Chapter 157: The End of Childhood (16)

Only then did Soyak rise from her seat and look at Eun Jeong.

He had already lost consciousness.

He was the sort of person who always pretended he was fine.

At a glance, he could seem reckless. Even foolish, perhaps...

But at his core, he was kind.

He never wanted to burden anyone with worry.

He never wanted his companions, his fellow disciples, or his juniors to worry about him.

Of course, he could have spared them that concern by simply not getting hurt in the first place.

But how could that be easy for someone who carried a sword through the martial world?

Soyak smiled bitterly and rolled up her sleeves.

Then she drew up her fully restored internal energy.

This was nothing like moments earlier, when she had poured out every last bit of strength and scraped bare the remnants left in her qi channels.

Power spilled from her in such abundance that her sleeves and hair billowed in graceful waves.

Jeonggang watched Soyak and could not help smiling with pride.

He had given her everything he had and brought her this far.

He had expected it to save her life, certainly...

But he had never imagined that, in the process of passing down Innate True Qi, she would absorb so much of his internal energy and grow to such a degree.

The black qilin that would bite into the world.

Born beneath the Heavenly Killing Star, a child of the stars...

In a martial world overflowing with extraordinary people and strange tales, perhaps even legends truly existed.

Around then, a warm breeze began to stir from Soyak’s small hand.

Like a spring wind.

“This is...”

Jeonggang knew what kind of energy it was.

Anyone standing close to death—or anyone who had calmly accepted an approaching end—would recognize it.

It was repose.

A repose that carried those desperately thrashing against death, those writhing in pain, gently toward the end of their lives.

Soyak slowly brought that energy to the blackened wound on Eun Jeong’s flank.

The instant her fingertips brushed it, the skin that had darkened to black began to regain its original color.

Eun Jeong, who had been drenched in cold sweat and suffering intermittent fits of hyperventilation and convulsions, gradually steadied as well.

Demonic Energy was the frantic struggle of those who refused to die.

It was a remnant of a Malevolent God, taken in and used by those who did not even know what it truly was.

A power that willingly summoned any sacrifice or pain for the sake of one’s own strength and life.

The power of the Harmonization Scripture, passed down to Soyak by the design of Mount Hua’s Sword Ancestor, erased those wicked traces one by one.

It calmed the mad obsession with deathlessness and immortality that defied natural order and principle.

And it extinguished the power from “outside” that was borrowed for that purpose.

“...Haa.”

Cold sweat ran down Soyak’s neck, spine, and forehead.

It was vicious energy.

The total amount of condensed Demonic Energy was not large, but it struggled like a living insect, writhing desperately to escape.

More than that, its density at a single point was so high that she had to pour out her internal energy and pin it down before she could properly crush it.

After a long time...

Soyak finally accomplished it.

Not even the slightest trace of Demonic Energy remained in Eun Jeong’s body.

“...It is done. Haa...”

Perhaps because the tension left her all at once, strength drained from her limbs.

Soyak slumped into a chair and could not move.

She had not exhausted all of her internal energy...

But she was completely spent.

“Thanks to you, Master Eun Jeong will live.”

Jeonggang chuckled softly and stroked Soyak’s head with his wrinkled, old, familiar hand.

For no particular reason, it reminded her of her grandfather’s touch.

Perhaps it was because the presence of death clung so thickly to Jeonggang.

“...Thank you.”

“My junior brother is the one who should thank you. You did more than enough.”

Eunsong gave a small shrug.

Then, just in case, he checked Eun Jeong’s condition once more.

No matter how carefully he examined him, he could no longer find even a trace of Demonic Energy.

“Returning someone who has been tainted by Demonic Energy...”

Jeonggang spoke slowly.

Then he patted Soyak on the back twice and rose to his feet.

“...That has always been considered impossible in practical terms.”

“Is that really true, Master...?”

“It is. Once a person sees their own dark desires and accepts that primal urge not to die, how could anyone suppress it?”

“But we cultivate the Dao...”

“Were not the Daoists who cultivated it the very people who abandoned it and made that choice?”

Only then did Soyak understand.

Those who had chosen without knowing what it truly was could not climb out of the pit created by their ignorance.

The deeper Demonic Energy consumed them, the harder it became to think of anything else.

And those who had chosen while knowing what it was...

They could not gather back up what they had already thrown away.

They could not undo their own choice.

Because they had chosen with full knowledge, they could not return.

“But then, even if I erase Demonic Energy from them... will they not eventually seek out the Demonic Cult again?”

