WeTried Translations

Translator: Joy

Editor: Joy

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◈ Damned Transmigration ◈

Chapter 42: Strength

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Thud.

A sudden heavy sound rang out.

The Blood Fiend, who had been about to pounce on the staggering Elena, flinched and stepped back. Haryeong, who had barely made it in time to block the Blood Fiend’s path, also widened her eyes.

Yuri was walking toward them.

He had clearly been told to run.

Haryeong and Elena had staked their lives on this. Since turning their backs and fleeing was impossible, they had decided to fight head-on and kill the Blood Fiend.

The Blood Fiend had staked his life as well. He intended to kill everyone here, one way or another. If he failed, Heavenly Thunder’s wrath would find and kill him. Even if he lived, it would not be much of a life.

But Yuri did not need to risk his life.

Yuri’s life was far too light and insignificant for him to stand here. A second-tier martial fighter could do nothing in this battle. Before the Blood Fiend’s blood-red force aura and palm arts, Yuri could not even serve as a meat shield.

That was why he had been told to run. Yuri complained often, but he was not foolish enough to be unable to distinguish a serious statement from a joke.

This was not a situation where any joke would work.

Yet something like an absurd joke was happening. Yuri was not running away. He was striding toward them.

If that were all.

Haryeong could have thought he had been swept away by foolish emotion and was throwing away his life meaninglessly. After much consideration, perhaps he had decided that he could not abandon them and did not want to run. Yuri had an emotional side, so it was not impossible to understand such a choice.

If that were all.

‘That is...’

A bright red current wrapped around Yuri’s body. It looked like a roaring flame. As a martial artist, Haryeong naturally knew what it was.

At the third tier, martial artists could release the internal energy in their dantians outside their bodies. From then on, swordsmen could wrap their swords in internal energy and manifest sword energy, while martial artists using other weapons could manifest blade energy or spear energy.

But martial fighters did not use weapons. Their weapons were their bodies themselves, including their fists and feet.

That was why third-tier martial fighters reached a realm distinct from other martial artists. Ki flames. Only upon reaching the realm where they could release energy over their entire bodies could a martial fighter’s body finally become equal to weapons like swords and spears.

‘He should be... second-tier...?’

To reach the third tier, one had to train both internal and external arts evenly. Releasing internal energy outside the body consumed it rapidly.

In Haryeong’s judgment, Yuri did not yet possess enough internal energy to reach the third tier. Even though he had consumed the Azure Heaven Pill, he had not directed all of its effects into his dantian, and the Art of the Untainted Heart was not an internal cultivation art specialized in rapidly accumulating internal energy.

For Yuri to be releasing ki flames, the symbol of a third-tier martial fighter, was beyond Haryeong’s understanding.

‘Common sense?’

No. That was wrong.

She could understand it through common sense. It was not something absurd or impossible.

She only had to stop ignoring what anyone in this world should naturally know and suspect. She only had to consider that Yuri was not merely talented in martial arts.

Without realizing it, Haryeong looked at Elena.

Elena’s face was covered in dirt, with blood smeared around her mouth, and she had gone pale. Bewilderment and fear mixed in her wide blue eyes.

Was that fear because she might die here? Or...

“Huh...?”

The Blood Fiend, staring at Yuri with a shocked expression, let out a startled sound. He tilted his head as he examined the red ki flames around Yuri.

“Has old age clouded even this old man’s eyes? How strange. You were not someone this old man needed to care about...”

He had been watching Elena’s group since yesterday. The guide he had trampled to death had been, at best, at the beginning of the third tier. He had estimated the bodyguard at fourth-tier, and the mage was certainly fourth-tier.

He had been impressed to learn that the bodyguard was actually fifth-tier, but it was not particularly surprising. It was an old saying that people hid a portion of their ability.

But Yuri being third-tier could not help but greatly surprise the Blood Fiend.

He had watched Yuri fight monsters such as orcs and lizardmen yesterday. Yuri fought remarkably well for a second-tier fighter, but the limits of his tier could not be overcome. Yuri could not even release internal energy and had needed to cut monsters’ throats with a dagger.

This was beyond simply hiding his strength.

“This old man does not understand why you pretended to be second-tier.”

The Blood Fiend smiled, twisting his lips.

Even so, nothing changed.

No matter how desperately a fifth-tier assassin and a fourth-tier mage struggled, they could not defeat the Blood Fiend. He was a martial artist who had trained for decades and a great demon who had ruled the Demonic Cult as one of the Seven Evils until ten years ago, before his expulsion.

