Single-Instant Blade

Chapter 74 : One Step Up (4)

Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoooosh!

Round objects floated up from the river.

The objects soon changed into human form. Their limbs stretched out, and they cut through the water and climbed up to the riverbank.

One person, one person… and another person.

Nearly thirty water demons stepped onto the riverbank.

They glared at the forest where the man and woman had disappeared.

“Shall we chase them?”

“That’s enough. We’re done here.”

One of the water demons said coldly.

“Too many of our brothers have died unexpectedly. We must take revenge.”

“Engrave it in your heart.”

“…”

“Ah Geol, Mongseol. These two are forever the enemies of the Water Dragon Gang. All the people and all the things related to these two are enemies. From now on, those guys will not be able to rest easy in any water. What about the damage?”

“Twenty-seven. Twenty-five brothers were hit by Ah Geol, and two were hit by Mongseol. It’s absurd, but… it’s an unknown blade and an unknown sword. We have recovered the bodies of our brothers.”

“Unknown blade, unknown sword. Hmm…!”

The water demon groaned.

They, the water ghosts, could not recognize the opponent’s blade art or sword art.

Those two executed amazing martial arts. But it was a martial art they had never seen before. They couldn’t even think of a martial art similar to that. It was a completely new martial art.

I heard that they had escaped from the Third Lord’s grasp.

From then on, I thought that this pursuit would not be easy. While I was on the pursuit, I felt uneasy, as if I had gone to the bathroom and had not wiped myself. So when I met the two, I was just going to watch.

A fight had broken out by chance.

I had told them to just watch, but there were those who had thought of catching them.

Well… they were ordinary people, so I thought that it would be okay to catch them with this level. Moreover, the man was heavy with a severe injury.

I could fully understand the water demons who had stepped forward to catch them.

Looking only at the result, I should have just watched as I had thought.

So I won’t chase them anymore. The land was not the territory of the Water Dragon Gang, so there was nothing to be hesitant about.

“Send a message.”

“Yes!”

“Write down the part about the unknown blade and the unknown sword in detail, and also write down the facts of the damage. Sixty came and twenty-seven died, so we’ve done what we could. We’ve done our job. Let’s go back!”

The water demon turned around and walked back into the water.

* * *

A coffin was placed in the forest.

It was not one or two coffins. Although it was not a cemetery, coffins were placed here and there in the forest.

“Mourning Guest!”

Mongseol muttered, frowning.

“How many?”

Ah Geol asked abruptly.

“Huh? What?”

“Have you counted how many coffins there have been so far?”

“Forty-seven. Shall we stop this test now? Even so, I’m the Garden Master of the Drunken Flower Garden, isn’t the test too much?”

“Haha, alright, let’s stop now.”

Ah Geol laughed.

Then Mongseol smiled brightly and took Ah Geol’s hand. And she brought her face close and said, “Thank you.”

“W-What?”

Ah Geol was flustered by Mongseol bringing her face close and stuttered.

Mongseol said, “I know what you’re checking. You’re checking whether the Mud Pill One Sword is scattered or well-fixed, right? The words to stop the test were just words, so keep watching. It’s reassuring.”

“Alright. Alright, so your face…”

Ah Geol pulled his head back.

“Hohoho! Seeing you flustered by this, I guess you have no experience with women?”

“W-What!”

“Hohoho! Hohohoho!”

Mongseol giggled and laughed brightly.

There were forty-seven coffins in the forest. In the coffins lay the murderers called Mourning Guests.

The Mourning Guest was called the First Guest of the Dead World.

It meant that they were the most honored guests that the ghosts welcomed. Because they gave plenty of bodies to be food for the ghosts.

There were low-level, mid-level, and high-level Mourning Guests.

The way to distinguish them was very easy.

Ten kills was a mourning flag, twenty kills was a coffin bearer, and thirty kills was entering the coffin.

If you killed ten people, you were given a mourning flag. You could form a connection with a funeral home. But you were not yet qualified to receive a ghost. Just carry the flag. Announce death.

