Murim Login - Chapter 419

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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 419
Lee Jung-yong found himself lost in thought.
‘Where did it all go wrong? What was my first mistake?’
Was it driving out Elder Brother’s bloodline and seizing control of the Ares Guild?
Was it committing countless crimes to fuel the Guild’s endless growth, never satisfied, always hungry for more?
Or perhaps something else entirely…
‘Making an enemy of that monster?’
Lee Jung-yong’s gaze fixed on a single figure—a young man whose entire body was drenched in blood from countless wounds.
After drawing a deep breath while gazing at the sky, the young man parted his lips.
“Jung-yong.”
Why was it? The moment that soft voice reached his ears, Lee Jung-yong felt ice crystallize down his spine. Despite bearing no wounds, he felt as though he’d been sliced by a blade.
Jin Tae-kyung, the young man before him, wore a savage smile at the corners of his mouth.
“Time to clip your claws.”
“…!”
A sharp crack split the air.
Wind erupted, and in the instant the space between them vanished, Lee Jung-yong swung his blade with a piercing cry.
A whistle of steel.
A brilliant concentration of aura slashed across Jin Tae-kyung’s body. But instead of blood spraying forth, only wind scattered.
An afterimage—not a physical form. Red alarms blared in Lee Jung-yong’s mind.
‘Behind me!’
There was no time to swing his blade. Lee Jung-yong spun like lightning and drove his fist forward. A fist wrapped in pristine white aura collided with a palm wreathed in blue flames.
A deafening boom.
The world trembled. No—it was Lee Jung-yong’s vision that shook.
Sent flying by an irresistible force, he flipped through the air and righted his stance.
His fists throbbed, and something welled up from deep within. But he had no time to spit blood.
A piercing shriek.
A spear materialized before his eyes. Jin Tae-kyung’s thrust aimed straight for his chest. Gritting his teeth, Lee Jung-yong poured all his strength into deflecting the blade upward.
Metallic screeches erupted, followed by a thunderous crash.
The spear barely missed, tearing through concrete and leaving a massive crater in its wake.
He’d managed to deflect it, but the tremendous force and rotational power had split his palms open, blood spraying from the wounds.
Yet Lee Jung-yong paid it no mind, extending his legs through the billowing dust cloud.
A violent gust erupted.
The dust and haze, unable to withstand the tremendous speed, scattered in all directions. At the end of Lee Jung-yong’s stride stood a single figure.
“Reckless, aren’t you? I like that.”
Jin Tae-kyung, now wielding a fresh spear, slashed it in a crisscross pattern. Space fractured and flames erupted. The tip of Lee Jung-yong’s blade pierced directly through the center of the inferno.
Compressed air detonated. Flames split apart, and a new path opened. Lee Jung-yong’s form shot forward like an arrow toward Jin Tae-kyung.
‘Die.’
His blade, infused with singular intent, blazed brilliantly and moved with blinding speed.
Yet in the slowed world before him, Jin Tae-kyung’s eyes were unmistakably smiling.
However, in the slowed-down world, Jin Tae-kyung’s eyes were clearly smiling.
‘Something’s wrong….’
Something had gone terribly awry.
Before Lee Jung-yong’s thoughts could fully form, Jin Tae-kyung’s hand gripping the spear blurred into motion.
Simultaneously, a colossal force swept across the blade that had been poised to pierce his throat.
Whoosh! Crash!
A deafening boom reverberated through the air, leaving his ears ringing. Lee Jung-yong skidded backward nearly twenty meters against his will, swallowing the blood that surged up his throat.
‘It’s not over yet.’
I cannot fall. I cannot show weakness. I am Lee Jung-yong—the architect who navigated the maelstrom of the Cataclysm, the most violent upheaval in human history, and a hero born of this age.
Lee Jung-yong gripped his blade, now etched with spiderweb fractures.
‘I will not die. I cannot die.’
The path to this moment had been fraught with countless trials. I had endured abyssal despair, known unbearable rage.
For half my life, I lived in another’s shadow, bearing the name of second-in-command.
