Chapter 255
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 255
Chapter Title: Any More?
Ha Mu-baek silently watched the Namgung Clan experts charging toward him.
A scoffing smile played on his lips.
The dark sword aura had already vanished, and Ha Mu-baek sheathed his blade.
"Pathetic mayflies."
With that, he lightly kicked off the ground and swung his sheathed sword at the oncoming foes.
Thud!
Thwack!
What good was unleashing sword auras?
If they couldn't land a hit on the opponent.
The elders' sword auras sliced through empty air.
Meanwhile, Ha Mu-baek's sheath struck their bodies with pinpoint accuracy.
Targeting only the most painful spots.
"Guhk."
"Urk!"
Screams erupted here and there.
Ha Mu-baek rampaged freely through the Namgung Clan warriors, pummeling them left and right.
The vast banquet hall turned into a battlefield in an instant.
It filled with the screams of Namgung Clan warriors.
Namgung Hwa-woo stared at the scene in a daze.
He knew the man was strong, but not this strong.
Right now, Ha Mu-baek moved as lightly as if he were merely playing around.
Yet the Namgung Clan warriors couldn't even graze his clothes before collapsing.
The former elders were no different.
Even so, the warriors who screamed and tumbled got back up and charged again.
Ha Mu-baek simply thrashed them once more.
Gong Son Mu-oe, watching it all, tilted his head in puzzlement.
A look that said he couldn't understand why this man—who never held back—was going easy on them.
As Ha Mu-baek was in the midst of thrashing the Namgung Clan warriors, his gaze met Gong Son Mu-oe's.
Sneer.
Ha Mu-baek's lip curled up.
'Something's up.'
From that smile, Gong Son Mu-oe realized Ha Mu-baek had some scheme in mind.
Now, it no longer mattered what Namgung Hwa-woo had been about to say.
An intruder had burst into the banquet hall and attacked Namgung Hyeon-cheol.
That fact alone remained, so every Namgung clansman present charged at Ha Mu-baek.
Among those affiliated with the Namgung Clan, the only ones who hadn't drawn their swords against Ha Mu-baek were Namgung Hwa-woo, Namgung Ji-yu, and Namgung Ji-hu.
Namgung Hyeon-cheol and Namgung Hwa-hyeon stood at a safe distance, continually shouting for attacks.
"He's just one man! Show him the power of the Namgung Clan!"
"Tahat."
With a light shout, he swung his sheath wide, sending half a dozen warriors flying and clearing a small space around Ha Mu-baek.
At that moment.
Ha Mu-baek grabbed Namgung Hwa-woo's nape with one hand.
"Wh-what...?"
Namgung Hwa-woo jumped in shock at Ha Mu-baek's sudden move.
Ha Mu-baek ignored his reaction and hurled him away.
"Argh!"
Namgung Hwa-woo let out an involuntary scream amid the abrupt chaos.
He tried to right himself somehow, but it was no use.
Without being able to twitch a finger—thanks to whatever Ha Mu-baek had done—he flew straight toward the banquet hall's wall.
Boom!
A deafening crash, and a hole larger than a man punched through the wall of the banquet hall building.
Namgung Hwa-woo, who had made the hole, rolled across the floor.
"We should probably step out for a bit ourselves."
At Gong Son Mu-oe's words, Ma Jin-gi, Namgung Hwi, and Chu Dong slipped out through the hole.
Namgung Ji-hu and Namgung Ji-yu followed suit.
Namgung Hwa-hyeon watched the scene clearly.
'No way?'
A sudden thought flashed through his mind.
Gong Son Mu-oe's visit to the Namgung Clan today with those kids.
The youngest, Namgung Hwa-woo, suddenly going berserk.
It might not be coincidence.
His thoughts extended to the Zhulipin who had followed Gong Son Mu-oe to safety.
'Now that I think about it, who are they?'
He'd assumed they were Gong Son Mu-oe's attendants and paid them no mind.
But he didn't even know their faces.
"C-capture those bastards!"
Namgung Hwa-hyeon's face twisted as he bellowed.
