Chapter 119

Mok Gyeong-hae’s Purple Cloud Divine Sword and Yeon Mujin’s Yin-Fire Sword clashed.

Each time the blades met, purple sword-ki and white mist billowed outward.

Mok Gyeong-hae set his stance and thrust, slashed, and swept with his blade.

It was a superb swordsmanship aiming simultaneously at the head, chest, and dantian.

“Aaah!”

Yeon Mujin screamed like a third-rate fighter and raised his sword to block.

The scream was clumsy, but his posture was not.

It was a sword path he had already faced hundreds of times in his imagination.

Kkagakang!

“I’m dying! Someone’s dying!”

Even with words like that, Yeon Mujin did not yield and counterattacked.

Pyupyupyup!

A cluster of sword-ki that Yeon Mujin unleashed shot toward Mok Gyeong-hae.

Three Calamities Sword Technique: Raging Wind

When Mok Gyeong-hae drew his blade vertically, the purple sword-ki split the Raging Wind.

Yeon Mujin met Mok Gyeong-hae’s sword qi with the Heavenly Flow form of the Three Calamities Sword Technique.

Chaeng!

The clashing sword qi scattered like plum blossoms.

Those watching felt as if the volcanic mountain was covered in plum blossoms.

Isn’t it ridiculous? Plum blossoms do not bloom on a volcano.

“Kkaengkkaeng!”

It wasn’t the sound of blades clashing. It was a sound Yeon Mujin made with his mouth.

Even while exchanging blows with Mok Gyeong-hae, Yeon Mujin did not stop speaking for a moment.

“Arrr!”

“Keongkeong!”

“Walfwalf!”

He even made dog-barking sounds,

“Aaah, someone help!”

“I’m going to lose! Please help!”

“I surrender, I surrender! Just spare me once!”

He groaned and whimpered,

“Mok Gyeong-hae! Do you think you can win?”

“Not easy, right? How was that just now—dangerous, wasn’t it?”

“Now I’m going to use my real secret move. Really, really. Brace yourself!”

He babbled nonsense.

Most of it was meaningless. If words came out of his mouth, he spoke them without thought.

Mok Gyeong-hae, listening, finally shouted like this.

“Please shut that mouth and fight!”

“Why should I!”

“Because of you, I feel like I’ve become some weird guy too!”

“What did you say? Weren’t you the one who suggested we fight like dogs? Do you really think a dogfight has manners or formality? If so, that’s your misjudgment, your mistake, your delusion, your arrogance. A dogfight has no rules or face. Eat this!”

Yeon Mujin kicked up the ground and flung dust toward Mok Gyeong-hae.

Such a street-fight trick would not work on Mok Gyeong-hae.

Mok Gyeong-hae raised a short sword wind so the dust blew back at Yeon Mujin.

Yeon Mujin, his face covered in dust, sneezed with tears in his eyes.

“Aachoo! You coward! Falling behind in skill so you use tricks like that?”

“What a crazy freak…”

He had drawn his sword determined to annihilate Mount Hua Sect, but the opponent acting like that made him feel cheapened.

This wasn’t the kind of fight he had imagined.

It should have been more desperate, more elegant, more ruthless…

“Mok Gyeong-hae, do not try to put weight into your blade. There is no justification or meaning in the way you swing your sword. Your loss to me is because of that difference. Your sword is heavy, my sword is light. There is no meaning contained in my sword.”

“I haven’t lost yet, you madman.”

“Ho? Saying ‘not yet’ means you’ll soon lose?”

“Shut up, you rootless fool!”

Yeon Mujin flinched at Mok Gyeong-hae’s roar.

“What did you say? Rootless fool? But that’s true. I am a rootless fool. The noodle shop owner picked me up and raised me. You were raised by Mount Hua Sect’s Sect Leader, but I was the noodle shop. If I beat you here, Mount Hua Sect loses to a noodle shop. Fight for Mount Hua Sect’s honor.”

“Didn’t you just say not to put anything into the sword?”

“In the murim world, you need the sense to understand things even when they’re said clumsily. You lacking that sense—no wonder people dislike you.”

It was utterly illogical and incoherent.

Even the craziest person in the world would probably think this when conversing with Yeon Mujin.

