Chapter 300
Sssssshhhh—!
The swirling black True Qi surged forth violently.
Then it began to shred and pulverize the assassins as though grinding them to dust.
"Evade!"
The assassins scattered in all directions, but the black True Qi pursued them like a living creature.
Crackkkkkk—!
By the time the black True Qi had coiled around the surroundings, the assassins had no choice but to raise their swords in resistance.
But it was utterly futile.
This pitch-black True Qi may have resembled writhing tentacles, but in truth, it was closer to Sword Aura.
The moment it touched anything, it crushed and obliterated it.
"Argh!"
"Guhk!"
The screams of the assassins rang out one after another. Even those who could still scream were the fortunate ones.
Those whose heads had been crushed by the Willful True Binding could only tremble silently, unable to utter a sound.
Bu Eun-seol, who had once again entered the Demonic Path, was unleashing the Willful True Binding with power akin to the Great Origin Realm.
This was a phenomenon that defied all martial logic.
No matter how immense one's Internal Power, such an ability should have been impossible without fully immersing oneself in the Demonic Path.
But Wicked Incense was connected to those who had killed his grandfather, Bu Jan-yang.
Bu Eun-seol's rage—enough to split the heavens—his overwhelming Killing Intent, and his Spirit and Mind, now submerged in the Demonic Path, merged with the Emotion Severing Secret Art.
In an instant, the Willful True Binding, wielding power comparable to the Great Origin Realm...
Was freely manifesting tens of thousands of weapons.
The Demonic Heavenly Emperor.
This Grandmaster of the Demonic Path, said to have reached the pinnacle of the Martial Extreme Realm,
Had devised an otherworldly technique that allowed True Qi to take any form through the union of Spirit and Mind and the Mind-Training Formula, unleashing the might of the Thunderous Myriad Annihilation.
—Aaaaargh!
The screams echoed endlessly.
When Bu Eun-seol entered Wicked Incense alone, it had only been to confront Master Moon. He had never planned to annihilate this place.
But once his Spirit and Mind descended into the Demonic Path, his rage reached its peak, and his infinite Killing Intent fused with the Emotion Severing Secret Art,
Bu Eun-seol was now displaying a monstrous Martial Prowess worthy of being called the Second Demonic Heavenly Emperor.
Plop, plop.
As blood rained down in all directions, Bu Eun-seol closed his eyes.
"Haa..."
He inhaled deeply, savoring the Blood Scent permeating the air.
Had blood always been this fragrant, this sweet? Had it always been so soothing to the mind...?
Now he understood why the Great Demons, who reveled in slaughter, drank so deeply of it.
'...'
In that moment, Bu Eun-seol realized his Spirit and Mind had reached an extremely perilous place.
If he continued to endlessly fuse his Killing Intent and rage with the Emotion Severing Secret Art...
He instinctively knew he would plunge into an abyss from which there was no return.
Crack.
Suppressing his Killing Intent and rage, a sharp, bone-chilling sound resonated through his entire body.
Simultaneously, the clarity in his eyes gradually returned.
Sensing imminent danger, his Spirit and Mind instinctively withdrew from the Demonic Path back to the Middle Path.
Only silence and terror remained within Wicked Incense.
Wicked Incense had never revealed itself to the Murim for generations, with Special-Grade assassins stationed like clouds.
Yet this place, which could effortlessly repel any invading faction, had been annihilated by a single man?
Thud, thud.
Bu Eun-seol, now with open eyes, walked toward the sole survivor—Master Moon.
"Y-you... you're a demon."
Master Moon gritted his teeth.
Bu Eun-seol had slaughtered hundreds of elite assassins without lifting a finger.
And worse—he had gazed at the spilled blood with gleaming eyes?
'He isn't just someone who entered the Demonic Path... He is the Demon itself.'
In his eyes, Bu Eun-seol was no longer human but closer to a black demon.
"A demon?"
Bu Eun-seol looked down at Master Moon with pitch-black eyes.
"You took a helpless boy hostage, severed the tendons of those who wouldn't resist, and ripped out their sinews."
"You cut off their arms, blinded them, and made their bodies rot with poison."
