Chapter 353 – Rushing (2)

“……”

A heavy silence flowed.

Both the martial world spectators surrounding the Golden Wing Sect compound and the masters of the two great Thirteen Evil Sects standing awkwardly on the scattered remnants of the spell formation remained silent.

It was right after an extraordinary event had occurred.

The dreamlike young man who had created an ethereal atmosphere just by standing there had vanished without a trace.

Along with him, dozens of martial artists who had been brought as human sacrifices, and half the forces of the Ten Perfections Sect and Golden Wing Sect.

Originally, everyone should have departed. That was how the great spell had been designed. By none other than “Sichuan’s foremost Golden Wing Sect Leader.”

Rustle.

Her sleeve hem hung down.

Her small, tightly closed lips uttered no words, and her eyes settled with an extremely dry quality.

That alone was enough to freeze the surroundings. Like an invisible giant’s hand descending upon the compound, her presence allowed no one to move. It was something beyond internal energy.

Only those who had reached the realm of peerless masters could break the silence.

“Excuse me.”

The figure who had been standing as her guardian.

After calling to the Golden Wing Sect Leader and pausing briefly, the Ten Perfections Sect Leader slowly opened his mouth again.

“What happened? I sensed a spider web-like energy wave suddenly flowing from that Tang Man-yan youngster’s body. Right at the final moment of the great spell.”

“…It was stolen.”

“He took control of the spell’s power?”

“Yes.”

“How could that be? No, how could you let it be stolen? Even if that fellow possessed some bewitching power in his appearance that could enchant people, how could such a youngster…”

“He’s extremely powerful. I don’t know his identity.”

The Golden Wing Sect Leader muttered softly.

The eyes of the martial artists gathered in the clearing, including the Ten Perfections Sect Leader, widened.

The elite masters of Sichuan’s Thirteen Heavens were well acquainted with the Golden Wing Sect Leader’s temperament and conduct. She never praised anyone for having high martial arts, not even her Left and Right Guardians.

“Could it be that the two sect leaders couldn’t properly sense that person’s energy waves…? How refined must his technique of concealing energy be?”

“It’s the realm of Half-Step Return to Origin. We were thoroughly deceived.”

“Could Desolate Fortress have sent a peerless master as a spy?”

“That’s nonsense. How could the imperial dogs have such resources? We could destroy their Sichuan branch right now and they couldn’t say a word.”

“Could it be the Ming Cult’s Young Sect Leader? Invincible Yelü Zhen. Not all peerless masters can freely manipulate spell formations after all.”

“Would that arrogant one disguise himself as an attendant? That’s equally implausible, isn’t it?”

“Silence.”

Suddenly, the debate among the Thirteen Heavens masters ceased. It was because the Golden Wing Sect Leader had turned her feet.

Rustle.

“We’ll perform it again.”

She said.

No one showed any negative reaction.

It was a great spell from the beginning.

The Golden Wing Sect had anticipated one or two failures. This meant they had prepared spare ritual implements to rebuild the formation.

***

The current Radiant Demon Wing Leader who had a mission to fulfill, the pitiful Tang siblings connected to him, and the Golden Wing Sect’s Right Guardian who didn’t know he had been chosen as a guide.

Jeong Yeon-shin didn’t feel particularly impressed that his manipulation of the spell formation had succeeded.

He only briefly focused on the Luminous Wheel in his heart that had given him a strange sensation.

Complete Three Flowers Gathering at the Crown, protective energy, void treading, a second Luminous Wheel.

He would soon achieve at least two of these.

It was right to focus on what was before him. An important matter had arisen.

Formation.

A mystical art no less than martial arts. It twists and penetrates the principles of nature rather than the interior of the body.

It’s known to be an extremely abstruse and complex study.

When properly cultivated, it can easily induce hallucinations in others, and at its peak, like Zhuge Clan Leader, it can control wind and rain, manipulating even the weather.

And beyond that.

Formations with heavenly beauty are said to create mystical places between spaces.

Another space difficult to perceive from the outside. Like the tombs of ancient masters who caused bloodshed throughout the world with just a single sheet of paper.

They are typically spoken of as utterly incomprehensible places.

The formation naturally deployed for the rain dragon is no different.

A prairie completely disconnected from the outside world. Only its scale is on a different level from the spell studies of ordinary humans.

‘The natural qi is dense. Incomparable to normal conditions.’

If there truly were an immortal realm, perhaps it would be like this. In terms of the feeling that clung to the skin like mist, it seemed at least seventy percent denser than before entering the formation.

Jeong Yeon-shin looked around.

