My understanding of the Heavenly Thunder Divine Art was sufficient. Though restoring it to its original form would be difficult, modifying it to suit me was something I could do even at this very moment.
Normally, it would be faster to simply learn the given techniques as they were, but…
The current Heavenly Thunder Divine Art was an incomplete martial art in need of restoration.
And this was the result of considering my somewhat abnormal talent—one that allowed me to learn others' martial arts and then recklessly tear them apart and rebuild them to fit myself.
"Then I'll leave it to you."
"Leave it to me. If anything happens, I'll wake you right away."
Seomun Hwa-rin patted her chest with a trustworthy expression. Only after nodding to her did I sit cross-legged and close my eyes.
Darkened vision. In the thick earthen cave, the only sounds were the faint breaths of Seomun Hwa-rin and myself.
The damp smell of soil and wood reached my nose. Yet within that mustiness, a single thread of cool freshness lingered. It was probably Seomun Hwa-rin's scent.
A body that had undergone Rejuvenation did not easily become dirty. Was it not only natural that a physique that had defied even time itself would not yield to mere mud and stench?
That was why, despite so much having changed, Seomun Hwa-rin's scent was no different now than before the regression.
With my eyes closed at such close distance, the boundary between the two of us would sometimes blur.
…It was what I had wished for.
Consciousness sinking inward. Amidst the settling senses, all kinds of memories rose like bubbles and burst, over and over.
Among them, I fished out the memory that was both the most painful and the warmest.
Before the regression. Back when I was still called the Blood Wolf, running wild on my own arrogance, Seomun Hwa-rin willingly became my teacher.
She taught me how to live in this world, me who knew nothing but swinging a sword. She taught me how to read and write, me who was a dullard. She even shared a portion of her own martial arts.
…And in the end, she taught me, through loss, that I too could hold someone in my heart.
At the time, I felt only a vague gratitude, but as time passed, that gratitude only grew.
What martial artist in this world would put in such effort to teach a subordinate all sorts of things, and even guide their martial arts, without any significant reward?
Neither I nor Seomun Hwa-rin ever said it aloud, but back then, we were something akin to master and disciple.
And it is only natural for a disciple to follow their master's back with their eyes.
As the years passed, I have forgotten much of the conversations I shared with Seomun Hwa-rin before the regression…
Her final moments. And the fragments of martial arts that Seomun Hwa-rin had shown me in life — those I remember clearly.
A quiet breath turns into a thunderous roar, and from her small limbs erupts terrifying power.
Yes. At that time, Seomun Hwa-rin had already fully made the Seomun Clan's secret art her own.
I do not know whether she fully restored the sword method, the Heavenly Thunder Divine Art, but there is no doubt that she had at least melted its principles into her own martial arts.
The Heavenly Thunder Divine Art I read and understood. Into that vague enlightenment, I now melt the manifested principles Seomun Hwa-rin had shown me before the regression.
Countless combinations of techniques rise to the surface of my mind. From among those chaotic postures, I cast out every one that falls even slightly short in speed or ferocity.
After one round of filtering, no small number of techniques remained, but using the image of Seomun Hwa-rin in my memory as a guidepost, I filter out the lacking ones once more.
And so, what remains at the end is a single technique. This, I wield without pause within my mind.
Dozens. Hundreds. Thousands of times—it makes no difference. I simply shave off the unnecessary parts, again and again.
A tedious, grueling task, like honing the edge of a dull blade.
The one saving grace is that, having reached the realm of Sword-Mind Unity, I can reproduce the sword in my mind's eye without ever having to swing it physically.
I forget the existence of the White Peak Mountain King and the Slaughter King. I forget Seomun Hwa-rin, who stands guard as my Cultivation Guardian. I forget the Heaven-Thunder Divine Art I have restored over this time. I even forget the Heavenly Demon who waits at the end of all of it.
The sword in my hand. And the single, ideal path of the sword that I must trace with it.
That was all that existed for me now.
How many times did I swing the sword like that? Before I knew it, I realized there was nothing left to shave away from the blade I wielded.
The moment I became aware of this.
