Chapter 257
Chapter 257
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 257
Chapter Title: Kongtong Sect
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The moment Manryeokseung's grip enveloped his face, a single thought flashed through Baek Yahyo's mind.
It wasn't admiration for Shaolin Temple's hidden strength, nor fear directed at Manryeokseung, nor the terror brought by certain death.
It was a question.
'If these bastards didn't bring the manual, then who the hell...?'
Crunch.
Baek Yahyo met his death, forever burdened with a question he could never solve.
*
Manryeokseung dragged Baek Yahyo's crushed skull outside and hurled the corpse high into the sky.
Baek Yahyo's body flew through the air for a moment before plummeting right into the midst of the battlefield where Righteous Faction warriors clashed with Evil Faction warriors.
Thud.
"..."
A hush fell over the Kongtong Sect's training grounds, where the clamor of clashing steel had raged moments before.
The Evil Faction warriors hesitated and fell back, assessing the situation.
They had held the advantage up to now but hadn't managed to break through the Righteous Faction warriors easily.
Now, with two sect leaders and Manryeokseung joining the fray, their odds of victory had plummeted.
Should they fight to the death and win, or flee?
As the Evil Faction warriors eyed each other uncertainly, one made a decisive choice.
He turned and leaped over the Kongtong Sect's walls, vanishing into the distance.
"Th-that bastard!"
Wild beasts always trail after their leader.
The Evil Faction warriors behaved much the same. They began fleeing after the first one to run. In a way, it was a predictable outcome.
A few slower or less agile Evil Faction warriors were caught and killed, but the vast majority escaped the Kongtong Sect alive.
The Righteous Faction warriors didn't pursue them recklessly. They were utterly exhausted themselves.
Only then did the Righteous Faction warriors look around.
Their sect brothers lay coldly dead on the ground, and even more groaned in agony where they had fallen.
The immediate reactions among the Righteous Faction warriors split into two camps.
Those who grieved and wailed before the corpses of their fallen brothers.
And those who, in this moment, purely rejoiced in victory. The latter were far more numerous.
"We won!"
"The swords of the Mount Zhongnan Sect have repelled the villains of the Kongtong Sect!"
Dang Mujin found it a bit strange to see the Righteous Faction warriors expressing joy in front of their dying comrades.
But it was only natural, really.
Any true martial artist had to be a little mad.
The joy of victory and the sorrow of sacrifice.
Had they been the type to be swayed first by sorrow, they never would have chosen a life wielding the sword.
The Righteous Faction warriors then approached Ilseonja and Seonwuja, expressing their joy with their entire bodies.
Meanwhile, Dang Mujin's group approached Manryeokseung and spoke.
"Are you alright?"
"You seem somehow different."
Unlike Dang Mujin and Hong Geolgae, who offered polite greetings, Hyeon-gong acted more proactively.
He immediately removed his outer robe and wiped the blood from Manryeokseung's body.
Watching this, Ilseonja and Seonwuja felt a twinge of discomfort. The two of them were far more injured than Manryeokseung, and covered in far more blood.
However, they had their own sect disciples and brothers nearby, so they weren't exactly desperate for help.
'Well, he came alone from Shaolin Temple, so it's right for Hyeon-gong to look after Manryeokseung. He's not doing it just to read Manryeokseung's mood or anything.'
After briefly savoring their joy, the Righteous Faction warriors scattered to tend to the dead and wounded.
Sword wounds and broken bones were hard to treat, but there would still be patients they could help.
Dang Mujin called out loudly.
"Please gather the wounded in one place!"
All eyes turned to Dang Mujin's group.
They had performed too prominently to simply be dismissed as the younger generation.
Unlike the other three, Hong Geolgae hadn't shown any special feats and had even disgraced himself by searching for liquor mid-battle, but his skills seemed decent enough overall.
'Are they the next generation of the Righteous Murim?'
Harboring their own thoughts, the Righteous Faction warriors gathered the wounded and brought them before Dang Mujin.
While Dang Mujin examined the patients, the Righteous Faction warriors resumed ransacking the Kongtong Sect.
They had come to search for the manual in the first place, not just to fight the Kongtong Sect.
Just as they thought they had uncovered nearly all the hidden manuals, they discovered a suspicious location.
Behind the Kongtong Sect were a great many graves, and judging by the grass growing atop them, they didn't seem very old.
And behind the graves, they found the prison cells.
