Obtaining Heavenly Demon Martial Arts in the Magic Era - Chapter 16

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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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16
Flash!
An overwhelming burst of light, searing as if to ignite the optic nerve itself. The barrier that had been artificially drawn across the alley shattered like tempered glass.
“Aaaaagh!”
“My eyes…!”
Their eyes, adapted to darkness, had been forcibly flooded with radiance—the inevitable result.
Especially for the one maintaining the barrier: the spell’s forced dissolution caused Mana pathways to tangle, inflicting internal injuries.
“Cough!”
The barrier caster collapsed where he stood, vomiting blood thick as tar.
The other two fared no better.
“Rrgh…”
“Something’s wrong with my vision.”
Kim Seung-yeon’s Flash was no simple household spell.
When she broke through the threshold of the 3rd Circle, she had blended in an awakened lightning Magic—a compound technique born of mastery.
The minuscule current scattered alongside the light extended the moment of vision recovery to an agonizing degree.
The Cleaners were crying out in ocular distress.
Without Kim Seung-yeon’s warning, Cheon Do-hyeon would have ended up in their same predicament.
Fortunately, he’d closed his eyes before the light could tear through his retinas, protecting his sight.
When he opened them again, the barrier had dissolved, and the remaining two lay incapacitated.
‘Is this my opening?’
He was gathering tension to spring forward when—
—instinct sounded the alarm.
They’d only lost their vision. A full-scale assault would almost certainly extend the stalemate. Worse, blind men tend to spray magic in every direction.
And in that chaos, Kim Seung-yeon would almost certainly—
‘—be in danger.’
Do-hyeon hauled Kim Seung-yeon onto his back and fled the opposite way without hesitation.
Rapid footsteps echoed—tap-tap-tap!
They burst from the dark alley in seconds. Kim Seung-yeon’s body hung limp against his back.
She gazed at the spreading bloodstain on his clothes and forced out her words.
“I’m sorry… I was just trying to help…”
“Why go so far?”
“Huh?”
“Why help me like this?”
“Because I want to… because I can…”
But her words died there.
Whish!
Something tore through the air from behind them.
An Air Bullet.
“Ugh!”
Do-hyeon twisted reflexively to dodge the vital points, but his shattered body had limits.
The sudden evasion cost him his balance,
and they crashed to the ground together—thud-bang!
Kim Seung-yeon tumbled down with him.
“Haa… haa…”
Do-hyeon raised his head, breathing ragged, and saw the three Cleaners emerging from the darkness in the distance.
“Did we hit them?”
“I felt contact.”
Their vision hadn’t fully recovered; they seemed unable to pinpoint Do-hyeon and Kim Seung-yeon’s exact positions.
There was still time to escape. But when he tried to push himself up, his body refused—whether from blood loss, wounds, or tangled Meridians, he couldn’t move.
That was when—
“Over here. Come quickly.”
A figure in the shadows beyond the streetlight’s reach at the alley’s edge gestured to them.
His voice was pitched for Do-hyeon and Kim Seung-yeon’s ears alone.
An older man’s voice, seasoned with years.
Suspicious, yes—but this was no time for caution.
He nodded.
After exchanging a silent signal with Kim Seung-yeon, he crawled after the stranger.
‘A trash bin?’
The man approached a loading compartment where volume-metered garbage bags were collected, then pressed himself low against it.
With a gentle shove of his body, the trash bin shifted aside, revealing a drainage grate beneath.
“Hurry, this way.”
Kim Seung-yeon hesitated.
It would have been difficult for her to push herself into a place where the stench of garbage hung thick in the air.
“What are you doing? Come on.”
But watching Cheon Do-hyeon squeeze through without hesitation, she resigned herself, squeezed her eyes shut, and contorted her body beneath the wall. The man who came last pulled a cord attached to the trash bin, sealing the entrance once more behind them.
Creak—
Almost at that exact moment, they heard a sound from the opposite side.
“Not here?”
“Damn it…!”
The voices of the Cleaners. Kim Seung-yeon clamped her hand over her mouth and held her breath.
Though Cheon Do-hyeon tried to appear composed, he couldn’t hide the tension that gripped him.
“They’re not down here.”
“Pick up the pace. They couldn’t have gotten far.”
Only once the sound of their footsteps had faded did Cheon Do-hyeon get a clear look at the man who had saved them. Streaked and stained windbreaker, matted hair clumped with filth. He was an ordinary homeless man reeking of sour staleness, as if unwashed for days. The face obscured beneath unkempt whiskers looked to be well into his forties.
“…Thank you.”
“Thank you. We’re alive because of you.”
Cheon Do-hyeon and Kim Seung-yeon bowed their heads in gratitude, speaking respectfully. Though they had to hold their breath against the reek, they could not show disdain before their savior.
When they looked up, the homeless man’s gaze was fixed on Cheon Do-hyeon.
He seemed to scan the blood-soaked figure before him, then muttered softly.
“What good is all that Internal Energy if you don’t know how to use it properly? Such a waste.”