But those facing Ha Mu-baek had no spare moment to pull away.
Just one man.
Yet dozens were being pushed back by him.
"Th-that damned bastard is...!"
Namgung Hwa-hyeon ground his teeth.
Ha Mu-baek confirmed that even the Namgung siblings had all fled the banquet hall.
Whether this was his intent, he leaped back, widening the distance.
A brief lull settled in.
Only then did the Namgung Clan warriors properly see Ha Mu-baek's face.
One of them recognized him.
"H-Ha... Ha Mu-baek...!"
The one uttering the name in a trembling voice was Namgung Hwa-gyeol, one of Namgung Hwa-hyeon's younger brothers.
He had seen Ha Mu-baek on the battlefield during the previous war, which was why he recognized him now.
The impact of that name was immense.
Most stared blankly, as if wondering who that was.
But the former elders from the elder council.
And Namgung Hyeon-cheol and Namgung Hwa-hyeon bulged their eyes.
"They called him a monster... Indeed..."
It was absurd.
Even so, causing this ruckus right in the heart of the Namgung Clan?
"What’s your relation to that brat Hwa-woo?"
Namgung Hwa-hyeon demanded in a voice thick with killing intent.
Ha Mu-baek shrugged.
"I was just passing by and heard an interesting story. Got curious about the rest."
Ha Mu-baek's nonchalance twisted Namgung Hwa-hyeon's face into a savage snarl.
"And the best stories are the ones shared with a crowd."
With that, Ha Mu-baek finally drew his sword from its sheath.
Dark sword aura instantly rippled and surged along the blade.
"Eek! Kill that bastard now!"
The intruder's fate was sealed.
Whether he was Ha Mu-baek or not didn't matter.
If he were Hocheon Corps Leader, maybe—but now he was just some instructor.
Killing one instructor meant nothing to the Namgung Clan.
So Namgung Hwa-hyeon thought.
That they could obviously capture and kill him.
He'd heard rumors about the Pang Clan, but the Namgung Clan was different from the likes of them.
Ha Mu-baek smirked again at the warriors lunging toward him once more.
He held his sword in a reverse grip.
"Then let's all go hear it together."
As soon as the words left his mouth, he plunged the sword wreathed in dark sword aura straight into the ground.
Stab.
He just stabbed it in.
Or so it seemed.
But.
The sword aura burrowed into the earth, spiderwebbing out in all directions.
"Explode."
With Ha Mu-baek's low murmur.
Boom! Kwang! Kwakwang! Boom! Boom!
Rumble. Boom! Boom! Boom!
A massive explosion rocked the ground.
The earth shook and split like an earthquake, erupting everywhere.
"Ugh, argh!"
"D-dodge!!"
"S-save me!!"
Pure pandemonium.
The banquet hall transformed in an instant.
And that wasn't the end.
Groooar.
The underground blasts snapped every pillar in the banquet hall.
The result was obvious.
The building began to tilt slowly.
Kwakwang!
It collapsed in a flash.
The immense storm of qi, radiating outward in concentric circles from Ha Mu-baek, utterly obliterated the banquet hall.
Ha Mu-baek stood at the epicenter, sword planted in the ground, looking utterly unfazed.
Not a speck of dust on him.
"Kuhk."
"Ugh..."
Despite the massive explosion and collapse.
Namgung Clan warriors groaned here and there as they struggled to their feet.
People staggering through the debris.
Many were injured all over, but none were dead.
Miraculous.
But Ha Mu-baek regarded them as if it were only natural.
It had to be.
What he'd blasted with qi wasn't just the ground.
He'd infused the banquet hall's walls and roof entirely with qi before detonating them.
Since the building shattered into fine pieces upon collapse, the impact on those buried was minimized.
And being martial artists, they survived with mere injuries.
The sudden blasts and massive collapse.
Lights flared across the Namgung Clan's inner and outer compounds like a bolt from a clear sky.
Soon, countless warriors swarmed the area.
Among them was the Namgung Clan's strongest armed force, the Soaring Heaven Sword Brigade, arriving in full.