The aftereffects of his Qi Deviation, his aged body, and the damage to his vital energy and blood were all real. Still, killing a mage who appeared to lack practical combat experience, especially against martial artists, and an assassin who had not fully inherited the Dang Family’s martial arts was not impossible, even if it was not easy.

Even if another third-tier martial fighter joined them, he was confident he could kill Yuri with a few swings of his palm.

“If you were hiding your strength, you should have used it to flee. This old man might not have been able to catch you.”

Yuri gave no answer.

The verses of the Heavenly Art of Annihilating Evil kept circling through his mind. The internal energy in his dantian had gone beyond merely feeling as though it were burning. It was truly becoming flame.

If he stepped forward and fought like this...

What excuse could he make? Could he even make one?

He did not think about it. He erased excuses and regrets from his mind.

Until now, he had believed he absolutely had to hide the fact that he was a transmigrator.

If that had been his highest priority, he should have run away here.

He had stepped forward because he did not want to flee, and he did not want to regret it.

‘That is enough.’

Crash!

Yuri kicked off the ground. His body, wrapped in red ki flames, flew across the distance.

He did not look at Elena or Haryeong as he passed them. He did not say anything to them. They would have to talk eventually, but now was not the time.

“You brat!”

The Blood Fiend bared his yellow teeth and smiled. Ignorance had made Yuri fearless, he thought. At the same time, he felt just how long the years had been.

Ten years ago, these people would not even have been able to meet his eyes. In his prime, the Blood Fiend could have killed the likes of them with a single wave of his hand. If ten years had not passed. If he had not been defeated. If he had not suffered a Qi Deviation!

“Kaaah!”

His surging rage burst out in a roar. The force aura gathered in the Blood Fiend’s hands became even redder.

Crimson Tide Palm.

The martial art that had elevated the Blood Fiend to the seventh tier unfolded.

A direct hit meant death. Yuri had judged as much while watching Haryeong fight.

Force aura could only be opposed with force aura. Even among force auras, power varied greatly depending on tier and martial art, but if it was force aura, one could at least make contact with it.

Without force aura, even touching it was difficult. The moment Yuri’s ki flames made contact, they would be destroyed. After that, his body, diligently trained through external arts, would be shattered.

‘Can I redirect it...?’

The ultimate essence of the Fist of the Rending Cloud was swiftness, flow, and change.

Yuri’s hands moved. The blazing red ki flames became clouds and swept forward.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The palm force of the Crimson Tide Palm collided with the red clouds.

As expected, the clouds were destroyed in an instant. But for that brief moment, the palm force’s advance slowed. Yuri could not withstand it, so redirecting it was impossible, but he had confirmed that he could make it troublesome.

“Haryeong-nim!”

Yuri shouted.

The frozen Haryeong immediately sprang into action. She did not send Yuri a Voice Transmission, nor did she ask him for anything more.

Haryeong was an assassin and a martial artist. She had seen with her own eyes that the red clouds had briefly held back the Blood Fiend’s palm force, and she knew what she needed to do to break through this situation.

[My lady. Get a hold of yourself.]

Instead of sending Yuri a Voice Transmission, she sent one to Elena.

[H-Haryeong. This... what is this? Yuri is...]

[My lady. That is not what you should be thinking about now. If we do not kill the Blood Fiend, we will die. If we die, we cannot talk.]

Elena bit her lip at Haryeong’s rapid message.

She was right. Elena knew that. But she could not calm herself at all. A horrifying thought circled in her mind. It was a suspicion, but it was close to certainty. She even felt certain that it was true.

‘Yuri, you...’

Blood flowed from the lip she bit hard. Borrowing the pain and taste of blood, Elena forcibly brought herself back to her senses.

Yes. Haryeong was right. They had to overcome this situation before they could talk.

Lightning began to churn.

Fourth-tier magic could not pierce the Blood Fiend’s protective force aura. That was an absolute fact, like sword energy being unable to defeat sword aura.

The Master of the Dersia Mage Tower.

Heavenly Thunder Orca Dersia had evaluated the Heinderga Magic Formula Elena had created and shown her like this.

“If you can complete it according to your current design, you should be able to use it through the sixth tier.”

That meant the Heinderga Magic Formula had potential far beyond Elena’s current fourth tier.

“If you complete it better than the design, it might even approach the seventh tier.”

Depending on how she refined it, it was magic that could go beyond the sixth tier and challenge the seventh, the level of a Mage Tower Master.

‘Then now.’

Elena’s thoughts opened wide.

Only an instant passed, but Elena’s consciousness drifted through countless spells. The formulas of common magic she had memorized perfectly. The magic formulas of Dersia. The various magic books she had seen. Jang-un’s Seven Thunders, obtained through Yuri. And...

