The Price Of Youthful Folly

Every hair on my body stood up.

Not one of the Demonic Cult martial artists I met at the Hohyeon Estate had been able to dodge the paper I scattered with the Nine Nether Spirit-Snatching Finger. The ones I had run into now batted it aside with their swords. Some still died with their heads holed through by paper thrown from behind, of course, but from the front it did not work.

They are at this level?

I went taut with tension.

No wonder the Paeng Clan’s martial artists, strong as they are said to be, are dying off, and the Jegal Clan has been all but wiped out, and half the Wudang Sect’s Daoists are dead too. A truly fearsome thing.

At first I had not much believed the talk of amplifying innate true qi twofold and making a man twice as strong. Having actually collided with them, I thought differently.

If we cannot find an answer to this, the Murim Alliance falls to the Demonic Cult.

A Demonic Cult martial artist rushed me, and I kicked up a sword rolling on the ground.

— Cha-cha-chang!

As I fell back, I unfolded Myriad Illusions in a Single Flash and drove the sword into the chest of the man coming in at me.

“Khuk!”

The fellow seized my sword in both hands, so I split his body then and there with Skyflash Parting the Sea and took the neck of the Demonic Cult martial artist closing in from my right. Two of them gone in an instant, and the rest faltered.

“Elder brother!”

Paeng So-un had recognized me from up ahead, blood streaming down him, and was shouting.

“Elder brother! It is I, Paeng So-un!”

“I know! Stop shouting and put your mind on the battle!”

At my shout Paeng So-un shut his mouth. A hurt look came into his eyes, but with a Demonic Cult martial artist driving in at him he too turned his mind back to the fight.

At this rate they all die.

Three Paeng Clan escorts still stood around Paeng So-un, and three were not enough to hold off Demonic Cult martial artists. Jegal Do-won had two left, and both were wounded badly enough that there was no telling when they would go down. Five of the Wudang Sect’s ten were alive and holding, though they lurched from one close call to the next. Against that the Demonic Cult men still came to some seventy, and by numbers alone they were overwhelming.

Let this go on a little longer and the Paeng Clan, Jegal Clan and Wudang Sect martial artists under attack would be killed to the last man.

There is nothing for it.

There was no help for it now but to show my full strength. I took the inner elixirs out of the leather pouch and tossed them up. Then I swept my fingers this way and that through the air.

Oh Ju-hyang’s flesh crawled at the sight of that scholar fellow, the one who had handed her a taste of defeat at Hefei. From sheer delight. To meet here, of all places, the man she wanted to tear apart and kill. Proof, if she needed it, that heaven was helping her.

Her business in Hunan Province was finished and she had been on the point of crossing into Sichuan to dispose of the Kunlun Sect’s remnants when she caught sight of the Paeng Clan, Jegal Clan and Wudang Sect greenhorns and thought of taking them hostage. To leave prey this appetizing and walk on would be a hunter abandoning her duty. And to run into the enemy from Hefei on top of that, a man she had never thought to see, felt like a windfall.

She was still working over how to dress up the fellow’s end when he drew something out and scattered it into the air.

— Thock-thock-thock-thock-thock!

Every time he swept a hand through the air, the sound of flesh being torn came from here and there.

“What is this!”

A blood mist bloomed up wherever a bead passed through one of her followers, and one after another they went down. Oh Ju-hyang cried out in shock.

“Block them!”

The Demonic Cult martial artists tried to block the inner elixirs, but the beads came too fast.

They cannot block them. I am turning three spirit energies at their fullest.

Spirit energy filled his body as Cheon Tae-san set three spirit energies turning, and a tremendous spirit force came pouring out of him. The destructive force the inner elixirs carried on that spirit force was not to be blocked, not even by innate true qi amplified twofold. Only then did the Demonic Cult martial artists break off their attack on the Paeng Clan, the Jegal Clan and the Wudang Sect and turn it on him.

Good!

“Kill them! Kill the Demonic Cult bastards!”

The Dang Sect warriors had joined late, and they came at the Demonic Cult martial artists from the rear. That bought a little breathing room.

But Dang Jin-ok had mistaken one thing. Seeing the scholar sweep the Demonic Cult martial artists aside single-handed, he had taken their measure far too lightly.

“No! Do not come!”

Dang Jin-ok and Dang Ga-ryeong were formidable in the hidden-weapon arts. But for Dang Jin-ok to look at Oh Ju-hyang and taunt her was crossing the line.

“Are you the Demonic Cult’s leader! Come here! I will take your head off for you.”

Oh Ju-hyang’s eyes left Cheon Tae-san and turned toward Dang Jin-ok, and Cheon Tae-san shouted.

“Young Master Dang, fall back! She is not an opponent you can take!”

