Chapter 98: Chapter 98
The Demon Physician was circling around Cheon Woo-jin. Earthen dust was thick around the two of them, rendering visibility poor.
Even so, Cheon Woo-jin shifted his gaze following the Demon Physician’s movements from time to time as if he could see everything.
The moment Cheon Woo-jin’s gaze turned to the right.
Swish!
A faint sound of breaking wind echoed from the right. Without even turning his head, Cheon Woo-jin lightly swung his Crescent Moon Staff.
Clang!
A large acupuncture needle commonly used by physicians struck the Crescent Moon Staff and bounced off.
Cheon Woo-jin still followed the Demon Physician’s movements with his eyes. However, the earthen dust grew thicker, and the Demon Physician’s figure blurred bit by bit.
Soon, the Demon Physician’s movements reached a point where they could not be tracked with the eyes. An ordinary martial artist would have lost their life to an attack they could not even see.
However, Cheon Woo-jin was calm as always.
‘Fascinating.’
It was the evaluation Cheon Woo-jin gave of the Demon Physician’s martial arts.
Being unable to track him with his eyes posed little threat to Cheon Woo-jin. Because he was already at a realm more accustomed to fighting using qi sense rather than sight.
Cheon Woo-jin closed his eyes gently. Then, the Demon Physician’s movements felt even clearer.
This time, the Demon Physician charged in directly.
His bursting calf muscles grew taut like a bowstring, lunging forward truly like a beast.
Cheon Woo-jin extended his palm forward. Soon, their palm centers met, pouring palm force into each other.
Boom!
Two streams of Dark Heaven Qi collided, causing a ferocious explosion, and amidst the storm of energy, the Demon Physician executed lightness arts once again.
This time it was from behind.
Likewise, an exchange of palm force took place.
Cheon Woo-jin deliberately faltered a step. Then he felt the Demon Physician’s speed slow down minutely.
‘Does it consume internal energy explosively?’
Even in Cheon Woo-jin’s eyes, that speed was a realm that a human could not achieve. Even his two masters or the Shadowless Divine Thief could not run faster than that.
Furthermore, the palm he clashed with was coarser than that of any martial artist Cheon Woo-jin knew. To be precise, rather than being hard like iron, it felt tough like ox leather.
However, it naturally did not mean the Demon Physician was stronger than his masters. Judging from how he confirmed his advantage and reduced his speed earlier, there appeared to be a limit to his internal energy.
The moment he thought so, the Demon Physician lunged again.
Cheon Woo-jin lightly deflected his fist, but this time he attacked like a man determined. He swung a continuous barrage, exquisitely mixing fists, palms, and kicks.
‘His stances have actually become simpler.’
Cheon Woo-jin observed the Demon Physician. To be exact, he observed his breathing, pulse, flow of qi, emotions, movements, and facial expressions.
As a result, he realized that the Demon Physician’s words were right. Right now, he appeared closer to a beast than a human.
His body had grown robust, and his senses were sharp. He dodged counterattacks that someone of his level should not have been able to dodge, but it appeared to rely on instinct rather than intentional action.
On the other hand, his judgment seemed to have declined instead. The Demon Physician was a man who had mastered medicine. He could not be unintelligent. Even so, the way he fought was nothing but ignorant and monotonous.
Soon, Cheon Woo-jin reached a conclusion.
“Did you decide to become a dog?”
There was no other way to explain it. Right now, the Demon Physician was acting like a stray dog that had starved for days.
Against an equal or an inferior, he might hold the upper hand instead. Because no martial artist would have faced a stray dog that surpassed the Super-Peak realm.
But entrusting one’s body to senses and instinct against an expert superior to oneself was no different from choosing death.
The Demon Physician considered Cheon Woo-jin an inferior. It was only natural. Even as Black Elder’s disciple, he was still young.
When no answer came to his question, Cheon Woo-jin tilted his head.
“Could it be that you have already become a dog? Have you become unable to speyue human words any longer?”
“Shut up!”
Having held back his answers to reduce internal energy consumption, the Demon Physician erupted with a furious shout. At the same time, Cheon Woo-jin’s figure surged toward the direction of the voice. The Crescent Moon Staff cleaved through the air, and a heavy resistance was felt at his fingertips.
Crack!
Struck across the forearm, the Demon Physician flew back at tremendous speed. Cheon Woo-jin genuinely admired the way he spun his body in midair to regain his balance.
