Murim Login - Chapter 114

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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 114
Chul Moo-baek stood at Hangshan Lake like an iron tower.
The gaping entrance was wide enough for two carriages to pass through side by side, yet none of the fifty-odd Red Wind Bandits dared set foot inside.
They had witnessed firsthand how their comrades ahead had fallen.
Skulls shattered, abdomens pierced, limbs snapped—yet no one had clearly seen when or how Chul Moo-baek’s fist had moved.
More than twenty had died this way.
“A monster….”
What saved them from their terror was a deep, measured voice calling from behind.
“You lot should leave now. I’ll handle this.”
With the arrival of Red Wind Master Pung Yang, the bandits retreated like a receding tide. The two masters of the pinnacle finally faced each other.
“It’s been a while, Senior Chul.”
“I have no memory of counting a bandit as my junior.”
“Still as prickly as ever, I see. They say even brushing sleeves creates a bond—surely we share more than that, having crossed hands before?”
“Indeed. You turned tail and fled without a backward glance.”
“A strategic retreat, let’s call it. I had no way of knowing Senior Chul would make an appearance.”
“Did your internal injuries heal?”
“My insides burned for days afterward. But since it wasn’t fatal, I brazenly returned to seek you out.”
“Today won’t end with mere burning.”
“Come now, couldn’t we settle this through conversation? For someone of your years, your temperament is remarkably fiery….”
At Pung Yang’s glib words, Chul Moo-baek ground his teeth.
“Conversation? Had you not betrayed us, Chul Baek might have lived.”
“I’m not fool enough to throw myself into a hopeless fight.”
“And that wasn’t enough—you killed So Gwang as well?”
“I’m not gracious enough to spare a reckless boy who doesn’t know his place.”
Pung Yang continued with a gentle smile.
“Had I known that boy would become my brother-in-law, I might have spared him.”
“You bastard!”
A molten aura erupted from Chul Moo-baek’s entire being. The formidable internal energy of a pinnacle master melted the snow covering the ground and turned the vegetation yellow.
At the sight, Pung Yang let out an exclamation.
“Truly impressive power. Had Senior Chul been willing, today I would be facing the Hangsan Kwon-mun instead.”
“I’ll tear your limbs from your body.”
“Best not to be overconfident.”
“Don’t expect the same luck as last time. Today you have no subordinates to use as shields.”
Pung Yang smiled faintly.
“Why do you think I sent my men away?”
“That is….”
Chul Moo-baek hesitated. He had been troubled by Pung Yang’s composed demeanor from the start.
‘What is he plotting?’
Last time, Pung Yang had suffered internal injuries and retreated after merely a hundred exchanges. That he had dismissed all his men and come here on his own terms meant he possessed considerable confidence….
“What scheme is this?”
“Trickery? A tiger doesn’t need a blade meant for chickens. I simply took matters into my own hands.”
“You alone?”
“Why wouldn’t that suffice?”
“It shouldn’t be possible. Still, I’m grateful.”
Chul Moo-baek’s eyes narrowed with suspicion as he clenched his fists.
“Thanks to you, the task concluded far more smoothly.”
Whoosh.
The moment his words ended, a scorching wave of heat surged forward. Pung Yang swallowed hard and swept his curved blade toward the crimson fist energy hurtling at his chest.
Boom! Boom-boom!
Two masters at the pinnacle of their power collided. With each thunderous explosion, the unleashed wind swept across the snow-covered ground.
Beneath the towering spray of snow, one figure staggered backward.
“Hmm.”
Pung Yang swallowed hard, staring at his torn palms. He’d managed to avoid the embarrassment of dropping his weapon, but the difference in strength was undeniable.
“You’re formidable indeed.”
Chul Moo-baek stepped forward as he replied.
“It’s too late for regrets.”
“We share the same lineage.”
“I’ll tear that mouth of yours apart.”
Screeeech!
Chul Moo-baek lunged forward with the ferocity of a tiger.
The devastating techniques of the Asura Annihilation Fist—a martial art thought lost to antiquity—poured down upon Pung Yang.
