Chapter 244. Within Ten Paces, You'll Find A Fragrant Flower (15)

Not long after, Sang-Woon happened to run into a man walking into the waterfall and simply chased after him. Although the man kept feeling as if someone was following him and looked around from time to time, he never even looked in Sang-Woon’s general direction.

Thus, Sang-Woon found his way into Martial Heaven’s headquarters. He went around here and there to gather information, but as he moved... he eventually ran into a crisis of his own.

The Martial Heaven God.

As Sang-Woon calmly walked around Martial Heaven as if it were his own playground, he discovered the Martial Heaven God’s existence and approached to observe him more closely.

Then, when he got roughly about ten zhang away, the Martial Heaven God sensed him.

“Hm?”

Shocked, Sang-Woon quickly ran away while further increasing his assimilation with nature.

Fortunately, the Martial Heaven God was concerned more with the strange changes that happened around him recently and didn’t feel like a random bug sneaking around was anything important.

From that point on, Sang-Woon avoided going near the Martial Heaven God as much as possible, and instead roamed around the edges of the massive underground cave.

It was then that he found her—he found Jin-Jin, trapped in a prison.

‘What the hell?! Why is that child here?’

Naturally, Sang-Woon wanted to grab Jin-Jin and get out. However, while it was perfectly easy for him to come and go as he wished, escaping with Jin-Jin was out of the question.

Thus, he decided to go find his grandson Woo-Moon and ask him for help. But right as he was about to do so, some big oaf of the imperial palace named Yang Cheon-Hwi came out of nowhere and caused a massive ruckus.

At first, he tried just to pass by and get out by himself. However, for some reason, he felt that he shouldn’t just ignore Yang Cheon-Hwi and thus continued to follow the commotion. Eventually, he discovered that the rumored Yang Cheon-Hwi was actually his very grandson.

‘Fuck, isn’t that convenient?’

He had thought about rescuing Jin-Jin the moment Yang Cheon-Hwi had started the brawl, but he feared that if the so-called hidden master was killed by Martial Heaven, he and Jin-Jin might be discovered midway and fall into serious danger.

Now that he knew Woo-Moon was the one here, and clearly sensing his power, Sang-Woon had no more misgivings. He merged with nature perfectly and headed toward where Jin-Jin was being held captive.

While this was happening, Woo-Moon’s identity was discovered, and some of the more cunning members of Martial Heaven started to threaten him with Jin-Jin’s life.

Meanwhile, Jin-Jin actually didn’t appear to have any injuries or suffered much.

She was, however, shaken awake by the sudden commotion outside, only to be surprised a few minutes later to hear the villains of Martial Heaven shouting her son’s name.

‘Woo-Moon! It’s my son, Woo-Moon!’

She tried to get out, and she tried to shout. But with her cultivation suppressed, how could she leave her cell and deal with her guards?

She burst into tears when she heard her son’s life being threatened with her own. She wanted to shout and tell him not to worry about her. Sadly, her captors had taken care of that already—her throat acupoint had been sealed to shut her up, and without qi, she couldn’t unlock it.

She wanted to sacrifice her own life to save her son’s, but she knew she couldn’t do so while her son couldn’t see her. If she were to commit suicide while her captors kept her hidden and continued to threaten her son, he may just end up dying as well.

At this very moment, Sang-Woon arrived.

Two Transcendent experts were guarding Jin-Jin. Sang-Woon moved right behind them and stretched out both his hands at lightning speed.

Thud!

With a nigh-inaudible sound, the two men had their hearts and lungs simultaneously ruptured by and lost their lives just like that.

As his assimilation with nature was interrupted the moment he attacked, Jin-Jin was able to see Sang-Woon.

Her eyes widened for a moment, and then tears flowed down.

“Alright, my dear daughter, I know you want to say something, but we have other priorities. I’ll let you talk when we’re out.”

Then, Sang-Woon ambushed and killed the warrior guarding the entrance to the prison in the same manner and took advantage of the moment when everyone was watching Woo-Moon to take Jin-Jin and run away.

