Obtaining Heavenly Demon Martial Arts in the Magic Era - Chapter 43

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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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43
Dozens of monitors displayed closed-circuit feeds of Seoul and the Yongsan Station area. Jang Gi-jun, reclining deeply into premium leather, swirled the wine glass in his hand and curved his lips upward.
“Fascinating. To think these archaic relics have been lurking beneath South Korea all this time.”
The classified documents his father, household head Jang Jae-young, had handed him days ago were truly intriguing. They contained detailed records of the hidden history of the Demonic Noble Clans and the traces of entities called the Murim that had opposed them—a world kept ruthlessly concealed from public view.
“They are the enemy you must face.”
What captured Jang Gi-jun’s attention most was a boy named Cheon Do-hyeon and an organization called Gaebang.
The very ones who had made the great Jang Jae-young pick up his discarded pawn—Jang Gi-jun—once more.
“Intriguing. Honeycomb-tight. No wonder they burrowed about so skillfully, hiding here and there.”
The organization Gaebang, which manipulated intelligence networks across the nation, was more than enough to provoke Jang Gi-jun’s peculiar sadistic appetite for collection and domination. He sipped his wine and stared at the monitors with cold, reptilian eyes.
“But the system remains mired in the old age. Sloppy. Crudely sloppy.”
Administrative enforcement and media control—the board Jang Gi-jun had laid was flawless. Gaebang’s key branches crumbled one by one. The displaced had nowhere to go but one place.
‘The Yongsan Station headquarters.’
Now that he had driven the rats into their hole, only the slaughter remained.
Jang Gi-jun felt the massive bloodbath about to unfold was like the entertainment and play he usually enjoyed in bed.
Slowly wrapping slender, soft necks with his fingers, tightening the noose incrementally. The initially panicked face would transform through stages—first shock, then confusion, desperate resistance, fury, terror—until finally arriving at the pitiful, beseeching expression of surrender.
“What kind of face will you be wearing right now, hmm?”
Jang Gi-jun licked his lips with his tongue, his expression betraying barely concealed excitement as he whispered.
“Checkmate.”
The moment his words fell away, a frantic report crackled through the radio from the Iron Security strike team that had just entered the Bunker beneath Yongsan Station.
– Headquarters! The targets aren’t visible inside the Bunker!
– It’s… completely empty?!
“…What did you say?”
In that instant, Jang Gi-jun’s leisured composure shattered. Veins bulged in the hand holding his wine glass.
The Bunker beneath Yongsan Station—every exit had been under thorough surveillance and sealed for ages. When exactly had they escaped?
“Exactly when…?”
Jang Gi-jun’s keen mind spun rapidly, generating every possible simulation. Then his serpentine pupils flashed.
“These incompetent bastards! They’re still at Yongsan Station! Hiding, waiting for us to charge in and pour our formation through the breach—that was their escape window!”
#
Jang Gi-jun’s sharp deduction was correct. Just before Cheolhyeol’s massive main force cascaded into the depths of the Bunker like a waterfall, every member of Gaebang had already crouched flat, hidden in a blind spot nearest the ground exit, using a cunningly concealed tertiary secret passage that led from interior to interior.
While external exits had been thoroughly monitored, Jang Gi-jun’s one fatal blind spot was his inability to fully comprehend the labyrinthine passages that connected chamber to chamber within the fortress itself.
‘Using the moment the enemies pour in is our only chance.’
It was the escape strategy Cheon Do-hyeon had proposed.
The instant the enemy had entirely funneled into the headquarters.
Watching the last column disappear into the underground darkness, Cheon Do-hyeon shouted.
“Everyone remembers the designated positions, right? You meet there no matter what! Run!”
The Gaebang members scattered in small groups and began rushing toward the surface.
Not long after they began their flight, a sharp scream cut through the radio—Jang Gi-jun’s voice.
– These incompetent bastards! They’re still at Yongsan Station! Hiding, waiting for us to charge in and pour our formation through the breach—that was their escape window!
Jang Gi-jun’s chilling deductive powers and immediate command allowed Cheolhyeol’s assassins to grasp the situation and scramble to regain control. The team-captain-level Mages and mercenaries who had been rushing underground veins now turned with bloodshot eyes to pursue the fleeing members like apex predators.
“Don’t let them escape!”
“Forget the chain of command from here on—just apprehend and destroy anyone you catch!”
