Chapter 360
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 360
Chapter Title: Really Like It
"Are you asking me to believe that right now?"
Ha Mu-baek asked in a voice dripping with murderous intent, his face twisted in disbelief.
However.
Yeo Hong-gi met Ha Mu-baek's gaze with unwavering confidence.
"I don't have it."
"Can you take responsibility for those words?"
"Hmph. What could you possibly do without even a scrap of internal energy?"
There was no reason for Yeo Hong-gi to yield now that Ha Mu-baek had been definitively poisoned by the Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison.
He had his own backup plan, and the Poison Path Expert was there as well.
Of course, Tang Ja-cheong and Tang Ji-yeon were on the other side.
But Tang Ja-cheong had already moved to Ha Mu-baek's side.
"Instructor Ha, calm down first. And you, Valley Lord Yeo—hand over the antidote if you have it. You know what happens if we don't kill him now..."
"......"
At Tang Ja-cheong's persuasion, Yeo Hong-gi shut his mouth.
He knew exactly what that meant.
But Yeo Hong-gi was confident.
If he couldn't withstand the Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison,
then this one would be no different.
It truly had no antidote, which made it something he hesitated to use.
"Time isn't on our side. This Power-Dispersing Poison won't last forever. Sooner or later, both you and that bastard will regain your strength. Can you handle what happens then?"
Ha Mu-baek pressed Yeo Hong-gi once more.
Right now,
if Ha Mu-baek could just recover his internal energy,
it might be the perfect chance.
A chance to eliminate the man stripped of his power.
But if the bastard escaped unscathed and regained his strength,
he'd come back even more cunning, having learned from their recent clash.
"I don't know the details, but I heard he slipped away from your master's pursuit decades ago. And today, he returned as a monster. If we let him go again now, who knows how he'll come back next time?"
Ha Mu-baek's words came one after another.
"Hoo."
Yeo Hong-gi let out a long sigh.
In truth,
when he had thrown the Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison,
he had aimed it at Ha Mu-baek as well.
Hoping for the luck to take them both out at once.
The result: both poisoned.
A success.
However,
he hadn't expected Myo Gu-eung to spew such a vicious poison even in that state.
He had let one escape,
leaving only Ha Mu-baek behind.
He could deal with Ha Mu-baek now,
but Tang Ja-cheong's presence made it impossible in practice.
No—if even a little of the Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison remained, he could neutralize Tang Ja-cheong and finish Ha Mu-baek.
But
there was none left.
Against Myo Gu-eung's monstrous form,
unsure if it would even work, he had thrown everything he had.
'Did I commit the error of underestimating a distant threat?'
The thought crossed Yeo Hong-gi's mind for a moment.
No.
He had more than just the Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison.
This could even make the enemy think that was all he had.
"I have the antidote. But I don't."
The absurd words came from Yeo Hong-gi's mouth.
As Ha Mu-baek's face contorted in rage,
Yeo Hong-gi continued.
"I did make the antidote. But I don't have it. The one who supported all the research and materials needed to create it—that person has everything."
Ha Mu-baek's bellow caught in his throat.
The antidote exists.
But Yeo Hong-gi, the lord of Heavenly Poison Valley, doesn't have it?
"Who?"
"Clan Leader Yeon."
Ha Mu-baek's face twisted even more at the response.
But he didn't press Yeo Hong-gi further.
That old monster was more than capable of something like this.
During the Great Martial Conference, every time they crossed paths,
he remembered the look in that old monster's eyes as he gazed at him and the Alliance Leader.
Eyes brimming with ambition.
The way he looked at Ha Mu-baek was like staring at an obstacle to that ambition.
And now,
with the bad blood over his son,
Ha Mu-baek's mind raced even in this situation.
"I must have been the target, right?"
A poison that shattered poison immunity and erased internal energy.
If Yeon Ja-kyeong was the one who commissioned it, the intent was obvious.
But Yeo Hong-gi wasn't one to be easily cornered.
"He merely ordered it made as a precaution."
There was no way he'd admit the intent so readily.
