WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Surviving as a Genius on Borrowed Time ◈
Episode 243: Opening One's Eyes (7)
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It was a silent mountain range.
The wind swept through the undergrowth. Among the canyon peaks rising here and there stood an unusually gentle hill.
Lush blades of grass swayed freely. Though winter's breath had reached the land, they had not lost their green.
“……”
The notices had been posted everywhere. No one could claim ignorance.
―A group that had subdued the Seven Great Clans of Xian had challenged the Tyrant Sword Sect to a fight.
They were no ordinary notices. They directly targeted the Tyrant Sword Sect's Elder Council Head.
The lines mentioned the Tyrant Sword Sect Master's parents softly yet without restraint, leaving countless people gaping. Some hurriedly turned away.
All kinds of talk spread from every direction.
Most said the culprit had lost all fear.
Beyond the Heavens.
That was what the highest echelons of the martial world, including the Tyrant Sword Sect, were called. A heaven beyond heaven.
No one even dared touch the paper.
The great city of Xi’an had been in an uproar.
Countless eyes had followed the matter all the way to these peaks.
“A person who swept aside the seven clan leaders at once.”
“How could they possibly handle the Ghost-Spirit Divine Sword? She isn't human.”
There were many spectators.
Hidden presences filled every peak like an army lying in ambush. All kinds of people concealed themselves among the thick but lifeless rust-colored pine needles.
It was different from when the Seven Great Clans of Xian had been destroyed. Martial artists had poured in from everywhere.
They hoped simply witnessing this might be a fortuitous encounter. They expected to see Yeo So-hyang in person, once famed alongside the Sword Immortal of Zhongnan as a sword immortal herself.
One could live an entire lifetime without seeing an extraordinary martial artist make a move even once.
“There, there she is!”
“Waaaaah!”
The instant a black dot appeared in the sky, scattered cheers erupted. They came from people who had not suffered oppression at the hands of the Demonic Sect.
At last, the tyrannical immortal descended. Every eye turned to the sky.
Whoooooong!
The sound of air being torn apart, like the wail of ghosts, grew louder. It was as if a heavenly divine general were descending.
Even the roar plunging down from the distant sky was overwhelming.
‘She's making quite an entrance.’
Standing alone upon the hill, Jeong Yeon-shin circulated the Light Wheel in his heart.
Energy stirred from his wrists, and his black sleeves billowed wide.
Saaak!
Silver threads extended from both hands. Their fine touch brushed against his wrists as they wrapped around the pine trees within a ten-jang radius.
They were thread-sword strands taken as spoils, dozens of strands in all. Twisting around one another, they drew taut.
It was as though he had used nature itself to create a seven-stringed zither.
The Leader of Demon Wings leaped gracefully and landed atop the golden strings. At once, a strange resonance spread beneath his feet.
Ding.
It was the harmony of inner energy. The Record of the Dharma Light Wheel, infused to its limit, resonated through the thread-sword strands one strand at a time. A deep, clear note spread throughout the forest.
The gazes fixed above gradually lowered and settled on Yeon-shin, but he raised his head without concern for the sunlight.
He did not realize he was creating a rare and mystical sight.
He simply watched.
He could see her.
Someone descending through the air while standing upon a treasured sword.
She was an old woman whose ears stood as sharp as sword blades. Her very presence was unbelievably keen.
Colorless sword qi of ruin wrapped around her entire body, and the air seemed to groan beneath the energy flowing from her.
A hissing sound, like a snake's cry, rang out without pause. It was easy to understand why she had earned the name Ghost-Spirit.
Though her empty left sleeve fluttered in the wind, the force surrounding her body remained firm. She lacked the distorted balance peculiar to a one-armed swordsman.
The Sword Immortal of Zhongnan had severed her entire Hand Yangming Large Intestine meridian along with her left arm, so her martial strength should have diminished.
Yet the name Tyrant Sword Sect suited her. Her entire body seemed to have become a divine sword.
