Chapter 32. Spirit Valley (8)

Before anyone could even catch their breath at a broadcast switching on without warning, screens all across the world had begun tuning in to Lee Tae-hyun's stream.

"Boss monster subjugation. Beginning monitoring now."

Seong Ju-ah set down her long-cold coffee, her eyes gleaming quietly.

"Less than a week into the raid, and he's already at the boss ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠monster...."

Wi Han-jun clicked his tongue. Just like that C-rank gate before it — the man was truly impossible to read. Could he actually be an Irregular, the way Seong Ju-ah kept insisting?

"But will he really be all right? Even if Lee Tae-hyun is that... Irregular, or whatever." He let his worry show on his face. "We're talking about a B-rank gate boss. It's hard enough for an F-rank hunter to take one down solo."

It wasn't as if Seong Ju-ah didn't know. That was exactly why permission had been granted for her to accompany him into the gate in the first place — if the worst came to pass, she could step in and pull Lee Tae-hyun out herself.

And yet.

For some reason, she wanted to believe in something else. A foolish judgment, hardly befitting the owner of the skill [Keen Insight].

"You have to trust him."

Seong Ju-ah was holding out hope. That Lee Tae-hyun would come back with a different result. Something like—

"Who knows? He might just take that boss down all by himself."

"Come on, even you can't believe that...." Wi Han-jun, about to add one more objection, heaved a long sigh instead. "You know what? I don't know anymore."

Meanwhile, in the chairman's office of Cheonseong Group.

"...."

Wordless, his breath held, Lee Jin-sung stared at the screen.

"Grrrgh...! He's out there pulling another insane stunt, boss!" — from inside a car tearing down a night road.

"...Don't die." — from a great wooden hall resting quietly at the foot of a mountain.

"What's this...? Big brother?" — from a country far across the sea.

Each in their own way, they all watched the broadcast.

With countless eyes fixed on a single point—

"The B-rank gate boss subjugation broadcast begins now."

His stream had started.

Contrary to my expectation that we would each take a beat to read the other's rhythm and stance—

"Kgh?!"

Cheonmagwi charged first, headlong and relentless. Spearhead and blade tangled in midair.

So... heavy!

It was as though he'd strapped boulders to his sword. I batted the blade aside with quick, economical strokes, preparing my own attack.

"Nameless Spear—!"

Before I could unfold even a single form, three sword strikes bored straight into my guard. Shhk! I slipped them by a hair's breadth, but a long gash still tore open across my skin.

Damn it, he's disgustingly fast.

I had steeled myself for this, but Cheonmagwi's strength was beyond anything I'd imagined. It felt like facing some peerless grandmaster torn from the pages of a wuxia epic.

There's no instinct mixed into his attacks.

Since entering this gate, I had cut through countless specters and jiangshi. Every last one of them had fought with the same ferocious, mindless savagery. Cheonmagwi felt nothing like them.

A sword thoroughly refined. Disciplined. Restrained.

If not for the state of his body, I might have mistaken him for a living swordsman.

"How... how could... how could...."

His withered lips cracked apart as he spoke, a voice like dry paper rasping out.

A corpse, talking. The queer revulsion of it held me only a moment.

"You... you... you... betray... ed...."

Cheonmagwi forced the words out one tortured syllable at a time.

"What are you even saying?"

"You... you are the one... who... defeated... us...."

Having choked out words I couldn't begin to fathom, he closed the distance at a monstrous speed and swung.

"...What?!"

I slammed the spear down in haste, wrenching the blade's arc off course. Thankfully, it sheared into the floor rather than my skull.

Whew...!

Parrying was out of the question — even blocking was down to a razor's edge. The palms wrapped around the spear throbbed as if they might split open.

Even a herring gone rotten is still a herring, apparently.

However much he was nothing more than a wretch puppeted by a curse, the martial mastery dwelling in that body still towered.

"I... I... out of... greed...."

"You've been muttering to yourself this whole time, you know that?"

But I had weathered this before, too. Compared to the real ones I'd faced before my regression—

"Shut up."

Cheonmagwi's movements were nothing more than a workbook with the answers printed in the back.

I raised my magic power and hauled the shape of the yaksha up from within.

A crimson blade like a streak of lightning shredded Cheonmagwi from shoulder to hip. The sensation of slicing through meat ran up the haft and into my fingertips.

"KAAAAAGH—!"

The thing shrieked in agony. Even as its whole body was carved open, it curled inward, shielding the wedge lodged in its chest above all else.

So that wedge really is the weak point.

The source of the curse had to be engraved into it. If I concentrated every strike there, I could put him down quickly.

Not that "quickly" would come easy.

As Cheonmagwi huddled around the wedge, crimson heat began to bloom from his body.

Just as the chat feared, blood-red veins surged beneath Cheonmagwi's skin, and something like muscle packed itself onto his stick-thin arms and legs.

"Ggggghh... you... are the one... who!"

A murderous spectral aura rolled over me like a cold front.

The moment Cheonmagwi stretched out his right foot, his form blurred and crumbled into mist. In the same breath, a stab of cold touched the back of my skull, like an icicle laid bare against it.

Behind me!

I spun the spear up in a flash and turned the blade — whuum! — and Cheonmagwi vanished again. This time he surfaced at my left ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠flank.

"Kgh!"

The instant I shut that one out, a chill came creeping toward my right knee.

I knew I couldn't win by defending forever. But—

The moment I try to counter, he's gone.

Every time I swung to cut him down, he scattered like cloud the instant the spearhead touched him. It was like fencing a mirage.

Come to think of it, the fog around me seemed thicker than before, too...?

"Whew... hah...."

