Chapter 79: The Swordsman from the North (1)
Chapter 79: The Swordsman from the North (1)
CRACK!
With a hair-raising ‘crack’ sound, the chest of one of the red-armored warriors sunk inwards, a giant dragon scale dao embedded in it.
“Hmph!” Yong Mu-Sung snorted. He pulled out his dao from the red-armored warrior’s chest with a grim expression on his face.
At more than fifty pounds, the dragon scale dao he wielded weighed several times more than the weapons most warriors used. Despite that, he still had to inject a significant amount of his chi into the blade just to damage the enemy’s red armor.
The sheer amount of destructive power needed to break that armor was ridiculous. It was only possible because the one doing it was Yong Mu-Sung, and the fact remained that none of the other warriors around were capable of reproducing his feat.
As if to hammer that painful truth in, the White Dragon escorts were faring very poorly in battle, and only the Iron Brigade mercenaries were capable of defeating the red-armored warriors.
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Where on earth did these people come from? Throughout the years, I’ve traveled all over the gangho, and yet I’ve never seen warriors like these anywhere before!
“Gah! I seriously got myself dragged into one hell of a mess this time.”
Even so, I cannot back down. Credibility is the lifeblood of the Iron Brigade. The losses we would sustain from abandoning a request midway is too great, and we would have to waste a lot of time and effort to make a comeback.
Noticing that their comrade was killed, five of the red-armored warriors rushed in on Yong Mu-Sung at once, emitting an aura so intense that it hurt the eyes of anyone looking at them.
Yong Mu-Sung immediately understood that he could not defeat these guys using only basic moves.
“Tsk! In the end, I’m still forced to use one of my trump cards, huh,” he grumbled as he infused his dragon scale dao with chi, making it glow red.
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His lips curled upward in a large grin, revealing his unusually white canines. He swung his dragon scale dao at the charging red-armored warriors, saying, “Damn bastards, don’t even dream that I’ll give you a painless death.”
Like the claw of a fearless wild beast, the dragon scale dao sliced through the air.
RUUUUMBLE!
A red tornado ravaged the heavens and earth, swallowing up all of the red-armored warriors and launching them into the air. The warriors tried to resist, but to no avail.
Then, the red glow surrounding Yong Mu-Sung’s dragon scale dao intensified.
“AHHHHH!”
SPLAT! BAM! PLOP!
Amidst ear-splitting screams, the five warriors fell back to the ground as a rain of blood mixed with bits of armor, flesh, and bone.
That was Yong Mu-Sung’s secret technique, the Infernal Dragon Scale Blade (龍鱗魔形刀), an attack so terrifying that even demonic practitioners forbade its practice, because it never left its targets corpses in one piece, instead ripping them apart like they had been assaulted by dozens of infernal beasts.
Finally, the red-armored warriors hesitated, startled by the ferocity and ruthlessness of Yong Mu-Sung’s Infernal Dragon Scale Blade. They glanced at each other for a moment, then began to retreat.
Seeing this, Yong Mu-Sung beamed triumphantly.
“Hahaha! I guess you guys were nothing special after all… Huh?” Yong Mu-Sung’s voice trailed off as it struck him that it wasn’t him the red-armored warriors feared. An odd atmosphere gripped the area as not only the enemies around him, but all of the red-armored warriors were backing away.
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For a moment, the Iron Brigade mercenaries and the White Dragon escorts, who had been struggling badly in the fight, looked around them, confused. When they finally noticed what was happening, their eyes opened wide.
CLANG! BANG! BOOM! CRASH!
An unimaginable fight was taking place in their immediate vicinity.
It was Jin Mu-Won and Nam-Goong Wi.
In the midst of their frenzied battle, the two men were destroying everything around them, even sending several unsuspecting warriors who had accidentally gotten close to them flying to their deaths.
SWISH!
Every time Jin Mu-Won swung his blade, the warriors would hurriedly close their eyes as if they had been cut.
“…….”
Several of the warriors soon managed to force their eyes open, but none of them dared speak in the face of the suffocating pressure from the two master martial artists.
After a long time, Jong-Ri Mu-Hwan finally mumbled, “What the hell…?”
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He couldn’t believe his eyes. Nam-Goong Wi and his sky piercer halberd were indeed intimidating, but Jin Mu-Won left his brain in complete disarray. He couldn’t sense an ounce of sword chi or sword flux from Jin Mu-Won’s sword, and yet every time the young man swung it, the chilling keenness of the blade sent shivers down his spine.
His mind was in such a mess that he couldn’t say anything even vaguely coherent.
“How is this possible?” Gong-Son Chang, the Seven Skills Swordsman, gasped as his shoulders shook uncontrollably. He was a proud swordsman who aimed for complete mastery of the sword, which was the level of Sword Flux.
Common sense told him that Weapon Flux could only be blocked and countered with Weapon Flux, so to achieve that stage, he had worked extremely hard.
However, the fight unfolding in front of his very eyes was telling him otherwise. It was demolishing all his most fundamental beliefs and common sense.
“How…” Blood spurted out from the wound as Gong-Son Chang bit down on his lip, hard.
The other members of the Iron Brigade quietly watched their comrade tremble in shock and disbelief. Although they were also badly affected by Jin Mu-Won’s display of skill and strength, it wasn’t to the same extent as Gong-Son Chang. The prouder one was, the harder they fell, and Gong-Son Chang was by far the proudest one of them all. They couldn’t even begin to imagine how much frustration and despair the man must be feeling.
Chae Yak-Ran sighed softly.
Jin Mu-Won.
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She’d never thought that these three words would have such a large impact on the Iron Brigade.