He hadn’t expected the space created by the formation to be so vast. Nor had he imagined seeing people living within it.

“Shouldn’t we inform the village chief?”

“No, just look at him. It’s the Fist Demon! From the Dragon-Slaying Alliance…!”

“To think they would come even here…”

“Don’t move carelessly. You’ll be trampled.”

“Those children, aren’t they blood relatives of Sichuan’s Tang family? Their hands reek of oil. Their martial attire is similar too…”

“Oh…!”

More than a dozen small people with tattered clothing and shabby appearances whispered among themselves while glancing at the group.

Their tone didn’t sound like modern speech or dialect.

The pitch and inflection of their voices were very unfamiliar, giving the impression of people who had been isolated for a long time and established their own order, like city dwellers.

Beyond them stretched an endlessly green forest.

Iron clan.

Their energy waves were faint. They appeared to be commoners.

“I am…”

Just as Jeong Yeon-shin, who had slightly bowed his upper body and placed both knees on the ground, was about to address them.

“The Sect Leader’s cultivation is truly profound.”

Wan Yang, who had been immersed in deep internal energy breathing with long exhalations and inhalations, suddenly opened his eyes and cut off his words.

“It’s like the Ninth Heaven Fairy descending to the mortal world. What figure in the world could find and enter the rain dragon’s formation in its exact location?”

“…Yes, it’s remarkable.”

“Her realm has reached the heavens. This must be a three-lifetime honor for you.”

Wan Yang said in a low voice. Now the energy surrounding his body was enveloping him transparently like smoothly refined silk.

A truly marvelous sight. The realm of constantly manifesting protective energy.

Jeong Yeon-shin just stared at him blankly without particularly refuting. After all, he was immersed in a mystery he had never experienced before.

‘Golden Wing Sect Leader.’

An absolute master of spell techniques and martial arts.

Since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, she had accumulated all sorts of ritual implements, spiritual medicines, and spell studies over a long period to create wonders… Finally opening the formation where an ancient mystical creature had coiled itself. It could be called an achievement rare throughout the ages.

She had opened the purple realm of the martial world to Jeong Yeon-shin. It was something to be grateful for.

It was then.

Perhaps their conversation had eased the tense atmosphere?

“The rain dragon’s formation? Really?”

“I thought we were going to die for sure…!”

Poison Phoenix and Poison Dragon, who had been frozen in their green martial attire, turned their heads in all directions.

The young lady and young master of Sichuan’s foremost noble family. Their conduct was as remarkably similar as their outward appearance, which made it somewhat amusing.

“Training here would give tremendous energy accumulation, wouldn’t it?”

“Look at that flower over there. What is it? I’ve never seen that species before. Is it poisonous?”

They were making a fuss despite having two overwhelming masters beside them. The siblings, who had been staring with their already large eyes opened even wider, simultaneously turned their gaze and cautiously approached Jeong Yeon-shin.

Rustle.

“Are you really our collateral brother? From which lineage? I’ve never heard of the Man or Yan generation names in Tang Man-yan. Did the family head teach you secretly?”

“I’ve been wanting to talk to you. If only those wretched worm-catchers hadn’t kept watching us…”

Just as the small boy and girl were chattering.

“Shut your mouths.”

Wan Yang coldly commanded.

Saaaa—

The energy waves overflowing from his voice swept over the surrounding undergrowth. Some leaves even bore marks of being strongly pressed down.

“…!”

The Tang siblings’ movements abruptly stopped.

Even if they were talents competing for the title of the best among the younger generation in the vast Sichuan Province, they couldn’t compare to a mid-level supreme master who had built his reputation as one of the Golden Wing Sect’s two great guardians over many years.

Despite their strong blood and pride, they hadn’t become one of the Five Marvels of Resplendent Brilliance. They could hardly follow in the footsteps of Desolate Fortress’s Seom Ye whom they admired.

“Who gave you permission to speak?”

Wan Yang sternly rebuked the siblings.

“Discipline isn’t important only in hunting mystical creatures. When you’ve come to unfamiliar dangerous terrain, you should properly regulate your breathing to enhance your abilities. That way you can at least serve as bait, can’t you?”

He clicked his tongue.

A dignified attitude that could almost be mistaken for an elder relative of the Tang family. But his concluding words as he moved his steps toward the iron clan people were not so.

Thud.

“I can see why the Tang family has fallen. It was truly a sight to behold. To see a figure called the Tang Clan Leader so pathetically lose his flying sword… even if his opponent was our Sect Leader.”

“What did you say?”

“You! How dare you!”