“You’ve crafted something remarkable.”
But the Demon Physician had no energy to reply. Originally, this should have been a match that ended within a quarter-hour after consuming the pill. However, that bastard was blocking his attacks without fail.
He even appeared to have considerable composure. Feeling as though only his own internal energy was rapidly depleting, it was difficult to erase his impatience.
The Demon Physician could not believe this situation. But there was no time to hesitate. Because that bastard was surging forward once more.
In the momentum of that fellow holding the Crescent Moon Staff, Black Elder’s figure was momentarily projected, making the Demon Physician flinch and shudder.
“A m-monster of a bastard.”
“…”
Cheon Woo-jin did not retort. Though he occasionally heard the rude word ‘monster’, he had not expected to hear it even from a bastard who chose to become a beast himself.
A rather unpleasant emotion was vividly imbued into the Crescent Moon Staff.
Boom!
The Demon Physician blocked by crossing both arms. He was pushed back continuously, but his arms remained intact. For Cheon Woo-jin, who had intended to at least break his arms, it was a failed attack.
But there was no need to despair. How could there be only one opportunity? The momentum Cheon Woo-jin emanated had already seized the surroundings.
The Demon Physician momentarily thought of fleeing, but stopped in his tracks at the thought that showing his back might mean death. The Demon Physician changed his strategy. In a situation where only he was impatient, even a winnable fight was bound to be lost.
Perhaps because Black Elder’s image was repeatedly projected, he could not easily calm his mind, so he planned to elicit impatience from his opponent equally.
“Isn’t it a remarkable pill?”
“It is.”
Cheon Woo-jin readily acknowledged it. If it could enhance the strength of a master around the Demon Physician’s level to that extent, martial artists below him would see an even greater effect.
Because inherently, poisons and medicines took effect less easily on stronger masters.
Smiling pleasantly when Cheon Woo-jin acknowledged it, the Demon Physician continued speaking.
“I have prepared a hundred pills at the Tang Clan. By now, your comrades must have been torn apart by the venomous stray dogs…”
Crack!
The Demon Physician’s head snapped backward. With this level of impact to the forehead, his neck bone should have broken normally. But the Demon Physician straightened his head once more. His bones and muscles had grown abnormally strong.
Looking straight ahead again, the Crescent Moon Staff was surging forward. The Demon Physician smiled. His opponent had grown impatient as well.
The Crescent Moon Staff surging toward him was exceptionally fast. Before consuming the pill, it would have been difficult to even track its movements with his eyes.
But now that his body and senses were awakened, it was clearly visible. Glaring straight at the trajectory of the Crescent Moon Staff, the Demon Physician raised his arms. He intended to block it. He planned to abandon attacking and block repeatedly, continuously.
So that the fellow would grow more impatient, until every Martial Alliance bastard at the Tang Clan dropped dead.
It was then.
‘Wh-what…!’
The Crescent Moon Staff he was clearly glaring at vanished from his sight in an instant. The moment he perceived that, a sharp pain was felt in his flank.
Crack!
Because the Crescent Moon Staff’s speed was so fast, he allowed a strike to his flank before he could even raise his arms.
The Demon Physician thought he had been too careless. While reproaching himself and preparing for the next attack, the Crescent Moon Staff was already driven into his solar plexus.
“Cough!”
For a moment, his breath seemed to stop. Starting with that, the chilling dark iron staff cleaved through the air in rapid succession.
Thud-thud-thud-thud!
The Demon Physician’s entire body was thoroughly battered. Agonizing pain rushed in. Yet within that pain, the Demon Physician’s skin, muscles, bones, and organs were enduring it.
Cheon Woo-jin, who had been driving the Demon Physician back, frowned slightly. It was so minute that even the Demon Physician close by could not recognize it.
‘He is sturdy.’
His body was truly abnormal.
The Demon Physician’s intention had hit the mark accurately. Cheon Woo-jin was impatient. He worried that Song Yi-yeon, Zhuge Rin, and Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader might be dead by the time he returned.
Instantly, seven methods to kill the Demon Physician occurred to Cheon Woo-jin simultaneously.
He could pry open his mouth by force and thrust the Crescent Moon Staff in, or gouge out his eyes. He could inject Dark Heaven Qi into his mind to induce qi deviation, or if push came to shove, bury him deep underground where he could not escape on his own and starve him to death.
