novelraw Chapter 108 : Feeling the Waves (15)
Chapter 108 : Feeling the Waves (15)
Profound Manifestation.
In other words, it is implementation.
The human body is weak.
This was natural before accumulating the learning of martial arts, and even after accumulating martial learning, humans were so weak that they could die from a single thorn prick while walking down a path.
The reason such a human could reign at the top of the ecosystem was the invention of weapons.
This, too, was not a panacea.
There were cases in the past where a single tiger killed more than 100 people in a group.
Nevertheless, humans did their best to survive, and the result was martial arts, a combination of martial learning and weapons.
Countless martial arts were created to strengthen the body.
Breathing became a profound heart art called a heart method, and posture became a unique secret art called a technique.
In that process, humans imitated the supernatural phenomena of nature, imitated nature itself, and imitated animals.
Profound Manifestation could be said to be the pinnacle created by the result of imitating the actions of animals.
Simply following a life form stronger than oneself.
Furthermore, imbuing the body with the strengths that the life form possesses.
Thus, transcending one's own limitations.
Upon reaching the Transformation Realm, humans shed a layer of the limitations placed on their bodies.
And the moment one reaches the Profound Realm, the restriction of being human is released.
The three people here were those who had reached the realm of Profound Manifestation.
The animal they implemented was a reptile.
Among them, it was a snake.
Snakes possess scales that humans do not, the ability to detect heat, venom, and surprising elasticity.
This animal called a snake is strictly at the top of the ecosystem.
In the case of a highly venomous snake, it can kill a hundred adult men alone.
Of course, it is not possible to implement just by imitating the shape, behavior, and characteristics of a snake.
Those who have achieved this Profound Manifestation have their own secret methods, and most of them are passed down. Simply put, it could be seen as a secret method of martial arts.
However, there is a common minimum condition to achieve Profound Manifestation, and that is the use of the fine meridians.
There are approximately one billion fine meridians in the human body. They are spread throughout the body and control all human senses.
To say it again, humans are finite and incomplete beings. Of the one billion fine meridians, the number that humans utilize is less than one-tenth.
On the other hand, the fine meridians that a snake possesses do not even reach 100 million, which is one-tenth of a human's.
However, the movements they show are astonishing. They move smoothly through the ground, and when they hunt their prey, they momentarily produce tremendous speed.
What could be the reason for such things being possible?
It was in the use of the fine meridians.
Although a snake has less than 100 million fine meridians, at the moment of hunting, it activates thirty percent of its fine meridians. Thus, it obtains speed and power that it could not produce before.
This was the secret to how a snake, which is more than ten times smaller than a human, could reign at the top of the ecosystem.
Creak.
The muscles in the three men's bodies activate.
They had activated the fine meridians spread throughout their bodies.
Although that amount did not even reach twenty percent, when based on the existing ten percent, the increase was nearly double.
This meant that they had transcended the limitations of humans by twice as much.
Pabat!
The three of them kicked off the ground at once.
Their movements, sliding as if their bodies were attached to the floor, resembled the movements of a snake. A form that minimized air resistance. It was fast.
Thump!
Just then, one of them bent his legs rather excessively. In that state, he bent his waist back. And he returned his waist to its original state. As if a snake were leaping to hunt its prey. Swoosh! His waist and legs straightened out at once, and his body flew. If it were a normal human muscle, it would have ruptured long ago, but it was a possible movement because he had activated the fine meridians in his waist twice as much.
A scene as if a snake were hunting its prey.
Swish.
Only then did the Sword Empress begin to move slowly. A simple motion of moving forward and thrusting her sword. However, the result it brought about was by no means simple. The air was being cut in the direction the Sword Empress's sword was advancing. The scene looked as if space itself was being cut.
Crash!
Their respective swords clashed.
Rumble.
A huge cloud of dust rose, and the duel stage shook. The vibration was strong enough for those in the spectator seats to feel.
Whoosh! The wind blew, the dust cleared, and the scene on the duel stage was revealed. The Sword Empress's feet were embedded in the duel stage. Tururu! The opponent was floating in the air, rotating to mitigate the impact. Swish! Before the Sword Empress could even catch her breath.
The other two appeared on either side of the Sword Empress and swung their swords.
And the Sword Empress was already in a stance as if she had known this. Slice! She swung her sword twice towards the swords coming down from both sides.
The two were pushed back by the Sword Empress's sword.
Only then did the Sword Empress, who had gotten a chance to catch her breath, exhale.
