Chapter 208

The warriors from the adjacent wall rushed out to surround Jin Ja-gang.

“Anyone who touches that bastard right now will die.”

It was Tang Qing’s warning.

The warriors were startled by Tang Qing’s killing intent and retreated far away.

Tang Qing rose from his seat.

Tang Qing’s build was small. His height barely reached Jin Ja-gang’s shoulders.

However, the moment that small giant raised his body, Jin Ja-gang felt the illusion of a massive wall rising up.

Tang Qing faced Jin Ja-gang with the curtain between them.

The distance between Jin Ja-gang and Tang Qing was only about three steps.

Tang Qing spread both arms.

“Welcome to being born in a crazy world.”

Jin Ja-gang concentrated all his nerves and raised his internal energy.

“You’ll come to regret meeting me in such a world.”

“Ehihihihi! Hihihihi!”

Tang Qing’s hair stood on end. Tang Qing plucked a single hair from his spiky protruding locks. A long hair over two spans in length.

The moment it was held in Tang Qing’s hand, it stood stiff as a needle.

“With this single strand of hair, I’ll show you the sights of hellfire.”

“Unfortunately, I’m already well-acquainted with hell!”

Jin Ja-gang circulated his internal energy more fiercely than ever according to the principles of the Jade Void Nine Light Five Thunder Toad Technique.

Whiiiiing!

Instantly, pressure was placed on his qi and blood, beginning to cause ruptures.

Pop, pop!

Blood vessels in Jin Ja-gang’s right side burst and blood began spurting. Due to circulating internal energy to the extreme, pressure rose all the way to Jin Ja-gang’s neck, making it difficult for him to speak properly.

Jin Ja-gang placed poison needles between the fingers of both hands and prepared to shoot them at any moment.

The curtain fluttering from killing intent was bothersome to the eyes. But Tang Qing must feel the same way.

Jin Ja-gang met Tang Qing’s gaze and quickly thought about how he would attack Tang Qing.

Earlier he had seen Tang Qing push away a dagger with protective qi. However, it was certain that without concentrating his consciousness, he couldn’t properly control his protective qi. He had laughed and gotten his throat stabbed, causing him to bleed.

He would shoot four poison needles with Flying Thread Twelve Branches, but like when facing Demon Buddha Myowol, he would vary the speed of each to scatter Tang Qing’s attention.

However, the distance was too close for much variation in trajectory.

The first target would be Tang Qing’s face, his eyes. When the eyes are attacked, most people feel fear and dodge. In that gap, he would shoot two needles toward the torso, which is easy to hit but difficult to defend, and shoot another needle toward the completely unexpected instep.

If he dodged the foot attack afterward, his posture would be disrupted, then he would rush in while pushing aside the curtain…

But Tang Qing suddenly intervened in Jin Ja-gang’s mental imagery.

‘No!’

Tang Qing’s body beyond the curtain became blurred and began responding to Jin Ja-gang’s mental imagery.

Tang Qing concentrated and shot killing intent at a single point on Jin Ja-gang’s right shoulder. The internal energy contained in Flying Thread Twelve Branches became insufficient while resisting the killing intent. The finger wound he had received from Myowol before coming here throbbed.

The internal energy that needed delicate adjustment wavered. The needle thrown with his left hand flew out before the right hand. The order of the needles became completely jumbled.

The silhouette of Tang Qing behind the curtain slightly shifted his foot to avoid the needle flying toward his instep, moved the hair that had stiffened like a long needle to knock away the needles flying toward his torso.

Then finally he raised his hand and blocked the needle flying toward his eyes with the tip of his stiffened hair. The colliding needle and hair came to a complete standstill in perfect alignment.

Tang Qing glared at Jin Ja-gang and laughed.

“Ehihihihi!”

Jin Ja-gang was startled and awakened from his mental imagery.

Tang Qing was still in the same place as before, and Jin Ja-gang was the same. He was still gripping the needles in his hands. Nothing had changed.

Yet there had been consumption of internal energy. His internal energy had disappeared by half, as if someone had scooped it away.

Tang Qing wiggled his finger.

Jin Ja-gang gritted his teeth.

Grind.

To think he would be defeated in mental imagery without even actually fighting!

Jin Ja-gang concentrated again… Suddenly he focused internal energy on his right foot and kicked the threshold. The threshold was torn away and fragments of the wooden door frame became sharp hidden weapons flying toward Tang Qing. Jin Ja-gang burst through the curtain and rushed at Tang Qing.

Jin Ja-gang reached both hands behind his waist to draw his sickle and immediately swung it.