“From now on, this man’s name will shake-up the entire gangho.”
The Iron Brigade mercenaries nodded in agreement.
Meanwhile, Nam-Goong Wi’s expression was grim. He had just unleashed one of his ultimate techniques, the Fire Dragon’s Blazing Annihilation (火龍炎滅), but Jin Mu-Won had dodged it easily just by moving his body slightly.
He’s like a shadow without substance. How can such a person exist?
Nam-Goong Wi face twisted in distaste as he tightened his grip on his halberd, causing the veins on the back of his hands to pop out like earthworms. Jin Mu-Won was an unexpected variable that no one had been able to predict, and to make matters worse, this variable was an enemy preventing him from accomplishing his mission.
Not even that man could foresee the arrival of a person like Jin Mu-Won, even though he is the most intelligent person I know, and can contain the knowledge of the world inside a tiny brain as large as my fist. As much as I respect him, there are still things beyond his calculations, huh.
So, where the fuck did this guy come from?
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Nam-Goong Wi was the leader of the red-armored warriors, also known as the Crimson Ghost Corps. Dozens of years and an unimaginable amount of money had been invested to create the Crimson Ghost Corps, and similarly, it was impossible for a master swordsman like Jin Mu-Won to have been trained overnight.
Is Heaven’s Summit behind this?
The instant the idea popped up in his head, Nam-Goong Wi shook his head. He was confident that he understood the internal and external movements of Heaven’s Summit better than anyone else, including many members of Heaven’s Summit themselves.
Although Heaven’s Summit was the most powerful organization in the world, both in regards to the strength of individual martial arts masters and the group as a whole, the method to create a master was not quite the same as training a group of warriors. It wasn’t something that could be done deliberately.
The killing intent in Nam-Goong Wi’s eyes surged.
If I fail to kill this guy now, he will become a plague we can never ignore.
It was common sense that individuals could not alter the world’s overall trajectory, but sometimes, a person would appear who overturned that common sense. They rejected the existing order and wrote history as they saw fit, sending the world spiraling into a whirlpool of chaos filled with uncertainty and volatility.
Naturally, not everyone approved of such drastic changes, especially Heaven’s Summit, who created and benefited the most from the current order. To them, an unstable variable like Jin Mu-Won was like poison in their political waters.
The same was true of the faction Nam-Goong Wi belonged to. Although they wished for change, they did not desire an uncontrollable variable like Jin Mu-Won making a mess wherever he went.
BOOM!
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Nam-Goong Wi’s aura exploded, unleashing a torrent that swept up everything around it.
ROAAAAAAR!
He smashed his sky piercer halberd down on Jin Mu-Won with all his might, causing a thunderous reverberation like he was heralding the end of the world.
In the face of Nam-Goong Wi’s all-out attack, Jin Mu-Won looked like a helpless leaf about to be swept away in a terrible windstorm. However, the expression on his face was as calm and composed as ever.
Like the saying goes: A tree that is unbending is easily broken.1 It is foolish to stand up straight and face a storm head-on.
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If the opponent forces his way forward, I will let him have his way, but the moment he steps down, I will close in on him.
The key to doing this is to carefully sense and read his breathing patterns.
One could feint using their eyes and muscle movements, but the breath could never be disguised. The brief intervals between inhalation and exhalation would always reveal an enemy’s intentions, allowing one to react accordingly.
Well, that was easy to say, but reading an opponent’s breathing patterns in the middle of a life-and-death situation was hardly trivial. Furthermore, Nam-Goong Wi was no weakling.
No matter how much a person steeled their heart, it was difficult to maintain one’s composure when faced with a threat to one’s life. Be that as it may, remaining calm and making logical decisions in the heat of battle was paramount to survival and victory.
At least, for Jin Mu-Won, coolly engaging in a close-range fight with Nam-Goong Wi was only possible because of his All-Encompassing Cognizance.
Not only that, he was also using the giant as a stepping stone to improve his skills to the next level as he fought. This particular ability was a trait of the Shadow Blade of Destruction, and one of the reasons it was one of the most terrifying martial arts techniques.
As the battle wore on, Nam-Goong Wi’s face gradually turned pale from extreme overuse of chi. The energy depletion was so bad, even his physical strength had been drained. Moreover, Jin Mu-Won’s constant counterattacks had completely disrupted his breathing rhythm.
If I let this drag on any longer, my chances of striking back will only get lower and lower. I have to finish this battle in one decisive move!
Fuck! To think that I would have to go through such a nightmarish experience in the boonies of Yunnan!
Frustrated and enraged, Nam-Goong Wi roared, “DAMN BASTARD! LET’S FINISH THISSSSSS!”
Scarlet chi wrapped itself around Nam-Goong Wi’s sky piercer halberd like a coiled dragon as he injected all his remaining chi into the weapon in preparation for his strongest technique, the Berserk Dragon Ascends the Heavens (狂龍飛天).
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As he watched Nam-Goong Wi’s body bend backward like a drawn bow, Jin Mu-Won narrowed his eyes. His instincts told him that this attack was different from all the ones before.
He tightened his grip on Snow Flower, which cried in response as if it knew what he was thinking.
Nam-Goong Wi’s sky piercer halberd flew toward Jin Mu-Won, tearing apart everything in its path.
In answer to Nam-Goong Wi’s provocation, Jin Mu-Won unleashed the third form of the Shadow Blade of Destruction (滅天魔影劍)—Dividing the Heavenly Seas (斷天海).
CRAAAAASSSSHHHH!
The latter idiom does not translate well so I added this sentence, a quote from Lao Tzu’s Dao De Jing that Jin Mu-Won is so fond of reading.
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