WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: DereKimchi

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◈ I Became the Mad Demon in a Novel ◈

Chapter 10: Thorough-Reading Addict

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The Mad Demon, a cripple when it came to internal energy, was barely shown moving in the original.

The author of Mad Heaven Records usually just dropped the Mad Demon into the story out of nowhere after * * *.

Maybe even the author had found it difficult to describe how a Mad Demon with no internal energy got around.

But this was unexpected.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

The violent wind pressure had the skin on my face flapping wildly.

I had thought the Ten Armies of the Mad Demon would have some unusual method of travel.

Instead, these bastards were simply carrying me while they ran.

Whenever one ran out of strength, they switched runners. The next guy would snatch me out of the air with a sharp grab. It was a shitty system.

What was worse, this one was not even carrying me on their back. They were running while holding me in a princess carry.

Whenever the road bent sharply, my face got shoved right into their chest.

I mean, I was the Mad Demon, for God's sake. It was humiliating.

Still, their lightness arts were incredible.

They stepped on sharp rocks and launched themselves like cannonballs.

They wound around trees, making exquisite use of centrifugal force. It was practically acrobatics.

Then, whenever the demonic energy around their bodies grew dense, acceleration hit hard enough to bend my neck backward.

Every spot they stepped on shattered or caved in.

Watching people leap dozens of meters at a time with my own eyes was truly astonishing.

You guys wouldn't need cars if you came to the modern world.

Then they all stopped at once.

"Chuk-ang. We have left the territory of the orthodox factions."

"Whew. Is that so?"

Sure enough, the smooth official road had disappeared.

I looked at the scattered old thatched houses along the narrow, rough dirt road.

It felt like a shantytown from a martial arts novel.

"Hng!"

The listless old people who had been squatting around blankly spotted us and immediately prostrated themselves.

These guys might be terrifying, but I wasn't that scary.

"Aren't you hungry? Doesn't look like there are any inns around here."

Thwap!

One of them immediately vanished, leaving a blurred afterimage. Before long, they reappeared holding a dog with its tongue hanging out.

Fwoooosh!

Blue flames burst from his palm.

The limp dog turned into a whole roast without even getting the chance to yelp.

It had been cutely wagging its tail beside one of the thatched houses moments ago.

"Please eat."

"…"

A pungent smoke stung my nose.

I was too dumbfounded to speak.

What kind of treatment had the original Mad Demon put them through for them to take everything this far?

They had turned a puppy that had been happily playing around into a lump of meat without a second thought.

It wasn't even our dog.

Did these people have no concept of property?

Demonic Cult this, Demonic Cult that. I'd only heard of them, but they really did operate on a whole different set of principles.

But this was a martial arts novel. I had no choice but to become a Demonic Cult thug too.

I was so hungry my mind was foggy.

The clouds drifting past were already starting to look like chunks of meat.

Crunch.

The instant I bit down hard on a front leg, powerful resistance surged through my jaw, as though my teeth would bounce out.

Maybe because it had spent its whole life running over dirt, it felt like chewing rubber.

There wasn't a trace of fat to be found. Nothing but tough muscle fibers tangled between my teeth.

"Ugh…"

That uniquely gamey wild smell rose with the acrid smoke.

Would this be what it tasted like if you injected your stomach with dozens of Wegovy shots?

This wasn't meat. It was disgusting charcoal.

No matter how hungry I was, it was beyond edible.

"Ptoo. You guys eat it."

At that, every one of them looked at me with blazing eyes.

"Please lift the Chuk-ang's authority."

The Chuk-ang's authority? What was that?

I didn't know what it meant, but it didn't cost money, so I decided to lift it for now.

I nodded.

The moment I did, their leader, Que Biao, snatched up a hind leg at frightening speed.

Ah, I had overheard enough of their conversations to learn a few of their names.

"Whew, thanks, Jin-gwang."

What? He was talking casually right away?

Did lifting the Chuk-ang's authority mean it was no-honorifics time now?

Crunch! Crunch!

The moment I nodded, they buried their heads and began tearing into the dog meat.

Riiip!

Que Biao tore off and chewed the tough hide and fascia whole.

Soon, their mouths were smeared with black charcoal powder, white marrow, and undercooked blood.

It looked less like a meal and more like they were shredding meat.

Why did they have no intention of removing the bones? This was seriously making me want to piss myself.

Then Que Biao wiped their bloodied mouth with their sleeve and slowly raised their head.

"Why did you leave that bitch, Yeowol, alive?"

Yeowol?

Who was that?

"If the Killing Veil learns we ignored the commission, they'll make things troublesome. No, Fierce Lord will latch onto this matter. Are you listening, Jin-gwang?"

I had been cramming unfamiliar information into my head so fast that I failed to react.

Before that, how was I supposed to answer when I knew nothing?

I gave Que Biao a little chin gesture with my usual indifferent expression.

"Go on."

Que Biao sighed and spoke.

"I will return and kill that bitch. I have examined their formation and traps from every angle, so I won't be caught again. Trust me, Jin-gwang."

Ah, Yeowol was the Swordwood Lord's name.

That meant this had not been some random incident.

No wonder the situation had felt strange.

No matter how insane the Mad Demon was, would he really massacre a group of people just for interrupting his meditation?

So this had been both a mission and a commission.

