Murim Login - Chapter 283

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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 283
Crash!
The air in the office shrieked with a piercing vibration.
Park Ji-hoon’s forehead smashed through the desk, shattering it into fragments before driving into the floor. With a sickening crack, spider-web fractures etched themselves across the surface.
“Ugh.”
I drove my knee down on Park Ji-hoon’s back as he gasped in pain, channeling the crushing weight of a thousand-jin hammer into the strike.
My eyes, fixed on the back of his head, gleamed with astonishment.
‘Well, well. Look at this bastard.’
Modern hunters possessed no concept of martial arts.
Even among close-range fighters, those like Lim Young-jun—a Black Hunter—who specialized in body techniques were exceedingly rare; most focused on weaponry instead.
‘Because that’s what keeps you alive.’
But Park Ji-hoon was different. Though it lasted only a fraction of a second, the movements he’d displayed rivaled those of a supreme master from the Martial World.
‘It was clumsy, sure, but it resembled a perfected Seizing Hand technique.’
I’d underestimated him and paid for it with surprise. The match had been decided quickly, yet the mere fact that he’d exchanged moves with me five times meant his skill far exceeded my initial assessment.
‘Body techniques of this caliber still exist in the modern era? Why hasn’t this been revealed?’
I voiced the question burning in my mind.
“Where did you learn that just now?”
Park Ji-hoon answered in a strained voice.
“Let me go. Before you regret this.”
“I see. Still plenty of fight left in you.”
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Once, twice, three times.
With each slam of his head against the floor, suppressed groans tore from his throat. Blood spattered across the pristine office floor, which had been spotless moments before.
As his body went limp, Park Tae-seop, who had been observing the scene, finally spoke.
“That’s enough.”
“Is this bastard the Guild Master’s son?”
“A son?”
“Or perhaps his daughter?”
“Obviously not that either.”
“Then this isn’t a matter the Guild Master should concern himself with. If you cross the line here, I can’t answer for what I might do.”
Park Tae-seop’s eyebrows twitched.
“Your tongue’s sharp.”
“My hands are sharper. My old nickname was the Spicy-Handed Master of Haengsin-dong—want to taste it yourself?”
“I have my pride. I’ve no interest in fighting someone barely old enough to shave.”
Park Tae-seop uncrossed his arms as he spoke.
“But if that friend of yours ends up seriously hurt, it creates problems for me. He’s an important business partner.”
“A business partner who sent a manager? Actually, calling him that is embarrassing—you’re being pushed around so badly you’re practically a figurehead. Did someone get leverage on you?”
I’d struck a nerve; his brow furrowed noticeably.
“You’re sharper than expected. Though I heard your head was dull.”
I didn’t need to ask who’d said such a thing—it was painfully obvious.
I grasped Park Ji-hoon’s hair—stiffened with wax—more roughly and answered.
“I’m a slow learner, admittedly. But once I learn something, I never forget it.”
“Since you’ve learned it properly this time, let him go now.”
“That was my intention anyway.”
As I lifted the struggling Park Ji-hoon’s head, Park Tae-seop gave a small nod.
“Good thinking….”
I brought the lifted head down with force.
Crack!
‘Once more.’
Smash!
Following the thunderous impact, the floor shattered. I drove my heel into the solar plexus of the writhing man, who flailed like a fresh fish.
With a dull thud, Park Ji-hoon flew backward and skidded across the floor toward the door.
“Gasp!”
Jolted awake by the impact, Park Ji-hoon trembled violently, spitting blood.
“….”
I spoke to Park Tae-seop, who had fallen silent.
“I let him go. That’s enough, right?”
“You’re quite ruthless.”
“Should I only take warnings from someone who cuts off limbs as a greeting?”
“I don’t particularly like that friend either, but taking my advice would have been better for your health.”
His expression and voice had turned rigid. This was genuine concern.
Rather than fear, I felt curiosity. Who was this person that even Park Tae-seop—a war hero of the Great Upheaval and one of the nation’s top-ranked hunters—avoided?
I asked with a puzzled expression.
“Who is it? That bastard just kept calling him ‘That Person.'”
“I can’t say. Even if I did, you’d only resent me later.”
“What’s with all the mystery? Is that person some kind of Asmodeus?”
“If you made him an enemy, you’d be better off facing a Demon King. The whole world would fight alongside you… But what are you doing right now?”
Park Tae-seop’s eyes widened as he stared at me.
Or more precisely, at the phone in my hand.
“Looking at my phone.”
“Suddenly?”
