Heavenly Demon Divine Saint - Chapter 57

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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 57
Yu Baek’s eyes narrowed, his face betraying his shock.
‘What in the world is this?’
A grip as unyielding as iron clamped down on his wrist with devastating force. The problem was the pure white flame that layered over it.
‘He wields the Samadhi True Flame?’
For Yu Baek, who had missed the preliminaries, the confusion was only natural.
Grappling was traditionally considered a parlor trick for masters—a technique that consumed enormous inner energy and offered little practical value. Yet his was entirely different.
This opponent’s approach was something else entirely.
“What kind of… treachery is this?”
Whoosh!
Yu Baek’s demonic energy continued to scatter. The flame seemed to repel it, preventing his power from flowing smoothly.
Cheon So-hyun’s eyes blazed like living fire.
“Feeling the heat?”
Whiiiip!
With his wrist locked firmly in place, he drove an uppercut skyward—a punch all the more devastating for its lack of warning.
Boom!
Yu Baek coughed up blood. Cheon So-hyun’s strike had driven deep into his ribs.
“…You bastard!”
Yu Baek launched a counterattack with his Corpse Poison Palm. Despite having one hand bound, his response was flawless.
Crash! Boom!
Soon a dizzying exchange of hands and feet erupted in relentless succession, each collision sending shockwaves that shook the fighting stage itself.
“Hmm.”
Do Je exhaled a soft exclamation.
Throughout the exchange, Yu Baek maintained the advantage. It was what he had anticipated before they even clashed, and that assessment remained unchanged as the collisions continued.
Boom!
Yet the Third Prince held the momentum of the battle.
Whenever Yu Baek attempted a counterattack or unleashed a technique, the Third Prince would deftly destabilize his center of gravity, severing his rhythm.
The Third Prince refused to release the wrist he gripped as though welded to it. With that same hand pouring the Samadhi True Flame into him, Yu Baek must have been suffering excruciating agony as his skin burned away.
Do Je’s gaze deepened.
‘A rare madman indeed.’
What lunatic would charge into the Poison Fog itself to press an attack? And for that lunatic to be of the Cheon Family bloodline?
Through successive assaults, Cheon So-hyun’s nature, cunning, and the venom he possessed became unmistakably apparent.
It was then.
“The… White Lotus Technique…!”
As a bewildered murmur escaped from the VIP Platform, Do Je’s head turned.
Heon Won-mok had shot to his feet, his gaze fixed on the stage. For some reason, his fists were clenched tight.
“What troubles you?”
“…!”
Heon Won-mok, who had been half-lost in thought, startled and answered urgently.
“No, it is nothing. The match is so exhilarating that I became absorbed in it…”
Boom!
The deafening explosion from the arena yanked both their gazes back to the fighting stage.
“This is growing tedious.”
From Yu Baek’s entire body erupted an overwhelming surge of energy far beyond what he’d displayed before.
The murderous intent revealed beyond his mask grew even more sinister, and toxic poison scattered in all directions as if manifesting his rising fury.
Sizzzzle!
“Whoa! What the hell is that bastard doing?!”
The spectators shrieked in terror as the ground began to dissolve beneath them.
This was a poison potent enough to corrode even thick stone in mere moments—a calamity no human body could possibly withstand.
“Ugh.”
Cheon So-hyun staggered backward, driven away by the onslaught.
As I met the lethal poison head-on, a searing pain tore through my organs as if they were burning away.
Purple blotches bloomed across my wrists where the toxin had taken hold.
“With the level of energy you possess, you must have already realized it. You’ve entered a situation from which there is no return. Only now do you regret your life, I imagine.”
Yu Baek laughed, his tone dripping with mockery.
“Why not crawl across the ground and beg for mercy? If the Cheon Family begs, it won’t be shameful—rather, it would be a rare spectacle worth witnessing. I might even grant you a path to survival. If you desire an antidote….”
Cheon So-hyun let out a hollow laugh.
“Do they teach you all this in some group seminar at the Demon Prison? You’re spouting the exact same nonsense as my dead cellmate.”
“…What?”
Yu Baek’s mask crumbled away in fragments, revealing his face beneath—and shock was written all over it.
“A cellmate? What are you talking about?”
“Why are you playing dumb? Or do you genuinely not know?”
“….”
“Yang Bong. The fool who wasted his time with Ja Gwi Moon or whatever nonsense, then fell into the Eight Hells. He kept spouting that drivel about how if you surrendered, you’d at least avoid being treated as a slave.”
“How did you know about Yang Bong….”
