Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 865
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 865
Boom–!
A brief but tremendous explosion.
All three of us are sent flying into the wall and collide with it.
At the same time, as Eon Jeong-mu splits apart and the small sun of qi energy bursts forth, it too loses its power and dissipates.
“Kugh!”
“Cough!”
“Puh!”
All three of us cough up blood.
The internal injuries are severe.
Pain spreads through my body.
Yet none of us collapse.
Sama Hyeon and I benefit from the external martial arts we’ve cultivated, while Cheonwoo disperses the force left and right using the mysteries of the Yang Healing Divine Art to cushion the damage.
“You two! Are you alright!?”
“I’m okay!”
“I’m fine, hyeong!”
At their responses, I exhale in relief and wipe my chest.
An opponent who has clearly reached Hyeongyeong!
If Eon Jeong-mu hadn’t been an artificially created Hyeongyeong, we three would have been annihilated.
Because he had only just become Hyeongyeong, his true martial prowess couldn’t be fully unleashed.
In that sense, we were fortunate.
“Hah…”
I collapse onto the ground, my energy depleted.
I create the flow of inner qi from the Heavenly Dragon Art, immediately healing the internal injuries, so the pain quickly subsides.
“So we finally ended this…”
Dong–!
A bell tolls.
This time it wasn’t painfully loud.
But what happened afterward made us brothers gasp in horror.
Fragments fly in from all directions.
The ashes reform into their original shape and merge into one.
In the span of a few blinks, Eon Jeong-mu returns to his original form.
“This cannot be…”
A sight that completely overturns all conventional understanding.
Cheonwoo’s single eye widens.
Sama Hyeon begins laughing like a madman.
And I gaze at ‘that’ with the cool, piercing eyes I inherited from my Master.
Operating the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong at its peak, steam begins rising from my entire body.
My flesh body, not a bone body, screams that it has reached its limit.
But there’s no choice.
I cannot die like this.
“Eon Jeong-mu has already become one with the ruins. Destroying Eon Jeong-mu is futile. Through the power of these ruins, Eon Jeong-mu shall regenerate at any moment. Jin Cheon-hee. Become a sacrifice willingly.”
Eon Jeong-mu had now become something belonging to an entirely different being with a different dharma.
His original self grew increasingly obscured, merging ever deeper with the ruins.
“Ugh.”
I staggered to my feet.
I felt as though I were dying.
Every fiber of my body screamed in agony.
Could I advance further?
I had no way of knowing.
But my younger siblings stood behind me. Therefore, there was nowhere to retreat.
Even now, my eyes burned with brilliant, unwavering light.
A playful smile graced my lips as I spoke with deliberate composure.
“Ou, the Ou family’s hospitality is truly excessive.”
Even now, my mind raced through tens of thousands of possibilities, accelerating my thoughts.
And I reached a conclusion.
“I will bring you down. And I will destroy this accursed ruin.”
I steeled my resolve.
Eon Jeong-mu regarded me with indifferent eyes.
“Is it possible? Can a mere human, a mortal, truly stand against Eon Jeong-mu?”
“I don’t know. But I have discovered a possibility.”
I drew my blade.
“I have conceived of a method to bring you down and restore the jiangshi to an ordinary corpse. Now that I have formulated a hypothesis, I must test it.”
“Obsessed with research—those words suit you perfectly. Audacious. Truly audacious. Then, Jin Cheon-hee, give it a try.”
Once more.
Eon Jeong-mu’s body transformed into qi.
Qi Apotheosis!
Simultaneously, I glanced at my younger siblings on either side.
Cheonwoo staggered, then rose with composure.
Sama Hyeon likewise rose with a playful smile.
Watching those two, I thought.
‘I seem to have brought my younger siblings to a needlessly dangerous place.’
Therefore.
As their older brother, I had to return them safely.
And I drove the Icy Frost Blade downward into the earth.
Eon Jeong-mu began levitating once more.
