I Possessed a Cultivator Destined to Die at the Hands of the Protagonist - Chapter 55

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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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55.
Jayang Mountain, Muyang Prefecture.
The sky had turned violet and crimson.
The sorcerers of Paecheonmun had succeeded in deploying blood vein formations across the entire mountain.
“Hold the line! If the Grand Celestial Formation Stele crumbles and the earth veins twist, a catastrophe beyond our control will be unleashed!”
Jo Seung-lip, an intermediate cultivator of Hyeonganmun, coughed blood as he roared the command.
Behind them stood a colossal Grand Celestial Formation Stele, towering thirty feet high.
Hyeonganmun had compiled the formation stele positions from the elders and dispatched cultivators to guard the Grand Celestial Formation Stele’s location.
But Paecheonmun did not remain idle.
The cultivators of Hyeonganmun and the eight major sects had been fighting ceaselessly on Jayang Mountain for days without rest.
The Grand Celestial Formation Stele, which served to suppress the eruption of earth energy, should normally radiate a golden light.
Yet from repeated assaults, black crystalline demonic energy clung to the stele in countless places.
Across Jayang Mountain lay the corpses of cultivators who had not yet ascended, scattered among shattered magical artifacts.
The sorcerers of Paecheonmun pressed their assault using Mano—creatures that could not die unless their talismans were removed.
“Drive them back!”
“Shatter the Grand Celestial Formation Stele and usher in a new era of the Great Paecheonmun!”
“Not a chance!”
Jo Seung-lip wove a hand seal and unleashed the Yellow Dragon Binding Formation Technique.
The earth surged upward as if to form a wall, but it blackened and melted away.
“Damn it, corrupted by demonic energy…!”
The demonic-tainted earth caused the technique’s power to plummet far below its normal potency.
The attacks from other sects that had come to reinforce them suffered the same fate.
The demonic energy rising from the ground continuously disrupted the cultivators’ techniques.
“Cultivator Jo! The western sector has been breached! The Inspection Division’s cultivators have been annihilated!”
“Cheon has been defeated?!”
At the messenger’s report, Jo Seung-lip’s face drained of color.
One of the pillars supporting the barrier that protected the Grand Celestial Formation Stele had been shattered.
‘This is critical!’
If this continued, the Grand Celestial Formation Stele could collapse entirely.
If that happened, the entire region would become completely corrupted—a land where no life could survive.
Jo Seung-lip withdrew a long-distance transmission talisman from within Jeomul Platform.
He then bit the tip of his finger and imprinted his blood seal upon the talisman before raising it aloft.
As the talisman ignited, a brilliant blue beam of light shot forth and rapidly spread to each sect.
[Grand Celestial Formation Stele on Jayang Mountain nearing collapse. Demonic corruption at seventy percent. Emergency reinforcements requested from the main sect and the eight major sects!]
The information transmitted through the talisman reached the Blue Heavens within Chingwoo Immortal Sect.
‘Jayang Mountain…’
It had to be the mountain where we had discovered Cheongun.
I had thought the earth energy there was unusually dense, but I never realized it was where the Grand Celestial Formation Stele was located.
“Master.”
I gazed at Baek Un-jin with anxious eyes.
Baek Un-jin held the position of supreme commander overseeing all matters related to Paecheonmun within Chingwoo Immortal Sect.
“We need to head to Jayang Mountain. Prepare yourselves.”
“Yes.”
As Baek Un-jin formed a simple hand seal, dozens of azure birds materialized at once, dispersing throughout Chingwoo Immortal Sect.
He was summoning every cultivator from the sect who could make the journey to Jayang Mountain.
“Let’s go.”
Baek Un-jin’s figure vanished first.
Eun Hui-gyeom and I followed in his wake.
Whoosh.
The landscape around us shifted in an instant as we employed the Spatial Compression technique, the distance closing rapidly.
Yet the gap between us and Baek Un-jin never narrowed.
The sky above Jayang Mountain was stained a sanguine crimson.
Ordinary people who knew nothing of what was happening wailed that calamity had descended from the heavens, fleeing in panic.
Cultivators from the Eight Great Sects of Jeongmun, already informed of the situation, converged rapidly upon Jayang Mountain.
The entrance to Jayang Mountain had already become a hellscape.
The streams flowing down the mountainside were contaminated with black demonic energy, reeking of putrefaction; the forest vegetation had rotted and withered; and from all directions came the grotesque cries of Mano that pierced the eardrums.
Eun Hui-gyeom, gazing downward, spotted Kang Jin-heon.
“Kang Jin-heon!”
Drawing his Hyeonsu Nakwol Blade, Eun Hui-gyeom leaped down and severed a Mano that had been targeting Kang Jin-heon.
“Are you alright?”
Kang Jin-heon adjusted his grip on his fan and gave a slight nod.
