Chapter 292
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 292
Chapter Title: That Too Is an Affinity
A barrage of tremendous fist energy rained down on Ha Mu-baek from all directions.
Its power was immense.
It felt like he had gone back in time to when he faced the Blood Cult Leader.
To think of the Blood Cult Leader while fighting a Shaolin monk.
What a ridiculous notion.
Ha Mu-baek raised his sword and swung it.
The fist power trying to bind him swept in, oppressively sticky and insidious, dominating every direction.
The energies were sliced apart by his sword aura.
Yet they endlessly poured out anew from Hyun Hwang's body.
It was like an attack from eight arms.
The qi fused into his two fists, along with the tentacles of energy sprouting from his body, flew toward Ha Mu-baek with the intent to tear him to shreds.
Ha Mu-baek's sword moved swiftly, blocking all eight.
Ha Mu-baek frowned.
A bald head shining purple, and attacks charging from eight directions.
"Bald head with eight arms. Not even an octopus spawn."
Ha Mu-baek sneered.
"You insolent cur! How dare you mock this seat's form, borrowing the image of the Thousand-Armed Guanyin? An octopus?"
Hyun Hwang's face turned beet red.
Ha Mu-baek let out an incredulous chuckle.
With no one else worthy of mention, he invokes the Thousand-Armed Guanyin?
A monk worse than a fallen precepts-breaker.
Comparing himself to the great compassionate Guanyin Bodhisattva, who saves sentient beings with a thousand hands and eyes.
The moment those words left his mouth.
The tentacles instantly multiplied to twenty.
Truly occupying every direction Ha Mu-baek could move.
'If there are many, then I'll just cut them all down.'
Ha Mu-baek's eyes gleamed.
"I'll turn you into grilled octopus."
"You bastard!"
The instant Hyun Hwang bellowed.
Ha Mu-baek's sword moved.
Infinite Free Eight Severing Sword Wave.
Three Severings.
Splitting Thunder.
Swords of cracking lightning, as if filling all space, flew toward Hyun Hwang's tentacles.
Crackle. Crackle-crackle.
The thunder qi incinerated all of Hyun Hwang's tentacles.
Thunder qi, the natural counter to corrupt energy.
Splitting Thunder burned the tentacles of corrupt energy and surged upward, instantly charging at Hyun Hwang.
"Urgh..."
Hyun Hwang drew up all his energy.
His gray qi hardened, resisting Ha Mu-baek's sword.
But.
Crack.
It shattered.
"Argh!"
Hyun Hwang screamed and retreated.
This time, it was clearly his loss.
Or so it seemed.
However.
Splitting Thunder shattered Hyun Hwang's qi and used that force to attack him.
But instead, it seemed to widen the distance from Ha Mu-baek.
Then he kicked off the ground and fled.
"You scum! Mu-baek, was it? Just you wait! I'll grind you to pieces, chew you up, and tear you apart!"
Leaving those words, he bolted away.
Ha Mu-baek considered chasing him down to finish it but held back.
The sensation from wielding Splitting Thunder told him otherwise.
It felt like a solid hit, but the feedback was lacking.
That bastard still had reserves.
If he went all out, Ha Mu-baek would win, of course.
But right now, there was something more important.
So.
Ha Mu-baek took the bow slung over his shoulder in his left hand.
It wasn't his, but.
Borrowing it once should be fine, right?
Thinking that, he drew the bowstring with his right hand.
Ha Mu-baek drew the empty bow with nothing nocked.
A white qi gathered at the Four Thunderclap Bow.
The qi on the empty string formed the shape of an arrow.
Truly beyond lost gang, an arrow made purely of qi.
Transforming Void to Lost Gang.
The moment Ha Mu-baek released the string.
The arrow of pure white qi.
Aimed at Hyun Hwang's back, now a distant speck, it shot forth like a beam of light.
No matter how fast his lightness skill.
It couldn't match Ha Mu-baek's Transforming Void to Lost Gang.
"Arrrgh! You bastard. I'll kill you for sure! Wait!!"
Hyun Hwang's scream and venomous shout echoed from afar.
The arrow seemed to have struck his left arm.
