Chapter 199

The Room of Time.

There, Jaseong wielded his sword every day.

In this place, where neither morning nor night existed, he set his own hours and moved according to them.

One day, he operated the Heaven Evading Celestial Formula to build up his internal energy.

The next day, he honed the forms of the Heaven Evading Flash Sword.

The day after that, he practiced the Heaven Evading Shadow Annihilation Sword learned from the Sword Demon, the Heaven Evading Clone Step from Hong Gukyul, and even the Heavenly Physician's Needle Technique learned from the Eternal Divine Physician.

He dismantled and refined every martial art he possessed, starting from the basics.

Mansul did not remain idle either.

She awakened her gumiho instincts, training her sorcery.

She conjured flames in midair, created illusions, and sometimes became Jaseong's sparring partner.

But as time passed, suffering set in.

It was not physical pain.

It was the soul-crushing loneliness and tedium that gnawed at him.

"Haa... haa...."

The tenth year.

Calluses did not just form but turned his palms to leather.

It was the price of having swung his sword tens of millions of times.

Wherever his sword passed, spatial rifts shrieked, but Jaseong was not satisfied.

The twentieth year.

Scars multiplied on Jaseong's body.

It was because of the harsh training he subjected himself to as he tested his own limits.

He used the elixirs he brought to amplify his internal power, but since his original internal energy was already vast as an ocean, it hardly helped.

The thirtieth year.

Jaseong's soul began to rust.

No matter how many times he swung his sword, it became harder and harder to reach the next stage of enlightenment.

Transformation Realm.

He had already surpassed human limits—reached the realm of gods.

But the road to the next realm, the Profound Realm, remained hidden.

In truth, the Profound Realm is a territory almost no one in the history of the martial world has ever set foot in.

Not even among the previous executors of Heaven's Mandate had anyone reached it, so he had no master, no guide—he would have to forge this path on his own.

"Profound Realm... How can I reach the Profound Realm...."

Jaseong questioned himself endlessly.

He swung his sword, meditated, then swung his sword again.

But the answer did not come easily.

It felt as if he were blocked by an invisible wall.

The fortieth year.

Jaseong sank to his knees.

The Wicked Flame Sword slipped from his hand and fell to the floor.

"No... No matter what I do, I cannot get past this wall...."

Despair swept over him.

Forty years of tireless effort, yet he felt stranded in the same place.

Would his mind just age and wither away like this?

Outside, only forty days had passed, but in here, he was rotting away.

Jaseong stared down at the floor.

His own aged, exhausted face reflected on the white ground.

'Should I give up....'

A feeble thought surfaced.

But in that moment, faces flashed across Jaseong's mind.

His eldest brother, dying and drenched in blood.

His sister-in-law, collapsing while holding her belly.

And Lee Rin, Gu Janghu, Hyang-I—waiting and believing in him....

Jaseong clenched his fist tightly.

His nails dug into his flesh, and blood seeped out.

'No... I cannot do that.'

Jaseong's eyes blazed again.

This was not hope.

It was a fierce, venomous will.

'As the Sword Demon said, I was not born with martial talent nor with an extraordinary physique.

All I possess is one thing: hatred for those who took my loved ones.

That hatred and venom brought me here.

Am I to kneel before something as trivial as time?

Don't spout nonsense.

Even if my body breaks and my soul burns away, I will not stop.

Not until I behead the Heavenly Demon and wipe out the Demonic Cult—I do not deserve to die, nor to give up, until that day comes.'

Jaseong gripped his sword again.

All hesitation vanished from his eyes.

In its place was a determination bordering on madness.

From then on, Jaseong repeated those words endlessly as he trained.

He did not sleep or eat.

There was only the sword, himself, and the wall he had to overcome.

The seventieth year.

Madness filled Jaseong's eyes.

"Haha... hahahaha...."

He began to laugh.

Laughter with no reason.

He swung his sword at the empty air, laughing like a madman.

His mind had finally reached its limit and begun to shatter.

"Jaseong! Snap out of it!"

Jaseong stared blankly at Mansul.

Light slowly returned to his unfocused eyes.

"......"

Jaseong regained his senses.

But his gaze was different than before.

His eyes were parched of emotion, deep and dark like an abyss.

The eightieth year.

Jaseong lost the ability to speak.

He no longer laughed or cried.

He just silently swung his sword.

His movements were now less like martial arts and more akin to a natural flow.

He wielded his sword as if breathing, stepped as if walking.

The ninetieth year.

Jaseong's body was emaciated.

Nearly a century of solitude had eroded his flesh.

His skin became coarse, bones jutting out beneath.

Yet the energy emanating from that frail frame dwarfed anything he had released before in scale and sharpness.

Jaseong remained in the Room of Time for over ninety-nine years.

He could have gone mad and become a corpse, but he did not stop.

Not until he achieved enlightenment, or until he died.

And at last.

"......"

Jaseong stood with his sword.

His hair had become snow-white, flowing down to his ankles.

His eyes were hollow, pure emptiness.

He quietly peered into himself.

His dantian surged with infinite internal energy like an ocean; all twelve meridian gates were fully open.

But it still was not enough.

No door to the Profound Realm appeared.

'The twelve gates... the limits of a human's energy channels.'