The twins’ eyes sharpened. A reaction close to outrage. Anyone would feel the same.

Whoosh—!

Jeong Yeon-shin considered how he would react if someone insulted a Radiant Demon Wing martial artist rather than his father Jeong Pan Yue.

While watching the thin whirlwind rising at the siblings’ feet, disheveling the leaves.

‘Chaotic times… The conflict between the martial world and the martial sects is deepening. It will eventually erupt.’

He silently lowered one hand diagonally to block the siblings.

The rain dragon’s formation was an unfamiliar place. It was better to let someone who had been here before guide them voluntarily.

Especially considering the Seventh Apostle and the Ming Cult’s Young Sect Leader who, for whatever reason, hadn’t immediately joined them here.

Torture methods like breaking bones and crushing flesh wouldn’t work on a supreme master who had achieved unity of essence, energy, and spirit.

‘Did they make it here after all?’

Just as the image of the Seventh Apostle with her blindfold and smooth smile flashed through his mind.

“No! You can’t! How can you ask us to open the village’s formation!”

“Time has flowed long. These lowly creatures who only create offerings as eye candy for the rain dragon are talking back.”

“Even if the Dragon Spirit Divine Fist says so…”

Right after some iron clan person’s words were cut off, a dull sound was followed by a short scream that was stifled with an “ugh—.”

Wan Yang had kicked someone.

“I know that the greedy rain dragon has brought saplings of the World Tree here.”

The Golden Wing Sect Leader’s right arm raised the corner of his mouth nervously. The low laughter made the surrounding air ripple semi-transparently.

Extremely powerful internal energy aftermath. The iron clan people who had bent their waists around their kicked comrade trembled.

“Your village chief must know all the earth veins of this land. I’ll have him find the locations of our scattered disciples.”

There was no answer. Only the sound of groaning came back.

But Wan Yang didn’t press for a response. This was because he had recognized the light of submission in the eyes of the lowly creatures before him.

“No different from slaves. They only understand when blood is drawn.”

Like the Sichuan Tang family— he muttered quietly, then raised the corner of his mouth and gestured to Jeong Yeon-shin. It meant for him to follow along with the Tang siblings.

“…Let’s go.”

Jeong Yeon-shin, who had been rotating the Luminous Wheel to prevent him from drawing blood again, patted the shoulders of the Dragon Phoenix Twin Poisons once each and slowly began to walk.

Not yet.

It was still time to endure.

‘First, the well-being of my seniors.’

He was no longer a boy who couldn’t distinguish between heaven and earth, but an adult.

Thud.

The moderately damp soil. Concerns about the greater good left tracks with each of his footsteps.

***

A village surrounded by massive stone walls.

No, it should be seen as a city wrapped in a fortress. It was far too large to be called a mere village.

The sound of iron being hammered continuously flowing from outside, the hoarse shouts, and smoke rising from various places.

Tremendous vitality.

The group, who had followed the iron clan people by stepping exactly where they stepped, remained silent for a moment. This was because they were freshly impressed by the scale of the mystical place where the rain dragon was said to have coiled itself.

—Halt!

A voice mixed with powerful internal energy.

More than a dozen iron clan martial artists standing guard looked down at the group with stern eyes. Unlike those who had guided Jeong Yeon-shin, they seemed to have properly learned internal energy cultivation methods.

They appeared to be living quite normally. They didn’t look like people who had been caught up in the rain dragon’s ascension as in old stories passed down orally.

As Jeong Yeon-shin was looking at them with curiosity.

“What…?”

A commotion arose on the stone wall. It was right after the iron clan masters who had been stroking their noble beards while looking down at the group caught sight of Wan Yang.

“Hey, Jang-sam! Who have you brought here!”

The leader of the gate guards shouted.

He was a master holding a white spear with short, thick arms exposed on both sides of his sleeveless martial attire, and despite possessing powerful energy waves, he couldn’t hide his agitation.

“I’m sorry, elder, I had no choice…”

The village youth who had led Jeong Yeon-shin’s group said. For a brief moment, his gaze brushed the belly of the iron clan woman standing beside him. It was rounded and protruding. She was in the final month of pregnancy.

“Oh, my…”

Along with the iron clan spearman’s sigh, the gate guards who had spread out on either side of him gritted their teeth and sounded the alarm.

Tang— Tang—

An extremely loud metallic sound, imbued with energy, resonated in all directions.

A reaction like that of a military unit receiving a foreign group. The response triggered by the Golden Wing Sect’s Right Guardian alone was that significant.

Wan Yang, who had smiled slightly, stood upright and opened his mouth.

[Call the village chief!]

