WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Surviving as a Genius on Borrowed Time ◈
Episode 360: Perfect Completeness
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Qi-Infused Sword came first.
The Record of the Dharma Light Wheel penetrated the sword blade and formed a straight central axis.
It was a method of filling a sword with inner power to keep it from breaking easily. He had already been using it, but now he condensed the qi even further.
It temporarily extended the life of the Meteor Sword, which had already begun to crack from within.
Jeong Yeon-shin went further.
In that brief instant, he injected Light Wheel qi once more, filling both sides of the blade. The qi of the Qi-Infused Sword formed the central axis, while two rippling streams of inner power ran alongside it.
Two long skeins of qi surged violently along either side of the blade in accordance with a mnemonic formula. Even in an instant divided into countless fragments, their vibrations gave off a tremendous resonance.
Wooooong!
It was an ultimate technique he had stopped using because, whenever he attempted it, the heat in his upper dantian had a fatal effect on his Baihui acupoint.
‘Spread far and wide.’
Wind Lord Lee Si-myeong’s kick grazed his collarbone, leaving behind a scorching cut, yet Jeong Yeon-shin simply continued driving the streams of inner power within the Meteor Sword. He held the sword diagonally downward.
Time flowed differently.
His mind slowly perceived heaven, earth, and all four directions. Enhanced by Three Flowers Gather at the Crown, his innate control over inner energy accelerated the flow of the Record of the Dharma Light Wheel to its limit.
At last, it activated.
Here and now, an ultimate technique reached complete perfection.
“...?”
The first to sense the anomaly was the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King, Peng Yeo-ran, who had been lifting the edge of Cheon So-so’s veil with her long fingers.
Entranced by the magnificent view beyond the cliff and Cheon So-so’s exquisite beauty, she tilted her narrow chin slightly.
That small motion moved along a faster axis of time than Lee Si-myeong’s kick driven with all his strength.
‘I was thinking of taking him as a concubine.’
Her fingertips slowly brushed down the reddish veil.
Before Cheon So-so, whose face was hidden behind the translucent cloth, could even flinch, Peng Yeo-ran glanced at Jeong Yeon-shin, who had all but offered his neck to Lee Si-myeong’s kick.
A Black Uniform brat from Desolate Fortress she had never seen before.
A young man of such rare beauty that she had privately chosen him for her concubine.
That was why she had not cared whether the old monsters she had taken as subordinates lived or died at his hands.
Just as the Golden-Wing Sect Master, the only person ever to defeat her, favored beautiful people, the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King cared not for ugly, wrinkled faces, but for handsome men and beautiful women who pleased the eye.
If they also possessed formidable martial arts, so much the better.
The peerlessly handsome young man in the black long robe, spreading pale waves through his sword, was worth more than a hundred old monsters.
Had there not been a flood dragon formation, he might have seemed more precious to her than Cheon So-so.
During the brief moment when an unfamiliar art activated within Jeong Yeon-shin...
‘What kind of art is that?’
Peng Yeo-ran wondered whether she should give up, if only for a moment, the soft, addictive sensation at the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit’s shoulder.
Her hand remained lightly pressed beneath Cheon So-so’s nape, though she had let go of the veil.
Thirty-five old masters of the Hidden-Realm Peng Family had died at Jeong Yeon-shin’s hands.
That much was fine.
This land was a Peach Blossom Paradise for masters of previous generations. She could replenish that level of strength as often as needed.
But no more. If the Hidden-Realm Peng Family suffered losses severe enough to shake its foundation, the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s authority would be tarnished.
Peng Yeo-ran had long enjoyed reigning as the law of this land.
Her Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber was an extremely practical Divine Technique, but it was also an orthodox martial art of the Eight Great Families, one that prioritized pure inner power.
Before she could cultivate martial arts capable of overpowering even the Golden-Wing Sect Master’s Heaven-Turning Dragon-Slaying Form, she first had to keep her heart calm. Peng Yeo-ran, who had been destined from birth to rule Hebei’s foremost martial nobility, could not maintain a tranquil mind without power and pleasure.
Her divine might had been forged from wine pools and meat forests.
So too was this peerless realm, which stretched time like taffy and divided it into countless pieces.
Saaaaa...
Even the Black Uniform brat from Desolate Fortress, blessed with beauty rare under heaven, was no more than a stepping stone to Martial Extreme.
There was no reason to wait quietly for him to complete that strange art.
‘Five Tigers’ Blade. Gate-Severing Pain.’
She raised her callused right hand, as graceful and rigid as a sculpture, and briefly recited the essential formula of the Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber.
Her mastery of Formless Sword was shallow.
