Chapter 58
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 58
‘I got impatient because of his formation and pulled it out too early.’
Ise reflected on his hasty judgment in that fleeting moment.
He hadn't expected the man to immediately discern the nature of the Dharma Artifact the second his demonic energy was sealed, nor to retreat outside the barrier without a moment's hesitation.
Even as his wife drew her last breath, the man had prioritized saving his own skin.
Judging by his remark about the subtleties of the Demonic Energy Sealing Formation, being a formation master must have made it easier for him to notice the trap. This was a sheer gap in experience.
A 10-Star Qi Refining demonic cultivator. Ise could hardly fathom what kind of life someone who reached this realm on the demonic path had lived, or how many bloody years he had survived to get here.
He was a genuine monster, cut from a completely different cloth than any enemy Ise had faced so far.
Ise stowed away the Twin Sickle Spirit Domain Uprising. He could pull it out again whenever necessary, but now that its effect had been exposed, it would be the enemy's primary target.
‘The Needle Eruption Armor needs time before it can be used again, and the Twin Sickle Spirit Domain Uprising has been seen through.’
As Ise kept the distant demonic cultivator at bay with the Fireball Art, the man swept aside his Daoist robe. He pulled a palm-sized round disc from his waist.
Blood-red incantations were densely engraved along its edge, surrounding a twisted glyph at its center.
A Formation Board. The man hurled it straight onto the ground.
The moment the disc struck the dirt, the glyph expanded instantly, tracing a crimson formation that soaked into the earth. A blood-colored circle spread out around the man.
Ise held his breath for a beat.
‘...A Blood Formation.’
It was a formation based on the Blood Cultivation Art—one of the four secret cultivation arts of the Cheolyang Lightning Sect recorded in the Basic Manual of the Great Martial Dao. It used the blood of others as a sacrifice to build one's cultivation realm.
The most atrocious aspect of the Blood Cultivation Art was that it granted its victims no peace. It trapped kidnapped humans in agony, bleeding them until they dried up and died.
Like a vampire bat dragging its prey along, the practitioner drained a set amount of blood every day to nourish their own realm. The day the victim was drained dry, left as nothing but an empty husk, would be their last.
Ise’s body stiffened slightly without him realizing.
This wasn't just someone who had fallen into corruption and become a demonic cultivator. He was a truly evil villain who had devoured countless lives to raise his own realm.
‘...He kidnaps someone’s family and bleeds them dry for the rest of their lives until they die...’
Ise’s eyes shifted briefly toward the woman collapsed on the ground.
‘...And yet he treasures his own family so dearly.’
Considering he was willing to abandon even her to save his own hide, it was a sickeningly hypocritical farce.
Streams of blood-red liquid shot out from the man’s formation. Four torrents of bloody water converged on Ise from different angles. Their speed was easily double that of a standard Flow-Dividing Art.
Ise immediately raised an Earth Wall.
Soil surged from the ground, constructing a thick, shield-shaped barricade.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
The streams of blood burst in rapid succession against the Earth Wall. Ise blocked the remaining stream with his Golden Supreme Parasol and ducked behind the earthen barrier.
The next attack took a different shape. The blood split mid-air, coalescing into five-fingered claws that bypassed the Earth Wall to swoop down on Ise.
Dogwi Shadow-Gathering Demonic Art.
Shadow Net Formation.
The Shadow Net Formation Ise deployed collided with the demonic cultivator’s blood-red claw. The dense black net disrupted and pushed back the bloody appendage, causing it to lose its shape and disperse into thin air.
When two consecutive attacks came to nothing, Ise could see through his Spirit Eye that the man beyond the ridge was gritting his teeth.
‘The power of our spells is roughly equal.’
Ise’s eyes moved calmly past the Golden Supreme Parasol. Catching his breath, he weighed his strength against his enemy’s.
– Internal Qi: Even combining all his spiritual and demonic energy, it barely equaled half of his enemy's. If this dragged into a battle of attrition, Ise would be the first to run dry.
