Chapter 463
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 463
Chapter Title: I've Never Even Heard of Such a Thing
Upon closer inspection, Ha Mu-baek's complexion was slightly pale.
It had been a truly long time since he'd last seen the man in such a state.
The last time must have been...
when he'd nearly died to the Myriad Things Alliance's Myeongcheon Gold Chain Thunderbolt.
Ha Mu-baek immediately sat cross-legged and entered a meditative trance.
Seeing this, Wi Ji-gun followed suit and entered meditation as well.
So Hwi-woong, who had been watching the siblings' reunion from afar with his brother and the priests, tucked the Mukgeum Statue into his armor pouch and entered meditation.
"I can't just stand around watching either."
Han Seol-bing entered meditation as well.
The Fierce Dragon Corps, Demon-Sealing Corps, and Dragon Training Pavilion trainees gathered around to stand guard.
Eleven members of the Hocheon Corps surrounded So Hwi-woong.
All of them, having delivered their reports and returned—even those who had gone back to base.
Color was slowly returning to Ha Mu-baek's face.
As he meditated, Ha Mu-ba-baek delved deep into his inner self.
The energy drawn in through his breathing passed through his dantian, transforming into inner power that stacked layer by layer.
Fiery energy.
Icy energy.
All energies filled him gradually.
No—rapidly.
It felt gradual to Ha Mu-baek, but to any onlooker, the speed would have been astonishing.
'Not bad.'
Perhaps because it had been so long since he'd poured out all his inner power and energy at full force.
As the energies flooded into his emptied dantian...
Ha Mu-baek sensed that he had taken another step forward.
The training during his journey from the Ancestral Cave to the Righteous Heaven Alliance, and then to the Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest.
Until now...
he'd been blocked by the wall of the ninth realm.
Truth be told, it wasn't really a wall.
Calling a mere few days of stagnation a "wall" would earn him scorn from any martial artist worth their salt.
Even so, he'd felt progress, however slight, each day.
But those few days of stagnation felt like being truly walled off to Ha Mu-baek—an suffocating frustration.
Especially since they'd been rushing to the Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest.
But now...
'I've reached the tenth realm.'
He didn't need to test it with a sword form.
Just meditating told him everything.
He had recovered up to the power of the tenth realm.
Was it because he'd unleashed a full-power sword form, expending every ounce of energy?
He'd leaped from the ninth realm to the tenth in an instant.
The corner of Ha Mu-baek's mouth twitched upward as he meditated.
"Gaaahhh!!!"
"M-Monster!!"
"S-Save me!!!"
Screams erupted.
The Demon-Sealing Corps members fleeing in blind panic had lost all reason to terror.
They didn't look to the sides or behind.
They ran forward blindly, with no idea where they were headed.
And if they sensed even the slightest presence nearby amid the chaos...
they shrieked like they were having a fit.
They had no choice.
At first, they'd simply scattered in all directions to escape.
Before that monster suddenly burst out.
Before they saw it plunge its hand into a comrade's dantian.
Rip out the dantian.
And crunch it between its teeth, swallowing it down.
And then their comrade's head fell.
It was terror beyond terror.
Those who witnessed it lost their souls.
Lost their minds.
They'd only been running like this.
Yet one by one...
they fell to the hands of the jiangshi that appeared out of nowhere, losing their dantians and their lives.
The jiangshi grew faster and faster.
The foul energy emanating from its body thickened by the moment.
Even the Dragon Training Pavilion trainees.
Even the instructors.
They were in disarray.
They too fled at full speed.
With no clue where they were going.
They had witnessed the horror too.
They prayed desperately to survive as they ran for their lives.
It was the only thing they could do.
'Where the hell did a monster like that come from... No, more importantly, it destroyed the Mountain-Crossing Great Wall...'
Beom Il-so, half out of his mind, gritted his teeth and sprinted onward.
He had to survive somehow.
In the midst of his flight, he noticed something wonderful.
Screams still rang out even now.
But wonderfully...
they were all from the Demon-Sealing Corps.
