The Great Heavenly Demon Sovereign - Chapter 516
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
Chapter 516.
The Demonic Blade, Cheon In Blood.
A legendary demonic sword passed down through generations in the Murim, said to take the form of a rusted iron blade.
However, if one offers the blood of a thousand Murim practitioners who have cultivated inner energy as a sacrifice,
it transforms into a demonic blade so powerful it can shatter any divine blade, and grants its owner mysterious abilities.
Cheon Hyeol Ma Je, the former master of Cheon In Blood,
once lured Righteous Path Murim practitioners to Dae Gok Mountain to awaken Cheon In Blood and attempted to kill them all at once.
However, he failed to gather the blood of a thousand Murim practitioners, and was ultimately killed by the Jeong Sa Alliance when they discovered his scheme.
‘No, with this scale, they could have awakened dozens of Cheon In Bloods.’
Considering when Geom Chong became known, the third-rate Murim practitioners who have died so far number at least thousands, possibly tens of thousands or more.
It would be absurd to cause such carnage merely to awaken a single Cheon In Blood.
‘Then the Cheon In Sect possesses demonic blades in vast quantities, and opened Geom Chong to awaken them.’
When I consider it, the Cheon In Sect has devised a remarkably ingenious strategy.
If they openly killed numerous Murim practitioners like Cheon Hyeol Ma Je did, they would become enemies of the Murim.
Instead, they easily lured Murim practitioners by offering them Geom Chong blades, and established the rules of Geom Chong Eight Regulations to ensure no one could fault them for the deaths.
‘I must destroy this mechanism first.’
All the blood flowing through this apparatus is likely being used to awaken the demonic blades.
If I don’t destroy it quickly, something terrible will surely occur.
But then,
Screeeech.
The sound of the Iron Gate opening echoed once more.
I immediately suppressed my presence and hid behind a pillar.
Squelch, squelch.
Three shadowy figures emerged, treading through the blood-soaked ground.
Unlike the mask I wore, they donned Ghost-Face masks stained pitch black.
‘They distinguish rank by mask color.’
Those wearing black Ghost-Face masks
emanated a power incomparably greater than Yeon Baek Ryang, the human blade I had dealt with.
‘Such formidable masters in a mere branch of an evil sect?’
Of course, they hadn’t reached the level of a Samgye Emissary.
Yet masters of this caliber should never emerge from a branch of an evil sect organization based on the Yellow River.
“Come out.”
The Ghost-Face Messenger in the center of the three spoke coldly, scanning the surroundings.
“We know you’re hiding somewhere here. This mechanism rings a bell whenever someone enters.”
I let out a low sigh inwardly.
‘I was too careless.’
With such a massive mechanism constructed, they would have installed corresponding security measures.
No matter how exceptional my abilities, I couldn’t identify all the flaws in every mechanism at a glance.
Ultimately, my intrusion was detected by some mechanism installed within.
‘This takes priority.’
Now that my hiding place here has been exposed, it’s only a matter of time before all the masters in this branch come rushing over.
If that’s the case, what I need to do first is not to face them.
Zing.
Drawing upon my inner energy,
Whoosh!
I wielded the demonic blade at my waist, unleashing a barrage of sword qi in rapid succession.
Shhhhh!
The tubes that lined the chamber shattered, and thick blood began pouring down like a waterfall from the ruptures.
“That madman!”
The three Black-Faced Warriors immediately rushed forward, unleashing sword qi to encircle me.
Shhhhh!
But the interior was filled with massive pillars supporting the ceiling, and blood was cascading from all directions.
Moreover, as I moved between the pillars using my full-power Shadow Step at extreme velocity to evade their pursuit, it was difficult for them to track my movements.
Thud.
Suddenly, the blood pouring from the tubes stopped in an instant.
Then, through the falling blood, my movements became clearly visible.
“There!”
Tap-tap-tap.
The Black-Faced Warriors, having pinpointed my location, immediately formed an encirclement in a triangular formation.
Slash-slash-slash!
They unleashed hundreds of sword qi in an instant.
What they wielded was Demonic Path swordsmanship, a lethal style rarely seen in the Murim.
I was instantly trapped within the barrage of sword shadows they unleashed.
But then,
Whiiiing!
With a peculiar sound of cutting through air, the sword shadows that had been raining down spun violently and poured back in the opposite direction.
Iron Sword Thirteenth Form.
A celestial technique that instantly rotates any form of force and returns it in an even more powerful state had been unleashed.
Boom!
The returning sword qi became a fierce wind of blades that tore through everything, spreading in all directions.
“Scatter!”
