Chapter 41: Azure Sky and Ninefold Heaven (5)

In the darkness, a man in black martial robes moved without a sound.

He covered his nose and mouth with a veil and deliberately let his hair fall loose.

To erase his impression.

A member of the Namgung Clan’s shadow group, Night-Heaven Hall.

Those called Night-Heaven Guests under the Night-Heaven Hall Lord.

They were the people Sword Sovereign Namgung Ak mobilized for “unofficial” executions.

Each one’s force matched even the members of the One-Under-Heaven Corps.

At minimum, they were masters of Apex or higher.

And among them, the one who accompanied the Clan Lord on external activities.

He was the deputy hall lord, a martial artist at the threshold of Transcendent Apex.

‘She received the Purple Firmament Pellet, so tonight she’ll circulate her qi. If I inflict just the slightest internal injury...’

Even if it wasn’t a full deviation, it would make her uncomfortable.

And that tiny discomfort decided victory and defeat among masters.

If your inner power lagged even for a moment, the match was over.

He wasn’t planning to cripple her completely...

But if he could, why shouldn’t he.

She was the “monster” even the young clan lord Namgung Seon had acknowledged.

Come to think of it, that gaze—her talent really was extraordinary.

‘...Which means she’s someone who can rival Namgung’s hegemony.’

At least while his lord remained the Clan Lord, it could not be allowed.

It would smear the prestige of the Clan Lord of the number one clan under heaven.

And besides, Sword Sovereign Namgung Ak, the Grand Clan Lord, would not leave it alone.

He had been dissatisfied even when he passed the Clan Lord position to his son.

The deputy hall lord’s steps shifted in an instant into something uncanny.

It was an assassin art.

The Extreme-Night Full-Shadow Steps, a technique that combined footwork and lightness arts.

How had he learned the assassin arts of that organization.

If you asked, you would probably become a corpse that would never open its eyes again.

His agile body melted fluidly into the shadows.

He had not reached great completion.

But with only this level of attainment, he had never once failed a covert mission.

‘Let’s see...’

His body, embedded in the night’s darkness, rode the wind and dashed forward.

He only needed to avoid the old ones.

The First-Generation disciples who were each his equal, or the elder-class masters who stood alongside the Sect Leader.

Anyone beneath that had no chance of perceiving him.

The place even the Demonic Cult had failed to find—the assassin organization’s main headquarters.

Their footwork was something no one could find, and no one could follow.

Like that, the deputy hall lord arrived at Ahwa Hall.

From what he had confirmed, among Mount Hua’s Third Generation there were only two girls.

Cheonhwa and Cheon Soyak.

With only two, they couldn’t be made to sleep mixed in with the boys, so the room with the least baggage would be theirs.

He focused inner power into his eyes and opened his sight.

‘...That room.’

But the room was empty.

Even though everyone had returned and was spreading bedding and preparing to sleep.

The only one who stepped into that wide room was...

Cheonhwa alone.

*****

The night air was cold.

Eunsong quietly looked up at the sky.

He didn’t have the talent to read the will of heaven like Master Sleeping Dragon of the old records.

But his senses were sharp.

He could catch the killing intent wandering nearby.

So long as it wasn’t an assassin of the assassin organization that had vanished long ago with the Demonic Cult’s collapse.

“...It’s taking a while.”

Eunsong turned his head and looked back at Soyak.

She sat quietly, tending to her own qi.

He could see her Famous Acupoint sink neatly inward along her straightened back.

He had deliberately told her to sit with her back to him.

Because you never knew what might happen.

Eunsong did not trust people easily.

Even within Mount Hua Sect...

The only ones he trusted were Elder Jeonggang, Master Myunggon, and his one and only junior disciple.

And then.

As expected, a chilling coldness swept in.

“Right. I knew it would be like this.”

Eunsong quietly drew the plum-blossom sword at his waist.

It wasn’t any special treasured blade.

But he was a master who had reached Transcendent Apex.

If he wrapped it in Sword Qi, then whether what he held was a treasured sword or not did not matter.

Then, from over there, a powerful presence could be felt.

Once you’d already been discovered, stealth was useless.

Hiding your inner power and presence for covert movement was also meaningless in a direct fight.

“...How did you notice?”

“My eyes are pretty good.”

Eunsong smiled slyly.

He spun the sword once in his hand, then took Banner-Form.

Ninefold Heaven Plum Sword.

Mount Hua’s core supreme art.

The smile vanished from Eunsong’s mouth.