Yu Baek’s face hardened like stone.
After escaping the Demon Prison, he had hidden away in the Borderland just as Yang Bong had, waiting for his moment.
The difference was that instead of building power, he had kept his ear to the ground for news from within the sect.
‘If he even knows about Ja Gwi Moon… then he actually ventured to that treacherous place? Why would the Third Son of the Cheon Family….’
In that instant, rumors he’d heard about Cheon So-hyun’s movements flashed through his mind.
How after regaining consciousness, he’d absurdly been running about trying to stop the Great Sect. How the physician who had treated him was now the current Inspector Chief, and how someone who had abandoned his family duties had suddenly switched allegiance to the Military Council.
‘If his subsequent actions were those of the Inspection Bureau….’
All emotion drained from Yu Baek’s expression. As his rage reached its peak, he became eerily serene instead.
“Ah, so you were the root cause of all this. The Blade Emperor Sect’s movements were ultimately….”
“Why do you search for reasons elsewhere? You should reflect on your own wretched life, spent scheming and plotting in darkness.”
“Krhehe. Very well, if you wish to die so badly, I shall oblige.”
Yu Baek’s hands moved with fluid grace, sweeping through the empty air. As they twisted in rotation, the twin blades he held suddenly lifted into the air of their own accord.
Eight blades in total spun ferociously, each trailing sparks as they whirled.
This was the signature technique of Yu Hoe-bi: the Eight Flying Spinning Dance.
Clang-clang-clang-clang!
A crystalline metallic ring tore through the air, spreading an eerie chill. The moment Cheon So-hyun steadied his breathing and exhaled a scorching breath.
Screeeeeech!
A flying blade traced a pale blue arc as it grazed past his face.
“Go ahead and struggle.”
Spinning projectiles descended in successive waves, their explosive momentum sweeping across the ground like a devastating typhoon.
Whoooooosh!
Cheon So-hyun clenched his teeth and drew his inner energy to its absolute limit.
‘Amitabha Buddha!’
Blazing Yang energy erupted outward, scorching the very air around him. I pushed the earth away with the King’s Palm, spinning my body in response.
Shwiiing!
A flying blade grazed my ribs, igniting a searing pain. Simultaneously, the deafening boom assaulted my ears, and I immediately unleashed the fist force of the Arhat Technique.
Boom!
Two flying blades collided with my fist. Despite the wrenching impact that threatened to twist my wrists, I refused to yield.
Whoooosh!
Wrapping Gwangak Gyeol around myself to amplify my grip strength, I barely deflected the blades when three more materialized from the explosion.
My eyes widened. The instant I judged this unstoppable, I concentrated all my energy into my feet.
Whoosh!
My silhouette blurred and scattered like lotus petals—the Lotus Platform Nine Forms. A movement technique I’d hoped never to use twice, given its devastating inner energy consumption.
As if to prove the recklessness of my choice, searing pain ignited throughout my meridian network.
‘It doesn’t matter.’
Such pain was trivial. I tore through space, kicked off the ground, and leveraged the recoil to plunge into Yu Baek’s embrace.
Boom!
“A peculiar creature, aren’t you.”
Yu Baek deflected the strike with visible displeasure.
The Eight Flying Immortal Technique was perfected when he slew the previous generation’s sect master. The technique he’d just unleashed was undoubtedly smoother and sharper than that day.
Because it carried only killing intent, devoid of affection or mercy.
‘Such a brat shouldn’t possess a technique capable of withstanding this….’
But there was an even greater shock. The bizarre smoke emanating from the Third Prince’s seven orifices.
Yu Baek immediately discerned its nature.
“…The poison doesn’t work. Has he achieved immunity to all toxins?”
“Your endless prattle grows tiresome.”
Scorching heat radiated from Cheon So-hyun’s entire body.
‘Amitabha Buddha!’
The Shadowless Divine Technique excelled at incinerating turbid energy and facilitating qi circulation to perfect the physical form.
Just as in my previous life I’d expelled poison using profound inner energy, burning away toxins with fire energy was no difficult feat for me.
Whoooosh!
My fists reached white-hot intensity. The extreme heat that seemed impossible from a human body shimmered with heat waves, evaporating blood.
“Ugh!”
Yu Baek’s entire frame convulsed under the intensified fist force. I seized the opening without hesitation, unleashing the Fist Master’s Perception like a thunderbolt.
Boom! Boom!
With each exchange, he accelerated further.
Though weakened by exposure to the toxic mist and blood loss, the power surging through my entire body was more abundant than ever before.