The Black-Faced Warriors hastily dispersed as their own sword qi came rushing back at them all at once.
Crack!
In that moment, I escaped toward the exit.
Ching!
But even as I slashed at the closed door, it only left a deep groove without splitting apart.
The door was far too thick, and it was no ordinary iron gate.
“Die!”
The Black-Faced Warriors rushed at me again, unleashing their swordsmanship.
They wondered if I would deflect their sword qi once more.
Without channeling sword energy, they wildly swung their blades to cut directly at my body.
Moreover, each of them wielded a different sword technique, yet they unfolded with perfect and intricate coordination as if executing a single unified style.
‘So the Cheon In Sect harbors a master swordsman of tremendous skill.’
Though the Cheon In Sect was known as a massive evil organization within the Murim, they were famous only for their bizarre and unique techniques.
They had never produced anyone capable of wielding such exceptional sword techniques.
Furthermore, even if they had obtained secrets from a genuine Geom Chong, it would be impossible to arbitrarily harmonize three different sword techniques.
In other words, a master swordsman who had reached the pinnacle of perfection had unified three superior sword techniques into a flawless coordinated style.
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
Yet since killing Peng Ryun, my sword technique had ascended to an incomprehensibly lofty realm.
I effortlessly neutralized the onslaught of attacks from the Black-Faced Warriors while simultaneously observing their sword techniques.
‘Their sword technique is formidable, but they haven’t trained for very long.’
The sword techniques unleashed by the Black-Faced Warriors possessed tremendous power and subtle execution.
Unfortunately, their training period appeared relatively short, revealing numerous openings.
I could instantly identify these flaws and easily spot opportunities to sever their necks.
‘Since things have come to this, why not develop the Iron Sword Thirteen Forms further?’
Through my battle with Peng Ryun, I had advanced the Musan Cheonryu once more.
And now, given my identity as Seon Woo Jin, wouldn’t it be fitting to develop the Iron Sword Thirteen Forms accordingly? Such peculiar thoughts occupied my mind.
“Ugh.”
Finally, groans erupted from the mouths of the Black-Faced Warriors as they stubbornly clung to their formations and deployed their techniques.
Even after forty seconds, they hadn’t touched a single thread of my clothing, and with each passing moment, weren’t their own wounds only multiplying?
―This one is currently practicing sword technique without using true energy.
The Black-Faced Warriors, struck by the same realization, appeared greatly flustered and momentarily retreated, exchanging glances with one another.
They had come to understand that my sword technique was so exalted that no matter how they coordinated their encirclement and attacks, it would prove futile.
Nod.
They exchanged fierce glances as if plotting some scheme, then nodded in agreement.
Then they approached a massive pillar directly ahead.
Shatter!
With a sharp cry, they suddenly drove their blades simultaneously into the pillar.
Rumble… rumble… rumble…
The ground beneath us began to shake as if an earthquake had struck.
Boom.
A deafening thunder roared through the space, and the interior began trembling uncontrollably and violently.
‘Surely not.’
I had overlooked one crucial fact.
The Cheon In Sect was not an ordinary martial faction of the Gangho, but a cult organization.
And the members of such organizations would unhesitatingly sacrifice not only the lives of others but even their own lives to achieve their objectives.
Crash. Boom.
The coffins haphazardly installed on the ceiling tumbled to the floor, and the ceiling began to collapse.
“They’ve destroyed the mechanism.”
At my question, the Black-Faced Warriors let out sinister laughter.
“That’s right. You will never escape this place alive!”
The Black-Faced Warriors realized Bu Eunseol’s martial prowess was too formidable to overcome, so they attempted mutual destruction by collapsing the mechanism itself.
“Die!”
The Black-Faced Warriors surrounded Bu Eunseol once more, unleashing a torrent of sword strikes to prevent her escape.
‘There’s no time!’
Whoooosh!
Bu Eunseol released her full power in an instant,
Craaaaaash!
unleashing a frigid aura so intense it seemed capable of freezing even the heavens themselves.
As they rushed in at close range, she unleashed the Glacier Heaven Stream Formation.
Crack.
Their martial prowess was formidable—struck by the Glacier Heaven Stream Formation, they froze only for a moment.
They escaped the freezing cold in an instant.
But that single moment granted Bu Eunseol enough time to execute five techniques.
Shatter! Shatter!
A brilliant violet sword energy spread before their eyes, luminous enough to illuminate the entire world.
The Ultimate Swift Killing Sword—capable of nine transformations upon reaching perfect mastery.
The Nine Dragon Island Thunder was unleashed once more.
Thud.
The heads of the Black-Faced Warriors fell instantly to the blood-soaked ground.
