Fist Demon of Mount Hua - Chapter 49

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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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Episode 49. There Is No Justice More Precious Than a Human Life—Part 3
The commotion at the main gate shattered the peace that had settled over Seocheon Mountain Manor.
Clang-clang-clang!
The alarm bell shrieked, and countless martial artists poured out in a torrent.
“What’s happening?”
“The, the main gate is under attack!”
“The Hyeol Sa Poong?”
The martial artists exchanged bewildered glances with one another. But it lasted only a moment—then, fury etched across their faces, they bolted toward the gate.
They didn’t know the attackers’ identity, but they weren’t naive enough to sit idle and wait for the enemy to reveal themselves.
Then it came.
Whoosh!
A scorching gale suddenly surged forward like a tidal wave.
The fierce, scalding wind—thick with killing intent and heat—swallowed them whole in an instant.
Crash! Crash!
“Aahhh!”
“S-save me!”
The deafening roar and screams mingled and echoed across the dawn sky.
“Wh-what?”
The martial artists behind stumbled backward, eyes wide.
A single man was charging forward.
In a Black Long Robe, he stampeded like a raging bull in a straight line—while countless martial artists swarmed to intercept him.
Blades carved through the darkness. Sword energy and pressure screamed with razor precision.
All of it converged on one man alone.
To halt his charge.
‘We can stop him.’
‘He’s human too. A blade will cut him. He’ll bleed.’
Until that very moment, they harbored a sliver of hope. But in the next instant, that hope shattered like pottery dropped on stone.
Crash!
Each time demonic thunder rang out, someone was smashed backward—along with whatever weapon they held.
Weapons refined through hundreds, thousands of strikes of quality steel were no better than rotted stalks of grain before this man’s fists.
“Urgh!”
“Wh-what?”
Dozens of martial artists collapsed into pools of blood in mere moments. Yet none could impede the advance of the man in black—Dam Ho.
From the time he breached the main gate until he burst through the inner hall, Dam Ho employed only two techniques: Chung Bo and Pa Seong Chui.
There was no need for anything else.
A single strike was enough. One punch, one life erased.
Dam Ho’s entire body was drenched in blood—none of it his own. The blood that soaked him was someone else’s life.
Between strands of gore-matted hair, a blackish gleam flickered. The moment Dam Ho’s unusually dark eyes fixed upon an attacking martial artist, the man’s hands and feet went rigid.
The martial artist swore he had never witnessed such a gaze in his life.
Could the eyes of a demon crawling up from the depths of hell look like this? But he would never know. His consciousness fled in that very instant.
Crack!
The martial artist’s body drove into the clay wall, fragments cascading down over him. He did not move again. He was dead.
Jo Deung Myeong, the inner master of Seocheon Mountain Manor, cried out.
“Who are you? What do you think you’re doing, slaughtering people within the walls of Seocheon Mountain Manor?”
Whether his desperate cry reached him or not, Dam Ho came to a halt.
His gaze turned toward Jo Deung Myeong.
“Are you the master?”
“The, the master is not here.”
“Then bring him to me.”
“The master is not the sort of person who comes at every summons.”
“Even if I kill everyone here?”
“What?”
“Will he come then?”
“What grudge could you possibly have with Seocheon Mountain Manor?”
“And why did your men kidnap merchants?”
“You, surely not because of that?”
Dam Ho did not answer. No further words were needed.
Jo Deung Myeong closed his eyes.
He had wondered, long ago, whether such a day might come.
A long tail invites stepping upon it, and when debts of enmity accumulate, their price must inevitably be paid—such was the way of the world.
Jo Deung Myeong found himself thinking that perhaps today was the day.
‘Still, this is far too soon.’
Then Dam Ho spoke again.
“Now you understand? Then summon the lord.”
“As I said before, the lord is not here.”
“Where is he?”
At Dam Ho’s question, Jo Deung Myeong’s gaze drifted toward Bak Gyeok Dal Bong without thinking. For Dam Ho, that was answer enough.
“He’s there, isn’t he?”
In the darkness, Dam Ho’s eyes flashed. In that instant, Jo Deung Myeong felt his heart plummet.
“No, no. The lord is not there.”
……
Dam Ho said nothing. There was no need.
The moment Dam Ho’s footsteps turned toward Bak Gyeok Dal Bong.
“Hold on. Stop right there.”