Only Cheon Do-hyeon could understand those words. A concept that existed only for those who wielded Martial Arts. Which meant—was this homeless man someone who also practiced Martial Arts, like himself?
Cheon Do-hyeon, who had believed himself the only person in the world to have received the power of Martial Arts, was startled and demanded an answer.
“Who are you?”
“Who am I? Just some beggar wandering around.”
……
The homeless man pulled a crumpled cigarette from his pocket and stuck it in his mouth.
“Follow me. More of those insects will swarm here soon. Take good care of your friend.”
The homeless man gestured toward Kim Seung-yeon with a tilt of his chin. There was no choice. Cheon Do-hyeon hoisted Seung-yeon onto his back again and silently followed the homeless man as he vanished into the darkness.
#
The damp, musty smell of mold. The rhythmic sound of water dripping.
When Cheon Do-hyeon opened his eyes, he found himself in a sealed section of an abandoned Subway Station—a hidden clearing near an enormous ventilation shaft. Around him stood makeshift boxes of crude dwellings scattered about, and hollow-eyed homeless men gathered around a bonfire.
‘Right… I followed the homeless man here last night. I didn’t know a place like this existed inside Seoul Station.’
Recalling the previous night, Do-hyeon pulled himself up.
“Ugh.”
As he moved, pain shot through his entire body, but the wound that had been pierced through was now tightly bound with a bandage that smelled of strange medicinal herbs.
Moreover, the turbulent energies within his Dantian had already settled into stillness and returned to their proper place.
“You’re awake?”
At the voice from beside him, he turned his head to see Kim Seung-yeon sitting against the wall, staring at him.
Gone was any trace of her former state—addicted and hovering between life and death. In fact, her eyes were now far brighter and clearer than before.
“How are you feeling?”
“Completely fine now.”
Cheon Do-hyeon sensed that something about Kim Seung-yeon’s energy had changed.
“Did you break through to the 3rd Circle?”
Instead of answering, she snapped her fingers.
Snap—!
Blue electricity crackled from her fingertips, sparking silently in the air before dissipating. It was no mere release of Mana. The current controlled the particles in the air with precision, extinguishing itself at the exact intended moment—a level of Mana manipulation that could only be achieved once one reached Ignition.
“Congratulations.”
At Do-hyeon’s words, Kim Seung-yeon shook her head emphatically.
“It’s all because of you. I think yesterday’s experience played a huge role in breaking through that barrier. I wanted so badly to reach this level, but now I feel only sorry, not joy. I started trying to help you, and instead of helping, I only caused trouble.”
“Don’t worry about it. From the moment we first got involved, I expected something like this might happen.”
“Is that supposed to be comforting?”
“That homeless man, though.”
Do-hyeon moved to the main question.
“I don’t know. He was already gone by the time I woke up. He treated your shoulder, poked your body in several places, then just disappeared.”
At Seung-yeon’s answer, Do-hyeon buried his head in his palm.
Regret weighed on him.
That man clearly knew something about the ‘Martial Arts’ his grandfather had passed down to him. Moreover, he possessed enough understanding of Internal Energy to stabilize Do-hyeon’s Dantian even while sleeping—a level of skill that was unmistakable.
‘I have to find him.’
For Do-hyeon, who had only been building outward strength while reciting the formulae of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art, that man was essential. Someone who could teach him the ‘foundation’—not the power of technique, but how to truly command Internal Energy.
Cheon Do-hyeon reached into his pocket and pulled out a Worn Leather Notebook and a pen.
And with quick, practiced motions, he began sketching a composite portrait.
Scratch, scratch.
From his pencil emerged the face of a man with matted hair—the cold, sharp gaze of the Homeless Man rendered with surprising fidelity.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for someone.”
Kim Seung-yeon asked, her expression incredulous.
“How are you supposed to find a homeless man with no home, no family, nothing?”
Cheon Do-hyeon tore the page from his notebook and stood.
“I still have to try.”
#
At that same moment.
A man stood looking down at the wreckage of Club Babylon’s interior with cold eyes.
Jang Gi-han. But there was no trace of his usual composure in those bloodshot pupils.
“You failed to dispose of him?”
“Give us a little more time, sir. We will complete the mission without fail. I stake the name of the Cleaners on it.”
“Time? The plan was to finish him before he ever entered Babylon. So what’s the result? The club is destroyed. How do you intend to compensate me for my losses?”
The Cleaners’ leader’s jaw tightened as Jang Gi-han’s frigid gaze fell upon him.
“I will deduct it from the final payment.”
“No. The contract is void.”
“Three days. We’ll bring you his head within three days.”
Exotic light eyes met Jang Gi-han’s own, inflamed with rage. For a moment, their wills seemed to collide head-on.
Jang Gi-han tilted his head to glare up at the dark Seoul night sky, then exhaled and spoke.
“Fine. This is your last chance. If the contract fails to be honored this time, it won’t end with mere termination.”
“Understood.”
The inescapable shadow of death began to slowly coil around Cheon Do-hyeon.

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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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