Heaven's Chains at Dawn
What the Heavenly Demon sought was my life, and nothing else. That was good news — and bad news alike.
The important thing was that I had not lived carelessly enough to hand my life over so easily. The same held true even against the Heavenly Demon himself, for I was the inheritor of Yakseon's and the Sovereign of Destruction's legacies.
"I'm going."
There was no reckless bravado in it. I lacked the strength to withstand the Heavenly Demon's attacks, which meant striking first was the only sensible course. Was it not said that the best defense is a good offense? The saying does not hold true at all times, but no words suited this moment better.
With a soft hiss of displaced air, I tore through space on the Cloud-Treading Steps and seized the Heavenly Demon's blind rear. He did not so much as glance back. I hoped he had lost track of my form, but I knew better than to believe it.
Without hesitation, I loosed the Formless Sword at him. My strike slammed against his guardian qi.
Bang!
It did not break through.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
If one strike did not suffice, then two, then three — that was how such things were done. Like a smith tempering iron, I hammered away at the Heavenly Demon's barrier, blow after blow.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
And then—
"Ugh."
It still had not broken. What the Heavenly Demon had spread around himself was better named rebound qi than guardian qi, for every blow I rained upon his wall struck back at me in turn.
My churned insides heaved. I forced down the blood surging up my throat, but fresh red was already trickling from the corner of my mouth.
But stopping was not an option. Attacking the Heavenly Demon was the only path left to me.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Whatever his reasons, I knew this much: with the Heavenly Demon refusing to counterattack, this was my one and only chance.
But then—
"Is this all?"
So he said, and the Heavenly Demon extended his hand.
"Kgh."
My Formless Sword, mid-charge toward him, was bound fast in midair, its very shape held captive.
For the first time, indifference took its seat upon that face which had shown me nothing but interest from beginning to end. His gaze, sunken back into the abyss, pronounced judgment.
As it had with Cheolsanmagun, the god's decree had arrived upon this earth. But I was not Cheolsanmagun, and so I did not turn my own blade upon my throat.
Instead, for the first time, the Heavenly Demon moved his own form. Slowly — as though the phantasmagoria had returned, his sword drifted with glacial patience toward the space between my brows.
It was unmistakably slow, and yet there was no escaping it. One might call it the ultimate art of the slow blade.
I did not close my eyes. Partly to witness, to the very last, the profound mysteries woven into the path of his sword — and partly out of sheer obstinacy, a refusal to bow to the Heavenly Demon even at the end.
Grrrk.
My Formless Sword, pinned down by his power, writhed and inched forward. The sword path laid out in my mind was not aimed at blocking his blade. It was aimed at his throat — at the nape of the Heavenly Demon's neck, where the Dancheon Sword had already cut once before. Toward that spot, my Formless Sword crept, slow and steady.
Even if it cost me my life, I would make the Heavenly Demon my companion on the road. However slim the odds appeared, I would not give up until the very last of lasts.
Then—
Hwaaaa—
A wondrous thing occurred. Light descended from the heavens.
It was not the radiance my Dancheon Sword had conjured within the phantasmagoria, but light that literally split the dawn, bathing the Dancheon Clan in its glow. It was around the Hour of the Rabbit, when the sun would be due to rise — yet there was nothing accidental about that beam falling upon the clan, falling with perfect precision upon the Heavenly Demon and me.
Shhhrrrak—
I witnessed it: the invisible chains, veiled until now by the soul-spirits of the extreme demon masters, manifesting upon the earth together with the light.
And then—
KWA-BOOM!
They coiled around the Heavenly Demon's body.
Thud.
The Heavenly Demon's sword stopped a single inch above my head.
"Let go."
Goooooh.
To shake off the chains' restraint and take my head, his sword path unleashed monstrous force, unbowed by the binding.
Grrrrk—
But in the end, the Heavenly Demon could not move his sword.
After a moment of silence—
"...I see."