KWA-RUNG!
A familiar loud noise, and a blinding flash of lightning was etched into my mind's eye.
It was time to wake up.
***
"Hoo…"
I opened my eyes and took a deep breath. I had thrown myself into the mental training with considerable intensity, so there was a slight dizziness, but the poison seemed to have been completely neutralized in the meantime, and my body felt refreshed.
As I blinked a couple of times to adjust my vision, I heard Seomun Hwa-rin's admiring voice.
"Heh. For a moment, there was a gleam of spirit in your eyes. Did you have some kind of enlightenment?"
"Yes. I had a good teacher."
"A teacher?"
Seomun Hwa-rin tilted her head for a moment, but soon realized that she was the one being referred to and shrugged her shoulders.
"That is a sweet thing to hear. However, I'm afraid I won't be able to savor this lingering feeling for long."
"…Surely not?"
"Indeed. At the very edge of my Qi Sense, I can feel the presence of the White Peak Mountain King. He tried to cover his tracks, but the fact that he's tracking us this precisely means…"
"There's a high probability he's joined up with the Slaughter King, who's skilled at tracking."
Seomun Hwa-rin's Qi Sense covers a much wider range than mine, but in exchange, its sensitivity is somewhat inferior to mine.
If the Slaughter King is already hiding, it's only natural that we wouldn't notice his traces.
I lightly rolled my shoulders and rose from my seat.
"Then I suppose we'll have to go settle our unfinished match."
"You're going to go right now?"
"We've come all this way—it's not like we can avoid him forever. And besides…"
After adjusting my clothes for a moment, I tapped the sword at my waist and grinned.
"Now is the perfect time."
My senses are sharp, my body is light, and the sword strikes I was swinging just moments ago feel within reach.
There will never be a better time than now.
"Ah, but I did skip a meal today, so I'm a bit hungry. Let's finish this quickly and eat something delicious."
"…"
Seomun Hwa-rin was momentarily taken aback by my words, but soon let out a soft laugh and nodded.
"There's no one else around, so let's secretly buy some expensive and delicious food for ourselves."
With those words as her last, Seomun Hwa-rin cleared away the rubble that had been blocking the entrance.
As we headed outside, a slight brightness greeted us. Following that, my Qi Sense began to pick up the presence of the White Peak Mountain King.
…And from a spot far off in the distance, I also felt a faint sense of dissonance approaching from our side.
As we had sensed them, the White Peak Mountain King was also rapidly closing in, having noticed us as well.
In contrast, the Slaughter King was cautiously narrowing the distance, his presence faint. I kept my concentration so as not to miss it, and spoke.
"I'll leave that one to you."
"Then I shall entrust my back to you."
We nodded to each other and then kicked off the ground toward our respective opponents.
At the same time, the thunderous sound unique to the Thunder Step rang out. Before I knew it, my Thunder Step and Seomun Hwa-rin's had become alike.
Leaving the White Peak Mountain King to Seomun Hwa-rin would be fine. It would become a contest of pure strength, but I had never seen Seomun Hwa-rin lose ground in a contest of strength.
So for now, I focus solely on the Slaughter King.
This time too, as I charged straight toward where he was, the Slaughter King, startled, swiftly veered off his trajectory.
Whether it was because he was putting far more effort into concealing himself than before, I couldn't pinpoint his exact location. But I could sense his general direction.
My Qi Sense, sharpened to an extreme degree. Within it, I swung my sword toward the intermittent breaks in the flow of the wind.
"Hup!"
A Sword Force that stretched out long. It was a strike that reached where it could not reach, cutting what could not be cut.
The ground along its trajectory was torn up, and broken trees revealed their pale insides with clean cross-sections.
A slashing strike that extended far. I unleashed it without pause. Until the lines drawn by my sword became a plane. And then.
Slicing.
The Slaughter King, who had failed to keep even his Qi Barrier out of my sword's path—let alone his body—revealed himself.
Perhaps because he had already been caught once. Even though the stealth he had taken such care to employ lost its meaning in an instant, the Slaughter King closed the distance with a composed expression.