“Yes.”
What kind of madman does this? That was the exact look on his face.
Park Tae-seop asked with an expression of complete bewilderment.
“What are you doing with it?”
“What else? Since you won’t tell me, I’m going to find the number myself.”
“The number?”
“Yes. That person’s number.”
“Wait, you don’t mean…?”
“That’s right. I took it from that bastard’s pocket earlier.”
At my answer, Park Tae-seop’s eyes widened, and Park Ji-hoon, who had been coughing up blood, cried out, his pain forgotten.
“I can’t hand it over right now!”
“Right, can’t hand it over.”
I toyed with an unidentifiable smartphone of unknown make.
It looked completely different from the one I’d seen when I visited his Officetel the other day. He couldn’t have changed it in just a few days—it had to be a burner phone for secret communications.
Even people juggling affairs carried two or three phones, so it wasn’t unusual.
‘He’s always been full of secrets anyway.’
When I touched the screen, two messages appeared alongside a lock icon: requests to recognize my fingerprint and iris.
Fingerprint recognition I could understand, but iris recognition too?
I gestured toward Park Ji-hoon, who was struggling to his feet.
“Hey. Come here. Let me scan your fingerprint and iris.”
“Jin Tae-kyung, you crazy bastard. Do you even realize what you’re doing right now?”
“Yeah, I do. So come over and cooperate before I have to extract your eyes and fingers.”
“Don’t bother threatening me. I was planning to do it anyway.”
Park Ji-hoon ground his teeth, wiping his mouth.
But unlike moments ago when he’d been gasping roughly, he now radiated vitality.
Though blood was smeared here and there, his forehead and nose—which had been shattered—were already healed, and his stamina seemed fully restored.
Only then did I notice a small reinforced glass vial rolling at his feet.
“A potion?”
“When your enemy is in front of you, don’t lose focus until the very end. Didn’t they teach you that at the Training Facility?”
While I’d been glancing at the phone for just a moment, he’d apparently pulled out something he’d hidden and gulped it down. I shrugged and replied.
“That’s only when you’re evenly matched. That’s not the case here, is it?”
“What?”
“I don’t know where or from whom you learned what you did, but….”
Following the incantations of the Blazing Divine Technique, I circulated my qi, and the fire dragon coiled in my dantian awakened.
I stared at Park Ji-hoon with eyes burning red-hot.
“You and I are in different classes, you worthless bastard.”
In the next instant, the fire dragon composed of ten thousand strands of blazing heat scattered into hundreds of fragments. As it dispersed, I awakened the blood meridians and surged forward without hesitation.
The power that had scattered converged again at a single point, merging into one.
‘Disperse, compress. And….’
Release.
Whoooosh!
Though early winter had already arrived, the cold office transformed in an instant into a scorching summer where the sun blazed. A tremendous wave of fire energy surged forth.
“Ha.”
I exhaled hot breath.
Beyond the shimmering heat haze, I could see one person, their face etched with shock. Their features were rigid, their eyes churning with turbulent waves.
“You, you….”
A moan-like voice spilled from between Park Ji-hoon’s lips.
“How is this even possible?”
“I told you. We’re different.”
The figure shuddered as if drenched in ice water, biting down on his lip so hard that flesh split and blood welled up instantly.
“This… this doesn’t make sense. How could you…”
The contorted face muttered before the man suddenly opened his mouth.
“I require assistance.”
It was clear who those words were directed at.
Park Tae-seop, the Myeongdong Guild Master, who had been watching me with eyes full of surprise, responded in a heavy voice.
“Is there a way to refuse that proposal?”
“There is not.”
“And if I refuse regardless?”
“Certain rewards and punishments according to choice. You should know well the methods of ‘That Person’, Guild Master.”
“…How tiresome.”
Park Tae-seop exhaled a sigh and withdrew a 60-centimeter rod from his waist. As he caressed the magic stone affixed to its end, a pristine blade erupted forth.
Shing, shing, shing, shing!
“Don’t resent me.”
With those bitter words, the sword’s edge, wreathed in azure aura, pointed directly at me.
My opponent was a hero of the Great Cataclysm and one of the nation’s top-ten ranked hunters. A colossal aura erupted from his body, meeting my own formidable presence.
Park Ji-hoon, now bolstered by this powerful reinforcement, laughed coldly.
“You’re finished now.”
“Finished?”
I laughed aloud.
I’d thought him somewhat intelligent since he attended Korea University, but it seemed he’d completely forgotten what I told him last time.
