novelraw Chapter 123 : Murim Hall (2)
Chapter 123 : Murim Hall (2)
Chapter 123: Murim Hall (2)
The reason Sewoon did not immediately leave for the Beast Palace after finishing the business with the Jecheon Unit.
That was precisely to forge a connection with the Shrine Maiden Sect.
-I think I’ll be going to the Tang Clan with my master.
Through Surin, a member of the Jecheon Unit, he had already learned that the Shrine Maiden Sect Leader would be coming, and though he could have left right away, he had chosen to wait.
Considering the time it would take to reach the Beast Palace and the timing of the Heavenly Martial Festival, he waited until the very last moment, and finally, the Shrine Maiden Sect Leader arrived at the Tang Clan.
‘After securing the Beast Palace, the next target will be Sichuan. In that process, ties with the Shrine Maiden Sect are absolutely necessary.’
The moment he obtained the Celestial Flame Furnace, he would declare the conflict between orthodox and unorthodox.
In that case, the Qingcheng Sect, who had long sharpened their blades against him and the Tang Clan, would never sit idly by.
At the very least, he needed to engrave an impression and relationship with the Shrine Maiden Sect so that they would not raise their swords against him.
In that moment, Sewoon’s eyes gleamed.
‘Only then will I be able to unify Sichuan.’
The Mount Emei Sect, the Shrine Maiden Sect.
Except for those two sects, Sewoon intended to subjugate every orthodox and unorthodox martial sect in Sichuan Province under his rule.
Though the might of the Sichuan Tang Clan was steadily expanding, it was not yet enough to place the entire province beneath his feet.
Sewoon might have been akin to a one-man army, but his subordinates were still in the midst of rigorous training and growth.
That was why the very first stepping-stone in his grand plan had to be—
‘This place, the Beast Palace.’
At present, the only power Sewoon could obtain without a bloody war was the Beast Palace.
But to claim it, two things were required.
The first was to win the Heavenly Martial Festival, thereby earning the right of challenger and defeating the Beast Palace Lord.
In the Beast Palace, where the Law of Survival of the Strong reigned supreme, one had to prove strength.
But that alone was not enough. One final thing was required.
‘The divine artifact now lying dormant in Muramdang.’
Defeating the Beast Palace Lord was a foregone conclusion.
No matter how strong Umun Geol was, he could not possibly defeat Sewoon when he fought with his true power.
The one problem, however, was that he was currently disguised under a false identity.
Even if he became the final victor, the warriors of the Beast Palace could all rise against him, claiming he had deceived them.
He could, of course, argue that it had been inevitable to deceive the Blood Cult, but to truly and absolutely make himself their lord, he needed the divine artifact of the Beast Palace.
-The one who obtains the divine artifact of the Beast Palace shall become its true master.
That was the legend tied to the lost divine artifact of the Beast Palace.
It was a saying left behind by the founder of the Beast Palace, Chuk Yeoun, whom the warriors of the Beast Palace revered like a god.
However, as the word “lost” implied, the Beast Palace currently no longer possessed its divine artifact.
Everyone longed to recover it, yet no one had even the faintest clue as to its form.
Too many centuries had passed since it was lost. There was not a single clue as to what it even was.
But soon, because of Sewoon, they would all feel utter despair.
‘It had been right before their eyes for centuries, yet they still failed to find it.’
Step.
Found it.
Sewoon stopped walking as he strolled through Muramdang.
Swoosh.
And then he reached out toward the “divine artifacts” he had already uncovered.
‘Tch, truly, this is unbearably troublesome.’
Chilho of the Jiangshi Sect was barely holding back the irritation bubbling up inside him during his mission.
-Track Pa Taeyun’s movements. And if he enters Muramdang, make a detailed report of all the manuals he chooses.
As if being swamped with work creating Jiangshi wasn’t enough already.
He couldn’t understand why he had to waste time monitoring some useless wretch like this.
‘If that damned Sect Leader hadn’t gone around changing his face all the time, this would have been resolved instantly.’
Inwardly, he hurled every kind of insult at the Demon of Prayers, who was busy causing bizarre disturbances in the Beast Palace.
Rustle.
“…!”
But only for a moment. Suddenly, Chilho’s eyes sharpened.
At last, his surveillance target began to move.
Pa Taeyun started striding purposefully through Muramdang, where martial arts manuals were stacked like mountains.
Chilho, who had been hiding in the ceiling, silently followed him.
‘What martial art is that bastard after?’
The surveillance target moved with deliberate steps.
It seemed he already had a goal in mind from the very beginning.
Step.
As expected, he soon came to a stop.
The manuals he reached for were a set of five.
Chilho mentally engraved the names of each for his report.
‘Heh, humans really are all the same in their greed.’
He sneered coldly at Pa Taeyun, his expression one of contempt.
“Cheonya Cheokcheonmu (Thousand Wild Skies Martial Art).”
What he had chosen was none other than the martial art of the first Palace Lord, Chuk Yeoun.
The Beast Palace provided martial arts manuals to all its warriors without discrimination.
It was Chuk Yeoun who first established this law.
Revered like a god, the founder was naturally the most sought-after figure by warriors entering Muramdang, and the most frequently chosen manual was Cheonya Cheokcheonmu.
‘But it had all been meaningless.’
Cheonya Cheokcheonmu was undoubtedly an extraordinary martial art.
But for hundreds of years, not a single person had achieved mastery in it.
