The Wizard Who Endured the World of Murim - Chapter 49

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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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Surviving in the Martial Realm as a Mage: Episode 49
I sat on the sandy ground with my rear end planted firmly, tearing into dried meat like a spectator watching a theatrical performance, and let out a quiet chuckle.
“Everything has proceeded according to plan, Senior.”
“Your sorcery is truly remarkable, Junior.”
“Fortune has simply favored us in many ways.”
To be honest, Geumok’s assistance was invaluable.
I wasn’t sure what method the Cheon Hyeol Dan used for tracking, but they possessed considerable skill—I couldn’t shake them off.
Even when I deployed magic mid-journey to alter my direction, they followed like ghosts.
‘They must possess an artifact specialized in tracking.’
If they were tracking through the subtle flow of mana that a person naturally leaked, I would never have missed such minute fluctuations.
So logically speaking, they had to possess some artifact capable of tracking.
‘The problem was I didn’t know their method, so I had to think carefully.’
The best option would have been to destroy the artifact outright.
But that would waste tremendous mana, and the risk of failure was too great.
While I was considering various approaches.
‘The Martial Arts Alliance made their entrance.’
Fortunately, my reaction was faster than the Martial Arts Alliance’s.
From the beginning, I had asked Geumok to erase all traces.
And with magic, I was fluidly controlling the flow of mana itself.
‘Then at the critical moment, I deployed Invisible Mana.’
This spell conceals all mana within a certain area, so it carried considerable burden on my reserves.
Fortunately, it worked perfectly.
Thanks to that, my group was now observing the collision between the two forces from a considerable distance, at our leisure.
“Why don’t we just create more distance and leave entirely?”
Chul Mu-geuk, anxious, suggested we flee, but my thinking differed somewhat.
“Well, that’s also a good approach. But it shouldn’t take long. Let’s just observe one crucial scene and then withdraw, Senior.”
“Hmm… I’ll defer to your judgment, Junior.”
I nodded and turned my gaze toward the clearing on the verge of collision.
‘That strange old man from the Martial Arts Alliance. I should observe his sorcery in advance.’
This was instinctive territory.
That old man certainly caught my attention.
He was unmistakably a sorcerer.
And quite a formidable one at that.
From a distance, he appeared to be a sorcerer of Gong Jeol-gang’s caliber.
‘But something feels off—as if there’s more to him than that.’
A sorcerer of Gong Jeol-gang’s level couldn’t harm me now that I’d reached the Fourth Circle.
Rather, the elite martial artists of the Martial Arts Alliance beside that old man posed a more immediate threat to me.
‘Yet he doesn’t feel like merely a sorcerer of Gong Jeol-gang’s level.’
What exactly was he hiding?
Remarkably, even my eyes couldn’t perceive it clearly.
In the meantime.
A spirit of the wind.
With Geumok’s assistance, I eavesdropped on the conversation unfolding in the clearing and posed a quiet question.
“Do you happen to know someone called Yuk Ji-no-goe?”
“Yuk Ji-no-goe Gao Shiji!”
Yang Cheon-jo, standing beside me, cried out as if in alarm, but when I brought a finger to my lips to signal caution, he quickly pressed his mouth shut with a look of realization.
In the meantime.
Chul Mu-geuk answered while stroking his rough, bristling beard.
“Before I met you, Yuk Ji-no-goe was a sorcerer I wanted to meet. I even sought him out at the Martial Arts Alliance, but never found him.”
“It seems fortune favored me then.”
“Hmm, perhaps so. In any case, the Moshan Sect, to which Yuk Ji-no-goe belongs, is affiliated with the Martial Arts Alliance, but the exact location of their base remains unknown. They likely have many enemies, so they’re cautious about such matters. Even with my connections, meeting the Moshan Sect proved impossible.”
“Oh? So he’s the greatest sorcerer of the Orthodox Sects, I hear?”
“Correct. The Moshan Sect is the only Xianxia cultivation sect officially recognized by the Orthodox Sects. And Yuk Ji-no-goe is the master of that Moshan Sect.”
I stroked my chin once.
His reputation and background.