“Whether it’s finished or not—that’s my decision to make, you idiot.”
Park Ji-hoon had arbitrarily placed me at the starting line and pulled the trigger to signal the beginning. But he’d failed to anticipate the most crucial detail.
This race had no finish line.
And wherever I stopped was the finish line itself.
‘Inventory open.’
Summoning White Flame.
Whoosh. I stepped forward alongside the inferno.
Azure flames flowing along the spear’s edge burned in all directions as I rushed toward my enemy.
* * *
“Ha!”
A massive greatsword came flying with a powerful shout. The blue aura gathered at the blade’s tip was deeper and longer than anything I’d ever witnessed in reality.
‘As expected of a top-tier ranker.’
Combat power and mana.
Different names, but the essence remained unchanged. In that sense, Park Tae-seop’s aura surpassed my own.
But…
‘Only that far.’
With the thought, I sprang upward in a rebound.
My hair barely grazed the ceiling, while the blade that had been sweeping toward my waist cut through empty air.
Whoosh! Clang, clang, clang, clang!
A tremendous gust of wind swept everything away. The reinforced glass that lined one wall of the office shattered, plummeting to the ground below.
Before screams could even rise from the streets below, I brought my blade down toward Park Tae-seop’s crown.
A sharp whistle, then a deafening crack!
Park Tae-seop’s knees buckled against the floor, his ears ringing from the thunderous impact.
His eyes widened in shock as he desperately blocked the assault with a shield in his other hand.
“What the—!”
By now, he must have felt it—the crushing weight bearing down upon him like a mountain of stone.
It was the difference in physical capability between us, the gap born from how we wielded our power.
‘Hunters truly lack efficiency.’
The martial techniques of the Murim, by contrast, exponentially amplified the efficiency of one’s inner force. This was why the great sects like the Nine Major Sects and One Alliance and the Five Great Families commanded such strength.
Exquisite internal cultivation methods that blossomed into countless martial arts radiating from the heart.
When those delicate gears meshed together in perfect harmony, that was what earned the name divine technique.
‘Disperse, compress, release.’
Inner force was like a rare resource—something to be carefully rationed and deployed only when most needed. Yet even Park Tae-seop, a top-ranked hunter, hadn’t completely transcended that limitation.
Boom! Boom! Crack!
The moment Park Tae-seop’s shield split in two after blocking four consecutive strikes, a flash of light shot toward his flank.
“Die!”
The wielder of that slender, deadly rapier was unmistakably Park Ji-hoon.
Just as I thought I’d evaded it, the aura coating the blade’s tip surged outward, grazing my side.
A sharp hiss.
Disappointment flickered across Park Ji-hoon’s face—his aura had only torn through my clothing, nothing more.
I checked my flank, finding not a scratch, and licked my lips.
“…This is quite intriguing.”
“Intriguing? Not afraid?”
“Did That Person teach you this?”
“Shut your mouth. You’re not worthy of speaking that name.”
“Well, seems I hit a nerve. This isn’t some cult nonsense, is it?”
“You bastard…!”
A sharp whistle, then a flurry of cuts!
Park Tae-seop’s greatsword came from the right, Park Ji-hoon’s rapier from the left.
Watching the two of them rush toward me, I simply extended both arms.
Boom! A dull thud!
I blocked Park Tae-seop’s greatsword with Baekryeom and Park Ji-hoon’s rapier with a freshly summoned dagger, then gently rotated my wrists.
A metallic grinding sound!
The four blades, locked in tension, began to intertwine with one another.
I recalled my sparring match with Geom-seong Maejong-hak.
His blade that let everything flow through it. His movements.
And I unleashed it.
‘Flow.’
A smooth glide.
The spear blade and dagger slithered like serpents, their path unobstructed by the massive greatsword or the slender rapier.
In moments, two razor-sharp blades pressed against the throats of both fighters.
A soft whisper of steel.
“Drop your weapons.”
“…!”
“…!”
Two pairs of eyes, wide with shock, snapped toward me.
Park Ji-hoon’s voice trembled with rage and despair.
“How is this….”
“Didn’t you hear me?”
A sickening crack.
Without hesitation, I drove my heel down against his knee, and cartilage shattered with a scream tearing from his throat.
“Aaaahhhhh!”
“I have two arms. One leg won’t balance the equation.”
Just as I was about to crush the other one’s knee as well.
“That should suffice, I think.”
An unfamiliar voice pierced my ear.
From that impossibly deep and low voice, my spine tingled and every hair on my body stood on end.
This is….
‘A supreme master?’

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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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