Chapter 179. Even If I Have to Paint Myself with Lacquer or Swallow Charcoal (25)

“Let’s go, Ma-Ra. We have to leave.”

“Mmm.”

Ma-Ra made sure to cover the corpses again, while Woo-Moon gnashed his teeth in anger.

It had been so nice to see Na Ban smiling mischievously and looking so young and bright for someone of his age as the sect master chased after him to get him to become a lay disciple.

Na Ban had been a genuinely good man.

To think he had died so cruelly, unable to protect his beloved disciples. How much it must have hurt!

Just thinking about it almost made his blood flow in reverse.

‘Just you wait, Martial Heaven. Just you wait.’

Now that Woo-Moon had some time to breathe, he took out eight small glass bottles, each containing a single drop of Pure Stalactite Milk, from his sleeve and drank them one by one.

Originally, as the Pure Stalactite Milk was impure, a person could only drink a single drop of it. However, as Woo-Moon had reached the Paragon realm, that limitation was no longer an issue; his body would process and eliminate the impurities.

Half an hour later, Woo-Moon was rejuvenated by the qi he absorbed from the Pure Stalactite Milk.

Then, he whispered a few words in Ma-Ra’s ear. She nodded, dropped Woo-Moon off, and disappeared.

Woo-Moon waited for his pursuers at the narrow entrance of a closed-off ravine. It looked like a mountain pass at first sight, but once you entered, it was clear that the gap between cliffs actually led to a horseshoe-shaped enclosure, with no exit whatsoever.

When they came into view, he limped through the entrance.

“We found him!”

“Haha, you imbecile! You ran all this way only to find a dead end. You’re trapped!”

Thinking that Woo-Moon was a rat in a trap, some of the Cruel Sandstorm Riders who had found him leisurely followed him into the narrow opening.

Meanwhile, the Cruel Sandstorm Riders’ other forces, which had been sent to various places to find him, received the call to gather and appeared one by one.

“Ha, ha...”

Woo-Moon took a deep breath and endured his pain.

Even though he was a Paragon, that didn’t mean that he didn’t feel pain. Moreover, even though he could treat his wounds with his rejuvenated qi immediately, he refrained from doing so. Instead, he simply endured the pain, even though it was getting worse by the moment.

“You damned bastard! It looks like that assassin bitch abandoned you and ran. Now, we can put an end to that tenacious life of yours.”

Woo-Moon looked back slightly. There was still some distance left. He had to draw them in further.

Woo-Moon staggered back, letting Gam Ak and the other Cruel Sandstorm Riders follow him in.

Most of the Cruel Sandstorm Riders who had chased after Woo-Moon had already arrived by this point.

Gam Ak followed Woo-Moon in and slashed down with his sword.

Woosh!

However, Woo-Moon pretended to squeeze out the last of his qi and use the Divine Phantasm Steps one last time, blood spewing from the injuries on his back.

Gam Ak’s sword narrowly passed by his side, giving Woo-Moon the opening to step back once more.

Then, Woo-Moon's back hit the steep cliffside.

Twang! Squelch!

Woo-Moon's upper body shook as an arrow struck him in the side.

The Murderous Wind Battalion Vice Leader Geum Yeob had been lying in wait, waiting for an opportunity to shoot.

Fortunately, the arrow missed Woo-Moon’s vital organs and only pierced through flesh, but still, it wasn’t a small wound. Seeing this, Gam Ak and the other members of the Cruel Sandstorm Riders smiled triumphantly and entered the cliff hollow.

When Geum Yeob shot another arrow, aiming for Woo-Moon’s head this time, another arrow suddenly fell from above Woo-Moon directly toward Geum Yeob’s arrow.

Clang!

The two arrows struck each other with a tinny sound and fell to the ground.

Woo-Moon smiled when he saw that.

“Young Master, we’re here to help!”

With a shout, ten young men appeared on the cliff above Woo-Moon. They looked young and uncouth, but also strangely majestic in their own way.

They were the Song Family Guards!

“Don’t you dare touch a single hair on the Young Master!”

They jumped down the cliff like the wind and blocked the Cruel Sandstorm Riders’ path.

It is said that a scholar who has been away three days must be looked at with new eyes.[1] While Woo-Moon had spent their time apart surpassing the Absolute realm and reaching the Paragon realm, they, too, had achieved incredible feats.

‘From First Class to the initial Peak Stage. You’ve all really grown a lot.’

