Reincarnation of the Cloud Dragon - Chapter 74

—————
This chapter is translated by Falnar Novels Team.
Support us by reading on our official site: https://falnarnovels.com
—————

Chapter 74.
At the foot of the staircase, Gwak Tu’s true strike shattered the floorboards.
Crash—!
A halberd thrust upward. The blood qi coiled around its tip swept across the narrow landing first.
Just before the blade could touch, my sword flashed out like lightning to block it.
Clang!
The crescent blade and sword body collided head-on.
The impact shook the entire staircase, and dust cascaded down.
Even though the attack was blocked, Gwak Tu laughed.
“Got you, you fool.”
He didn’t continue the test of strength from below. Instead, he twisted the halberd shaft inward where it met my blade.
Screech—.
A hidden hook concealed behind the crescent blade bit at my sword’s hilt. The thrust aimed at my neck transformed in an instant into a grappling strike, hooking and twisting my blade downward.
‘An unconventional exotic weapon….’
My eyes narrowed.
It was far more than a simple cutting weapon.
A weapon that hooked, twisted, and dragged downward.
Gwak Tu’s mouth twisted into a grin.
“Dragging down those who stand in higher places—that is the true purpose of my halberd.”
At the same moment, he flicked his other hand.
Whoosh—!
A blood chain wound around the shaft’s end came loose.
A crimson iron chain shot toward my ankle from the side, snapping like a viper’s strike.
“Let’s see you handle this too, whelp.”
The halberd pressed my sword from the front while the blood chain targeted my ankle from the side.
The staircase was narrow. There was barely room to evade.
Certainty flashed in Gwak Tu’s eyes. Whichever I chose to defend, I would leave an opening. It was a lethal trap honed through actual combat.
But I neither withdrew my feet nor hastily swung my blade.
Instead, a cold smile played at the corner of my mouth.
‘Did he think he had bound my right arm?’
My left-hand sword slid downward toward the blood chain flying in from the side.
Ting—!
A dull resonance as blade met chain.
Gwak Tu’s lips curled upward.
“Fool! Using a sword against a chain—”
But in the next instant, his expression froze.
Whisper—.
My sword had not simply struck the chain away. The Kunlun Sect’s Positive Yang Sword Technique traced a gentle arc, weaving the incoming chain into a knot with exquisite precision.
Gwak Tu’s eyes widened in shock.
“What—!”
Gwak Tu’s force twisted back upon itself, unraveling.
The crimson blood chain was no longer a viper.
Caught upon Yun Cheon’s blade, it tangled grotesquely between the railing and empty air.
Yalü Hee, observing from above on this level, widened her eyes as well.
‘This is…! Just like when Yu Ha faced Kyoto’s chain technique!’
There was one difference.
Yu Ha had unraveled it with palm techniques, but Yun Cheon had done it with his sword.
‘…Is that even possible?’
To receive a flying iron chain with a sharp blade, and then weave its trajectory into itself.
That was a technique of a different caliber entirely.
‘It’s not just his killing-intent-laden swordplay…? When did he master such fluid sword technique?’
While Yalü Hee marveled, Yun Cheon was already executing his next move.
Weaving the chain was not to display technique. Clashing with an absolute master through pure internal force would be disadvantageous. Deflecting was the most efficient approach.
Yet Gwak Tu was no easy opponent either.
His blood-red eyes gleamed with murderous intent.
“Hmph! Parlor tricks!”
The moment Gwak Tu felt the chain binding, he released his grip without hesitation, abandoning the blood chain.
Simultaneously.
Crack—!
He bent the shaft of his Gujian spear downward, violently twisting the hook that had caught the blade.
It was not merely an attempt to disarm.
It was a technique to forcibly drag the blade’s trajectory downward and topple Yun Cheon’s upper body forward.
‘Impressive.’
Yun Cheon’s eyes flashed with sharp intensity.