Though it had once shaken the Central Plains beyond the Southern Barbarians, something within it was undeniably flawed.
‘It completely contradicted the principles of all the Beast Palace’s external martial arts.’
The more one trained in it, the weaker the body became.
While the Beast Palace’s arts focused on hardening the body and strengthening the spirit, this art did the exact opposite.
The body grew frail, and the spirit was shaken.
That was why, alongside the divine artifact, Cheonya Cheokcheonmu was regarded as the greatest mystery of the Beast Palace.
The warriors of the Beast Palace had concluded that only the founder had been born with the special bones and sinews to wield such an art.
From then on, the chiefs of the Beast Palace warned every warrior entering Muramdang never to waste time on the founder’s martial art.
‘But I suppose no one gave that fool such advice.’
Truly, a worthless man.
With that, the last shred of suspicion Chilho had about Pa Taeyun disappeared completely.
Creak.
Just then, Pa Taeyun entered a private training chamber connected to Muramdang.
And at that very moment, as Chilho turned to make his report—
Tap.
‘Huh?’
Suddenly, he felt something touch the crown of his head.
It felt as though a raindrop had struck him.
Chilho reached up to wipe it away, but by then it had already evaporated without a trace.
Rustle.
Thinking nothing of it, Chilho completely exited Muramdang.
In that instant—
Woom.
From the shadows cast upon the ceiling, the figure that had remained hidden all along revealed itself.
Nameless appeared, his cold eyes fixed on the direction Chilho had vanished.
For several days, he had been carefully infecting the target with a poison that spread slowly to those nearby.
The man who became the host would return to his companions and spread the poison to them as though it were nothing more than a cold.
‘Does our damned master even realize that Senior Brother is thinking this far ahead for him?’
Shaking his head in dismay, Nameless’s figure slowly dissolved like mist.
‘It feels as though I’ve stepped into a furnace.’
That was Sewoon’s first impression upon entering the training chamber.
The main palace of the Beast Palace was built atop an area of extreme heat.
Endless, hellish geothermal heat rose up, with even sulfur tormenting those within.
Someone who had cultivated Yang Fire Qi Art would have gladly paid a fortune to train here.
If he wished, he could have used the power of the Ice Wheel Thread to lower the temperature to comfort. But Sewoon left it as it was and calmly took his place.
The training chamber resembled a small cave, just large enough for a person to move their body.
On its stone walls remained scars and cracks left behind by the previous practitioners.
Even bloodstains were visible, showing just how fiercely external martial arts had been trained here.
Without even bothering to stretch, Sewoon went straight to the matter at hand.
“Well then, let’s begin.”
Whoosh!
Sewoon hurled all five manuals of Cheonya Cheokcheonmu that he had been holding into the air.
Woom!
At the same time, the Heavenly Thread linked to his hands split into dozens of strands.
Slash!
Slash, slash!
With cutting sounds, each page was neatly sliced apart, the fragments scattering through the air like petals of cherry blossoms.
But only for a moment.
Shrrrk!
Soon, the entire walls and floor of the chamber were densely plastered with the scattered pages, without a single gap.
It looked as though he stood inside a room constructed entirely of manuals.
It was a scene as beautiful as an ink painting, but had anyone from the Beast Palace seen it, they would have flown into a rage.
To dare defile the manuals of the founder, Chuk Yeoun!
But Sewoon felt not the slightest fear.
‘This was Chuk Yeoun’s intention from the very beginning.’
Sizzle!
Sizzle!
At that moment, the pages clinging to the walls began to burn rapidly under the geothermal heat.
Normally, they should have been reduced to ash in an instant, leaving nothing behind. But instead, something strange began to happen.
Drip.
Drop.
The words of Cheonya Cheokcheonmu, densely written upon the pages, melted into droplets of liquid that began to drip downward.
Swaaa—
Those black droplets swirled around Sewoon’s body in a whirlpool.
At the same time, the message left behind by the founder Chuk Yeoun echoed in Sewoon’s mind.
-The one who obtains the divine artifact of the Beast Palace shall become its true master.
For hundreds of years, everyone in the Beast Palace had interpreted Chuk Yeoun’s words to mean a divine artifact.
But they had been mistaken.
What Chuk Yeoun meant was “the ink of the gods.”
The very ink he used to write his manuals was the true legacy he left behind.
‘It was a secret revealed by chance, when the Blood Cult forcibly moved the main palace of the Beast Palace to its own base.’
When Meng Yung, who had newly ascended as the Beast Palace Lord of the Wolf Tribe, tried to erase all traces of Umun Geol, he set fire to the main palace before leaving.
In that process, all the manuals of Cheonya Cheokcheonmu were burned, and Meng Yung lost his miraculous opportunity right before his eyes.
Sewoon, however, had learned of this from the Blood Cult’s reports in his past life.
The reason Chuk Yeoun had arranged for the one who burned his manuals to obtain the miraculous encounter was simple.
‘Only the one who recognized that the martial arts left by the ancestor were trash, and who had the courage to burn away that flaw, would be worthy of inheriting it.’
Flaaash!
Flaash!
In that instant, the black droplets pierced into Sewoon’s body like sharp spears.
The needle-like drops tore through his skin, bringing endless, excruciating pain.
Yet Sewoon did not use any technique to harden his body.
For this was the very process of accepting Chuk Yeoun’s power.
‘I must accept it all!’
Shhhh!
Shaa!
Thus, the divine ink began to etch itself into Sewoon’s flesh, like a tattoo of black calligraphy.