Chapter 331
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 331
Chapter Title: Surviving Comes After
A streak of light shot out from the tip of Ha Mu-baek's sword.
Tak Yo-beom once again erected a barrier of flame walls before his eyes.
On top of the azure flames wrapping around his body like armor.
Even a barrier of azure flames.
Tak Yo-beom brimmed with confidence.
No matter how monstrous that foe was, he was certain this barrier and armor he had created could never be breached.
However, Danha sliced straight through the barrier.
"Hmph."
Even as the barrier slowly split into two pieces before his eyes, Tak Yo-beom still snorted in derision.
He trusted the azure flame armor encasing his body.
But.
Danha did not end there.
It kept flying forward, embedding itself into the azure flame armor surrounding Tak Yo-beom's body.
Yet that was all.
The azure flame armor erupted with fierce blue flames, blocking Danha.
"Heh heh. That's more like it."
Just as Tak Yo-beom let out a laugh of relief.
Danha glowed from within the azure flames.
And soon.
The azure flame armor began to crack open.
Only then did Tak Yo-beom's eyes widen in shock.
"Wh-what?!"
He had thought that sword strike's power and momentum were different from before.
But he could never have imagined it would cleave through even the azure flame armor and reach him.
"Eeeeek!"
Tak Yo-beom poured all his energy into the azure flames.
The massive heat from the roaring inferno spread in every direction.
Even Bing Chwi-seol and Han Seol-bing, who were much farther away than Ha Mu-baek, could feel it.
They channeled their internal energy to resist the scorching heat radiating from Tak Yo-beom.
The azure flame armor had now shrunk to a small shield, clashing against the Danha Ha Mu-baek had unleashed.
All his power concentrated into a single point.
It was no longer a shield.
It resembled a crystallized mass of tremendous heat.
A form worthy of being called Fire Essence.
Ha Mu-baek gritted his teeth, his sword thrust straight forward.
He too was exerting his full power.
Danha had not yet ended.
It was still pressing forward to cleave the enemy.
Ha Mu-baek's sword remained locked in place.
Pure white sword energy poured out into the air.
Emitting immense power, it sought to sever Tak Yo-beom's Fire Essence.
Both their faces were rigid with tension.
Each grinding their teeth, pouring everything they had into the clash.
This was a first for Ha Mu-baek as well.
Having his sword blocked by such an absurd quantity of energy.
The sheer volume that could bridge the gap in enlightenment.
The energy Tak Yo-beom was emitting now could hardly be called internal power.
It was simply pure heat blasting outward in all directions.
How on earth had he obtained such power?
What exactly lay beneath that ground?
Ha Mu-baek shook off stray thoughts and focused on his sword.
Danha had not yet ended.
It was advancing further to cut deeper.
Ha Mu-baek poured his mind and internal energy into the sword.
A brilliant light exploded from the white sword aura.
Danha, now even sharper,
slowly,
bit by bit,
bore into the Fire Essence Tak Yo-beom had created.
"Th-this... How dare you... Where do you think you're..."
Tak Yo-beom tried to draw up even more energy, but
panic colored his face.
There was no energy left in his body.
The Fire Essence before him contained every last drop he had obtained.
And yet,
it was being sliced away,
bit by bit.
Slowly.
Slowly.
The pure white sword aura burrowed in.
Against any ordinary foe of decent caliber, this technique would have shredded them without them even glimpsing its form.
Tak Yo-beom had halted its advance with his vast energy.
Now, he could watch Danha's sword aura unfold before his very eyes.
And that made it all the more terrifying.
Watching the sword aura slowly carve through the ultimate concentration of his full power, drawing ever closer with its immense might.
He could imagine all too well what lay at its end.
"N-no... Impossible..."
Only then did Tak Yo-beom sense the crisis.
He tried to pull back,
but he couldn't.
He had focused all his energy into the Fire Essence.
At this point, he was one with it.