And seeing him in person now.
He clearly stood above Gong Jeol-gang.
‘Yet he shows no sign of it.’
That was the problem.
To examine him closely, I would have to use magic.
But then the other party would certainly notice.
‘If I could just see one move.’
Then I could gauge his level to some degree.
From a distance as far as possible, I gazed at the clearing with a rather intrigued expression.
The parties facing each other in the clearing.
Hong Sun-won was speaking while biting his lower lip.
“You have no intention of simply letting me go?”
“Would that work?”
At Peng Tian-yu’s mockery, Hong Sun-won fixed him with a cold stare.
“You should at least be prepared to lose your limbs.”
“Grasping the Butcher’s Demon Blade and losing an arm would be an honor.”
“…There are surely many others gathered here besides us. Is there any need to weaken our collective strength?”
It was a rational argument.
But the opponent was not receptive.
Peng Tian-yu, the Azure Dragon Faction Master, was not someone who operated through logical reasoning in the first place.
“Those who run their mouths are never good people.”
“I offer my condolences for your pitiful view of human relationships.”
“Heh, now you’re starting to feel like fighting, are you?”
“Leave behind at least a final testament.”
Hong Sun-won, having given up by this point, slowly began to gather his momentum.
Two figures stood at the very front.
The air between them began to sizzle and burn.
“I’ve been curious about this for a while now.”
Peng Tian-yu, living up to his epithet of the Mighty Blade Tyrant, hoisted his massive greatsword overhead as effortlessly as one might lift a sheet of paper, rolling up his sleeve to flaunt the rippling muscles of his forearm.
“I kept hearing this nonsense that the Blood Cult’s swordsmanship reigns supreme under heaven. As if mere swordplay could be supreme. It’s an exaggeration.”
The masters of the Murim Alliance began to shift gradually, encircling the Cheonlang Squad in a wide, circular formation.
The vast encirclement was completed in moments.
The masters of the Cheonlang Squad showed no intention of fleeing.
They had clustered together in this formation specifically for their slaughter array technique.
Both forces had become perfectly interlocked—neither could escape the other unless one side was completely annihilated.
As Hong Sun-won, the Blade Demon of Slaughter, steadied his breathing and prepared to unleash his strike.
Peng Tian-yu lifted his gaze, murderous intent gleaming in his eyes, tracking the tip of Hong Sun-won’s blade to its very end as he spoke.
“Much as I hate to admit it, I’m no fool either.”
“…?”
An ominous chill raced down Hong Sun-won’s spine.
In that same instant, something caught in his peripheral vision.
‘Damn!’
Hong Sun-won became a scarlet arrow, shooting forward with crimson sword energy coiling around his blade’s edge, thrusting toward Peng Tian-yu’s dantian.
“So go ahead and die, fall into hell where you belong, you worthless human scum.”
Though Peng Tian-yu’s words were crude and harsh, his movements were extraordinarily cautious—he stepped back deliberately, assuming a heavy yet thoroughly defensive stance to carefully receive Hong Sun-won’s devastating strike.
Crack-crack-crack-crack―!
In that moment.
An elderly man, five feet tall, who had been concealing himself behind the massive Peng Tian-yu with his presence utterly suppressed.
Gao Shiji swept his sleeve in one grand arc.
Simultaneously, a tremendous resonance spread across all directions.
‘This bastard….’
Now I finally understand what that creature truly is.
Ilhyang, watching from a distance, widened his eyes.
Sensing the traces of a colossal giant spreading outward in all directions, he quickly rose to his feet.
“We need to leave now, Senior.”
“What?”
“We’ve been caught by misfortune.”
“Hmm… let me explain properly. I’m not sure about Gao Shiji, but I have some acquaintance with Peng Tian-yu.”
“No, sir. We should flee now.”
Ilhyang tapped Geumok’s body lightly, which he had been wearing like a scarf around his neck.
All the traces he had been hiding—the concealment, the mana.
He simply exposed everything completely.
Then the heavy atmosphere surrounding them became directly perceptible against his skin.
Since it had come to this, Ilhyang began a mana search directed at Gao Shiji.