Dozens upon dozens of cultivators’ corpses lay scattered around Kang Jin-heon, their bodies not yet ascended.
The demonic energy rising from the ground that had transformed into cursed soil prevented the cultivators’ ascension, desecrating even death itself.
The condition here appeared far more severe than elsewhere.
Eun Hui-gyeom’s expression twisted at the acrid stench that assaulted his nostrils.
“Ugh, what in the world happened here?”
“I don’t know either. When I arrived, it was already like this.”
Baek Un-jin examined the condition of the dead cultivators.
“This is….”
“Master? What’s wrong?”
“These weren’t killed by Mano.”
The cultivators had lost their lives to some unknown dark art before the Mano ever arrived.
The moment Baek Un-jin finished speaking, clear bell chimes rang out at regular intervals from the blood-reeking forest.
Ding. Ding.
The crystalline bell sounds echoing through this incongruous space made my nerves stand on edge.
As the crimson mist drew ever closer, a man with an unnaturally tall frame and a ghastly pale face emerged from within it.
Dozens of skulls hung from chains at his waist, clattering softly, and a nameplate identifying him as an elder of Paecheonmun dangled alongside them.
The moment I laid eyes upon him suspended in the void, my body trembled instinctively.
‘That creature….’
He was undoubtedly at least at the Breath Accumulation stage or higher—stronger than Muk-hyeon himself.
Upon seeing us, he formed a hand seal.
[Myriad Ghost Devouring Art]
“This cannot be—!”
I, who had been momentarily entranced, hurried to form a counter-seal, but I was already a heartbeat too late.
The skulls at his waist clattered their teeth in unison, then unleashed a torrent of consuming darkness.
Just as the black void surged toward us—
[Suspended Heaven Hundred Technique]
Light erupted between me and the darkness, and a crystalline wave swept the shadow away in an instant.
Simultaneously, a massive semicircular barrier materialized around us.
I turned to see Baek Un-jin standing with his seal complete.
“Master!”
“Are you unharmed?”
“Yes, I am.”
Thanks to Baek Un-jin’s Suspended Heaven Hundred Technique, Eun Hui-gyeom, Kang Jin-heon, and I all emerged unscathed.
The scope of his technique was incomparably more formidable and expansive than what Eun Hui-gyeom had wielded.
“I have a task for the three of you. Leave him to me, and investigate what is transpiring at the location of the Great Immortal Formation Tablet.”
“…But—”
“Sister, we would only be a hindrance. You know this.”
Eun Hui-gyeom, quick to grasp the situation, seized my arm.
I hung suspended in the air, looking down at Baek Un-jin.
“You must return safely.”
“Do not worry. Go.”
As the three of us prepared to employ the Spatial Stride toward the Great Immortal Formation Tablet, a bell chimed once more.
As darkness crept toward us, a massive fog now engulfed the shadow.
“Cloud!”
Baek Un-jin’s figure vanished beyond the mist alongside the elder of Paecheonmun.
“Sister, quickly!”
While Un-mong concealed and protected our presence, we swiftly slipped from the elder’s sight and launched ourselves toward the heart of Jayang Mountain.
***
As Yeon-seo and her companions vanished beyond the mist, he descended to the ground with a look of regret.
He gazed down at Baek Un-jin, who stood alone, from an odd angle.
“I am Gui-yeong, an elder of Paecheonmun. By your appearance, you seem to be a disciple of Chingwoo Immortal Sect, but what is your name?”
“I have no name to share with an enemy.”
“Hmph, so that’s how you’ll play it? Then I shall hunt down every last one of those runaway disciples and tear their souls to shreds!”
As Gui-yeong formed a grotesque hand seal, dozens of skulls hanging from his body opened their jaws in unison, their eye sockets flashing with eerie light.
A pitch-black darkness erupted from the skull cavities, engulfing Baek Un-jin.
[Nine Heavens Wraith Technique]
Resentments extracted from corpses converged and clung to Baek Un-jin.
Wherever the black flames touched, space warped and screams never ceased.
Even as the darkness consumed everything, Baek Un-jin remained utterly motionless.
“How foolish.”
“What?”
“Your disciples did not run away.”
“….”
“They simply left because they were a hindrance.”
From beneath Baek Un-jin’s feet, blue spiritual energy erupted violently.
As he lightly swung the Jaha Sword downward, the pitch-black darkness and malevolent spirits that had consumed the entire area evaporated without a trace.
The word “obliterated” without form was the most fitting description.
Gui-yeong’s complexion instantly turned ashen as he watched his ten thousand spirits dissipate without even putting up a fight.
Driven by instinct, he fled.
“Gahhh!”
Baek Un-jin caught up to the fleeing Gui-yeong in an instant, seizing his throat and lifting him into the air.
“Is it not a master’s desire to show only his best self to his disciples?”
“Ugh, spare me…!”
Before Gui-yeong could finish speaking, his body swelled from within before bursting apart completely.

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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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