Those Abandoned by the Gods
The clear night sky was swallowed by a black blizzard.
Ten Thousand Demons Bow!
The cry of the demonic cultivators ringing through the Hebei Paeng Clan told the full measure of the disaster.
"Who are you?"
Yeong-hwa wiped the blood from his face with a white sleeve and fixed the man with a hard stare.
A roar tore through the air as the power of the Black Tortoise erupted from the back of Yeong-hwa's left hand and swallowed everything around them.
"Kill the Paeng dogs!"
"Stop the Demonic Cult!"
In the midst of the reeking chaos, two men who each served their own gods faced one another.
Yeong-hwa chanted a low mantra.
In the East, the Azure Emperor God
In the South, the Crimson Emperor God
In the West, the White Emperor God
In the North, the Black Emperor God
In the Center, the Yellow Emperor God
Black snakes rose from beneath Yeong-hwa's feet and struck for the man's throat with vicious speed.
One of the man's eyebrows lifted.
"Not bad."
In an instant his brow went black. Fresh blood ran down his face as the hair that had covered his forehead whipped outward in every direction. Upon that brow was carved the character for Gung — Exhaustion.
He answered Yeong-hwa with a mantra of his own, spat out in a rapid flood.
Yeong-hwa's eyes flew wide.
"You insane bastard!"
"Why should we abandon our own cult to serve gods who ran off to the orthodox sects?"
The man dragged a hand across his forehead and cackled as if the whole thing were a joke.
Yeong-hwa muttered in a shaking voice.
"The Four Fiends and Four Crimes…"
The man's eyes flooded with indigo. His demonic qi surged as if about to explode. Yeong-hwa shouted at him in something close to pure horror.
"You're a ritualist — don't you know the price of serving the malevolent gods of slaughter?"
"I know."
Behind the man, an indigo tiger with black eyes took shape. Unlike the sacred majesty of the White Tiger God, its face was twisted. Bizarre wings sprouted from its forelegs, a sight that filled any who looked upon it with unease. Its hooked claws had grown out wild and unkempt, and its fangs jutted so long they forced their way past its lips.
"Gunggi…"
Gunggi of the Four Fiends revealed itself upon the grounds of the Hebei Paeng Clan.
With a strange, rumbling cry, Gunggi swept a forepaw. The black snakes that had been coiling around the man shattered at once into pieces. Still not satisfied, the beast opened its jaws to swallow Yeong-hwa whole and charged.
In that instant the Black Tortoise manifested, catching Gunggi upon the tortoise shell of its back. Divine beast and fiendish beast collided; halls collapsed and the earth split open.
"Now we can have a proper conversation."
The man tipped his head at Yeong-hwa.
"I am no petty ritualist."
His voice was low and slick as oil.
"I am a priest who serves Holy Maiden Seonghwa of our cult…"
He drew a dark, heavy sword with a ringing scrape of steel.
"Baek Un-geuk, young master of the Mukhongeomga."
Yeong-hwa took his pine-patterned ancient sword in hand as well. He glared at Baek Un-geuk and shouted in fury.
"You will regret this."
"You know nothing of us."
Blood ran in streams down both of Baek Un-geuk's cheeks.
"You know nothing of the hell walked by those the gods abandoned…"
"Then you should repent all the more!"
"Why?"
He cackled like a madman and threw the question back at Yeong-hwa.
"Why should we submit to gods who will not even tell us what we did wrong, what we got wrong?"
Baek Un-geuk was screaming.
"Why must we kneel?"
He settled into a ready stance and leveled his sword tip at Yeong-hwa.
"We will forge a new god…"
He stamped through his footwork and charged. Yeong-hwa answered with the Taiji Azure Pine Step, claiming the nine palaces of the battlefield — yet the dark demonic qi in the man's every footprint spilled outward in every direction. Caught in that spreading miasma, Yeong-hwa's body grew slower and slower.
Their blades crashed together with a sound that split the air.
"…and spread a world where humans are the masters across the whole of the Central Plains."
