WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 39: In April, All the Flowers of the World Have Faded (10)
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Morning sunlight stretched long across the wooden floor.
Seo Muryang was in a good mood for the first time in a while.
“People really do need baths.”
The screams he had heard last night had been lovely.
So had the sensation of striking someone who seemed as if they would crumble at the slightest touch.
Even drawing their blood properly and using it as bathwater had been perfect.
The heat in his heart had melted away, leaving even his mind smooth and refreshed.
Birdsong.
Cool morning air.
Seo Muryang smiled as he fell asleep in his quarters.
‘Hm...?’
A faint sense of wrongness was what woke him again.
An unease that was hard to explain.
‘What is this...?’
The sudden awakening left a heavy irritation pressing down on his entire body.
He had been sure he would sleep deeply for at least four hours before lazily opening his eyes.
‘Why...?’
Annoyed by the unexplained discomfort, Seo Muryang rolled roughly onto his right side, like someone grumbling in their sleep.
Thud!
Something stabbed into his left shoulder.
Right where his heart would have been if he had remained still.
“Argh!”
Bang!
He instinctively surged with true qi, struck the ground, and launched himself into the air.
His eyes snapped toward a woman in black. Her expression was blank, and she held a bloodstained dagger.
Seo Muryang did not waste time thinking.
Floating in midair, he curled his thumb and forefinger together.
Bang!
He fired Finger Flicking Art.
Using the recoil to twist his body, he landed on the floor.
Fwish!
Eun-yeong brushed past the Finger Flicking Art and kicked off the wooden floor as she rushed at Seo Muryang. Though she had pushed off with great force, not a single footstep could be heard.
Only white vapor billowed from between her lips.
“You crazy bitch?”
Seo Muryang stared directly into Eun-yeong's eyes.
They were filled with nothing but the will to kill him. Her body shot toward him at terrifying speed.
Yet he was not afraid in the slightest.
He smiled instead.
“What could this be? Where did something like you come from?”
Blood streamed from his left shoulder, but he moved as if it did not matter, evading Eun-yeong's dagger. He twisted his hand and struck her lower abdomen.
Crack!
Martial force flowed from him as naturally as breathing.
Eun-yeong did not even have the chance to fly backward.
The martial force wave that struck her body swept through her whole frame.
Even a martial artist who had mastered Breathing Smoke into Clouds would have had their insides turned to mush by that blow.
“Pff!”
Blood burst from her mouth.
Thud.
Eun-yeong collapsed to the floor.
Smack!
Seo Muryang kicked her wrist, sending her dagger flying away.
“Sniff. Sniff.”
He stood before her and inhaled.
A thin smile stretched across his lips.
“Well, look at that. You smell like face powder.”
He lightly nudged the seated Eun-yeong with his foot.
“You. What's your connection to Cheongun Pavilion? Why do you smell like Cheongun Pavilion?”
Tap. Tap.
“I don't think the master of Cheongun Pavilion would be this brave. Could it be... you came because of that girl Choran? For revenge? Hmm. What should I do? Should I use this crime as an excuse to cut off the heads of the pavilion master and Choran first? It’s about time I tightened discipline.”
Seo Muryang snickered, then took an exaggerated step back.
“Whew. Killing intent. You're still giving off killing intent in that state? But listen. If you can't even hide it properly, do you think I'd let you catch me?”
His thin lips split into an even narrower grin, as though he found this unbearably amusing.
He took another step and a half forward, pressing close to Eun-yeong.
Then he bent down and whispered into her ear.
“How about it? Hold on until then. Don't die, all right? Don't you want to see Choran's head?”
“Huff!”
Prick!
“...!”
Something thin stabbed into the nape of his neck.
Seo Muryang instinctively jerked away.
Thud!
Before he could pull his foot back completely, a dagger buried itself in the top of his left foot.
“Argh!”
“Ptoo!”
Eun-yeong spat out the thin tube she had held in her mouth and pushed herself up.
As if by magic, she now held another dagger in each hand.
“You... Don't tell me!”
