The Unbreakable Mind
“Keuk!”
The moment the phantom blade drove through my neck, the feeling of flesh ripping and bones shattering was far too vivid. I groped at my throat in a panic.
“Huk… huk…”
The disconnect between my senses and my body sent me rolling across the floor, clutching my neck. I have no idea how long I stayed like that.
“...”
A pure white, empty ceiling filled my vision. My head was still firmly attached to my torso. I had definitely died, yet here I was, alive. I had lived beside death for ten years. I thought I was ready. But actually facing it was completely different.
Only then did the hologram window register.
Rank: Unique
Upon death, you regress.
Regression. Yeah, I had regressed. The me who had spent every day just waiting to die could no longer even die. It was ironic, but strangely the fact didn’t hit me that hard. Instead of relief at surviving, what rose first was rage at having been killed so pathetically and the cold pain that had sliced through my neck. The sensation of collapsing onto the damp floor still lingered clearly.
Still unable to pull my hand away from my throat, I slowly sat up.
Thump. Thump.
It was still there. Even after regressing, the Holy Fire created by the Heavenly Demon Divine Art remained in my middle dantian. If anything, it had grown slightly larger.
[23:51:16]
The waiting room’s time limit had reset as well.
“Haa…”
I let out a long breath. The natural energy floating in the air felt familiar now. First things first, that Kim Yu-Sin statue had struck first. Damn Kim Yu-Sin. True to his taste for decapitation, the bastard who took his anger out by cutting off heads had sliced mine clean off in a single stroke.
The problem was that I hadn’t even properly registered his speed. That huge body moving at that velocity. Thinking about it alone wouldn’t give me any answers, so I opened the gallery.
They were holding another cyber funeral. But the gallery itself didn’t seem affected by regression. I immediately hit the write button.
I had decided to reveal my trait to the people in this gallery. If I wanted to properly learn even a single martial art, hiding it wouldn’t help. Fortunately the status window didn’t send any warning like “You will be fucked if you reveal regression to the gallery.”
A question suddenly occurred to me.
Only CuteHighSchoolGirl truly paid attention to me. The pain of being decapitated seemed to ease a little.
A hundred more decapitations? She had to be crazy. If I got beheaded a hundred times my mind would break first. So that’s why the regression trait was called “Unbreakable Mind.”
That thought led me to look for other weapons, but the waiting room only contained swords. Short ones at that.
A preemptive martial art. I wondered what would be good.
After a short wait, BlondeHairBlueEyesBigBreasts uploaded a new post.
She must have been an art major. Unlike CuteHighSchoolGirl’s clumsy meridian diagrams, these drawings drew genuine admiration at first glance. The explanations of the formulas and qi operation were thorough too.
I closed the comment window and focused on BlondeHairBlueEyesBigBreasts’s explanation. The Three Heavenly Demon Swords consisted of Danak, the horizontal cut, Byeokhae, the vertical cut, and Pacheon, the thrust. It was truly the most basic sword style. However, while the forms were simple, the formulas and qi operation were quite complex, and the art itself was based on Holy Fire. It was a sword style that deliberately imposed the restriction of requiring the basics of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art. The name “Heavenly Demon” was no exaggeration.
I picked up the sword and swung it.
Whoosh.
My body staggered. Even swinging an 80-centimeter blade was difficult with pure physical strength. Compared to my lower body that struggled to stand without qi support, my upper body was in much better shape. As I recalled the Three Heavenly Demon Swords formulas, the Holy Fire in my middle dantian stirred.
Following the diagram, I split the qi and sent it flowing through the meridians in my arm. It felt like flames burning through my blood vessels. Intense, but bearable. This was it.
I swung the sword through the air.
Danak.
The first form of the Three Heavenly Demon Swords, the horizontal cut.
Swoosh—!
Once qi was infused, even the sound of cutting the air changed. But something still felt off. The Holy Fire was supposed to flow from my dantian through my entire arm and all the way to the blade’s edge, yet it scattered somewhere around the hilt.
I tried Danak again. Failure once more. As I drew the horizontal line, part of the Holy Fire spread thinly along the blade before immediately fading. It was better than before, but the energy still didn’t remain intact all the way to the tip.
[23:00:59]
Twenty-three hours remained until entry. Inside the waiting room, all physical fatigue recovered instantly.
Danak. Danak. Danak…
Recalling the pain of decapitation, I swung the sword like a madman. My muscles screamed and spasmed, only to be restored by the waiting room’s effect. Simple endless repetition of the horizontal cut. The more I repeated it, the more the Holy Fire began to settle completely into the blade.
[21:00:11]
I adjusted my grip. Next was the vertical cut, Byeokhae.
[18:00:11]
Then the thrust, Pacheon.
[14:00:06]
Finally, linking Danak, Byeokhae, and Pacheon together in endless repetition.
The time the Holy Fire remained on the blade gradually increased. How long had I trained? At first it felt like my wrist was on fire, but at some point the sword began to feel like an extension of my hand. If I viewed the sword as a meridian extending from my arm—
Sssss— The blade glowed red and vibrated.
Now. I poured every ounce of strength into the swing.
Swooooosh—!
The Holy Fire exploded outward along the blade. Success. I still wouldn’t be able to match the Kim Yu-Sin statue’s speed, but with this I should be able to cut it.
[00:05:12]
The time limit was almost up. Nearly a full day had passed, yet the gallery remained silent. Were they waiting for me to post?
I had assumed she went quiet because she was looking up martial arts for me, but she had been thinking about how to deal with the Kim Yu-Sin ghost story the whole time. Well, she was the only modern person in the Cheonma Gallery who would know about ghost stories, so it made sense.
Don’t avert your eyes. Just remembering those pitch-black eyes that looked like a mass of wriggling black earthworms made goosebumps crawl across my skin.
“Whew.”
I took my hand off my neck without realizing I had been touching it and took a deep breath. Damn Kim Yu-Sin. This time would be different.
Tick. Tick. The second hand sounded.
Replies poured in immediately. Strangely, even though I didn’t know their faces, they gave me comfort.
[00:00:03]
[00:00:02]
[00:00:01]
I closed the window.
The waiting room time limit has ended. Moving to the First Chimro World.
My vision blurred and the white room collapsed. Pitch-black darkness and the damp, moldy smell that stung my nose. Then, the heavy metallic clang echoing from far away that made the back of my neck ache just to hear it.
The moment I opened my eyes I ignited my Holy Fire and kicked off the ground. It’s my turn now, you decapitation-loving bastard.