Chapter 48

Ak Mu-jin raised his right hand sharply without answering.

At that, one of the subordinates standing like a folding screen stepped forward.

In his hand was a long iron staff. A demon figure carved from green jade hung from it.

The moment Ak Mu-jin received it, the believers let out a mad cheer.

“It is the Green Jade Divine Staff!”

“The Cult Leader’s sacred relic!”

“The Three Divine Relics are all assembled! The Longevity God will descend!”

Behind a religious power that grows with abnormal speed, there is always a plausible trick.

Ak Mu-jin had been running a crafty pseudo-religious scheme, and the so-called Three Divine Relics were its core.

The mask was said to house the Longevity God’s spirit and allow him to receive divine revelations.

His body was said to be under the Longevity God’s protection and thus could never be wounded.

And the Green Jade Divine Staff was said to have been wielded personally by the Longevity God and could never bend or be cut.

It was all absurd, but two of those claims were believable enough.

The Rotting Corpse Body Art did in fact have the ability to make the body as hard as adamant, and the Green Jade Divine Staff was such a monstrously thick and solid iron club that it would not bend or be cut by ordinary blows.

But that is what makes life interesting.

I had a trump card that could neutralize all three of those Divine Relics.

Namely this cold-iron dagger I had received from Wi Geum-myeong.

“With the Longevity God’s authority, I shall execute you!”

Ak Mu-jin shouted as he raised the Green Jade Divine Staff high.

The believers’ shouts swelled as if to pierce the sky.

I gave a faint smile.

That blind cheering would instead become a double-edged blade that dragged Ak Mu-jin down.

“Hoo.”

Tightening my grip on the cold-iron dagger, I recalled the essence of Insect Courage.

There was no retreat.

There were no fixed forms, no path of withdrawal, no defense.

It was only a lethal killing art that instinctively found the shortest, most optimal path toward the opponent’s vital point.

That was Insect Courage.

Pat!

Kicking off the ground, I moved to attack a step ahead of Ak Mu-jin.

As the Soul-Extinguishing Flash Steps unfolded, I closed the distance to right before him in an instant.

Through the mask, I could clearly see Ak Mu-jin’s eyes fly wide.

Thanks to the staff’s length, the advantage in reach was his.

However, that advantage was nullified by speed he could not have imagined and a head-on momentum that cared nothing for defense.

He reflexively swung the Green Jade Divine Staff, but he was too late.

Before the staff could even touch me, I had already slipped into his chest range and thrust the dagger.

Ak Mu-jin twisted his body with all his strength, but he could not avoid it completely.

Kkang!

With a dull scraping sound, the dagger grazed his side.

Thanks to the Rotting Corpse Body Art it left no sword wound, but I did not miss the faint groan Ak Mu-jin let out.

‘It worked.’

It had not been for nothing that I had scuffled with him in the rain.

I had been checking his attainment to see whether the cold-iron dagger would work.

The result was just as I had expected.

The first strike had failed to wound him, but the next blow would surely tear flesh and draw blood.

The believers, who had no way of knowing any of this, continued to pour out frenzied cheers.

“As expected of the Cult Leader!”

“An attack like that will never work! The Cult Leader is invincible!”

‘Enjoy it all you want. It will end soon enough.’

What mattered most to me was uprooting the Longevity Cult itself.

To do that, it was not enough to simply defeat Ak Mu-jin.

I had to completely smash the illusion he had built up with lies.

His body, his staff, his mask.

Each time one of these three Divine Relics was shattered, the believers would come to realize it.

That there was no such thing as a Longevity God, and that everything they had believed in was a mirage.

Like a castle built on sand, the Longevity Cult would collapse from its foundations.

“What is this martial art? Its moves have no fixed pattern, yet they are this fierce… Who in the world devised such a thing?”

Ak Mu-jin asked in horror.

He seemed to have grasped Insect Courage’s lethal power.

Well, after taking a blow without any way to respond, he could hardly react otherwise.

“Do you know how a yellow bee kills a giant wasp?”

“What are you talking about?”