So he murmured, and his gaze lifted toward the heavens.
That was all.
He had not so much as blinked, yet the Heavenly Demon's form vanished without the slightest warning. As if he had never existed at all, nothing remained where he had stood so solidly.
"..."
Only the corpses of the extreme demon masters and Cheolsanmagun remained to prove that everything which had happened here was real.
My strength spent, my knees buckled and gave out beneath me.
It was fine. I had not knelt before the Heavenly Demon.
The crisis had passed. The clan's grand training grounds lay half in ruins, but few warriors had lost their lives.
Few — not none. The blades of the extreme demon masters had been anything but dull. A great battle in which every soul walks away unscathed is the stuff of traveling players' stages, not of real war.
We offered silent prayers for the guards who had died defending the Dancheon Clan, but no one grieved overmuch. Such is the fate of those who live by the blade. They had neither been felled by poison nor cut down screaming in the dead of night — one might even call their ends honorable, as a warrior's death goes. At the very least, they had died with blades in hand, crossing swords with mortal foes. By any honest accounting, that was true.
The Dancheon Clan had lost several guards who had reached the Peak Realm, and some of the Haomun members who had come to our aid perished as well. Several elders of the council were wounded, though none fatally — one might call it the vigor of ripe old age. Brother Chunbaek, Ma Sok, Uncle Yeo-baek, my father: not one of them bore wounds beyond saving. The worst injured were the Sovereign of Destruction, the Overlord Martial Emperor, and me, but our realms stood high enough that regulated breathing and quiet recuperation would mend us.
The Demonic Cult, however, had lost extreme demon masters of the very highest order. Every one of them had been a Second-Rank Sleeper Agent operating in the shadows of the Central Plains' murim, and that loss would bleed. Nor did it end there: Cheolsanmagun, a pillar of the cult's leadership, was dead. Judging by his realm, he had surely been poised to rise beyond Demon Lord and contend for the seat of the next Divine Demon. He had not died by our hands — but that he had perished here all the same was what mattered.
In other words, we had won. A resounding victory, one might call it.
And yet no one could bring themselves to cheer. It was not out of mourning for the dead. It was because everyone present had witnessed the Heavenly Demon's majesty — the sight of him trampling the Murim Alliance Leader and neutralizing the Sado League Leader in a single exchange was seared too deep into memory to forget. The Great Righteous-Demon War of the Myeonggae era still lay in the future, which made those gathered here the first people to grasp the true terror of the Demonic Cult with their own flesh and blood.
But there was no one in the Dancheon Clan who would collapse in despair over the dark clouds gathering on the horizon of the future.
"For now... let us begin the cleanup."
"Yes, Clan Leader!"
At Clan Leader Dancheon Gang's command, everyone moved with purpose. They gathered up the fallen warriors' bodies and made hasty repairs to the training grounds.
Amid the bustle—
"We will take our leave."
Ma Sok offered his farewell. Haomun could hardly extend its hands to the clan's cleanup as well — this was, after all, the upright and prestigious Dancheon Sword Clan. Behind him, a file of his warriors carried the shrouded bodies of the Haomun dead. Those men had died helping the Dancheon Sword Clan.
"I will come find you before long."
I had received a great kindness, and repaying kindness is only right. Even once repaid, though, the goodwill Yeo Wol and Ma Sok had shown me would remain in my heart.
"Thank you."
"Until next time."
Ma Sok smiled at my words and vanished together with his men.
The next to approach was the Overlord Martial Emperor.
"The debt is paid."
He said it with eyes that held nothing back.
"There was never a debt to begin with."
I had given him the Ten-Thousand-Year Snowbell Herb, and he had granted me leave to begin the Five-Stage Pill Art. The Yeomhwa Bang affair had concluded our transaction — which meant his aid today belonged to a realm beyond even prediction. At least, that was how it figured in my ledger. I now owed him a great debt.
