Chapter 181: What Remains in My Heart

Shin Kangheon, transformed into a flame demon, subdued the puppets and burned the battlefield, while Kim Bokja drove her termite legion to gnaw through the Giant Tree Ghost’s thick outer hide.

In the rear, thanks to the wandering duo, whose presence had been almost nonexistent, one-fifth of the roots rotted away.

Kyaaaaaaak—!

The Giant Tree Ghost’s ghostly wail, which had once made its enemies tremble in fear, now sounded like a scream torn out by unbearable pain.

As a result, the gazes of the martial artists and spellcasters who had looked at Blue Wolves with suspicion began to change into astonishment.

“Only a few people......”

“......They completely changed the course of battle.”

“Ha! How did they even come up with the idea of bringing in foreign anomalies to deal with the Giant Tree Ghost?”

“What happened to the roots? The poison we prepared barely worked on them.”

“Blue Wolves? I don’t think I’ll forget those masks for a while.”

The martial artists of Transcendent Extremity Gate, said to have the greatest pride in martial arts among the Eight Great Sects.

And the spellcasters of Mystic Hall, the largest spellcraft organization in the country.

It was the moment the name Blue Wolves was carved powerfully into their minds.

But Kim Muhyuk was still watching the battlefield carefully.

Unless another major variable appears, our side will suffer almost no casualties.

Thanks to Blue Wolves intervening at exactly the necessary moment, the course of battle had tilted greatly. No matter what variable arose from here on out, it would be difficult to reverse the situation.

In the current situation, the Giant Tree Ghost seemed too busy protecting its own body to attempt anything else.

But......

Kim Muhyuk did not relax. Some part of this still felt unclear.

Could a variable only this large really have cut off Sunwoo Jeha’s arm?

Sunwoo Jeha’s figure, racing up the Giant Tree Ghost’s pillar, had become so small that she was almost a dot now.

BOOM! BAM-BAM-BAM!

Shockwaves burst intermittently from above, and he could only guess at the ferocity of the fight from the falling debris of wood.

I was startled when she tried to come back down partway after climbing all the way up there, but......

When the puppets had first appeared.

The first time Sunwoo Jeha’s charge stopped was when the formation of Transcendent Extremity Gate’s martial artists fell into disorder.

If Shin Kangheon and Kim Bokja had not stepped forward in time, Sunwoo Jeha might have jumped down to the ground and dealt with the puppets herself.

So she wasted a great deal of stamina on the Giant Tree Ghost’s scheme, fought while exhausted, and eventually had one arm cut off?

Kim Muhyuk tried assuming that for a moment. Then he shook his head.

No. That isn’t enough.

The puppets were not a variable threatening enough to greatly endanger Sunwoo Jeha.

They were at a level the martial artists of Transcendent Extremity Gate could handle if they hardened their hearts.

At most, they would only have made Sunwoo Jeha a little more tired.

Sunwoo Jeha anticipated much more threatening variables. Even so, she was confident she could kill the Giant Tree Ghost.

In other words, it meant there had been a variable even she found difficult to handle.

Kim Muhyuk thought stubbornly, reasoned it out, and reached one conclusion.

[If it was a major variable even the Strongest in Korea did not anticipate......]

No matter how he thought about it, there was only one possibility he did not want to face.

......A betrayal from our side.

What if it was not the Giant Tree Ghost that had cut off Sunwoo Jeha’s arm?

It might have been an excessive leap. It might have been nothing more than an imagination he had forced into place to fit the result.

But unless it was a variable of that degree, Kim Muhyuk simply could not imagine Sunwoo Jeha losing an arm.

Just then, a voice came from beside him.

“Whew...... Thanks to you, we can finally breathe a little. Every one of your masked friends is capable.”

Kim Muhyuk turned his head and looked at the face of the man approaching him.

Moon Seokju, the vice sect leader of Transcendent Extremity Gate.

He was one of the two supreme masters apart from Sunwoo Jeha, and the person she had said she would hand the sect leader position to if she died.

[We accepted a commission, after all.]