The three brothers each generated their own qi.
Blood flowed simultaneously from the corners of all their mouths.
Even I could not prevent my internal injuries.
Time stretched into an endless crawl.
From the Ice Frost Sword, Five Elements qi spread outward in all directions as if taking root.
All of this occurred in a single instant.
Soon after, the qi touched the formation.
The world transformed.
* * *
‘What exactly is a formation?’
Since arriving in this martial world, I had learned many things that didn’t exist on Earth.
The Five Elements, qi, and such.
Among them, the most surprising was not martial arts, but formations themselves.
Why do formations work?
What is the reason that merely twisting and binding the world’s qi produces phenomena that seem like sorcery or magic?
Back when I was learning sorcery from Jasi.
He defined sorcery this way.
-Sorcery activates by weaving thoughts and paying a price. Therefore, sorcery must follow proper procedures and forms. Otherwise, the sorcery doesn’t work properly and instead harms the shaman themselves.
Weaving something rooted in thoughts.
That is sorcery.
But formations produced sorcery-like effects without requiring any thoughts at all.
Wasn’t that what made formations akin to magic?
The greatest family in formations under heaven was naturally the Jegallim Family.
I had absorbed and learned all of their formation techniques.
Regarding formations, I had always thought that aside from my Master Jegalling, there were few in the world who could surpass me.
As a result.
I began to think that formations might be like a programming language that governs the rules composing this world.
A formation is a terminal for intervening in the vast program called the world, and perhaps by restructuring formations, one rewrites the program language itself.
I had come to think this way, using the sensibilities of a modern person.
Because of this.
I could intervene in formations deployed by others, modify them, and use them according to my own will.
‘As long as my skill is superior enough.’
And one more thing.
‘This one is tricky since sorcery is also woven into the formation.’
The Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong began to rotate at maximum intensity.
Heaven’s timing, earth’s geography, spiritual veins, temporal conditions, Five Elements, Eight Trigrams.
The power to twist not merely fortune and misfortune as commonly spoken, but the very principles themselves.
‘Parasitizing another’s formation and correcting it my way—it’s similar to hacking in modern terms.’
My Master had utilized this principle to face other great sects.
Merely one person.
The fundamental reason a single human, not even a Hyeongyeong, could extract blood debts from massive powers lay there.
By turning their formations against them, delivering the iron hammer of karmic retribution.
And now.
I walk that same path.
The energy radiating from the Icy Frost Sword intertwined with the sorcery of this ruin, reversing its power and influence.
Deeper and stronger than when I had divided space moments ago to redirect Eon Jeong-mu’s wave of force.
I was destabilizing the formation itself.
Crackle.
‘Good. If I continue like this, I can use the formation’s power to reverse and steal Eon Jeong-mu’s strength….’
In that instant.
My consciousness touched the source of the formation.
It was like developing a sense that had never existed before.
Beyond the sixth sense of qi perception gained through martial arts training, the seventh sense of spiritual intuition obtained through sorcery cultivation.
That faint sense expanded further.
And as the sixth and seventh senses activated simultaneously.
I saw and understood something new.
-Now that it’s come to this, I naturally understand why this ruin has activated. It seems I’ve become subordinate to this ruin. And in exchange, I’ve received the ruin’s knowledge.
Gaju Eon-gwon had certainly said so.
And now.
As I attempted to reverse-engineer the formation, I too could stand at the threshold of the process of ‘receiving’ that Gaju Eon-gwon had spoken of.
-Ilgwang.
-Veiled Madman.
-Free us.
-Isn’t this a body that can survive even the end times? Gae Pa Josa prepared for the apocalypse.
-Is this alive? I don’t know what the landscape of the end times looks like, but can this truly be called living?
-My daughter went out to foreign lands. Tell her a message from me.
-The Jin Ju-eonga clan will survive even when the end times arrive.
-Corpses. We call these moving corpses jiangshi!
I connected with countless spirits and souls.