Meanwhile, a voice brushed past his mind.
– Did I teach you like that!
It was Master Black Elder’s rebuke.
At the same time, the methods that had surfaced in Cheon Woo-jin’s mind vanished in an instant, leaving only one method behind. It was a manner thoroughly suited to Black Elder.
Cheon Woo-jin stopped his attacks and let the Crescent Moon Staff hang down.
“What do you think Master would tell me to do when I see a disobedient dog?”
At Cheon Woo-jin’s question, the Demon Physician’s lips twisted. Just as much as they feared Black Elder, those closest to him were none other than the Dark Emperor’s disciples.
“No doubt he would tell you to beat it with that creepy staff. Saying the rod is the cure.”
“You are wrong.”
“Hm?”
The Demon Physician tilted his head. The Black Elder he knew would have certainly spoken like that.
“He told me to look straight into its eyes and gently stroke it. Saying that unlike arrogant humans, beasts instinctively perceive their position and their opponent’s.”
Having said so, Cheon Woo-jin looked straight into the Demon Physician’s pupils. The Demon Physician, whose eyes met his, flinched in an instant. Pupils as deep as an abyss.
The last time he saw that gaze was decades ago. However, the terror deeply engraved upon one’s psyche never fades even after hundreds of years.
‘The eyes I only saw from Master and Eldest Senior Brother…’
The Eldest Senior Brother was Black Elder, and the master was the Venerable One of Evil who brought them into the world today.
“How is it? Now that you have become a dog, do you think Master’s words were right?”
“…”
The Demon Physician could not say anything.
As if he had not expected an answer in the first place, Cheon Woo-jin extended a palm strike toward the Demon Physician.
It looked like a simple palm strike. But the surrounding air was violently torn apart, and heaven and earth shook as if the sky were about to collapse right now. Cheon Woo-jin infused half of his internal energy into this single palm strike.
Was it around age fourteen? After a palm strike unleashed at full power collapsed an entire cliff. His masters told him to use only half of his internal energy, at least against anyone other than the Three Lords Under Heaven: the Heavenly Demon, the Lord of the Black Overlord Castle, or the Alliance Leader.
Since his internal energy had doubled compared to then, that instruction would also need revision, but the masters who would do so were no longer here.
Cheon Woo-jin’s palm touched the Demon Physician’s solar plexus.
At that moment, the Demon Physician had the illusion that the world was distorting.
Just when he thought an explosion was occurring…
On the contrary, that energy sucked in everything in the surroundings. It was the complete opposite phenomenon of an explosion releasing energy in all directions.
A flash engulfed the vision of the two, and only a continuous ringing sound followed.
* * *
Cheon Woo-jin looked down at the Demon Physician.
He thought it was fortunate that there were no civilian houses nearby. Centered on the Demon Physician, a massive crater reaching a radius of a hundred zhang formed.
The Demon Physician lay dead with his ribs caved in.
The moment he gazed upon the corpse for a while and was about to turn away.
A far too familiar energy was felt from behind.
It was Dark Heaven Qi.
“Could it be.”
Cheon Woo-jin turned his head. Fortunately, the Demon Physician was still dead. Indeed, if he had survived even after taking such a palm strike, the Demon Physician would not have tried to coax Tang Bi-cheon to establish the Righteous Heavenly Alliance.
Looking closely, something like a black bead was visible between the collapsed ribs. It was the source of the Dark Heaven Qi.
Cheon Woo-jin lightly hopped down into the crater where the Demon Physician’s corpse lay. He retrieved the bead nestled inside his ruptured heart.
It harbored Dark Heaven Qi of an extremely dense concentration. Did the Demon Physician know? That he had lived carrying a miraculous medicine in his heart far more precious than any pill he had ever concocted.
“…Master.”
Instantly, Black Elder’s dug-up corpse came to Cheon Woo-jin’s mind. And even the Giant Stone Monster and the Blood Immortal who had died in the same manner.
Could it be that all of the Dark Emperor’s disciples harbored such a thing in their hearts? If so, the incident back then was also likely something done by someone targeting this bead.
Cheon Woo-jin’s energy sank colder than ever before.
A person who would know of the existence of this bead.
Furthermore, a person who required such dense Dark Heaven Qi.
At the same time, a person capable of accomplishing that.
There was only a single such being under heaven.