No. 410: Breaking the Demon Seal (2)
The Demon Finger really earned its keep.
Even among demonic techniques, the Hyeon-eum Jade Demon Finger stood near the very top for sheer lethality, and the way its index finger sheathed itself in frost made it unmistakable at a glance. Thanks to that, I had played the part of a Demonic Cult master without raising so much as a flicker of suspicion—and in the process, swiftly secured this dungeon's top-priority objective.
Now it was time to turn to the dungeon's main objectives. I held up two fingers for Go Hyeon-woo to see.
"We have two jobs, broadly speaking."
The first was securing the Demon Sealing Box—the very thing the title had promised. To be precise, our task was to help the Yanwang Unit secure it.
"Of course, the people in there won't exactly close their eyes and take it lying down."
"Some master or other is bound to be waiting within, I'd say."
"A hundred percent."
When speaking with the Yanwang Unit Leader, I had couched it in vague terms—"possible variables," "unforeseen masters," phrases of that stripe. In truth, however, a battle against a master was all but settled.
The Geumyeong Merchant Guild had evidently felt uneasy about smuggling the Demon Sealing Box out from under the cult's nose, because they had gone to the expense of inviting in some genuinely formidable experts. Those men would prove a major stumbling block to toppling the guild, so how quickly we could put them down would decide the whole operation.
"The other job is finding the Guild Master."
"He is the mastermind behind this affair, after all."
"Right. Honestly, the box alone would have been enough, but the Guild Master comes with a bonus reward attached."
"Indeed—if an additional reward is on offer, it would be unthinkable to let him slip away."
Traveling at my side, Go Hyeon-woo had well and truly taken on the mindset of a seasoned schemer.
The Yanwang Unit, advancing under strict cover of stealth, gradually slowed its pace before coming to a complete halt. Ahead stood a manor made up of a handful of halls, neither too large nor too small. For its modest scale it was ringed by a remarkably tall wall, and the plaque above the main gate read:
Geumyeong Merchant Guild
At once the unit exchanged some signal among themselves and closed on the buildings with stealthy, terrifying speed. Warriors stood sentry at points all around the grounds, but by the time any of them spotted the unit bearing down on them, it was already far too late.
"Enemy atta—"
Shlick!
The sentries were erased in the space of a breath, and the Yanwang Unit ringed the Geumyeong Merchant Guild entire—so that not a single rat could slip away.
Fssshhh—
The only sounds were the faint whispers of brushing fabric. As Go Hyeon-woo and I looked on, the Yanwang Unit Leader came over and reported in a tone of deep deference.
"All preparations are complete."
"Begin."
At my slight tilt of the chin, the Unit Leader signaled with a flick of his hand. A sharp whistle tore through the air—
Fweeeee—!
—and the unit encircling the guild leapt as one, clearing the high wall in a single bound. From that moment on, there was no longer any need for stealth.
"Cut them all down!"
"Sweep them away! Leave not one of them breathing!"
Go Hyeon-woo and I traded a glance and vaulted the wall after them. From its top I looked down on the stunned faces of the guild warriors who had been standing watch, and one of them cried out in desperation.
"Enemy attack—!"
Those were the last words that ever left his mouth.
Shlick!
For the very next instant, his head went flying.
Battle was joined, and from every quarter rose the clang of colliding weapons, shouts of fury, and the wet sounds of men being hewn down.
Kagagak!
"Ugh...!"
A Yanwang Unit member slashed in on the diagonal; a guild warrior crossed his sword to catch the blow. For a moment the two stood blade-locked, each straining to drive the other back—but the guildsman gave ground inch by inch, and before long his sword snapped clean in two. The unit member swung again and finished him.
Shlick!
"Gwaaagh!"
He swept the fallen man aside like a piece of trash and moved on to the next. The Geumyeong Merchant Guild had clearly shelled out serious money to hire and court fighting men of its own, but measured against the Demonic Cult's armed fist, every one of them fell hopelessly short.
Shlick!
And so they dropped like flies, rarely surviving more than a handful of exchanges. Their numbers thinned in moments. Now and then someone would put up a ferocious fight against a few unit members at once, but the Yanwang Unit drilled group tactics every bit as rigorously as everything else—two or three would combine their assault, and those men, too, at last buckled and did not rise.
But what if they were stronger than that?
What if someone came along whom even a coordinated assault from several unit members could not bring down? I was thinking it was just about time for men like that to show their faces.
And right on cue—SHLAK!
Three or four Yanwang Unit members pressing forward with irresistible momentum were bisected in a single stroke. Others rushed in to fill the gap and attacked again, only to be cut in two just the same.
The attackers were twins with nearly identical faces, short and squat and round, like a pair of dwarfs. Each swung an axe as large as his own body, and the blue axe qi clinging to those blades was proof enough of their caliber. That was precisely why the Yanwang Unit could not receive their blows—bodies split apart again and again. Worse, the pair worked in remarkable harmony, covering each other's blind spots without a single gap.
These were the masters the Geumyeong Merchant Guild had secretly brought in.
The Mountain-Crushing Twin Axes—the Jeong brothers.
I exchanged a look with the Yanwang Unit Leader standing nearby. His eyes had widened slightly with alarm.
"To think you foresaw even their appearance... I am in awe of Demon Brain's discerning eye."
"Demon Brain perceives all things."
Except, of course, that there was no Demon Brain—I had perceived it all myself. But if we left the Jeong brothers rampaging, the unit's casualties would only snowball. So I stepped forward, Go Hyeon-woo at my shoulder.
