North Sea Martial Arts Warrior - Chapter 34

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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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34. The Iron-Willed Soldiers

Blood fell.
A droplet trailing from the back of Airak’s hand marked the frozen earth with a crimson dot.
A wound from yesterday’s battle.
He did not look at it. His gaze remained fixed ahead, toward the stone walls of the Okmuneun Gate alone.
One step.
His shadow stretched long across the ground.
The morning sunlight struck the ramparts and poured down upon two thousand soldiers. Spearheads gleamed. Arrowheads glinted. All of it was leveled at a single man.
The two thousand atop the walls held their breath.
Not a soul moved. Not a voice spoke. Only the sight of one man walking forward filled their eyes.
‘Two thousand. I have half a Spear Formation to break through them. That is my only chance.’
A measured calculation flowed through Airak’s mind. But in that moment, Karani’s face crossed before him—a smile like spring snow melting. ‘You must come back to me.’ That was what she had said. He had promised then: he would return without fail.
The Beokryeongdo vibrated at his waist.
The earth beneath his feet was frozen solid. Unlike the Northern Sea, this ice was thin. It shattered with each step, bare ground revealed again with the next.
The boundary of the Central Plain.
As he drew closer to the wall, the cold emanating from the Sword Spirit deepened. The blade hungered for blood.

Upon the rampart.
“He truly comes alone? No subordinates?”
Hoyeongak stood with folded arms, looking down at Airak as he spoke.
A valiant commander with boundless ambition but never defeated in combat. His eyes narrowed to slits.
“Yes. We see none, sir.”
The adjutant bowed his head.
“What of infiltration elsewhere?”
“No signs of such activity, sir.”
Hoyeongak let out a derisive snort.
“Alone? There’s something everyone says in a situation like this.”
“That he’s a madman, sir?”
“Exactly. A madman.”
Hoyeongak tapped the rampart’s railing with his finger. Tap, tap, tap. The rhythmic sound rang out sharply through the tense air.
“Look at that gait. No tremor. How many men can walk like that before two thousand?”
The adjutant tilted his head, puzzled.
“Could it be mere bluster, sir?”
“Bluster?”
Hoyeongak burst into laughter. But his eyes did not laugh.
“The man who slaughtered three hundred vanguard troops from Majeon single-handedly. Kutor died there. Majeon rabble, they call them, but Kutor was a cunning old fox who’d prowled the Northern Sea for thirty years. Could mere bluster accomplish that?”
The adjutant’s face hardened.
“He’s not mad. He believes in something—believes he can win…”
The adjutant asked carefully.
“Commander, the gold we received from the Ice Palace…”
“It’s enough. All we need is to finish the job.”
Hoyeongak raised his hand.
“Archers!”
Five hundred archers lifted their bows in unison. Standing in a line atop the rampart, they aimed downward.
Five hundred arrowheads flashed in the sunlight, naked malice on display.
Airak did not stop. He walked on. Slowly. As if taking a morning stroll.
“Fire!”

Thwang-thwang-thwang-thwang!
As five hundred bowstrings released in unison, the sky darkened. Five hundred arrows erupted skyward, blotting out the sun in an instant. A shadow of death poured down upon Airak.
Whissssh-whissssh-whissssh!
The sound of air being torn. A black rain slicing through the wind. Hundreds of arrowheads flashed as they descended.
In Airak’s eyes, time seemed to slow. He saw each trajectory with perfect clarity—which were fatal, which were feints.
The Beokryeongdo was drawn.
As the black blade danced, spinning in a perfect circle, the arrows froze the instant they touched its path and fell harmlessly to earth. Plink, plink-plink, plink. Four hundred shafts struck the ground without purpose.
Yet another hundred arrows streaked toward Airak. Shafts thrumming with Internal Power. Fired by the garrison’s elite archers. These bore a weight utterly different from ordinary arrows.
Airak moved at a speed entirely unlike anything before—pure lightning.
Whishhh!
An arrow grazed past his body.
He dodged them all. But even so, three shafts clipped his arm and shoulder in the chaos.
Blood sprayed.
“We got him!”
A roar erupted from atop the wall.
“He bleeds! The Northern Sea Combat Warrior is only human!”
Two thousand voices shook the ramparts. Morale surged. They had seen the monster before them shed blood.
Airak’s expression did not change. He did not examine the wounds. He simply did not slow.
‘Disciplined troops.’
His eyes narrowed. The garrison was stronger than anticipated.
“Second formation, fire!”
At Hoyeongak’s command, a second volley descended.
Airak drove forward through the black rain of arrows, the earth bucking beneath his feet.

Three hundred spearmen waited before the gate.
“Deploy the Spear Formation!”
When three hundred voices bellowed as one, the earth trembled.
“Haah!”
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The shaft-ends struck the ground in unison, advancing.
A rhythm like a heartbeat. Three hundred spearpoints flashed in the sunlight, forming a forest of iron.
Murderous intent that would yield not a single step.
Each spearpoint bore the dried stains of old blood. Shafts worn down in countless battles. Spears that had drunk the lives of hundreds.
The spearmen moved like machinery. Their breathing synchronized. One thrust, the next blocked, the rank behind drove forward. They were not individuals. They were a single organism. A beast with three hundred heads and three hundred arms.
The tremor rising from the earth traveled through their soles and spread through their entire bodies. The mingled stench of blood and iron pricked at the nostrils.
Airak charged straight into the Spear Formation.
Shrieeeek!
Spears flooded forward. Dozens of points aimed simultaneously at his heart, throat, and head.
No room to dodge. No room to block.
The Beokryeongdo swept through the air. Shaft after shaft shattered. Five, ten, fifteen shafts splintered in a blink. But from behind the broken ends came more spears.
This was the terror of the Okmuneun Gate Spear Formation.
When the front rank fell, the rear rank pressed forward. An endless wave. Cut them down and still they came. A relentless tide of iron. Trampling corpses, stepping over fallen comrades as they advanced.
“Die!”
“Ten thousand silver! Just his head and it’s ours!”
“You Northern Sea bastard! What are you doing here!”
The spearmen threw themselves at him with foam flecking their lips. Not fear. Madness. The madness of eyes drunk on gold.
A spearpoint grazed his thigh. Blood ran down. Another shaft drove toward his ribs; he twisted to evade, but his skin tore and blood sprayed.
Small wounds began to accumulate.
A thousand small wounds were more dangerous than a single killing blow.
A bead of sweat traced along his brow and hung from his eyelash.
Airak did not blink.
The ragged breathing of one spearman sounded unnaturally loud. The grinding of teeth in someone’s jaw.