Yeong-hwa's sword spun in a sudden circle, tracing a small ring of steel, and he gave half a step of ground. Sensing the advantage, Baek Un-geuk stamped down with crushing force. The shock nearly threw Yeong-hwa off his feet.
"This ends here, boy!"
The dark heavy sword was about to touch Yeong-hwa's throat when Yeong-hwa spoke two short words.
"Softness overcomes hardness."
The spine of Yeong-hwa's blade climbed the heavy sword like a snake. The heavy sword was pulled in toward Yeong-hwa's body. He spun with the motion and thrust his left hand forward.
A small breath of wind touched Baek Un-geuk's abdomen.
"With a palm technique like that—"
Then the gentle breeze became a savage storm that wrapped itself around the man's midsection. Baek Un-geuk poured demonic qi into his belly, but it was already too late. He lost his grip on the sword and was hurled backward, coughing blood.
Yeong-hwa glared down at him and roared.
"Remember this. That is the Cotton Palm of Wudang."
A tortured howl rose at once. The Black Tortoise, which had only been defending, had sunk its teeth into Gunggi's ankle. The linked divine beast took the blow, and Baek Un-geuk spat blood and twisted his mouth into a grin.
He spoke slowly.
"Still — don't you think the situation favors us?"
Only then did Yeong-hwa look around, and he swore under his breath.
"Damn it…"
The Hebei Paeng Clan was burning.
Paeng Yu-heon rested a crimson great saber on his shoulder, black eyes gleaming, and spoke.
"Somehow, Grandfather, your skill in the Transcendent Realm seems a shadow of what it once was."
Paeng Un-ro knelt on one knee, his whole body a mass of wounds and blood.
"You… are no longer my grandson."
"Thought is free."
Paeng Un-ro forced himself upright again, seized his great saber, and settled into a mid guard. Crimson blade energy shimmered along the steel. He stamped through the Mountain King Dominion Step, and his form vanished in a single breath.
As if he had expected it, Paeng Yu-heon looked up.
From the empty air, the old tiger brought his great saber down with crushing force.
White energy and black demonic qi roiled over Paeng Yu-heon's body. He drew his great saber across in a light, almost casual stroke. A vast crescent of blade energy swallowed Paeng Un-ro whole — the ninth form of the Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber, Tyrant Tiger Cleaves the Moon.
Red blade energy and black blade energy crashed together and tore a vacuum through the air. Paeng Yu-heon's white great saber spun through empty space. The old tiger's right hand was crushed as he fell.
"Senior!"
Hyeonsong, who had been cutting down Demonic Cult fighters, broke from the battlefield on the Taiji Azure Pine Step and barely caught Paeng Un-ro as he dropped from the sky.
"The Martial Alliance… contact…"
Unable even to finish the sentence, Paeng Un-ro lost consciousness where he lay.
Footsteps approached, one after another. Paeng Yu-heon was walking toward Hyeonsong as if determined to finish this. Hyeonsong pressed swiftly along Paeng Un-ro's right arm and sealed the blood points. Once he confirmed the bleeding had stopped, he stripped off his long robe and covered the old man with it.
A wind thick with murderous intent howled around Hyeonsong. Watching him, Paeng Yu-heon wore a thin, cold smile.
"With skill that has yet to reach the Transcendent Realm, you will only throw your life away."
"I know."
Hyeonsong's voice was endlessly calm.
"As the price for uncovering the truth of my mother's death, I will spare the Wudang Sect…"
Paeng Yu-heon leveled his great saber at him.
"Withdraw. Now."
At those words Hyeonsong smiled with quiet kindness. The inner power of Mugeoksimgong poured from his body in every direction.
"Do you know this? A swordsman of Wudang never yields."
"Foolish."
White sword energy bloomed explosively along Hyeonsong's blade. From the very first exchange he had unleashed Guhontalbaekgeom. Paeng Yu-heon's mouth curled.
"Have you resolved yourself to die?"
