The Great Heavenly Sword Emperor - Chapter 6

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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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#Episode 6. Gwiwang Coin (4)

Assassins move in silence and speed.
By the nature of their work, they leave scarcely a trace of their passage.
That is why, should a companion fall during a mission, the rest choose abandonment over rescue.
It is the only way the others survive.
By this standard, the behavior of the assassins who had come to kill Cheon Mujgyeol was decidedly strange.
Any other man would have grown suspicious, uneasy—but Cheon Mujgyeol felt neither.
He simply did not know the nature of assassins.
Knowing nothing, he harbored no suspicion; suspecting nothing, he pursued.
That was all.
Thud!
Following the assassins’ trail, Cheon Mujgyeol arrived at a place.
Far removed from the village where the Guest Inn stood.
A relatively flat expanse atop a low hill.
Yet the surroundings bristled with towering trees, deepening the darkness of the night around him.
Whissh, whissh, whissh!
Cheon Mujgyeol knew.
The assassins had blanketed this entire area.
He had been lured here, though Cheon Mujgyeol did not think of it as a lure.
Standing motionless, he kept the leather wrapping of the Cheonsingeom undrawn, waiting.
Whissh, whissh, whissh!
The assassins stirred chaotically around him.
How many were there?
Ten? Twenty? No—it seemed there were at least fifty.
Whine-screech!
A Concealed Blade pierced through the darkness toward him.
Clang!
Cheon Mujgyeol deflected it easily with the Cheonsingeom.
The blade flew off in a direction wholly different from its approach, yet made no sound as it fell.
And then.
Whine-screech-screech!
Dozens of Concealed Blades flew at him at once.
Standing in his original spot, Cheon Mujgyeol swung the Cheonsingeom with fluid speed.
Clink-clink-clink-clink-clink!
Remarkably, the blades collided with one another not at all as they flew; more remarkably still, he deflected every single one.
In the movements of Cheon Mujgyeol’s defense, there was no trace of strain.
Whee-whoosh!
The rain of blades ceased abruptly.
But had the assassins vanished?
No.
As if they held something else in reserve, they held their breath and prepared for what came next.
Whissh, whissh, whissh!
Soon the assassins moved again.
Like a hawk diving from the sky to snatch its prey.
Assassins erupted from the darkness, their weapons raised, sweeping past Cheon Mujgyeol in a frenzy.
Dozens of them appeared at random, slashing at him without order or mercy.
It seemed that against such an onslaught, even the greatest master would be shredded to dust, flesh and bone ground away to nothing.
Yet all they managed to cut was the fabric of his clothes.
The skin beneath bore not a single scratch.
Hum!
Then the Cheonsingeom sang out.
An immense force flowed into the blade, and the leather wrapping that bound it fell away of its own accord.
Slip!
The binding dropped to the ground, and the beautiful blade was revealed.
From that moment, it was Cheon Mujgyeol’s time.
Whoosh! Thud-crash!
An assassin rushed toward Cheon Mujgyeol.
But shockingly, the attacker’s body shattered into pieces, his strength draining away as he crumpled to the ground.
The next one met the same fate.
Another assassin charged at Cheon Mujgyeol, only to suffer an identical end.
No blade-work was visible.
No sound of a swing reached the ear, nor any sound of a blade cutting through flesh.
Cheon Mujgyeol simply stood motionless, or so it appeared.
The assassins met their deaths without ever knowing how they had fallen.
At first, he had no intention of killing them.
But as he reached this place, the thought occurred to him that these might be the assassins of Gwigok—those who had attacked him at Cheongeom Hall.
Once that possibility took root, Cheon Mujgyeol ceased to show them any mercy.
For some time after that.
The assassins’ movements came to a halt.
This time, he could sense no presence of assassins circling the perimeter.
Had they hidden their presence more skillfully?
That was not it.
The assassins who had surrounded him withdrew to a distance, and in their place, a single, massive presence filled the void.
Whip! Crash!
Something flew at him, and Cheon Mujgyeol raised his blade to block it.
What came flying was no Concealed Blade.
A person.
A man launched himself through the air with heavy, rapid momentum, wielding a Short Sword that he drove down upon the Cheonsingeom as if to shatter it.
And he showed his face without reservation.
“You’re more impressive than I thought!”
The man let out a shout, his lips curled into a wild, manic grin that bared his teeth.
He looked to be in his forties, perhaps nearing fifty, yet his frame was as robust as that of a young athlete.
And despite that powerful physique, his movements were faster and sharper than any assassin’s.