Not a single Dragon Training Pavilion trainee or instructor had fallen.
Only Demon-Sealing Corps members were losing their dantians and lives to that monster jiangshi.
As if following some rule.
Even so...
'Damn it. A jiangshi that eats dantians? I've never even heard of such a thing.'
It was truly terrifying.
Terrifying enough to shatter sanity.
That he hadn't fallen into full panic was a miracle.
So...
Beom Il-so cast aside such questions.
And poured all his inner power into running.
He didn't know the way.
There was no path.
Yet he ran.
And he wasn't the only one.
Everyone fleeing from the monster jiangshi that had ambushed them did the same.
"Kekeke."
Dokgo Ya-pae let out a fiendish chuckle.
More people than expected had refined and consumed the jiangshi's inner cores.
With them scattering in all directions...
he busily hunted them down.
Insignificant pests.
Annoyingly persistent.
They moved quickly, but numbers were numbers.
It took considerable time.
Even so...
now.
This one before him was the last.
No more who had absorbed jiangshi inner cores registered in his senses.
Not around here, at least.
"M-M-Monster..."
Hearing Dokgo Ya-pae's chuckle, the Demon-Sealing Corps member went deathly pale and collapsed on the spot.
Even so...
Desperate to flee somehow.
He crawled backward unsteadily.
But Dokgo Ya-pae's hand reached for his abdomen.
"N-No! Aaaahhh!"
He screamed.
And wet his pants.
Overwhelmed by terror, he'd pissed himself.
As if such things didn't matter.
Dokgo Ya-pae's hand burrowed into his gut, ripped out the dantian, and swallowed it down.
"Uh... uh... uh..."
The Demon-Sealing Corps member, tears streaming down his face, didn't even know how to react to the instantaneous horror.
Dokgo Ya-pae flicked his hand lightly.
The head fell.
Having absorbed the final dantian...
Dokgo Ya-pae closed his eyes briefly.
A satisfied smile crept across his lips.
They were nobodies, but...
the power their dantians granted him was no small thing.
"Ptoo."
He spat out the impurities rising in his mouth.
And expanded his senses.
"Is this really the end?"
Extending his senses to the Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest...
five caught his attention.
His lips twisted upward.
"More after all. Kekeke."
As he gauged their precise locations...
"Hm?"
Dokgo Ya-pae tilted his head.
He sensed the presences of the six Guardian Gods, who had awakened before him.
The problem was...
their presences felt strangely altered.
Not like intact Guardian Gods.
Moreover...
they were subdued.
All six Guardian Gods.
His awkward smile vanished.
His expression turned ferocious.
"Who dares to lay hands on the Guardian Gods..."
He sensed countless presences, but...
those rabble couldn't have subdued six Guardian Gods.
They were small fry.
Four new presences registered in his senses.
The strongest in that area.
One among them...
that one was the issue.
Even after absorbing jiangshi inner cores and growing this strong...
there was one human whose energy he couldn't gauge at all.
"What the hell is this..."
Dokgo Ya-pae muttered, rummaging through his memories.
Cases where Guardian Gods' presences might change.
In truth, it hadn't been long since he'd awakened.
He'd come straight here, toppled the wall...
Curious, he'd consumed what he'd found in some jade box.
Impressed by its effects...
he'd been hunting humans since.
Calmly...
he reviewed his memories.
And checked his own state.
One thing surfaced.
"I see. One of the One Elders became a Guardian God, did he..."
A supreme technique usable only by a One Elder turned Guardian God.
The Blood Heaven Four Guardians Revival Grand Blood Art.
That would explain it.
It could revive Guardian Gods slain by the enemy.
But they would no longer be fully intact Guardian Gods, so their presences would change.
Yet all six like that meant...
even the one who cast the technique had fallen.
That realization hit him.
Dokgo Ya-pae halted his step toward hunting those five humans who had consumed jiangshi inner cores.
And he thought.
Could he take down six Guardian Gods now?
At his initial awakening, three at most.
After consuming the jade box pill and inner cores, four easily; five would be dicey.