Perhaps even now.
But….
“No longer.”
Thump. Thump-thump-thump.
Veins bulged across his entire body as muscles swelled. A tremendous aura erupted from Lee Jung-yong, crushing the air around him.
Drawing upon the final reserves of power he had preserved for this ultimate moment, he fixed Jin Tae-kyung with bloodshot eyes.
“He is as good as dead. The world’s greatest—that is me.”
Uuuuhhhhh.
Everything surrounding Lee Jung-yong trembled violently. Yet Jin Tae-kyung’s gaze remained utterly composed, unwavering.
“I beg to differ.”
Boom!
The aura erupting from both their bodies tore through the surroundings.
In a fraction of a heartbeat, they hurtled toward each other simultaneously.
* * *
Crash!
The collision blazed like lightning, its shockwave immense. Amid the world-shaking roar, they became two intertwining currents of wind.
The spear tip wreathed in azure flame and the blade engulfed in brilliant radiance flew toward one another.
Shhhhwick!
Torrents of light tore through space itself.
Jin Tae-kyung launched upward from the ground with devastating momentum, driving his spear downward. First strike, second strike, third strike. With each collision, thunderous booms erupted alongside catastrophic shockwaves.
Blood began trickling from the corner of Lee Jung-yong’s mouth, spattering in droplets.
“Cough.”
For an instant, his form wavered. The aging lion’s momentary weakness exposed, the young lion bares his fangs.
The spear blade, swung horizontally, came crashing toward Lee Jung-yong’s flank with tremendous force.
Boom!
The earth trembled as if struck by an earthquake.
At a distance where their breaths mingled, Lee Jung-yong barely blocked the spear, his eyes meeting those burning with flame across the locked weapons.
‘So young. Just as I once was.’
Why was it? Why did such a thought suddenly occur to me in this very moment?
Because I was lost in memories of my pathetic, wretched former self, I failed to block Jin Tae-kyung’s palm as it came hurtling through the flames.
Boom—!
Searing heat. The protective aura that had enveloped my entire body shattered, and terrible warmth seeped into my lungs.
Amid the azure flames painting my vision and the agony, memories long buried flashed through Lee Jung-yong’s mind like arrows.
‘Your name?’
‘Pardon?’
‘Oh, I was asking you.’
‘Why the sudden introduction?’
Early days of the Cataclysm. A person I met in a desperate situation, surrounded by countless monsters.
‘Just. You looked about my age. I was glad to see you.’
‘Your speech suddenly became curt, young friend. You look much younger than me.’
‘Then shall we be friends? I don’t mind.’
‘…Are you saying such things in a situation like this?’
‘I suppose so.’
I thought he was a madman, half-crazed by the fear of death.
Until that madman suddenly stepped forward and swept away thousands upon thousands of monsters.
Crash—!
‘This crazy bastard….’
‘Now’s the time! Charge—!’
After the battle ended, when he came back and asked again, the question was the same as before.
‘Your name?’
‘Lee Jung-yong…’
‘That’s a cool name. And your age? Oh, I’m five years older. Not much difference—shall we just be friends?’
‘No, sir.’
He was cursedly youthful in appearance, and impossibly strong.
A-rank Hunter Lee Jung-yong discovered in that first meeting both his hero and an insurmountable Mountain Range he could never cross.
‘By the way, sir.’
‘Hmm?’
‘What is your name, if I may ask….’
‘Oh, I haven’t told you yet.’
He smiled and spoke.
‘Cheon Tae-min.’
Cheon Tae-min. Cheon Tae-min. Cheon Tae-min….
A name that resonated deeply no matter how many times I repeated it. A face etched into my mind despite all attempts to forget.
The giant who cast an enormous shadow across Lee Jung-yong’s entire life.
“Disappear! Get out of my sight this instant—!”
Lee Jung-yong screamed with a voice seething with rage. My vision, bleached white by pain, shattered like glass, and the wind rushing past my ears was fierce.
The moment I regained consciousness, Lee Jung-yong was struck by a tremendous impact and driven through a high-rise building, crashing into cold concrete.
