I Shouldn't Have Joined the Martial Arts Alliance - Chapter 72

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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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Foolishly entering the Murim Alliance — Chapter 72
The lightning strike had been so violent that a section of the wall surrounding the Hyeol-u Room collapsed inward.
Yet no one had the time to care about a crumbled wall.
And then, following the thunder, rain fell in sheets like a waterfall—a downpour so torrential it threatened to sweep the entire Hyeol-u Room away.
With rain falling so thick that one couldn’t see a hand’s breadth ahead, the battle descended into chaos.
The situation was turning against Jang Hye-in and his people, and against Chu-yeop’s subordinates as well.
Without visibility, they couldn’t mount clean attacks, and the weight of the rain-soaked world pressed down on them with each passing moment.
“Damn it!”
“Hell!”
“Heaven’s abandoned us!”
“Cursed sky!”
“We’ve never faced anything like this!”
Hadn’t the heavens always favored Sa U-rin, Jang Hye-in, and their people?
No. The heavens favored no one.
And yet, despite that truth, luck had followed Jang Hye-in, his people, and Sa U-rin as though heaven itself were on their side.
But now……
Today, it seemed, was different. Everything was turning against them, wasn’t it?
Now even Sa U-rin had drawn his sword. There was no need to think twice—he pulled not just any blade, but the Hwaryong Sword.
The moment had come when everything had to be wagered. It was the only choice.
Shing.
Despite the torrential rain and thunder shaking heaven and earth, the sound of the Hwaryong Sword sliding from its sheath seemed to cut through it all.
And in the moment the blade emerged completely.
They flinched.
‘……What is this?’
‘……This is no ordinary sword!’
The aura flowing from the Hwaryong Sword made the two young martial artists who had mastered the Honwon Art instinctively stumble backward.
The two young men were Chi-hyeon and Seo-hun.
Despite having learned the same Honwon Art as Sa U-rin, they still sensed nothing emanating from him, nor could they detect the Honwon aura flowing from the Hwaryong Sword at all.
Chi-hyeon opened his mouth toward Sa U-rin.
“How do you know we’ve learned the Honwon Art?”
“You’ll understand soon enough.”
And with that, Sa U-rin released all the internal power in his Danjeon—his Honwon—without restraint.
Whoooosh!
Splash, splash.
“Kh——”
“Ugh——”
Chi-hyeon and Seo-hun stumbled back once more. That wasn’t all—pained groans escaped their lips.
Their eyes went wide with shock.
‘……This……’
‘……What……’
Was he subduing them with nothing but his aura?
It was beyond belief. The one before them appeared to be barely more than a youth, yet here he stood.
But Sa U-rin himself was equally astonished, though it didn’t show on his face.
‘These men surely……’
They’ve learned the Honwon Art……
Yet they seemed even more vulnerable to Sa U-rin’s Honwon than Jang Hye-in, his people, and the other ordinary martial artists, didn’t they?
And that was what amazed him.
And his confidence doubled.
And hope began to kindle.
Perhaps……
They could escape from this mire of death after all.
Sa U-rin himself,
His comrades who stood with him,
Even his mother’s subordinates.
All of them might see tomorrow’s sunrise.
He didn’t know why.
These men had clearly mastered the Honwon Art, yet why were they so vulnerable to Sa U-rin’s own Honwon?
He wanted to know.
But wanting to know and being able to know are not the same, just as wanting to do something and being able to do it are not one and the same.
Such is the burden that those who walk the Gangho must carry—whether we call it burden or fate.
So I don’t care. Didn’t care then, don’t care now.
I’ll simply move forward.
Walking and walking,
running and running,
or crawling across the earth if I must.
What my father longed for and desired,
what Sa U-rin inherited and now desires myself.
Sa U-rin didn’t enter the Murim Alliance on a whim.
And so.
Sa U-rin’s lips curled upward, confidence blooming with them.
“Surprised, are we?”
“Shut your mouth!”
Chi-hyeon and Seo-hun wanted nothing more than to draw their blades right then and cleave the brat before them in two, but the Middle-aged Man’s order held them back.