Yet a peerless master on the level of a former Peng Family Head could create a sturdy blade of force waves simply by envisioning martial arts honed over a lifetime.
In this realm of speed, which even most masters of Ascension could not enter, no lesser fighter could withstand the art and would die instantly.
The pale aura rising from her palm like a ray of light formed a long edge like a great saber.
Blade qi from the Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber.
With the slightest gesture, it would brush past the Wind Lord’s neck and pierce the brat’s solar plexus. Yet Peng Yeo-ran spent a brief moment adjusting the aura, imbuing it with the mysteries of an internal heavy-hand technique.
Judging by the young man’s dazzling physique, he would likely offset ordinary attacks with muscles reinforced by inner power. Rather than ruin that smooth skin with a crude attack, it was better to ravage his insides and preserve him as a specimen afterward.
‘Farewell.’
Empty-handed, she unleashed a world-shaking saber strike.
She flicked her wrist toward Jeong Yeon-shin, who seemed frozen in the distance. There was a faint trace of regret in the motion.
Swish!
Then, suddenly...
Jeong Yeon-shin’s eyes turned toward her fingertips.
Slowly yet clearly, his gaze followed the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s fast saber art, which she had honed all her life with the Golden-Wing Sect Master as her target.
His sky-blue pupils moved little by little.
The sight struck her with a shock she had never imagined.
“...!”
Peng Yeo-ran’s eyelashes slowly rose.
“Thank you.”
Jeong Yeon-shin’s lips moved.
“There was a flow like this as well.”
The battle sense of the Leader of Demon Wings, forged through repeated fierce battles on the front lines, had reached an exceptional realm.
Following the sudden sensation of someone’s gaze tickling his body, he changed the arrangement of qi in his upper dantian into the shape of a fan. Then, using the stream of spirituality raised through Dragon Fan Treading Flowers, he linked the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King to the crown of his own head.
It was as though he had met the eyes of the person spying on him from somewhere unseen.
The Meteor Sword Art of the Moyong Family Head, which he had encountered before, dominated space through a sword domain. The Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber of the former Peng Family Head contained the mystery of stretching the heightened sense of time possessed by masters to its limit.
Severing the Gate.
The name meant exactly what it said, cutting down and removing a gate. It seemed to mean breaking through the limits of perception.
‘It doesn’t seem she can maintain it for more than a few breaths.’
The martial world at Purple Uniform was astonishing to this extent. Had he not paid attention to the slightest sensations, he would have been caught before anyone noticed.
Still, Jeong Yeon-shin’s martial arts were becoming versatile enough to contend with Divine Techniques and secret arts he encountered for the first time.
‘Rise.’
The instant he murmured inwardly toward the Meteor Sword, a tidal wave surged within its blade. The flow of qi was far faster than before.
Kuuuuung!
It was a mystical resonance, like the cry of a newly born serpent dragon. The groan of a serpent dragon breaking free from its egg in an unseen sea of blades transformed in an instant into a dragon’s roar.
Whoosh!
At the same time, the slow flow of time brushing against his skin returned to normal. The wind raked harshly across him.
Jeong Yeon-shin had already tilted his head aside. A booming impact passed by his ear.
It was the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s attack.
At the same time, Wind Lord Lee Si-myeong, whose leg was extended before him, suddenly tilted backward.
It was more accurate to say that he had been pushed away. His right foot, which had been rushing toward Jeong Yeon-shin, merely brushed his robe before dropping.
“What...!”
A short groan escaped him. He could not launch another move.
The pale waves already rising from the Meteor Sword had spread in all directions like a storm tide.
Sword Song.
As the startled Wind Lord raised his inner energy to its peak and layered his entire body in a faint mantle of inner power, the waves of melody manifested at the realm of Three Flowers Gather at the Crown reached the old masters attacking Jeong Yeon-shin from behind.
Everyone’s movements stopped at once.
“Ghk...?!”
“Fall back...!”
They were experts who had undergone long training as the Hidden-Realm Peng Family’s main force.
They instinctively understood the existence and power of the art that had struck their skin, but all they could do was feel its irresistible force sink deep into their bodies.
Confusion, shock, panic.
For a brief moment, their eyes lost focus as though they had witnessed a natural disaster.
The translucent shock wave swallowed the old monsters whole and surged outward.
The faint tidal wave crushed through dozens of zhang around Jeong Yeon-shin. Because of its scale, it appeared slow, but in truth, it seized all eight directions at a terrifying speed, blasting apart even the yellow earth in an instant.
Kwwaaaaaaaang!
A hemispherical explosion raced savagely outward, overturning the ground.