Crash-boom!
* * *
On the city wall, a fierce battle raged. Despite being outnumbered four to one, the warriors of the Hangsan Inspection Bureau refused to yield.
“Retreat and you meet only death!”
“Will you surrender your homeland to these bandits?”
“Avenge our fallen brothers! Make these dogs pay!”
Slash, thud!
“Argh!”
“Don’t fall back!”
The Red Wind Gang’s bandits descended into chaos. The aftermath of the earlier fire attack and the dread of unknown traps paralyzed them.
In stark contrast, the warriors of the Hangsan Inspection Bureau surged forward with eyes ablaze, cutting through their ranks with unstoppable momentum.
“Don’t you dare flee!”
“Any who retreat will die by my hand!”
The bandit leaders roared their commands, but restoring order proved impossible. Instead, they too fell to arrows from unknown sources, their lives forfeit.
Thud-thud!
“Gack… ugh…”
“L-leader!”
Eun So-wol stood atop the highest watchtower, drawing her bowstring without pause.
Beside her stood five of the Hangsan Inspection Bureau’s finest archers.
Thwack! Thud!
With each draw of the bowstring, another bandit fell. Those who appeared to be squad leaders or higher ranked were my priority targets.
‘One more, just one more.’
Yet the battle was unfolding far worse than I had anticipated.
The Hangsan Inspection Bureau’s warriors, already outnumbered from the start, were rapidly exhausting themselves, and one by one they were falling to blind steel.
Meanwhile, the bandits were gradually recovering from their initial chaos.
“Get your heads in the game! There aren’t many of these Hangsan Inspection Bureau bastards!”
“Kill them and victory is ours!”
The Hangsan Inspection Bureau’s warriors, with nothing left to lose, fought back desperately despite the dire situation.
“Kill them!”
Scrape, scrape, scrape!
Yet for every bandit I cut down, two more appeared to fill the gap.
“Gasp, gasp!”
A Hangsan Inspection Bureau warrior, flailing his blade wildly, was hacked to pieces by five or six polearms erupting from all sides.
Scrape! Thud-thud-thud!
Throat, chest, abdomen—warriors across the wall fell without even a scream, their bodies slashed and pierced.
Emboldened by their momentum, the Red Wind Gang bandits pressed their assault relentlessly. Half the wall was now swarming with enemies.
“Hah, hah.”
Thwack, thwack, thwack!
Eun So-wol drew the bowstring with every ounce of strength she possessed. Blood trickled from her delicate fingers and the corners of her clenched jaw, while the metallic taste of blood filled her parched mouth.
“There!”
Her relentless barrage of arrows soon gave away her position. When twenty or so bandits raised their shields and charged toward the watchtower, a desperate cry erupted.
“Sect Leader!”
“You must flee! They’re coming!”
Three hours had passed since the siege began. Eun So-wol, who had only practiced archery as a pastime and was no warrior, had long since reached the limits of her endurance.
Yet she did not stop. She forced strength into her trembling, slender forearms and sought her next target.
‘Flee? Where to?’
She had lived her entire life here. The Hangsan Inspection Bureau was her hometown, something she had to protect until her dying breath.
The same was true for the warriors still mounting their final stand.
“Hold them back!”
“Do not let them reach the Sect Leader!”
Despite their desperate cries, the wall had already fallen.
The surviving Hangsan Inspection Bureau warriors retreated to the watchtower. But over a hundred bandits were closing in from all sides.
Between the torches the enemies held, eyes gleamed with murderous intent and desire.
“These damned women dare to—”
“We’ll tear every last one of them to shreds and feed them to the dogs.”
The killing intent of the bandits surrounding the watchtower pierced through her skin.
In that moment of despair, Eun So-wol suddenly drew her bowstring toward the sky.
Whoosh.
A fire arrow, trailing flames, descended toward the darkened city gate.
Those flames were a beacon—a search for one person.
‘Uncle Chul.’