If you achieved twenty kills, you were a coffin bearer. You were given a coffin. But you were not qualified to use the coffin. You had to drag the coffin around. You walked around, keenly feeling death.

Only after surpassing thirty kills did you finally enter the coffin. You could lie down and rest in the coffin. You also slept in the coffin. You lived with death. Because you had come to know death that much.

There were forty-seven coffins, forty-seven people who had entered the coffin.

If you added up the number of people they had killed, it would reach a whopping one thousand five hundred. Since they didn’t count the number from entering the coffin, it would be much more than that, not less.

Clatter! Clatter! Clatter!

The coffins opened.

There were people inside. Of course, they were living people. But they were as stiff as dead people. Their complexions were pale, even bluish. They were faces that had not seen the sun at all.

Although the coffin lids had opened, the people did not get up. They lay there like dead people with their eyes tightly closed.

“Ugh!”

Suddenly, Mongseol retched and stepped back.

When the wooden coffin opened, a strong smell of rotting corpses wafted out. At first, she hadn’t known, but soon a terrible stench pierced her nose.

“It’s corpse poison. Stop breathing.”

Ah Geol didn’t even need to say it. Mongseol had already stopped breathing and was glaring at the corpses.

“Kikik! Kikikik!”

The corpse lying in the wooden coffin let out an unpleasant laugh and sat up.

Its two eyes were green like a snake’s eyes. Its lips were so red that it looked as if they had been smeared with ink. Its skin was as white as if it had been powdered, and its tongue was completely black.

The study they had trained in was called the Yin Kissing Art. It was a study that was trained while receiving the energy of death.

They lived with a corpse by their side to train in the Yin Kissing Art.

They slept with the dead, and ate. They didn’t care if the corpse rotted. Rather, they were even more engrossed in receiving the corpse qi. They also extracted corpse poison from the corpse.

These were the unorthodox path.

The martial world would immediately kill them if they saw them. Because they trained in an unconventional martial art called the Yin Kissing Art, which was outside of ethics, and because the mental state of those who had trained in the Yin Kissing Art also became strange.

How had these people joined the Sacred Sword Sect’s pursuit?

If the Sacred Sword Sect had mobilized them, the Sacred Sword Sect deserved the criticism of the martial world. It was a serious problem where they would have nothing to say even if a fellow martial artist of the martial world took down the Sacred Sword Sect’s sign.

“Be careful of the corpse poison.”

“Alright!”

Mongseol said cheerfully and launched her body.

* * *

Peok! Peok!

He cut the chest with the half-iron blade. But it did not cut. The chest was as hard as if it were wearing armor.

It was the effect of the Yin Kissing Art.

It filled the body with corpse qi and killed its elasticity. It made the skin stiff. Then, a hardness similar to the external martial art, the Iron Cloth Shirt, was acquired.

“You’re really making me angry today.”

Shwiiit!

Ah Geol shot up into the air.

Shwit! Shwit! Shwit!

At the same time as he launched his body, a nine-section whip followed.

A blade also followed. It passed, cutting his back. He also felt a sharp energy on his head. A large axe, a great axe, was striking.

Paaat!

Ah Geol struck down with the half-iron blade without any hesitation.

The blade of the twenty-first Single-Instant Sect Master, the Falling Flower Blade, fell. It split the Mourning Guest’s head in half.

Shriik!

The blade that had been aiming for his back passed by his feet. The great axe also struck the empty air where there was nothing. Only the nine-section whip that had rushed in first had struck the half-iron blade.

Taang!

The nine-section whip was cut in half. And with the following blade, the Mourning Guest’s head was split in half.

Even the Yin Kissing Art was cut by the Falling Flower Blade.

Chwirit! Chwirit! Tang tang tang! Tang tang tang tang!

The Mourning Guests’ offensive rushed in fiercely. They stuck to him without even giving him a moment to breathe.

“Hook!”

Mongseol calmly executed the Mud Pill One Sword.

Six had stuck to her. The six fiercely struck with their weapons as if they were experts in combined attacks. Since she was surrounded by the six, it was also easy to attack.