This would do for now.
His benefactor was here in this place.
Checking on her safety came first.
And Gong Ya Hwi-yeon was here too.
'Soon, I'll have to head to Shaolin and beat that monk Hyun Gwang. Hiding a monster like that... Claiming to exterminate the unorthodox. What impudence.'
If Shaolin had confined or punished that monstrous monk Hyun Hwang, it would have been different.
But they let him loose into the world to capture unorthodox women.
The moment they did, Shaolin lost its justification to exterminate the unorthodox.
Ha Mu-baek stared for a moment at where Hyun Hwang had vanished.
Then he turned his gaze.
U Mun Ga-yul was watching Ha Mu-baek.
"It's been a long time, benefactor."
"You've grown splendidly. Thank you for saving me."
U Mun Ga-yul bowed gracefully to Ha Mu-baek.
"I can't accept that. Benefactor. Just like nineteen years ago, treat me the same."
Ha Mu-baek waved his hands frantically in embarrassment.
But how could it be easy?
Ha Mu-baek was already a grown man.
And not just that.
Even White Pine Scholar, the strategist of the Four Evils Alliance, treated him with caution.
"I heard from Strategist Mun-in that a great expert named Ha Mu-baek agreed to help find my daughter, Gong Ya Hwi-yeon..."
"Yes, that's me, benefactor. I've already found Gong Ya Hwi-yeon. She asked me to help her mother, so I hurried here."
"It seems she already knew I was her mother... or rather, me..."
U Mun Ga-yul awkwardly used informal speech with Ha Mu-baek.
Perhaps because of the divine might he'd shown before her eyes, speaking casually wasn't easy.
It couldn't be helped.
They'd only spent two days together.
Nineteen years ago, at that.
In a sense, it was no different from strangers meeting for the first time.
"I heard from one of the Shaolin monks about the previous owner of this bow."
Ha Mu-baek glanced at the Four Thunderclap Bow still in his left hand and said.
Then, as if realizing.
He politely offered it to U Mun Ga-yul.
"Ah, I'll return it to its owner."
U Mun Ga-yul stared at the Four Thunderclap Bow.
To think it had hidden such a form.
When she used it vigorously on the battlefield.
It hadn't shown these beautiful seven-colored hues.
The platinum shine was beautiful enough.
But learning the Four Thunderclap Bow had kept even this form from her made her feel a bit miffed.
Feeling miffed at a weapon—what a laughable thing.
U Mun Ga-yul slowly shook her head.
"It's true I'm the previous owner of the Four Thunderclap Bow, but only previous. Its current owner is someone else."
Ha Mu-baek knew who she meant.
He'd first seen the bow in its ordinary form when that child had it.
"Understood."
Ha Mu-baek slung the Four Thunderclap Bow back over his shoulder.
"Now that I see it, it suits you better than me, Mu-baek."
At U Mun Ga-yul's following words, Ha Mu-baek looked sheepish.
"I use a sword."
"For someone who does, even I hadn't seen that form on it before. And that skill just now..."
Ha Mu-baek understood what U Mun Ga-yul meant.
"The color was different from my memory, so I was surprised."
"It wouldn't have taken that form when she used it."
"Hwi-yeon hid the Four Thunderclap Bow in a dried-up well in some village. To evade tracking from Shaolin's Prajna Bodhi Insight. When the Shaolin monks were about to find it, I retrieved it."
Ha Mu-baek's explanation.
U Mun Ga-yul looked at him in wonder.
"So it reacted to your martial arts back then? Amazing. This thing doesn't react to orthodox faction techniques."
Ant Mountain had said something similar.
That it only reacted to unorthodox martial arts.
U Mun Ga-yul was saying the same thing now.
But Ha Mu-baek hadn't learned unorthodox martial arts.
'Then is what I learned not orthodox either?'
Racking his memory, his master had never called it orthodox.
Simply.
Because the nature and traits of what he'd learned matched the orthodox.
He'd just assumed it was.
Back then, the most important thing for Ha Mu-baek was smashing the Blood Cult and Demonic Cult scum.
"I was surprised too. It suddenly changed form. Well, thanks to that, I knew who you were, benefactor. This form stuck clearly in my memory. And luckily, there was a monk who knew all about this bow."