The moment he tried to move away,
the energy he had sent to the Fire Essence would dissipate,
and in that instant,
the sword aura would cleave him.
It was obvious.
Judging by its approach speed,
he couldn't hope to dodge it.
He was trapped, unable to advance or retreat.
Fear filled Tak Yo-beom's eyes.
There stood Ha Mu-baek opposite him,
gripping his sword, teeth clenched.
He had gained the power of the Dragon Training,
yet this monster couldn't be felled even with that?
He couldn't believe it, couldn't accept it.
But the sword aura he had unleashed was slowly closing in on him.
"U-ugh..."
The sword aura had now burrowed halfway through.
The corner of Ha Mu-baek's mouth twitched upward slightly.
As if sensing something.
And then.
The sword aura blazed with blinding light once more,
its speed at slicing through the Fire Essence accelerating,
cleaving through nearly the remaining half in an instant.
"N-no... Nooo..."
The moment Tak Yo-beom's terrified voice leaked out.
Crack.
Danha severed the Fire Essence
and cleaved Tak Yo-beom clean in two.
"Gah... Th-this... Can't be..."
Tak Yo-beom uttered his final words and collapsed, lifeless.
At that sight, Han Seol-bing and Bing Chwi-seol were about to raise cheers of joy.
The bisected Fire Essence.
From within erupted a colossal storm of flames.
It was the heat Tak Yo-beom had wielded.
With its controller dead and gone,
it rampaged wildly.
Roooar! Roooar!
The flames, elevated to azure flame level, spread in all directions as if possessed of a will, igniting everything in sight.
"N-no... Nooo..."
Bing Chwi-seol gasped in shock.
The flames were no longer confined to the Tak family grounds.
They threatened to engulf the entire Ice Heaven Palace.
Their movements like a beast venting rage and grudge.
The blue flames, split into several streams, writhed like furious dragons,
blasting immense heat everywhere.
Even before the flames touched anything,
the buildings around the Tak family grounds in the Ice Heaven Palace burst into spontaneous flames from the heat alone.
Ha Mu-baek frowned as he watched.
He had slain the enemy,
but now an even greater disaster unfolded.
The master's death had not quelled the remaining energy; instead, it raged more madly than ever.
Energy that did not fade with its owner.
"What the hell is this thing..."
Ha Mu-baek muttered gravely.
He couldn't leave it like this.
Otherwise, it would devour not just the Tak family, but the entire Ice Heaven Palace.
The azure flames thrashed as if their fury had peaked,
like a fire dragon descending upon the land.
Ha Mu-baek tilted his head curiously and stepped into the inferno.
"Not sure if I can pull this off."
But his expression burned with resolve to see it through.
"Still, gotta try."
Ha Mu-baek cracked his neck.
A faint smile played on his lips.
Even he wasn't sure if he could withstand that heat.
Or if he could extinguish it all.
No way to know.
Yet he had to.
No, he would.
It was a gamble with fifty-fifty odds, but such things were beneath his concern.
Tak Yo-beom had wielded that energy with casual ease.
An inexplicable mystery.
He had rushed here without hesitation at Han Seol-bing's desperate plea,
but to think such a catastrophe awaited.
Ha Mu-baek waved once toward where Han Seol-bing stood, then headed to where the azure flames burned most fiercely.
'This'll be dicey. One slip and I might die.'
When he had endured the Ten Thousand Golden Chain Thunder Explosion, he had truly thought his end was near.
The energy before him now stirred the same sense of peril in Ha Mu-baek.
'But first things first—clean up these bastards. Survival comes after. They say people are precious in the North Sea.'
Ha Mu-baek recalled what Han Seol-bing had once told him about the North Sea's plight.
That was why he had refrained from killing as much as possible.
They were North Sea folk after all—valuable lives he had no right to take lightly.
Now, only a sliver of his internal energy remained.
If he had known, he would have fully recovered it through meditation upon arriving in the North Sea.