While his assimilation with nature wouldn’t work as he carried Jin-Jin away, Woo-Moon was drawing every bit of Martial Heaven’s attention, so there was no chance of being discovered.

Then, the moment the Forgetful King was about to kill Woo-Moon, Sang-Woon sent his grandson a Voice Transmission.

–I’ve saved Jin-Jin!

‘Grandfather?’

Woo-Moon’s mind and body moved simultaneously.

He generated a defensive qi barrier to deflect the dagger, while his hand grabbed the Forgetful King’s neck.

“Ugh! Y-you bastard... your mother...”

“Alright, that’s about enough. Shut it.” Woo-Moon smirked. “You see, I had a secret plan. It was so secret that not even I knew about it, but you get my point.”

Crack!

Woo-Moon twisted the Forgetful King’s neck, then simply ripped his head off as if it was some kind of weirdly-shaped fruit.

Crunch!

He slammed the Forgetful King’s head into the ground and smashed it into pieces.

“You fucking bastard! Hey, you there, kill that bitch immediately!”

Woo-Moon flinched for a moment, still not completely believing that his grandfather had sent him a voice transmission.

‘What if what I heard was a hallucination?’

he thought to himself, worrying that the situation itself was ridiculous. After all, to the best of his knowledge, his grandpa was well and truly dead.

However, the next moment, the warriors of Martial Heaven kindly confirmed that everything was real.

“What are you doing? Kill that bitch!”

As soon as the warrior finished speaking, another warrior behind him shouted, “She... She disappeared! The guards are dead and that bitch is gone!”

“What? What the fu—”

The warrior couldn’t finish his sentence. It’s rather hard to finish a sentence when your head and your body part ways, so that was understandable.

At that moment, Sang-Woon’s voice reached Woo-Moon.

—

Hey, I’ll take your mom and run for the hills. You deal with this until I take her out.

“Understood! Go ahead, I’ll follow you soon.”

Woo-Moon was greatly worried about what would happen to his grandfather and mother during the escape, so he quickly followed along.

‘What a relief! Grandfather is alive! And not only is he alive, but he somehow managed to find this place and rescue Mother!’

In spite of the terrible situation overall, he couldn’t help but chuckle. He was nervous because he didn’t know when the Martial Heaven God would appear, but for now, he seemed to be safe still.

—We’re out!

The voice of his grandfather reached him again, and after a while, Woo-Moon also arrived in front of the lake, the exit that led to the outside world.

‘What about the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor? He’s not here...’

It seemed as though something had gone wrong while he was saving his younger sister.

Worried about his grandfather and mother, Woo-Moon moved to jump into the lake immediately. However, at the last moment, his body stopped moving.

‘Damn it!’

Woo-Moon cursed inwardly and headed toward where he had last seen the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor. While fighting, he had noticed the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor sneakily go underground in one of the halls.

𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

“It’s him! Kill him!”

He was discovered once more, but as long as the Martial Heaven God didn’t appear, there was nothing for him to be afraid of.

“Hmph!”

Woo-Moon suddenly vanished from the air.

The countless people who had been looking up at him from below looked around frantically, unable to find him.

A few moments later, Woo-Moon stealthily entered the hallway where he’d seen the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor disappear and found a staircase leading to the basement.

Then, he saw the back of the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor in the deepest room underground.

‘That’s her?’

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor was holding a block of ice in his arms and using his Burning Yang Palm Force to melt it.

Inside the block of ice was a beautiful girl who looked to be in her late teens, sleeping.

Examining the ice as he approached Blood Cloud Devil Emperor, Woo-Moon’s gaze suddenly grew wide.

“Seop Un-Ha, stay your hand right now!”

But it was too late.

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor had already melted through the ice and woke the girl up.

“Ah...!”

The girl let out a small moan, as if she were coming to her senses; at that moment, the madness that had always been in the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor’s eyes disappeared, and warmth emerged. Yet right when the girl finally opened her eyes and saw him, white smoke suddenly rose from her entire body.

“Cho-Cho-Ah... Cho-Ah!”

“Big brother...!”

The girl’s eyes rolled back before she could finish her sentence and she started convulsing; she was clearly in excruciating pain. An unbearable heat rose from within her body.