A small smile played on Ha Mu-baek's lips.
"I see. That too is an affinity."
"I heard the monk is suffering because of me and Lan."
His thoughts reaching there, Ha Mu-baek wiped the smile and spoke gravely.
"That too is merely an affinity."
U Mun Ga-yul said calmly.
"More importantly, where's Yeon-a?"
Ha Mu-baek spread his senses wide.
He'd told her to release the seal and stay in An-gyeong, but would she obey?
'As expected, smart girl.'
She had.
He clearly sensed her internal energy from an inn in An-gyeong.
"She's safely entered An-gyeong. Shall we go?"
U Mun Ga-yul nodded at Ha Mu-baek's words.
They kicked off the ground and flew toward An-gyeong with lightness skill.
This time, Ha Mu-baek spread his senses to the maximum, scanning the surroundings.
While focusing on An-gyeong to check Gong Ya Hwi-yeon's condition.
Alternating the form of his senses at short intervals.
'If I'd done this earlier...'
Then he would've detected Hyun Hwang's approach much sooner and intercepted him before disaster struck.
If so.
Ha Mu-baek glanced at U Mun Ga-yul's torn hem.
She'd hastily covered it for now, so her skin wasn't fully exposed.
Just peeking slightly through tiny gaps.
'She wouldn't have suffered such humiliation.'
It was his own negligence and complacency.
Never again would he allow such a thing.
Vowing that, Ha Mu-baek pressed on with his lightness skill.
Occasionally sharing stories of the intervening years with U Mun Ga-yul.
Then Ha Mu-baek's face hardened.
"What is it?"
U Mun Ga-yul asked worriedly at his sudden silence.
"Ah, nothing. I think I need to watch a bit more..."
Ha Mu-baek kept it brief.
The two fell silent.
Simply flying on.
Ha Mu-baek focused his senses on Gong Ya Hwi-yeon's internal energy.
'What is this?'
An unknown foreign energy was mixed in with her qi.
Sensing it had its limits.
He'd need to check directly with the Infinite Bright Wheel Eye.
He noticed because he'd examined her qi closely.
If he'd just skimmed it like before, he might have missed this tiny foreign energy.
Of course, the Infinite Bright Wheel Eye would have caught it.
But there'd been no reason to activate it when seeing her.
He might miss the chance again.
'Hyun Hwang. That bastard's doing...'
It was foreign, yes.
But not entirely unfamiliar.
And right now, Hyun Hwang was the only suspect.
Since she'd released her qi seal for the first time after being caught by him.
Ha Mu-baek glanced back.
The opposite direction from where they were heading.
Where Hyun Hwang had fled.
He might even reach Mount Song faster than expected.
The moment they entered An-gyeong.
U Mun Ga-yul veiled her face with cloth.
Having experienced countless times the repercussions of her beauty.
Ha Mu-baek led the way through An-gyeong's streets.
U Mun Ga-yul gazed curiously at his back.
In such a large city.
With so many people.
How could he sense Hwi-yeon's presence so precisely and head straight there without hesitation?
What realm must one reach to do that?
That child, who back then had only desperate resolve and murderous intent to protect his sister.
How had nineteen years transformed him so?
She'd heard roughly.
Through fateful ties, he met an excellent master and trained bloodily.
But.
Not just anyone reaches such heights through that.
One needs that level of talent and aptitudes.
Now he seemed to surpass her by leaps and bounds.
How had she failed to recognize even that child's aptitudes back then?
'Looking back, I might as well have been blind.'
Yet her heart warmed knowing what she'd done then wasn't wrong.
If.
Back then.
She'd passed by that desperate child.
This unparalleled expert, whose limits she couldn't even fathom, might never have been born.
"Here."
Ha Mu-baek stopped.
In front of a fairly large inn.
There.
Her daughter Gong Ya Hwi-yeon was.
She'd seen her when captured by Hyun Hwang.
But then, she hadn't been in her right mind.
Just desperate.
How long had it been since seeing her daughter with a sound mind?
U Mun Ga-yul's heart began to beat a little faster.