“You make this mess and just walk away?”
A rough, rasping voice cut through the air, and a coarse killing intent engulfed Seocheon Mountain Manor. Simultaneously, dark shadows emerged from every corner.
Men in tattered clothes, hair and beards unkempt—over two hundred of them, dressed like ronins. At first glance, they seemed utterly out of place in Seocheon Mountain Manor.
From among them, a man who appeared to be their leader sauntered forward.
A towering figure, seven feet if an inch, with an enormous Bang Cheon Hwa Geuk slung across his shoulders. From every fiber of his being radiated a palpable force that made the legs of those who beheld him weak.
Dam Ho’s gaze turned toward him. The leader smiled wickedly.
“Impressive. You’ve reduced Seocheon Mountain Manor to ashes.”
“Who are you?”
“Me? I’m called Sa Pyeong Gang.”
“Sa Pyeong Gang?”
“That’s right!”
The man who had announced himself as Sa Pyeong Gang chuckled. Around him, ronin-dressed martial artists clustered and swarmed closer.
With all two hundred gathered in one place, their momentum was no trivial thing.
Sa Pyeong Gang, surveying the men gathered around him, muttered to himself.
“Thanks to you, Hyeol Sa Poong is assembling in full for the first time in ages. Should I say thank you?”
“Hyeol Sa Poong?”
“That’s right! A name they once went by. And the name of the force that will turn you into blood and sand.”
Hyeol Sa Poong—once called the terror of the desert.
They were alive and well, despite Seocheon Mountain Manor and Eun Ha Seong having supposedly annihilated them. And they were here, within Seocheon Mountain Manor itself.
Seocheon Mountain Manor’s greatest secret was unraveling.
Hyeol Sa Poong had thrown all of Shin Gang Seong into fear, and then Seocheon Mountain Manor stepped in to restore order—winning the hearts and power of the people in the process.
Hyeol Sa Poong was Seocheon Mountain Manor’s hidden blade. A double-edged sword that could turn on its master if revealed to the world. That is why Eun Ha Seong had kept them so carefully hidden until now.
Dam Ho did not know this. Nor did he care.
His attention was fixed on only one thing: Bak Gyeok Dal Bong. There lay the source of all this chaos.
At Dam Ho’s indifference, Sa Pyeong Gang clicked his tongue in disbelief.
“Tch! I’ve never been disrespected like this before.”
“Boss! You’ve rested too long. That’s why this punk is looking down on you.”
“Actually, it works out well. This is the perfect chance to remind everyone what Hyeol Sa Poong can do.”
The men of Hyeol Sa Poong chattered among themselves.
They paid Dam Ho no mind, laughing and talking among themselves. Yet from every inch of their bodies, a killing intent rose like mist. Even the martial artists of Seocheon Mountain Manor, their supposed allies, instinctively retreated.
‘Those butchers are stirring.’
‘Seocheon Mountain Manor will be swept away in a tide of blood.’
Though the effort had been more for show than substance, they had once stood against Hyeol Sa Poong. They had witnessed firsthand the carnage those men could wreak. Better than anyone, they knew how terrifying they were.
Yet in this moment, those killers did not seem nearly as frightening as the solitary figure of Dam Ho standing at the center of the impending slaughter.
Jo Deung Myeong’s eyes fixed on Dam Ho.
‘Can they possibly stop that demon?’
He found himself desperately hoping that Hyeol Sa Poong would hold Dam Ho back. If only that were to happen, he felt he could overlook whatever atrocities they committed.
Hyeol Sa Poong continued laughing and jesting. But their eyes were locked on Dam Ho, and their bodies were slowly shifting, completing their encirclement.
A circular formation surrounding Dam Ho.
The Honcheon Cham Ma Jin.
A formation method designed to counter elite martial artists of small number.
The Honcheon Cham Ma Jin’s defining characteristic was that two hundred fighters moved like interlocking gears with no gaps between them, launching continuous cascading attacks.
Even Sa Pyeong Gang, who led Hyeol Sa Poong, had doubted whether there would ever be occasion to use it. But today, it seemed, he had finally met the right adversary.
Though he had outwardly mocked Dam Ho, he sensed intuitively that this was no ordinary martial artist. It would be impossible for a common fighter to reduce Seocheon Mountain Manor to ruin and simultaneously instill such dread in hardened warriors.