But he had not known those words would touch Dang Jin-ok’s pride. Even so, Cheon Tae-san shouted again to save him. A man cannot stake his life on one moment’s pride, surely.

“She is the Demonic Cult’s Fourteenth Pavilion Master!”

Dang Jin-ok checked for a moment at that, then ground his teeth and advanced on Oh Ju-hyang. That scholar fellow was sweeping Demonic Cult martial artists away like a man possessed; could he not do as much himself? And he of the Dang Sect’s direct line, no less.

I will show them the power of the Dang Sect’s direct line! What manner of man I, Dang Jin-ok, am!

Dang Jin-ok had lived his whole life thinking himself the best, and there was no falling back in him.

Dang Ga-ryeong caught at his collar.

“Brother, she is a Demonic Cult Pavilion Master! Just as Scholar Cheon says, this is no time for bravado.”

If anything, those words set fire to Dang Jin-ok’s bravado. A resolute light settled in his eyes.

“Take that one and the fight can be ended. This Dang Jin-ok can do it.”

A greed had risen in him to end this losing fight with his own hands, and he believed he held the skill for it. Only lately had he reached the level of holding ten directions at once and loosing hidden weapons from them.

The Ten-Direction Flower Rain!

A shabby thing, set beside the Sky-Filling Flower Rain, and yet that was a level of attainment only the clan head and a few elders could reach even within the Dang Sect. The Ten-Direction Flower Rain alone, he reckoned, was more than anyone could block. When he completed it, even the clan’s elders had been unsparing with their praise. A genius had come out of the Dang Sect, they said.

“Hiyah!”

Dang Jin-ok sprang up into the air in fine spirits and swung both hands fast. Every hidden weapon in his breast, at his waist, in his sleeves, at his shoulders, thighs and ankles was loosed at Oh Ju-hyang. They came in every color, and they painted a scene like flower petals sent flying.

“Kheh, kheh, kheh! Now that is beautiful. Indeed, the Dang Sect knows the aesthetics of death.”

Oh Ju-hyang drew her fingernails out long with the Blood Jade Claw and came on toward Dang Jin-ok.

— Tak-ta-ta-ta-tang!

The hidden weapons making for her major meridians she batted away; the ones flying at parts that would not kill her she did not block at all. They were of a level even Oh Ju-hyang could not turn aside entirely, but they were not enough to bring her down.

“Brother! Dodge!”

Dang Ga-ryeong threw hidden weapons and put herself in the way to save him. The Blood Jade Claw trailed dozens of blood-lights as it bore down on Dang Jin-ok, and even against her joint attack it drove into his blind spot.

— Snick!

At the ghastly feel of long fingernails grazing past his body, Dang Jin-ok jerked back.

— Plop!

But his right arm, on its way to his waist to draw a dagger, dropped limply to the ground. None of it felt real. Then Dang Jin-ok grasped that the thing was his own arm, and his face twisted. Shame came before the pain.

“Uwaaah!”

Dang Ga-ryeong came quickly to him and sealed the points at his shoulder to stop the bleeding.

“Kheh, kheh, kheh, where does a whelp of a boy get the nerve to try and put a blade in me.”

She had taken Dang Jin-ok’s arm, but a great many hidden weapons were buried all over Oh Ju-hyang too, and her front was soaked red with blood.

— Sway!

Oh Ju-hyang’s frame swayed for a moment.

It was then that Jegal Do-won, who had been behind her, drove in at her back like a thunderbolt.

Of Jegal Do-won’s fifteen escort warriors all but two were dead, and he had taken a heavy wound himself. Fall back now, as things stood, and he would be branded for life as the sorry wretch the Demonic Cult men had gotten the better of, so he kept his eye on Oh Ju-hyang. Kill a Demonic Cult Pavilion Master and that ill name would be washed away; he would be looked up to as a hero. So he judged her badly hurt, and threw himself in.

“No! It is a trick!”

Cheon Tae-san shouted.

Oh Ju-hyang had always taken pleasure in drawing an opponent out that way and killing him. Jegal Do-won, who did not know how she fought, had fallen for the sly trick at once.

Oh Ju-hyang grinned. A gnat had blundered into her web, and she swung the hair braided long in two plaits.

Cheon Tae-san shot an inner elixir off his hand at once. One elixir flicked one braid aside, and a second struck the other away.

— Diiing!

Mercifully the hair meant for Jegal Do-won’s neck was turned off its line. But it wound round his left forearm and yanked.

— Wrrrench!

The bone broke and the left forearm was torn away.

“Gaaaargh!”

As Oh Ju-hyang swung her hair again and made for Jegal Do-won, Cheon Tae-san called in every inner elixir that had been handling the Demonic Cult warriors and poured them all at her. He spent spirit energy until all thirteen spirit meridians ached, and the twenty-odd elixirs gave off light.

