WeTried Translations

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Editor: Abstract

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 34: The Hand of Temptation (2)

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The Hand of Temptation (2)

Jo Mae-hui spoke, her voice trembling.

"W... what did you just say?" "You've got a lot of fat there. Want to work on your chest muscles?" "......"

So she hadn't misheard after all.

'This bastard... is he impotent or something?'

The Demonic Joy Palace walked a different path from other martial houses. Through the art of Harvesting Yang to Nourish Yin, they absorbed a man's yang energy to build their internal energy. Seduction was their foundation. Every secret method and technique they'd developed centered on one question—how to lure a man in efficiently and fast.

'Hah...'

Jo Mae-hui found this absolutely absurd. She ranked among the top three talents in the entire Demonic Joy Palace. Her looks, her skill at seducing men, even the palace mistress herself acknowledged she was exceptional at both. And yet this bastard wasn't even looking at her like a woman.

'Chest muscles?'

For a moment she felt her own charm dilute into nothing. In all her years of seduction, she had never once lost control of reason, but this was the first time she felt real anger flare up.

'So that's how you want to play it.'

There were only two possibilities. Either he genuinely didn't know what a woman was, some legendary specimen beyond even the finest purity. Or he was deliberately steering the conversation elsewhere, gripping his willpower with everything he had so he wouldn't slip. Honestly, though, the first option seemed far more likely.

'...His eyes are too pure.'

Normally she'd have bet on the second without hesitation, but there was something about Mumu's eyes that screamed the first. If that was the case, there was only one way forward. Everything up to now had just been foreplay leading into the seduction. It was time to unleash the real secret art of the Demonic Joy Palace.

'Compared to the palace's final trials, you're nothing.'

To become the true heir of the Demonic Joy Palace, one had to clear the last two trials. One was corrupting a Buddhist monk or Taoist priest who had devoted themselves fully to their faith. The other, the final one, was arousing even a man who couldn't be aroused at all. Clear both, and you earned the right to become the young mistress of the palace, above the rank of ordinary disciple.

[Mae-hui. No matter how much patience a man has, no matter how naturally composed he seems, buried in his most fundamental instinct lies a drive that runs even deeper than survival—the urge to leave behind descendants. Stirring that urge and dragging it to its absolute peak, that is the secret art of our Joy Palace.]

'Watch me.'

She would bring even this legendary innocent to his knees.

"Young master." "Mm?"

Jo Mae-hui reached her hand toward Mumu. From her palm bloomed a strange fragrance, a catalyst meant to stir up desire. She drew her life energy up and chanted the Demonic Joy Meditation of the Demonic Joy Palace.

'Stage one. Oblivion.'

Oblivion blurred the boundaries of reason. Mumu's eyes, which had scrunched up at the scent, slowly began to glaze over.

'Stage two. Origin.'

Jo Mae-hui made a strange gesture toward Mumu. It was a kind of suggestion. Through it, she stirred the instincts buried deep in the mind and dragged them up to the surface.

'Stage three. Stimulation.'

Jo Mae-hui closed in on Mumu and dragged a sticky touch down his cheek. That touch moved boldly from his cheek downward toward his chest, and before long, like a snake stalking its prey, it was creeping toward his lower body.

'No!'

Tang So-so, who'd been watching from hiding, shot up from the brush. She couldn't keep watching this. At this rate Mumu was going to fall prey to that fox.

"Wai..."

Just as she was about to launch herself forward, Tang So-so froze. Because Mumu had seized Jo Mae-hui's wrist as it crept toward "that place."

'What?'

Jo Mae-hui stared at Mumu with wide eyes. His pupils were still lost in the fog of oblivion.

'Then how?'

By the third stage of the Demonic Joy Meditation, a man should lose all control over himself. And yet he'd suddenly caught her hand right as she moved into the fourth stage, foreplay. Jo Mae-hui's eyes sharpened.

'A self-defense reflex, then.'

It was startling that someone with no martial arts training could reach past instinct and protect himself like that. But she'd run into this variable before, during the Demonic Joy Palace's final trials. The monks and Taoists too had shown that same fierce self-defense instinct, rejecting her touch on some deep, involuntary level, right up to the very end. Of course, in the end that instinct always got devoured by lust anyway.

