Azure Stone Milk
“Is the information in here real?”
“Yes, sir. As far as we can tell, it came out of the operation against the mid-sized guilds.”
“Pagwon Guild.”
The moment the Association President finished verifying the documents seized from the executive branch, fury blazed from the crown of his head down.
A guild that had bathed in privileges under the banner of being a major guild had stabbed the Association squarely in the back. Of course he was angry.
“Where's Han Jin?”
“He vanished from sight once the last mid-sized guild was dealt with.”
“I see.”
It didn't matter. Give it a little time, and he would resurface on his own. All he had to do was wait.
“Send an official memorandum in the Association's name.”
“What should it say?”
“Clearing of the S-Rank Gate.”
Hearing the order, the Director of Executive Affairs left the office at once to draft the document.
So that's how they want to play it.
Major guilds were, without question, a necessity. The number of awakened humans kept dwindling while gates kept multiplying, and processing those gates demanded organizations of their scale.
But this time, they crossed the line.
They hadn't merely hidden demons among them — through their pacts, they had become demons themselves. This was a national crisis. No longer could he sweep it under the rug just because they wore a major guild's name.
“What is this?”
“Well, you see...”
Pak Jin-sung — guild master of Pagwon Guild. He read the memorandum his subordinate had brought, a deep furrow carving between his brows.
“The Association is suddenly requesting we clear an S-Rank Gate?”
“They say the Sword Demon and the Gray Witch will be paying a visit.”
At his subordinate's report, Pak Jin-sung pressed a hand to his forehead.
The timing could not have been more exquisite. It had only been a single week since he made his pact with the demon and began wielding demonic energy.
Of all times, they choose now to come knocking.
He was irritated, but he didn't let it touch his lips. Only he and the executives in the inner circle had accepted the demonic energy. The rank-and-file members, the secretaries — none of them knew a thing about it.
I must not let my emotions slip here.
The tower he had spent decades building was Pagwon Guild. Accepting the demonic energy had been, in the end, one more rung on its climb.
Everything is for Pagwon.
All that Pagwon possessed was his, and Pagwon was everything to Pak Jin-sung.
Refusing the memorandum would only invite suspicion.
Better to accept, clear the gate quickly, hurry back, and throw himself into training with the demonic energy. That was all there was to it.
“Tell the Association we accept the memorandum.”
“Yes, sir.”
The subordinate withdrew with the document in hand.
The room, now empty, let Pak Jin-sung loosen his grip on the demonic energy, if only for a moment. The chamber was thoroughly lined with divine power — not a wisp of it could leak outside.
What fool on earth would refuse power like this?
Merely accepting the demonic energy had made him tremendously stronger. If he could master it completely, he might land a single decisive blow on that insufferably proud Geumgang.
I find myself looking forward to that day already.
While events outside were racing ahead at full gallop, I was still deliberating over what to do with the elixir.
The Azure Void Elixir, huh.
In murim-style worlds, it was counted among the fabled elixirs. Even from the description alone, it was plainly too good for me to use right now.
Why did the system have to hand over something this premium?
I found myself suddenly resenting the system for bestowing the Azure Void Elixir. Of all things, it gave me an elixir this high-grade just to torment me with indecision. Then it occurred to me — maybe the system had engineered this exact situation on purpose.
“What say you drink it, then?”
“Is that really all right?”
“I don't pretend to understand this 'system' of yours, but didn't it say it provides what you need?”
True — it had searched out and offered precisely the elixir I required at this moment. Everything it had granted me so far made it abundantly clear just how generously the system was padding my pockets.
“Trust it and drink, then?”
“I judge that to be the right course.”
With that, Cheongun drifted away from me, as if to say the choice rested entirely in my hands.
After saying everything he had to say, too.
Cheongun simply soared leisurely around the orb of heaven and earth, the very picture of a bystander who'd had nothing to do with it.
“Fine, I don't know anymore.”
Maybe it was his words working on me, but I'd worked up an appetite for it. There was a saying, after all — hoard a thing and it turns to dung. Saving it for later in a place like this, who could say when the chance to use it would ever come?
“Whew.”
One long, steadying breath, and I drained the Azure Void Elixir in one go.
Gulp.
I felt it slide burning down my throat. The moment the last drop was gone, the system message appeared.
You have consumed the Azure Void Elixir.
Mana increases by 100.
“Oh no...”
Before I could get a single word out, an excruciating agony came crashing down on me. A hundred mana in one stroke meant two awakenings striking simultaneously.
This is going to kill me...
A single awakening was already torture enough. Two arriving at once — my body would never hold. Just as the pain began to blur my consciousness, another message surfaced.
The Azure Void Elixir soothes your pain.
The instant the message appeared, the agony that had been wringing my body out vanished as though it had never existed.
Crackle-pop!
Impurities came pouring out of my skin — the work of the awakenings, no doubt. I waited a short while, and the process ran its course. The moment it finished, the shed impurities dissolved into mana and disappeared.
“Status window.”