‘This guy is a genuine lunatic.’

The madman shouted like a madman.

“But I cannot tolerate being called rootless! Taste the wrath of a traditional noodle shop!”

Yeon Mujin swung his blade again.

The sword-ki grazed Mok Gyeong-hae’s cheek, skimmed his thigh, and cut across his belly.

The first two were bearable, but the third was not.

The wound from Yeon Mujin’s ambush had not yet healed.

Yeon Mujin said to Mok Gyeong-hae, who stepped back frowning.

“It seems the belly wound bothers you. Mok Gyeong-hae. If we drag this out, it’s to my advantage. You are wounded, and even if you fell me you’d still face Mount Hua Sect’s warriors. A crafty man would slowly draw out time to wear you down, but I’m not such a coward. A true chivalrous fighter doesn’t resort to such cowardly victories. Let’s decide it with the next move.”

“Are you serious?”

“Actually, I don’t know either. If I’m at a disadvantage I’ll change my tune again.”

“You’re utterly mad…”

But Yeon Mujin’s words were right.

Mok Gyeong-hae realized that prolonging the fight would be disadvantageous.

He took his stance and drew up his internal qi. The purple force in his blade deepened.

Seeing that, Yeon Mujin said.

“What the—! I was just talking, but you’re really going to use a finishing move. Scatter, plum blossoms. Is it something like that?”

“Huuu…”

Mok Gyeong-hae decided to shut his ears.

Being swayed by the madman’s words would only harm him.

He calmed himself quietly and trusted his sword.

His talent was Mount Hua Sect’s best. Mok Gyeong-hae believed that even beyond Mount Hua Sect, his sword skill was unparalleled across ages.

Talent and skill that even the Lord of the Ten-Thousand Golds would covet. What he had staked in this fight was not Mount Hua Sect’s honor but his own talent and strength.

When he drew his sword, he would surely cut.

Anyone who stood in his way would be torn to pieces.

Mok Gyeong-hae believed he was not someone who would be defeated here.

One day the world would know his name.

Not as Mount Hua Sect’s current sword, but as the Sword Ghost Mok Gyeong-hae.

‘His breath has calmed.’

Watching Mok Gyeong-hae, Yeon Mujin clicked his tongue inwardly.

Sure enough, the mountain named Mok Gyeong-hae was not easy to topple with just three inches of tongue.

He had hoped Mok Gyeong-hae would be swept by his words and self-destruct, but it did not happen.

But it didn’t matter.

“Sseueup… huu…”

Yeon Mujin raised his sword and focused.

Mount Hua Sect, Flying Swallow Manor, even the Yong-ma… none of that mattered now.

In the world there were only Mok Gyeong-hae and Yeon Mujin, and the two swords held in their hands.

Wasn’t it the familiar scene he’d often met in his mind?

His win rate was seventy percent. No, whether ten, nine, or whatever, once you draw a sword, the outcome is always one of two.

Die, or kill.

When Yeon Mujin closed his mouth, Mount Hua Sect fell silent.

The Yin-Fire Sword is a blade that lets internal power flow like mist to dominate the surroundings.

When I first learned from the old man, the Three Calamities Sword had only three: Heavenly Thunder that cuts down foes, Raging Wind that deals with many enemies, and the Yin Fire Sword that controls space.

I liked that it was a clean, no-frills sword technique.

After all, in martial arts, the longer the pointless name, the weaker it seems.

Cut to kill, slash to kill, burn to kill.

How clean is that?

But among the foes I faced in my previous life, there were powerful ones who could not be defeated with just these three sword types.

I suddenly fell into thought.

Could forms of Raging Wind or Yin Fire be used like Heavenly Thunder?

For example, like this.

The mists that had spread around Yeon Mujin thinned.

No, they weren’t thinning. The mists were gathering toward his blade.

Swords gathering like clouds and mist assembling on a mountain peak.

It was a stark contrast to Mok Gyeong-hae’s blade, which bore purple force.

Three Calamities Sword Technique— Extra Form: Dense Mist Sword.

This was a sword form invented by Yeon Mujin.

Well, it’s more than just gathering Yin Fire qi into the sword and concentrating internal qi. But it’s simple.