“If you do not, forget it.”

I did not reply any further and charged in again.

Ak Mu-jin carefully adjusted his grip on the Green Jade Divine Staff.

Even so, he could not withstand Insect Courage’s momentum and kept retreating again and again.

No, or so I thought.

Hwoong!

Just then, the Green Jade Divine Staff traced an abnormal trajectory. The demon figure hurtled straight toward the spot under my nose.

Reflexively, I swung the cold-iron dagger and struck the side away.

Karang!

A sharp metallic clang rang out and my upper body shook from the impact.

I had managed to deflect the staff’s path, but I had not fully endured the internal energy behind Ak Mu-jin’s counter.

Inwardly, I swept a hand over my chest in relief.

A battle between masters could be overturned in a single instant.

My face had almost been split like a watermelon.

Hwhoong!

Ak Mu-jin’s iron staff traced a heavy arc as it came crashing down at my head again.

I almost used Whirling Wind Fluttering Leaf Steps to evade, then changed my mind.

In the essence of Insect Courage, the Heavenly Demon had taught me, there was no such thing as evading.

Raising my fighting spirit, I hurled my body straight into the gust thrown off by the Green Jade Divine Staff.

Now the only thing filling my mind was Ak Mu-jin.

I drew the shortest distance between him and me in my head and moved along it.

I squeezed through the spaces I could see between the sweeping arcs of the staff.

My clothes snapped in the wind pressure, and as I brushed the staff again and again, my skin split and bruises bloomed.

But I did not stop.

I kept surging in, slashing, stabbing, and slashing again.

Was he crushed by my momentum that threw aside regard for my life?

Before I knew it, Ak Mu-jin’s sharp offense had turned entirely into defense trying to block me.

The result of that change was obvious.

Puhwak!

At last, the cold-iron dagger sliced Ak Mu-jin’s side.

With a pained groan bursting from beneath the mask, black blood reeking of rot spurted out.

It had broken through the peerless defensive art, the Rotting Corpse Body Art.

“……”

The fanatical shouts of the believers that had been shaking the altar cut off as if it were a lie.

They were all seeing their cult leader bleed with their own eyes, yet they could not believe what they were seeing.

“Guard Im, tell the believers this. That there was never any such thing as the Longevity God’s protection. That your cult leader is not invincible, he has only cultivated a special martial art. That before a blade, he is nothing more than a man who spills blood.”

“Y-yes!”

Im Yeon quickly shouted as I had instructed.

With that, the silence shattered.

Voices full of confusion poured out from the believers.

“Shut up, Demon Cult lackey!”

“T-the Cult Leader is bleeding!”

“That makes no sense! How can a body blessed by the Longevity God bleed?”

“The Cult Leader is invincible. He has to be.”

Most of the believers were shaken.

However, Ak Mu-jin did not seem inclined to end it here.

He pressed a pressure point to staunch the blood at his side, then shouted loudly to the believers.

“The Longevity God’s power is unchanged! I shall soon execute that fiend and prove the Longevity God’s greatness, so do not be shaken by the vile tricks of a Demon Cult spy!”

In reality, the one most shaken was Ak Mu-jin himself.

Turning his head away from the believers, he glared at me while gasping for breath.

I spoke toward him.

“How about we stop here. It seems your believers’ faith is already broken.”

“Not yet.”

Ak Mu-jin’s eyes gleamed savagely.

“Your true enemy is not me, it is the Elder Council Lord. To be honest, my relationship with him is not good either. So disband the Longevity Cult and return to the main Cult. Then I will help you take the revenge you want so badly.”

One of the reasons I had taken on this mission was precisely the Elder Council Lord.

If it were the former Ghost-Face Unit Leader Ak Mu-jin, he could sufficiently disperse the checks and restraints aimed at me.

“I do not trust Demon Cult scum.”

“Well, then it cannot be helped. We will just have to take this to the end.”

Ak Mu-jin rejected my offer out of hand.

It was the answer I had expected.

I dashed forward and swung the dagger.