Except for Jae Hwa, none of them had known any martial arts in the beginning, and even Jae Hwa barely scratched the surface of the lowest-level trash martial arts. To think that in such a short span of time, they had all grown so much.... Something like this wouldn’t have been possible if they hadn’t trained their bodies down to the bone.

“Do you think these pieces of trash are going to save you?”

Although they were quite surprised at first, they were soon able to figure out the level of the newcomers’ cultivations by seeing how they went down the cliff.

‘The only two that reached the Peak stage are that brat who shot the arrow and the skinny one... the rest are First Class at best.’

However, right at this moment, a scream erupted from the left.

“What’s going on—”

Then, a roar seemed to shake the heavens and earth, drowning out Gam Ak's shout.

ROOOAAARRR!!!!

Due to the strength imbued within the roar, the Murderous Wind Battalion members, who were all relatively low in cultivation, were pushed back, legs quivering.

The one attacking the Murderous Wind Battalion from the left was none other than Eun-Ah!

Woo-Moon was also surprised by Eun-Ah’s appearance. This hadn’t been planned.

He was sure... he had clearly told her to guard Yu Yu...

Suddenly, Woo-Moon smiled faintly, realizing that Eun-Ah, who was connected to him psychically, had realized he was in crisis and had immediately rushed to him.

Then, behind the Cruel Sandstorm Riders, a group of warriors appeared, blocking the only escape route.

“We are the swords of the Iron Sword Baek Family!”

They were soldiers wearing pure white clothes and holding iron swords!

The Baek Invincible Forged Squadron!

“Now, should we give it another try? Jae-Hwa, it’s the Qi Dispersion Poison.”

“Understood!”

𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

Jae-Hwa, one of the two Peak class experts among the guards, drew a vial from his sleeve and threw it at Woo-Moon.

Woo-Moon opened the vial and downed it the moment he caught it, immediately beginning to circulate his qi slowly.

Jae-Hwa had just thrown Woo-Moon a very common antidote to Qi Dispersion Poison. It was an extremely common and generic antidote; it wasn’t terribly effective, but it did work against all known forms of Qi Dispersion Poison.

And for Woo-Moon, this minimum efficacy was more than enough.

He had filled more than half of his massive qi tank already, thanks to the pure natural energy contained in the Pure Stalactite Milk, and there was still plenty more energy to process. As he began circulating his qi and inspected his meridians, he could clearly sense how the antidote ate away at the Qi Dispersion Poison.

‘Good, now, move the qi in the same way!’

The qi of the Forbidden Divine Art flowed through his body, reproducing the action of the antidote, and almost immediately dispersed all of the Qi Dispersion Poison.

Moreover, that wasn’t all. Now that he understood how both the poison and the antidote worked, this poison would no longer be effective on him, ever. He had gained complete immunity; even if he was poisoned again, cleansing it would be a breeze.

“Fuck! What are you guys waiting for?! It’s just ten people and a cat! Song Woo-Moon is dying, this is our chance! Slaughter them all, and kill Song Woo-Moon!”

Gam Ak’s shout caused the morale of the Murderous Wind Battalion members to rise, quickly resolving the confusion caused by a surprise attack on two fronts. They immediately launched their counterattack.

“HAAAA!!”

However, Gam Ak didn’t know that Woo-Moon was now free from the Qi Dispersion Poison. Moreover, the resilience of a master at the Paragon Stage was beyond his imagination.

A tremendous amount of qi surged through Woo-Moon’s entire body, and the qi in his dantian soared explosively as he processed more of the energy in the Pure Stalactite Milk.

After recovering all of his qi in an instant, Woo-Moon smiled coldly.

“First, you archer rat. I’ll start with you.”

Woo-Moon’s figure disappeared.

Then, he reappeared right in front of Geum Yeob!

“Huh?”

Squelch!

Woo-Moon’s sword passed through the neck of the Vice Battalion Leader as if it wasn’t even there. Then, blasting forward with the Raging Wind Palm, Woo-Moon slapped Geum Yeob’s head right at Gam Ak.

Gam Ak hurriedly responded with a fist, causing Geum Yeob’s head to explode. Bone fragments and blood rained down on Gam Ak's torso.

“Aghh!!!”

Pieces of Geum Yeob’s skull actually lodged themselves into Gam Ak’s chest due to the sheer force of the clash.

Meanwhile, Eun-Ah was also showing an incredible performance.

BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG!

“W-what the hell is this?!”

“Is this a tiger or a god?!”