“Child, those words.”
The old woman moved her wrinkled lips while standing upon her sword.
“Did you write them?”
She did not descend fully. She remained about three jang above the ground. The sword beneath her resembled a throne.
The way she looked down at Yeon-shin with her remaining hand held behind her back revealed the experience of many years, along with the arrogance accumulated over that long time.
Yeon-shin understood at once.
She had once stepped into the realm of Purple Uniform.
Otherwise, it made no sense. Even with martial arts said to have declined, she gave off an overwhelming impression.
The sword qi rising from Yeo So-hyang's body reached Yeon-shin's very breath.
It rippled with terrible sharpness, constantly stimulating the Protective Qi Technique around his face from the moment she descended.
“It is true that those words were written as I dictated them. Was there a single false word among them?”
Yeon-shin answered carelessly, though he did not expect much. The eye techniques of martial artists of the elven race excelled at discerning truth.
Cheong Myeong had been the same. The Tyrant Sword Sect's Elder Council Head would be no different. It only bothered him that Hyeon Won-chang had faithfully copied the alias onto the notices.
The eyes of Yeo So-hyang, the Ghost-Spirit Divine Sword, filled with anger.
“A lie, then. But…”
The sword beneath Yeo So-hyang suddenly shot into her hand like a ray of light. It was sword control.
Anyone capable of sword flight would naturally be capable of qi sword control.
Even holding it in one hand, she hovered steadily, as though her center of gravity had shifted to the sword hilt. Suspended gracefully from the sword, Yeo So-hyang's lips trembled.
“You clearly bear responsibility as well.”
At that moment, the force wave concentrated in her sword formed another blade.
It took shape around her sword.
Wooooong!
The treasured sword in her wrinkled hand rang violently. Along with the formless great sword that sprang into being, it swept sideways.
Toward another peak, where the spectators had gathered.
Yeon-shin understood at once. One of the three great secret arts Jegal Hyeon had told him about was manifesting.
Loyal Severing, Wilderness-Breaking Sword Art: Shattered Wall.
The air ahead warped.
Kwwaaaaaang!
Yeo So-hyang's force wave, compressed into the shape of a sword, exploded outward. It was a straight slash. The trail it carved through the air burned colorlessly as it reached the middle of the peak.
The rocks along its surface cracked and were carved away. At the same time, an invisible shockwave surged.
In an instant.
The entire peak holding several hundred people was cut away. Thick clouds of dust rose with an unreal texture.
The enormous severed face began to slide downward and sideways. Boulders fell with fragments of stone.
Kugugugung!
Screams erupted everywhere. Voices filled with shock and terror rang out in every tone. They were cries wrenched from people's throats.
There was no resisting it.
It was close to a disaster.
People clawed at the undergrowth before falling off the cliff. Those clinging to tree trunks fell along with the severed mountain peak.
It was chaos. A heavy sound echoed from far below. With a single sword strike, the lives and deaths of countless people had been twisted.
It had all happened in an instant. The strike had been like a ray of light.
“They saw scraps of paper insulting the Sect Master and rushed over in delight. Insects unworthy even of being jackals.”
Yeo So-hyang, the Ghost-Spirit Divine Sword, spoke. Her aged voice settled calmly.
Just before she unleashed the slash, Yeon-shin's thread-sword strands had swept past her feet. Her evasion had been exquisite. While suspended in the air, she had already risen higher.
The treasured sword in Yeo So-hyang's hand descended beneath her feet once more. It was an utterly mystical sight.
“First, I must slaughter every last one of these vermin. Child, putting you to death…”
She stood upon the sword's surface with a lofty bearing. Her gaze upon Yeon-shin was cold.
It was the gaze of an old master who had spent a long time at the highest position. Even the slow parting of her lips carried weight.
“It will be done slowly. Very slowly.”
“Shut up, you decrepit old fool.”
Yeon-shin swiftly swept the area with his aura sense.
