The Enemy’s Tail (2)

“Let me have a look at you, brat!”

Leaving Kaifeng, it was a short trip to Zhengzhou where the Martial Alliance was located—close enough that even ordinary people could reach it in a day if they walked a little briskly.

The moment he passed Jungmo County at the midpoint, that sudden “brat” made Neung Je-gang let out a bitter smile. He’d heard Shingae say the man was narrow-minded, but he hadn’t expected him to react this fast.

“What is it?”

“On your way to the Martial Alliance?”

Neung Je-gang’s expression changed. If the man knew his route, this wasn’t a random chase.

“How did you know?”

“Damn it. Still so crooked. I heard you learned some Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign or something?”

Du Pyo ignored the question and asked what he wanted.

“I still haven’t heard how you knew I’m heading to the Martial Alliance.”

“Show it once. Let me see it.”

“Are you picking a fight with me right now?”

“Brat, you only figured that out now? Ever since I came down from the Tianshan, no one’s dared stand in front of me with their neck stiff like you. A rude punk needs manners taught with a beating. In your case, it won’t end with just a beating…”

“Haah. So not knowing who you were is reason enough for you to start trouble?”

A sigh escaped Neung Je-gang at the childish old master’s behavior.

“Of course.”

A full-blown lawless man. If acting however you please isn’t lawless, what is?

“Let’s stop. I don’t want to hear people saying I beat up an old man.”

With that, Neung Je-gang slipped past Du Pyo in an instant and moved ahead.

“Huh?”

Du Pyo looked shocked as Neung Je-gang brushed past him at once.

But the shock quickly twisted into anger.

“You dare ignore me?”

Whoooom—

In that instant, Neung Je-gang sensed a chilly wind against his lower back and his complexion changed. This was no ordinary wind.

Before he could even think about what it was, searing pain tore through his back.

Bang!

“Kuuk!”

He staggered forward with a shock that felt like it snapped his waist in half. For the “price” of trying to brush off a childish old master, the blow was far too heavy.

Blood welled up his throat, ran down his chin, and soaked his chest. Ever since escaping the Forbidden Demon Prison, this was the first time a single palm strike had inflicted internal injury on him.

Internal damage that shook his heart meridians in a single strike—on a body the Demonic Physician had sworn was the finest?

And what was this yin-yoo, secretive palm force—so subtle that he only realized it was an attack after being hit?

Forcing down the boiling qi and blood, Neung Je-gang turned to face Du Pyo.

Du Pyo was walking toward him slowly, wearing a smile whose meaning was impossible to read.

Neung Je-gang spat out the mouthful of blood, raised a hand, and wiped the blood from his jaw. When he ran the Sura Demon Art, the raging qi and blood gradually settled.

Then again—without the slightest sign—another chill wind came.

The same chill as before, and this time it aimed at a fatal spot: his heart.

‘How…?’

Neung Je-gang’s eyes filled with disbelief. He swore he hadn’t seen Du Pyo make any preparatory movement at all.

He twisted sideways and darted right to evade the “wind,” but the moment he sensed it, it was already delivering a crushing impact into his body.

Thud!

Even with the evasive move, a coin-sized hole punched clean through his shoulder. He bit his lip to endure the pain—his lower lip split, and fresh blood again stained the jaw and neck he’d just wiped clean.

“Hoh. You dodged that?”

Du Pyo said it with a face full of mockery. Which meant the attack clearly originated from Du Pyo.

Formless, soundless fingertip force and palm force—without sound, without presence!

Du Pyo’s martial art clearly had that nature. It would be a nightmare to deal with.

Bleeding, Neung Je-gang glared at him with a terrifying expression. He couldn’t believe there was a martial art that attacked with no movement at all. There had to be some motion somewhere—something his eyes weren’t catching.

And he realized: if he couldn’t find it today, he might die.

Du Pyo stopped three paces in front of him and, utterly calmly, stood with his hands clasped behind his back, staring at the bleeding Neung Je-gang.

“Feel like using Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign now?”

Du Pyo was back to that refrain.

“Do you want Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign, or do you want me?”

