WeTried Translations
Translator: ZERO_SUGAR
Editor: Abstract
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 101: Kang Mui (3)
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No Ik-bong was a seventh-rank Inspector Censor and one of the three squad leaders of the Imperial Palace's hidden Flying Horse Brigade.
Even now, the trembling would not leave him easily.
Though he had been injured, his dantian had not been shattered, so his Ki sense remained open.
‘...The Left Assistant Censor is such a monster.’
The fact that O Mu-yang had concealed his Martial Arts was shocking enough.
Yet the unfathomably deep life energy made No Ik-bong realize that the Left Assistant Censor was a master he could not begin to compare himself to.
‘At that level, O Mu-yang might be on par with a Brigade leader or even the Deputy Chief Brigade Leader.’
The Imperial Palace had raised five organizations.
The martial prowess of the Brigade leaders who headed them was in no way inferior to that of the masters renowned throughout the martial world.
Two people commanded even them.
They were the Chief Brigade Leader and the Deputy Chief Brigade Leader.
No Ik-bong had felt the same pressure from O Mu-yang.
‘Damn it.’
Frightened out of his wits, he had revealed the mission.
The Imperial Palace's Flying Horse Brigade had given him three orders.
The first was to assess Changcheon Martial Academy's level and shake up its interior through an investigation.
That was the foundation for intervening in Changcheon Martial Academy and the martial world.
The second was to pressure Yu Jin-sung, a Changcheon Martial Academy graduate, and obstruct the investigation. That was meant to build the justification that martial artists should not be appointed to official positions.
The third and final order was this.
[We heard that the person in charge of guarding the Changcheon Martial Archive was caught up in the incident and died. This works out well. Use the investigation as an excuse to search the archive.]
[Search the archive for what?]
[There is a rumor that the True Heavenly Martial Scripture, said to contain the essence of all Martial Arts, is inside the Changcheon Martial Archive. Confirm whether it truly exists.]
[...And if it does?]
[If it is the essence of all Martial Arts, it belongs in the Imperial Palace Martial Archive. Bring it back without fail.]
Unable to withstand O Mu-yang's pressure, No Ik-bong had revealed all of it.
Strictly speaking, that was a serious crime of leaking classified information.
He could only worry over what would happen to him now.
The one fortunate thing was that...
[Hmm. I see. Yes, you have been given a truly difficult mission.]
After learning of the secret mission, O Mu-yang had simply left as if there were nothing more to discuss.
No Ik-bong could not understand it.
The revelation that O Mu-yang had hidden Martial Arts had filled him with terror for a moment.
He had thought O Mu-yang might kill him.
‘What is the purpose behind this?’
He had been wondering that when...
-Bulge!
A strange sensation came over him.
No Ik-bong slowly touched his cheek.
It was where Mumu had slapped him. The area was bruised, and pus had welled up beneath the skin.
Then...
-Bulge! Bulge!
‘What?’
Something was wrong.
He had touched his cheek because of the strange sensation, only to feel the blood vessels twisting.
He had not noticed it at all until now, but it was as though the flow of his ki had become tangled. He could no longer control the blood vessels in his face.
‘Why all of a sudden...!?’
At that moment, No Ik-bong recalled what had happened before O Mu-yang left the room.
[Your cheek is quite a mess.]
O Mu-yang had touched his cheek several times as he said that.
The pain from Mumu's slap had been so severe that the physician had treated him with anesthetic, leaving him unable to feel a thing.
[Then get plenty of rest.]
With those words, O Mu-yang had left.
No Ik-bong's eyes shook wildly as he remembered.
O Mu-yang had not spared him.
That remark about getting plenty of rest meant he would rest forever...
“D-damn it... Gghhh...”
-Papapapak!
“Cough! Cough!”
The blood vessels in his cheek and forehead burst, and No Ik-bong collapsed onto the bed.
Once he died, the Censorate warriors guarding the door entered.
They did not look shocked in the slightest upon seeing No Ik-bong's fallen body.
Instead, they pressed his pulse to make sure he was truly dead. Then, wearing strange smiles, one of them rushed outside as if something urgent had happened.
