Hyeon and the other Heavenly Demon Divine Cult warriors who had entered the brothel together—they all rushed up and paid their respects to him.
"We've eliminated every last rat without exception."
To prevent any information leaks, the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult warriors had cleared from the lowest floor upward.
Hyeok-ryeon Seon-a, Ju Seo-yeon, and Jeong Hyeon, who had been fighting the Shadow Phantom Unit, easily mopped up the rest once they joined.
As soon as the warriors finished reporting, Ju Seo-yeon spoke up in a frantic tone.
"Young Master! P-Please save Senior Sister Ha-yeon!"
"You mean Miss Jin?"
Il-mok turned toward the ice wall with a puzzled expression.
Even amid his fight with the Hao Mun Leader, he'd roughly noticed the massive burst of yin energy from behind. That Miss Jin had unleashed some major technique.
He just hadn't realized something had gone wrong with her afterward.
Curious, Il-mok focused his inner sight on the ice wall and saw Miss Jin trapped at its center along with the enemies.
Il-mok deployed his lightness skill and swiftly approached the ice wall, with Seo Wan-pyeong and Ju Seo-yeon leading the others in pursuit.
Tap.
Stopping before the ice wall, Il-mok reached out and touched its surface, like a pillar of ice from an eternal snow mountain.
'Definitely too much for the Miss Jin I knew to deploy.'
Without inner energy protection, the chill seeping into his hand where it touched the wall felt like it could freeze solid in an instant.
On top of that, faint traces of cold continuously leaked from inside.
'She's alive.'
Excessive technique usage, the ongoing emanation of energy, and being trapped in her own method.
'Demonic Deviation.'
Knowing she was on the verge of Extreme Demon, Il-mok figured it was entirely plausible.
Having assessed the situation, Il-mok drew his Ascending Heaven Sword from its sheath once more.
"Everyone, stand back."
With that, he enveloped the blade in qi and thrust at the ice wall.
Crack!
Unlike Ju Seo-yeon's short spear, Il-mok's Ascending Heaven Sword plunged deep into the ice wall in one go.
With the sword embedded, he unleashed the Heavenly Net Sword.
Sword qi beams ravaged the interior where cracks had already formed from the blade's entry, causing part of the ice wall to crumble away.
Thud.
Perhaps because it involved Jin Ha-yeon, Ju Seo-yeon moved with uncharacteristic quick wits.
She hurriedly swept aside the debris from the crumbling ice wall with both hands, and once a path opened, Il-mok entered the ice wall's interior.
Destroying the ice wall two more times along the way, Il-mok finally reached Jin Ha-yeon's vicinity.
'Whew.'
This was the crucial part.
One wrong swing could slice her.
Steadying his breath and focusing, Il-mok now carved away the ice wall with sword beams instead of the Heavenly Net Sword.
Even now, the ice wall regenerated bit by bit, centered on Jin Ha-yeon from the gushing yin energy.
'Any later, and she might drain her congenital qi and die.'
Realizing her condition was quite severe, Il-mok wielded his sword swiftly and soon succeeded in removing some of the ice encasing her.
With the wall between them cleared, Il-mok placed his palm against her abdomen, where her dantian lay.
* * *
In a world filled entirely with white snow, there was one woman. Her deep black hair and eyes contrasted sharply with skin as white as the snow.
Despite the skin-cutting blizzard winds, she oddly felt at ease.
Paradoxically, the bone-piercing cold felt warm and cozy.
In that vast white snowfield, she simply huddled, knees drawn to her chest with arms wrapped around them.
Like a child in its mother's womb.
Her gaze upon the snow-covered world was utterly empty.
As if she knew nothing of joy, anger, sorrow, or pleasure.
It was only natural.
Nothing remained for her.
No home to return to, no cherished ones. Not even who she herself was.
Nothing at all lingered for her.
She simply froze the world endlessly.
The world was dyed white.
By her hand.
She couldn't remember why.
Only a sense of duty remained: that she must do so.
'Duty...?'
For some reason, the word "duty" felt unfamiliar.
Then, did she really need to keep freezing the world like this?
But even that doubt soon faded.
She had always done it, so she felt she must continue.
Then. A change came to the pure white world.
