Chapter 621
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 621
Chapter Title: Darkness is Darkness
Shocked, the two of them.
No, one person and one monster.
At the moment Ha Mu-baek had appeared just before.
Gongya Jangcheon had sensed through his qi perception that he dealt some kind of blow to Gongya Harang.
But seeing it now with his own eyes like this.
He couldn't believe it.
Gongya Harang felt the same.
At first, she thought it might be luck, but if it happened repeatedly like this, it meant it wasn't luck or coincidence.
How on earth?
Such astonishment settled on both of them simultaneously.
"Huh? How?"
Ha Mu-baek turned to Gongya Jangcheon and asked, but Gongya Jangcheon didn't hear.
His eyes were open, but the hearing acupoints were still sealed.
Ha Mu-baek let out a low sigh, and his left hand moved swiftly.
"Mmph."
Gongya Jangcheon widened his eyes at the sudden action.
Ha Mu-baek, who had said he would face the Blood Cult monster, was suddenly striking toward him.
It happened in an instant.
Even the expression "in the space of a breath" fell short.
Gongya Jangcheon clearly saw Ha Mu-baek's hand flying toward him but couldn't react.
No matter how close they were, within striking distance, and how sudden it was.
He had allowed Ha Mu-baek's hand far too easily.
'How......'
He had thought Ha Mu-baek was stronger than him, but this result was too shocking.
He stared at Ha Mu-baek with eyes wide open.
"Old man. Can you hear now?"
Ha Mu-baek's voice drilled into Gongya Jangcheon's ears.
"Uh......?"
"I told you to unseal your hearing. What good is just staring blankly?"
Ha Mu-baek's words pierced his ears.
Only then did he recall what Ha Mu-baek had transmitted via Wise Light Heart Language.
He had been so shocked that he just opened his eyes without thinking to release the acupoints.
So.
Ha Mu-baek had personally struck to release Gongya Jangcheon's own sealed acupoints.
'Right... it was to release the acupoints, so there was no killing intent. No killing intent, that's why I couldn't react.'
Gongya Jangcheon tried to brush off his earlier shock and sense of defeat that way.
In doing so, Gongya Jangcheon overlooked one fact.
That Ha Mu-baek had effortlessly and casually undone the acupoint he had sealed himself using the Gongya clan's unique secret technique.
At that moment.
Darkness approached the two men.
It was Gongya Harang drawing even more perfectly into the darkness, assimilating with it.
The instant Gongya Jangcheon felt the surrounding atmosphere shift.
Ha Mu-baek's eyebrows twitched.
And the sword moved.
"Huh? Dodged?"
Followed by a mutter.
Gongya Harang materialized at a considerable distance from them.
"You bastard. What sorcery did you use!"
A bellow erupted toward Ha Mu-baek.
Ha Mu-baek looked at Gongya Harang with eyes full of disbelief.
"Sorcery? Seems like you're the one wielding it."
At Ha Mu-baek's retort, the one who flinched was Gongya Jangcheon.
The form of address.
It felt just like Ha Mu-baek was cursing his own little sister.
Ha Mu-baek couldn't have missed that reaction.
He smirked.
"So, monster, you're not wielding sorcery right now?"
He changed the address.
"Grit."
Gongya Harang ground her teeth.
Her body vanished again.
And darkness surged toward Ha Mu-baek from all directions.
Clang! Clang clang clang!
He clearly swung his sword at empty space, yet harsh clash sounds rang out.
Ha Mu-baek took one step, then another.
There was intent to widen the distance from Gongya Jangcheon, but also.
The large hole at the center.
The place from which Gongya Harang had surged.
He headed there.
Dark qi was still flowing from that spot.
Ha Mu-baek extended his left hand toward it.
The flow of qi heading toward Gongya Harang shifted to Ha Mu-baek's left hand.
"You son of a bitch who guzzles it all!"
Gongya Harang's graceful voice spat rough curses.