'Won't help you.'

Jo Mae-hui circulated her ki and drove the Demonic Joy Meditation to its peak. She was supposed to build slowly and reach climax at the sixth stage, but given the circumstances, she'd arouse him all at once and drag out whatever lust lay hidden deep in his chest.

'Awaken. Your true instinct...'

Flinch!

That was the exact moment. A crushing pressure stabbed through her whole body like needles, sending a chill down her spine. Jo Mae-hui, one hand still weaving the Demonic Joy Meditation while the other aimed for Mumu's most sensitive spot, slowly lifted her head. She swallowed without meaning to.

'What is this?'

Mumu was looking at her with an incredible gaze. That gaze had nothing to do with innocence, nothing to do with the fog of oblivion. The pressure bearing down on her was so intense, so like standing before a true master, that for a moment her words caught in her throat.

'Why is this kid...'

The Demonic Joy Meditation was supposed to drag out even a man's most buried desires. So why was he giving off this kind of terrifying presence instead? What instinct could possibly be hidden in him to cause this...

Thud!

At that moment Mumu's fist slammed into Jo Mae-hui's stomach.

"Guh!"

The blow sent her body flying backward. She flew back more than ten paces before flipping through the air and landing steady on her feet.

'That was just raw physical strength?'

Jo Mae-hui rubbed at her stomach, unable to hide her shock. She'd heard things beforehand, and she'd seen from a distance how he'd driven a floor leader into the ground like a stake. But experiencing it firsthand was something else entirely. It wasn't internal energy, no ki had actually pierced inward, and yet the force of the blow felt like it wanted to punch straight through her insides, the way an Expert's strike would.

[Let me give you one piece of advice. Don't get careless and end up regretting it. You'd do well to stay cautious.]

Ha Ryun's words from the Valley of White Death came back to her suddenly. Now she understood why he'd said that. A kid who'd reached this level on raw muscle alone was a variable that couldn't just be brushed aside, not with the greater plan at stake. There was no telling how he might grow later.

'I see.'

Jo Mae-hui's lips curled into a cruel smile. She had no idea why the Demonic Joy Meditation had dragged out this kind of instinct instead of lust, but she was fundamentally different from the other cadets.

'I'm nothing like the fools you've been throwing your muscle around against so far. I'm the young mistress of the Demonic Joy Palace, one of the House of the Eight Villains.'

Jo Mae-hui settled into the opening stance of the Claw Technique. Seduction had failed, plain and simple. The only move left was to crush him with pure skill.

Whoosh!

Jo Mae-hui launched herself at Mumu. She closed the distance like a lightning bolt, ending up right under his chin in an instant before driving a Claw Technique straight at his stomach.

'Vicious Deep Claw!'

A wicked technique meant to pierce the stomach with the nails and tear through the organs beneath. She meant to end this in a single strike. But,

Pak pak pak!

Her nails didn't pierce his stomach. They tore through his clothes, but couldn't break the skin. Jo Mae-hui's eyes went wide at the sight of Mumu's stomach, muscled like a washboard, unbelievably solid.

'What!'

Was this really possible from muscle training alone? It was the kind of hardness you'd expect from a master who'd reached the realm of an indestructible golden body. While she stood there in shock, Mumu's fist came slicing through the air straight at her face.

Whoosh!

Jo Mae-hui stepped half a pace back and dodged it easily. She didn't stop at dodging either. She followed with a Claw Technique, seizing his wrist to try and snap it right there.

Pak!

But Mumu's foot came flying in, forcing her to dodge that instead.

'Crude, but the impact's strong.'

She could tell that much just from the sound of it cutting the air. But since he hadn't trained in any Martial Arts, his fists moved in simple, predictable lines, easy enough to dodge.

'If it doesn't land, it means nothing.'

By her judgment, Mumu's weakness was glaringly obvious. Muscle training alone couldn't stand up to the true essence of Martial Arts built specifically to counter enemies.

"Hmph!"

She gathered her life energy at the Yongquan point and kicked off the ground, driving herself back at Mumu.

Thud!

She stamped the ground with a grounding step and slammed her palm into his stomach.

Pwaaang!