Every old master of the Hidden-Realm Peng Family was swept into it.
One after another, they collapsed as blood burst from their eyes, noses, and mouths. Their vast inner energy revealed only a thick presence before fading away.
None of those who had leisurely enjoyed the banquet on the eve of the wedding ceremony remained.
After the overwhelming roar swept over the old masters, only Wind Lord Lee Si-myeong remained standing.
Even he could not hide the stream of blood running from his ear. His head had clearly suffered a severe blow.
The rest lay sprawled about, their eyes soaked in blood and their lips stained red.
There were a hundred and several tens of corpses.
Instant death.
The elders of the Hidden-Realm Peng Family’s previous generation had been annihilated. The backlash from Sword Song swept up the hems of their clothes as it passed through the corpses.
It was a desolate wind.
It would be difficult to call it futile, Jeong Yeon-shin thought. They had died to martial arts never before seen under heaven, so were they not better off than Desolate Fortress martial artists who so often died away from home in the wilderness?
“I went through needless trouble,” he said.
“You would have died soon enough if I’d left you alone.”
“...”
The Wind Lord remained silent, wearing a dazed expression.
Anyone would have been.
As the intermittent sounds of clumps of dirt and rocks rolling echoed around them, Jeong Yeon-shin looked at the Meteor Sword, whose blade had vanished, leaving only the hilt.
Without a word, he tossed the hilt behind him.
Thud.
The distant spectators flinched at the sound.
The young man did not care.
‘This isn’t a martial art I can use freely.’
The sword had been cracked, but it was still the Moyong Family Head’s cherished blade.
It had clearly been as sturdy as most precious swords, yet it broke without enduring even a single strike despite being reinforced with Jeong Yeon-shin’s Qi-Infused Sword.
Sword Song greatly consumed a sword’s lifespan.
Then again, he would not be able to bring out enough power by picking up just any weapon. It was a restriction of sorts.
Still, that strike had immense significance.
‘My Baihui acupoint is fine.’
The damned acupoints at his crown had not ruptured. He had not even felt a great burden while using Sword Song.
It all proved one thing.
Complete unity of essence, qi, and spirit.
The level of his body had caught up with the spirit of his upper dantian and the Record of the Dharma Light Wheel. His body could now fully withstand his innate senses.
Jeong Yeon-shin looked past the Wind Lord’s shoulder toward the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King and Cheon So-so.
Peng Yeo-ran had already turned fully toward Jeong Yeon-shin, her face expressionless. Cheon So-so’s eyes had widened after sensing the Light Wheel qi spreading without restraint.
“You...”
“Quiet.”
Peng Yeo-ran reached back and stopped Cheon So-so from speaking. Then she gestured toward Jeong Yeon-shin, cold sunlight gathering over her slender jawline.
“So you went through with avenging the Swift Heaven Wing Squad Leader. Can you bear what comes next?”
“...Avenge?”
Jeong Yeon-shin asked quietly, feeling an ominous sensation, as though the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s malice were brushing across the back of his head.
“So you didn’t know.”
Peng Yeo-ran’s lips curved.
“That brat named Ha Do-un died at my hands long ago. He came to confront me over the dwarven race slaves I kept, then dared to draw his sword against me.”
“...”
“He held out rather well, unlike this family’s servants, whose lives were snuffed out by your strange move.”
She disparaged the old masters who had served under her without hesitation. Did she think that would shake Jeong Yeon-shin’s composure?
Only then did the silence in the area break.
“What just happened...?”
“Was that even a human art...?”
The spectators gathered to watch the grand ceremony began whispering among themselves.
Then Peng Yeo-ran’s figure suddenly blurred where she stood.
Whoosh!
The sound of something splitting the air rang out behind Jeong Yeon-shin.
Before he could blink once, the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King had taken up position behind him, her aura burning coldly like karmic fire rising from the underworld.
Five Tigers Severing Gate Saber, Tiger Immortal Emerges into the World.
At some point, she had seized a great saber from somewhere and was bringing it down with both hands.
The red sleeve marking her status as the groom in the ceremony fluttered upward.
Chwaaaaaak!
A force wave tore through the air along a massive trajectory. Its terrifying weight pressed down in every direction.
Within it, Jeong Yeon-shin naturally turned around.
Nothing obstructed his movement.
The subtly twitching muscles throughout his body drew out the force of Force Projection. Wind Body’s wind freely fluttered the hem of Jeong Yeon-shin’s long robe, even within the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s blade wind.
At the same time, his eyes blazed blue through the Heaven-Displaying Eye Technique. The instant his gaze collided with the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s...