"Our route has been completely exposed. Can you really succeed?"

Que Biao ground his teeth at my question.

"Can you endure this? Those bastards will surely go around boasting that they defeated the Mad Demon."

Ten pairs of eyes gathered around me, blazing like fire.

They valued the Divine Cult's honor, no, the Mad Demon's reputation more than their own lives.

'Hm.'

To be clear, I didn't consider the Swordwood Lord an ally.

But they weren't completely without value, either.

No, the gallery's Return Seekers’ group itself had plenty of uses.

My decision was made.

"There will be no changing my mind. We return to the Divine Cult."

Que Biao's jaw muscles bulged.

For someone who valued honor above life, this order seemed difficult to endure.

"By the way, Brother, have you mastered a new sword art?"

"Hm?"

"It was a sword I'd never seen before."

The one who approached to ease the mood was the youngest, Tie Zhen.

It was difficult to adjust to seeing someone who had brutally sliced apart the heads of Hundred Snakes Valley men smiling so warmly.

Hmm. What should I say?

I answered with a question.

"What did you think?"

Tie Zhen's expression immediately brightened.

"It felt like a sword unbound by any path. Freer, perhaps. But…"

"But?"

"It also seemed somewhat obsessed with efficiency alone. Still, it was a sword form I had never imagined before, so it was refreshing."

Come to think of it, martial artists in martial arts novels gave their martial arts grand narratives.

Even Mount Hua Sect piled on endless, long-winded enlightenment about blossoming plum flowers and whatever else.

As someone who had read martial arts novels for years, I could honestly say that even while reading it, I usually had no idea what any of it meant.

"Efficiency."

To masters of the martial world, the word efficiency was practically a vicious insult that denied the foundation of martial arts.

The essence of enlightenment gained after thousands, tens of thousands of sword strokes.

The plum blossom that bloomed from a sword wielded for a lifetime was the natural order, the hardship of life itself.

But what about ordinary modern people like us?

Addicted to Shorts, we couldn't even watch movies properly anymore.

At some point, whenever I searched for a movie or drama, I had begun adding the keyword "ending included."

The instinct of a skip freak, bypassing tedious narratives to chase only the conclusion.

The result was obvious when someone like me, pursuing extreme efficiency, swung a sword.

Motion within stillness, softness overcoming hardness.

Nothing like that could possibly seep into my sword.

Then curiosity suddenly rose in me.

"How does it compare to the Six Mad Demon Forms?"

Tie Zhen's expression immediately twisted with discomfort.

If an answer didn't readily come from their mouth, the answer was obvious.

"B-Brother, since you do not fear such new attempts, you will surely achieve great things again! Hahaha!"

Whew. Just as I thought.

They meant it was too embarrassing even to compare with the original Six Mad Demon Forms.

In martial arts theory, pursuing efficiency alone was the so-called deviant path.

The end of martial artists who chased only efficiency instead of following the proper route was predictable.

They either died young from qi deviation or lost their minds when their internal energy ran wild, falling into soul loss.

But me?

'I have no internal energy to lose in the first place.'

Qi deviation was a luxury reserved for people with internal energy.

At least for me, there was no risk even if I ignored orthodox martial theory and pursued only speed and efficiency.

Could I perhaps complete a sword art even stronger than the Six Mad Demon Forms?

After all, efficiency meant faster results.

A sword art like a mathematical function, one that produced only death instead of enduring enlightenment and hardship.

As I smirked, Que Biao spoke again.

"Jin-gwang. Think once more. Returning to our cult like this means placing collars around our own necks and handing the leashes to that cunning Fierce Lord."

Fierce Lord.

My attention was currently consumed by Blood Lord, but Fierce Lord was actually more dangerous.

The very word fierce in their epithet represented their vicious and violent nature.

On top of that, they were clever, and above all, their mastery of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art was abnormal.

A monster beyond the level of the younger generation. Saying he was like Messi in high school would be the perfect comparison.

If they continued to grow, it was nearly certain that they would become one of the Seven Seats.

"There will be no changing my mind."

Discontented looks immediately erupted from all around.

"Even so, I'm the Chuk-ang, you bastards."

Perhaps realizing no-honorifics time was over, they dropped the bones in their hands and threw themselves into full prostration.

Que Biao spoke while lying facedown.

"…Do you perhaps have another plan in mind? If so, please tell us."

A leader was a leader, after all.

Even after I reasserted my authority, Que Biao looked determined not to yield.

'A plan.'

Of course I had one.

Could I enter the horrible demon's den known as the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult without any preparation?

But should I tell these guys beforehand?

"Why has our Divine Cult become such a mess?"

Every chaos in history arose when power was vacant.

Naturally, every shitty thing happening in the Demonic Cult right now was because one person wasn't where they were supposed to be.

"What do you mean by that…"

The Heavenly Demon.

The person who had suddenly abandoned all affairs and entered Demon-Shedding Seclusion.

Maybe the author had set it up and forgotten, because the Heavenly Demon's Demon-Shedding Seclusion never ended all the way to the finale.

"Yeah. I'm going to wake the Divine Demon."

"Gasp!"

You want to know how I planned to pull the Heavenly Demon out of Demon-Shedding Seclusion?

I was the kind of person who took an hour to read a single web novel chapter.

An extreme thorough-reading addict.

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