And then.
‘So you can organize your Mental World as you please?’
The opponent’s Mental World manifested as a transparent giant.
And it had quite a distinct form at that.
This level of mastery was surprisingly at least a 5-Circle Master.
Perhaps it was a realm that could only be displayed upon reaching the 6-Circle.
But if what Ilhyang had just judged was true.
This was rather strange.
‘According to the rules of this world, a 6-Circle Grand Mage shouldn’t be able to exist in the Lower Realm?’
If they had become a 6-Circle Grand Mage by learning magic, that would be one thing.
But what those bastards were learning was the method of this world.
In other words, a peculiar form of cultivation technique called the Xianxia Cultivation Method.
According to Gong Jeol-gang’s account.
The Xianxia Cultivation Method naturally leads to ascension to the Upper Realm once one reaches a certain stage of enlightenment.
In other words, they would transcend, or so it was known.
‘From my understanding, that threshold should be around the 5-Circle Master or 6-Circle level.’
What this old geezer was displaying now was a clear violation of this world’s rules.
How could that bastard remain in the Lower Realm while violating the world’s laws?
As Ilhyang examined it from various angles, backing away all the while, I couldn’t help but let out a scoff.
‘He used a loophole.’
Of course he did.
Through normal means, a Celestial Watcher of that caliber couldn’t exist on the surface.
It would be a rule violation.
So this Yuk Ji-no-goe was currently using a very special method to forcibly compress his body.
‘He controlled that power very delicately just now.’
Kuuuuung―
The enormous transparent giant brought its fist crashing down upon the location where Cheon Hyeol Dan had been.
It was merely an exercise of raw physical force.
Immediately after, a tremendous tremor and gale swept through.
As Ilhyang glanced back briefly.
I caught sight of the transparent giant’s eyes in the distant sky, observing Ilhyang with precision.
‘Let’s call it here for now. We both have our paths to walk.’
The giant withdrew its transparent fist from the ground.
For some reason, a chilling sound effect of blood and flesh tearing away seemed to reach Ilhyang’s ears.
And the giant, having withdrawn its hand, hesitated for a moment.
Then it began to raise its fist once more.
Kugggeuk―
‘…It would be better if you stopped right there.’
Ilhyang let out a sigh.
Yuk Ji-no-goe.
The sect master of the Moshan Sect, belonging to the Orthodox Sects.
For some reason, he seemed determined to destroy himself no matter the cost.
‘If I overexert myself now, wouldn’t he suffer more losses than I would? Why not calm down?’
Yuk Ji-no-goe was currently forcing himself to remain anchored to the Lower Realm, his body bearing immense constraints.
In other words, he had placed a powerful seal upon himself.
On the surface, there was no sign of it whatsoever.
But Ilhyang had just thoroughly scanned his interior with magic, making Yuk Ji-no-goe’s true state far more apparent to him.
‘That monster’s realm is at the level of a 6-Circle Archmage.’
This was an extraordinarily shocking realm even to Ilhyang.
In the Seven Continents where Ilhyang originally came from, a 6-Circle Archmage would be treated as the ruler of an entire region.
If one were to measure this by the standards of this world…
‘Should I call it beyond the Breath-Gathering Realm and into the Decisive Realm?’
If one had reached the Breath-Gathering Realm, they should have ascended long ago.
The Lower Realm could not sustain the Breath-Gathering Realm.
Yet somehow, this monster had transcended the Breath-Gathering Realm and reached the Decisive Realm.
Like a colossal dragon crouching within an impossibly narrow well.
Normally, such a being could not remain in the Lower Realm even for a moment.
But he had deliberately imposed a powerful seal upon his own soul, tearing and reshaping his spiritual essence to a size suitable for dwelling in the Lower Realm.
‘But I saw through all of it.’
A deep, resonant hum—
Had he realized that I had seen through his true circumstances?
Was he feeling threatened by that revelation?
The colossal fist descending from the heavens showed no hesitation.
Yuk Ji-no-goe spat out black blood from his mouth even as—
For some reason, he gritted his teeth and forced himself to swing his fist with all his might.

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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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