The unleashed hunting hounds surged after the fleeing Gaebang members with genuine intent to maul.
To completely evade enemies who were simultaneously tracking escape routes in real-time via CCTV networks and pursuing in three dimensions through Flight Magic was nearly physically impossible.
“The enemies have realized and are chasing!”
“They realized faster than we expected.”
To make matters worse, among the slowest-moving groups was the severely wounded patriarch, Seon Young-hoon. Unable to fully recover from the mortal wound inflicted by Kim Gi-beom, his steps were heavy. One of the Three Dragons, Lee Sang-won, came to a halt behind him.
“Patriarch! Go ahead!”
He voluntarily separated from the group to buy time for the pursuing unit.
“Sang-won! You mustn’t!”
Seon Young-hoon cried out urgently, but the Gaebang members protecting him desperately held him back.
Sure enough, the sound of closing enemies reached their ears.
“Grab that old man first!”
Seeing Seon Young-hoon being dragged along by his subordinates in desperate flight, the high-ranking Mages seemed to instantly recognize him as a top-level leader and began swarming toward him with greedy expressions.
“That one’s mine.”
“Dream on.”
“First one to grab him wins.”
Just as three team-captain-level Mages of Cheolhyeol, armed with Magical Equipment, were about to chant their attacks—
Ting! Ting! Ting!
Clear metallic rings and sparks flashed before their eyes.
“Aaaaagh!”
“My, my leg!”
“What hit me? Ahhhhh!”
From Lee Sang-won’s fingertips, hundred-won coins flicked outward like bullets, cutting through the air and piercing the knees, collarbones, and shoulders of the Mages leading the charge with perfect precision. It was his specialty: Coin Throwing.
But the number of enemies pouring in behind them was overwhelming.
“By the look of his skill, he’s no ordinary man!”
“Turn him into a beehive!”
Boom-boom-boom-!
Under the relentless barrage of indiscriminate magical fire, Lee Sang-won threw himself desperately aside, but some of the lethal spells he failed to evade tore deep and cruelly through his ribs and thigh.
“Gahhh!”
As Lee Sang-won fell bleeding, the pursuing Mages descended like hyenas that had caught the scent of blood, unleashing various Binding Magic spells.
“Ehehehe! He’s mine!”
“Blood, I smell blood!”
Behind them came three Mages wounded by Lee Sang-won’s Coin Throwing, their faces twisted with rage.
“Get out of here, all of you. This bastard dies by my hand.”
The Magical Power of the three senior Mages, burning with killing intent and fury, pressed down heavily on the air around them. Trapped at the center of the encirclement, Lee Sang-won gazed at the receding silhouettes of Seon Young-hoon’s group fading into the darkness and smiled faintly, as though unburdened.
‘That’s enough.’
It was the moment he closed his eyes peacefully, sensing his end.
Thud—
A figure fell from the sky between Lee Sang-won and the Mages with a sharp drop.
A boy gripping a blood-soaked, dark Three-Section Staff in one hand—Cheon Do-hyeon.
“What?”
The Mages could not even read his speed; he appeared like a ghost.
In that fleeting instant, the hunting dogs froze, even their casting halting.
Heavenly Demon Descent Step.
Thud-thud-thud—
A heavy pressure bearing down on everything crushed the space around them completely.
“Gasp?!”
“Ugh?!”
As if gravity itself had malfunctioned, the previously aggressive Mages collapsed to the ground in unison, their knees buckling. The effect was all the more dramatic because it was rare for Mages to properly train their physical strength.
In the moment they thrashed about, Do-hyeon hoisted the wounded Lee Sang-won’s arm over his shoulder, supporting him.
“Hold tight. You still have the strength to grip, don’t you?”
“Of course.”
That was when—
“You won’t escape us…!”
As one might expect from team-leader-class Mages: the three who had been wounded in the knee, collarbone, and shoulder by Lee Sang-won’s Coin Throwing recovered in an instant, shaking off the pressure of the Heavenly Demon Descent Step and rising to their feet.
Crackle-crackle-crackle—!
[Electronic Field]
Boom-boom-boom—!
[Strength On! Full Power]
Whiiiish—!
[Wind Cutter Quadruple]
Their signature Spell Incantations manifested fully.
Or rather, they would have.
Because Cheon Do-hyeon’s Three-Section Staff cut through the air first, before they could even manifest their spells.