Neung Je-gang asked as he began preparing Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign, exactly as Du Pyo wanted.

“Heh. You caught on? Of course I want you. Your life. In such a short time, the name ‘Secret Shadow’ has climbed quite a bit.”

“So that’s it. I wondered why you were starting a fight over something so pointless. What—did the Tianshan run out of food? Or did the water dry up near Tianzhou? If life is so hard you had to leave your hideout, why not try begging?”

Neung Je-gang provoked him—then immediately grimaced and staggered.

Paat!

A tearing pain bit into his right thigh, and his pant leg turned red. He’d been wounded again by Du Pyo’s fingertip force.

‘I didn’t see it again.’

Of course. Fingertip force used fingers—and Du Pyo still had his hands behind his back.

‘Is the fingertip force bending to attack? Is that even possible?’

Neung Je-gang’s One-Finger Piercing was purely straight-line. He’d assumed fingertip force worked that way by nature.

‘Still… there’s also a way to rotate fingertip force. If it can rotate, bending isn’t that shocking.’

He knew the Spinning Finger Technique as well. Even the Spirit-Bell Seven-Blades Art—one of the strongest arts he knew—contained methods like that.

‘Why didn’t I ever think to link it with other martial arts?’

Getting beaten by Du Pyo taught him something: by combining the arts he knew, he could forge something even stronger.

But to do that, he first had to deal with Du Pyo, who was currently threatening his life.

Ssswk—

Neung Je-gang moved. A hole in his thigh meant he couldn’t move at full speed, but he could still move enough that Du Pyo’s bending fingertip force couldn’t track him cleanly.

“So you figured it out?”

Seeing his movement, Du Pyo sighed as if it was inevitable, unclasped his hands, and finally raised a finger openly to point at Neung Je-gang. His right middle finger tracked Neung Je-gang’s movement, swaying left and right.

Neung Je-gang shifted sideways to avoid the fingertip. It was a simple motion, but by the time Du Pyo tried to launch force, Neung Je-gang had already slipped beyond the targeting point.

“You’re annoying.”

Du Pyo finally raised both hands.

“There’s something I want to ask. Who said my life was for sale?”

Neung Je-gang asked while moving constantly, never staying in place.

“Heh-heh. You’re dying here anyway—what’s the point? But if you want to know before you die, I’ll tell you one thing. An old man who lives next to me said that if I hung around Shingae, I’d meet you someday.”

“Next to you?”

Neung Je-gang couldn’t make sense of it.

“Ghost Finger Force is my secret art, unknown to the world. You can’t dodge it just because you want to. So die already.”

As if making a final declaration, Du Pyo shouted and unleashed two streams of fingertip force at once.

Ureureung—Paaak!

Neung Je-gang fired the Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign he’d prepared straight at Du Pyo, then urgently flung himself aside. Strangely, the fingertip force that left Du Pyo’s hands followed Neung Je-gang’s movement.

“Damn it!”

Du Pyo’s fingertip force really was ghost-like in every sense.

Thud!

Luckily, one stream was swallowed by the Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign and vanished.

But the other stream pursued him relentlessly and slammed into his side.

“Kkugh!”

Neung Je-gang bit his lip. Bright red blood flowed from his mouth and his side.

And in that instant, his mind snapped clear.

‘One got swept away by the palm force.’

A stream of fingertip force had been erased without a trace by the power of Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign. He didn’t have to keep trying to dodge. If he couldn’t see it, then he should block it with something equally unseen.

And even better: the wounds he’d taken earlier were already almost sealing, thanks to the body the Demonic Physician had reshaped.

Du Pyo didn’t know that. He assumed Neung Je-gang was in terrible condition and grew leisurely.

“What? This is Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign? This is all it is, and the whole martial world trembled calling it a forbidden art?”

Du Pyo, having narrowly avoided the rushing Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign, wore the smug face of a victor.

For all its horrific power, Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign could be dodged if you knew the direction of the attack—though only an absolute master like Du Pyo could do it.

Chaaang—

Neung Je-gang drew the Mindless Sword.