"Damn it."
Ha Mu-baek stopped pressing him.
He accepted Yeo Hong-gi's words.
If it was the Yeon Ja-kyeong he knew,
he wouldn't let even the poison creator, Yeo Hong-gi, hold the antidote.
"How long does this last?"
"A day."
"Got it."
With that, Ha Mu-baek slipped into an empty room in the vacant building.
The four remaining.
"Heh. Impressive, truly impressive. A Power-Dispersing Poison that neutralizes even total poison immunity..."
Tang Ja-cheong marveled.
Then he eyed Yeo Hong-gi warily.
He knew that if Yeo Hong-gi had more of that poison, even he wouldn't be safe.
"I used every last bit I had on Sa-baek. Unsure if it would work, but thankfully it did on him too... There's no more."
Tang Ja-cheong believed him.
If there had been any left, he could have used it on Tang Ja-cheong in that moment.
"Then what after the day passes?"
Tang Ja-cheong's question.
Yeo Hong-gi gave a bitter smile.
There was no answer.
Taking the smile as his reply,
Tang Ja-cheong nodded.
"Mind if I use an empty room?"
"Make yourself at home. Thank you."
Even with a day's respite secured,
he was grateful that Tang Ja-cheong chose to stay in Heavenly Poison Valley.
Ha Mu-baek immediately sat cross-legged and entered meditation.
The Power-Dispersing Poison lasted a day.
He had to break it.
At that moment,
Yeo Hong-gi sent a messenger pigeon to Wu-chang.
He didn't expect Yeon Ja-kyeong to help.
He simply reported that the Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison had worked on Sa-baek Myo Gu-eung and Ha Mu-baek, and informed him of Myo Gu-eung's power.
To prepare for when Myo Gu-eung crossed Heavenly Poison Valley into the Central Plains.
Yeon Ja-kyeong was the only one who still had any Light-Scattering Power-Dispersing Poison.
'Shin-myeong, though...'
Regrettably, he hadn't brought it.
He hadn't made the antidote yet.
What if he had?
A pointless what-if.
Yeo Hong-gi shook his head, his gaze deepening.
It was directed toward where Ha Mu-baek had holed up.
What would happen?
"Hoo. Hah."
How far had he run?
Myo Gu-eung gasped for breath.
He looked back.
The plants along his path were withering black.
Clear signs any pursuer could follow easily.
But he had no choice.
He couldn't control the formless poison leaking from his body at will.
Thanks to the formless poison, he had escaped,
but it also left his trail blatantly exposed.
"Damn it all."
Myo Gu-eung looked down at his dantian.
It felt as if everything had vanished; he sensed nothing.
His body's poison energy was still raging wildly as a result.
He had to do something about it.
After catching his breath briefly, Myo Gu-eung ran again.
No pursuit for now,
but it could come anytime.
Yeo Hong-gi, who had used the Power-Dispersing Poison on him,
likely had the antidote.
He needed to flee farther.
Unaware of Heavenly Poison Valley's situation, Myo Gu-eung ran at full speed, endlessly.
How long had he run?
Only after the sun set and night fell did he stop.
He found a cave by constantly moving.
It was home to a bear,
but the moment it encountered Myo Gu-eung,
it succumbed to the nameless poison and died on the spot.
Myo Gu-eung settled inside the cave and sat cross-legged.
The Power-Dispersing Poison's effect wasn't infinite.
His internal energy would return eventually.
Unsure when,
he needed a solution quickly.
Myo Gu-eung closed his eyes and examined his inner body.
His internal energy had melted away like snow, replaced by churning poison energy.
This had become formless poison leaking out.
The essence of the Ten Millennia Poison Crystal he had absorbed but not fully made his own.
To control and assimilate it, he needed internal energy.
But
he had none.
Because of the Power-Dispersing Poison.
No matter how he circulated the Ten Thousand Desolations Pure Deadly Poison Art,
the poison energy wouldn't budge.
The Deadly Poison Art was still based on internal energy, after all.
'Son of a bitch. Is there no way... no way to move my internal energy?'