"Withdraw. We will take them."
"As you command."
The Yanwang Unit fell back, and the brothers' gazes swung to us of their own accord. They must have sensed at a glance that we were cut from different cloth, for each tossed out a boast.
"About time something worth fighting turned up."
"This should be fun."
Within this dungeon, at least, I was a hidden master of the Demonic Cult—and with so many eyes watching, I meant to keep up the arrogant act.
"Not worth so much as one of my fingers, the pair of you, and yet look how those mouths of yours run. You don't amuse me in the slightest, so hurry up and come at me."
"...!"
The Jeong brothers' faces twisted ugly. The provocation had landed perfectly. After all, what warrior alive could calmly swallow being told he was not worth a single punch?
Their auras surged violently, and they kicked off the ground as one, charging. Blue energy gushed up in thick streams and coiled along their axes. Go Hyeon-woo regarded them with keen interest.
"This is my first time facing masters of the axe."
An iron sword had somehow already found its way into his hand, and a soft current of wind wrapped itself around the blade.
Following Stream
A defensive art devoted wholly to letting the enemy's attacks slide harmlessly past.
He had leaned on it heavily during the midterm, deflecting the Ogres' blows. But somewhere in real combat, Go Hyeon-woo seemed to have realized something. Instead of receiving the strike rooted in place as he always had, he took one long stride forward and brought his iron sword crashing down.
THWAM—!
The twin axes, swung with terrifying force, veered wildly off their paths. I was hardly the man to let the opening thus exposed slip by. In a flash I was inside their guard, driving the Hyeon-eum Jade Demon Finger into the elder Jeong's arm.
Thuck.
"Th... this is...!"
The man staggered backward in a daze and stared down at the wound with panicked eyes.
Krrrk, krrrk—
Frost qi was racing along his veins, devouring his body at appalling speed. The man who had at first trembled only from the arm down was soon shaking from head to toe. Seeing it, the other brother shouted,
"You bastard! What did you do to my brother?!"
"Ah, so you're the younger one. No need to worry."
You would look like that soon enough yourself. This time Go Hyeon-woo and I pressed the attack—Go Hyeon-woo taking the elder brother, who was desperately trying to force the frost qi from his body, while I closed on the remaining Jeong in a rush. An axe came swinging at me on pure reflex,
Whoosh—
but I evaded by a hair's breadth and sank in deeper still, jabbing my index finger into the man's swinging arm.
"Nghhhk...!"
Fair and square, one strike apiece—the Jeong brothers shuddered where they stood, both stricken by the Hyeon-eum Jade Demon Finger. Fury and fear warred openly in the eyes they turned on us. I held their gazes for a moment, then gave the order.
"Dispose of them."
"As you command."
The Yanwang Unit ringed the brothers once more and closed in step by step. At this point there was no need for us to finish the job ourselves. The two could barely resist the finger's frost as it was; the unit alone would be more than enough.
"Gyaaaaagh!"
Leaving the brothers' screams behind us, we walked straight into the main hall. The unit members who had entered ahead of us were cutting down everything that moved and turning every room inside out in their search for the Demon Sealing Box. We paid them no mind and pressed deeper.
"With the masters dealt with, only one thing remains," Go Hyeon-woo said, matching my stride.
"Right. Time to find him."
Guild Master Geumyeong.
We kept walking until the corridor dead-ended, the building's wall barring our way. Go Hyeon-woo turned his head, asking with a look what we did now. I pointed at the wall.
"Cut this."
Without a flicker of doubt, Go Hyeon-woo swept his iron sword through the air twice in quick succession. Two streams of sword qi crossed the wall in an X.
Kagak!
A long gash opened across the wall's face—but that was all. Go Hyeon-woo recovered his sword and asked, "I trust you had your reasons for such an order, Brother Kim... am I right?"
"I did."
I nodded and laid a palm against the wall. "Because this is a formation."
"...!"
Go Hyeon-woo studied the wall all over again with new eyes. He traced the gash he had cut, let a thread of qi seep into the stone, and soon his gaze had gone deep. "Now that I look properly, I do sense something amiss. Though I fear unraveling it would be beyond me."
"That's plenty for today."
Breaking a formation begins with noticing that one exists at all—and today, Go Hyeon-woo had taken that first step. Keep exposing him to all manner of formations until sensing that wrongness became instinct, and one day he would pick them out at a single glance, just as I could. As for the one right in front of us—well, we already had a very easy solution on hand.
"Take out the Bodhidharma Statue."
"Ah—of course...!"
Go Hyeon-woo's eyes lit up. He had just understood why I had told him to bring the statue along on this raid. He drew it from his robe. "And what would you have me do with it?"
"Set it down here."
I indicated a corner of the wall. And the moment the Bodhidharma Statue came to rest there—
Fsssshhh—
—the wall's surface rippled and slumped away of its own accord, unveiling a short passage and, at its end, a hidden chamber. A formation had cunningly disguised the whole thing as solid wall.
We crossed the passage and stopped before the door—and Go Hyeon-woo immediately drew his iron sword and swung.
Shlick!
The door burst into fragments, revealing the middle-aged man who had been hiding within. One look at his opulent clothes and his face slicked with grease was enough to know this was Guild Master Geumyeong himself. He had never dreamed anyone would smash straight through his formation, and naked disbelief flooded his face.
"H-how?!"
"Peekaboo."
[208] The Support Ate It All