ROAR!!

Eun-Ah lashed out at those who attacked her with her front paws, while her tail flicked about like a whip.

“AGH!!!!”

“UGH!”

Anyone hit by her front paw was crushed like rotten fruit, swords and sabers be damned. Meanwhile, her tail broke bones and limbs as if it was a steel whip.

“You damn monster!”

Go Myeong-Ah, one of the members of the Murderous Wind Battalion, swung a mace as large and thick as a tree trunk toward Eun-Ah with as much force as he could muster.

Eun-Ah moved quickly and opened her mouth to catch the mace descending toward her.

‘Ha, stupid beast, bite this!’

Just as he hoped, the steel head of the mace indeed smacked Eun-Ah right in the mouth.

And then... she indeed bit it.

Crunch!

Even though the mace was made of fine steel and black iron and was coated in mace aura, Eun-Ah’s teeth simply took a chunk off as if it was made of cake and coated in chocolate.

“What the f—”

The impressive upper body of Go Myeong-Ak disappeared, only a piece of miserably torn meat remaining in its place.

ROAR!!!

After pulverizing Go Myeong-Ak to death with a single slap, Eun-Ah roared once more and moved on to attack other enemies.

No one could stop Eun-Ah.

When Eun-Ah stomped on another enemy, turning him into a meat patty, a tremendous explosion rang out.

It was the sound of six Transcendents of the Murderous Wind Battalion coming together to attack Woo-Moon with all their might.

However, even that effort had been in vain, as a golden shield appeared, covering Woo-Moon and blocking all of their attacks.

“Hmph. Golden Wall Severing Void.”

The Impenetrable Golden Wall flew away, killing sixty bandits in an instant.

That wasn’t all, either.

Woo-Moon had realized he could control the Impenetrable Golden Wall just like he normally controlled his swords with his qi. Under his command, it changed direction and flew toward another group, razing everything in its path like a death god’s scythe.

After moving back and forth through enemy lines, the number of people killed by the Impenetrable Golden Wall exceeded two hundred.

“That’s as far as you go.”

A young man with red hair and red eyebrows suddenly appeared and thrust his palm at Woo-Moon's Impenetrable Golden Wall.

BOOM!

The Impenetrable Golden Wall collided with the young man's palm force and dissipated, causing a massive shock wave that made those around them collapse, bleeding from all over.

The young man with red hair and red eyebrows was the Great Darkness Palace Master Yeong Ho-San. Woo-Moon definitely remembered his face.

He was one of the two Paragons that appeared when Woo-Moon tried to infiltrate the Cruel Sandstorm Riders and gather information.

“Then, let’s test your skills, why don’t we? Let’s see if you’ll be able to stop me!”

As he said that, Woo-Moon's figure disappeared in a blur and appeared behind the Great Darkness Palace Master.

‘North Wind!’

A wind carrying a cold chill swept over the Great Darkness Palace Master.

‘He disappeared?’

The Great Darkness Palace Master Yeong Ho-San's figure seemed to disappear by the wind of the North Wind. Then, Woo-Moon immediately disappeared using Illusive Shift once again, right as he felt a slight breeze from right behind him.

Woosh!

The Great Darkness Palace Master, who had appeared behind Woo-Moon, had created dozens of beads of power in front of him.

'What is this?'

The moment this thought crossed Woo-Moon’s mind, the beads filled with aura exploded.

A tremendous tsunami of destruction enveloped Woo-Moon.

“Ugh!”

Woo-Moon created a veil of sword energy in front of him, blocking the blast.

Then, he gritted his teeth hard.

Seeing this attack, he had just realized something.

“It was you! You were the one who killed Sect Master Na Ban and his companions!”

Yeong Ho-San smiled coldly.

“As expected, they had something to do with you. Right, that was me. And after that, I also slaughtered a few more groups of bastards who were sneaking around.”

In fact, the Great Darkness Palace Master was precisely on a quest to kill every single one of Woo-Moon’s allies; had only come this way after hearing the sound of a fierce battle.

Woo-Moon almost lost control over his qi as he heard the Great Darkness Palace Master say that he had killed not just the Kunlun Sect disciples, but even

more groups

of people like them!

Flames of rage blazed within his eyes.

“You... That... was the last thing you did. You’ll die by my hand, even worse than they did!”

1. This is an old Chinese saying, implying that traveling changes people’s perspectives, and someone who is intent on learning will practically be a different person when returning. ☜