— Fwing-fwing-fwing-fwing-fwing!

Oh Ju-hyang must have thought the hidden weapons Cheon Tae-san had loosed were no ordinary thing, for she blocked with all her strength.

— Thock-thock-thock-thock!

She dragged in two Demonic Cult warriors standing beside her and offered them up as the elixirs’ sacrifice.

Cheon Tae-san kicked up a sword from the ground, caught it, and unfolded the Boundless Azure Sky Sword Technique’s Flying Dragon Crossing the Sea.

— Whoom!

A vast spirit energy poured off the sword and took shape. An azure dragon shone blue and fell upon Oh Ju-hyang.

And he shot the inner elixirs up into the air again and set them on the Demonic Cult martial artists around him.

— Pa-pa-pa-pow!

Bodies burst and heads blew apart, and as they went down the ground in front of him emptied like a cavern.

— Kooong!

Oh Ju-hyang took Cheon Tae-san’s azure dragon, and her clothes were torn to pieces.

“Hurrgh!”

Oh Ju-hyang spilled out a clot of blood. In front of her several Demonic Cult warriors lay dead, crushed to pulp. This time too she had made shields of her own men.

As Cheon Tae-san came on toward Oh Ju-hyang, the Demonic Cult warriors ringed her all at once and threw themselves at him.

“Get the Pavilion Master away!”

Cheon Tae-san scattered inner elixirs without mercy at the Demonic Cult warriors rushing him.

“Fourteenth Pavilion Master Oh Ju-hyang! I said that the next time I saw you I would send you to the underworld! I am keeping that promise now!¹”

Cheon Tae-san lifted his body into the air. Then, screening it with a hand, he spat out the Flying Dantian and flicked it away with the Nine Nether Spirit-Snatching Finger.

— Whoosh!

The Flying Dantian flew at Oh Ju-hyang like a lightning bolt. The Demonic Cult warriors raised their swords as one and struck at it.

— Cla-cla-cla-cla-clang!

But it carried spirit energy and force driven to their utmost by three spirit energies turning, and better than thirty years of internal force besides, so they could not flick the Flying Dantian aside.

— Kra-kra-kra-kra-kraang!

It broke every sword the Demonic Cult warriors swung and flew on for Oh Ju-hyang’s forehead.

Oh Ju-hyang wrung out all her internal force and unfolded body-protecting qi. A transparent qi screen formed around her.

— Whump!

But the Flying Dantian went through even her body-protecting qi and struck her forehead.

— Cruuunch!

Oh Ju-hyang’s forehead caved in. Perhaps because it had lost force breaking through the body-protecting qi, the Flying Dantian failed to punch through and fell away. Blood shot up out of her forehead like a fountain.

As the Demonic Cult martial artists turned their heads on Cheon Tae-san as one and raised their killing intent, he moved the Flying Dantian and put it into her mouth. That was so he could fix her position even if she fled. Of late he could feel the Flying Dantian even when it was far away from him.

The Demonic Cult martial artists set themselves to attack Cheon Tae-san all together. He spread both arms and cried out with a grand air.

“Come, O evil! I will return you to nature!”

Some of them made to throw themselves at Cheon Tae-san, but a Demonic Cult man who seemed to hold high rank spoke.

“The Pavilion Master’s safety comes first! We fall back for now!”

At that the Demonic Cult martial artists bit their lips, hoisted Oh Ju-hyang up between them and carried her off the field.

Dang Jin-ok cried out to the surviving Dang Sect warriors.

“Chase them down and kill them!”

Ragged as their bodies were, the Dang Sect warriors gathered themselves to obey Dang Jin-ok’s order.

“Stop!”

Dang Ga-ryeong spoke to Dang Jin-ok.

“Brother, come to your senses! Work your temper off like this and our brothers all die!”

At that Dang Jin-ok came sharply to himself. These were all his blood, and no strangers.

“Curse it!”

It galled Dang Jin-ok to let the woman who had cut off his right arm walk away.

“Brother, we are not the only ones. There are many worse off than we are.”

At his younger sister’s words Dang Jin-ok looked at the Paeng Clan, the Jegal Clan and the Wudang Sect Daoists.

The sight was ghastly. The Paeng Clan and the Jegal Clan of the Five Great Clans, and the Wudang Sect that held the first seat of the Nine Great Sects, had been all but wiped out.

Cheon Tae-san watched Dang Jin-ok take comfort from the sight of them, and clicked his tongue inwardly.

Taking pleasure in another man’s misfortune is only human, but a man must rise above it to become truly great.

Cheon Tae-san looked out over ground where blood had sprayed in every direction, and his mind grew troubled.