“Even so, we can prevent things like this from happening.”

Jeonggang looked toward Eun Jeong.

Involuntary corruption.

To force someone to be tainted with Demonic Energy—with that desire—even though they had never wanted it.

“For those who wanted to escape, we have never had a rope to throw them.”

Jeonggang brushed at his clothes as he continued.

“Now, you are that rope for us. That is why you must be careful.”

“If I must be careful...”

“A rope cannot be used forever. Neither can a person. You are strong, but soft at heart, so you must be wary of people. If everyone in the world tries to seize the same rope, it will soon wear through and snap.”

They said the Heavenly Demon had not yet died.

The Young Cult Leader had resurrected and fled.

The Left Luminary Guardian had risen and lured away venerable masters of the righteous factions with honeyed words.

The fate of the world was once again pointing toward a great war with the Demonic Cult.

Toward chaos.

Toward the return of an age of disorder.

And Soyak was still only fourteen years old—far too young to be ready for a war of such scale.

“...I will be careful.”

“No. What we want is not for you merely to stay cautious and protect yourself.”

“Then...”

Jeonggang drew a small slip of paper from his robe and handed it to Eunsong.

The moment Eunsong read it, his eyes widened.

“...Great Grand Master, this...”

“Medicine Sage—that man has finally completed the second Primordial Peerless Pellet of his life.”

A talent that might appear only once in thirteen centuries.

The Medicine Sage’s ability was such that he could be called the reincarnation of Hua Tuo—a living miracle.

And even with that ability, he had made only two of them.

To break through the wall of a realm, one needed enlightenment and mastery.

And reaching that wall required individual effort and talent.

In other words, full maturity.

Even the Primordial Peerless Pellet could not replace enlightenment or mastery.

But what if it granted, in a single instant, an immense amount of internal energy that no individual could normally obtain?

An amount like rivers and seas...

No matter how formidable a martial artist was, internal energy would eventually run dry.

And that was a concern even more pressing for masters of higher realms.

Sword Force and Sword Qi consumed enormous amounts of internal energy.

As one grew more accomplished in one’s martial arts and heart method, it was possible to reduce that consumption and recover more quickly...

But throughout history, those who could use qi without limit—or come close to it—had been few enough to count on one hand.

One of them was the current Sword Sovereign, Namgung Ak.

Another was the Heavenly Demon who had died fifty years ago.

They were men truly worthy of contending for the title of number one under heaven.

Fifty years ago, Namgung Ak had not yet become the Sword Sovereign.

At the time, he could not defeat the Heavenly Demon alone.

Yet he brought him down, survived, and became the Sword Sovereign he was today.

He became the number one martial artist under heaven—one who could not be said to fall short even when measured against the Heavenly Demon of that era.

People said he used internal energy as though it were inexhaustible...

But that was only a figure of speech. He did not truly possess infinite internal energy.

He simply stored an oceanic reserve within himself.

The Primordial Peerless Pellet created that.

It restructured the size and depth of the dantian, forged a vessel of staggering scale, and filled it like a sea.

“With that, it would be fair to say you have made the minimum preparations necessary to face the Sword Sovereign.”

Jeonggang muttered bitterly.

The opportunity to consume a Primordial Peerless Pellet was unquestionably a fortune and a blessing beyond compare.

And the person who accepted it would inevitably bear the wishes of those who gave it.

The one who devised and carried out the formula for the Primordial Peerless Pellet was the Medicine Sage.

The one who secured all its ingredients and funding was the Reverse Heaven Society.

To receive the Primordial Peerless Pellet meant...

To carry every hope of the Medicine Sage and the Reverse Heaven Society on those small, fragile shoulders.

Jeonggang found that deeply troubling.

But Soyak had already chosen, of her own accord, to join the Reverse Heaven Society.

She was a martial artist who had made her resolve.

He could no longer think of her simply as a child.

Or as a girl.

“Are you not afraid?”

Even so, Jeonggang asked Soyak.

It was adults, old people, and those who held the world in their hands who had made this gilded sky.

Not the small disciple-great-granddaughter standing before him.

That was why, if she said she wanted to run away, he had intended to tell her she could lay down that burden.

“I am not afraid.”

Instead, those black eyes...

Those boundless black eyes, like a starless night sky, gazed even more deeply into her fate.

The destiny of an adversary.

The karmic burden of an avenger.

Jeonggang decided he would worry no longer.

“...Good. It will arrive in about a week. Until then, prepare both your body and your mind.”