“...!”
She drew the saber back against her body and leaped away.
It was an exquisite retreating movement technique. As though using the Ground-Shrinking Art, she opened a distance of ten paces in an instant.
Then, from a distant mountain ridge, a booming guffaw burst forth.
“Hahahaha!”
“The Hidden-Realm Peng Family, which strutted about saying its formation was too narrow, has been exterminated, and the tyrant of the world is retreating! Would it not be all right for this old man to set you aside and speak with the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit?”
A conspicuously large boulder.
An old man in a worn straw mat reclined sideways upon it.
He propped up his head with one arm and scratched his stomach, looking every bit the beggar by nature. Yet the eyes that swept over those below were chillingly sinister.
Ghost Lord Man Hugae.
He was the junior martial brother of the Wine-Mad Divine Beggar, the Beggars’ Sect Master. It was said that Man Hugae had stolen the secret manuals of the Dog-Beating Staff Art and Drunken Eight Immortals Step before fleeing.
“That beggar always prattles from afar.”
Above the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King and Jeong Yeon-shin’s heads, a handsome young man with a hearty air spoke while crouching on a tree branch.
“Brat of Desolate Fortress, that was quite an impressive ultimate technique.”
Jeong Yeon-shin’s eyes widened slightly as he glanced at him.
For an instant, he thought he was seeing the Languid Flame Dragon.
That arrogant yet straightforward aura felt familiar. It was the Huangbo Family’s Yeojo Heavenly King Martial Art.
Divine-Hand Radiant King Huangbo Gon.
He was said to be a former Huangbo Family Head. The grandfather of that opium addict from Demon Wings was there, with a markedly contrary air about him.
There was another unfamiliar figure.
Someone floated beneath the branch where Huangbo Gon sat.
An old Daoist with a ceremonial cap atop his head moved his lips as though speaking to himself.
“At last, ruin has arrived...”
His manner of speech was antiquated.
His gaze was deep. The hem of his fluttering Daoist robe appeared like an immortal’s garments through Walking Upon Empty Space.
He had reached a level where he kept the Cloud Dragon Eight Steps of the destroyed Kunlun Sect active at all times.
“Immortal Master Void Emptiness!”
“Even the Dark Lord...!”
Groans spread through the mountainside.
The absolute powers of this land.
The Two Kings and Three Lords, surrounding the area at different heights, watched Jeong Yeon-shin.
Hostility, interest, indifference, and caution were laid bare in their separate gazes.
The weight of their attention was immense.
Any one of them could force those present to their knees. Many who had come to watch the grand ceremony began descending the mountain all at once.
“I don’t know what will become of this land.”
“I had wondered whether such a junior existed in the martial world outside, but to think all the Two Kings and Three Lords would gather here...”
The situation was close to a cataclysmic shift.
Amid it all, Jeong Yeon-shin stared quietly at the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King.
She was the one who had said she killed Swift Heaven Wing Squad Leader Ha Do-un. He had no interest in the people called the Two Kings and Three Lords.
He simply reached out a hand.
No matter that Peng Yeo-ran, standing in his line of sight, furrowed her brow and released incredibly dense waves of inner power. No matter how the Two Kings and Three Lords looking down on him reacted.
“Seom-ye!”
It was a deep voice, and one he recognized.
From afar, he sensed Heaven-Treading Forest Squad Leader Xiahou Wi-jin. Something long was in his massive hand.
Supplies had arrived.
Jeong Yeon-shin instinctively layered the fan within his mind over it.
He felt that he absolutely had to.
‘Come here.’
Buaaaaaang!
A tremendous sound of air splitting closed the distance in an instant. It happened in the literal span of a moment.
A sharp light pierced through the exact center of the Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s abdomen with a wet thud.
The blood that burst outward as though scattering could not even reach the tip of that beam of light.
“Kuheok...?!”
Jeong Yeon-shin slightly twisted his waist and caught the sword’s hilt at once.
Tak.
It was astonishingly light.
The feeling in his grip was warm. The Light Wheel qi throughout his body shook fiercely as though it had found someone who understood its song, releasing searing heat.
The perfect balance, as though it had become one with the muscles of his arm, was extraordinary. His soaring heart instantly heated his inner power to its peak.
Unity of sword and self.
Woooong!
The large golden character for Desolation painted upon his shoulder melted away, filling the area around it in a circle. The Squad Leader’s long robe, woven from heavenly silkworm silk, remained intact.
He felt his hair streaming long behind him.
Saaaaa...
The dandelion seeds rolling about nearby each took in a fragment of Light Wheel qi, then began scattering like white flower petals.
Footnotes:
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