Chapter 108: The Snipe-and-Clam Stratagem (6)

“I said she was fourteen.”

“Oh, Primordial Heavenly Worthy...”

“...Since when did you start believing in Daoism?”

“At times like this, you pray to every god there is.”

Namgung Byeok would never lie.

Especially not to the man who had saved his life.

Besides, he was an expert at the opening stage of the Transformation Realm.

There was no way he could have misjudged the realm of someone who had reached Transcendent Apex.

“...So everything you said was true?”

“When have I ever lied to you, Medicine Sage?”

“You have failed to keep a promise before.”

Namgung Byeok let out a low groan and sighed.

“Then... I’ll have to finish the Primordial Peerless Pellet quickly.”

“You’ve been making it?”

“I’ve kept at it steadily in case the need ever arose. Another month, and one will be complete.”

It was insane.

A medicinal pill that took twelve full years of uninterrupted boiling and care to produce.

The fire could not be allowed to go out even once.

To flood it with boundless pure-yang qi, the flame had to be kept burning for all twelve years without fail.

If only it could be fed with just anything.

But the fire itself had to be raised with medicinal ingredients, and not just any ingredients at that.

Every single one had to be a priceless top-grade treasure steeped in numinous power.

It was extravagance on an almost horrifying scale.

But the effect was just as certain.

Enough to restore a shattered dantian and reconnect severed heart-veins.

It was an efficacy worthy of the word peerless.

“Fourteen. Fourteen years old...”

The Medicine Sage murmured to himself.

Naturally, every medicinal pill worked better the younger the person taking it.

That went without saying for a supreme pill like the Primordial Peerless Pellet.

More than anything else—

When Namgung Byeok had received the pill, his entire frame had been wrecked and his dantian destroyed.

The fact that it had brought him back from the brink and raised him to his feet was undeniably a miracle.

But it was also true that it had been unable to draw out anything beyond that.

Part of that was because his body had already reached full maturity at thirty-one.

Part of it was because all of the pill’s effect had been spent on healing his wounds.

But this time, it would likely be neither.

“There is one thing, though. That child is a Heavenly Killing Star.”

Namgung Byeok said it lightly.

At those words, the Medicine Sage paused for a moment in his stride.

But his smile did not fade.

If anything... his smile brightened so much that even Namgung Byeok hesitated for a beat at the sight of it.

“Isn’t that good news?”

“You think so?”

“I’ve lived to this age and seen all kinds of things, but there is no such thing as a revolution that doesn’t call for blood.”

Namgung Byeok nodded as well.

That was true.

Since ancient times, the strong had trampled and persecuted the weak.

If the weak wished to escape that fate—

Then they had no choice but to take up blade and spear, cut off the strong man’s head, and prove that they themselves had become the new strong.

And that was no different now.

If one hated the Sword Sovereign’s order, one had to be able to deny the Sword Sovereign.

To do that, power was necessary.

Whether it was the power of an organization or the power of an individual did not matter.

All that mattered was that, when gathered and hurled against him, it surpassed the Sword Sovereign’s strength, crushed him, brought him down, and won.

And in the martial world, that usually meant blood and steel.

If they wished to break free of the order laid down by Alliance Leader Namgung Ak, the Sword Sovereign—

Then first they had to break the order he had built.

Naturally, endless blood would be spilled, and corpses would roll across the ground.

But if they did not have the resolve for that—

Then they should never have set foot in the Reverse Heaven Society to begin with.

In that sense, both the Medicine Sage and the Sky-Burning Sword Tiger were already fully resolved.

And Cheon Soyak was no different.

“Is that young friend joining the Reverse Heaven Society?”

“She’s a child Eunsong discovered. By now, she’s probably gone to Zhuge Yeon.”

“Well, this is something to look forward to...”

The Medicine Sage stroked his hanging beard with one hand.

Then, from the corner of his eye, he looked at the little cauldron that had already been boiling for eleven years and eleven months.

“When the Heavenly Martial Body descended upon the Namgung Household, I thought it was all over.”

“You mean Namgung Seon?”

“That’s right. That clever little brat. From what I hear, he’s not especially like his father or grandfather.”

Namgung Byeok gave a shrug.

He had been cast out of the household twenty years ago.

Namgung Seon, meanwhile, was seventeen.

He had never seen the boy himself or lived through any of it, so it was hard for him to add much.

“...Still, he’s Namgung blood.”

“Don’t act like that. You’re Namgung blood too, aren’t you?”

“Damn it. That’s true enough. Still, I’d managed to forget for a while.”

He said it in jest.

The Medicine Sage snorted softly with a smile and opened the cauldron beside him.

Something thick and viscous bubbled inside.

“Your medicinal decoction is almost ready too.”

“That’s a relief. My body’s been aching so much lately I thought I was going to die.”

“I think it might be perfectly fine to let you die like that.”

“Elder, didn’t I just give you some very valuable information...”

*****

The Zhuge Household’s closed-door training site.

This place was filled with the most exacting, the most difficult, and the most dangerous formations and mechanisms.

More so even than the Family Head’s chambers.