With a single strike, she severed the necks of three swordmasters.
Boom! Crash!
Meanwhile, enormous boulders continued raining down from above.
Whoosh!
Bu Eunseol deployed her Ultimate Speed Shadow at full power, attempting to shatter the Iron Gate with all five hundred years of her accumulated cultivation.
Rumble!
But in that moment, with a deafening roar, tens of thousands of pounds of massive boulders began piling up around where the gate had been.
Crash!
She barely dodged the falling rocks, but it was already too late.
Crumble!
As if Tae Pyeong Mountain itself was collapsing, tens of thousands of pounds of boulders rained down endlessly above Bu Eunseol’s head.
There was no space left to evade.
‘Harmony.’
Seeing the massive boulders falling,
Bu Eunseol recalled the time she had been trapped with Gong Son Dan Ah in the underground mechanism of Gugok Mountain.
Back then, the two had fallen into a trap, and tens of thousands of pounds of enormous boulders had rained down upon them.
Finding no way to escape, Bu Eunseol had aligned the four forces within her body and unleashed the power of Harmony, overcoming the crisis.
‘No, that method won’t work now.’
The power of Harmony could only be used once.
Even if she deployed Harmony amid this endless cascade of falling boulders,
I could only hold back the cascading boulders for a brief moment.
And there was another problem.
If I unleashed the power of harmony, the conflicting forces within my body would cause it to rupture and tear apart.
At that time, after I had unleashed the power of harmony, I immediately lost consciousness and collapsed.
If Gong Son Dan Ah had not been there, if she had not injected the water-attribute divine energy into me.
I would have already perished.
‘But haven’t I already obtained two powers?’
The lightning-attribute divine energy and the crystal-attribute divine energy.
Unlike then, I now possessed two of the divine energies.
There was a thread-thin glimmer of hope.
‘I must not unleash it all at once.’
To survive the collapse, I could not release the power of harmony all at once.
Instead, I had to wrap the power of harmony around my body until the collapse ceased.
If I released it immediately, I might block the initial onslaught, but ultimately I would be buried beneath the collapsing rocks.
Rumble, rumble, rumble.
Finally, hundreds of boulders came crashing down all at once.
As they exerted their tremendous pressure, the power of the Prajna Great Ability erupted from my body.
“Haah!”
I used that power to perfectly align all the forces flowing through my body and radiate them outward.
Whiiiing!
My body was then enveloped in a five-colored radiance, and the massive boulders touched by that light began to dissolve and vanish.
“Ughhhh.”
A groan escaped my lips, swallowed within the radiance.
Wrapping this power of harmony around my body without releasing it all at once was far from easy.
My entire body felt as though it were being torn apart, and my skin began to crack.
As I endured the energies that a human body could not contain all at once, my flesh was crumbling.
Rumble, rumble, rumble!
At last, the collapse seemed to cease, and no more boulders fell.
Crumble, rumble, rumble.
In the meantime, the interior of the facility had completely collapsed into a massive stone tomb.
I could not escape the catastrophe and was buried beneath the pile of stones, vanishing without a trace.
Had I come to such a futile end?
For a long while, the underground facility was filled with nothing but dust swirling in the air and a silence so profound that a pin drop could be heard.
Crackle. Crackle, crackle.
Yet from beneath the towering boulders, a lightning-like brilliance suddenly flickered.
Whoooosh!
Finally, a flash drenched in five-colored light burst upward toward the ceiling.
The pile of stones that had been stacked on one side all vanished, leaving behind a circular space.
Standing in that space was a man whose appearance had been utterly ravaged.
It was Bu Eunseol.
Even amidst the cascading rubble, he maintained consciousness and held firm to the power of harmony, enduring the onslaught.
And finally, when the collapse ceased, he unleashed the power of harmony and escaped from that place.
Drip, drip, drip.
Bu Eunseol’s clothes were soaked with blood, and his skin was cracked like brittle candy.
The Ghost-Face Mask he had been wearing was already shattered and nowhere to be seen.
By not expending the power of harmony all at once but instead holding it within his body for more than half a quarter hour.
Unable to withstand that force, his vital energy and physical body sustained severe damage.
Thump.
In the end, he dropped to one knee and spat out a mouthful of blood.
Blood continuously welled up as if from internal injuries, and his body felt heavy as a water-logged sponge.
‘My inner power….’
Bu Eunseol attempted to circulate his vital energy, but felt nothing, as though his inner power had been completely sealed.
That power of harmony—merely invoking it once would twist his vital energy and rob him of consciousness.