– Dharma Artifacts: There was no telling what else the enemy had hidden in his robes. He surely had a few more tricks up his sleeve besides the Formation Board he had just thrown.
– Power of Spells: Judging from their brief exchanges, they were on par. Excluding formations, Ise actually held a slight advantage in pure spell power.
– Physical Specs: Though well-conditioned for a formation master, the man fell short compared to a Great Martial Dao cultivator who continuously tempered both body and Dharma power.
‘There are no pre-installed formations.’
What Ise feared most was a Static Cannon Formation—a large-scale, high-power formation that required time to set up. Perpetual formations that ran twenty-four hours a day, such as Invisibility Formations, Defensive Formations, and Alarm Formations, were resource-draining monsters. Unless one belonged to a massive sect, they were impossible to maintain.
Setting up even a single Alarm Formation around this mountain stronghold must have been quite a burden for them. There wouldn't be anything beyond that.
‘A frontal head-on battle is an even match.’
The demonic cultivator's nature as a formation master rather than a combat specialist, combined with the advantages of Ise's Heavenly Demon Dual-Meridian Physique, bridged much of the gap between their realms.
In a split second, he finished his assessment.
Stowing the small axe into his storage pouch, Ise gripped the Meridian-Severing Blade. This was an opponent that demanded every trick he possessed.
Behind the Earth Wall, Ise pushed lightly off the ground with his toes.
Streams of blood flew at him once more.
This time, Ise did not raise an Earth Wall. Instead, he coated his Golden Supreme Parasol in a thick layer of spiritual energy and deflected three streams in succession with the shield face. The energy-laden shield violently repelled the bloody attacks.
Then, he charged straight forward.
Using Dokkaebi Footwork, Ise closed the distance by dozens of paces at a time, bearing down on the man.
The man’s response was swift and calculated. Wary of the Twin Sickle Spirit Domain Uprising, he maintained a cautious distance. Ise intentionally chased the bastard to force him to reposition, then instantly pivoted.
His target was the Formation Board on the ground.
If it was a cherished Dharma Artifact, the man would surely come to retrieve it. Ise’s body launched forward like a coiled spring—a sharp turn that would be impossible to follow unless anticipated.
Yet, the man's reaction was the exact opposite of what Ise had expected.
Even as he saw Ise dashing toward the Formation Board, the man didn't move an inch from where he stood. No—to be precise, he had begun another movement.
He drew three small flags from his robes. They sliced through the air and struck the ground around him in a triangular pattern.
A formation utilizing three formation flags. Being more intricate to deploy, it was bound to be even more powerful than the Formation Board.
The moment Ise reached the Formation Board, alarm bells rang in his mind.
‘...No. This is—’
Instinct told him something was already wrong, but carried by momentum, his hand reached down and touched the Formation Board.
A firm sensation briefly brushed his fingertips before the Formation Board shattered with a crunch, scattering into dust.
It was a single-use Dharma Artifact.
To the man, it was a disposable tool he had already used up. A consumable item that dissolved after fulfilling its role in deploying a single Blood Formation.
‘I miscalculated!’
He turned his head a second too late, but the aura surging from the three formation flags set in a triangle was already making his skin prickle.
"Let's see if you can still stand after taking a Killing Formation, dog of the Great Martial Dao!"
The air shrieked as if being sliced apart all at once.
Hundreds of translucent blades erupted simultaneously from within the triangle, hurtling directly toward Ise. A murderous aura of unknown origin, forged into lethal sharpness. It was an instant-activation formation that shredded anything standing within its bounds.
By reflex, Ise raised the Golden Supreme Parasol in front of his body and channeled his spiritual energy to protect himself.
However, the triggered Killing Formation was not something that could be blocked by such a half-baked defense.
His thick Daoist robe shredded into ribbons in an instant.
Flank, shoulder, thigh, arm—blood erupted simultaneously from every cut. Several gashes carved deep into his bones.
He swallowed down the urge to scream from the excruciating pain. His breath choked in his throat. A mouthful of blood spilled from his lips, and his balance broke as he stumbled.
It was then that the man's shriek echoed out.