They had to take him alive.
But it didn’t look easy. Capturing without fatal injury was harder than killing, after all.
Even in the pouring downpour, Sa U-rin maintained the upper hand against Chi-hyeon and Seo-hun.
With that advantage, Sa U-rin knew he couldn’t afford to squander the opportunity.
And in the moment he thought it,
Crack!
Sa U-rin’s foot came down hard against the ground.
Rainwater pooled on the pavement scattered violently in all directions.
Sa U-rin gripped the Hwaryong Sword tightly and drove forward at Chi-hyeon first.
The Hwaryong Sword cut through the relentless curtain of rain with the force of intent to sever Chi-hyeon’s torso in one clean stroke.
Chi-hyeon’s brow twitched.
The speed was beyond expectation.
He’d wanted to avoid clashing with that uncommon blade, but found himself unable to do so.
It was simply too fast.
And so Chi-hyeon had no choice but to meet Sa U-rin’s Hwaryong Sword with his own—else his body would have been split in half.
And so,
Clang!
Sa U-rin’s Hwaryong Sword and Chi-hyeon’s blade clashed.
“Ugh.”
Skitter-skitter-skitter.
Chi-hyeon was driven back a full two zhang. The pooled rainwater contributed to it, true, but what mattered was that in a single exchange, Chi-hyeon felt he was no match for Sa U-rin.
It made no sense to him,
but he had to accept it.
Only then could he devise a strategy.
Sa U-rin was about to press his advantage and continue his assault, but Seo-hun was already moving in behind him.
Though the Middle-aged Man had ordered Sa U-rin taken alive, Seo-hun believed it impossible and had decided that when the chance came, killing the brat would be the smarter choice.
His own survival came first.
So he’d targeted Sa U-rin’s back.
‘Got him!’
As expected, the brat’s rear was weak—a failure of inexperience, Seo-hun thought.
But then,
Seo-hun’s eyes went wide as lanterns.
‘This can’t be…!’
He’d been certain he had him…
Yet somehow the brat had spun his body and was now swinging his blade right at him!
‘Damn it!’
And so,
Clang!
Seo-hun’s sword and Sa U-rin’s collided hard. And as it turned out,
Seo-hun too was driven back a full two zhang, just like Chi-hyeon.
Sa U-rin wasn’t about to let this opportunity slip. Chi-hyeon, whom he’d struck moments before, still hadn’t moved—likely nursing an internal injury.
Seo-hun didn’t look any different.
So he spoke.
“Let me show you.”
Seo-hun gritted his teeth against the pain of his internal injury and opened his mouth.
“What the hell, you little bastard!”
He wanted to show him.
Sa U-rin had likewise mastered the Honwon Art.
Sa U-rin raised the Hwaryong Sword high into the sky. And then something impossible unfurled before Seo-hun’s eyes.
The lightning that was tearing through the heavens struck with perfect precision—directly at Sa U-rin’s blade, the Hwaryong Sword itself.
Seo-hun’s lips curled upward involuntarily. Chi-hyeon, who had been tending to his internal injuries moments before, wore the same expression.
‘It’s over.’
‘Goodbye, you bastard.’
They believed he could not have survived a direct lightning strike. It was only logical.
How could a man be unharmed after being struck by lightning?
Of course, he’d heard tales of people who survived lightning strikes, but such things were hardly common.
Yet their hopes crumbled in an instant. Sa U-rin stood there with his sword still raised, perfectly intact.
“Watch carefully.”
“……What is this bastard doing now…….”
In that moment, Seo-hun’s words caught in his throat. Because he saw it—Sa U-rin’s blade moving in a way that seemed to dazzle and bewitch his eyes.
“……That, that is…….”
Seo-hun’s pupils trembled violently, as though shaken by an earthquake. He was witnessing something that should not exist.
“……The, the……, Thun…….”
Seo-hun could not finish his words. Sa U-rin’s Hwaryong Sword had already completed a single technique.
Seo-hun was cut down.