A voice like a lion’s roar erupted, sending a massive cloud of dust racing along the stone wall before him.

The tremendous energy accumulation characteristic of a noble clan’s supreme master exerted a power like a gale with just his voice. The gate guards who had been maintaining a solemn posture staggered in place.

“That evil one has finally…!”

The gate captain, who was the first to regain his balance, bit his lip.

The atrocities committed by the Dragon-Slaying Alliance masters when they first opened the formation and entered, telling them to become the alliance’s workers in exchange for capturing the rain dragon, flashed before his eyes.

Madmen who had even created a strange martial art called the Dragon-Slaying Technique.

They were impossible to resist. They were too powerful.

They had to constantly make weapons for them. Naturally, there was no payment that should have been given in return.

Occasionally, when the rain dragon let out a roar as if the world were being torn apart, those people would hide in civilian houses and wait until the dragon’s scales were no longer visible.

And they made them place properly made offerings on the altar so that the rain dragon wouldn’t be angered. Along with excuses that they weren’t ready yet.

This meant that exploitation occurred in two ways.

The clan trapped in the rain dragon’s formation was treated like slaves with nowhere else to go.

Until the Dragon-Hunting Alliance, which ultimately failed to achieve its goal, left this divine and unstable space.

During this time, the one who had placed all the villagers under his feet like a king was the Dragon Spirit Divine Fist. He seemed even more powerful now. It was unbelievable.

The gate captain wondered: Could the new village chief handle this person?

And so, while he was momentarily distracted by the memories of that swamp-like past.

“You’re slow to follow orders.”

The Dragon Spirit Divine Fist, who had climbed the seven-zhang-high stone wall with just one step of protective technique, smiled at the gate captain.

“A low-level practitioner shouldn’t have so many distracting thoughts.”

“…!”

Woooong—

The gate captain, who had suddenly raised his head, saw Wan Yang wrapped in whitish internal energy garments.

The protective energy that had always reigned as an invincible armor. It was the technique that had made the Golden Wing Sect’s Dragon Spirit Divine Fist pursue the Dragon-Slaying martial arts with bare hands unlike other disciples.

To the iron clan people of this city, it was equivalent to despair. A gloom settled on the faces of the gate guards, including the captain.

Some gripped their weapons as if contemplating dying together.

Wan Yang snorted and took a step forward. He was right in front of them.

“Much time has passed. It’s understandable that you’ve forgotten.”

“What are you planning to do now?”

A voice suddenly interjected from the side.

It was Jeong Yeon-shin, who had somehow climbed up to the stone fortress.

Without waiting for an answer, he extended his hand toward Wan Yang’s shoulder.

It wasn’t particularly swift. The speed at which the corner of Wan Yang’s mouth rose was even faster.

The Golden Wing Sect’s Right Guardian smiled as if pleased and turned his body. While quickly whispering with oral technique.

“It’s pathetic to see a weapon trying to act like a person.”

Jeong Yeon-shin didn’t answer and placed his hand on Wan Yang’s shoulder, which was surrounded by a garment of internal energy.

The man’s words and conduct were insignificant.

There were far more important facts. They had reached their destination, his atrocities had gone too far, and this noble clan member possessed quite interesting cultivation.

Woong—

In an instant.

He thoroughly felt the structure of the protective energy that touched the center of his palm. The process of breaking it down, which he had always done as naturally as breathing. It was no different from usual. Only the follow-up action was different.

In the extremely slowly flowing time.

“…?”

Wan Yang’s eyebrows rose. He seemed about to strike, as if he had sensed something.

Jeong Yeon-shin’s face remained expressionless.

The noble clan member’s reaction was unimportant.

At this moment, Jeong Yeon-shin’s energy sense rose like wildfire from the center of his palm, sweeping over Wan Yang’s shoulder and racing through his entire body, and following that sensation, the energy that had spread countless times cut through the protective energy from within like minute blades with a scraping sound.

Power structure reverse calculation.

Sword energy.

Internal weight technique.

Then Jeong Yeon-shin activated the absorption incantation of Myriad Heavens Flower Rain through the Labor Palace acupoint in his palm.

Whoosh—

Following the powerful absorbing energy wave, Wan Yang’s protective energy covered Jeong Yeon-shin’s hand, climbed up his arm, and then enveloped his entire body.

“…!”

Wan Yang’s face showed silent astonishment. It was right after Jeong Yeon-shin had stripped off the garment of internal energy he had been wearing and put it on himself.

“Low quality.”

Jeong Yeon-shin said like a merchant who had opened his eyes to superior goods.