My target was the exact center of the Green Jade Divine Staff. I intended to split it cleanly in two.

Kkang!

The cold-iron dagger scraped across the staff.

It bounced off, leaving only a shallow groove.

Ak Mu-jin truly was a master seasoned in real combat.

He blocked my attacks with the Green Jade Divine Staff while exploiting openings to drive in knee strikes or momentarily release one hand to send out palm strikes.

He had found his own way to counter it.

Because of that, wounds grew all over my body.

My abdomen was struck, my forearm was hit. It was a mess.

Even in the midst of that, I stubbornly aimed for the same spot.

The cold-iron dagger was steadily shaving away at the iron staff.

Perhaps thinking the tide had turned, Ak Mu-jin shouted loudly.

“This is the power of the Longevity God!”

But it was then.

Kang!

A sound completely unlike before rang out.

Ak Mu-jin’s gaze dropped to the exact center of his Green Jade Divine Staff.

“Th-this!”

The eyes beneath the mask filled with shock.

Only now had he noticed what had happened to the Green Jade Divine Staff.

‘Too late.’

Drawing up as much as half a year’s worth of my remaining internal energy, I brought the cold-iron dagger down.

Jjeojeong!

With a tearing crack, the Green Jade Divine Staff broke in two.

“……!”

Two of the Three Divine Relics had been shattered.

“U-urgh, uooooh!”

Ak Mu-jin roared like a beast and charged in barehanded.

His composure had been completely smashed, only rage remained in his movements.

Now all he had left was the mask.

Letting his charge slide past to the side, I wrung out my last strength and swung the dagger at his face.

Pasak!

In the next moment, Ak Mu-jin’s mask split along a clean diagonal and fell to the floor.

“……!”

Ak Mu-jin touched his own face.

On that face carved with a thick sword scar, shock, rage, pain, and other expressions flickered by.

I placed the cold-iron dagger against his neck.

“It’s over.”

Ak Mu-jin could not answer.

It was because everything that had kept him clinging to life had ended in this moment.

I took the dagger from his neck and turned my body.

My legs buckled and I nearly collapsed.

Im Yeon hurried over to support me, but I raised a hand to show I was fine.

Looking down at the area beneath the altar, I shouted loudly.

“Everyone, clear your heads and look closely at this face. This man is not the Longevity Cult Leader but Ak Mu-jin, the former Ghost-Face Unit Leader of the Divine Cult. All that talk of the Longevity God and the Three Divine Relics was nonsense he made up to use you.”

When my shout ended, an unreal silence fell over the clearing that was hard to believe for a crowd of thousands.

Soon the believers began to murmur.

“T-the Cult Leader was the Ghost-Face Unit Leader?”

“He is from the Demon Cult… how can something so absurd be true!”

“Are you saying all the Three Divine Relics were fakes? Then what about the Longevity God?”

“Cult Leader! What is the meaning of this!”

“Is what that man says true?”

Questions and doubts rained down, but Ak Mu-jin’s lips did not so much as twitch.

He only stood there in a daze, like a man whose soul had left him.

Just then, someone shouted.

“What are you asking for? Can you not see? It was all a load of crap. How could the Three Divine Relics shatter that easily if it were real?”

“Yeah! The Cult Leader, no, that bastard, he is the one who made fools of us!”

The shockwave spread.

Those who had blindly believed in Ak Mu-jin until now were beginning to turn on him fiercely.

Gritting his teeth, Ak Mu-jin threw both arms up.

“Everything the Heavenly Demon’s disciple says is a lie! The Longevity God will lead you to salvation!”

After the Three Divine Relics had been broken, his cry was already hollow.

Perhaps his subordinates felt the same as I did.

One of the masked men opened his mouth.

“Unit Leader. This is enough.”

With his only arm, he removed his mask and continued.

“We stayed with you because it pained us that our dead comrades were gone, but in truth I did not like this from the beginning. I would like you to stop using these people now.”

On the man’s face, marked by a thick scar running across it and the stench of corpses.

The light in the eyes of that man with such a strange combination began to fade in misery.