And now, after the hunt...
five shouldn't be hard.
But...
not six.
Even thinking that much...
the humans hunkered there were stronger than him.
They weren't moving for some reason.
'Hm? I see. They're meditating.'
Dokgo Ya-pae sensed the four in meditation.
'Of course. No one can fully handle six Guardian Gods.'
He nodded.
Impressive enough as it was.
Still, the gap between him and them had narrowed, he thought.
'If I devour those five there?'
He might manage six on a razor's edge.
Which would put him nearly equal to that human.
Not enough.
He expanded his senses further.
Nothing.
No more humans with jiangshi inner cores.
So...
he sought jiangshi.
Thinking he might have to take inner cores from lesser ones directly.
But...
none.
In the Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest.
Only dozens of scattered inferior jiangshi were active.
Utterly worthless trash.
Their inner cores were useless to him.
"Hmmm."
As his thoughts continued...
they turned to the six subdued and silenced Guardian Gods.
"Guardian Gods are jiangshi in the end. Annihilation Heaven Jiangshi..."
Just like him.
Even if he saved them...
they'd been defeated once.
No guarantee they'd win in a rematch.
Higher chance of losing again.
In that case...
"Better I consume them myself. Kehehehehe."
Bloodlight gleamed in eyes filled with darkness.
A viscous crimson glow.
It did not fade.
His fiendish chuckle grew more sinister.
"Yes. That will do. A sacrifice for the birth of a true Great Guardian God."
With his decision made, Dokgo Ya-pae kicked off the ground.
He had to arrive before the enemy finished meditating and devour them in one go.
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!
He raced toward them at full speed.
Not just sonic booms.
Energy devastating everything in his wake as he charged.
"Wh-what?"
Ha Seol-ran, guarding her brother, glanced toward the Demon-Sealing Corps headquarters and jolted in shock.
Her face quickly drained of color.
"What's wrong?"
Yeon Ha-min beside her asked.
"A-An enormous monster is coming."
Ha Seol-ran stammered, trembling.
"Those things?"
Enormous monsters—they'd already seen six here.
Yeon Ha-min's question made Ha Seol-ran shake her head.
"M-Much, much, much stronger. Not even comparable."
At her words...
everyone around froze.
Not just the seven squads of the Fierce Dragon Corps.
All who heard her.
And rightly so.
They'd already experienced her eerie ability once before.
"A jiangshi even stronger than those?"
Namgung Ji-hu muttered in disbelief.
Those alone had been called mutant monster jiangshi.
Yet something stronger?
What...
was this place?
The Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest.
The thought struck him.
And his mind turned to the Righteous Heaven Alliance elders who had preserved it intact.
'Crazy bastards.'
He cursed them inwardly.
Experiencing it firsthand...
he understood how insane it was to just build a wall and leave it be.
Hadn't that wall they'd boasted of crumbled already?
"Father endured a place like this..."
Namgung Ji-yu murmured.
Namgung Ji-hu's thoughts went there too.
Their father.
Namgung Hwi.
He'd lost an arm but survived here, they said.
They knew and respected his strength.
But experiencing the Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest themselves...
they felt anew just how extraordinary he was.
"How long until it arrives?"
Yeon Ha-min asked, forcing calm.
"F-Fast... ab-about one gak?"
No one could respond to Ha Seol-ran's answer.
Ha Mu-baek had only been meditating for about one gak.
Yet another monster would arrive in one more gak?
Given Ha Mu-baek's cultivation...
and his state before meditating...
Even captured by enemies, he'd need at least one sichen to recover.
Yet now, just one gak in, and another monster in one more gak?
This "gak" was far too short.
"We have to make a stand anyway. Form the formation to encircle the instructors and elders."
Dang Jin-san said with resolute eyes.
The Fierce Dragon Corps nodded and moved in perfect unison.
Dang Jin-san's gaze turned to Namgung Ji-hu.
"You—go inform the Hocheon Corps."
So Hwi-woong was meditating atop the wall, so he wouldn't hear their conversation.
Namgung Ji-hu nodded and leaped away.