Had he concluded that stealth using a Qi Barrier did not work against me?
He made no attempt to hide his body again, simply focusing on his footwork.
Even though I was clearly watching him with my eyes, his form wavered like a heat haze.
Despite pushing off the ground this quickly, no sound could be heard, and despite drawing his sword, no light reflected off it.
Movement stealthy enough even without a Qi Barrier. That sinister quality—where a single lapse in concentration would see a dagger buried in my neck—was surely the Slaughter King's true weapon.
I focused the Sword Force, which I had expanded greatly to unleash my slashing strike, back into a single point, and mixed Gwiyeongbo into my footwork as I charged toward the approaching Slaughter King.
Not as stealthy as the Slaughter King's, but with erratic movements that rivaled his. A glimmer of surprise flickered in the man's dull eyes.
Following that, the Slaughter King swung his sleeve wide toward me with the arm that wasn't holding his sword.
Hidden weapons, painted black to kill their presence just like the sword, came pouring out.
"Ha!"
It was a high-level Hidden Weapon Art, but nothing compared to the Tang Clan's. The opponent surely knew well enough that something like this wouldn't get through.
Still, I couldn't just let the flying hidden weapons hit me, so I began striking them all down with my sword, which had already turned white.
The hidden weapons, unable to withstand the edge of the white sword, were all cut apart. Just as I sliced through a dagger whose handle was unusually thick—
BOOM!
Smoke burst out from within, along with the smell of something burning.
The smoke had a strangely acrid, pungent scent—likely a poisonous mist laced with toxins. It didn't seem to affect me, though; I didn't even feel a sting.
But the important thing wasn't that I had inhaled the poisonous mist—it was that the thick smoke blocked my vision.
"Indeed."
If a Qi Barrier could be seen through anyway, then instead of a barrier, they'd hide their body with smoke instead.
The Slaughter King already had a faint presence. If he concealed his body in thick smoke, pinpointing his location would be nearly impossible. It would be like fighting with my eyes closed.
There wasn't a trace of a martial artist's pride in this plan, but I couldn't deny that it was a rational one.
The most ideal move I could make against the current Slaughter King was to wrap myself tightly in Protective Qi, endure against an enemy I could neither see nor sense, and develop my Qi Sense to take a step forward.
But this reeked of an obvious setup. I had already decided I would not play along.
Far from wrapping myself in Protective Qi, I instead withdrew even the energy I had been unconsciously maintaining.
All so I could pour every remaining bit of energy into my sword.
Wooong—
The blade let out a Geommyeong as it blazed ever more fiercely white.
There was no need to trade multiple exchanges. No need to struggle to locate an opponent I couldn't see.
And no need to hold anything back for what came after.
One sword.
One sword is enough.
After all, that one sword is everything to me.
The sword hung loosely, my body's muscles relaxed. The blade rooted in my palm was already part of my flesh, and the sword stroke just etched into my mind's eye was something I couldn't forget even if I wanted to.
My senses were honed sharp as a single blade. My breath stopped, and in the silence where the only sound was my own heartbeat, death came creeping in.
At the edge of my vision, a sword shot through the poison mist.
How had he changed direction in that instant? Though he had clearly been charging straight at me, the Slaughter King's sword appeared from my flank, aiming precisely at my neck.
It was too late to react now. Too awkward to dodge, and even if I blocked, I was at a distance where I couldn't put proper force behind it.
…That was what he would think.
Only after confirming the Slaughter King's incoming sword with my eyes did I move my body.
One foot slid across the ground, toes turning sideways.
I exploded my internal energy throughout my body in time with my heartbeat, as if unleashing the Thunder Step with my whole being.
KWA-RUNG!
The sound of my heart, which should have been audible only to me, had already become thunder, loudly shaking heaven and earth.
And lightning always strikes a step ahead of thunder.
The sword that had been hanging toward the ground was already swung.
The white heavenly lightning that stretched from the ground toward the sky became a pillar connecting heaven and earth, and together with the Slaughter King's sword, it split his body apart.
It happened in the instant the Slaughter King's sword touched my neck.