Kim Muhyuk answered calmly, then took off his own wolf mask and continued.

“Shouldn’t we make sure you feel your money wasn’t wasted?”

It was because talking while looking each other in the face could create a slightly more comfortable atmosphere.

At Kim Muhyuk’s confident appearance, Moon Seokju let out a low laugh and nodded.

“To be honest, at first I thought the sect leader had done something unnecessary...... When we get back, I’ll make sure you receive a generous bonus. You can look forward to it.”

“Really? You won’t say that and then fail to give it to us because the sect leader objects, will you?”

When Kim Muhyuk asked playfully, Moon Seokju’s expression stiffened slightly, then relaxed.

“You don’t need to worry. When I put approval documents in front of her, that one usually signs them without even reading.”

With a complicated look in his eyes, Moon Seokju looked up at Sunwoo Jeha as she climbed the Giant Tree Ghost.

Kim Muhyuk stared at him for a while, then asked.

“By the way, is it all right for you to be here like this? I thought you were in command of the martial artists, Vice Sect Leader......”

“I left command to someone else. I just said it, but thanks to all of you, we have some leeway now.”

A few martial artists approached from behind Moon Seokju.

Every one of them had restrained bearing, as though they were among the best of the elites participating in the hunt.

“A few of us need to go support the sect leader. Even for Sunwoo Jeha, fighting alone should be getting difficult by now.”

“......”

This was not part of the plan that had first been shared.

Because the role of destroying the Giant Tree Ghost’s heart was supposed to be handled by the Transcendent Extremity Gate sect leader alone.

Are they really reinforcements? Or......

But instead of asking why the plan had suddenly changed, Kim Muhyuk probed him in a subtle voice.

“This must feel different for you.”

“......For me?”

“Yes. I heard the previous sect leader was your father, Vice Sect Leader.”

Moon Seokju was silent for a moment, then nodded calmly.

“That’s right. He was a fine man as a sect leader. Enough to sacrifice himself against a Great Anomaly and save countless people......”

Perhaps because he thought of Kim Muhyuk as a comrade who had fought alongside him on the battlefield, Moon Seokju revealed those complicated emotions in front of someone he had met for the first time today.

“Ah, so that was why?”

Kim Muhyuk decided to openly test the other man’s reaction while pretending he was tactless.

Thinking ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) that being treated as a madman was quite convenient at times like this.

“The Transcendent Extremity Gate sect leader said that if she couldn’t return, she would transfer the sect leader position to you.”

It was a question that could sound extremely rude.

But Moon Seokju, who had heard the conversation between Sunwoo Jeha and Kim Muhyuk before, only clicked his tongue softly with an expression that said, Birds of a feather, then.

“She didn’t mean it. If she intended to die, she would have died ten years ago.”

Perhaps realizing in that instant that it was a joke that crossed the line even by his own standards, Moon Seokju quickly added,

“I’ve known that one for over twenty years. Sunwoo Jeha is not someone who dies in a place like this.”

Then Moon Seokju looked upward again.

Sunwoo Jeha’s advance, which had seemed unstoppable, was gradually slowing down.

It seemed the closer she came to the Giant Tree Ghost’s heart, the more intense the interference became.

“......Now is the right time to leave. Then let’s meet again after the hunt is over.”

Moon Seokju patted Kim Muhyuk’s shoulder once, then said to the martial artists waiting nearby,

“Is everyone ready to stake their lives? It is time to help the sect leader and avenge our enemy!”

“Yes!”

Moon Seokju and Transcendent Extremity Gate’s elite martial artists drew up their internal energy and began running up the tree pillar.

WHIIISH!

A little while later, Moon Seokju, who had been racing like a gale along the path Sunwoo Jeha had made ahead of them, sensed someone following from behind and looked back.

“Why are you......?”

Kim Muhyuk, whom he had thought remained on the ground, was already close behind him.

“I’ll go with you too.”

At that moment, a hint of irritation appeared on Moon Seokju’s face.

But in a situation where every second mattered, there was no time for a quarrel.

After thinking for a brief moment, Moon Seokju warned him in a cold voice.