The decision to release the chain was swift, and the wrist rotation of the Gujian spear was equally fast. The moment he realized his move had failed, he transitioned seamlessly to the next.
‘A warrior honed through countless real battles.’
Gwak Tu’s lips twisted.
“Don’t get cocky just because you blocked the chain!”
Boom—!
The Gujian spear, freed from the blade, crashed down upon the staircase where Yun Cheon stood.
Crack—crack—crack—!
The wooden planks, soaked in blood, shattered into fragments. Pieces of the broken railing and a severed arm from a corpse flew into the air, and an entire section of the staircase collapsed.
The terrain advantage Yun Cheon had enjoyed crumbled with it.
Yalü Hee’s eyes trembled greatly.
‘He deliberately destroyed the staircase? He didn’t stop at clearing the blocked path—he destroyed the very battlefield that favored Yun Cheon! Was all of this calculated from the beginning?’
A smile thick with killing intent appeared on Gwak Tu’s lips.
“I may have missed his ankle, but dragging him down was enough!”
At the edge of the collapsing staircase, Yun Cheon’s gaze swept rapidly downward.
Tangled tables and chairs.
Shattered wine vessels.
The floorboards were soaked with blood.
“You lot are in the way. Step back!”
At Gwak Tu’s command, the Jinguan Pavilion warriors shuffled backward, clearing the center of the Inn.
Yun Cheon threw himself forward without hesitation.
Whoosh—!
His black robes billowed dramatically through the air.
‘The advantage I held in the stairwell’s narrow passage was gone. But….’
As Yun Cheon spun his body through a complete rotation in midair, a dark dagger shot forth from his hand.
Whistle—!
The Soul-Severing Dagger.
The shadow-laden blade flew straight toward the space between Gwak Tu’s brows.
Yet the dagger itself was never Yun Cheon’s true target. The calculation had been complete from the moment of release.
To eliminate the blind spots of a long weapon, one must swing it in wide, sweeping arcs. And each time that long shaft rotates through space, a dead zone inevitably opens in the wielder’s vision.
“Brat! More of your tricks!”
As expected, Gwak Tu spun his body and swung the crescent-blade spear in a massive arc.
Clang—!
The curved blade struck the dagger head-on, deflecting it.
But that precise moment was exactly what Yun Cheon had been waiting for.
As he released the dagger, Yun Cheon twisted his body a half rotation.
The recoil from the throwing shoulder, the elastic snap of his feet pushing off the broken staircase, the torque of his waist twisting through empty space.
Weaving these three forces together, he redirected his falling body to bounce sideways instead.
Cloud Dragon’s Eighth Form.
In that instant, Yun Cheon’s figure vanished from Gwak Tu’s sight.
“…Where?”
The rotational arc created the moment the crescent blade deflected the dagger. The vast blind spot carved through the air as the long shaft swept past.
Yun Cheon’s body had already slipped into the shadow behind that arc.
Tap!
Just before touching the Inn’s floor, his left foot lightly pressed against the edge of an overturned table.
A subtle footwork that dampened the impact of the fall while simultaneously bouncing his body deeper inward.
Shadowless Step.
Moving without a trace, he penetrated Gwak Tu’s blind spot in a single breath. The dagger had been nothing but bait to steal the eye.
The true killing strike was Yun Cheon’s figure that followed in its wake.
‘A crescent-blade spear… a troublesome weapon indeed. But close the distance, and the advantage shifts to me!’
Sensing the killing intent, Gwak Tu reacted on pure instinct.
“Ugh! This bastard!”
The greatest strength of a long weapon was distance.
Conversely, its greatest weakness was also distance.
Gwak Tu’s eyes widened in shock.
He had dismissed it as pointless trickery, yet with a single maneuver, Yun Cheon had erased that distance entirely.
‘How did he approach from that angle…? Could he have actually maneuvered his body through the air?!’
A question flickered through Gwak Tu’s mind.