Cheon Mujgyeol shifted the Cheonsingeom.
Not a swing—merely a change of angle as he angled the blade downward.
In a single motion, his opponent lost his footing and tilted off-balance.
But the man spun gracefully through the air and landed behind Cheon Mujgyeol’s back.
Tap. Smack!
The instant his feet touched the ground, he pivoted and surged forward in a fluid motion.
He was a master not to be underestimated.
Bang! Bang! Crash!
He swung his Short Sword in a frenzy.
Without warning, he drew another blade and wielded both hands in a relentless, indiscriminate barrage.
Yet Cheon Mujgyeol remained expressionless, betraying no emotion, defending against every attack.
Opposites in the extreme.
One unleashed reckless, thoughtless attacks in wild succession; the other seemed to be waiting for his opponent to tire, focusing entirely on defense.
The seemingly endless exchange ended surprisingly swiftly, and anticlimactically.
As the man came rushing in, Cheon Mujgyeol lowered his blade.
It was his opponent who faltered, caught off guard by such an attitude of abandoning even defense.
Was he resigned to death?
At that very instant—
Searing pain!
Sensing something inexplicable, he twisted his body, and a burning sensation flared across his cheek and earlobe.
‘What kind of monster is this?’
He did not look away.
Cheon Mujgyeol had certainly not swung his blade.
Yet his cheek and earlobe now burned with the sting of wounds, blood flowing freely.
The sharpness and subtlety surpassed even the Assassin Martial Arts.
Where had this technique come from? Where had he learned such a skill?
“Who are you?”
His opponent stared at Cheon Mujgyeol and asked.
“And who might you be, sir?”
“I asked first!”
The man bellowed in irritation.
But Cheon Mujgyeol did not so much as blink, his gaze fixed upon his opponent.
“I know you took out a contract on yourself. Did you think I wouldn’t?”
The man spoke in a low, growling voice.
“But a single Gwiwang Coin as the bounty? Are you affiliated with Gwigok?”
He radiated raw, blazing anger.
Cheon Mujgyeol regarded him with an expressionless face for a moment, then spoke.
“Do you know of Gwigok?”
“I’m the one asking questions here.”
The man’s words dripped with killing intent.
“I’m not affiliated with Gwigok. I’m someone trying to learn about them.”
“A man holding a Gwiwang Coin claims he wants to learn about Gwigok? That’s rich.”
Cheon Mujgyeol met his stare calmly before responding.
“The Gwiwang Coin belonged to those who attacked me. I found it in their possession and kept it without knowing what it was. I only learned it was a Gwiwang Coin—and that Gwigok uses them—recently.”
Even as Cheon Mujgyeol explained, the man’s killing intent did not waver.
It was hatred that transcended mere anger.
The man clearly harbored a deep grudge against Gwigok.
“Where are those bastards now?”
The man asked, struggling to contain his fury.
Yet the rage and bloodlust pouring from his body were far more intense and suffocating than before.
“That’s what I want to know. What happened to Gwigok, and where are they now? I was trying to meet an Assassin to find out.”
Cheon Mujgyeol threw the man’s own question back at him.
“You truly have no connection to Gwigok?”
“None. If anything—”
Cheon Mujgyeol swung the Cheonsingeom lightly and continued.
“I’m someone with a grievance against them.”
He met the man’s gaze directly as he spoke.
“Mukyeon has an older score to settle. If I find those bastards, I’ll slaughter every last one of them with my own hands.”
Mukyeon.
They were an organization with a long and storied history in the Assassin World, standing alongside Heukssal.
Had Gwigok not emerged suddenly and rapidly expanded their power, Mukyeon could have rivaled even Heukssal for supremacy in the Assassin World.
But with Gwigok’s rise, Mukyeon was forced to cede considerable influence to them, and the conflict intensified.
And in the end.
War erupted between Mukyeon and Gwigok.
They were fundamentally incompatible, and the conflict became a desperate struggle for survival.
Though Gwigok had struck first, Mukyeon managed to repel their onslaught.
Both sides suffered grievous losses.
Just as Mukyeon prepared to counterattack—
Gwigok vanished like a ghost.
Jang Pafung, the Organization Leader of Mukyeon, had been burning with the desire for vengeance ever since, watching for any sign of Gwigok over all these years.
So when the Gwiwang Coin surfaced, he had come in person—perhaps for a trivial contract, but he had come.
Bringing every Assassin under Mukyeon’s banner with him.
“So there was conflict between Mukyeon and Gwigok.”
