Chapter 507: Karma Drips Along the Thread of Life and Death (9)

Qing stood her ground.

A witch who had gathered four of the Ten Supreme Demonic Arts?

No. What she had mastered were five, with one in reserve.

In terms of collecting them, she had gathered six; so strictly speaking, Qing could not be the witch who had gathered four of the Ten Supreme Demonic Arts.

If one insisted—maybe a grand witch of the world?

“I’ll clarify these one by one! First, there’s the suspicion that I practiced a ‘Lesser Demonic Art,’ but that isn’t true. The hand art I trained is the Divine Lady’s Hands, which can look similar at a glance.”

At that, the warriors stared at Qing as if wondering what kind of monstrous nonsense this was.

“It’s a peerless hand art created by my master, Seo Mun Surin. You all know Divine Lady’s Gate is famous for its fairy arts, yes? This is a beauty-and-defense method that cultivates hands this lovely!”

Qing snapped her hands open.

Among the younger warriors, oohs slipped out—then, catching the older men’s looks, they clamped their mouths shut.

Folk of the Central Plains had an odd love for fine hands.

To be fair, her hands were truly beautiful.

Pale skin, slender long fingers, joints with faint lines—elegant as if carved from white marble.

At any rate, everyone still looked dubious.

But no one shouted her down.

Whatever the bond between master and disciple, she had invoked her master before the world; refuting her here could call for a life-and-death blood vendetta.

By the customary law of the Central Plains, a master and disciple were one body; to attack the master was to attack the disciple. (The reverse did not hold.)

And above all, there was a greater reason:

Seo Mun Surin—the top-ranked woman among Absolute masters by the public rolls—was terrifying.

Thus, whether the Divine Lady’s Hands were truth or lie, they had to be treated as truth.

So no one rebutted her, but the looks fixed on Qing were crooked as hell.

Three “demonic arts” remained; their faces said they were waiting to see what she’d say next.

“Next—Black-Kill Demon Palm, was it? Those black hands back then weren’t the blackened meridians of that palm. I was wearing gloves.”

“Eh?” “What!?” “Come again?”

The warriors gaped.

Impossible! The truth behind the black hands was... black gloves? Who could have foreseen such a revelation!

“How does that make sense!”

The same man who’d been howling about witch-this demonic-art-that jumped in again.

Qing remained cool.

“Does it make sense to you? Black-Kill Demon Palm’s blackened hand is an unavoidable side effect of that demonic art, isn’t it? How would my hands turn black and then white and then back again? And what, Lesser Demonic Art in the right hand and Black-Kill Demon Palm in the left? Do you get that by practicing two demonic arts fifty–fifty?”

“Ahem.” “Mm.” “That... is true.”

Heads nodded.

Come to think of it, the so-called Lesser Demonic Art yielded a beautiful white hand like Vajra Indestructible; Black-Kill Demon Palm yielded an ugly black hand from shoddy hardening.

If mixed, it should turn gray—or tilt toward the higher attainment—not split neatly half and half.

Do you get that by learning half the mnemonic apiece?

“If a hand looks black, the normal thought is ‘she wore a black gauntlet,’ no? Shouting ‘Black-Kill Demon Palm!’ from the start—shouldn’t we question the intent there?”

Ten-Thousand-Slayer Wei Damyeong asked:

“What intent?”

“She learned a demonic art, so she’s a bad woman. She learned several, so she’s worse. Therefore we can seize her and—by any means—steal her martial arts without guilt. How’s that?”

Wei Damyeong nodded.

From the outset, Wei Damyeong hadn’t come hunting Absorbing Qi Demonic Art.

He’d come to verify the truth: was the so-called Young Dragon of the orthodox world actually a vicious witch who mastered foul demonic arts and meant to drown the world in blood?

If that were true—

He’d cut down that filthy hypocrite.

“I saw it with my own eyes! That woman swung that black hand and—my sworn junior, Yeodong’s boy—khk, that bitch smashed my brother’s skull!”

But the looks that landed on him were cold.

His sworn junior had been killed; he had a grudge.

He had ample motive to slander.

“Now then, next—Self-Rotating Demonic Art? Honestly, I don’t get it. Everyone, you know the hallmark of Self-Rotating Demonic Art, don’t you?”

Violet lightning that flared to emotion.

What made that art vicious was that a mere stir of murderous will triggered true qi into firing first like lightning.

In Qing’s homeland phrasing: a rage disorder that launched a lethal attack.

“I’m known the world over as the Heavenly Flower Sword, and my face and deeds are so public they’re transparent. Where has there ever been a rumor that I spit lightning?”

A murmur rolled through the warriors.

Come to think, if Qing were truly the Self-Rotating witch, then every time a little killing intent rose in her, thunder and lightning should have cracked down.

But... there were no such rumors, were there?

Qing had erased three of the four.

The warriors wavered as they stared at her.

One remained.

“And finally—Heavenly Wheel Demonic Catastrophe. Why that one, I wonder? Hmm.”

Qing pretended to think.

For a moment.

Then she clapped once.

“Ah—maybe because my eyes sparkle too much? It’s a little awkward to say myself, but honestly, my eyes are big and beautiful, aren’t they?”

Too much sparkle—so they took them for the Heavenly Wheel’s Demonic Sight, was the claim.

Three furrows—like the character for river, 川—etched between every warrior’s brows.

Granted, her eyes were striking—clear whites and blacks, lustrous, big, wet, beautiful.

But still, that’s a bit...

And who says that about themselves?

Just as Qing bandied about Peerless Thunder-Smile Girl with ease, so the crowd took it half as a joke.

But to say flat out “aren’t I pretty”?

It was so true it made it more absurd.

