The Great Heavenly Demon Sovereign - Chapter 737

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 737.
The woman who had taken back the pouch opened her eyes wide in disbelief.
“What did you say?”
Bu Eunseol didn’t answer and simply climbed into the carriage with a swift motion.
“Hey!”
She grew angry and opened the carriage door, but
“Cough, cough.”
Bu Eunseol, seated inside, began to cough.
As blood-tinged coughs wracked her frame, the bandages around her torso darkened crimson in an instant.
Witnessing this, the woman’s resolve softened,
“There’s no helping it.”
She furrowed her brow and closed the door again.
“We’ll simply have to make do with some discomfort.”
“Miss, there are many skilled coachmen here at the station.”
“Hmph, they can’t deceive my eye.”
The woman spoke decisively as she surveyed the interior of the station.
“The old coachman is the finest here, isn’t he?”
Like Bu Eunseol herself,
she had discerned that the Old Coachman possessed the most exceptional skill in this place, and his carriage was maintained in pristine condition.
For a journey by carriage, the most crucial elements were the coachman’s expertise and the carriage’s condition.
However, one cannot force a patient who refuses even with extra payment.
In the end, she selected a different carriage and began to negotiate.
Meanwhile, the carriage carrying Bu Eunseol began to move slowly, following the merchant guild’s procession.
Clatter, clatter.
Seated in the slowly moving carriage, Bu Eunseol gazed out the window with a grave expression.
‘Who could that monk be?’
The monk’s prayers were ordinary, yet his eyes held a mysterious luminescence.
It was the kind of gaze one could only see in masters who dominated Tianxia.
Had it not been for the bandages wrapped around his form, Bu Eunseol would have suspected that Bul Jon was disguising himself as a monk.
‘Moreover, he knows of Mujok’s Secret Chamber, which only Mu Jon and Mu Gyeol are aware of?’
Bu Eunseol’s eyes narrowed as she recalled the monk’s gaze.
That monk, despite his shabby appearance,
was undoubtedly a master of considerable background and skill.
“Cough, cough.”
Lost in thought, I coughed once more.
My inner energy had nearly dissipated, and my body held no strength whatsoever.
Though the carriage moved very slowly, even its jolting was enough to make me feel dizzy.
‘At least the Muk Hon Sword looks like this—I’m grateful for that.’
The Muk Hon Sword bore the appearance of an ordinary, commonplace iron blade,
whether wielded by me, Seon Woo Jin, or even a third-rate martial artist.
It was difficult for anyone to distinguish.
Clack, clack.
The carriage was now passing through the Mountain Road.
But at some point, its speed had noticeably slowed.
‘This is not a good sign.’
An ominous premonition flashed through my mind.
And it soon became reality.
―Stop!
A thunderous shout rang out.
Thud, thud, thud, thud.
The sound of a massive group moving echoed through the air.
Looking out the window, roughly a hundred bandits surrounded the merchant caravan.
Moreover, their clothing was all different, and the quality of the fabric was quite fine.
They appeared far removed from ordinary bandits.
‘These don’t seem to be unaffiliated brigands.’
This region was neither Orthodox Sect nor Demonic Path territory, nor did it belong to the Green Forest faction.
Because of this, unaffiliated bandits sometimes appeared to plunder merchant caravans.
But the movements of these bandits were far faster and more coordinated than even the genuine Green Forest Stronghold brigands.
They were clearly not ordinary bandits, but martial artists disguised as brigands.
‘They have a specific purpose.’
A flash of insight ignited in Bu Eunseol’s eyes.
There was no way such skilled individuals would come for the meager wealth of a small merchant caravan.
They clearly had some other objective.
“From whence do you hail, honored warrior?”
At that moment, the leader of the warriors escorting the caravan stepped forward.
“This old one’s eyes are dim, and I failed to recognize your esteemed presence.”
The Middle-Aged Man glanced down at the silver blade he wore at his side, then clasped his hands toward the bandits.
“I am Gwa Cheon Ho. The heroes of Gangho have bestowed upon me the undeserved title of Thousand-Victory Silver Blade.”
Since bandits would not remain in the trade for more than a year or two.
Most would withdraw after the caravan provided sufficient payment and allowed them to save face.