First, it was urgent to get out of the encirclement.

Mongseol could not get out of the encirclement.

Although she was also fast, the Mourning Guests were also fast. She barely received the rush of the six with one sword. She was struggling to face the murderers who each had a killing record of over thirty.

But if you looked a little more calmly, you would notice something strange.

Mongseol’s breath was not rough. Although the Mourning Guests’ attacks were as fast as a ray of light, she was facing them very calmly.

Her sword cut off the flow of the attack.

Before the opponent’s weapon could even come close, she would cut off the path and rush to the next weapon.

Although the Mourning Guests seemed to be attacking loudly, in reality, they had no gains at all.

In the meantime, on one side, the Mourning Guests continued to die. One by one… they died slowly, but already eight had fallen.

Ah Geol’s blade was a one-shot kill.

Since the Mourning Guests had trained in the Yin Kissing Art, he had no choice but to use a tyrannical blade.

A powerful blade that could even split a rock!

No matter how hard the Mourning Guests were, there was no way they would not fall.

* * *

‘…Look at this guy?’

Seori Hyeonggae smirked.

Ah Geol had gotten stronger. It had only been a month since he had been hit by him, but he had grown considerably in that time.

A month ago, he had a strong feeling of imitating a form.

He was still immature. But he had gotten much better. Still, now he had the feeling of using his own blade.

‘Huhu! The one our master chose is different. Was Dongbak the only mistake our master made?’

Seori Hyeonggae crossed his arms and leisurely watched the fight.

The Mourning Guests had come to a place where they would die. It was not the death that the Mourning Guests talked about, but a real death had come.

They would all die.

Since the Sacred Sword Sect had used the Mourning Guests, they would die even if they won, and they would die even if they lost. If they lost, they would die at Ah Geol’s hands, and if they won, they would die at the Third Lord’s hands. Because he had used them with the intention of killing them all.

The Third Lord probably had not thought that they would defeat Ah Geol. He had just mobilized the unorthodox path with the intention of clearly seeing what the Single-Instant Blade was.

“Get stronger. Actually, you were too weak. It’s the real taste when you clash after getting stronger.”

He had no intention of attacking Ah Geol.

Since Ah Geol had killed the Eighth Lord, Ah Geol had become the share of the Sacred Sword Sect. Unless he asked for cooperation from the Sacred Sword Sect again, he was in a position where he could not attack. Unless he could ignore Heo Dogi.

More than that… the woman! The woman was unusual.

“She uses the Blood Sword Sutra… the Drunken Flower Garden assassin, Mongseol. What is her identity? Why did the martial art of the dead Hyeonjeong appear from you? Huhu! The Sacred Sword Sect is going to have a pretty big headache. It’s going to be interesting.”

Seori Hyeonggae laughed.

He was one of the few martial artists who could recognize the Blood Sword Sutra.

Before he had put a blade to his master’s body in his youth, the Illuminating Heaven Sword of the Two Moves Decisive Sword, Heo Dogang, and the Blood Sword of Hyeonjeong had been a big mountain that he had to overcome. At that time, it had been the only sword that could face the Single-Instant Blade.

It was not strange that Mongseol’s martial arts had progressed rapidly.

Wasn’t Ah Geol by Mongseol’s side?

The Single-Instant Sect disciples had an outstanding eye for martial arts. They could grasp the pros and cons of any martial art just by looking at the starting stance. You had to have that level of eye to be a Single-Instant Sect disciple.

Ah Geol could not help with the training. But he could make her realize in one go the martial principles that she would have to realize over ten years. If she was lucky, she could also meet a fateful encounter.

Looking at Mongseol, it seemed that she had gotten a fateful encounter.

Ren and Du meridian opening?

Seeing that her internal energy had strengthened several times, and her forms had also become precise, she had gotten a considerable fateful encounter.

The Blood Sword!

“Huhuhu!”

Seori Hyeonggae watched Ah Geol and Mongseol fight. With interested eyes.

(End of Chapter)