But his opponent had already driven in beneath his chin.
Gwak Tu immediately shortened his grip on the Gugyeom Spear’s shaft.
It was a matter of inches.
Gripping the long shaft as though folding it in half, he alternated between flicking the crescent blade and the shaft’s end to meet the close-range assault.
Left sword and right saber collided with the shortened Gugyeom Spear at point-blank distance.
Clang—! Crash! Clang!
The metallic screech tore harshly through the Inn.
The instant the distance closed, I drove the peak master Gwak Tu back with overwhelming force.
My left hand’s sword flashed first.
Jingyang Sword Technique.
Not the broad, defensive circle that had flowed before. A small, sharp circle that carved through the narrow gaps of close combat.
The blade’s tip slid along the spear shaft’s grain, deflecting the force loaded in Gwak Tu’s wrist. Not blocking, but a move that threw off the axis itself.
And the instant the sword opened a gap—
Shriek—!
My right hand’s saber streaked forward like lightning.
Banyang Saber Technique.
Following the gap the sword had carved, a merciless straight line tore through Gwak Tu’s chest.
Rip—!
Gwak Tu’s side armor split open in a long gash.
Blood scattered diagonally across the Inn’s floor.
“Tsk, a touch too shallow.”
My eyes dimmed slightly.
It had been a strike that properly pierced the vital point.
Yet, half a cun.
Exactly half a cun had fallen short.
‘Left-hand sword… still insufficient.’
My mind had grasped it perfectly, but my body’s instinctive sensation in that instant hadn’t completely inverted.
That half cun had missed the killing blow.
Gwak Tu, too, did not miss that opening.
Clutching his bleeding side, he immediately leaped backward.
Tap! Clatter!
Kicking aside the shattered table and wine jar fragments, he reclaimed the open space in the Inn’s center.
He didn’t even pause for breath. He immediately compressed the wound to staunch the bleeding.
Whoosh—!
His hand holding the Gugyeom Spear’s shaft lengthened again, veins bulging across his knuckles. The blood chain wound around the shaft’s end flowed like licking the floor, then reared its head like a viper once more.
Gwak Tu’s eyes flickered with savage intensity.
“A fine move, whelp.”
He spat blood and sneered, but caution had vanished completely.
“But you didn’t finish it.”
Yun Cheon did not answer.
Instead, he flexed and relaxed his left hand’s grip on the sword with the subtlest of movements.
A brief adjustment to recalibrate the sensation in his left hand.
His right hand’s blade remained low and cool, settled like still water.
A brief silence blanketed the Inn.
“….”
The floorboards, tangled with debris and soaked in blood.
And in the center of it all, two figures once again separated by distance.
It was different from before.
Both Gwak Tu and Yun Cheon now acknowledged each other as true adversaries.
Yalü Hee held her breath from the railing above.
‘Now the real battle begins.’
A technique revealed once loses its former value when used again.
Moments ago, he had closed the distance with his Demon-Sealing Fist and divine movement technique, but Gwak Tu would no longer grant such openings so easily.
Despite his wounds and retreat, Gwak Tu’s momentum had only grown more ferocious.
As the Asura Blood Qi surged, the scent of blood flooded the Inn.
Yet facing such a supreme master’s full power, Yun Cheon’s eyes remained cold and settled.
Gwak Tu adjusted his grip on the Nine-Segment Spear and opened his mouth.
“Now you have no more chances—”
Tap.
Before Gwak Tu’s arrogant words could even finish, Yun Cheon pushed off the ground first.
“…!”
Before the Asura Blood Qi could even surge, Yun Cheon’s form had already erased half the distance between them, striking like lightning.
‘If half a chi was insufficient.’
His cool left-hand blade carved through space.
‘Then this time I’ll penetrate half a chi deeper.’

—————
This chapter is translated by Falnar Novels Team.
Support us by reading on our official site: https://falnarnovels.com
—————