While observing his inner body,
Myo Gu-eung reviewed the incantations of the Ten Thousand Desolations Pure Deadly Poison Art over and over.
The world's supreme poison art.
The poison art that could absorb the Ten Millennia Poison Crystal.
Such an art couldn't be nullified by mere Power-Dispersing Poison.
'The Ten Thousand Desolations Pure Deadly Poison Art. If I just had a scrap—no, a single breath of internal energy. If my dantian... if I could revive just one cycle of internal energy...'
As he pored over the incantations, pondered deeply, and desperately sought a way,
Myo Gu-eung suddenly realized.
'Huh? One cycle of internal energy? Internal energy? Internal energy? What is internal energy, anyway?'
The essence of internal energy.
It was the qi existing in nature, the innate energy humans possess from birth in the great world.
Innate True Qi and Acquired True Qi.
Recognizing their existence, Myo Gu-eung examined his Innate True Qi.
Using Innate True Qi meant burning one's lifespan,
but that wasn't important now.
One cycle of internal energy.
That was what Myo Gu-eung desperately needed.
However,
Yeo Hong-gi's Power-Dispersing Poison was vicious.
His Innate True Qi remained intact,
but it was hardened like stone.
It hadn't vanished like his dantian energy,
but it was rigidly solidified.
No matter how hard he tried, it wouldn't move.
Truly a fearsome Power-Dispersing Poison.
To think his junior from the same sect, Heavenly Poison Valley, had created this.
Myo Gu-eung's thoughts circled back.
Innate True Qi was blocked.
Then Acquired True Qi.
That was drawing in nature's qi through breathing and accumulating it in the dantian.
He had no internal energy, not even a single cycle,
but he could still breathe.
Nature's qi entered and left his body through breath.
Yes.
Internal energy existed.
More precisely, nature's qi existed.
He just needed to turn that into a scrap of internal energy.
Internal energy was made from qi absorbed through breathing in the first place.
So what if his dantian seemed gone?
Who cared?
When first learning martial arts, internal energy,
he hadn't even known the dantian existed.
One realizes the dantian after feeling internal energy.
Thus, Myo Gu-eung felt and moved internal energy through breathing.
That long-desired scrap of internal energy.
It was created.
After that,
it was smooth sailing.
The scrap of internal energy merged with the lingering poison energy in his body according to the Ten Thousand Desolations Pure Deadly Poison Art's incantations and began to circulate.
Half the essence of the Ten Millennia Poison Crystal he hadn't fully assimilated.
He began slowly absorbing it.
Myo Gu-eung sank deeply into his inner world.
'So this is how it was.'
A blessing in disguise.
The poison energy, mixed chaotically with his internal energy before,
unrecognized during absorption.
Now, filled only with that poison energy,
nothing obstructed the Deadly Poison Art from fully assimilating it.
The unassimilated poison energy flowed freely through his meridians and began to be absorbed.
The absorbed energy gathered roundly where his dantian should be.
Not the forgotten dantian from the Power-Dispersing Poison, but a new one formed.
However, its composition was entirely different from a normal dantian.
The new dantian held only a scrap of internal energy.
A dantian led by that internal energy, composed solely of poison energy.
A small poison crystal formed inside Myo Gu-eung.
Around then,
his internal energy slowly returned.
Myo Gu-eung opened his eyes.
"Keke. Even better. Really like it. Poison crystal, poison crystal. A human with a poison crystal. Heh heh heh."
A realm not even mentioned in the Ten Thousand Desolations Pure Deadly Poison Art.
To think something like this was possible.
As the Power-Dispersing Poison's effect faded, his recovered dantian began exchanging energy with the new poison crystal.
The two spheres touched, endlessly swapping internal energy and poison energy.
Power surged through his entire body.
"Kuh huh huh huh."
Laughter spilled from Myo Gu-eung's mouth.
It carried every emotion.
The humiliation from fleeing under threat of death once more.
That resentment poured into the laughter.
"Wait for me. I'll melt you all in one go."
Myo Gu-eung rose from his seat.