“Damn it!”

Woo-Moon quickly tapped the girl’s acupoints, the smoke emanating from her body subsided.

“W-what... What’s going on? What’s happening to Cho-Ah?!”

Woo-Moon kept manipulating the girl’s meridians.

“Fucking Martial Heaven God! You idiot, he was just playing with you!”

“W-what are you saying?!”

“A Zenith Master has placed a seal on her. A Zenith Master who is much stronger than me, I have to tell you.”

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor froze in fear. Even worse... Woo-Moon was equally terrified.

He could get a sense of the Martial Heaven God’s incredible cultivation just from the seal that the Martial Heaven God had placed on Cho-Ah.

‘Is he even human? How the fuck is this even possible?!’

Even grasping the full extent of this seal was beyond Woo-Moon’s abilities.

The Martial Heaven God was just that strong.

He had most likely already reached the peak of the Zenith realm. As someone who had only just entered this realm, Woo-Moon definitely was no match for him.

“W-what sort of seal?”

“There was flame locked in her meridians... a flame so strong it might as well be the fire of Hell. The moment the block of ice around Cho-Ah was melted, the seal was set in such a way as to trigger this flame. And let me tell you: This was not something the Martial Heaven God placed here with the intention of removing it later. This was meant to kill her from the get-go. Specifically, to kill her the moment you thought you’d gotten her back.”

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor was already aware of Woo-Moon’s level. And if someone at that level called it “so strong it might as well be the fire of Hell,” then that flame had to be terrifying beyond his imagination.

‘But even so... My only hope is Song Woo-Moon.’

Seob Un-Ha collapsed on the spot, crying with tears streaming down his face.

“Please save her! Please save Cho-Ah. She’s the only reason I’m alive. I was never able to protect her before and I can’t let her go like this. Please save her! Please!”

However, Woo-Moon couldn’t answer easily.

This was the power of none other than the Martial Heaven God. There was no guarantee that he could do it even if he tried, and he had to focus a hundred twenty percent on the task. In other words... he would be completely defenseless.

‘I can’t die here. I have to live.’

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor threw away all of his pride as an Absolute Master, grabbed Woo-Moon’s pant leg, and shouted while spitting out blood.

“Please, please, I’m begging you! You know, I’ve even saved your life once! No, not just once! Many times! So, please help her in return, I’m begging you!”

“Huh? You? You saved me?”

“Yes. Before you became an Absolute Master, a long time ago, remember when I tried to kill you in Hefei? I was there under Martial Heaven’s orders, but the Saber Emperor interfered. Actually, I looked for you again once I got away from him, but....”

“But?”

Even as they talked, Woo-Moon’s hands continued to move, suppressing the heat rising within Cho-Ah’s meridians.

“When I found you again, you were at the underground slave market. And you were saving Ma-Ra.”

Woo-Moon felt a cold sweat run down his face as he listened to the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor.

‘There’s no way he knows this. It was just me and... So he really was there! How else could he possibly know that I met Ma-Ra at the slave market? And I had no idea he was watching me... He could’ve killed me ten times over and I wouldn’t even know it.’

“Then why didn’t you kill me?”

“I saw Ma-Ra. She... she looked like Cho-Ah. I couldn’t kill you after seeing you save her and then... I saw you spend time with her. I didn’t want to break up that peace and happiness. So, I’m telling the truth. I was around you for a long time, not just for a day. I thought countless times during that time about whether or not to kill you. And I didn’t! So I saved your life! I saved it hundreds of times!” the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor screamed.

His voice was filled with sincerity—his sincere desire to save Cho-Ah.

In the end, Woo-Moon couldn’t help but curse again.

“Damn it! Fuck, I’ll do it. Well, with three conditions. First, I really don’t know if I can remove the flame. You can’t blame me if I can’t. Second, while I’m doing this, I’m completely defenseless. I can already hear a bunch of people coming in, and you’ll have to stop them all. Third, if all three of us survive and we get out of here, I’m killing you first to get rid of a pest. Are you sure you’re willing?”

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor Seob Un-Ha smiled brightly.

“Of course I’m willing!”