Heavenly Thunder Orca Dersia’s unique magic, Thunder God’s Mirage.

Magic that transformed both body and soul entirely into lightning energy.

Elena had experienced it only once. No matter how much of a genius she was, she could not understand and imitate a great mage’s magic after seeing it once.

But she would put the sensation she had felt then into her current magic. If lightning that split apart and spread was too weak, she would forge it into a single bolt of lightning.

Elena’s Soul Power resonated intensely with the mana around her. Countless spells and formulas drifting through her mind were added to her incomplete unique magic formula.

‘That brat...!’

The Blood Fiend’s face twisted.

One hit would kill Yuri.

Yet he could not land one.

It was hard to believe. The movement of the brat who had suddenly barged in was extraordinary. His fluid footwork and the movements of his arms were perfectly united, while his unceasing attacks were swift, flexible, and ever-changing. One moment clouds seemed to whirl before the Blood Fiend’s eyes, then they became spreading mist. They danced together with the wind, only to try to swallow him instead.

None of it could destroy the Blood Fiend’s force aura. It only bothered him.

But that annoyance had gone too far. Like a mosquito buzzing around his ears, Yuri threw his focus into disorder and made him swing his hands.

Yet no matter how he swung, he could not catch Yuri. Yuri swiftly retreated whenever it seemed he might be struck. The Blood Fiend could not focus entirely on pursuit, either. Whenever an opening appeared, hidden weapons rushed at him as if they had been waiting.

When he blocked the hidden weapons, a dagger covered in force aura stabbed deeply toward him. He dealt with it. After swinging both hands and knocking it aside, Yuri intervened again.

It was absurd. Only a third-tier martial fighter had joined the battle, yet the fight had become troublesome. Irritation boiled within him.

The brat’s martial art was strange.

His fist technique and footwork were strange as well, but the Blood Fiend felt that was because the damned brat understood and executed martial arts unbelievably well.

What was truly strange was the cultivation art that produced Yuri’s ki flames. A third-tier fighter’s internal energy should not even have been able to bother the Blood Fiend. Whether sword energy or ki flames, they should have vanished the instant they approached force aura.

Yet Yuri’s ki flames did not vanish. Instead, they held back the Blood Fiend’s force aura for an instant.

‘Is he truly... third-tier?’

The thought even came to him. Perhaps the Blood Fiend had simply grown too old... or perhaps the brat had learned some special martial art.

‘This martial art is... something...’

Even if his tier had fallen due to Qi Deviation, his mastery of martial arts remained. A third-tier martial fighter’s ki flames holding force aura for even an instant?

‘Has he learned an anti-demonic martial art?’

Just as magic had elements that countered each other, martial arts did too. Of course, even a countering martial art could not completely reverse a difference in tier, but judging by the brat’s skill...

Yuri seemed to have a deep understanding of the martial art he had learned.

‘Martial art...’

When the Blood Fiend focused on Yuri’s martial art, something bothered him.

It felt as though he had experienced it somewhere before.

He put off searching his memories based on that faint impression until later.

The old martial artists of the Demonic Cult were cunning.

If they were not strong, they died before growing old. Anyone who survived to old age naturally developed the cunning needed to kill opponents as a basic quality.

Giving flesh to take bone was a common saying. The Blood Fiend did not intend to give up even flesh.

Instead, he withdrew his force aura the moment Haryeong’s close-range dagger made contact.

Haryeong had been trying to draw the Blood Fiend into a prolonged battle and wear him down. The current balance was precarious enough to collapse at any moment, and she worried as Yuri desperately fended off attacks on a terrifyingly thin margin.

When her stabbing dagger penetrated deeply into the force aura, Haryeong closed the distance further. The dagger was steeped in deadly poison. Even grazing him would poison him. Then...

‘A mistake.’

Before she could judge the situation and retreat, a palm strike drove into her side.

Clang!

The strike shattered her protective force aura and shook Haryeong’s internal organs. She did not let out a groan, but blood burst from her mouth.

Yuri blocked the Blood Fiend’s path to the fallen Haryeong. Gritting his teeth, he unleashed the Fist of the Rending Cloud at the Blood Fiend.

But there was a limit to Yuri holding back the Blood Fiend alone.

“?!”

The Blood Fiend’s hair stood on end.

An enormous amount of mana was gathering at one point.

Unlike martial artists, who used the internal energy in their dantians, mages used the mana of this world. All the mana in this area was gathering there.

The mage was no longer visible. Only a storm of crackling lightning remained.

Yet the Blood Fiend could feel a clear gaze aimed at him from within that storm.