'…'
Not every sect had prison cells.
The Kongtong Sect did, however—and compared to those of other sects or clans, theirs were unusually large.
Not every Evil Faction warrior who entered the Kongtong Sect shed their past and found a new life, so naturally, there were many who ended up imprisoned.
The Righteous Faction warriors cautiously entered the prison cells and soon discovered emaciated, battered figures.
They naturally assumed someone might be locked up. The problem was that the Righteous Faction warriors recognized some of the prisoners.
Most notably, there was Sang Gwal Doin, the younger brother of Sang Yu Doin, who had become the Kongtong Sect leader after Mulryangja's death.
"Sang Gwal Doin!"
Hearing Seonwuja's shout, Sang Gwal Doin lifted his head and looked at him.
"Aren't you the leader of the Huashan Sect? How did you come all the way here?"
Seonwuja hesitated, unable to answer rashly. It felt awkward to admit they had already killed many Kongtong Sect warriors and had come searching for the hidden manual.
But Sang Gwal Doin said something unexpected.
"Have you perhaps dealt with all the villains outside?"
Seonwuja sensed a faint note of hope in Sang Gwal Doin's voice.
And the phrasing was odd. Villains.
Only then did the Righteous Faction warriors realize something was off.
Among all the Kongtong Sect warriors they had fought so far, not a single one had been familiar.
They hadn't even used Kongtong Sect martial arts.
At first, they thought it was due to incomplete training, but there wasn't even a trace of the Subduing Demon Swordsmanship in their swordplay.
As if they had never learned the Kongtong Sect's pride, the Subduing Demon Swordsmanship.
The people led Sang Gwal Doin and the other imprisoned warriors out.
Sang Gwal Doin faced the sunlight and wore an incredulous expression. Joy, rage, and pain mingled chaotically on his face.
Seonwuja asked Sang Gwal Doin.
"What happened to the Kongtong Sect?"
Sang Gwal Doin stammered in reply.
"Not long after the Bone Shedding Pavilion burned down the year before last, Evil Faction warriors from the north began arriving at the Kongtong Sect headquarters. We thought they were those who wanted to leave their Evil Faction lives behind and be reborn as new people. We figured they came to us since they couldn't go to the Bone Shedding Pavilion."
Sang Gwal Doin staggered to his feet and gazed at the graves, which weren't even fully covered with grass yet.
"But an unusually high number of people started coming to the Kongtong Sect. Just as we were thinking we should stop accepting Evil Faction warriors and focus on strengthening ourselves, dozens more sneaked in under cover of night. They killed my brother... Sang Yu Doin."
Only then did the Righteous Faction warriors understand what had happened to the Kongtong Sect.
Of course. The Kongtong Sect Daoists they had known wouldn't have rampaged across the Central Plains stealing manuals. This had to be the scheme of vicious Evil Faction warriors.
Sang Gwal Doin continued.
"Most who resisted were killed, and those who bowed their heads before them survived—at least some of them—by being thrown into the prison cells."
However, the people locked in the prison cells hadn't simply bowed their heads to survive.
They too had once been Evil Faction warriors.
Rough individuals for whom choosing death over submission was hardly unfamiliar.
But ones who knew how to bend if there was a greater purpose than death.
Sang Gwal Doin was the same. He planned to survive somehow and exact revenge on the Evil Faction warriors.
Seonwuja said to Sang Gwal Doin.
"Don't worry too much. We've avenged the Kongtong Sect for you."
"How many of the Six Venerables came here?"
"Manryeokseung has reached a level rivaling the Six Venerables, but the Six Venerables themselves didn't come. We came to the Kongtong Sect without expecting a fight."
"Were there any Absolute Peak experts among the Evil Faction?"
"...Any?"
A puzzled look crossed Seonwuja's face.
As if there should have been Absolute Peak experts besides Baek Yahyo.
And from the way he phrased it as "any," it didn't seem like just one or two.
Seonwuja answered.
"The only Absolute Peak expert was Baek Yahyo."
After a brief silence, Sang Gwal Doin spoke.
"If the only Absolute Peak expert who invaded the Kongtong Sect last year had been Baek Yahyo alone, the Kongtong Sect wouldn't have fallen."
With no way to gauge how much Evil Faction strength remained, Seonwuja felt a tightness in his chest.
Sang Gwal Doin raised his skeletal arm and tore away the rags that had once been his upper garment.