Hemmed in on every side by the dense haze that had swallowed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the chamber, I kept my nerves drawn wire-tight. Until I worked out a way to crack this stalemate, my only play was to defend as much as I possibly could.

All right. Where next?

Stilling my breath, I leveled my spear into the dark. Before long, that chill brushed my body again.

The problem was—

Two places...!

One aimed straight at my heart, dead ahead; the other at my left flank. Two points at once. Impossible — unless he'd suddenly awakened the ability to split himself in two.

One of the two is a phantom.

Whoever this body had belonged to in life, he had clearly been a master of illusion arts. The fog was no accident either — it flowed from the man's martial art itself.

If it isn't just one place...!

Then I would simply shut down every spot a strike could come from.

Dark-red energy fanned out around me all at once, spreading like a wall of fire.

"...!"

Cheonmagwi's sword snagged on the spear's arc. I shoved through the bind and hurtled forward.

Not letting you slip away this time.

The fog smudged my sense of distance, but I could see it plainly — that blackened wedge, seeping its nauseating aura.

If I pull the spear back to recover it, he'll vanish on me.

So I let the weapon fly from my hands entirely and charged in bare-fisted, my eyes never leaving the wedge. Squeezing my grip with everything I had, I closed my hand into a fist.

THUD!

I stamped the ground hard, imprinting the movement in my head onto my body.

The secret fist art of the Black Tortoise Fist Gate. Of all the hidden arts of the Four Gates Sect, it was the one I had mastered least.

Still better than a fist with nothing behind it.

If this shattered the wedge, the victory was mine.

Gritting my teeth, I drove my fist at the wedge.

Or—

"...Damn it."

I thought I had. Right up until I saw the pale hand clamped around my wrist.

No way.

The moment I had discarded my spear, he had discarded his sword. And then he had caught the fist aimed at his wedge.

Far too precise a judgment for a mere "monster."

"That... that was... your choice...!"

Cheonmagwi rasped the words out in that scraping voice, then laid his palm flat above his own abdomen.

WHAM!

An explosive shock, instantaneous and total.

A palm art!

The hand, laden with monstrous internal force, had detonated against me.

"Hrk—!"

The blast took my body off the ground and flung it away. I tumbled across the floor, coughing fit after coughing fit.

"Hkahk! Hkahk...!"

My stomach felt as though it had turned completely inside out.

Then again... at that level of skill, of course he could wield more than the sword....

I had let my guard down. I had never dreamed he would come at me with an offense this varied. Every specter I had met so far had wielded one art, and one art only.

Even Yakseon had never used anything beyond his hidden blade.

So boss-tier individuals really were a different breed.

I righted myself and swept my gaze slowly around the chamber.

"...."

Silence had settled once more. Only the thick fog pressed in on my mind.

"...I lost my spear."

This time, the situation was even grimmer. I had been so intent on ending it that I had let the weapon fly clean out of my hands.

Could I even ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠find it again in this fog?

Probably. The only catch was that the thing in the fog would likely carve me apart before I did.

"Ah, damn it all."

This was the worst of it. Hadn't I walked straight into a trap he'd laid out for exactly this? Stay put like this, and the odds were high I would be killed one way or another.

And yet—

Why did I feel this good?

Blood drummed into my head. A vitality I had never known hummed through every inch of me. My body was rousing itself, desperate to break this crisis open.

"I haven't given up."

The instinct that had dragged me back from death time after time took the reins once more.

My master told me once.

I was strong in a crisis. The deeper the pit I fell into, the harder I set. That tragic gift of mine was the only reason I had survived everything I had survived.

"Whether it becomes a blessing or a curse — that, you will decide for yourself."

Before my regression, it had been nothing but a vicious curse. Losing the people I cherished was a poison far sharper than death.

But now was different.

It's a blessing, Master.

My blood was singing even in the jaws of a dead end like this.

Heh.

I folded the elation down into a small smile and drew something from my subspace.

"No teeth? Then it's the gums."

No spear, then—

"Trickery it is."

I had planned to take it on a far more deliberate schedule. But dying here would render all of that meaningless.

Gulp!

I swallowed the Heavenly Dragon Pill whole, without so much as chewing.

Burst-effect elixirs like the Qi-Clearing Pill hit hardest when you chew them; the kind that permanently raise your stats work better swallowed whole.

I knew this beyond any doubt — I had personally tested several hundred varieties of elixirs before my regression.

"Haah...!"

It felt as if a pine forest had taken root inside my body. A crisp coolness, like mint concentrated a few hundredfold, slid down my throat.

Truly an S-rank elixir. Merely swallowing it had delivered gains so steep they bordered on the miraculous.

And my current potential rank was C.

The elixir's efficiency had soared to a degree that would have been laughable for an F-rank body.

Still, I can't absorb everything sealed inside it just yet.

The energy within the Heavenly Dragon Pill was an open sea. The most I could hold was, at best, a lake's worth.

I'll bank the rest for later.

I sent my will coursing through my body's interior and gathered up the energies I could not yet absorb, tucking them away neatly. When the day came that I could digest them fully, I would simply undo the knot.

Even having absorbed only the barest sliver of the pill, my Technique stat had already reached the C-rank ceiling for growth.

So this is what mages feel?

My "magic power" and "wisdom" could now hold their own against the ordinary mages of the Tower.

The very air reaching my lungs felt different.

It was as if a filter had grown across my lungs. The mana laced through the air was almost tangible, thread by thread. In any case, the feeling was anything but unpleasant.

If anything—

It was exhilarating beyond words. Magic power didn't merely stir; it overflowed. In this state—

It would be possible.

"Domain Art."

To sweep away this miserable fog—

to remake this ground into my space.