“Now I understand. If you can’t dodge it, you block it…”

He shouted while staring at Du Pyo.

A cold smile touched Du Pyo’s lips.

“You can’t even dodge, and you think you’ll block? You said you’d use sword aura—do you think that’s the pinnacle?”

Paaah—

Sword aura surged from the Mindless Sword, nearly a full jang in length.

“Young punk—your inner power is quite usable. But this time I’ll crush all your organs.”

Du Pyo alternated extending his hands, his movements light as if there was no force at all in them. Yet from those casual gestures, soundless palm force was erupting.

Neung Je-gang waited—until he felt that chill wind again, the same one he’d sensed each time he was struck.

And the moment he felt it, he swung the Mindless Sword like a madman through empty air.

Bang!

A single collision rang out, bursting directly in front of him.

‘And the other one?’

He’d blocked one with the sword-wall, but Du Pyo had two hands—there was no way that was the only strike.

‘If not in front… then behind?’

Another bending attack. Neung Je-gang realized it, and in the same instant felt it was already too late. If so, he had to go beyond dodging and blocking—he had to strike.

He trusted his tough body. The flesh the Demonic Physician had crafted as a life’s masterpiece wouldn’t collapse from a single palm strike, he believed.

Paht!

Neung Je-gang kicked off the ground and charged Du Pyo. Somehow, it felt like the time he’d fought Hwangbo Chu. If he rushed in like this and swung exactly as he had then, Du Pyo’s body would be cleaved apart.

Ssssss—Puhng!

But a sudden thunderous impact exploded in Neung Je-gang’s back.

“Keohk!”

Maybe his body could endure it—but he hadn’t expected the shock to ruin his attack. The inner power he’d infused into the Mindless Sword scattered.

Paaak!

Blood sprayed from his mouth like mist. Yet Neung Je-gang forced himself upright and kept charging Du Pyo. A sense of crisis flooded him—if this attack failed, revenge and everything else was over.

‘That can’t happen. I only just learned where they live… I can’t stop here.’

Grinding those words into himself, Neung Je-gang locked eyes on Du Pyo.

Seeing Neung Je-gang keep charging even after being struck by his palm force, Du Pyo raised both hands again. Then, like Neung Je-gang’s sword-wall earlier, he began lazily swishing both hands through the air.

“Brat! That kind of attack can’t pierce my Ghost Steel Wall. This is the end.”

“If I can’t pierce it, I’ll sweep everything away together. Sword Aura Explosion!”

Neung Je-gang gripped the Mindless Sword with both hands and poured every last shred of inner power into it.

Jjeojeok—

As the sword aura formed from all his power, the Mindless Sword groaned, unable to withstand the overload. Fine cracks etched across its surface, as if it might crumble into dust at any moment.

But Neung Je-gang didn’t even feel it. In his mind there was only one thought: his life and death hung on this single strike.

Kwaang!

With a sound like lightning striking, the sword aura wrapped around the Mindless Sword detonated.

Kukwakwakwakwakwakwa—

A storm of sword aura—no, a tempest—shot straight into Du Pyo’s proud Ghost Steel Wall.

“W-what is this?”

Bangbangbangbangbangbang—

Ghost Steel Wall meant nothing. Du Pyo watched his wall crumble like paper—yet Neung Je-gang’s attack did not lose strength at all, raining down on him like a torrential downpour.

Du Pyo flailed both hands desperately. Ghost Steel Wall was his life-saving ultimate technique, a form he had always believed could block anything. But before hundreds—thousands—of sword aura strikes, the word “wall” became laughable.

“U-uaaaagh!”

With a dying scream, the storm of sword aura swept over Du Pyo’s body and passed through.

Thud.

Neung Je-gang collapsed onto the ground, exhausted.

“In the end, I only won by relying on the Spirit-Bell Seven-Blades Art. The world is wide… and there are many powerful warriors you can’t predict.”

Silence fell.

“I’m tired.”

Neung Je-gang didn’t even try to get up. He closed his eyes.

Lying there, he circulated the Sura Demon Art. He didn’t feel like sitting up either.