A clarity of sensation that only emerges in the chasm between life and death.
Sensations long forgotten, buried beneath the years, blazed vividly back to life. Such heightened perception allowed the circulation of my vital energy to flow with even greater precision.
Yu Baek staggered as the fist burrowed into his abdomen.
“Ugh!”
Whoosh!
The Muryeong Divine Art intensified with each cycle, accumulating heat, while Gwangak Gyeol endured that burden and drew forth latent power.
If the Muryeong Divine Art expanded the vessel of a warrior’s capacity, then Gwangak Gyeol was the supreme technique that fortified that vessel into unbreakable steel.
As the two harmonized seamlessly, they birthed a force of even greater intensity.
Sharper and more ferocious still.
Vital energy moves according to intent. By wielding the Muryeong Divine Art and Gwangak Gyeol as their principles dictated, true power flowed forth.
Though the martial techniques differed from Shaolin’s methods, Cheon So-hyun paid it no mind.
Change was natural from the outset. All things inevitably transform according to time and circumstance.
Why should martial arts be any different?
Resistance to change only breeds greater suffering—an ancient teaching of Buddhism—so there was no reason to concern myself with it.
Boom! Crash! Crash!!
Like violent waves crashing against stone cliffs, like merciless avalanches sweeping across the earth, explosive assaults that shook the very ground continued relentlessly.
As Yu Baek endured the relentless barrage of attacks, his vital energy grew increasingly savage.
“You’re not holding back at all, are you?”
His eyes blazed with killing intent. As he swept his hand, the surrounding air rippled.
“I told you. Martial arts forged from regret as their foundation.”
Clang clang clang clang!
The flying blades scattered across the ground shot skyward.
“Is there regret that ends with a single lifetime?”
“No, Young Master!”
Kang Hyun cried out at the ominous spectacle unfolding before him.
Screeeee!
The spinning blades surged toward Cheon So-hyun’s back.
“Fool. There are many such regrets.”
Yet Cheon So-hyun’s response was faster still. Gripping Yu Baek’s hand, I twisted his collar with my other hand and wrenched my entire body, executing a bizarre throwing technique.
“…!”
Yu Baek’s form was hurled into the air by the unconventional grappling method.
As their positions reversed in an instant, Yu Baek’s pupils trembled violently as if an earthquake had struck.
‘This insane bastard…!’
It was the worst possible move—a mutual destruction. At this rate, both would perish from a direct hit by Yu Hoe-bi’s blades.
Yet Cheon So-hyun’s demeanor remained unperturbed.
There was no need to contemplate what judgment a man clinging desperately to life would make at the crossroads of death.
Boom!
The blade struck the empty Fighting Stage, sending tremors through it. Yu Baek had twisted the trajectory of the blades.
“Cough!”
Slammed against the ground, he felt his consciousness grow hazy for a moment.
Danger. The rising dread sharpened Yu Baek’s gaze even further.
‘I cannot be drawn into this creature’s rhythm!’
Boom-crash!
He unleashed a torrent of force intertwined with venom and demonic energy downward at the ground.
‘One strike. A single poisoning—that’s all it takes.’
A desperate gambit to overturn the unfavorable tide of battle. Yet before that swift calculation could unfold, Cheon So-hyun bared his white teeth in a grin.
“Why is it that every poison user fights exactly the same way?”
Crack-snap!
Suspended in midair, Cheon So-hyun’s foot came down hard on Yu Baek’s shoulder blade, trampling the point where his force erupted outward.
Crunch! Crunch!!
Yu Baek’s energy reversed and his shoulder blade caved inward, while the joints from his wrist to his elbow shattered into fragments. Cheon So-hyun had twisted his wrist with a true strike, shattering it completely.
“Ahhhhhhh!!”
Yu Baek’s arm hung limp like a dead serpent, grotesquely twisted and useless.
The meaning was unmistakable. The spectators clenched their fists, sensing victory.
“Ooooooh!”
“The Third Prince has won!”
Then, the foot pressing down on Yu Baek’s shoulder drove deeper still.
Whoooooom!!
A sound like thousands of wasps filled the arena.
Shaolin’s true strike draws earth energy up from the feet, circulates it through the body, and amplifies the power of the prescribed techniques.
In other words, it functioned as a continuous chain strike.
Yu Baek cried out desperately.
“S-stop! I concede…!”
“Silence.”
Pure white force engulfed Yu Baek’s entire body.
It was Shaolin’s ultimate technique—the Great Force Palm.

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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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