But he knew that martial arts are inherently more powerful when they’re simpler.

After all, it’s a technique to kill people; what path or meaning is there to it?

The meaning contained in a sword is essentially only one.

That is killing intent.

Mok Gyeong-hae, ready, glared at Yeon Mujin.

‘…What?’

A sinister aura was gathering on Yeon Mujin’s blade.

It was an ominousness not lacking even compared to his Purple Cloud Divine Sword.

But that was not the only thing that surprised Mok Gyeong-hae.

‘He’s closing his eyes?’

Yeon Mujin had his eyes closed.

As if he’d forgotten he was about to decide life or death, the man who had been blabbering like a madman was calm, without a trace of agitation.

Is it an opportunity? A trap?

Mok Gyeong-hae, pondering, soon dismissed the thought.

What was there to worry about? The enemy to be cut down remained the same.

‘Die as you are…!’

Without giving any sign, Mok Gyeong-hae surged forward and thrust his sword.

Sword-ki from his blade scattered like shards, blossoming like plum petals.

Puuuuk!

The sound of the blade piercing flesh and cutting bone. And then.

“…!”

Mok Gyeong-hae looked down at his chest in disbelief.

Yeon Mujin’s sword had pierced his chest.

Mok Gyeong-hae’s sword, cut in two, whirled away and vanished between the valleys of Mount Hua Sect.

“Mok Gyeong-hae.”

At a distance only they could hear, Yeon Mujin spoke.

His pupils were covered in ashen mist.

“This time I was one measure stronger.”

“Guh…”

“And thank you.”

“What… ?”

“If I can surpass you, then I can surpass others as well.”

The chill of the Dense Mist Sword rapidly spread outward from Mok Gyeong-hae’s heart.

Mok Gyeong-hae felt his limbs grow ice-cold in an instant.

Yeon Mujin said.

“Farewell. Let’s never see each other again. I’m fed up.”

Fwahak!

Flames rose from the pierced chest.

The cold flames spread like wildfire, leaving no time for a scream.

Chest, belly, throat, limbs, and finally the head.

Mok Gyeong-hae vanished into a handful of ashes.

As if a Sword Ghost of Mount Hua Sect had never existed in the world to begin with.

Jjang!

Yeon Mujin tossed away his sword.

Everyone now focused on Yeon Mujin and his astonishing prowess.

“Sect Leader, listen.”

Yeon Mujin turned his head.

Yeon Mujin, returned from madman to leader of Flying Swallow Manor’s External Protection Troops.

“With my hand I killed the past that Mount Hua Sect had to cut. With the hands of my comrades, I saved the future Mount Hua Sect must protect.”

The past was Mok Gyeong-hae, and the future was Mount Hua Sect’s three great disciples.

“Earlier I told you to sell off Mount Hua Sect, but that was not true.”

Everyone listened to Yeon Mujin in silence.

There was a gravity in his words that demanded attention.

“Our Bukgung Family’s Flying Swallow Manor has decided to take on the Ten-Thousand Gold Lord’s supplies and open a transport route to Shaanxi Province and Xi’an. By now the lord should have secured the Southern Edge Sect’s agreement.”

A voice returning from battle to reality.

“Even if you do not permit it, Flying Swallow Manor will push this forward. You lack the power. I will make it so. Do you think Mount Hua Sect, which cannot even endure internal misfortune, can stand against Flying Swallow Manor?”

A dogmatic declaration.

“If the Xi’an transport route is opened, the people of Shaanxi will no longer starve as they do now. Money will gradually flow, and people will gather. Whether you like it or not, Mount Hua Sect may find a way to survive.”

Yet a generous offer.

“Your choice is to break your pride and ride the new tide to preserve your lives, or to embrace the old Mount Hua Sect and die with it. I said earlier: sell pride? legacy? Such things can be sold for money. A sect I know failed six times because it couldn’t sell them. On behalf of Flying Swallow Manor, one piece of advice: when money is merely riches, selling your pride for it is the work of money-devils. But when that money is today’s meal and survival, people call selling your pride for money a decision.”

Yeon Mujin bowed politely.

“I sincerely hope Mount Hua Sect makes a wise decision.”