Cleanly bisected.
The blade he had been holding to block.
His own body as well.
Then Sa U-rin immediately turned to face Chi-hyeon. Chi-hyeon’s eyes flew open wide as his mouth opened.
“……The Cheonroe Shingyeol……you……how…….”
Yes.
Sa U-rin had deliberately unveiled the Cheonroe Shingyeol of the Honwon Art with his Hwaryong Sword.
“So you two also know the Cheonroe Shingyeol.”
Having mastered the same Honwon Art did not necessarily mean they had learned the same swordwork, but judging by the reactions of both warriors, he could see that they had indeed learned the same technique as Sa U-rin.
Yet there was still something that puzzled Sa U-rin.
How easily they had fallen to him.
Despite the fact that they possessed far greater martial strength than this.
“……Who are you, really?!”
Chi-hyeon could not fathom how this boy before him had come to master the Cheonroe Shingyeol of the Honwon Art.
“You speak first. Tell me who you are and where you come from. Then I will answer you.”
Chi-hyeon fell into thought for a moment. Then he glanced behind him.
His superior, the Middle-aged Man, held a decisive advantage. Though Chi-hyeon himself seemed likely to die soon.
Which meant the boy before him would also die soon. At the hands of the Middle-aged Man.
Facing certain death, he wanted to satisfy his curiosity. So Chi-hyeon opened his mouth.
“We come from the Cheonhwun Gate.”
‘The Cheonhwun Gate…….’
Sa U-rin etched the name into his memory.
“Now it’s your turn to speak.”
So Sa U-rin opened his mouth.
“I am Sa U-rin, son of Sa Cheol-gang. Currently I belong to the Murim Alliance.”
Chi-hyeon’s face contorted. It was not the answer he had wanted.
“……You bastard……! That’s not what I was asking!”
“I’ve told you everything I can tell you.”
“You should be telling me how you mastered the Honwon Art!”
“I did. I’m Sa U-rin, son of Sa Cheol-gang.”
“……You mean……?”
“Yes. I learned it through my father.”
It was the truth, without a single lie added.
It seemed like the truth. And in this moment, there appeared to be no reason for him to lie.
“……Damn it.”
“Well then, farewell.”
Sa U-rin unleashed the Cheonroe Shingyeol upon Chi-hyeon as well.
Crimson lightning erupted from the Hwaryong Sword, engulfing Chi-hyeon. He wrung out what little remained of his Honwon Art and made one final desperate effort to resist.
But it was futile.
The result was no different from Seo-hun’s fate.
A swift cut.
Chi-hyeon’s blade and Chi-hyeon’s body were both bisected.
Sa U-rin turned his gaze away.
He looked first at Jang Hye-in and the members.
They looked exhausted. Jang Hye-in and his men were wearing down, and as a result, small wounds were accumulating one after another.
Still, it seemed they could hold out to the end. That much, at least, was something to be grateful for.
And the reason for their struggle was unmistakable.
Chu-yeop’s subordinates were nowhere to be seen. And so Sa U-rin’s gaze turned toward Chu-yeop.
……!
Seven of Chu-yeop’s men were already dead. That was why the remaining subordinates who had been helping Jang Hye-in and the others had rallied around Chu-yeop.
Since Chu-yeop and his men’s purpose was to protect Sa U-rin, they had not thrown away their lives trying to save Jang Hye-in and the members.
That was the reason.
If Chu-yeop lived, then Sa U-rin could live.
Chu-yeop was being pushed back harder by the middle-aged man than Sa U-rin had anticipated.
And Chu-yeop’s condition was far from good. He was already bleeding heavily.
And then two more of Chu-yeop’s men who rushed at the middle-aged man fell dead.
And then two more died.
Now it was time for Sa U-rin to step in. Whether stepping in would prove of great help, he could not say.
Still, he was confident that things would improve from the current situation.
Just as he had felt when facing Chi-hyeon and Seo-hun, he hoped that the Hwaryong Sword and his Honwon Art would gain the upper hand against the middle-aged man.

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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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