Heavenly Demon Sword Art, Fourth Form—Dark Spiral Abyss
Inner Force Energy like black flame swept in circles, filling the surroundings.
As if drawing a domain.
And in that instant, dozens of crimson lines slashed across the bodies of the three men in a dizzying blur.
“Wh…?”
The three Mages caught just the briefest glimpse of the Three-Section Staff in Cheon Do-hyeon’s hand moving at blinding speed before being retrieved once more.
And that was the last sight they would ever see in this world.
Splooooorch—
The Cheolhyeol pursuit team, witnessing in real time the brutal spectacle of bodies collapsing into chunks of meat, unable to maintain their form, felt their hearts freeze and their will to fight evaporate in an instant.
“Wh…whaaaagh!”
Some of the more faint-hearted Mages clutched the ground and retched.
In the chaos, Cheon Do-hyeon spirited Lee Sang-won away.
It all happened in a fraction of a second.
Yongsan Outskirts.
Several decrepit vans skidded to an abrupt stop at the designated rendezvous point right on schedule.
They were escape vehicles that had been waiting in advance. The Gaebang members who arrived first began boarding the vehicles, and it was just as Seon Young-hoon, arriving last, was about to get in.
“We’re departing.”
“Wait! Not yet. There are still those who haven’t arrived.”
“…We can’t wait much longer. That wasn’t what we agreed upon.”
“But…but…!”
Then they appeared—figures approaching the van at lightning speed from the distance.
“Cheon Do-hyeon! Lee Sang-won!”
Seon Young-hoon and Lee Ye-rim leaned out the windows in relief, calling out their names. But joy turned to shock in an instant. The moment they saw the state Lee Sang-won was in—practically limp in Cheon Do-hyeon’s arms—their faces drained of color. His bleeding and injuries were far more severe than they’d anticipated.
“Ugh… I’m fine. No internal damage. Don’t waste time—get moving, now!”
Screeeech—!
Lee Sang-won was crammed into the back seat, and the tires shrieked in protest as the vans vanished into Seoul’s darkness. Through the rear window, as Yongsan Station receded behind them, Seon Young-hoon and the Gaebang members watched with eyes heavy with sorrow—the price of abandoning and fleeing the territory they had long defended.
#
Deep in the sparsely populated mountains, on the ramshackle grounds of Cheongyun Jang, a minor sect barely clinging to survival, the Gaebang members set down their burdens. It was only thanks to Cheongyun Jang’s faction leader—a man who had lost his past glory yet refused to abandon the code of the Murim—that he willingly offered them this safe house.
Yet the situation was dire. Though the escape had succeeded, several faces were nowhere to be found, and those bearing severe wounds lay scattered about, clutching torn garments.
In one corner of the temporary base, where a heavy silence had settled.
After treating Lee Sang-won’s wounds, Seon Young-hoon wiped his blood-stained hands and turned to face Cheon Do-hyeon, who approached quietly.
“…If it weren’t for you, we’d have been in serious trouble, Cheon Do-hyeon.”
“That’s right. Without that ingenious escape plan of yours, we’d all be buried under concrete in the Yongsan Station tunnels by now.”
Yet beneath Seon Young-hoon’s words lay not triumph but profound despair. He understood better than anyone that this escape was no victory—merely a brief postponement of their inevitable destruction.
“……”
Cheon Do-hyeon nodded quietly in agreement. The Cheolhyeol clan, armed with the colossal weapons of the State System and overwhelming capital, was an enemy that Korea’s fragmented Murim forces—scattered as they were in cell organization—could never hope to overcome.
“Eventually this place will be discovered. It’s only a matter of time. And when it is, Cheongyun Jang will face grave danger. In the end, we need a fundamental solution.”
The proposal Cheon Do-hyeon had presented—to “change the game”—was never simply about exchanging one safe house for another.
Seon Young-hoon’s hands trembled as he gripped the ledger listing the wounded. After a long silence, their gazes met across the empty space between them.
“Within South Korea… we cannot win.”
When Cheon Do-hyeon spoke in a low, resolute voice, Seon Young-hoon rose slowly from his seat. In his eyes burned not the defeatism of before, but the fire of desperate resolve.
“You’re right. It seems the time has come to execute the grand strategy you proposed.”
“Exactly. We must rebuild the General Murim Alliance.”
It was the moment when a name long forgotten was spoken once more—the name of a great coalition of warriors.

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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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