His heart raced with urgency.
It was Han Seol-bing's desperate call.
He had rushed nonstop from Wu-chang to the North Sea, starting the battle with much of his energy already depleted.
Ha Mu-baek drew up his last reserves of internal energy.
He straightened his sword.
He targeted the spot where the azure flame energy was most dense.
"C-Corps Leader..."
Han Seol-bing called out to Ha Mu-baek with a trembling voice as he vanished into the flames.
She didn't know what he planned,
but she felt even he couldn't handle such mad flames.
In the past,
Ha Mu-baek had survived the immense inferno of the Ten Thousand Golden Chain Thunder Explosion.
But the heat, energy, and azure flames before them now dwarfed that.
The azure flames surged even fiercer.
"Ah... Aaaah..."
As Ha Mu-baek completely disappeared, a sigh of regret escaped Bing Chwi-seol's lips.
Unconsciously, she clutched her necklace.
It was the sacred treasure of the Ice Heaven Palace, passed down from the founding Palace Lord.
Ice Heaven Cold White Refinement.
A necklace crafted personally by the founding Palace Lord from processed Cold Jade.
She had seen it only as a symbol of the Palace Lord.
But as the colossal heat spread everywhere,
it glowed in her hand.
"Huh?"
Bing Chwi-seol startled at the sudden change.
Regardless of her surprise,
the necklace floated up on its own.
At the center of the pristine white Cold Jade,
a soft light seeped out, splitting left and right like opening doors.
From within shot a pure white arrow of light.
It traced a graceful arc, plunging into the heart of the heat storm over the Tak family grounds.
Pop!
It burst with a tiny sound, then spread in a massive circle of white light, utterly contrary to its start.
The white energy enveloped the immense heat Tak Yo-beom had left behind,
carrying a chill that could freeze the world in an instant, and began to transform.
A storm of pure white ice and snow howled forth.
The writhing azure flames' heat clashed against the pure white blizzard's cold.
Tremendous energies battled atop the Tak family grounds.
White steam billowed endlessly.
Bing Chwi-seol and Han Seol-bing could not withstand the force and retreated further.
"Palace Lord... What is that?"
Bing Chwi-seol shook her head at Han Seol-bing's question.
She had no idea either.
She never dreamed the Palace Lord's sacred treasure held such a contingency.
No, none of the previous Palace Lords had known.
There were no records or mentions of it.
Atop the Tak family grounds, only Ha Mu-baek stood firm, watching the two energies tangle fiercely.
Heat versus cold.
Fire energy versus ice energy.
Flame walls versus blizzard.
Azure flames versus white ice.
It was a brutal clash.
Just when it seemed the heat was gaining the upper hand,
the cold began to wane.
Once more, heat dominated the Tak grounds.
However.
It was different from before.
Its intensity had halved.
Thanks to the chill from Bing Chwi-seol's necklace.
Still immense heat and flames,
but Ha Mu-baek grinned sincerely.
"This I can handle."
That was his thought.
Ha Mu-baek's sword cleaved the core where the azure flame energy was most concentrated.
The heat writhed in resistance, but the strike laden with his final internal energy mercilessly slashed it apart.
As the heat visibly diminished,
the last remnants of the ice energy appeared, settling on Ha Mu-baek's left shoulder.
Ha Mu-baek grasped it with his right hand.
"Yeah, looks doable."
He absorbed the ice energy directly.
Ha Mu-baek trudged into the source of the heat, where he had just cleaved with his sword,
and sat cross-legged.
The ice energy he absorbed swirled around his body, bolstering his resistance to the heat.
Protecting his meridians, his dantian, his entire body.
There, Ha Mu-baek began circulating the Infinite Carefree Heart Method.
The Infinite Carefree Heart Method, infused with the ultimate technique he had comprehended in his battle against the Primordial Fragment, began greedily devouring the surrounding heat.