Therefore, when bandits appeared, merchant caravans would always employ.
Martial artists with wide connections who could negotiate smoothly.
Gwa Cheon Ho was precisely such a martial expert hired by the caravan for this purpose.
“Never heard of you, you worthless wretch.”
As the bandit leader scoffed, Gwa Cheon Ho’s eyes widened.
“What did you just say?”
“You stay out of this. We only need to confirm something.”
“Confirm what?”
“You don’t need to know.”
As the leader bandit nodded to his subordinates, the surrounding bandits slowly advanced.
Gwa Cheon Ho drew his silver blade and spoke.
“Even theft has its principles. These are mere merchants who haven’t mastered martial arts—where is the honor in drawing steel and oppressing the defenseless?”
He stepped forward with confidence.
“Declare your affiliation and purpose clearly. Otherwise, there will be no negotiation.”
“Negotiation? Hardly.”
The Leader stroked his chin and shook his head.
“This is tedious. It would be simpler to kill them all.”
He shouted to his subordinates.
“No need to verify anything. Just slaughter them all.”
Steel sang.
The bandits drew their blades and immediately began cutting down the martial artists protecting the merchant caravan.
“Aaaagh!”
The bodyguards, caught off guard by the sudden assault, screamed in agony.
Even the most ruthless bandits typically target wealth, not indiscriminately slaughtering people.
But these men fought as though possessed by Sal Gwi, a spirit that hungered endlessly for death.
Bodyguards and merchants alike—they spared no one, cutting them down without mercy.
“Damn these villains!”
Gwa Cheon Ho wielded his silver blade against the bandits.
“Stop them!”
At Gwa Cheon Ho’s cry, the martial artists protecting the merchant caravan drew their own blades and engaged the bandits.
“Argh!”
“Aaaagh!”
Screams echoed continuously as the martial artists fell in gruesome succession.
The bandits’ skill was formidable—the caravan’s bodyguards were utterly outmatched.
Moreover, the bandits’ techniques were
so brutal they severed torsos and heads without hesitation, as though facing mortal enemies.
Their methods were extraordinarily savage.
Just as the martial artists fell and the bandits turned their blades toward the merchants,
“You wretched villains!”
A carriage door suddenly burst open, and a woman wearing a face veil drew twin blades and stepped forward.
It was the merchant family woman who had tried to borrow Bu Eunseol’s carriage earlier.
“There you are.”
The bandit Leader’s eyes swept over the woman from head to toe, and he laughed cruelly.
“Hiding like a rat in the merchant caravan!”
It became clear that the bandits’ true purpose in attacking the caravan was to find this woman wielding twin blades.
“You heartless demons! Why do you slaughter innocent people?”
The woman, enraged by the sight of the brutally slain bodies, drew her twin blades.
She immediately unleashed her sword technique, cutting through the bandits.
Steel flashed in succession.
Her swordsmanship appeared to have been taught by a master.
Her technique was exquisite and sharp, yet sadly, she lacked any real combat experience.
The advantage of dual-sword technique lay in its ability to unleash relentless, chained attacks.
She could freely employ the subtleties of evasion and deception, making it impossible to discern truth from illusion.
However, the Woman’s swordplay consisted only of beautiful, flowing postures.
While outwardly dazzling and brilliant to behold,
in actual combat, she was squandering countless amateurish moves.
“Not bad.”
As she felled several bandits with her ornate dual-sword technique,
“Hehehehe. Allow me to be your opponent.”
The Leader drew his blade and stepped forward with a sinister laugh.
Clang!
From the Leader’s heavy sword unfolded a keen and vicious blade technique.
The Woman leaped gracefully like a butterfly, evading the attack and launching a counterattack.
But this proved to be a grave mistake.
“You should have kept both feet planted firmly on the ground.”
The Leader relentlessly unleashed sharp blade strikes at the Woman suspended in mid-air, preventing her from descending.
To defend against his attacks,
the Woman had no choice but to deploy her lightness technique, continuously keeping herself airborne.
While the Leader stood firmly with both feet on solid ground, attacking with stability,
the Woman remained suspended in the air, parrying his strikes—her internal energy depleted rapidly and her stance grew increasingly unstable.