“Who do you take us for, idiots! There were others who witnessed it besides me! Isn’t that right!?”

“Right! I, too, clearly saw the cursed demonic eyes with three soul-flames!”

“I saw it!” “Me too!”

So the “maybe you mis-saw because my eyes shine” angle was too much.

The warriors who’d been there shouted that they hadn’t mis-seen.

But—

Qing’s tongue had reached the formless-poison heights acknowledged by the Tang Clan’s Grand Elder.

Would she throw that stretch of an argument because she had nothing else?

“Er—everyone? I’m twenty-one this year. I won the Hidden Dragon Martial Meet with the Moon Maiden Sword Formula passed down in my family, and I had a fated tie to Shaolin’s deathless Tathāgata Divine Palm. From my master I learned the Refined Heart Classic of Zhouyang, the Divine Lady’s Hands, the Moon Maiden Sword Formula, and the Divine Lady’s Lake Steps. As for movement arts, I’m training Thousand-Li Flight and Wave-Skimming Steps.”

Out of nowhere, she was bragging.

Faces twisted with annoyance—then Qing detonated the primer she’d laid.

“Unless I started learning martial arts in the womb, how exactly am I supposed to have learned even more by now?”

Their faces—

If you personified an exclamation mark, that was it.

Come to think, the Heavenly Flower Sword before them was barely twenty-one, a young orthodox prodigy.

“How does it make sense that the Young Dragon of the orthodox world learned demonic arts?”

“She’s already loaded with supreme arts—why learn a demonic art and make herself a public enemy?”

“Hmph. Fools. I never believed that nonsense to begin with. It was just a pretext to strip her arts.”

Ten-Thousand-Slayer Wei Damyeong now wore an openly apologetic expression.

They said he had cut only invaders; the number over his head shone a clear blue.

“As I’ve aged I’ve grown suspicious of everything. I have erred greatly. Heavenly Flower Sword, I offer my apology.”

In Qing’s heart, the moral triangle—worn down into something nearly oval, rotten and reeking—prodded her for once.

Mm. I feel a bit bad for this uncle...

Even those who’d been in the stone chamber thought, Hm, did I mis-see?

Could the Self-Rotating fiend have been someone aiming at the Heavenly Flower Sword that day?

The black hand could have been a glove.

They looked like the Heavenly Wheel’s eyes because her eyes were just that big and bright?

Hmph. It stings my pride, but they really are big and clear... so maybe, possibly?

“No! I saw it!”

Of course, not everyone accepted it or doubted themselves; a few aggrieved men hopped madly, insisting she was still a witch who’d learned demonic arts.

Then—

“Right! The corpses in the stone chamber! You! Ha, why didn’t I think of it! You were alone in that chamber—how do you explain the bodies with holes in their hearts! When we reached the deepest place in the Shin Family Tomb, the dead were everywhere, all with their hearts plucked! That means you practiced Heart-Plucking Art!”

All eyes turned to Qing.

She looked at them as if they were pitiable.

“What kind of idiot would learn Heart-Plucking Art when she has Daoist true arts?”

The warriors wore the same look.

Right. Who would practice an old Daoist true art and then, with Heart-Plucking Art, shatter that purity and foul a formed dantian?

Heart-Plucking Art was grotesque in its methods and in how one pushed to higher realms; from the start it was a mongrel craft far from pure inner work.

The man who’d lost his sworn junior had only rage left; he screeched on.

“Then what about Absorbing Qi Demonic Art!? There were drained husks there!”

“I told you—they were a Blood Sect trap.”

“That’s only your claim! You’ve got no proof!”

“So you’re saying I picked up Absorbing Qi Demonic Art in a handful of hours in that chamber and mastered it well enough to turn several people into drained husks?”

Absorbing Qi Demonic Art, one-on-one, let you ignore most differences in realm and win—a vicious art.

But many-on-one?

It drew true essence from one body at a time.

And while drinking essence, the practitioner was vulnerable; the very claim that there were several husks was a huge error from the start.

“Anyway it’s your fault! You—!”

At last the man who’d lost his sworn junior threw a fit without basis.

Such arguments were never to convince each other.

Once emotions ran hot, words never landed.

A war of words existed to win the bystanders; and to the bystanders, it was plain who was throwing a tantrum.

“She’s the witch! She’s—”

Dooong.

Then Qing rang a temple bell.

Those who had heard it before were still stunned that a Buddhist bell tone could ring here; those who heard it for the first time shivered at the legendary art they’d only heard of—the Tathāgata Divine Palm.

“Even if all of it was the Blood Sect’s plot—those who live by the sword are not free of karma, are they? Such is the law of the martial world. If you seek vengeance, call for a life-and-death duel. Don’t yap with your mouths and act like women.”

Don’t only yap and act like women.

Said by the woman who’d been yapping keenly till now.

But Qing actually was a woman, so it sat fine.

“And those who still think I took in demonic arts—and would seize demonic arts from me—likewise.”

Qing let a deliberate chill touch her smile.

“Ah, yes. Since my attainment is so lofty—three Absolute masters may come at once, and Flower Realm masters may come one-on-one.”

It was Qing’s second gambit.

She summoned up that boundless snowfield—that sheer ice wall she’d almost, just barely, almost touched.

She needed a proper fight.

Not always scheming with petty tricks, spinning heads, cursing, taunting, spouting nonsense to make people lose their composure, baiting gaps, poisoning and using every means, forcing an opening and stabbing through—in other words, what do you call this anything-goes fighting?

Ah, right.

Not the clever way.

If someone heard her heart, they’d say that wasn’t clever—that was low, filthy, and cheap.

Whatever.

It was time to step a little away from Absolute-transcending Absolute abso— from that rut, and look to the next realm.