Hoo.
The Sword Empress, who had pulled her feet out of the duel stage, kicked off the ground first this time.
At the end of it was Lee Yul-dok, who had become one-armed. His pupils narrowed even more. He sneered at the Sword Empress who had reached him. His body bent like a bow. And his body straightened out even faster than before. Whoosh! The sound of a whip cracking was heard from his body. To be more precise, his body was merely a launchpad. The cannonball fired as a result was his one remaining arm. His arm, drawing a perfect parabola, and the sword held at its end, advanced towards the Sword Empress.
"Die!"
Swoosh!
The sword advanced first.
Bang!
After that, the sound of the air exploding was heard.
The sound of the echo was a beat late.
This was a characteristic that appeared when the speed broke the sound barrier.
However, the expression of Lee Yul-dok, who had committed this tremendous act, was crumpled, contrary to the sneer he had just worn.
"H-how?"
The Sword Empress was precisely meeting the tip of Lee Yul-dok's thrusting sword with her own.
Lee Yul-dok's sword was showing a tremendous tremor. Soon, that tremor spread throughout Lee Yul-dok's entire body.
His startled eyes were no different from those of a criminal who had encountered something impossible to understand.
Slice.
The Sword Empress drew her sword towards him, and Lee Yul-dok's neck fell.
Maintaining the same action as the first time, the Sword Empress uttered.
"Next."
The spectator seats and the duel stage were silent.
Swish.
Only the sound of the Sword Empress kicking off the ground echoed quietly.
The Vice Master, Yuk Nam-gi, who had not expected Elder Lee Yul-dok to die so easily, instinctively took a step back when he saw the Sword Empress coming towards him.
Seeing that, the Sword Empress opened her mouth.
"An animal that has lost its momentum is nothing more than prey. Even if that predator is a snake."
The Sword Empress swings her sword. The movement was extremely slow.
Enough to make even someone who has not learned martial arts yawn.
But Yuk Nam-gi, who was opposite the Sword Empress, was not showing any movement.
No! He couldn't move, like a mouse facing a snake.
Slice.
The Sword Empress's sword cut off Yuk Nam-gi's neck.
A death too futile for a master of the Profound Realm.
Swish.
The Sword Empress immediately moved towards the last remaining opponent, the Master, Nam Ji-myeong. However, he was showing a different appearance from the two who had already died.
He was not excited like Lee Yul-dok, nor was he frightened like Yuk Nam-gi.
All living creatures in the ecosystem have their own compatibilities.
A snake has a poison that can kill an elephant, but it is a snake that is also killed by a cat that is dozens of times smaller than an elephant.
This is the difference in compatibility.
His eyes were calmly observing the situation.
The reason Lee Yul-dok and Yuk Nam-gi died was simply because their compatibility was not good.
Lee Yul-dok, in order to implement the elasticity of a snake, concentrated the fine meridians in his waist and momentarily added twice as much elasticity. As a result, he gained speed and power that he could not produce before.
However, he did not have the eyesight to see it. What's the use of being fast if there is no means to perceive it?
On the other hand, Yuk Nam-gi, seeing Lee Yul-dok die, had his momentum completely broken. He could not see the Sword Empress as she was and had turned her into a monster in his own imagination.
If he had used his abilities to the fullest, he would not have met such a futile death.
Therefore, he could calmly watch this situation.
He and the Sword Empress had good compatibility.
Apart from that, Nam Ji-myeong knew.
"It's a bluff."
Nam Ji-myeong's eyes saw through the Sword Empress. The Sword Empress had not looked well from the moment she appeared on the duel stage.
According to rumors, she had suffered a major internal injury, and there was no doctor in Hainan to treat it. Even the only doctor with potential was now on some island in Hainan, busy making salt.
Therefore, he was certain.
That's a bluff. She's making a last-ditch effort before she dies.
Look at that! A face that looks like it will collapse if you just touch it.
What gave strength to that was the ability he had gained upon reaching the Profound Manifestation.
Heat sense.
The seventh sense, beyond the five senses and the sixth sense that humans possess.
The ability to detect heat.
All living creatures possess a sense of heat.
His eyes now were looking at a slightly different world from ordinary people.
A world not dependent on sight, but a world made up solely of heat.
What had heat was red.
What had no heat was black.
What was lower than the surrounding heat was blue.
It was tinged.
There was nothing in this world that he could not see.
No matter how fleeting the moment.