When the men of Hyeol Sa Poong had taken their optimal positions for executing the Honcheon Cham Ma Jin.
“If you’re done barking, come.”
Dam Ho’s voice fell flat and heavy.
The Hyeol Sa Poong martial artists flashed anger at his contemptuous tone, and Sa Pyeong Gang’s rage was particularly fierce.
“Open the Honcheon Cham Ma Jin Formation. We’ll annihilate him with thirty-six thousand strikes.”
“Command!”
The Hyeol Sa Poong fighters who had been laughing and chattering moments before moved as one at the barked order, their response thunderous and immediate.
The Honcheon Cham Ma Jin was no mere formation of coordinated bodies. It contained the subtle principles of heaven and earth, magnifying each warrior’s individual power beyond its limits.
A terrible pressure descended on Dam Ho’s entire frame.
Crack!
His legs drove into the earth under a weight like Mount Tai itself bearing down on his shoulders—a pressure so immense that an ordinary man would have died instantly without question.
Objects all around fractured and crumbled. Solid stones shattered into fine dust; ornamental plants disintegrated and scattered like powder.
Dam Ho stood at the center of it all.
Whiiing!
With a sound like grinding gears, the Honcheon Cham Ma Jin spread outward around him.
Horizontal, vertical…….
Their intricate movements dazzled and confused his vision.
Blades thrust suddenly at his throat while sharp sabers flew toward his limbs.
“Brother!”
Bang Jin Bo, arriving late, cried out at the sight.
To someone ignorant of martial arts, it looked as though Dam Ho’s body might be torn to shreds at any moment.
Then Dam Ho moved.
Bang!
“Gasp!”
A deafening impact and a scream erupted simultaneously.
A Hyeol Sa Poong fighter flew backward at invisible speed, his upper body crushed beyond recognition.
Dark blood ran down Dam Ho’s forearm.
Another nameless life had vanished by Dam Ho’s hand. Yet he felt no guilt.
‘Have I become a monster?’
The muscles in Dam Ho’s jaw twitched.
It didn’t matter.
Human or monster.
He had never chosen this life from the beginning.
He had not wished to walk this path of monstrosity, yet no regret attended the journey he had undertaken.
Pop!
He kicked off the earth.
Four blades flew toward Dam Ho.
Nearly two hundred martial artists were coordinating their assault, yet only four or five could directly attack him at any given moment.
Even such a supreme formation method as the Honcheon Cham Ma Jin could not greatly increase that number.
At most, six. So he need only face six at a time.
Two hundred divided by six meant thirty-four rounds. Merely thirty-four times fighting. That was Dam Ho’s mathematics.
Any ordinary person would have been deemed mad for such calculation. But Dam Ho was no ordinary man.
Crash!
A single Pa Seong Chui following his Chung Bo crushed and sent another flying. Nearly simultaneously, five or six warriors crumpled into broken heaps on the ground.
“One.”
The first line of the Honcheon Cham Ma Jin collapsed.
The second line surged forward without hesitation.
Six blades converging from six directions.
There was nowhere to evade, and blocking seemed utterly impossible.
“We have him.”
“Got him!”
In the instant triumph flashed across their faces, Dam Ho’s body curved in an unnatural way.
His form twisted like a beetle’s carapace, and six slashes crashed against him. The warriors who had dealt those cuts had no doubt his body would be torn to ribbons.
Tink-tink-tink!
In that moment, a faint metallic ring accompanied the shattering of their certainty.
The sharp sabers that struck Dam Ho’s flesh glanced off at an angle, impossibly deflected.
The Golden Beetle Shell.
It was a defensive technique unique to Dam Ho, inspired by the rounded carapace of a beetle that turned aside the sharp forelimbs of a mantis—perfected through cultivation of the Am Hohn Shim Gong.
It was a miracle born from the synthesis of his deep internal power and a body trained to its absolute limits.
In the instant bewilderment dawned on their faces, a terrible wind pressure crashed down upon them.
Crack!
A calamitous blow struck them all at once.
In an instant, six martial artists lay strewn about as mangled corpses.
“Two!”
A soft voice spilled from between Dam Ho’s lips.
His voice was barely a whisper, yet it cut through the battlefield with such clarity that it pierced every ear present.
“This bastard!”
The moment Sa Pyeong Gang’s eyes snapped open, Dam Ho’s voice rang out across the battleground once more.
“Come out for the third time.”

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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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