Seo Muryang's eyes widened.
‘She pretended to be hurt?’
To make him lower his guard?
His teeth ground together.
“I got fooled?”
Hooo...
Eun-yeong did not answer. White breath billowed from her lips as she rushed him again.
Seo Muryang tried to respond immediately, but a dizzy spell hit him, and strength drained from his whole body.
‘Poison...?’
The needle that had pierced his neck had been coated in paralytic poison.
“Ghk!”
Sizzle!
A heat haze rose above Seo Muryang's shoulder.
The poison that had seeped into his body could not withstand the heat of True Flame. It burned into black smoke and escaped through his pores.
A martial artist at the first-rate realm could detoxify most poisons on their own.
Still, his reaction had slowed a little because of it.
Eun-yeong's dagger aimed for his neck.
No, perhaps not. With one turn of her flexible wrist, the blade might stab his chest, or suddenly dip to pierce his thigh. No one could know.
Seo Muryang could not read her killing intent.
‘Then the killing intent from before was intentional...?’
To make him lower his guard?
What kind of bullshit was this...?
Shocked, Seo Muryang drew heat into his Eight Extraordinary Vessels.
True qi surged along the roiling Eight Extraordinary Vessels.
“Gah!”
With a roar, he flung his entire body away and kicked off the floor.
Crack!
The wooden floor split along its grain, and his left foot, which had been pinned by the dagger, came free.
The recoil from his kick, backed by martial force, propelled Seo Muryang explosively backward. He flew away as though struck by a giant's hand.
Crash! Crack!
He smashed through the sliding doors and flew outside, digging his right hand and right foot into the ground as he skidded to a stop.
Screech...
“Huuuu...”
The haze along his back thickened, as though it were burning.
Blood dripped from the shoulder that had been stabbed by the dagger, aggravated by his violent movements.
Seo Muryang gritted his teeth.
“What are you idiots doing? It's an assassin! You useless bastards!”
“...!”
The formerly quiet Golden Powder Gang suddenly erupted into chaos.
The sound of people grabbing weapons and rushing over rose from every direction.
Even then, Seo Muryang did not take his eyes off Eun-yeong as she walked out of the building.
His eyes narrowed.
“I was wondering how you endured the martial force strike at the beginning...”
His gaze dropped to Eun-yeong's lower abdomen.
“You over-tempered the injured area, didn't you? Only in patches, so it wouldn't evaporate immediately. You built a peculiar structure with it. That's how you're enduring.”
When he scanned Eun-yeong with qi sense, he could feel a trace amount of essence qi leaking from around her lower abdomen.
Clear proof that she had over-tempered her lower abdomen, perhaps even parts of her shattered internal organs.
Essence qi was energy that could remain fixed while retaining strength and pressure. If one handled it skillfully enough, it was not impossible to use it as a temporary replacement for destroyed body parts.
“But that's only a temporary measure, isn't it? A mere assassin couldn't possibly have learned a transcendent secret art passed down only by great and prestigious sects...”
Seo Muryang laughed in disbelief.
“You came here intending to die from the beginning, didn't you? Not prepared to die. You included actually dying as part of your plan. Ha. Did you want to kill me that badly?”
He had experienced his fair share of life-and-death battles.
He had fought enemies who charged desperately because they could not win otherwise. But this was the first time he had seen someone enter a fight after laying a trap with their own life.
He was not someone who was easily impressed by others, yet goosebumps rose across his body at that moment.
“So this is an assassin. The sort you only hear about in martial world legends. A real assassin.”
He grinned.
“But even after going that far, you still couldn't kill me?”
Rumble!
“Gang Leader!”
“There! The assassin is over there!”
The Golden Powder Gang members who had rushed over in an instant surrounded Eun-yeong.
“What will you do now?”
Seo Muryang sneered.
Eun-yeong did not answer.
“Hooo...”
White vapor poured from between her lips.
Then she moved.
Tap!
She charged toward the Black Path members of the Golden Powder Gang surrounding her from every direction.
“Chop her to pieces!”