“Conflict! Those bastards were the ones who drew their blades on us first. Then they disappeared without a trace. When I find them, I’ll grind their bones to dust.”
Jang Pafung glared at Cheon Mujgyeol as if he were Gwigok himself.
“Then who the hell are you? Who did you make an enemy of Gwigok? How did you survive their attacks?”
Jang Pafung could tell that Cheon Mujgyeol was not lying.
But that didn’t mean all his suspicions were dispelled.
Most importantly, the mere possession of the Gwiwang Coin made Cheon Mujgyeol a person he couldn’t simply overlook.
He was the only link to Gwigok.
“I learned my martial arts from my ancestors, from my sword.”
“From your ancestors? Hmph! I’ve never heard of such remarkable martial arts! Unless you’re talking about the techniques of some legendary swordmaster from ages past!”
Cheon Mujgyeol simply looked at him in silence.
“There is no falsehood in what I say.”
“Perhaps not false, but you’re hiding plenty.”
Jang Pafung’s killing intent flared again as he studied Cheon Mujgyeol.
“If I pick through everything you’re hiding, dust by dust, I might just discover where Gwigok is lurking.”
Watching Jang Pafung cling to the hope that Cheon Mujgyeol held the key to finding Gwigok, the young swordsman let out a sigh—uncharacteristically so.
“I’ll say it again: I have no connection to Gwigok. I wanted to find them, but it seems you don’t know where they are either. There’s no point wasting any more time here.”
Without hesitation, Cheon Mujgyeol turned to leave.
“You insolent bastard! You dare turn your back on me!”
At Cheon Mujgyeol’s presumption, Jang Pafung’s fury erupted in a sharp rebuke.
Showing one’s back to a martial master—worse still, to an Assassin—was an insult, a desecration.
At Jang Pafung’s rebuke, Cheon Mujgyeol’s steps faltered.
He turned.
Cheon Mujgyeol pivoted to face him.
His gaze met Jang Pafung’s with the same detached expression and empty eyes.
But the words that left his mouth were utterly at odds with that affectless face.
“Think carefully. From this moment on, every action you take leads to only one outcome: death.”
Jang Pafung’s eyes widened.
An overwhelming pressure emanated from Cheon Mujgyeol’s frame.
In his expression, his words, his bearing, his very presence.
For all his courteous demeanor, it was unmistakable—the Organization Leader of Mukyeon, Mukyeon’s finest Assassin, was treating him like a novice.
Jang Pafung made no reply.
He launched himself forward instead, hurling his body at Cheon Mujgyeol.
Cheon Mujgyeol watched him approach with a tranquil gaze, then drew his blade with indifference.
Steel sang as it cut through air.
A casual sweep of the sword.
It looked almost careless, yet Jang Pafung gasped and threw himself sideways in terror.
Crash—crash—crash—boom!
Everything behind him was obliterated.
Trees snapped not merely in two but shattered into splinters; the grass around them turned to powder and scattered like dust on the wind.
Had he met that strike head-on, Jang Pafung would have been powder too.
Barely escaping the attack, he pressed forward without hesitation.
Jang Pafung succeeded in closing the distance, and raised his dagger with a desperate slash.
The blade caught cloth.
That was all it accomplished.
Cheon Mujgyeol’s skin was like diamond—not even a scratch marred it.
Jang Pafung looked up in shock, meeting his eyes.
The instant their gazes locked, Cheon Mujgyeol’s cold stare boring down from above—
“Ugh!”
A tremendous force, as if struck by a boulder, hurled Jang Pafung backward through the air.
Powerless to resist, he crashed through five or six trees before finally coming to rest.
He was broken.
Blood streamed from his nose and mouth; his skull had split open, his skin torn in a dozen places, each wound bleeding profusely.
“Nngh…”
All he could manage was a groan.
“I held back out of deference—an apology for the death of your subordinates. We both labored under misunderstandings, and there were unavoidable reasons for what transpired. Let us leave it at this. Should you come at me again, you will die.”
With those words spoken, Cheon Mujgyeol turned away, his stance inviting another assault if Jang Pafung dared attempt one.
Yet regardless of what Jang Pafung’s will demanded, his body refused to obey.
Recognizing this, Cheon Mujgyeol turned once more.
A flick of his wrist.
With a swift gesture, the leather wrapping that lay on the ground fluttered through the air and landed in his hand.
Moving unhurried, Cheon Mujgyeol wound the Cheonsingeom in its leather once again as he walked.
Long after Cheon Mujgyeol had vanished into the distance, Jang Pafung remained pinned beneath the fallen trees, unable to rise.

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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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