Solo Assault on the Blood Sect
“Hey, Baal.”
“What is it?”
“Someone’s coming in fast. Roughly eight of them.”
“Then why is that thing just standing there?”
Baal, transformed into human form, stared at the jiangshi.
Only if that corpse puppet attacked first could they put on a convincing show of fighting. If he or Metatron struck first, the jiangshi would simply disintegrate. They had no choice but to wait for the enemy to move.
“We should start fighting soon…”
Metatron, likewise wearing a human guise, narrowed his eyes. To fool the ones approaching, they needed to clash now and make some noise. Just how long was that jiangshi going to stand there?
“Canteas, you bastard, what the hell are you—”
In that instant—
Shushushuk!
The vacant-eyed jiangshi vanished.
“Wh-what?!”
“Teleport?!”
Metatron and Baal both jumped as the jiangshi disappeared. They were supposed to start the act any second—where had it gone? And more importantly… since when could a jiangshi teleport?
Shushushuk!
While Baal and Metatron were still reeling, Canteas appeared.
Whoosh.
Thud.
“Hey, Canteas! What the hell is going on?!”
“Where’s the jiangshi, and why are you here instead?”
“…”
“What’s with that face?”
“It’s always weird seeing expressions on a skeleton. What happened?”
Canteas stood there with his jaw hanging open in a dazed expression. Baal and Metatron tilted their heads. Had someone smacked him? Why did he look so thoroughly shaken?
“Do-ha…”
“What about Baek Do-ha?”
“Don’t tell me he’s dead?!”
“That would be wonderful—ah… I mean, that would be tragic?!”
“As if. You idiots.”
Canteas snapped at the two of them, the scolding finally jolting him back to his senses.
“Do-ha crossed over with the demonic sword.”
“Crossed over where?”
“He crossed over?”
“Yeah. He was pissed as hell. Took Un-jeop-bi-jang and the Heaven-Cleaving Blood Demon Sword and went…”
“Went where, exactly—”
Metatron’s mouth fell open mid-sentence. Beside him, Baal’s face drained of color.
No…
Surely not. Even that madman wouldn’t just charge straight into the Blood Sect’s headquarters. One wrong move and he’d be facing the Demon God Cult, the Heavenly Demon Cult, and the Blood Sect all at once. He wouldn’t go in blind like that.
“He told us to clean up every Blood Sect bastard here. Said he’d cut off the Blood Demon’s head himself and come back…”
“You boneheaded bastard! You should’ve stopped him!”
“You just let him go?!”
“Since when have either of you ever worried about Do-ha?!”
“We’re not worried about Baek Do-ha—we’re worried the Heaven-Cleaving Blood Demon Sword will fall into the Blood Demon’s hands!”
“If that Baek Do-ha bastard just dies, it’d actually be better!”
“Ugh, you two are seriously…”
Listening to Baal and Metatron, Canteas let out a long sigh. He was stuck working with these damn fools from now on.
“We’ll talk later. First we deal with the Blood Sect coming this way.”
Boom!
Canteas lightly struck the ground with his staff. A vast magic circle bloomed across the entire Dark Forest.
“That’s an absurd amount of mana.”
“I’ve never seen a magic circle this large.”
Baal and Metatron snorted in disbelief at the sight. Expanding a magic circle’s size required enormous mana—yet Canteas’s formation had swallowed the whole forest. Truly staggering reserves.
“You two hit the approaching forces from behind. No one gets away.”
“Hmph. Don’t worry about us.”
“Just make sure you don’t screw up.”
Whoosh!
Baal and Metatron snorted and vanished.
Moments later—
Boom.
Canteas struck the ground once more. Undead clawed their way up from beneath the earth while high-grade entities burst into existence in the air above.
Ssssss.
“It’s been a while since I’ve been outside.”
“Cheon Seol-gyeong. Those coming this way are Blood Sect. Kill them all.”
“The Blood Sect… killing those bastards has always been my specialty.”
Cheon Seol-gyeong—the Heavenly Demon—wore a thin, vicious smile. Back when he was alive, he’d torn Blood Sect members apart for sport. Of course, that had stopped once Baek Do-ha appeared.
“The ones who couldn’t even lift their heads while I was around have grown quite a bit.”
Grip.
Whoosh!
The moment his hand closed around his sword, Cheon Seol-gyeong vanished.
“Death Knights. Bone Dragons. Dullahan Corps.”
Chajajajak.
At Canteas’s call, the highest-tier undead erupted into view.
“You handle the ones coming at us.”
Toward the Blood Sect members racing in with light-foot techniques, Canteas leveled his staff.
Grrrk?
“What the hell? What’s wrong with you all of a sudden?”
At the entrance to the Blood Sect headquarters, a guard grabbed the leash of a grotesque monster. The chimera had been created to guard the gate—yet now it was backing away.
Screeech.
“Has this thing gone mad?!”
The Blood Sect member holding the leash snarled in irritation. It had been drooling and staring blankly a second ago—why was it suddenly retreating? Had something gone wrong during its creation?
“Damn it. A defective product.”
Shing.
In the end the guard drew his sword from his waist. Building a chimera cost materials and money, but a defective one couldn’t be left alive.
Step. Step.
“Huh?”
Sword raised high, the Blood Sect member turned at the sound of footsteps behind him.
“Who goes there?!”
“Is the Blood Demon here?”