The Sado League Leader. The Overlord Martial Emperor, Wiji Han. The absolute sovereign of the unorthodox world, a master who held all under heaven in his command, had come in person to save the Dancheon Clan — and had fought with his life on the line. Perhaps, for my sake. It was a debt I could not even begin to fathom repaying.
Had he not arrived when he did — had he not stood against the Heavenly Demon's descent and shielded my kin — I knew the clan's losses would have been beyond all reckoning.
"...I did nothing of the sort."
So said the Overlord Martial Emperor, whose view of matters seemed to differ somewhat from my own.
"Until next time."
Wiji Han left those words behind and was gone in a blink.
"Whatever debt remains unpaid, I shall settle next time."
A Six-Harmony Voice Transmission — delivered so that I could not even answer back.
The expression the Overlord Martial Emperor had worn in his final moment before departing lingered in my mind. I cannot see the future; I am no god. But I judged that the Sado League Leader would likely grow stronger still, beyond the realm he now held. I know full well that for a master who has already reached the summit, crossing into a new realm cannot be achieved by will alone — yet the resolve steeped into the Overlord Martial Emperor's face seemed capable of accomplishing even that.
"Kahaha!"
The Sovereign of Destruction roared with laughter, his limp left arm bound in cloth and slung about his neck. The brightest face in the Dancheon Clan at that moment belonged, without question, to him. Setting aside those who had fallen, the most grievously wounded man present was the Sovereign of Destruction — and so was the man with the brightest smile. That old gentleman was, without a doubt, not in his right mind.
"How delightful."
I drew near to him where he stood aglow.
"You're well?"
"That I am."
In Yeom Gi-ha's eyes burned a competitive fire much like my own.
"I can go further."
The Sovereign of Destruction, Yeom Gi-ha — he was truly a man made of fire. Having witnessed the calamity called the Heavenly Demon, he had not despaired. He had seen a path forward.
"And that pleases me so."
He was genuinely delighted by the fact that he was not the finest under heaven.
Whatever his competitive spirit, I knew his body was in no state to celebrate. The Sovereign of Destruction had not attained the Diamond Body, so unlike me, his broken bones would not knit on the spot. Of course, he would heal at a speed no ordinary man could hope to match — such was the world walked by those who had reached the Transcendent Realm.
"Will you rest a day before departing?"
A day would likely suffice. Yeom Gi-ha's station was that of the Murim Alliance Leader — quite apart from being my clan's benefactor, he was owed the most lavish courtesy. His circumstances were different from Ma Sok's or the Overlord Martial Emperor's.
"Hm."
The Sovereign of Destruction deliberated a moment before answering.
"Can't be done."
I gave him a puzzled look, and he replied:
"Unless I hurry back before that Gija fellow gets any angrier, I won't live to enjoy my victory, now will I?"
"...You ran away from home again?"
Come to think of it, I had been wondering why the Sovereign of Destruction was here at all.
"Ahem."
Having cleared his throat, the Sovereign of Destruction added:
"An Alliance Leader cannot leave his Alliance empty for long."
He tried to patch things up with a dignified excuse, but it came a little late.
"..."
I owed the man a debt of gratitude and wanted to say something that would help him — but no good words came readily to mind.
"Ahem."
Clearing his throat a second time, the Sovereign of Destruction looked rather forlorn.
Perhaps he had never truly been the finest under heaven to begin with. Singija, the finest under heaven — that was a name I would do well to remember.
"Disciple, once things are settled, come pay the Alliance a visit."
With those words, the Sovereign of Destruction's form dissolved like a mirage. A broken arm did nothing to diminish his martial might, so the result was only natural.
"Understood."
I had been meaning to go anyway, so I answered readily. I, too, had gained a reason to stop by the Murim Alliance.
The man I was before meeting the Heavenly Demon and the man I am now are two different people. Encountering a foe beyond my strength would not bring me to despair — for I had a road to walk. If anything, my pointless worries had all been resolved. I could advance faster now.