Every kind of blade came pouring down on her.
Broad sabers.
Straight-backed sabers.
Goose-feather sabers with straight blades that curved only slightly at the tip.
Willow-leaf sabers with broadly curved blades.
Eun-yeong rushed between them without hesitation.
She had the skill to tear through three or four Golden Powder Gang members in an instant.
But they did not matter to her.
She looked only at the narrow path appearing between the descending blades.
Then she threw her whole body into that small opening, wrapping herself in true qi.
Boom!
For the first time, a sound rang out from her footstep, and a refined martial force wave swept across the ground.
Boom!
Her body accelerated through the air like a cannonball, piercing through the Golden Powder Gang members.
“What...!”
Eun-yeong crossed the layered encirclement in a single step and shot straight toward Seo Muryang.
“Huh...?!”
Even Seo Muryang was caught off guard.
He had thought she might break through the encirclement, but never like this.
“Crazy...!”
Eun-yeong was covered in blood as she rushed toward him.
A red trail marked the ground behind her.
That was the price of escaping through the impossibly narrow opening in one step.
She had forced her way through it, giving up flesh from her arms and legs to every blade that caught her.
All for one chance.
One chance to catch Seo Muryang off guard and close the distance.
Seo Muryang hurriedly fired Finger Flicking Art with his right hand.
Bang!
Eun-yeong threw herself to the ground as though collapsing, avoiding the attack. Her blood-soaked leg could no longer support her, so she slammed her knee against the ground and hurled herself forward.
A dagger was clenched in the right hand she had preserved until the end.
“You...!”
Seo Muryang had already fired Finger Flicking Art with his right hand.
Bang!
This time, he fired Finger Flicking Art with his left.
A haze rose above his left shoulder, where the dagger wound continued to drip blood.
Muscles and joints over-tempered beyond their limit creaked loudly.
Even so, he had managed to raise his injured left arm and fire Finger Flicking Art.
Crack!
The move he had saved until the very end landed cleanly.
Eun-yeong's right collarbone shattered.
Her body jolted in place and spun, and her final strike sliced helplessly through empty air.
“Fucking hell...!”
Seo Muryang clutched his trembling left arm with his right hand.
He had forced his left arm through over-tempering because there had been no time, but it could leave serious aftereffects.
“Huff... Hah...”
With her face pressed to the ground, Eun-yeong twisted her eyes upward and glared at Seo Muryang.
Her forehead was drenched in sweat from repeatedly forcing out strength beyond her limit in such a short time.
A chill he could not explain crept over Seo Muryang as he shouted.
“What are you doing? Kill this bitch already!”
He gave the order because he did not want to approach Eun-yeong himself.
But his subordinates were not the first to react.
Tap.
A faint sound came from behind him.
The sound of someone stepping on the ground.
Refined to the utmost, like a cat landing.
Seo Muryang felt goosebumps rise along his neck.
His qi sense moved sharply, detecting a blade extending from behind him.
Though he realized it a little late.
“You bastards...!”
His Eight Extraordinary Vessels surged.
The first-rate realm was the realm where one melted essence with True Flame to create qi.
Qi was harmony.
When the qi roiling within the Eight Extraordinary Vessels resonated through the body, true qi mixed with strength and harmony arose throughout the body.
Like an electric current running through metal within a churning magnetic field.
Except this was not simple strength. It was a special force that twisted phenomena and brought harmony.
Whoom!
The haze rising from Seo Muryang's body spun as it was swept into a vortex.
The harmony created by a first-rate martial artist's true qi.
Without moving or exerting strength, the vortex that arose around Seo Muryang wrapped around his body and turned him backward.
At the same time, the vortex tried to twist away the approaching blade.
Yet though the blade was caught in the vortex, its path did not bend much.
A white blade thrust straight at him.
Seo Muryang had no choice but to hurriedly fire Finger Flicking Art again to knock it away.
Clang!
‘If only I had a dagger...!’
Grinding his teeth, Seo Muryang finally saw his opponent's face.