A crimson light flared within Bu Eun-seol's darkened pupils.
"And you made sure they wouldn't die too quickly... So you could be called a demon."
As he finished speaking, he stepped closer to Master Moon.
"Stay back."
Master Moon trembled violently.
Death itself did not frighten him.
He was an assassin who had presided over countless lives and deaths.
He had long known the day would come when he would meet a miserable end.
But Bu Eun-seol wasn't here to grant him death.
He intended to deliver something far worse—agonizing pain, the deepest suffering and terror a human could endure.
Master Moon could feel it.
"Don't come any closer!"
He shrieked like a man already in torment.
"I'm not Master Moon! The truth is—!"
Shudder.
Suddenly, Master Moon's body stiffened like ice.
At the same time, his head tilted unnaturally before he collapsed face-first, as though an invisible hand had shattered his neck and ended his life.
"How strange."
Bu Eun-seol stared at the scene with hollow eyes.
"There is only one martial art in this world that uses qi with such overwhelming force."
When Bu Eun-seol raised his head, a faint shadow appeared at the village entrance.
It was none other than Master Moon, who had collapsed before Bu Eun-seol moments ago.
Astonishingly, the Master Moon he had been facing until now had been a fake.
"Shaolin, of all things."
Bu Eun-seol shook his head.
Though disguised through some other method, what the newly appeared Master Moon had unleashed was unmistakably Shaolin's Prajna Great Power.
Having entered the Martial Emperor's Secret Repository, Bu Eun-seol could clearly discern orthodox martial techniques.
Not only that—hadn't he personally experienced the Prajna Great Power from Buddha Venerable Hong-hyeon of the Martial Alliance?
That was why he could instantly recognize that the technique Master Moon had just displayed was a variation of the Prajna Great Power.
"Fascinating."
Master Moon tilted his head.
"How does the Heir of the Demon Hall recognize our sect's secret arts at a single glance?"
Surprisingly, he readily admitted to being a disciple of Shaolin.
Wicked Incense.
That an assassin sect with such a long history was led by a Shaolin disciple?
Wasn't this even more shocking than the revelation that a revered Shaolin monk was actually a bandit?
"I didn't expect you to admit it so easily."
"It makes no difference either way."
Master Moon replied indifferently to Bu Eun-seol's words.
"The dead cannot speak."
Zzzzing!
In an instant, an unseen, razor-sharp force seized Bu Eun-seol by the neck.
Kwoong!
Bu Eun-seol retreated thirty feet in a flash.
A faint look of surprise crossed his face as he stared at Master Moon.
Bu Eun-seol's internal energy and martial arts, amplified by his entry into the Demonic Path, had surged far beyond their original level.
Yet this man had forced him back in a single move?
"Your martial arts are extraordinary!"
Master Moon let out an admiring sigh and nodded.
"With skills like these, even if you were to rise among the Four Gods and Seven Kings, no one would dare question it. I can't fathom why rumors like Mad Sword spread instead."
Zzzzing!
As soon as he finished speaking, Master Moon unleashed the Prajna Great Power again.
But this time, Bu Eun-seol stood his ground. He remained rooted in place, preparing to counter the Prajna Great Power.
'Overconfidence will be your downfall.'
A faint smile curled at the corner of Master Moon's lips as he observed.
The Prajna Great Power was an intangible force—impossible to grasp or block with mere hands. Yet this man stood still, fully aware of what was coming?
Wooong!
At that moment, black true qi erupted from Bu Eun-seol's body, spreading outward to form a massive wall.
And when the Prajna Great Power struck that wall, its force was rendered powerless.
He had repelled the Prajna Great Power with the Willful True Binding.
"This... is truly remarkable."
Master Moon exhaled in awe.
"To block an intangible force with materialized true qi?"
To disperse true qi in all directions and forcibly materialize the formless power of the Prajna Great Power—wasn't this proof that Bu Eun-seol's martial techniques had reached the level of a grandmaster?
"Hoh."
Master Moon let out a deep sigh.
"Such a peerless genius, yet you chose the Demonic Path."
His demeanor suggested he was confident he could take Bu Eun-seol's life at any moment.
