My Father Is the Number One Under Heaven - Chapter 68

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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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Episode 68. The Ten Demons of the Demonic Sect
“Sigh.”
Jegal Gil had just arrived at his destination.
He hadn’t noticed during the day, but coming at night, the distance proved far greater than expected.
Perhaps the deep darkness of the late hour had made the journey feel longer than it was.
“Well then.”
Jegal Gil steadied his breathing and began reconstructing the scene in his mind, drawing on the materials he had painstakingly gathered up to now.
The obsessive detail of his research combined with his extraordinary powers of concentration created a vivid illusion—as if the events of that day were unfolding before his eyes.
The Sarin Group had been passing through this place. Then, without warning, the Heugsalband appeared before them.
And the Demonic Sect had struck with poison in a sudden assault.
‘Sancong Poison.’
Why that particular poison?
Why not simply eliminate the Sarin Group outright? Why resort to such a roundabout method?
If anything, his best guess was that they’d used the poison to incapacitate the Sarin Group before saying something to them.
But what could they have wanted to say?
What possible message warranted such trouble?
An abduction, perhaps? Or something else?
Yet the moment he accepted the assumption that the Sarin Group had been struck by Sancong Poison, the entire case could no longer yield the result that was publicly known.
How could the Sarin Group, stripped of their ability to use Internal Energy, possibly fight the Heugsalband to mutual destruction?
Unless they’d been completely annihilated in a one-sided massacre.
That alone seemed impossible.
No matter how much he reasoned through it, he kept circling back to the same conclusion.
There had to be something more.
But what could it be?
What exactly had happened here that day?
“Sigh.”
Frustration welled up in him.
Could further investigation alone truly uncover the hidden truth?
He couldn’t be certain.
Only a shapeless, oppressive uncertainty remained.
“My head aches. It truly aches.”
That was when it happened.
A chill.
The air around him suddenly shifted.
Every hair on Jegal Gil’s body stood on end without his knowing.
“W-who goes there!”
The usually impassive Jegal Gil found himself staring into the darkness, his voice trembling.
“Tsk, tsk.”
A rasping, weathered voice reached his ears. Then, from the shadows, a figure slowly emerged.
An old man. White-haired and ancient.
“Boy. Who are you? What brings you to this place?”
The old man, bearing an extraordinarily cantankerous expression, swept his gaze slowly across Jegal Gil from bottom to top—eyes so pale they seemed to belong to a dead thing, unsettling in their emptiness.
In the darkness, those pale eyes flickered with an especially eerie quality.
He rolled his eyes slowly as he spoke.
“Hmm. Judging by your attire, you must be from the Murim Alliance.”
“And who are you, sir? What are you doing in this place at such an hour?”
The aura emanating from the old man was the most sinister and dangerous Jegal Gil had encountered in his entire life.
His instincts as an Investigator screamed at him.
He needed to leave this place. He needed to run, now.
But he couldn’t.
For some reason, his body had gone rigid, completely unresponsive.
A sickening premonition gripped him—if he so much as twitched clumsily, his neck would be forfeit in an instant.
He felt like a mouse frozen before a snake.
“Tsk, tsk. Me? I came to see this place with my own eyes, unable to believe that my own children whom I raised died here.”
Jegal Gil’s eyes widened at the old man’s words.
Surely he wasn’t referring to the ‘Sarin Group’ that the Murim Alliance had raised.
Jegal Gil had never once seen this old man among the ranks of the Murim Alliance.
Which meant the children this old man spoke of could only be—the Heugsalband of the Demonic Sect.
Jegal Gil cried out in alarm.
“T-the Demonic Sect?!”
“Yes. I am precisely one of the Ten Demons of the Demonic Sect, Heukmma.”
“Heukmma!”
Jegal Gil’s voice trembled as if seized by madness.
The Ten Demons of the Demonic Sect.
They were the supreme masters representing the Demonic Sect itself—those whose savagery and cruelty made all under heaven tremble with dread. That was what the Ten Demons were.
Among them, Heukmma was counted among the most merciless.
Once, he alone had burned four minor to mid-sized sects in an entire region in a single night.
The reason? Simply that his mood was foul that day.
In a moment’s temper, he had snuffed out hundreds of lives.
An arch-villain whom no one in this realm should ever cross paths with.
That man was Heukmma.
And such a being had suddenly materialized before him.
To encounter Heukmma, one of the Ten Demons of the Demonic Sect, while alone in this place at this hour.
Could fortune ever turn so cruelly against a man?
Jegal Gil’s instinct had been correct.
Had he attempted to flee clumsily just moments before, he would have been killed without mercy.
Yet standing perfectly still offered him no better escape either.
It was a situation where nothing he did would avail him.
‘Well. How foolish of me to venture out investigating on such a night—only to die for it.’
Now that he faced Heukmma, there seemed no possibility of returning alive.
“Indeed, boy.”
Fortunately, Heukmma did not immediately strike.
“This time, I shall ask you. Why were you here at such an hour?”
“…I am an Investigator dispatched by the Murim Alliance.”
“Ah. An Investigator, then.”
A glimmer of intrigue flickered in Heukmma’s eyes.
“Well then. What have you discovered?”
Jegal Gil bit his lip.
A shallow hope arose in him—perhaps if he surrendered what he had learned so far, he might survive.
“I have wondered all along as I journeyed here.”