Even at a speed that was impossible to see with the human eye.
In this world made of heat, it was visible!
Swish.
The Sword Empress kicks off the ground.
Her speed was still slow.
But he is not careless.
There must be some secret hidden in that sword.
The Sword Empress swings her sword.
The sword was as slow as expected, enough to make one yawn.
There was no way that Lee Yul-dok and Yuk Nam-gi, no! The two Vice Masters of the Black Heaven, would die so futilely from such a sword.
'Come! Nothing can escape my eyes!'
The slowly descending sword.
From the middle, Nam Ji-myeong's eyes saw the Sword Empress's body gradually turning red.
A living creature emits heat when it performs life activities. And when it hunts, it soars to the extreme.
The muscles of her legs, arms, and waist are gradually turning red.
This is a phenomenon that appears when contracted muscles expand.
The hand holding the hilt of the sword turns red.
This means that she is putting that much force into her hand.
From the ground she is stepping on.
From the Sword Empress's entire body.
Heat spreads.
Soon, it heats up the surroundings, the entire space.
A sight invisible to the eyes of ordinary people.
But in the field of heat sense, all of this was seen in detail, like a naked body that had shed everything.
When that heat reached its peak.
'It's coming!'
Finally, the secret revealed itself.
Swoosh.
Layers were being added to the sword.
One layer, two layers, three layers... Nam Ji-myeong momentarily stopped counting.
A qi made of at least hundreds to thousands of layers was surrounding the sword.
And they were showing a fine vibration that was difficult to perceive with the eyes. The so-called ultra-vibration! The surrounding air was being heated up tremendously by it.
'I see.'
Nam Ji-myeong found out why the two people before had lost their lives so futilely.
At a glance, that shabby-looking blow had a qi of thousands of layers vibrating, and as a result, the air around the sword was being heated up in an instant.
The estimated temperature was approximately 1,538 degrees.
This was enough heat to melt iron.
The cause of the strange phenomenon of the air being cut that he had seen before also originated from this.
If so, the way to counter that sword was very simple.
The slow appearance was a trick to make the opponent underestimate the sword and face it.
'The countermeasure is, just don't touch it!'
Nam Ji-myeong pretended to counter the sword and dodged it by a paper's breadth.
Grin!
Now, if he just raised his sword, it would be his victory.
Just then, Nam Ji-myeong felt his vision tilting.
A wet feeling was transmitted from both ears.
'Huh?'
By the time he realized that something was wrong, blood was already pouring out of his eyes, nose, and mouth.
Why?
A momentary question.
The sword had not touched his body. But his vision was turned upside down. The operation of his qi was cut off. The world of heat sense was broken.
At that moment, he could find the answer to the question just now.
'So that's what it was! The heat itself was a trick!'
The real thing about that blow was the sound wave created by the ultra-vibration of thousands of layers of sword qi, which occurred more than tens of thousands of times per second.
That's why the moment that sword got close, the Vice Masters of the Black Heaven, Lee Yul-dok and Yuk Nam-gi, couldn't do anything and had to be hit.
The semicircular canals, the organ responsible for a person's balance.
Nam Ji-myeong could tell that it had been shattered now.
In a world where balance was broken, only the Sword Empress's sword was slowly approaching him. Nam Ji-myeong squeezed his eyes shut at the sword strike that even someone who had not learned martial arts could dodge with their eyes closed. Slice. Nam Ji-myeong's neck fell.
Cough.
Right after, the Sword Empress coughed. A handful of blood was vomited from her mouth.
Swoosh.
The Sword Empress, who wiped the blood with her sleeve, looked at the seat of honor and said softly.
"Next."
The young master of the Hainan Sect, Nam Ji-hyeok, clapped his hands out of the blue in a situation where he was left alone.
Clap, clap, clap!
"Amazing! Absolutely amazing! I never imagined you could do this much with that body. No wonder you were designated as a special-grade target by the Heaven."
Leap.
Nam Ji-hyeok jumped onto the duel stage.
"Is the wound I gave you then still there?"
The Sword Empress's prediction was correct. The pirate she had seen then was definitely this young man.
The opponent did not seem to have any intention of hiding himself any longer.
As someone who had protected Hainan for a long time, the Sword Empress aimed her sword and asked.
"Who are you?"
Grinning, Nam Ji-myeong opened his mouth.
"Who do you think?"
Just one more time.
That was the maximum the Sword Empress could swing her sword.
(End of Chapter)