A small ripple of shockwave burst from his stomach and sent Mumu's body flying backward. He tumbled across the ground once. Seeing him like that, Jo Mae-hui's lips curled up.

'So internal force strikes still work.'

Given his monstrous muscles, surface blows seemed to just bounce off his sheer toughness, so she'd used internal force strikes instead. It was an advanced technique that drove ki straight through and struck damage inside the body. Only someone who'd reached the peak of Expert could pull it off. Jo Mae-hui looked down at Mumu, sprawled flat on his back on the ground, and sneered.

"How's that feel? Your insides all churned up like you're about to die?"

When it came to internal energy, she was confident that no one her age at Changcheon Martial Academy could match her, save for the direct heirs of the Four Immortal Masters. She'd devoured dozens of men and built up her Force of ki through Harvesting Yang to Nourish Yin, far beyond what anyone her age could normally accumulate. Jo Mae-hui walked toward the fallen Mumu. She licked her lips, looking down at him, and murmured.

"Now, how should I season you so you'll taste good going down..."

Tak!

That was when the hand of the "unconscious" Mumu shot out and seized her ankle. Jo Mae-hui scoffed.

"Oh my. Were you waiting all this time out of your mind, just for me to get close? Too bad for you. I'm not one of those little punks you've been showing off your strength against."

Jo Mae-hui focused her internal energy into her ankle and drew up her Force of ki. She meant to shake his hand off.

Twitch!

At that instant, the veins on the back of Mumu's right hand bulged out grotesquely, one after another, and the adjustment screw of the Ki-Restraining Bracelet clamped to his wrist glowed red and clicked, turning with a grinding sound. The number etched at eight had somehow shifted down to five. And with that,

Craaack!

His sleeve tore as the muscles of his right arm swelled up. Around the deltoid at his shoulder, the biceps rose like a mountain, and the triceps, the medial head, lateral head, and long head, strained until they looked ready to burst. Jo Mae-hui's eyes went wide at the sudden change.

'Wh, what is this...'

She had never seen a person's muscles change so dramatically before her eyes. But it didn't stop at appearance alone.

Kkeuguk!

"Ow!"

She'd pushed her Force of ki up to seventy percent, but her ankle began to hurt like it was about to snap.

'What kind of strength is this?'

Startled, Jo Mae-hui hurriedly pushed her Force of ki to its absolute peak. At the same time, she aimed her index and middle fingers straight at Mumu's eyes. That was the exact moment.

Pwang!

Mumu's body, still lying flat, sprang up off the ground and stood straight up.

"Wha?!"

Thrown off balance, she found herself falling, still gripped by the ankle, ending up dangling upside down from his grip. Her startled eyes caught sight of the ground where Mumu had just been lying.

'?!'

The shape of his monstrously developed back muscles was pressed into the ground like a rubbing left on stone. Jo Mae-hui was momentarily speechless. Had he really just bulged his back muscles for an instant, using the spring of it to snap his whole body upright? Was something like that even physically possible? While she was still reeling from the shock,

Bang!

Mumu, still gripping her ankle, slammed her body into the ground. The pain that shot through her whole body was so sharp she couldn't even scream. Even so, she wasn't some sack of grain. Did he really have to slam her around like this? Jo Mae-hui barely managed to get words out.

"Ah, aah... M, Mumu, young master. Even so, this isn't how you treat a lady..."

Whoosh!

"Gah!"

Bang!

Mumu paid no attention to her words and slammed her down again. And that wasn't the end of it either.

Bang! Bang!

Mumu kept slamming her into the ground, back and forth, again and again.

'St, stop!'

Bang! Crack!

'Huh? W, wait, no?'

Her face had just been driven into the ground, and it felt like her nose had broken. That elegant nose she'd been so proud of...

'Th... this...'

Whoosh! Bang!

"Gweup!"

There wasn't even time to feel humiliated. As the slamming kept coming, Jo Mae-hui couldn't hold onto her senses at all. Watching the whole scene unfold, dumbstruck, Tang So-so pinched her nose shut, unable to contain her excitement.

'Wow... total alpha male.'

Cold and ruthless, without a shred of mercy just because the other party was a woman. She'd thought he was nothing but pure innocence dipped in fruit juice sweetness, but apparently that wasn't all there was to him.

Footnotes:

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