"?"
Turning her head, far in the distance, she spotted something gray and hazy manifesting.
The gray presence, defiling the white world, felt unpleasant for some reason.
'Unpleasant?'
It was strange. For her, who felt no emotions at all, it was an utterly foreign word.
It felt like a forgotten word resurfacing, but she soon ignored it.
She didn't want to recall it.
Thus, she focused her energy on the gray presence.
Whoooosh~!
A blizzard of skin-cutting cold hurtled toward the gray figure.
Yet even her power, which had blanketed the whole world in white, failed to repel the gray presence.
No, it was steadily growing stronger, advancing step by step toward her.
She grew angry at the thing defiling the white snowfield.
'Anger...?'
Another unfamiliar word surfaced, but she shook her head. Thinking of such things made her head ache.
To clear her stray thoughts, she concentrated harder on pushing back the gray presence.
But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't stop it from approaching.
What had been a hazy shape in the distance was now right before her nose.
"Who...?"
It took a human form, much like hers.
Though she couldn't remember, it evoked an inexplicable sense of familiarity.
A man with an indifferent, lazy gaze, as if everything bored him—yet looking into those lazy eyes filled her with relief.
A feeling that, even if something went wrong, it would somehow be resolved.
'Relief...?'
As another foreign word brought her headache, the man now close enough placed his right hand on her shoulder.
It was an odd sensation.
She who found even the skin-cutting gale cozy now felt a different warmth from his hand. Gentler than the gale.
"You've had a tough time, Miss Jin."
"......"
A familiar voice emerged from the man's mouth. But before the voice, the words it carried reached her.
That single phrase—"you've had a tough time"—acknowledging her efforts, filled her with a sense of fulfillment for some reason.
'Fulfillment...?'
Amid the torrent of surging emotions, she parted her frozen lips for the first time.
"Is my name... Miss Jin?"
At her question, the man shook his head.
"Jin Ha-yeon. That's your name."
"!!!"
Into the mind of she who had forgotten even herself, a storm of memories raged.
"Aaah."
Intense headache centered on her unleashed another wave of cold, but she felt no chill.
The man with his hand on her shoulder blocked all the cold.
And soon, when she recovered all her memories, the world-blanketing blizzard vanished completely.
The man who had shielded her from the cold also disappeared.
'Young Master.'
But now she remembered who he was.
The once purely white world underwent a change.
Though white stretched to the horizon, the spot where she sat had melted clear of snow.
[Heavenly Demon Divine Cult]
The first thing she saw was that name, so terribly familiar to her.
Turning her head slightly, she saw a human figure drawn beside the words. Most still covered in snow, but the small exposed part let her recognize him instantly.
It was the face of the gray man who had just come to her.
'I must return.'
To the world of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult. To where this man was.
* * *
Sensing the rampaging yin energy in Jin Ha-yeon's acupoints gradually subside, Il-mok withdrew his palm from her abdomen.
"Whew."
Il-mok exhaled, and cold breath misted out.
His body was now covered in thin frost.
One slip, and he might have been swept into her Demonic Deviation, putting himself in danger.
But the crisis was past now; he just needed to wait for her return.
As if responding to his expectations, the ice wall freezing all around began melting bit by bit.
Rustle.
Jin Ha-yeon's eyelids, trapped in the ice, cautiously fluttered open.
"Y-Young... Master."
Whether from overusing her true qi or the Demonic Deviation, she murmured in a feeble voice.
At her call, Il-mok replied with a faint smile.
"Congratulations. You've broken through Extreme Demon."
Exhausted, perhaps, she gave no reply to his praise.
She merely lifted the corner of her mouth in a light smile.
Even that seemed taxing; the expression faded from her face, and she closed her eyes again.
Swoosh.
At the same time, the ice wall holding her melted away, and her body began to collapse.
Il-mok swiftly moved to support her as she fell toward the floor.
Gazing at her now sunk into deep slumber, he soon let out a sigh of relief.
'Just asleep, then.'
No rampaging inner energy, and her breathing was steady.
After checking her condition, Il-mok suddenly chuckled.
'Come to think of it, that smile was a first.'
He recalled the expression she'd worn right before passing out.