* * *
-Kwaaaaaang!
“Urgh!”
Kang Mu-i's body, struck in the head by Mumu's palm, bored into the ground as though someone had hammered a stake into it.
Mumu had seemed to strike lightly, yet the power was so immense that Kang Mu-i's mind felt as if it had been shaken apart.
With that one blow, Kang Mu-i understood for certain.
‘This bastard?’
That monstrous strength already surpassed his Ki-Force Unity.
No wonder Master Heo, Sa Mu-heo, had been unable to stand against Mumu and ended up in such a state.
Kang Mu-i's thoughts raced.
‘There is a way, but...’
He could not be certain.
Using that method in this situation might even backfire.
It might let him deal with this monster, but it would ruin the plan.
‘Do I have to accept that?’
As Kang Mu-i wrestled with the decision, Mumu grabbed his head and pulled him straight out of the ground.
The moment Kang Mu-i emerged, he launched a kicking technique at Mumu's head.
It was Ki-Force Unity imbued with ki manifestation once again, but...
-Puck!
Mumu's neck did not so much as bend. Instead, Kang Mu-i's foot hurt even worse.
What was this bastard's body made of? Why did Ki-Force Unity, which he had believed was the ideal form, not work at all?
It was absurd.
Mumu spoke to him in a flat voice.
“You are tougher than I expected, senior.”
Mumu had driven him into the ground with the intention of breaking bones without killing him.
Yet judging by the counterattack, Kang Mu-i had not been hurt as badly as intended.
Mumu's guess was right.
‘To think I had to use Ki-Force Unity for defense.’
Kang Mu-i had covered his entire body with Ki-Force Unity the instant he struck the ground.
Otherwise, his spine and skull would have shattered first.
“Do not underestimate me...”
-Puck!
Before he could finish, Mumu struck Kang Mu-i's abdomen with his palm.
“Ghk!”
The pain was as though he had been struck with an iron mace. Kang Mu-i's body flew backward, smashed through the ground, and rolled away.
-Kukwakwaang!
“Cough, cough...”
Kang Mu-i knelt on one knee and coughed up blood.
He had protected his abdomen with Ki-Force Unity, but the destructive force had pierced through it and inflicted an internal injury.
It was strength beyond imagination.
-Step. Step.
“Let us increase the intensity little by little.”
-Shuuuuu!
Steam rose from Mumu's gray, heated skin as he approached.
He looked like a War God.
The pressure he gave off was immense.
‘What... is this bastard?’
He felt like an unnatural being that ignored every law.
Sa Mu-heo believed it might be the power of an artifact, but Kang Mu-i was beginning to think otherwise.
He did not know about ordinary artifacts, but an artifact that bestowed such incredible power could not come without a price.
Artifacts carried risks.
They never lent such extraordinary power without demanding something in return.
Had Kang Mu-i not paid a price himself in order to use ‘that’?
‘...There is something.’
Kang Mu-i believed there was something about Mumu.
There was something that could not be explained through muscle training alone.
At that moment, Mumu spoke.
“How much do I have to hit you before you talk, senior?”
Kang Mu-i snorted at the question and answered.
“Hah... hah... I told you I do not know anything.”
“I figured you would say that.”
The instant he finished speaking, Mumu reached for Kang Mu-i.
Kang Mu-i narrowly avoided Mumu's hand with a half-step, then spun both hands in a spiral toward Mumu's chest and unleashed a double palm strike.
‘Ki-Force Unity's secret technique, Shattering Spiral Palm!’
-Paaaaang!
Ki manifestation whirled sharply in a spiral and bored into Mumu's chest.
Mumu's body shifted back slightly.
Kang Mu-i found the sight unbelievable.
‘It should have enough power to shred even a house-sized boulder from within.’
Yet all it did was push Mumu back slightly.
“...Is your body truly an indestructible golden body?”
Mumu tilted his head at the question, then said,
“I do not know what that is, but anyone can become like this if they train their muscles hard enough.”
-Bulge! Bulge!
Mumu flexed his chest muscles, making them writhe.
“...”
Was Mumu making a joke?
Who could become like this by training their muscles?