Eventually, the Woman found herself trapped, squandering her power with each clash of weapons while hovering helplessly.
Crash!
Finally, one of the swords in the Woman’s left hand fell away.
She had been managing only because of the advantage of dual swords.
With one blade gone, her stance crumbled beyond recovery.
Boom!
She took a full strike from the Leader and tumbled across the ground like a bird stripped of its wings.
She rose quickly, but blood trickled from the corner of her mouth—evidence of internal injuries.
“Did your uncle send you?”
“I know nothing.”
As the Leader raised his blade, the Woman swallowed the blood in her mouth and spoke.
“These people have nothing to do with me. They are innocent commoners.”
“So,”
“let them go. After all, you only need to kill me, do you not?”
“Hehehehe. What a kind heart you possess.”
The Leader gazed at the trembling merchants and laughed coldly.
“I would like to oblige, but I have received a commission.”
“A commission?”
“I was hired to make it appear that you were robbed and killed by bandits.”
The Leader smiled faintly.
“A master assassin of the Blood Sect cannot speak with a forked tongue.”
At the mention of the Blood Sect, the merchants’ faces drained of all color.
These were not mere bandits—they were assassins from the Murim’s most notorious killing guild.
Disguised as thieves, they had come to slaughter everyone, including the woman.
“The Blood Sect, you say?”
The woman bit her lip.
Ma Deung, the leader of the assassins and the Blood Sect’s First Killer, smiled wickedly.
“If you had realized this sooner, you might have surrendered.”
Then, as if struck by another thought, he shook his head.
“No, actually—it would be a waste to simply kill her.”
Ma Deung’s eyes raked across the woman’s slender form beneath her veil, and he licked his lips.
“After all, no one specified how I should kill her.”
Dark, lustful fire flickered in his gaze as he resolved to violate and murder her.
“The rest of you—kill them all. As for me… I have other business to attend to.”
Ma Deung licked his lips once more, then—
*Crack.*
He struck her vital pressure point.
“Heh heh, she’ll be tender enough to eat raw without a hint of fishiness.”
Just as Ma Deung turned, cradling the woman in his arms—
*Creak.*
The door of the old carriage groaned, shattering the silence.
It was merely the sound of rusted hinges, yet it carried an eerie, lingering resonance.
*Thud.*
A shadow descended from the carriage with a heavy footfall.
It was a man wearing a tattered iron sword at his waist and bandages stained with blood and pus wrapped tightly around his face.
It was Bu Eunseol.
“What is this now?”
Ma Deung studied Bu Eunseol’s appearance carefully, then noticed the worn iron sword at her waist and furrowed his brow.
“Some meddlesome hero has arrived. Kill her at once.”
Three of the bandits—no, the Blood Sect assassins—surrounded Bu Eunseol.
*Stumble, stumble.*
Bu Eunseol approached the assassins with feeble movements, then—
*Scrape.*
She laboriously drew the Muk Hon Sword, which bore the appearance of a cheap iron blade.
“Hahahaha.”
The assassins, who had been tense, burst into uncontrollable laughter at the sight.
With bandages wrapped around her face, her complexion was impossible to discern.
Her gait was unsteady, and her sword hand trembled constantly.
Moreover, despite drawing the blade, there was no sharp sword energy, no inner force ripple—nothing at all.
In short, she was a typical third-rate martial artist attempting to play the hero.
A metallic clang.
As Bu Eunseol raised her sword with a feeble motion, one of the assassins let out a contemptuous sneer.
“A madwoman trembling like that, wielding a blade…”
But he never finished his sentence.
A wet thud.
A dark iron sword had suddenly pierced through his throat.
Despite extending the blade with such a listless, almost mocking motion, somehow in that instant the sword had pierced clean through the assassin’s neck.
“A master concealing their true strength!”
Ma Deung cried out in alarm upon witnessing Bu Eunseol’s technique.
“Deploy the Poison Vein Blood Formation!”
A rumbling sound.
They moved in perfect unison, deploying the formation technique that the Blood Sect took pride in.
A sharp whistle.
The assassins rushed forward simultaneously, their blades extending as one.