"Wiiiiife!"
When Ise turned his head, he saw the woman’s body, impaled on the Earth Spear, finally go limp.
The man's bloodshot eyes snapped back to Ise. His eyes rolled back in madness, his lips trembling violently with rage.
"I will... I will definitely..."
The man howled like a beast.
"I will offer your blood as a sacrifice for my wife's memorial!"
Ise immediately popped a Healing Pellet from his robe into his mouth. It was a temporary fix, but it would at least allow him to keep moving.
The pain was another matter entirely. The medicine could close his wounds, but it couldn't numb the agony. Every breath felt as if white-hot needles were thrusting in and out of his ribs.
The demonic cultivator raised a brush-shaped formation flag and began drawing another instant-activation formation.
Ise made a move to drive down the Twin Sickle Spirit Domain Uprising.
Seeing this, the demonic cultivator immediately abandoned his drawing and retreated, as if he had been expecting it.
Taking advantage of the opening, Ise washed away the blood on his body with the Flow-Dividing Art and pulled two talismans from inside his robe.
An Invisibility Talisman and a Spirit Concealment Talisman.
The Invisibility Talisman masked his form, while the Spirit Concealment Talisman hid his presence. His figure vanished from the man's sight.
"...?"
The enraged man, eyes wide, frantically searched the spot where Ise had been standing a moment too late. Only bloodstains remained on the ground.
The man hurriedly tried to draw an instant Defensive Formation, but a round Dharma object flew from nowhere and exploded with a loud bang!
Deadly poison oozed from the shattered Poison Bomb.
The man belatedly stopped breathing, but poison gas didn't enter through the lungs alone. Skin, eyes, ears—it seeped into his body through every open pore.
The man's qi and blood twisted violently in an instant. His crazed eyes temporarily lost focus and wavered. The fingertips holding the brush trembled, warping the defensive formation pattern he was drawing mid-stroke.
In that split second, Ise's form reappeared from thin air.
The Meridian-Severing Blade was already infused with the golden light of the Vajra Lock.
The man instinctively spun around, thrusting his bare hand forward. The demonic cultivator's demonic energy and Ise's spiritual energy collided head-on.
Short blade clashed against bare hand; between them, the two opposing energies violently repelled each other. The collision was deadlocked.
In that moment of tense deadlock, Ise's other hand moved.
Dogwi Shadow-Gathering Demonic Art.
Four Directions Strike.
Four shadow hands surged from beneath the ground, striking down at the demonic cultivator.
As the flustered demonic cultivator diverted his demonic energy to block the shadows, Ise's Meridian-Severing Blade moved once more.
This time, he wasn't aiming for the neck. He aimed for the ankle. As long as he could embed the blade anywhere in the enemy's body, victory would be his.
"You persistent bastard...!"
The man reflexively gathered demonic energy into his feet, but he was a step too late.
Ise's Meridian-Severing Blade had already cleaved halfway through his ankle. Unfortunately, he failed to lodge the blade deep enough to trigger its full effect.
However, Ise's attack was far from over.
The stone palm of the Stone Hand, activated in the blink of an eye, slammed down onto the demonic cultivator's head.
Coughing up blood, the demonic cultivator frantically tossed a single-use Dharma Artifact and scrambled backward to gain distance.
A blood-stained Daoist robe, a body wracked by spreading poison, a head covered in dust and dirt, and dragging one foot as he backed away...
His state was just as pathetic and desperate as Ise's, who was covered in bloody gashes.
Just as Ise thought he had backed the enemy into a corner, the man stretched one hand toward the corpse of his wife lying on the ground behind him.
Red energy drew out from her body like threads, rising toward his fingertips. His wife's blood—and even the blood of the demonic beasts Ise had slain moments ago.
In the end, the demonic cultivator had decided to use his own family and their demonic beasts as sacrifices for his Blood Cultivation Art.
A decision truly fitting for a demonic cultivator.
Watching the drops of blood slowly gather together, Ise felt a primal sense of dread.
This is dangerous.
His Dokkaebi Sense screamed in alarm.