What Rage Left Behind (3)

“Umm!”

Go Won-gi was so ashamed that he could not raise his head. He felt sorry toward Neung Je-gang and was ashamed to look at the sky. The fact that the Martial Alliance had to be devising such petty schemes infuriated him too much.

“I stayed too long. It is time for me to leave the martial world.”

Go Won-gi resolved that once this matter ended, he would retire from the martial world. He decided that he would spend the rest of his life appeasing Neung Je-gang’s soul. But that thought was far too premature. The Martial Alliance did not know Neung Je-gang’s true strength. They did not know it at all.

“Hehehe!”

Neung Je-gang drew his blade. He intended to reveal his true face so that they would never again dare to devise a petty scheme like the Martial Alliance’s. People would now learn that one forbidden art called Heaven-Shattering Thunderbolt Sovereign was not all he had.

Kwa-gwang.

Peopeopeopeopeok.

A desperate battle unfolded. Of course, that was from the Eon Clan’s perspective.

From Neung Je-gang’s left hand, thunderbolts flew out and tore the sky apart, and from his right hand, the force energy of the Empty Spirit swept through heaven and earth. Whether from his hands or his sword, he poured out force energy in bundles. There was no mercy. Both those who killed and those who died were filled only with killing intent.

Even the Martial Alliance figures hiding and aiming to reap the fisherman’s profit had their bodies burst apart from the force energy Neung Je-gang fired. In any case, they were no different from people who had targeted Neung Je-gang’s life.

Neung Je-gang was already not in his right mind. Only now were the Martial Alliance and the Jinju Eon Clan realizing why Kunlun had shuddered so much at the name Secret Shadow.

“Ahh!”

“What in the world have we done?”

Eon Cheong-gun and the Martial Alliance figures despaired at the sight of Neung Je-gang, who seemed not the least bit tired even after pouring out force energy for half an hour. The seventy elites of the Eon Clan had already met the end of their lives. Only Eon Cheong-gun remained, writhing in despair.

The battle was as good as over, but Neung Je-gang’s attacks did not stop. The Martial Alliance’s two thousand elites were his next target.

Peopeopeok.

Kwagwagwagwang.

Trees turned to powder and vanished, and the ground was overturned. If people were hiding, even the things covering their bodies were destroyed together with them.

“Stop!”

Go Won-gi shouted at Neung Je-gang. But Neung Je-gang had already gone mad by choice. His friendship with Go Won-gi was now a story of the distant past. Neung Je-gang did not have the patience to forgive those who dared plot a petty scheme against him.

“Stop! Please stop…….”

Go Won-gi shouted once again. Prepared to die, he ran toward Neung Je-gang. However, his efforts were ignored. Not by Neung Je-gang, but by the Martial Alliance figures.

They fled in order to survive. Their revenge for their comrades, and even the noble spirit with which they had vowed to eliminate Neung Je-gang and the Eon Clan for learning forbidden arts, melted and vanished without a trace like shards of ice under the blazing sun.

Leaving Go Won-gi, who was running over to stop him, alone, Neung Je-gang chased after the fleeing Martial Alliance figures. He intended to see it through to the end. If the Martial Alliance later branded him a public enemy, he intended to erase the Martial Alliance cleanly from the world as well.

Ma-jil, Cheong Yeon, and Gongsun Gyeong-in had not fled far. Thanks to that, while hiding underground, they saw just how terrifying an existence the enraged Neung Je-gang was. They too were seeing the true face of the Neung Je-gang they served for the first time.

“Was the Captain that strong?”

Ma-jil muttered with a sickened face. Gongsun Gyeong-in and Cheong Yeon could not even open their mouths.

A cruel hell had unfolded in the world. On every tree and rock lay human bodies crushed and cut apart. Blood covered the world. It was the hell Neung Je-gang had created.

After a long while, Neung Je-gang returned. He had not killed them all. Neung Je-gang knew that too. Still, he stopped there. The Martial Alliance, gripped by terror, would now be unable to make any provocation against him.

“Did it really have to be this way?”

Looking at the returned Neung Je-gang, Go Won-gi asked as if his soul had left him. In the basin, which had turned into a wasteland, only he remained kneeling.

“Then what should I do to those who tried to kill me?”

“The Martial Alliance will not forgive you.”

“Is there ever a case where the weak forgive the strong? The Martial Alliance will now learn that the best the weak can do is hope for tolerance from the strong.”

Perhaps because Go Won-gi’s words displeased him, Neung Je-gang no longer used honorific speech with Go Won-gi. It was a change that had happened far too suddenly.

“What are you going to do?”

“Go and tell them. Tell them I will erase the Martial Alliance. Do not think I cannot do it. It would be best for you to know that I did not show my full self today.”

Neung Je-gang’s words were true. In truth, Neung Je-gang had not used his specialty, illusion arts, at all. If he had used even illusion arts, not a single person would have dared flee from his assassination.

“Then, as the strong one, can you not forgive them?”

“Have everyone who plotted this scheme come to Beijing, kneel, and beg. If His Majesty tells me to forgive them, I will forgive them too.”