Seo Muryang's eyes met Yeon Sowol's.
“You...!”
He stared in shock.
“You learned the sword in that time? And you can even release martial force?”
In the passing wind, it felt as though the wind from the Jipseong Riverbank that night had mixed in.
Yeon Sowol's eyes were cold.
He recovered the sword that had missed and turned his body, sending the blade sweeping out.
With Sword Fingers formed in his left hand, he held fast to himself. Then he put his whole body and heart behind the blade he swept out.
Bang!
Seo Muryang frantically fired Finger Flicking Art once more.
Yeon Sowol's sword was knocked away again.
But unlike before, he did not stagger.
He dispersed martial force with martial force, immediately regained his stance, and thrust his sword forward once more.
With Eun-yeong having rendered his left foot and left arm useless, Seo Muryang felt faint.
“Gang Leader!”
That was when the Golden Powder Gang members, who had reacted too late, intervened.
Slash!
A broad saber and a willow-leaf saber swung with force, blocking Yeon Sowol's path.
They appeared to be among Seo Muryang's more skilled subordinates, for martial force clung to their blades.
Crunch!
Clang!
“Huh...?”
The blades infused with martial force snapped in half beneath Yeon Sowol's casually swung Sword Fingers.
“Huh?”
“What?”
Why were they breaking like that?
Against only two fingers?
Faced with something no one had expected, everyone flinched and froze.
Whoosh!
Only Yeon Sowol took the first step.
Thud!
The tip of his sword pierced straight through Seo Muryang's neck.
“Ghk...”
Slash!
Yeon Sowol drew the blade sideways as he pulled it free.
“Keh...”
With his neck nearly severed, Seo Muryang made a deflating sound. He collapsed onto the ground and flailed his limbs.
“...”
“...Gang Leader?”
Seo Muryang flailed.
Blood darkened the ground.
Flail.
Flail...
Silence fell over the scene.
Looking down at him, Yeon Sowol thought,
‘...It really does feel different.’
The difference between killing to survive and attacking first to kill someone when his own life was not immediately in danger.
An unpleasant feeling he could not explain seeped into his chest.
But now was not the time.
‘This isn't the time for that.’
Smack!
Yeon Sowol kicked off the ground.
He stopped in front of Eun-yeong, shielding her as she lay on the floor.
Staring down the Golden Powder Gang members frozen in silence, he asked Eun-yeong in a whisper.
“Are you alive?”
“Yeah.”
Eun-yeong rested her forehead against the ground and looked up at Yeon Sowol.
She was wounded badly enough to seem on the verge of death, yet she was unbelievably calm.
Yeon Sowol asked again.
“Can you live?”
“No.”
“...Try to live. Please.”
“Forget it. Go.”
“...If you die, I'll carry your body out at least.”
“Why?”
“Miss Choran and Miss Eun-yeong both helped me. I can't leave you here.”
“Go.”
As the two spoke, the Golden Powder Gang members began to come to their senses one by one.
“Gang Leader...”
“Fuck...”
They stared at Seo Muryang, dead with his neck half cut through, in shock and rage.
Seo Muryang had been cruel, but he had always given them plenty of gold.
Their anger was justified, at least to them.
Without Seo Muryang, none of them could have enjoyed such a prosperous life.
“You...! Yeon Sowol of Windflow Martial Academy!”
“You must really think we're a joke...”
“Our Golden Powder Gang had never been enemies with you!”
Yeon Sowol asked the people shouting over one another,
“Are you going to fight?”
“We'll tear you into a thousand pieces.”
“My father will be here soon.”
“We'll throw your torn corpse to Windflow Sword.”
Yeon Sowol sighed.
He gripped the Demon-Severing Sword he had received from the Governor-General of Liangguang in his right hand and formed Sword Fingers with his left.
Bending his knees halfway, he said,
“Let's finish everything today.”
He pointed the tip of his sword at them.
“Arrrgh!”
The Black Path members of the Golden Powder Gang, furious, charged toward Yeon Sowol and Eun-yeong.
Footnotes:
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