As Kang Mu-i stared in disbelief, something caught his eye.
‘!?’
Mumu's clothing over his chest had been completely torn apart by the Shattering Spiral Palm, revealing the Jade Medallion hanging around his neck.
It bore an unusual triangular symbol crossed by two lines.
Kang Mu-i's eyes shook at the sight.
“You!”
“Do you feel like talking now?”
“How do you have that?”
“That?”
Mumu followed Kang Mu-i's gaze.
It was his Jade Medallion.
Mumu tilted his head, then asked,
“Do you happen to know something about this Jade Medallion?”
“...?”
Kang Mu-i frowned.
That was what he wanted to ask.
He knew the faces of all those people who possessed Jade Medallions, but he had never seen this bastard before.
Mumu's eyes lit up at Kang Mu-i's reaction.
For the first time, he had met someone who knew about his Jade Medallion.
“Do you know what this is?”
Kang Mu-i narrowed his eyes.
‘Does this bastard not know who I am?’
Otherwise, there was no reason for someone carrying a Jade Medallion to ask such a question.
Yet his own doubts deepened.
How did someone he had never seen before possess that Jade Medallion?
If Mumu was around his age, it was even more impossible that Kang Mu-i would not know him.
“...You do not know me?”
“I do not. Did we know each other? If we did, can you tell me what our relationship was?”
Kang Mu-i became certain from Mumu's response.
Mumu did not know what the Jade Medallion was at all.
Seeing Mumu's abnormal strength, he clearly had not acquired it by chance.
‘How interesting.’
For a new owner of a Jade Medallion to appear in this situation.
Mumu clenched his fist and spoke.
“I do not know what this is, so if you said that just to get out of this situation...”
-Swish!
Before Mumu could finish, Kang Mu-i pulled something from his robes.
It was a Jade Medallion bearing the exact same symbol as Mumu's.
Mumu's eyes widened.
“They are... the same?”
Kang Mu-i smirked at Mumu's reaction.
Until a moment ago, he had considered this a troublesome situation.
But for an owner of a Jade Medallion who did not even know who he was to appear before him, what greater stroke of fortune could there be?
-Tatatatata!
‘Good.’
People had been gathering here because of his fight with Mumu.
They would arrive soon.
His original plan had been to defeat Mumu at full strength and escape, but Mumu's power had exceeded his expectations, making that difficult.
If Mumu was a Jade Medallion owner, though, the situation was different.
Kang Mu-i said to Mumu,
“Now that you have seen my Jade Medallion, you understand that we are not unrelated, correct?”
“Not unrelated?”
“I would like to talk more, but we cannot do that if we keep fighting here.”
“Why not?”
“Do you really need to ask? Because of you, both of us could end up in danger.”
“Danger?”
“Then again, since you do not even know what that medallion is, you probably do not understand what you have gotten yourself into. Still, that is fortunate. I have seen your medallion.”
Mumu became certain from Kang Mu-i's words that he knew something about him.
Kang Mu-i had to be someone who knew the secret of Mumu's birth, the secret he had wanted to uncover for so long.
Kang Mu-i held out a hand.
“Do you want to know the secret of that Jade Medallion? Then take my hand. I will tell you.”
“...You want me to take your hand?”
“As you have noticed, the academy's people will be here soon. If we were laid out side by side, perhaps not, but if we were lined up vertically, you belong on this side.”
Kang Mu-i thought Mumu would understand after hearing that much.
Once they escaped this place, he could sweet-talk Mumu and turn him into one of his own.
With the Jade Medallion involved, Mumu would have no choice but to listen.
“There is no time.”
Kang Mu-i held out his hand and gestured with his head.
It meant Mumu should take his hand quickly.
After hesitating for a moment, Mumu approached and took it.
Kang Mu-i curled his lips into a smile.
“You made the right choice. First, once we get out of here, about the Jade Medallion...”
-Crack!
“Arghhhhh!”
Before he could finish, Kang Mu-i twisted like a wrung cloth and screamed in agony.
Mumu watched him, scratched his head, and said,
“I am curious, but Father said it is not right to let other people drag you around without a mind of your own.”
Footnotes:
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