Jaseong realized it.

He could not reach it through any existing path.

It was not about opening an existing gate, but creating one where none existed.

In that moment—

"... The thirteenth gate."

The words left Jaseong's lips in a cracked, raspy whisper, yet filled with certainty.

Celestial Gate Opening Art.

He knew up to the twelfth gate.

But beyond that... in a hundred years of solitude, he had intuited the existence of the nonexistent thirteenth gate.

Beyond the twelve gates, the final gate.

It was not a gate of the flesh.

It was the gate of the mind, the gate of the soul.

"Yes... If there is no further Immortal Gate to open, I will create one. The thirteenth gate... creating it is the key to reaching the Profound Realm."

Life returned to Jaseong's eyes.

He gripped his sword in reverse.

And pointed it at his own heart.

"Jaseong!"

At that sight, Mansul's eyes went wide.

She feared that Jaseong had truly been driven mad by relentless training.

But at this moment, Jaseong's mind was clearer than ever.

'There is only one place to create the thirteenth gate: the middle dantian. If this works...'

Without the slightest hesitation, Jaseong stabbed in his sword.

It was not a blow to his flesh, but a sword of the mind that shattered the shell of his ego.

KWA-AAAAANG!!!

A tremendous surge of energy erupted from Jaseong's body.

The white earth split, space distorted.

The entire Room of Time shrieked and trembled.

Whooosh!

Dark flames enveloped Jaseong's form.

The Wicked Flame Sword awakened automatically in response to its master's will.

At the same time, the golden ki of the Heaven Evading Celestial Formula merged with the black flames, creating a tremendous vortex.

CRAAACK! BOOM!

Lightning crashed down from the sky.

Even though there was no sky inside the Room of Time, thunder raged.

It was a signal of cosmic upheaval.

"Jaseong!"

Mansul cried out in shock.

Behind Jaseong, an apparition appeared.

An illusion of twelve massive gates opening one by one.

And above them, a thirteenth gate—never before existing—slowly materialized.

That gate was made of light.

Creeeeak—

As the final thirteenth gate opened,

Jaseong's body became light.

His old, sick flesh and soul shattered and fell away, and from within, a new being was born.

At last, he had reached the Profound Realm.

"This is... the Profound Realm...."

Jaseong looked at his own hand.

The skin, wrinkled and rough from a hundred years of training, had turned as smooth as jade.

His once-white hair reverted to inky black, his shriveled frame filled out with strong muscle.

Regained youth—return to innocence.

He had perfectly reclaimed his youth.

"Jaseong! Are you alright?!"

Mansul ran over to him.

In disbelief, she touched his face.

"... I'm fine. In fact, more than fine."

Jaseong clenched and unclenched his fist.

His whole body brimmed with inexhaustible strength.

The rules and principles of all things felt as if they were within his grasp.

"I... have finally reached the Profound Realm."

Clear tears welled up in Jaseong's eyes.

"A hundred years... it was a long time, but I did it."

Mansul wept, clinging to Jaseong's chest.

She knew, having witnessed his harrowing solitude and torment firsthand, just how great his achievement was.

"Let's go out now."

Jaseong reached out his hand.

A door formed in the empty air.

A door leading to reality, opening after a hundred years.

"Let's go... and finish this."

The genius of the Red Light District—no, now the absolute master of the Profound Realm—Jaseong, was returning to reality.

The moment was at hand for the history of the jianghu to be overturned once more.

* * *

When Jaseong stepped out of the Room of Time, what greeted him was not the peace to make up for a century of loneliness.

The moment he opened the door and set foot outside, the acrid stench of smoke and thick, metallic scent of blood stabbed at his nose.

"What is... all this...."

Jaseong's pupils quivered slightly.

The scene before his eyes was horrific.

Black Union City—once the heart of the Hao Sect, and Jaseong's new base—had half-collapsed already.

The majestic halls were swathed in flames, belching black smoke; the once-flamboyant streets were buried under corpses and shattered debris.

"Sect Leader!"

Just then, a figure staggered from between the collapsed walls.

It was Gal Seo-ryeong, the Right Protector.

Her black martial robes were torn to shreds, her body covered in blood from countless wounds both large and small.

"Protector! What happened here? Who did this?"

Jaseong supported her and asked.

The moment Gal Seo-ryeong saw Jaseong's face, she wept tears of relief and barely managed to speak.

"It's the Demonic Cult's... a full-scale assault! Barely a month after you entered secluded training, they swept through the entire Central Plains!"

Jaseong's brow furrowed.

"Our information said we could hold out for at least a hundred days. How did this happen so fast...?"

"The new Heavenly Demon is simply too strong...!"

Gal Seo-ryeong's voice trembled with terror.

Jaseong glanced around.

He could not feel any sign of Lee Rin or Gu Janghu.

"Where are Lee Rin and Gu Janghu?"

"The two of them defended the gate to the last to protect your secluded training. When the situation grew hopeless, they moved to the front lines, where the righteous alliance is gathering. They didn't tell you, worried it would be a distraction."

Jaseong bit down on his lip.

While his companions fought, risking their lives for him, he had been in the Room of Time for a hundred years.

'Just wait, everyone. I'm coming now.'