The divine blood stirred.
Normally I could not have delved this deeply, but the divine blood I possessed created talent.
And that talent dragged me further down into the abyss.
The thoughts and emotions of people began to surge forth.
Dizzying.
An ordinary person would have lost their mind long ago in such circumstances.
But the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong at its peak would not permit madness.
‘How is this even possible?’
Even as my sense of self was being dragged away entirely, I maintained considerable composure.
Enough to ask myself such a question.
‘I know it’s not just a formation, but is sorcery capable of something like this?’
Ancient ruins.
Haven’t I encountered such ruins even in the Saeoe region?
They were all composed of things utterly incomprehensible by human knowledge.
And they seemed as though they had been created in advance, prepared for a distant future.
Flower Points.
For someone like me who loved Go, recalling this concept came naturally.
‘Ah, so the Heavenly Mechanism is something far more intricately layered than I imagined.’
Oddly enough, it resembled the Jegallim Family’s methods.
When devising plans, didn’t they establish flower points like placing stones on a Go board, laying out their opening strategy?
Based on that foundation, they would construct their plans, expand them, and engage in tactical battles.
That bore an uncanny resemblance to the Heavenly Mechanism’s approach.
What had Gae Pa Josa arranged?
Why had he taught future generations in this manner?
A surge—
Blood dripped from my nose.
‘I see. The Heavens are something that a single human could never control on their own… truly something vast and incomprehensible.’
Long before I arrived in this world, the Heavens had already laid all their opening moves.
From the distant past.
From the time of Gae Pa Josa of the Jin Ju-eonga clan, and even before that, from the ancient kingdom of the Bird Realm that had fallen into ruin.
—Come with us too. We’re preparing for destruction. You’re not necessarily connected to the Jin Ju-eonga clan, but you’re more than worthy of receiving our ‘blessing.’
A voice echoed.
It was a woman’s voice.
Could she be a disciple of Gal Hong, the Gae Pa Josa?
Or perhaps someone connected to him?
I couldn’t tell.
One thing was certain—she genuinely lamented for those left behind in this world.
That’s why she maintained this ruins.
To create a gatekeeper for the Blood Layer Five-Gate Barrier, a suitable corpse was necessary.
She must have shared such knowledge with Gaju Eon-gwon.
Eon-gwon would have been unable to resist facing such a tremendous spirit.
The human self was fragile.
Just by her voice reaching him, madness would flood in.
Without even realizing he was being manipulated, he would have simply moved according to her will.
He would have possessed many corpses.
Including those of masters.
Among them, the corpse of the ancestor from three hundred years ago, whom I first encountered, would have been the best preserved.
She had issued ‘revelations.’
She taught him which jiangshi to place where.
It was an ancient contract and promise.
A promise that even though already dead, if resurrected as a jiangshi and achieved victory against a guest, they would be granted a new life.
Why would anyone refuse?
The same promise applied to Gaju Eon-gwon as well.
Eon-gwon, whose sense of self had already been shattered by the ruins’ power, would not have hesitated.
It would have been a sensation similar to being caught in a nightmare.
Isn’t it human nature to make choices in dreams that we would never dare make in reality?
While conducting research on jiangshi with Jin Cheon-hee, I felt as though I was concealing something fundamental—and now I understand why.
‘A jiangshi with consciousness.’
Those who died long ago may have chosen this fate themselves, but what of those who were living well?
‘Unable to taste anything, unable to sleep properly.’
Fighting the enemies of the Blood Layer Five Gates, I noticed they seemed incapable of feeling pain properly either.
A body stripped of sensation—the feeling of embracing someone, the feeling of being embraced—all gone.
Could such a thing truly be called a ‘blessing’?
And yet, she genuinely worried for her children.
‘What in the world happens at the end of days?’
I decided to speak to the colossal presence within the ruins.
Would my voice even reach it?
I have no certainty.
Yet my divine blood responds, churning and bubbling within me.
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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