Before Ha Mu-baek could reach the center.
Gongya Harang materialized from the darkness and stood over the hole.
She then pulled the qi flowing toward Ha Mu-baek back to herself.
Where on earth had this goblin-like bastard popped out from?
There was no such martial artist in her memories.
Not in the Evil Alliance, nor in the Righteous Heaven Alliance.
[Manhwang... Gen......]
A voice like a groan of darkness echoed in Gae Se-ak's mind.
'Manhwang? Gen?'
Incomprehensible words.
Gae Se-ak focused on the voice of darkness.
[Heh heh. That's right. Abyss of darkness.]
[Gen's abyss... you bastard.]
Darkness was clearly flustered.
And rightly so, for he hadn't even noticed Manhwang hiding in his own darkness.
[How could you hide there?]
The question burst out directly.
[Darkness is darkness. Whether primal or Manhwang.]
Gen's calm reply.
[And besides, what kind of place was the one you were in?]
Followed by another question.
The original place.
Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest.
A vast forest.
Forest Sea.
A land that could be called an ocean of trees.
[I see... a forest, your domain.]
If Manhwang Tae was lakes and swamps.
Manhwang Gen was the forest.
And the darkness draped over the forest.
That was Manhwang Gen's nature.
But Darkness had never imagined it. That it had been silently lurking, hiding in the forest for so long.
[Why did you suddenly awaken instead of continuing to sleep hidden like before?]
Darkness asked, as if utterly baffled.
[Because the seed you scattered met my darkness. Thanks to that, I could wake from slumber.]
A calm answer, but laced with the thrill of complete awakening.
It had met the darkness.
A moment flashed in Gae Se-ak's mind.
The time he felt a foreign qi in the darkness.
But it was brief.
By the time he sensed the foreign qi and directed his perception there, it was gone.
And if it was then, it should have awakened then, not now.
[That qi was the seed you scattered.]
Darkness muttered, as if something dawned on him.
[Yes. I hoped that seed would sprout and call me forth... but disappointingly, your contact awakened me like this.]
A voice that sounded not disappointed at all, contrary to the words.
'What is he talking about?'
The moment Gae Se-ak wondered.
[One of the things that reacted to the qi I sent out this time.]
Darkness answered the question.
Besides the entity that moved through the Beggar Clan.
Another entity came to mind.
It was definitely near Mount Hengshan.
The Curse of Demon Extermination had activated, but one being endured it without succumbing to the curse by its own will.
Of course, the dark qi Gae Se-ak sent merged with the Demon Extermination qi.
And within days, it finally fell to the curse.
Still, it was such an unusual case that he remembered it clearly.
[I sensed this one's trace, but dismissed it as insignificant... To think it was in my darkness. The lamp's shadow is darker than I thought.]
"What does that mean?"
Gae Se-ak's question.
[The power possessed by the one who resisted what you call Demon Extermination—my power—its source was this one's power.]
She had cultivated a martial art derived from Manhwang Gen, allowing her to resist the curse of Demon Extermination born from Darkness's darkness.
Because it was a power of the same kind, she could stand against it.
[Heh heh heh heh heh. But now that child seems to be in a bit of trouble?]
Manhwang Gen's muttering chuckle.
Gae Se-ak and Darkness directed their senses there again.
And soon, they could sense the newly appeared existence.
"Ha Mu-baek......"
When was this monster-like bastard in Kaifeng of Henan Province?
He should have headed to the Mountain-Crossing Demonic Forest.
How was he in Mount Hengshan now?
[You going to leave it like this?]
Manhwang Gen asked, as if amused.
As if answering the question, a strand of qi flowed from Gae Se-ak's body.
Mingled with it was the qi sent from Manhwang Gen's abyss.
"You bastard, who the hell are you!"
A clear voice contrasting the rough tone.
To Gongya Harang's question, Ha Mu-baek answered calmly.
"Me? Ha Mu-baek."
A short introduction.