His torso was covered in torture scars.
It wasn't torture to extract information. Sang Gwal Doin had no valuable secrets to spill, and the Evil Faction warriors sought no specific intel.
It was done purely out of morbid curiosity and malicious whimsy.
As a result of that "play," Sang Gwal Doin had lost one eye, and his body was etched with all manner of scars.
To top it off, a humiliating tattoo had been inked onto his forehead.
Yet Sang Gwal Doin endured.
He hid the fact that he was Sang Yu Doin's brother and bore all manner of pain and humiliation. Solely to survive and take revenge.
"Come with me for now."
Sang Gwal Doin and the Kongtong Sect warriors walked unsteadily to the training grounds.
The countless corpses still littered the area.
Sang Gwal Doin picked up a sword with his emaciated arm and hacked at an Evil Faction warrior dying from his wounds.
"You dog bastards!"
The Evil Faction warrior let out a piercing scream.
"Aaagh! Just kill me—kill me already!"
But Sang Gwal Doin swung his sword with eyes full of hatred.
Finally, when Sang Gwal Doin was exhausted and the opponent's reactions had nearly ceased, he pierced the Evil Faction warrior's throat.
"Gurgle..."
The Evil Faction warrior frothed blood and died.
The Righteous Faction warriors watching Sang Gwal Doin said nothing, merely observing the scene.
Swinging a sword to inflict greater pain on the wounded. It was undoubtedly cruel, but no one condemned Sang Gwal Doin. They knew the extent of the suffering he had endured.
The Kongtong Sect's history would end here, and they could show that much mercy to a warrior witnessing the final moments of his sect.
But contrary to what the onlookers thought, Sang Gwal Doin had no intention of letting the Kongtong Sect's history end here.
Sang Gwal Doin raised the sword to his own head.
Nangong Myeong and Hong Geolgae thought he intended to take his own life and rushed forward to stop him.
"Stop!"
However, Sang Gwal Doin did not stab his throat.
Instead, he brought the blade to his forehead—the forehead where the Evil Faction warriors had carved their humiliating tattoo.
He sliced off the skin of his own forehead.
Blood streamed down, covering Sang Gwal Doin's face. Yet he seemed not to feel the pain. He even chewed on the flesh he had cut away.
Nangong Myeong and Hong Geolgae, along with everyone else, watched the scene in silence.
No one spoke. No one moved. What Sang Gwal Doin was doing was more grotesque than if he had simply ended his life.
Next, Sang Gwal Doin sheared off his hair.
The filthy locks fell, covering his face. His blood-soaked features were obscured by the dirty hair, but the eyes blazing with thick rage could not be hidden.
"The Kongtong Sect's lineage will not end here."
Sang Gwal Doin said in a cold voice.
"I will become the next leader of the Kongtong Sect and carry on its history. But the Kongtong Sect will be different from the old Kongtong Sect. It will no longer accept Evil Faction warriors."
Seonwuja recalled the old Sang Gwal Doin.
He had been so gentle that it was hard to believe he had once been part of the Evil Faction. Much like Sang Yu Doin, who had been slain by Evil Faction warriors.
But now, Sang Gwal Doin was a completely different person.
He hadn't changed by choice. The world had changed him.
Sang Gwal Doin held his sword horizontally, raising it toward the sky.
And with a metallic ring and a voice thick with resentment, he shouted.
"The Subduing Demon Swordsmanship is no longer a sword to embrace Evil Faction warriors. It will become a sword solely to force them to their knees and cut them down. I will dedicate the rest of my life to that purpose alone!"
Like Sang Gwal Doin, the other Kongtong Sect Daoists raised their swords horizontally high.
It signified accepting Sang Gwal Doin as the new leader and vowing to dedicate their lives to his cause.
Whether the Kongtong Sect could overcome this trial and rise again was unknown.
But the Kongtong Sect of the past and the Kongtong Sect of the future would share only a name, with not a single similarity between them.
Dang Mujin recalled something Yu Jingwang had once said.
That the Bone Shedding Pavilion might never be rebuilt.
That the Kongtong Sect might one day stop accepting Evil Faction warriors.
Yu Jingwang's prophecy had come true in just two short years.
'Is this the flow of the world?'
The transformation of the Kongtong Sect. And the Evil Faction and Demonic Cult.
It felt as if dark clouds gathered from all directions, so Dang Mujin let out a deep sigh.