"My apologies."
With a regretful expression, he stretched out his hand.
And gradually, the black true qi Bu Eun-seol had manifested through the Willful True Binding began to fade.
Astonishingly, he too possessed the ability to invert the nature of martial techniques—just like Buddha Venerable Hong-hyeon.
Flash!
Startled, Bu Eun-seol intensified his true qi.
But there was something he didn't yet realize...
The Willful True Binding Bu Eun-seol had unleashed was a supreme demonic martial technique that materialized true qi through the Emotion Severing Secret Art, a mind-training formula.
In contrast, the Prajna Great Power was the pinnacle of the Buddhist School's divine power.
In other words, it possessed a force diametrically opposed to the Emotion Severing Secret Art, which plunged the spirit and mind into the Demonic Path.
Zzziiing!
As the true qi formed by the Willful True Binding dissipated, Bu Eun-seol felt as if all his strength was draining away.
Thud.
Staggering, he finally dropped to one knee.
Step. Step.
Master Moon slowly approached and looked down at Bu Eun-seol's head.
"Farewell."
He raised a sharply honed hand blade and slowly lifted it above Bu Eun-seol's neck. And in the moment before he could strike—
Swish!
A sharp surge of energy suddenly erupted from Bu Eun-seol's right hand.
As Master Moon closed in, Bu Eun-seol had drawn the Ink Sword and unleashed the Meteor Chasing Moon with all his might.
Zzzzing!
But the Ink Sword halted just before Master Moon's throat, unable to advance further.
A viscous, overwhelming force of the Prajna Great Power had blocked the blade.
"Did you really think such a trick would work?"
Yet Master Moon's expression stiffened.
Because from the halted Ink Sword, a blade-like surge of internal energy had extended, piercing into his meridians.
'Just as I expected.'
Bu Eun-seol had already tasted the Prajna Great Power from Hong-hyeon.
That was why he knew full well that he couldn't perfectly block the Prajna Great Power—a force transcending martial techniques—with his own strength alone.
So he deliberately exposed a weakness, feigning defeat as he dropped to one knee.
Just as anticipated, when Master Moon moved in close to strike his neck, Bu Eun-seol instantly unleashed the Quick Sword Form with the Ink Sword.
All to force Master Moon to materialize the Prajna Great Power to block the sword strike.
Only then could he seize the moment to force an internal energy clash.
'What is this?'
Beads of sweat rolled down Master Moon's forehead.
Bu Eun-seol's Internal Energy was so overwhelmingly powerful it felt suffocating,
yet the unbroken flow of the Prajna Great Power's force was gradually being absorbed into his meridians—wasn't it?
'The Great Art of Power Absorption? No.'
If it had been a technique that drained Internal Power, he would have instantly collapsed into the Collapse State.
But now, wasn't it flowing naturally along its source, like a river merging into a greater current?
'This again.'
As the Prajna Great Power entered his meridians, Bu Eun-seol frowned.
In the past, he had already experienced this phenomenon—when enduring the Heart-Knocking Bell technique of the Eighteen Arhats, Shaolin's Internal Energy had naturally merged with his own meridians.
'It must be because our Internal Energy shares the same origin.'
He assumed this phenomenon was simply due to their Internal Energy stemming from the same source.
Oooom...
But the Prajna Great Power flowing into his body was not merely circulating through his meridians as before.
The pure and majestic force was absorbed into his Sea of Qi point like a river, transforming into a violent torrent—
and then erupted upward along his Governing Vessel, wasn't it?
BOOM!
The Prajna Great Power, soaring up his Governing Vessel to the back of his head, drilled into the very center of his skull—
then began descending along the Conception Vessel in front.
CRACKLE—!
Having violently pierced through both the Conception and Governing Vessels, the Prajna Great Power finally returned to Bu Eun-seol's dantian...
Only to disperse once more into his meridians, stored away until, before he knew it, all traces of it vanished.
"Ugh..."
In contrast, Master Moon's skin darkened, and his hair began turning white.
With the Prajna Great Power he had cultivated his entire life now dispersed and stored within Bu Eun-seol's meridians, his vitality drained away as if aging rapidly.