Tang Qing bent his waist backward to avoid the sickle that came horizontally. Jin Ja-gang turned his body and made horizontal circles five times. Tang Qing moved only his waist to avoid all the incoming trajectories.

Jin Ja-gang stopped turning his body and continuously struck downward at the head.

Tang Qing dodged by moving his head left and right.

Jin Ja-gang frantically pressed Tang Qing. Extreme killing intent was contained in the sickle.

But even though Jin Ja-gang poured attacks for nearly twenty seconds, he couldn’t touch a hair on Tang Qing’s head.

Jin Ja-gang cleverly threw his sickle to prevent Tang Qing from escaping, then switched to Grappling technique. Having recently learned the Grappling method, he had some confidence. He tried to make contact with Tang Qing’s hands using the first stage of linking and touching hands. However, Tang Qing withdrew his hands and wouldn’t engage.

He knew Jin Ja-gang was trying to fight and simply wouldn’t respond at all.

Jin Ja-gang curved his fingers like claws and tried to grab Tang Qing’s throat.

Suddenly his middle fingertip became hot as if on fire. Tang Qing had stabbed under Jin Ja-gang’s fingernail with his stiffened hair. About two inches of the two-span-long hair had penetrated.

‘Gugh!’

His entire right arm caught fire. Pain came as if struck by lightning and burned instantly.

He stretched out his left arm to catch the hand that was stabbing with the hair. Tang Qing immediately pulled it out and stabbed Jin Ja-gang’s left hand. This time he gouged the wound on Jin Ja-gang’s ring finger, the broken nail. With tremendous agony, his left arm became paralyzed. His whole body tingled and his vision seemed to flip.

Jin Ja-gang clenched his fist again and struck at Tang Qing’s face. This time the hair was driven between the bones of his index and middle finger knuckles.

‘Uaaaah!’

When both of Jin Ja-gang’s arms became paralyzed and unusable, he gritted his teeth and let out a scream through his teeth while striking down at Tang Qing’s crown with his forehead. Tang Qing pressed against Jin Ja-gang’s forehead with his finger to prevent him from striking with his head.

‘Are you done?’

Tang Qing looked at Jin Ja-gang with a dull expression. Just as Jin Ja-gang was grinding his molars and trying to raise his internal energy again, Tang Qing extended his hand.

The hair that had paralyzed both of Jin Ja-gang’s arms flew toward Jin Ja-gang’s forehead. Jin Ja-gang retreated but the hair kept getting longer and longer.

Unable to use both arms, he tried to twist his waist sideways to dodge when Tang Qing stepped on Jin Ja-gang’s foot.

His instep was crushed.

Jin Ja-gang kicked up at Tang Qing’s groin with his other foot.

Jin Ja-gang’s knee struck precisely between Tang Qing’s legs.

Tang Qing was expressionless. Even though he had taken a direct hit to the testicles, men’s weakness, he seemed unaffected.

Jin Ja-gang realized something was wrong. He hadn’t felt the sensation of hitting the testicles. This wasn’t happening because it was mental imagery. Tang Qing had hidden his testicles inside his body.

Masters hide their vulnerable pressure points, and Tang Qing was no exception!

‘Tsk.’

Tang Qing thrust the hair straight into the space between Jin Ja-gang’s eyebrows.

From that single point between his eyebrows, pain came as if hundreds and thousands of needles were spreading through his blood vessels throughout his entire body.

“Uaaaaah!”

Even Jin Ja-gang, who was accustomed to pain, couldn’t endure this first-time agony.

Jin Ja-gang collapsed to his knees.

“Huff… huff… huff!”

What had happened?

Both arms were paralyzed and the pain remained.

Jin Ja-gang looked ahead while on his knees. The curtain was completely torn to shreds.

It must have been a fight in mental imagery, right?

Even his sickle hadn’t been drawn and remained stuck in his back.

Tang Qing was also just standing behind the torn curtain.

Tang Qing pushed aside the bothersome tattered curtain and approached Jin Ja-gang.

“What a strange fellow. Your fundamentals seem third-rate, yet your concentration and killing intent are above first-rate masters. Where did such a fellow come from?”

But contrary to his words, Tang Qing expressionlessly held up his hair. Then he did exactly as before, inserting the hair between the eyebrows of the kneeling Jin Ja-gang.

“Huff huff… huff, huff!”

Jin Ja-gang wanted to dodge but his body wouldn’t move. Neither his hands nor feet, nothing would move!

Puh… ook.

Meanwhile Tang Qing’s hair pierced Jin Ja-gang’s forehead.