“Yeah. I don’t know what kind of dog bones you crawled out of, but—”

“You’re a Daoist and your mouth is filthy.”

“In front of my disciples I act refined, but in front of trash like you, it doesn’t work.”

That man took Banner-Form as well.

Eunsong knew what that swordsmanship was.

That bizarre posture filled with killing intent...

The assassin organization’s art.

And among them, Killing-Soul Sword.

A sword art that balanced extreme speed and illusion at the same time.

A murder art made only of real cuts and killing cuts.

“You think you can beat me, White Plum Scholar?”

White Plum Scholar.

On the surface, it sounded like praise—as if he were lofty like a white plum blossom.

But it wasn’t.

It meant he could not reach Mount Hua’s red plums.

And calling him a scholar was, in other words, calling him neither swordsman nor warrior.

“There’s something you’re misunderstanding.”

Sword Qi surged from Eunsong’s blade as he held Banner-Form.

A brilliant radiance, a blade bearing a martial artist’s will and intent to cut while disregarding distance.

It was the self-proof of a swordsman who had reached Transcendent Apex.

“You have to kill me to win, but I win as long as I just endure.”

*****

Mindscape.

They said it was the shape of the heart.

A space seen when a martial artist focused deep within and looked into their own interior.

For Cheon Soyak, that place was a starless night.

An endless spread of water, and a sky of boundless darkness with no stars and no moon.

Within it, the black qilin lay curled up.

But not now.

The entire sky was filled with a river of stars.

And the black qilin, too, was roaming through the sky, devouring that river.

Each time it took a bite, its body grew larger and its cry became more crystalline.

All of that had to be the Purple Firmament Pellet’s inner power.

Soyak quietly sat down and watched the black qilin.

Soon, the black qilin sensed Soyak’s gaze.

—GRRRRRR.

She heard its cry.

But it wasn’t a threat.

If anything, it was a gentle voice, saying it would come to her side soon.

Only after the black qilin had eaten nearly half the stars in the sky did it descend to Soyak.

Then it showed off its body, grown enormously.

“Yeah. Mm. Good job.”

She lightly stroked the black qilin’s throat.

She felt heat beneath its hard scales.

Then it breathed out warm breath.

Black breath.

Each time it did, the black qilin’s body, which had swelled so much, shrank little by little.

As if it were filtering out most of what it had devoured.

—GRRRR...

Then, in case Soyak might inhale it, it scattered it with its tail.

Soyak knew instinctively what it was.

Those were impurities.

The Purple Firmament Pellet was a pill shaped by human hands.

Of course, it contained ingredients to hold its form and defy time.

It was burning and filtering all of that away.

“...Thank you.”

Usually, those impurities seeped out through the skin.

So when you woke after taking such an elixir, you were unpleasantly soaked with the filth expelled from your whole body.

But that wasn’t Rebirth and Renewal.

Impurities pushed out unconsciously, just from being overwhelmed by inner power.

Could you really say that “all” impurities had been filtered into pure essence?

No.

A master around Transcendent Apex might manage it.

Even an Apex master, if they had taken pills often, would filter them out with familiarity.

But Soyak was not.

So the black qilin was doing it for her.

Filtering and burning the impurities so that instead of being forced out through the skin...

They could leave mixed into her breathing, carried out on her exhale.

The black qilin rubbed its large, fluffy cheek once against Soyak’s face, then flew up again.

Then, with surprising speed, it began devouring the inner power scattered across the sky like stars again.

So fast it almost looked impatient.

“...You can go slower...”

But it couldn’t.

Soyak might not be able to see the outside from here, but that creature could.

As a spirit beast, it was trying to protect its master.

Then there was only one answer.

Her master’s prediction had been right.

No matter who it was, someone had come to harm her and her master.

The black qilin’s size barely increased at all.

Even if it ate and filtered all that Purple Firmament Pellet inner power filling the mindscape, it would be the same.

But she couldn’t stay still during that time.

Quietly, she brought up, in her mind, a familiar sensation.

This was mindscape—if she willed it, she could summon anything.

And then... an unforgettable touch settled into her hand.

Falling Blossom Tranquil Edge.

Soyak began unfolding Falling Plum Elegy, one move at a time.

Each time she raised Harmonization Scripture’s inner power, the divine beast soaring through the night sky let out a cry.

A roar of joy and exultation.

The black qilin returned to Soyak’s side, leaving only a single point of starlight behind.

That point was Army-Breaking Star.

The last star of the Big Dipper, and...

The burden-bearer of the cart that carries the dead.

A radiance that breaks the world and opens it again.