Zhuge Yeon and Cheon Soyak stood before it.

“Young Hero Soyak. You must step exactly where I step. Only when I signal.”

“...I understand.”

But Soyak could already see it all.

A formation was a technique that fixed human intention into space and preserved it there.

That was why human killing intent could be felt within it.

And the place where that killing intent was thinnest was the Life Gate.

Which meant...

...Found it.

A place where not a single blood-red line could be seen.

A place where no trace of murderous force remained at all.

That was the Life Gate.

Zhuge Yeon glanced at Soyak and frowned.

She herself had not yet even stepped onto the Life Gate.

And yet Soyak was already staring as though she knew exactly where Zhuge Yeon would place her foot.

...It has to be coincidence, right?

Zhuge Yeon brushed off the uncomfortable, prickling feeling and moved forward.

A Heavenly Killing Star.

They were said to be born with the fate of Blood Calamity and immense martial talent, but—

No matter how brilliant she was, she should not have been able to instantly identify the Life Gate when she had never even read a single book on formations.

This was scholarship.

It was not something instinct or intuition could solve.

Especially not here.

This was a place built upon the accumulated labor of centuries of the Zhuge Household.

...Huh?

But the next step was the same.

And the step after that as well.

Soyak was definitely following exactly where Zhuge Yeon had told her to step.

But those black eyes were already looking at the place Zhuge Yeon would step on next.

“...Young Hero Soyak?”

“Yes, Internal Affairs Pavilion Lord.”

“Can you... see the Life Gate, by any chance?”

She knew perfectly well it was a stupid question.

She was the one the Zhuge Household cherished as its keenest mind.

And especially when it came to the interpretation and construction of formations...

Among the living, she could confidently say she ranked within the top five.

“I can.”

“Of course. There’s no way you could possibly see it—wait. You can?”

“Yes.”

She answered as if it were nothing.

But Zhuge Yeon could not dismiss it as a lie.

He said he could literally see it with his eyes.

It was impossible to believe.

“...Then where do I step next?”

“Three paces to the northeast, after blinking three times.”

It was exact.

The dead center of the Life Gate, without the slightest error.

Zhuge Yeon’s eyes widened in shock.

“How? Have you studied formations before?”

“That... I have not.”

Soyak answered honestly.

Zhuge Yeon was Eunsong’s comrade.

Not merely an associate, but a comrade who shared his purpose—to kill the Sword Sovereign, drag down the gilded heavens, and rebuild the world.

And now, she was Soyak’s comrade as well.

Because Zhuge Yeon was the one who had allowed her entry into the Reverse Heaven Society.

“Then how...”

“I can see them. Human murderous will and killing intent. They appear as thin, vivid red lines...”

Soyak moved ahead of Zhuge Yeon.

She stepped onto the newly shifted Life Gate with perfect accuracy as time passed.

Then the next Life Gate.

And the one after that.

“Isn’t that what a formation is, in the end? If a place holds no murderous will or killing intent at all, then that place is the Life Gate.”

“...That’s true.”

Only then did Zhuge Yeon understand why the Heavenly Killing Star had always terrified the world.

Of course.

Did she really think that sight appeared only when determining the Life Gate inside a formation?

Obviously, it would appear when swords were drawn with lives on the line as well.

And that child...

By dodging and severing the blood-red lines aimed at her own body, she could shut down every attack.

And by following the lines that ran toward her opponent, stabbing and cutting along them, she could inflict fatal wounds.

For all of that to be a talent she could literally see with her own eyes—

Zhuge Yeon spoke bitterly.

“...Are all Heavenly Killing Stars like that?”

“I’ve never met a Heavenly Killing Star other than myself, so I don’t know.”

She would probably never know.

There was only ever one Heavenly Killing Star born in a generation.

Just as there was only ever one Heavenly Demon in a generation.

Zhuge Yeon followed behind Soyak and went deeper into the Zhuge Household’s formations.

All she had to do was step where Soyak stepped.

There was no need to wrack her brain by recalling every formation she had memorized and calculating them one by one in time.

“Still... this does feel a little deflating.”

“...I’m sorry. I hadn’t meant to say anything.”

“I’m the one who pressed you. I know. I wasn’t trying to blame you, Young Hero Soyak.”

Had about a quarter of an hour passed?

Only then did the two of them arrive at the cave hidden away for closed-door training.

Zhuge Yeon clicked her tongue bitterly, as if she had never imagined she would come here twice in such a short span of time.

“It’s here. The Zhuge Household’s secret closed-door training site.”

Zhuge Yeon entered the cave first.

The luminous pearls set into the ceiling shone overhead.

Farther inside lay a broad corridor, and beneath the brightest and largest luminous pearl...

Someone was sitting cross-legged.

“...Huh?”

At that instant, Soyak drew her sword.

Then she thrust it through the space between Zhuge Yeon’s arm and waist and knocked aside something flying toward them.

CLANG—!

It was a poisoned throwing knife.

“...Very impressive, little child.”

The figure who had been sitting cross-legged rose from his place as he spoke.

A grotesque chuckle was woven into his voice.