But Gongya Harang flinched.
It was a name in her memories.
During the height of the Great Martial War.
More precisely, after the Blood Cult Leader died.
The name her brother, the Evil Alliance Leader, had mentioned as the world's best was Ha Mu-baek.
But even so.
How could he absorb that power of darkness?
She redirected the qi back to herself now.
"Hmph."
As if it were nonsense, Ha Mu-baek pulled the qi again.
Gongya Harang quickly lost control over the qi.
Ha Mu-baek immediately used the drawn qi.
A pure white sword aura formed on his blade.
A black outline appeared around it.
Thud.
Ha Mu-baek kicked off the ground and charged at Gongya Harang.
Gongya Harang melted into the darkness again.
Her sword assaulted Ha Mu-baek from all sides.
Movements as if four people were attacking.
The Southern Bright Asura Hell Sword flying from four directions at once.
Ha Mu-baek's sword moved fluidly, deflecting all the dark attacks coming at him.
At the same time, he thrust into empty air.
"Kuhk."
Gongya Harang's groan leaked out.
She dodged, but her side was torn long.
How on earth did this bastard precisely find her hidden form in the darkness and wound her like this?
Ha Mu-baek's sword didn't stop.
Chasing Gongya Harang, who had moved to a completely different spot in an instant via the darkness despite the side wound, he thrust again.
At that slash that seemed to cleave space itself.
Gongya Harang was startled.
It was such an immense sword strike that she couldn't even think to dodge.
Thanks to that.
Slash.
One arm was severed.
Because she was flowing through the darkness mid-movement.
If she had hesitated to dodge, it might have bisected her.
"This time it felt pretty good."
With Ha Mu-baek's mutter, Gongya Harang's form materialized.
Her left arm was severed from the shoulder.
From there, black, viscous something kept bubbling and flowing out.
"Ha, Harang......"
At that sight, Gongya Jangcheon couldn't help letting out a trembling voice.
This bastard was clearly a Blood Cult monster.
Yet seeing her grimace with an arm severed like that.
He was reminded of his sister.
He had never seen his sister with one arm cut off.
He showed agitation beyond his experience.
"Please calm yourself, my lord."
One of the Blood Thunder Corps members surrounding him cautiously advised.
Gongya Jangcheon clenched his teeth.
His tightly gripped fist trembled.
'That bastard is a Blood Cult monster. A monster. A demon.'
He repeated to himself again.
"Ah, so that's it."
Gongya Harang now clearly understood from that strike.
The black line wrapped around the white qi like a border.
This bastard had absorbed the qi of the Dark Blood deep underground and cloaked his sword aura in it.
Because it was the same qi, it could wound even her, who had become darkness.
"How can a righteous faction bastard? No, a martial artist?"
That qi wasn't something anyone could handle.
It wasn't something learned by hearing and practicing.
She knew instinctively.
That humans could never easily wield such qi.
Even Gongya Jangcheon alone.
Couldn't feel it, couldn't do anything.
Of course, it had influenced him slightly once, but that could have been coincidence.
But not Ha Mu-baek.
He could absorb and use the qi with his own will properly.
Gongya Harang first repaired the wound on her severed arm.
She couldn't let the qi keep leaking.
The wound healed and reattached in an instant.
The viscous flow stopped immediately.
"As expected, a monster."
Ha Mu-baek nodded and said.
There was no regret.
Just a calm expression that he could cut it off again anytime.
'Damn.'
Gongya Harang tried to pull darkness from Ha Mu-baek again.
Having her arm severed had consumed considerable qi.
She had only stopped the bleeding, not regenerated the arm.
She needed more dark qi, but Ha Mu-baek gripped it tightly.
Still, she sent her will into the qi.
Because she was the true child of darkness.
At that moment.
"Huh?"
Ha Mu-baek let out a short gasp.
And the darkness slipped from Ha Mu-baek's grasp, beginning to flow toward Gongya Harang.