“Ha…”
The figure approaching the gate. Hearing Do-ha’s words, the guard let out a hollow laugh. In all his life he’d never heard anyone walk up to the Blood Sect and casually ask if the Blood Demon was in. A lunatic? Or just some idiot looking to die?
“If you wanted to kill yourself, you should’ve gone somewhere else and swallowed poison. Get caught by us and you won’t die cleanly.”
Humans dragged into the Blood Sect usually met horrific ends—drained of blood, used in rituals, or turned into jiangshi.
“Quit the side talk. Is the Blood Demon here or not?”
“…I can’t let that slide.”
Tap!
The guard sighed and shot forward at high speed. That mouth of his meant he couldn’t be left alive. Ideally the man would be dragged to a dungeon, but if the Blood Demon ever heard that kind of insolence, every other member would catch hell for it.
“Be grateful I’m not using pressure-point strikes.”
Whiiish!
Ting.
“Ting?”
The Blood Sect member tilted his head mid-swing. What? He’d clearly aimed for the neck—why had there been that strange metallic ting?
“Tsk tsk. I let you hit me just to see how strong the Blood Sect has gotten these days…”
They felt even weaker than before. At least in the old days someone would have managed to leave a small cut on him.
“You clearly don’t know where the Blood Demon is, so just die.”
“Wai—”
Slash!
Do-ha beheaded the guard with the Heaven-Cleaving Blood Demon Sword.
“You should be grateful I didn’t torture you either.”
Swoosh.
Do-ha flicked the blood from the blade and turned. A grotesque monster stood there.
“You’re a pitiful thing too, aren’t you?”
Grrrrr.
Sensing his gaze, the chimera let out a low whine and closed its eyes.
“I’ll send you off peacefully.”
Press.
Ssssss.
As the chimera shut its eyes, Do-ha stepped close and pressed the creature’s death point. A chimera stitched together from countless living things had tangled pressure points, but finding them wasn’t difficult.
You wanted to be free, didn’t you?
The monster had even pushed the death point forward itself, showing him exactly where to strike.
“Blood Demon… Blood Demon… just where are you hiding?”
Whoooom!
Do-ha rose into the sky. Mixing the Void-Treading Art with Fly and Levitation let him drift through the air as freely as any immortal.
“Wow… this is practically an empire.”
Soaring high, Do-ha clicked his tongue at the sight of the Blood Sect headquarters. With only one entrance he’d expected something small—yet deep inside they had built a vast empire. He’d visited Blood Sect bases many times before; this was by far the largest.
“Alright, time for a light greeting—”
Tadatadatadat!
Whiiish!
Just as Do-ha prepared to cast Meteor, someone below shot upward at tremendous speed, treading on empty air to attack.
“You’re both still alive? Bloodlight Twin Demons.”
Tilting his head back to dodge, Do-ha looked down at the two glaring up at him.
Twins, both masters of the Transcendent Realm. Their combined assault had sent countless martial artists to the Underworld. Yet decades ago he’d heard they died fighting Je-woo.
“Je-woo wouldn’t have shown mercy… and he was stronger even back then… Ah! You two faked your deaths, didn’t you?”
“Shut your mouth!”
“I’ll rip that jaw of yours clean off!”
Tadatadat.
At the light provocation, the Bloodlight Twin Demons roared and began aerial stepping. Tall trees and buildings throughout the base made it easy enough for them to close in on Do-ha in the sky.
“You still can’t use the Void-Treading Art? What have you been doing for decades?”
As the twins approached, Do-ha simply rose a little higher. At this rate he didn’t even need to attack—just climbing higher left them with nothing they could do.
“Hey, even a mage who just enrolled at the academy flies better than you two.”
“You son of a bitch!!”
“Get down here!!”
In truth, a brand-new academy mage couldn’t fly at all. Fly required at least Fourth Circle, and free flight needed Fifth Circle for stable mana supply. But even false information worked perfectly well for enraging the Bloodlight Twin Demons.
“By the way… you’ve been way too obvious from the start, haven’t you?”
“?!”
“If you’re going to block my vision, at least make it look convincing.”
Far off among the buildings, mana was surging in a very distinctive pattern. That meant only one thing.
“You even got your hands on siege magic weapons, you lunatics.”
Ancient armaments, restored as thoroughly as possible and used during the war against the Demon Realm. Afterward the demons had destroyed most of them—yet here the Blood Sect was using them.
“Bloodlight Twin Demons. So that’s why your attacks felt so half-assed.”
Zaaaaang!
Do-ha raised a hand. Enormous magical power was absorbed and converted into mana.
Blizzard
Shwaaaaaaaaaaa!
The moment the spell activated, a howling gale and blizzard swept over the entire Blood Sect headquarters.
“Siege magic weapons hit hard, which is nice… but the second you block their line of sight, they become completely useless.”
Compared to modern weapons, they were similar to lasers—except each shot was the size of a dump truck.
Tong! Tong! Tong! Tong!
“It’s been a while, but the power’s still the same.”
Attacks streaked past overhead. Do-ha watched in mild admiration. In the old days those beams had melted demons by the score.
“Ahh… nostalgia.”
Woooooom!
Seventh Form — Moonlit Lake Reflection Sword
Killing intent spilled from Do-ha’s eyes even as he spoke lightly.
“Hey, Bloodlight Twin Demons. This time I’ll make sure you’re dead for real.”
Looking down, Do-ha began to move Un-jeop-bi-jang and the Heaven-Cleaving Blood Demon Sword.