'I can't die like this!'
As the Prajna Great Power vanished, Master Moon mustered his last strength to grip the blade of the Ink Sword with his bare hand.
Blood spilled as he seized the divine sword's edge, yet his fingers remained uncut.
He had unleashed Shaolin's Ultimate Art—Dragon Claw Hand.
Swish!
The Dragon Claw Hand immediately tore toward Bu Eun-seol's chest as if to gouge it out.
Thud.
But only a dull sound followed. It didn't even pierce Bu Eun-seol's clothes.
Though he had aimed to impale his chest, not a single drop of Internal Power remained in his body.
In the end, the Dragon Claw Hand became nothing more than an empty flourish.
"Ugh..."
Master Moon, now aged beyond recognition, lacked even the strength to keep his eyes open. Clutching Bu Eun-seol's collar, he collapsed to the ground.
"Hmm..."
Bu Eun-seol, too, blinked dazedly, as if just waking from a deep slumber.
The Spirit and Mind that had been brimming with Killing Intent and rage suddenly settled into tranquility, his gaze now calm and indifferent.
Was this, too, the will of heaven?
As the pure Prajna Great Power was absorbed into his body... his Spirit and Mind, which had been suspended in the Middle Path, faintly shifted toward the Righteous Path.
In other words, he had returned to his original spiritual state—before Seo Jin-ha had been injured.
Because of this, the overwhelming Willful True Binding, which had reached a level worthy of being called the Second Demonic Heavenly Emperor, could no longer be unleashed.
But this was, in fact, a tremendous stroke of fortune... though he would only realize that much later.
'Why is this happening?'
At this moment, the Prajna Great Power Master Moon had poured into him was dispersed and stored within his meridians.
Thus, while his Internal Power remained unchanged, an immense force now writhed within his meridians.
"Gh...!"
As Master Moon let out a death rattle, Bu Eun-seol looked down at him.
Then, in a composed voice, he spoke.
"Answer me."
Forcing the groaning man upright, Bu Eun-seol demanded sternly:
"Who was it that coated Death Fragrance's hidden weapons with the Flesh-Rotting Blood-Ruining Poison?"
"Our temple... protects the Murim...!"
Had his Internal Power been completely drained?
Master Moon's hollow eyes rolled as he muttered deliriously.
"This old man... abandoned his status... returned to the secular world... to save countless lives...!"
With no choice, Bu Eun-seol channeled Internal Energy into his Life Gate Acupoint.
"Speak."
"The one who mastered the Indian Yoga Art, favored the Flesh-Rotting Blood-Ruining Poison, and was versed in the Demonic Sword Arts—who is he?"
"Indian Yoga Art... Flesh-Rotting Blood..."
A strange light flickered in Master Moon's fading eyes.
"You seek... the one who took the Blood Essence Poison Needle..."
"Who is he?"
As Bu Eun-seol pressed urgently, Master Moon's dying lips uttered a single word:
"Star."
And with that, his body stiffened into cold stillness.
"'Star'? What does that mean?!"
Bu Eun-seol shouted—
Thud.
But Master Moon's eyes remained wide open, all life drained from them as he breathed his last.
Darkness clouded Bu Eun-seol's vision.
Star?
Was the killer of his grandfather a star? Or was it referring to a Copyist who divined the stars?
CRASH!
Enraged, Bu Eun-seol slammed his fist into the ground.
He had finally found Death Fragrance. He had thought he had seized the entire trail leading to the mastermind...
Yet Death Fragrance, too, was merely a pawn—not the true culprit.
"..."
Lowering his head, Bu Eun-seol bit his lip.
"To come this far and still fail to find the murderer!"
He had been certain that, upon reaching Death Fragrance, he would at least uncover a lead.
The killer had used Death Fragrance's hidden weapons—so at the very least, the leader of Death Fragrance would know who he was.
But Master Moon had died meaninglessly in their clash of Internal Energy.
In the end, he could not find the one who had killed his grandfather.
"Master Moon."
Bu Eun-seol clenched his teeth.
Suddenly, one fact surfaced in his mind.
"Shaolin."