“Third formation, advance!”
Hoyeongak’s shout carried from atop the wall.
“Give him no respite! Drive him down!”
His deputy asked a question.
“Will wounds like that bring him down?”
“We’ll make them bring him down.”
Hoyeongak’s eyes gleamed with cold calculation.
“No matter how strong he is, two thousand will exhaust him. Exhaustion brings death. Simple, but certain tactics.”
More spearmen pressed forward. Then more again.
Airak cut them down. With each sweep of the Beokryeongdo, a spearman fell. But another filled the space where he had stood. There was no end.
‘Spatial Freezing would end this.’
Cold calculation flowed through Airak’s mind.
‘But not yet. Not close to the gate.’
Spatial Freezing consumed Internal Power at a ruinous rate. Use it here and he could not open the gate. And afterward, there would be no strength left to protect his subordinates. Yet reality demanded that the gate open, his men pass through, and the battle continue still.
‘I have to hold on. Just until the gate.’
The spear point grazed him again. Blood streamed down his arm.

Then it happened.
Boom.
A heavy sound rang out from the top of the wall.
The sound of a crossbow firing!
Airak twisted his body by instinct.
A massive bolt screamed through the ranks of spearmen—three times the size of a normal arrow. It was a large siege crossbow, the kind typically used to breach walls… but they were firing it at a man.
Ten bolts from the siege crossbow were aimed at Airak.
Airak contorted his body like a swallow, evading the volley. Nine bolts went wide. But one…
Where the crossbow bolt passed, the air whirled in a vortex.
A spearman beside him caught the edge of the shot and his arm tore clean off. A scream erupted.
“Ahhhhh!”
That same force was now bearing down on Airak.
One bolt grazed his shoulder as it passed.
“Ugh…!”
A gasp of pain escaped him.
The impact was far harder than he’d anticipated.
Blood poured from his shoulder. It wasn’t a mere graze. Flesh had been torn away, and bone showed through.
‘Siege crossbow. The destructive power exceeds my calculations.’
Even as pain wracked him, he analyzed the enemy’s weapon. But his body swayed uncontrollably nonetheless.
Hoyeongak looked down from the wall above and laughed.
“Reload. This time, don’t miss.”

As Airak staggered, the spearmen closed in, forming a circle around him.
There was no escape. Spear points bristled from all sides. Three hundred spears were leveled at Airak.
Hoyeongak gazed down at the scene.
“It’s over.”
A cruel smile twisted across his lips.
“Even a Northern Sea Combat Warrior has his limits, it seems. I’d say this payment of gold was well earned, wouldn’t you?”

From a distance, his followers watched.
“Clan Chief!”
Garkan tried to rush forward, but Taikan caught him.
“Not yet.”
“But—!”
Garkan tried to wrench his hand free from Taikan’s grip. But Taikan held firm.
“The gate hasn’t opened.”
“The clan chief is bleeding! He’s surrounded by all those men…”
“I know!”
Taikan’s voice broke through the chaos.
His own voice wavered, but it was resolute.
“I want to run to him too. Right this instant. But the clan chief commanded us—when the gate opens, we charge. Until then, we don’t move.”
“What does that matter! The clan chief is—”
“He won’t die.”
Harku spoke quietly in Taikan’s stead, his entire frame drenched in blood as he fixed his gaze on Airak.
“The clan chief doesn’t fall to something like this.”
Garkan clenched his teeth. His fists tightened so hard his nails bit into his palms, drawing blood.
“Clan Chief…”
Serian also watched Airak.
Her hand clenched at her chest without thought. Her lips trembled. Her eyes reddened.
‘He has to live. Please. He has to avenge Sister Karani.’

Within the circle of enemies.
The moment Airak’s eyes snapped open wide, the Beokryeongdo cried out sharply.
Whoooooosh!
A wave of arctic cold surged outward. The Sword Spirit blazed with icy blue light. Spatial Freezing was on the verge of activation. The air around him began to crystallize white. The spearmen’s breath turned to frosted mist that fell like snow.
“What—what is this!”
One of the spearmen screamed. Frost was beginning to coat their spear shafts.
But Airak held back.
‘Not yet.’
He clenched his teeth until blood trickled from his lips. When he forced his Internal Power back down, it felt as though his skull would split.
‘Not yet…’
Karani’s face surfaced in his mind. That smile from thirty years ago. A smile like spring snow melting away.
‘I have to come back.’
He’d made a promise. He would return. Alive. After revenge was finished. And he would tell her. That he had loved her.
The spearheads surged toward Airak in unison.
Three hundred spears poured down upon a single man.
Hoyeongak gripped the railing. His nails scraped the stone wall. The adjutant held his breath. Two thousand soldiers stopped breathing as one.
Time froze upon the fortress wall. It was the hour of the wolf.

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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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