The Demon Wings members spread out as scouts had been tasked with identifying powerful opponents.
He had feared that the Tyrant Sword Sect's elite might come flooding in. Only Ma Gwang-il’s Squad, Weiji Myo-hwa, Jegal Hyeon, and Languid Flame Dragon waited nearby in disguise.
Fortunately, they had not been caught in the sword strike just now. They had been lying in wait atop other peaks.
‘No.’
Fortunately? Not at all.
Yeon-shin had witnessed a massacre.
Commoners and martial artists alike had been swept up in it. There had not been just a few. Yeo So-hyang had killed well over a hundred people.
She had used sword flight to remain far beyond the reach of the Leader of Demon Wings' attack.
Whoooooo!
She did so even now.
Yeo So-hyang rode her sword far away. She seemed to be heading for the peak opposite them.
She had already been outside the range of all his techniques, but now it was as though she had moved into an entirely different space.
This was not how Jegal Hyeon had described her behavior.
She was close to a madwoman. The Tyrant Sword Sect's Elder Council Head was insane.
With a swift sword that even Yeon-shin had failed to properly catch, she had unleashed a slash rare under heaven upon the people. The area was already in turmoil.
Crowds fled in every direction in a sudden evacuation. Among the commoners running with both hands over their heads, Yeon-shin spotted Demon Wings members wearing bewildered expressions.
‘I have to stop her.’
Strength entered Yeon-shin's eyes.
Anger rose within his chest, searing hotly through his heart, where the Light Wheel resided.
A killing technique could not be used so casually. The lives of commoners should remain beyond the martial world.
Yeon-shin had wielded his sword to obtain the World Tree fruit. He had done it to preserve the single thread of his own life.
But how many threads of life were being extinguished on that cliff across from him? Each one must have carried the same weight as his own.
Kugugugung!
Another peak was cut diagonally and fell away. It was beyond his reach.
‘Can I handle this?’
Yeon-shin's eyes darkened.
He and Jegal Hyeon had carefully estimated Yeo So-hyang's full strength.
Her left arm had been severed during the Zhongnan Sect's sect war. Her tyrannical martial art had weakened by the day, and age had steadily taken her farther from her prime. He had thought she would not be as formidable as her reputation suggested.
But facing her in person was different. That was how it felt.
He had not properly seen her attack. Tyrant Sword. It was a sword worthy of seeking supremacy among the Demonic Sect. Her ability to deploy qi and release sword strikes was astonishingly fast.
Her sword power was monstrously strong as well. It reminded him of Xiahou Wi-jin, the Thousand Fists, Dragon-Powered Divine Official.
Her fame had spread throughout the vast world from the beginning. She was an extraordinary swordsman who could sever mountain peaks.
She was a powerful figure known by all, even across the provinces of the vast Central Plains.
Even if the Record of the Dharma Light Wheel was well suited to countering her art, it was useless if he could not read her attacks. In his current state, he could not win.
Then all his thoughts converged into one line.
‘I have to complete it here.’
Quickly. Now.
He decided to use the time the arrogant Elder Council Head of the Tyrant Sword Sect had delivered to him herself.
‘The eye technique…’
Yeon-shin's talent responded. It was a talent nurtured by consuming his lifespan. When the time truly came for it, it had always answered with ferocity.
He felt as though he could do it now. The wind brushing his skin felt different from before.
It was a refreshing sense of omnipotence, familiar yet strange.
Just before he closed his eyes, the color of the sky passed through Yeon-shin's pupils.
Huuup.
With an inhalation, his consciousness sank inward.
He went deep. He reflected on everything he had seen until now.
At the Martial Alliance Assembly, he had broadened his knowledge through the Comprehensive Guide to Breaking the Orthodox Sects, and he had experienced the body refined by Baek Seo-gun, the Spirit Sky Sword Ghost.
After returning to the main fortress, he had formed bonds with the senior Squad Leaders. The world of martial arts was truly vast.