Traits: Footwork, Second Body Reconstruction (Hwan-Gol-Dol-Tae), Lower Dantian, Negotiation, Balancing
Achievements: One Who Defied Time, Founder of Footwork, +12 others
Stat Points:2,830
[Skills]
Fighting Spirit — Passive (A) · Taeho Heart Sutra (B) · Area Detection (C) · Battle of Warriors (C) · Concealment (A)
[Unique Skill]
— The Great Adversary
My base stats and my mana stat had both reached 300. Leave it to the Azure Void Elixir to bump a stat by a whole hundred.
Granted, the true gain was fifty, doubled by my Elixir Addict trait — but even fifty was a staggering effect in its own right.
It even took away the pain.
With the agony wiped out entirely, I'd been able to sit through the awakenings in perfect comfort. Now I was curious what boons the fifth and sixth awakenings had brought. I waited a moment, and the system messages came through.
Mana stat has reached 250.
The 5th Awakening unlocks the Lower Dantian.
Confirming the unlocked Lower Dantian.
Enhancing skills related to the Lower Dantian.
Mana stat has reached 300.
The 6th Awakening grants 'Mana Awakening'.
Description: A heart method modeled on the energies of yin and yang and the qi of the heavens.
Effects: Magic power recovery speed +40%, Maximum mana +20%, Resists false qi.
Mastery: 3 Stars
*The skill grows with each star attained.
The mastery of Taeho Heart Sutra, long stuck fast, had climbed at last. Reaching three stars had granted it a brand-new effect as well.
No idea what that last one does, though.
As for the sixth awakening, it had granted me Mana Awakening. It was a technique akin to Limit Break and Forced Activation — except with almost no risk. The payoff to my stats was smaller for it, but being risk-free carried real weight in itself.
“Glad I drank it.”
“It seems your efforts bore fine fruit.”
As I was marveling, Cheongun came gliding back over. Bound to me as he was, he was acutely sensitive to every change in my body.
“It turned out better than I even imagined.”
“Then I am glad indeed.”
Drinking the Azure Void Elixir promptly had clearly been the right call. Otherwise, I'd never have reaped results like these.
“Shall we head out, then?”
The elixirs were all consumed and my condition was stable. There was no reason to linger in the gate any longer.
“How go the preparations?”
“They are nearly complete, sir.”
The memorandum had come down from the Association yesterday, and with preparations begun in haste, nearly everything was wrapped up already.
We have to finish this as fast as possible.
It hadn't occurred to him yesterday, but if the Association had caught the scent of demons and sent that memorandum, then Pagwon Guild would not escape unscathed either.
That fellow who's been raiding the demons' hideouts of late might come calling.
It was pure conjecture, but conjecture with teeth. Hence the early preparations, and the early departure.
“Father!”
“What is it?”
Just then the door swung open, and Pak Jin-sung's son, Pak Hyun-jin, strode in. Dissatisfaction was written all over his face.
“Me — on standby? What is this about?”
“It means exactly what it says.”
“I can't accept that!”
Pak Hyun-jin led Pagwon Guild's second strike team. If the second team leader was benched, that meant the entire second team was benched with him. Unable to stomach it, he had come to demand answers.
“The guild rules say you address me as guild master.”
“Guild master — I still cannot accept this.”
“Does the second team leader defy the guild master's direct order?”
The high commands; the low obeys.
Primal words, yes — but the founding rule of every organization.
“Yes. I simply cannot accept your order, Guild Master.”
“Ha...”
With his son standing before him like this, even Pak Jin-sung could not open his mouth carelessly. His son — and the team his son belonged to — had never touched the demonic energy. A father's wish that his boy stay clear of dangerous things, nothing more.
“Son.”
“Yes.”
“Stand down. Wait.”
“......”
When his father came down on him with that cold authority, Pak Hyun-jin had no answer to give. His father — the man who held hierarchy in the guild as sacred — had called him son.
Something is happening, isn't it?
Pak Hyun-jin felt it in his gut. Something he knew nothing about was unfolding behind closed doors.
“...Understood.”
In the end, there was nothing for it but to submit to his father's command. Hearing his answer, Pak Jin-sung turned and left the room without another word.
“Effective now, we depart to clear the S-Rank Gate!”
“WOOOOAH!”
The great roar rolled in from outside the guild building. He wanted, right that second, to be out there throwing his voice in with theirs — but he couldn't. It had been his father's command, and his father's plea, the man he had looked up to all his life.
“Damn it...!”
He had no idea what his father was thinking, making a request like this. But some instinct whispered that if he let his father walk away now, he might never see him again. And still, Pak Hyun-jin could not move.
“Well then, shall we get moving?”
Stepping out of the gate, I learned that the Association President had laid out the stage for me, lavishly so.
First, the demons' hideouts.
A hiding place prepared by a major guild would very likely have a head attached to it. And no head could possibly imagine that I was already on my way.
So I'll take the head's neck first.
I set my footwork in motion and headed for the demons' hideout.