As Jegal Gil hesitated, Heukmma stroked his chin thoughtfully.
“I clearly ordered that one be brought back alive and all the rest slaughtered. Yet somehow those capable enough to eliminate even the sect leaders of respectable schools ended up in mutual ruin with mere children. I have puzzled over how such a thing came to pass.”
“……!”
A truth Jegal Gil had never contemplated fell from Heukmma’s lips.
“What was your intention in preserving only one?”
Jegal Gil managed to gather the courage to ask.
Heukmma answered as though the question were of no consequence.
“Why, it should be obvious. I meant to turn him into a spy.”
Jegal Gil’s eyes widened.
How had he not thought of this!
He should have considered it at least once.
“Why do you look so startled?”
Heukmma’s head tilted, displeased.
“Did you truly believe the Murim Alliance harbors not a single spy of the Demonic Sect? Tsk, tsk.”
“Nonsense! That cannot be!”
“Cannot be? Everyone becomes pliant before the threat of death. Tsk, tsk!”
Perhaps it amused Heukmma to see Jegal Gil bristle with indignation.
A smile deepened across Heukmma’s face.
Heukmma’s fingers flexed restlessly.
It was his habit—watching such self-righteous fools who knew nothing of their own station always made his hands itch.
Were he to lower his guard even for a moment, he might find himself hurling the fool’s head clean from his shoulders without thinking.
But for now he must exercise restraint. After all, there was still something to learn.
“In any case, let us move past that matter. So then, boy—what did you discover?”
At Heukmma’s words, Jegal Gil bit his lip once more, hard—as though steeling himself this time not to waver.
Seeing this, Heukmma feigned benevolence and drew his mouth into a smile.
“Speak freely. If the intelligence is sound, I shall grant you your life.”
“You would grant me my life?”
“Yes. I do not lie.”
Jegal Gil regarded Heukmma in silence for a moment, then slowly shook his head.
“I cannot speak of it.”
“Don’t you want to live?”
“I do want to live.”
“Then why make such a choice?”
“Because what you’re saying is a lie.”
“What makes you think that?”
Heukmma tilted his head, puzzled.
At that, Jegal Gil answered without the slightest hesitation.
“Your eyes are laughing.”
Jegal Gil could see it clearly.
Heukmma’s gaze was saturated with a perverse playfulness and murderous intent.
He was simply toying with human life.
A man who cared not at all about breaking his own promises.
And Jegal Gil had already seen through it.
“And if you truly intended to spare me, you would never have told me such secrets.”
“Couldn’t you be used as a spy?”
“No, that’s impossible.”
Jegal Gil’s face had turned cold and hard as he replied.
“A spy is ultimately nothing but a tool to be discarded when no longer useful. You would never carelessly reveal such secrets to a mere tool.”
Clearly, his intention was to extract all information from him and then, when he became expendable, kill him without a backward glance.
And Jegal Gil was neither stupid nor foolish enough to fall for it.
“Well, well. Look at this one.”
Heukmma’s face broke into a chilling, sinister smile at this unexpected response.
“Yes. You have good instincts, and you’re quite clever in your own way. I find myself taking a liking to you. Perhaps this time my heart truly intends to change.”
……
“What say you? This time I am sincere. I shall let you live. Work for our Tianma Divine Cult.”
But even now, Jegal Gil did not hesitate for so much as a moment.
“I refuse this time as well.”
“Truly? Even though you could live?”
“To be honest, it matters not whether your words were a lie or truth. I will never become a dog of the Demonic Sect.”
“Hmm. So you won’t tell me what you’ve learned, and you refuse to work for the Demonic Sect either — is that what you’re saying?”
“It is.”
“Heh heh.”
For some reason, Heukmma burst into hearty, delighted laughter.
“A spirit upright and true, conduct virtuous, and mind brilliant. Tsk tsk. I do love such a man. All the more so such a man…”
Boom!
In an instant, a vast wave of killing intent erupted from Heukmma’s body.
“Gack!”
Jegal Gil felt his breath catch sharply in his throat.
“There is a pleasure in death. Breaking a bright life full of promise before its light can shine — it is exquisite beyond measure.”
“Gack!”
Heukmma thrust his hand forward.
“Yes. I shall slowly drain away all your life force.”
His eyes gleamed with savage hunger.
“And you will feel every moment of that agony as you die a miserable, wretched death.”
Boom.
Screech.
Jegal Gil’s body lifted into the air and was swiftly pulled toward Heukmma.
It was only a matter of time before he was seized.
‘Is this the end? Like this?’
He had never imagined his final moments would come here in Hebei.
There was still so much left undone……
‘Brother……’
And so Jegal Gil squeezed his eyes shut, accepting his imminent end.
That was when it happened.
“It is too early for you to meet your end. You must live on — for much longer yet.”
A voice suddenly called out from nowhere.
And then,
Whoosh.
The hand that Heukmma had extended toward Jegal Gil fell to the ground with a soft thud.
“Good. We arrived in time.”
Suddenly, an unknown figure materialized between Heukmma and Jegal Gil, intercepting the flying swordsman’s body mid-air.
Jegal Gil’s form came to a halt, drifting downward with deliberate slowness.
“You… who are you?”
A son-in-law of the Hebei Peng Clan—and the lord of Baekrang Manor, a man who knew nothing of martial arts.
Yeo Unhwi smiled faintly at him.

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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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