In moments, an enormous host of warriors assembled.
No exaggeration to say the entire Namgung Clan had gathered.
"Kuhuku. Kuhuhuk. What? You said crowds make it better? You've dug your own grave, Ha Mu-baek! No matter how strong you are, you've wrought havoc in the Namgung Clan—you've got no ground to complain if you die. Offer your neck nicely!"
Namgung Hwa-hyeon crowed triumphantly at the rapidly assembled forces.
A few flinched at the name Ha Mu-baek.
Others paled upon confirming his face.
All had faced him in the previous war.
"How about we hear the story first?"
Ha Mu-baek said, still smiling.
"No questions! The Namgung Clan shows no mercy to intruders!"
Namgung Hwa-hyeon shouted dismissively.
His instincts screamed a fierce warning.
If Namgung Hwa-woo's words continued here, something irreversible might happen.
Fortunately, Ha Mu-baek had effectively protected him by assaulting the Namgung elders.
Justification was ample.
Now, just kill him.
Kill the bastard and silence Hwa-woo in the momentum.
"What are you waiting for? Dispose of the intruder at once!"
At Namgung Hwa-hyeon's cry.
The Soaring Heaven Sword Brigade and other Namgung Clan forces drew their swords and slowly encircled Ha Mu-baek.
The dust from the collapse gradually settled.
Ha Mu-baek pulled his sword from the ground.
Dark night.
Darker still, the inky sword aura billowing forth.
Instead of the drawn sword, Ha Mu-baek stabbed his sheath into the ground.
"From now on, I kill."
Ha Mu-baek said lowly.
His voice dripped with thick killing intent.
A few backed away hesitantly at those words.
Those who had seen Ha Mu-baek's sword before.
"You idiots! What are you doing? Charge him now!"
Frustrated by the sight, Elder Namgung Ho-cheol launched himself forward.
Sword aura blazed on his blade as well.
And the Emperor Sword Form embroidered the air.
He unleashed it with full power toward Ha Mu-baek.
The sword aura gleamed in the night sky.
The blade flew at Ha Mu-baek's throat.
Its grand yet flashy variations showed he'd attained some mastery of the Emperor Sword Form.
Light flickered in Ha Mu-baek's eyes as he watched the movement.
It resembled the Emperor Sword Form.
But not the one he'd seen in the manual.
'The latter part?'
If it was an Emperor Sword Form Ha Mu-baek didn't know, that was the only possibility.
He'd glimpsed it fleetingly on the battlefield before.
It was similar, yet different.
'Isn't it only for the clan head?'
Such doubts briefly surfaced.
But it wasn't particularly important to Ha Mu-baek.
He had clearly warned them.
And this fool had charged.
Showing his full power now might actually save countless lives, he thought.
Ha Mu-baek's sword moved.
Slash.
A chilling sound rang out.
The dark sword aura cleaved through Namgung Ho-cheol's pristine sword aura.
A sword aura slicing another sword aura.
As people's jaws dropped at the sight.
Ha Mu-baek's sword didn't stop, continuing its motion.
Slash.
Another eerie sound echoed.
Thud.
And Namgung Ho-cheol met his end.
With a single stroke.
Far too simply.
As if swinging playfully.
The sword aura severed, and Namgung Ho-cheol was bisected.
Silence descended.
A stillness as if no one were there enveloped the Namgung Clan in an instant.
No one could open their mouth.
As if speaking would make this impossible illusion into harsh reality.
Wasn't it?
A Namgung Clan elder.
An elder who had reached the transcendent realm.
Losing his life to a single sword stroke.
Absurd nonsense.
That's why everyone clamped their mouths shut.
Pretending what their eyes had seen was an illusion, a mirage.
Imagining Namgung Ho-cheol's sword prevailing and this Ha Mu-baek bastard collapsing in blood any moment now.
"Next?"
But.
Ha Mu-baek's single word shattered those hopes to pieces.
"Any more?"
Ha Mu-baek swept his cold gaze over the crowd.
His sword remained inky black.