To have maintained it within his body for more than half a quarter hour while surviving within the collapsing structure… there was no way his body could have remained unscathed.
Fortunately, thanks to the power granted by the Water Spirit Technique and the Brain Divine Technique, he had neither lost consciousness nor suffered physical destruction.
But his martial power, along with both the power of the Alien Divine Technique and the Righteous Demonic Immortal Technique contained within his body, were temporarily sealed.
Clench.
Bu Eunseol clenched his fist tightly.
He had prided himself on reaching a higher realm, yet with merely one use of power, the forces within his body were sealed?
“I still have far to go.”
Bu Eunseol wore an expression of despair, but the reality was entirely different.
In all of Murim history, there was no one who had reached the complete Extreme Heaven Realm at his age.
The power of harmony he had just unleashed was closer to the ‘manifestations’ that masters of the Limitless Realm could display.
He had accomplished something unprecedented—wielding transcendent power without ascending to the Limitless Realm.
Yet, unaware of this fact, he still lamented that he had far to go.
“Let me get out of here first.”
Bu Eunseol moved forward weakly and escaped that place.
Then, quite unexpectedly, he discovered a black Ghost-Face Mask among the ruins.
It was the Ghost-Face Mask worn by the Black-Faced Warriors earlier.
“….”
This place had collapsed, but the situation outside remained unknown.
On a whim, Bu Eunseol picked up the black Ghost-Face Mask and placed it over his face.
Step, step, step.
As he climbed the stairs out of the collapsed ruins, the hellish door that had been closed earlier stood wide open.
Bu Eunseol wiped the blood from his lips with vacant eyes and slowly entered.
“….!”
His lifeless eyes widened slightly as he beheld the unfolding scene.
Across the desolate landscape, numerous swords were planted in the ground.
Geom Chong.
Remarkably, even through this collapse, Geom Chong had not been completely destroyed.
Across this vast, open hillside, swords of every conceivable variety were planted deep into the earth. Some lay buried beneath collapsed or shattered sections of the structure.
‘So that’s it… The Cheon In Sect created the Geom Chong to awaken the Demonic Swords.’
Through the ruins of the Geom Chong, blood flowed like veins through stone—blood that had been injected from the mechanisms below.
Three gates had been constructed to force Murim practitioners to slaughter one another, unleashing their murderous intent.
It was all to harvest the blood of Murim practitioners consumed by the frenzy of carnage.
‘Demonic Swords, indeed.’
I drew one of the blades embedded in the Geom Chong.
The swords remaining in the collapsed Geom Chong were Demonic Swords thirsting for blood, their numbers beyond reckoning.
‘At this scale, there must have been hundreds of Demonic Swords originally.’
Judging by the traces scattered throughout the Geom Chong, most of the Demonic Swords had already been extracted.
Whether they had been drawn by the martial artists who entered in the past, or recovered by the Cheon In Sect after the Geom Chong’s collapse, I could not determine.
‘To awaken so many Demonic Swords, they needed countless sacrifices.’
Awakening a Demonic Sword requires various conditions. Some hunger only for the blood of children, others crave the blood of virtuous women.
But most Demonic Swords demand the blood of martial artists with inner strength—specifically, the blood of those consumed by madness.
The reason they opened the Geom Chong was deliberate.
To lure those incapable of spiritual refinement.
Third-rate martial artists with no one who would mourn them, even in death… they were the bait.
Crunch, crunch.
The Geom Chong was vast. After walking for some time, a massive gate came into view in the distance, standing wide open.
And before that gate, corpses lay piled like mountains, their deaths marked by unspeakable brutality.
Among them were not only Murim practitioners but also what appeared to be followers of the Cheon In Sect.
‘They haven’t been dead long. Moreover.’
Warmth still lingered in the bodies, yet their skin bore an eerie, ashen pallor.
‘There’s no blood.’
The corpses had been drained completely—not a drop of blood remained in any of them.
‘Could it be.’
As I examined the bodies, puzzled,
Crunch, crunch.
A shadow emerged from within the gate, moving toward the Geom Chong.
Hair disheveled, the entire body drenched in blood.
And in the right hand, a sword wreathed in black mist.
It was Cheon Hwa In.
Whoosh.
But something strange occurred.
With an ordinary blade, blood would drip to the ground. That was natural.
Yet the blood clinging to the sword in Cheon Hwa In’s grip was slowly vanishing, absorbed into the blade itself.
‘Was it truly the Cheon In Blood?’
A Demonic Sword. The Cheon In Blood.
What rested in Cheon Hwa In’s hand was the legendary Demonic Sword passed down through generations of Murim—the Cheon In Blood.
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————