"From the moment I became Sect Leader."
Hyeonsong's form vanished on the Taiji Azure Pine Step.
"My life has belonged to Wudang!"
The strike meant to take Paeng Yu-heon's back was turned aside with ease. Sparks flew as great saber and sword collided, and Hyeonsong gave half a step of ground — yet Paeng Yu-heon did not press, and withdrew with him.
"I can see it."
The scar on Hyeonsong's face trembled as his move was read. His complexion went deathly pale. Tremendous inner power flooded the surroundings. Unleashing Mugeoksimgong to its utmost, Hyeonsong's white sword energy blazed still more brilliantly. His blade split the nine palaces like lightning and drove downward. The white sword energy condensed, then burst all at once into the shape of vast wings that fully encircled Paeng Yu-heon.
The ninth form of the Taiji Thirteen Calamities — a white roc soaring as Hyeonsong's sword struck for every vital point.
A Mountain King's roar shook heaven and earth, and black lightning qi gathered upon Paeng Yu-heon's saber. At the same time his entire body shone black. He dropped the great saber to his lower right, stepped forward with his left foot, and drew a diagonal cut — the tenth form of the Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber, White Tiger Returns Blood.
An endlessly thin, compressed black blade energy flew at the roc. With a short, sharp sound the white roc was cut cleanly in two. Hyeonsong fell from the empty air. Blood spread across the black martial robe over his chest. His pine-patterned ancient sword, severed in half, clattered down beside him.
Paeng Yu-heon turned away with eyes empty of all feeling. The place his steps carried him was the clan head's hall. The brothers Paeng Mu-jin and Paeng Hwi-ryeok cowered behind clan head Paeng Il-mok, trembling.
"Come out!"
The roar of a fallen White Tiger rolled through the Paeng estate. Paeng Mu-jin and Paeng Hwi-ryeok clutched their father's trouser legs and begged.
"Please spare us, Father."
"Please, please, please, please!"
Paeng Il-mok looked upon his ruined son and shed tears of blood. The boy had already crossed a river from which there was no return. The power he carried had surely been bought with a life. The characters carved into the flesh of his face and arms spoke that truth for him.
"Yu-heon…"
Paeng Il-mok stretched out a hand toward his son. In the next breath the boy was gone from before his eyes. Appearing behind him, Paeng Yu-heon struck the vital point at the neck with a precise bare-handed blow. Paeng Il-mok crumpled where he stood.
Paeng Yu-heon looked down at his younger brothers with black eyes as if regarding insects.
"Elder Brother, we were wrong!"
"Mother made us do it all!"
Paeng Yu-heon's crimson great saber fell upon Paeng Mu-jin's head. The body burst, and scraps of flesh scattered in every direction. At the sight, Paeng Hwi-ryeok could only tremble and stumble backward in shock. A single cut whispered through the air.
"Ah— ah— ah—"
Paeng Hwi-ryeok watched the mist of blood fountain from his own throat. His body would not obey him. With his head struck free he could only work his mouth. Paeng Yu-heon crushed the skull underfoot.
"Well then. Time to deal with the true culprit."
He flung open the doors of the clan head's hall. His second mother was already hanging from the ceiling, swaying coldly. Driven past endurance by fear, she had taken her own life. Paeng Yu-heon chuckled and set candle flame to the white silk that decorated every corner of the hall. Fire leapt to the fabric and spread in every direction. Humming under his breath, he stepped back outside.
"The old tiger's hide…"
The words died unfinished. Hyeonsong stood before him, the broken pine-patterned ancient sword in his hand. Eyes closed, he was reciting a formula under his breath.
"Softness and hardness, life and death — all of it is only one current in the flow of living."
No inner power could be felt from Hyeonsong at all. And yet cold sweat ran down Paeng Yu-heon's back. The recitation would not stop.
"Life and death are as one, and this too will pass within the cycle of the Taiji."
Rings of black and white manifested behind Hyeonsong's back and began to spin with ferocious speed.