One of the Poison Vein Blood Formation’s capabilities was not only to completely trap those caught within its array,
but to unleash any attack without restraint or overlap.
A sharp scraping sound.
Bu Eunseol instinctively twisted her body to evade as waves of razor-sharp sword energy crashed down upon her.
But with her body drained of strength and her steps unsteady, her evasion came half a beat too late.
A spray of blood.
A sharp blade grazed past her shoulder, and crimson droplets scattered.
Bu Eunseol’s eyes narrowed as she gazed down at the blood pooling on the ground.
‘My body has no strength now, so I must move as little as possible and unravel their formation one technique at a time through swordplay alone.’
The assassins naturally assumed Bu Eunseol would either desperately escape the formation or move with great speed,
so they had preemptively woven a sharp blade net around her and unleashed it.
Yet Bu Eunseol stood firm at the very center of the storm of sword energy,
silently wielding her long blade without wavering.
A sharp whistle.
In the end, the blade net they had so meticulously constructed passed perilously close to Bu Eunseol’s body.
“Strike!”
The assassins within the formation unleashed another barrage of lethal techniques upon Bu Eunseol.
But each time the old, dark iron sword moved, the flaws in their own sword techniques became glaringly apparent,
and with each extension of her blade, the assassins fell one by one, their vital points pierced.
―How was this possible?
How could someone so weak that they staggered from the mere wind of passing blades possess such exquisite swordplay?
“Fire the hidden projectiles!”
As Bu Eunseol displayed her mysterious sword techniques, the assassins quickly retreated,
then moved swiftly while launching hidden projectiles.
A sharp impact.
As blade and projectile collided, a tremendous shock rippled through Bu Eunseol’s body, shaking her.
The hidden projectiles were packed with so much inner energy that I nearly dropped the Muk Hon Sword in that instant.
‘There’s no need to meet them head-on.’
When my inner energy was abundant, I would deflect or reverse the hidden projectiles using the Hwan Gwi Ben Ju method.
But now, with almost no inner energy remaining, I couldn’t afford to block them directly.
Ting ting!
I angled the sword’s tip and flicked the hidden projectiles away.
Meeting them head-on would be impossible to withstand the recoil.
But by flicking them at an angle like this, I could neutralize a portion of the force contained within the hidden projectiles.
Clang clang clang!
However, such a technique required not only exceptional swordsmanship but also the ability to perceive the exact form of the hidden projectiles and their trajectories with precision.
My inner energy was nearly depleted, and my body moved with difficulty.
Yet regardless, the Wild Beast Dao dwelled within me, allowing me to deflect the hidden projectiles without any hindrance.
But what I faced was far more than just the projectiles.
Whoosh!
The moment the barrage of hidden projectiles ceased.
Countless assassins launched a simultaneous assault like a violent gale.
Slash slash slash!
With each breath, stars burst before my eyes, and with each sword stroke, hot blood surged up my throat.
Yet I bit my lips until they bled and sharpened my focus.
‘If I fall, everyone here will die.’
My own death meant nothing.
I had long ceased to concern myself with living or dying.
But I could not stand idle and watch innocent civilians perish.
Slash slash slash!
With my concentration sharpened, I unleashed my swordsmanship against the assassins once more.
Swaying unsteadily, I had already pierced the vital points of some thirty assassins, felling them.
Each time the long sword struck an assassin.
They cried out and struggled desperately to defend themselves.
Yet my sword technique moved along unpredictable paths as if alive itself.
The deployment and recovery of each move was so subtle it was invisible to the eye.
―What is this?
The assassins grew increasingly afraid.
My movements lacked strength.
My sword paths were crooked and uneven, as if a drunken man were wielding the blade.
Yet no one could block a single stroke of my sword.
Thud. Thud.
Now I was deploying my technique in the posture of a drunken old man, stumbling and nearly falling with each movement.
Thump. Boom.
Yet it was always the assassins who fell.
After a moment had passed, every assassin save Ma Deung lay dead, their vital points pierced.
“….”
Faced with a sight that defied all comprehension.
Not only Ma Deung, but the Merchant Guild merchants and escort warriors who had been observing the spectacle as well.
All stood with gaping mouths, drool trickling down their chins.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————