Crash—!
“Cough.”
Dark crimson blood spilled between my lips.
My vision blurred while pain assaulted every limb. My shattered ribs scraped against my organs, making each breath a struggle, and my broken left arm and leg hung uselessly at my sides.
‘A potion, I need a potion….’
This was my last chance. I had to heal my wounds while the attacks paused, however briefly.
Lee Jung-yong reached toward his side with his one intact right arm, but the spatial pocket that should have been there was empty.
Instead, what he found was a single figure approaching from the distance.
“Oh, were you looking for this?”
Clink, clink, clink. Thud.
A single glass vial reinforced with magic rolled toward Lee Jung-yong and came to rest at his feet.
It was the highest-grade potion—the miraculous elixir that could save anyone as long as they still drew breath.
Though it looked considerably different from the last state he remembered it in.
“My throat was so parched I drank some, and it really was refreshing. Where’s this spring water from?”
As Jin Tae-kyung approached with those casual words, Lee Jung-yong let out a hollow laugh.
‘Jin Tae-kyung.’
The name, the face, the personality—everything was different.
But in this moment, Lee Jung-yong could finally understand.
That day when I first encountered Jin Tae-kyung, the unease and intrigue I felt deep in my chest—the familiarity I had deliberately ignored by packaging it into those two words.
“Jung-yong.”
A low voice that burrowed into my ears.
As Jin Tae-kyung drew close enough to touch, another figure’s face overlapped with his.
Lee Jung-yong murmured like a groan.
“Who are you? Who exactly are you?”
I wanted to ask. I was desperate to know.
How could he resemble him so completely?
How could someone like this F-rank Hunter grow stronger than me, who followed in his footsteps and earned countless Achievements, revered as a hero!
“Me?”
In the next moment, Jin Tae-kyung smiled and continued.
“I’m Jung-yong’s responsibility.”
And like an echo bouncing back from a distant place, the face and voice of someone from Lee Jung-yong’s ancient memories overlapped with the present.
‘Brothers. Sworn brothers.’
Both of them were smiling, their words carrying different meanings.
Lee Jung-yong stared blankly at that damnable resemblance in their smiles, then slowly, very slowly, opened his mouth.
“I….”
Decades of time, countless emotions rose and fell.
After a wait that was but an instant yet felt like eternity, a hollow voice slipped between my lips.
“I have no regrets. Never.”
If asked whether there was even a shred of regret, the answer would be no.
Yet Lee Jung-yong could not regret. I did not wish to regret. I simply believed this was the most fitting end for me.
“Kill me.”
At Lee Jung-yong, who smiled brightly, a cold word fell like a blade.
“Your last words. I heard them well.”
A whoosh.
A spear tip wreathed in azure flames, its voice belying the inferno it carried.
* * *
The flames, pregnant with ultra-high temperatures, erupted in an instant, consuming everything before extinguishing themselves.
In the melted concrete and blackened earth, only traces remained—the mark of a man who once stood there.
And a bell’s chime that only one person in the world could hear.
Ding.
–
[Lv.153 Lee Jung-yong]
has been defeated!
– Massive experience gained!
– Level Up!
– Level Up!
I slowly withdrew my spear, listening to the cheerful system notifications.
‘Damn old bastard.’
That smile I saw at the end kept haunting me.
What kind of life had Lee Jung-yong lived, and what was he thinking in his final moments? Beyond that, the movements he showed and those strange actions he took…
‘No. I’ll think about it later.’
Even for me, the battle with Lee Jung-yong was far from easy.
A wave of mental fatigue suddenly crashed over me, but ironically, my body—blessed with top-tier potions and the effects of level-ups—felt remarkably light.
And more than anything, I had a reason to push forward.
‘The Arch Lich.’
The root cause of all this. That bastard had to be eliminated before he transformed the massive city into a Gate…
– Y-you… human.
Suddenly, the trembling voice of the Skeleton Warlord reached my ears.
I lifted my head, every hair on my body standing on end.
There. It was there.

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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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