The sixth sense was especially sensitive to gazes containing emotions such as killing intent and hostility.

Elena’s resolve to kill him no matter what became the trigger.

A streak of light shot from the lightning that formed the storm.

Dodging was impossible. It did not loudly swallow the surroundings. The thread-thin light had already reached the Blood Fiend’s protective force aura the instant it flashed.

“Kaaah!”

The moment the light touched his protective force aura, the Blood Fiend immediately leaped backward. He intended to create distance and reduce its power somehow.

It was meaningless.

The storm of lightning connected to the light moved toward the Blood Fiend.

Crackle!

The lightning storm swallowed him.

“Hah... hngh... heuk...!”

Elena could no longer remain standing and collapsed where she was. She had poured all her strength into that spell. Whatever the result, Elena could no longer move.

“Argh!”

The Blood Fiend screamed from within the lightning storm.

“How dare you, how dare you!”

It was magic that transcended Elena’s tier.

But it could not kill the Blood Fiend.

At the center of the lightning energy scattering away because it could no longer be maintained, the Blood Fiend stood. Until now, Elena’s magic had not inflicted even a small wound on him, but blood now streamed from his mouth.

That was all.

Breathing heavily, the Blood Fiend pointed at Elena.

“You bitch...! I will not simply eat you. I will eat you slowly, very slowly, and carefully make sure you do not die...!”

Elena tried to stand somehow, but her legs had no strength left.

Haryeong stood unsteadily, holding her side. She vomited blood, then looked at Yuri.

“Should you retreat now, at least with Lady Elena?”

“I will not let you go!”

The Blood Fiend let out a monstrous cry and charged.

“Damn old man.”

Haryeong closed her blood-covered lips and passed Yuri.

They had to repeat the earlier battle.

Yuri would slow him down, and Haryeong would close in.

Could Haryeong fight as well as before? Moving was uncomfortable. Her left side, struck by the palm art, hurt badly. She could not turn her body to the left. Every breath brought the taste of blood.

“You.”

Haryeong could not fight as well as before. Unable to fend off the broadly sweeping hand, she was pushed back.

The Blood Fiend whispered to her.

“I will cut off your arms and legs and eat them before your eyes. Then I will throw your body to the monsters.”

‘What a terrible death.’

Everyone dies someday, but Haryeong had never imagined dying like that... Should she kill herself now instead? If she were subdued, she did not think she would even be able to do that.

Blood streamed through Haryeong’s tightly closed lips as she thought.

Thud!

Yuri’s body shook violently. The balance they had forcibly pieced together had already collapsed.

Elena could no longer use magic.

Haryeong could barely endure before falling.

Yuri alone could not hold on. His fists could not yet kill the Blood Fiend. If they continued fighting, they would all die in the end.

‘I am too weak.’

Yuri had not neglected his training, but it was not enough. To survive, he had to kill that old man, but Yuri did not currently possess the power to do so.

‘The wall.’

Yuri thought of the Heavenly Art of Annihilating Evil.

He thought of the fourth tier he had yet to reach.

He thought of the wall he had been unable to cross.

Would becoming fourth-tier solve this situation? Yuri did not think such things. He lacked strength right now. If he crossed this wall, he would become stronger than he was now.

Crack!

An attack Yuri failed to properly redirect made his body stagger. The taste of blood rose from his stomach. Tension made his chest churn. A bright red palm approached.

Death.

Yuri charged straight in. Crying out, he threw a punch.

The result of the punch he drove in properly was futile. The Blood Fiend was unharmed, while the taste of blood rising from Yuri’s stomach climbed to his throat.

Thwack!

Yuri saw Haryeong, who had moved in from the left in coordination with him, tumble across the ground.

“An insect.”

There was a foul smell. As Haryeong had said, a terrible stench came from the Blood Fiend’s mouth. His open hand approached Yuri’s face.

Everything looked slow to Yuri.

Within slowed time, Yuri saw the Heavenly Art of Annihilating Evil. Like when he had seen it during circulation and meditation, the Heavenly Art of Annihilating Evil appeared as a great flame.

Yuri understood what was needed to feed that flame.

Will.

Something different from not wanting to die, and different from wanting to live.

The killing intent to kill his opponent no matter what.

The flame fed on killing intent and blazed fiercely. The greatly swelling flame swallowed even the invisible wall above and burned it to ash.

The wall of the fourth tier that had kept Yuri wandering burned away.

Thud!

Yuri’s fist blocked the Blood Fiend’s palm.

Only force aura could collide with force aura.

What covered Yuri’s fist now was force aura.

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