“I can’t look after you while we’re going. Protect your own life.”

He turned his head and raised his speed even further. As though saying, follow if you can.

WHIIISH!

The distance between them and Sunwoo Jeha, who was fighting a Great Anomaly alone at a dizzying height, began closing faster than before.

“We kill that bastard today, no matter what.”

Moon Seokju muttered through clenched teeth.

Who the bastard he spoke of was, and where that bone-deep killing intent was directed.

I really hope my guess is wrong, but......

Kim Muhyuk quietly followed behind him and covered his face again with the wolf mask.

[We were paid a commission fee, so we have to be worth the money.]

*****

Sunwoo Jeha was racing endlessly along the tree pillar.

CRRRRUNCH! BAM-BAM-BAM—! Rustle!

Fragments of the Giant Tree Ghost and insect anomalies parasitizing its body were crushed along the path she passed through and fell below.

However, even Sunwoo Jeha was not tireless. The Giant Tree Ghost’s vitality seemed infinite. Branches swung endlessly, leaves flew like hidden weapons, powder laced with deadly poison, and writhing vines obstructed her vision......

She was breaking through all that interference alone.

“Haa, haaaah......”

She could not remember the last time she had been this out of breath.

But from beginning to end, a bright smile hung on Sunwoo Jeha’s lips, and she kept muttering the same words.

“Just a little more. Just a little more. Just a little more. Just a little more. Just a little more.”

It felt as though the pressure in her chest had been blown wide open. The more she swung her saber and sword, the more she felt an endless sense of release.

The sensation that if she went just a little farther, she could reach the sky.

Both her body and mind surged beyond their limits.

“I made it this far again......”

Ten years ago, Sunwoo Jeha had seized the chance to reach the peerless realm.

She had cut off food and drink and entered seclusion for more than ten days. When she grasped the edge of enlightenment and came outside with joy in her heart—

—A Great Anomaly has appeared. I will catch it and return, so wait here. We can hold your celebration party for coming out of seclusion then.

—......I’m going too. You’re old, Master, so you can’t fight well.

—Where do you think you’re going in that state! I told you to rest quietly!

—I don’t want to. I’m going.

In the end, she stubbornly followed him, but in the fight against the Giant Tree Ghost ten years ago, Sunwoo Jeha was almost no help at all.

Because the aftermath of her seclusion had left her body far too worn down.

—Jeha. Just because you won’t have a nagging master anymore doesn’t mean you can live however you want. Get along with the people around you...... and live well.

And she had to watch helplessly as her master sacrificed himself before her eyes.

“Why did it have to be then, of all times?”

With her master’s sudden death, Sunwoo Jeha fell off a cliff.

Her body, her mind, and the martial artist who could have reached the peerless realm all fell with him.

It took ten years for her to barely gather herself, recover, and grit her teeth again.

“......Master. I’m here.”

The sky that had been completely hidden by the Giant Tree Ghost’s branches and leaves seemed close to appearing.

Grrrrk...... Jeha.......

It was then that a puppet with the face of Moon Seungil, the previous sect leader, appeared.

I missed you, Jeha, my one and only disciple......

Unlike the other puppets, whose missing bodies had been roughly filled in with rotten branches, Moon Seungil’s puppet was as elaborate as a real person.

The Giant Tree Ghost’s finest card, one it had created with great care.

That appearance was unmistakably the beloved face Sunwoo Jeha had seen in her dreams countless times.

“......Master.”

She smiled white and bright, then charged as though she meant to embrace her master.

And she swung her saber and sword without hesitation.

SHHK-SHHK-SHHHK—!

The puppet, sliced into dozens of pieces, collapsed vainly.

Sunwoo Jeha leaped past its remains and rose even higher.

Thump! Thumpthumpthump!

The faint sound of the Giant Tree Ghost’s heartbeat began growing louder and louder. It was close now.

“I feel like if I kill the master who remains in my heart, I can move on to what comes next.”

The eyes of the Strongest in Korea, whose madness had reached its peak.

There no longer seemed to be anything that could stop her.