Pain far more extreme than in the mental imagery shook Jin Ja-gang.

“Uh… uaaaaah!”

Jin Ja-gang convulsed throughout his body and spewed bloody foam from his mouth.

“It feels like your body is burning in hellfire just as I said, right? It should be about a hundred times more painful than bone-splitting torture.”

The frustration of not being able to struggle while in pain multiplied, making the agony feel far more terrible.

Jin Ja-gang bit his tongue to avoid losing consciousness. With the side effects of the Clarity Pill preventing him from losing consciousness, he had never done this before.

It showed how much of a sense of crisis he felt.

However, regardless of Jin Ja-gang’s will, even the effects of the Clarity Pill were useless as Jin Ja-gang was forcibly losing consciousness and his seated body fell backward. The startled Tang Ha-ran ran over to catch Jin Ja-gang, but Tang Qing raised his palm to stop her.

“Stop right there.”

“Ah!”

Tang Qing looked down at his feet. Tang Ha-ran also looked at Tang Qing’s feet.

Poison blood lice lay dead in black piles at Tang Qing’s feet.

But poison blood lice were still continuing to crawl out from the walls, squirming toward Tang Qing.

If Tang Ha-ran had thoughtlessly rushed over just now, she might have been bitten by poison blood lice.

The poison blood lice crawled up and bit Tang Qing’s ankles.

However, shortly after, the poison blood lice that bit Tang Qing fell away dead.

Thus dead poison blood lice continued piling up at Tang Qing’s feet.

Watching this scene quietly, Tang Qing was puzzled.

“How did this fellow move the poison blood lice?”

Master Eun, who hadn’t moved a step and had been drinking tea until then, spoke about the situation.

“When you were peering into his mental imagery, the poison blood lice swarmed toward you, elder.”

“Well, that’s something.”

He couldn’t blame Master Eun for not telling him even though she knew. It was his own fault for being careless.

Of course, these poison blood lice are poisonous insects that interfere with qi perception. Tang Qing only realized the poison blood lice had crawled out after being bitten while absorbed in mental imagery.

“Hmm.”

Tang Qing’s expression was quite serious.

If the one bitten had been someone other than Tang Qing, it would have been fatal.

The Poison Dragon had shown he could endure earlier, but that was in a prepared state. Even within the Tang family, if someone were bitten by this many poison blood lice in an unguarded state, not many could survive.

“Surely he wasn’t aiming for this and stalling for time.”

Tang Qing shook his foot to brush off the poison blood lice. Tang Qing’s ankle also had bite marks remaining with blood beaded like sesame seeds.

But Tang Qing didn’t harm the surviving poison blood lice. Rather, he carefully scooped them up with his hands and pushed them into the wall so they wouldn’t be crushed to death.

“Poor things. What wrong have you done? Tsk tsk.”

Tang Qing’s attitude was as if looking at cute pets.

After pushing all the poison blood lice in, Tang Qing looked down at Jin Ja-gang.

Jin Ja-gang lay sprawled, unable to move.

“It’s been good meeting interesting fellows in succession after so long. Mang Ryo recommended quite a useful fellow. Our children should also learn from this fellow and have some poison in them.”

Master Eun said with a smile.

“Didn’t you say earlier that he lacked spirit?”

“That was something I said deliberately to provoke him. If you keep praising children saying they did well, they quickly fall into arrogance.”

“You must be quite pleased with him.”

“Hmph. Fellows like him used to be very common in the old days, but they’re hard to see these days.”

“But I think it would be fine to praise this one.”

Master Eun stood up and approached Jin Ja-gang. She lifted Jin Ja-gang up. Then she wiped Jin Ja-gang’s blood-stained cheek with her monk’s robe sleeve.

Master Eun’s telepathic voice echoed in the mind of Jin Ja-gang, who was barely holding onto the last thread of consciousness.

“When you find the answer to my questions, come to Mount Emei anytime. Then Mount Emei will also become your strength. In this world, there are no eternal enemies or eternal allies.”

A single statement from the unpredictable Master Eun.

However, Jin Ja-gang was not in a state to question Master Eun’s intentions.

Master Eun carried Jin Ja-gang and walked lightly to place him in front of Tang Ha-ran.

“Namo Amitabha. May Buddha’s protection be with you.”

Tang Ha-ran’s eyes reddened as she embraced Jin Ja-gang. On the day of wearing wedding clothes, she was in the position of holding a bloodied prospective husband.

But Tang Qing looked down at Tang Ha-ran and Jin Ja-gang with cold eyes and said.

“Take him away. I’ll give that fellow one last chance.”