Chul Moo-baek of Hangshan Lake. He was the Hengshan Sword Sect’s last hope.
A figure emerged from the firelight cast by the burning arrows.
Footsteps echoed—steady, deliberate.
“I know it’s late to say this, but…”
A voice I’d heard only once, yet never forgotten even in my dreams.
Eun So-wol couldn’t bring herself to look, her eyes squeezed shut, while Pung Yang flashed a brilliant smile.
“You’ll have to marry me.”
* * *
The hunter Chul Moo-baek became Hangshan’s tiger because he encountered destiny.
While tracking a wolf through the sprawling Hangshan mountain range, he plummeted into a secret cave hidden between cliff faces, where he discovered forbidden martial texts and elixirs left behind by a reclusive master.
‘I will return. I must survive and return.’
Chul Moo-baek learned martial arts to survive. When the grain pills in the cave ran out, he trained by plucking grass between the cliffs and hunting bats to eat.
After three years, he clawed his way up the cliff face with bare hands and returned to the village, only to find his home in ruins and his wife and children dead.
‘It’s been about two months since I lost contact. That Hwang family dog who’d been eyeing my wife…’
By the time his mind cleared, he’d already beaten the village’s great landowner and all his servants to death.
Having avenged his family, Chul Moo-baek returned to the secret cave to train once more. It was both self-flagellation and atonement for his loved ones.
Time passed, and before long, Chul Moo-baek was known as Hangshan’s tiger.
But…
“Huff, huff… even a tiger weeps.”
Chul Moo-baek breathed heavily, his once-piercing gaze now clouded like an overcast sky, his beard soaked with blood.
‘I need to go, I need to stop him…’
Yet all that remained was willpower; his shattered limbs no longer obeyed him. Though he’d displayed martial prowess worthy of his title as Hangshan’s tiger, he couldn’t overcome Pung Yang.
‘How did he possibly…’
The outcome was clear. Pung Yang had reached the threshold of the pinnacle realm, barely manifesting blade energy, while Chul Moo-baek was a perfected master of the pinnacle realm.
Pung Yang, fragile as a candle before the wind, transformed the moment he withdrew something unidentifiable from his robes.
‘A crimson ring. Yes, that was definitely it.’
Retreating in caution was a mistake. After swallowing the ring, Pung Yang was no longer merely the leader of a bandit gang that Chul Moo-baek knew.
‘How can a human become so monstrously strong?’
Chul Moo-baek’s eyes trembled as he recalled Pung Yang’s movements.
An insurmountable gap—one he couldn’t bridge even if they fought ten times, a hundred times. Pung Yang, who had reversed the tide in an instant, shattered his limbs and inflicted grievous internal injuries before departing.
‘For now, I’ll let you live. I’ve grown curious about receiving your martial secrets as a wedding gift.’
Chul Moo-baek’s eyes reddened as he recalled Pung Yang’s parting words. The Asura Annihilation Fist was a technique of single transmission, never passed to two.
He would choose death before yielding it to Pung Yang, but Eun So-wol, whom he cherished like a daughter or granddaughter, weighed heavily on his heart.
‘What am I to do?’
It was in that moment, as Chul Moo-baek gazed at the sky with a heavy heart.
Thud-thud-thud!
The sound of hoofbeats, distant at first, drew steadily closer until four horses halted before him. Beneath the brilliant moonlight, four pairs of eyes looked down upon him.
“Do the Red Wind Bandits have no sense of honor? What’s an old man doing banditry?”
“Young Master Jin, this is Chul Moo-baek, the great master of Hangshan Lake.”
“Oh, my apologies. Moo-jin, why aren’t you apologizing at once?”
“But the squad leader was the one who made the mistake, so why should I—”
Smack!
“Grandfather, or rather, Great Master. Are you alright?”
Chul Moo-baek stared intently at the young man’s chest instead of answering.
A single character embroidered on the dark blue martial robe.
Jin (進).
“Taewon… the Jin Family?”
“Yes, you recognize it?”
The young man, Jin Tae-kyung, smiled with a smirk.

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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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