He had come to understand how varied the ways of using one's body could be. The help of Senior Jin, the Blood Guard Squad Leader, had been especially great.
He had also observed his maternal grandfather Ma Yeon-jeok's body while bringing about his Rejuvenation.
He compared it to the body of the current Divine Sword Squad Leader he had examined when he was still Blue Uniform. He studied the flows of blood and qi produced by peerless masters whom few could approach.
All of it was insight.
Now, Jeong Yeon-shin's knowledge was sufficiently broad and deep.
‘Let me establish the mental image that will become the foundation of my martial arts.’
He would absorb all of it into his vision like lightning.
Then he would be able to read it completely.
Thump.
In that extreme situation, Yeo So-hyang's sword strikes and his current feelings connected into inspiration.
A keen stimulus, sharpened to a blue edge, struck the crown of his head. Within his heart, the Light Wheel turned.
‘I have to stop that old woman. Unless I thoroughly shatter every sword strike, winning would be no different from losing. I don't need vision in every direction. I need an eye technique that gives me absolute command over what lies before my eyes. One whose power to break techniques reaches even masters above me.’
The eyes of the Leader of Demon Wings, who protected the people under heaven.
The Record of the Dharma Light Wheel began rising toward his head. Gentle power filled the surrounding minor meridians.
From his face to his eyes, the Sibai acupoint, Cuanzhu acupoint, and Yintang acupoint heated beneath his inner energy.
An extremely dense aura spread from his face. It was a flow that rewove his nervous system.
Wooooong!
Blue energy began streaming through the gaps of Yeon-shin's eyelids.
He had long since constructed the qi structure with a mnemonic formula. It was enough to clearly grasp the outline of the martial art.
He melted the insights drifting through his mental image into the mnemonic formula. His innate talent transformed into light inside his mind and raced through his entire body.
The current Leader of Demon Wings was a Grandmaster. He kneaded the mnemonic formula and intent that had fused together in an instant, allowing an eye technique unseen beneath heaven to bloom.
With the mental image of crushing the bothersome vermin obstructing his sight beforehand.
‘I will name this the Heaven-Displaying Eye Technique…’
His eyes grew hot. Every flow connected to the Baihui acupoint at the crown of his head.
‘And make it the eyes through which I view the world.’
The waves of the Record of the Dharma Light Wheel rushed into his head.
It was complete convergence.
Flash!
The upper dantian in his brain burned blue.
The crown of his head boiled as though pierced by lightning. Within the blue radiance, a flow of Unhindered Adaptability formed.
With a fixed qi structure, it constantly traveled through the minor meridians between his optic nerves and the Baihui acupoint. At that moment, without warning, a peerless eye technique was born.
Yeon-shin immediately opened his eyes.
Then he spoke.
―The Tyrant Sword Sect Master cruelly cut down my father. Perhaps it was because the Sect Master failed to receive a proper upbringing from their own parents. Or perhaps the wet nurse's teachings were simply poor.
The Record of the Dharma Light Wheel filled his voice to the limit, carrying it in every direction.
He had borrowed Hyeon Won-chang's method, and its effect was certain.
Fwaaaash!
A sudden gale scattered Yeon-shin's hair. Yeo So-hyang, the Ghost-Spirit Divine Sword, had returned in an instant while riding her sword. The speed of sword flight was truly terrifying.
Light brown pine needles scattered through the air around them.
The old woman stood with her remaining hand held behind her back and looked down at Yeon-shin.
“You insist on hastening your own death. Do you wish to die in a single stroke so badly?”
Yeon-shin calmly met her gaze as he rested a hand upon the silver sword hilt of the Northern Light Sword.
“Worry about your own karma. Aren't you an old monster of the unorthodox sects, soon to fall into hell?”
“……”
Yeo So-hyang's lips twisted.
“Child, you have eyes as strange as that tongue of yours. What do you see right now?”
“Everything you are.”
The Leader of Demon Wings' eyes flashed with blue light.
Footnotes:
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