After setting that condition, Neung Je-gang turned away.

“The elders’ petty tricks are ruining the Alliance. Heoheo!”

Only Go Won-gi’s hollow laughter circled the basin and disappeared. With their pride, they would never kneel.

“You can come out now.”

Neung Je-gang looked toward the place where Ma-jil and the others were hiding and spoke.

“Captain, hehe!”

Ma-jil came out of the hole with a strange laugh. Gongsun Gyeong-in also seemed to have received a shock, as his expression was strange. Cheong Yeon, too, seemed unable to remain calm this time, and his face was flushed red.

“What is wrong with you all?”

“Hehe! You really are the Captain, right? You were too scary.”

Ma-jil played the fool. Because of his joking, the atmosphere brightened again.

“Eon Cheong-gun escaped.”

Cheong Yeon said. Cheong Yeon had not only been watching Neung Je-gang kill people. He had been monitoring the surrounding situation and people’s presences.

“I know. I deliberately left him alive.”

“Why?”

“We cannot allow the Small-Hand Art to be lost. It is far too precious a martial art for that.”

“Then?”

“We have to follow him and collect it.”

“Collect the Small-Hand Art? What if you really become a public enemy after that?”

Excitement was mixed into Ma-jil’s tone.

“I already did something today that could make me a public enemy. If the Martial Alliance ignores my warning, they will make me one.”

“What if you really become a public enemy?”

Ma-jil asked as if worried. Though he often resisted and did not listen in ordinary times, Ma-jil’s loyalty was real. This fellow had a strange loyalty that meant he would never abandon those he had acknowledged, no matter what.

“Then I just have to kill the Martial Alliance Leader. Since I will already be a public enemy, there will be nothing to hesitate over.”

“You are really going to kill the Martial Alliance Leader? I heard he is incredibly strong…….”

“Did you forget? What happens when the rumor spreads that the Martial Alliance Leader died? They won’t even have time to chase after me, will they?”

Kunlun and the Necromancer Cult had fallen, but their remnants remained. The ghost of Cheon-geum Domain had not yet awakened. As long as Neung Je-gang knew how to awaken it, it was the same as holding an extremely powerful weapon. Provided that Deung Gak and Deung Hyeon did not activate it first.

“Ah!”

In any case, the three of them understood Neung Je-gang’s words. If he mobilized the Eastern Depot to spread the death of the Martial Alliance Leader across the world, that rumor would soon become the truth. Murders by nearby women would happen one after another everywhere.

“Let us chase Eon Cheong-gun first.”

“Do you know where he went?”

“Where else would that bastard go except the Eon Clan? By now, he is probably fully occupied hiding the Eon Clan’s treasures or martial arts manuals.”

All martial clans of the martial world dug tunnels that would let them escape any difficult situation. Even if they were not martial clans, they made such holes. Neung Je-gang himself had survived thanks to just such a secret chamber. The Eon Clan must have made such a hole as well.

However, as Neung Je-gang approached the Jinju Eon Clan, he was startled. The Black Alliance, which had supposedly been arriving late, was already turning the Eon Clan into ruins.

“Haha! The true fisherman’s profit has been taken by the Black Alliance.”

Eon Cheong-gun had already been killed. The moment the Martial Alliance touched Neung Je-gang, the Black Alliance had occupied the Eon Clan and was putting the Eon Clan’s treasures into its hands.

“We greet Secret Shadow.”

“Who are you?”

“The Demon-Steed Branch Master told us to deliver this to you. In addition, he told us to convey that the Black Alliance is Secret Shadow’s eternal friend.”

The Black Alliance warrior took out a bundle from his bosom. Neung Je-gang gently untied it. Inside it was one book.

[True Explanation of the Small-Hand Art]

It was none other than the secret manual containing the Eon Clan’s Small-Hand Art. Surprisingly, it was the genuine article.

“Hahaha! The Demon-Steed Branch Master is indeed impressive. His scale is different from the Martial Alliance’s. Please tell him that I gratefully accept the Demon-Steed Branch Master’s goodwill.”

“Understood.”

Though it meant he had handed the Eon Clan’s wealth over to the Black Alliance, Neung Je-gang did not feel displeased. Though the Black Alliance had likely already made a copy, he had obtained the genuine Small-Hand Art.

Thunderbolt and Small-Hand had entered the hands of one person. If those two merged and became one martial art, the wall of forbidden arts would now collapse.

“Find out whether there are any survivors of the Eon Clan.”

He issued the order to the Eastern Depot. It was not because he intended to root them out entirely. He thought to at least prevent the Eon Clan’s lineage from being cut off. Unfortunately, however, the Black Alliance found every person who used the surname “Eon” and did not leave them alive.

“The situation has turned strange. The Eastern Depot started it, but the Black Alliance finished it.”

In any case, the Jinju Eon Clan disappeared completely like this. It was not that there were no survivors, but that survivor too lived on after changing his surname and name. Officially, the Jinju Eon Clan, which had been a martial family, no longer existed.