WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Surviving as a Genius on Borrowed Time ◈
Episode 362: Perfect Completeness (3)
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The divine sword the Tang siblings had given him.
It was practically another part of his body.
The moment Jeong Yeon-shin gripped its hilt, he sensed that he could wield the Absorption Formula and dispersal mnemonic formula of Myriad Flowers Rain through a weapon.
An extreme state of unity of sword and self carried the harmony formed in his palm into the blade itself. He could now unleash with his sword the Myriad Flowers Rain he had honed through real battles.
The Silent Merit Divine Sword of the Tyrant Sword Sect Master.
The Thunder-Enticing Vast Heaven Sword of Namgung First Sword.
The Dog-Beating Staff of Beggars’ Sect Master Ju Gwang-sin-gae.
The Fire-Subduing Grand Demon Bow of the Dark Night Hall Lord.
Every one of them represented unrivaled authority and martial might in the martial world.
Among them, the Divine Sword of the Divine Sword Squad Leader and the Nirvana Sword of the Lord of Desolate Fortress ruled the martial world through fear despite rarely being drawn.
They said the command seals of renowned major sect leaders were divine weapons and rare artifacts comparable even to dharma implements.
Some sacred relics served solely as exalted symbols, such as Shaolin’s abbot’s Green Jade Buddha Staff. Others were divine weapons that could draw the martial arts of peerless masters to twelve-tenths mastery.
Even the shattered Meteor Sword had displayed a fiercer presence in the hands of the Moyong Family Head.
Yet Jeong Yeon-shin envied none of them at this moment.
The vast mountain wilderness had been overturned, its earth turned ochre.
Only the wind blew quietly across the land, scattering dust and stirring his clothes. Holding his sword pointed down, he reviewed what had just happened.
He was consolidating his insight.
‘So it works.’
A moment ago, he had deflected Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s Dragon-Manifesting Heaven-Rending Cannon with his sword while unleashing the sword wind of Myriad Flowers Rain.
He had taken in the enemy’s forty-five changes in that fleeting instant, then covered the drifting dandelion seeds with Light Wheel qi and sent them flying.
Ghost-Cry Tyrant King had been replacing her shattered bones and organs with qi.
That meant she had not even had the leisure to wrap herself in a layer of Protective Qi Technique while unleashing a move meant to perish alongside her enemy. A fatal wound had been inevitable.
“To unleash the Myriad Flowers Rain known throughout the world with a single sword and golden hairpin herb, a dandelion...”
Peng Yeo-ran stared at Jeong Yeon-shin with eyes that were gradually losing focus.
The red hem of her clothing, now little more than rags, fluttered around her feet. It no longer resembled the groom’s ceremonial robe from a joyous wedding day.
She tilted her head slightly upward.
“It has a certain charm. The Golden-Wing Sect Master will take a liking to you.”
Countless emotions clung to the end of her words. There even seemed to be a trace of tangled affection and resentment.
“After all my effort creating Dragon-Manifesting Heaven-Rending Cannon, it will vanish without even being measured against Heaven-Turning Dragon-Slaying Form...”
Peng Yeo-ran muttered bitterly.
She had mentioned one of the three great ultimate techniques of Sichuan’s foremost martial artist. Judging by her words, her obsession with it could not have been ordinary.
Jeong Yeon-shin had seen the years Ghost-Cry Tyrant King had poured into Dragon-Manifesting Heaven-Rending Cannon.
He could have involved himself in her affairs.
I have inherited your martial art. The Golden-Wing Sect Master will surely see a fragment of Dragon-Manifesting Heaven-Rending Cannon...
He could have offered the sort of comfort orthodox sect martial artists might exchange.
But he did not.
He had lived long enough, and he had even undergone his coming-of-age ceremony.
His experience of the world had naturally grown broader than that of most adults. Long ago, he had stopped feeling much toward people like Peng Yeo-ran.
“Old monster. You said you killed the Swift Heaven Wing Squad Leader of the main fortress.”
“Old monster...?”
“Was that true?”
Jeong Yeon-shin asked.
Peng Yeo-ran’s gaze slowly lowered from the empty air.
“How harsh. I will soon depart, so why not pay attention to me?”
“Don’t spout nonsense,” Jeong Yeon-shin said.
The moment he had encountered Ghost-Cry Tyrant King earlier, he had pushed his upper dantian to its limits so he could distinguish truth from falsehood in her words and actions.
When she had said she killed Swift Heaven Wing Squad Leader Ha Do-un, she had clearly been sincere.
Even so, Jeong Yeon-shin needed to confirm it again.
―I wish to teach my junior proper conduct. If there is a Squad Leader who wishes to step forward, tell me beforehand.
A senior who had openly shown that he disliked the young Leader of Demon Wings, yet still fully acknowledged Jeong Yeon-shin’s achievements, martial arts, and potential.
‘People die so easily.’
Even those around me.
Jeong Yeon-shin forcibly suppressed the anger rising within him.
The same emptiness he had felt when Jeong Family Manor was destroyed washed over him.
If Ha Do-un was truly dead, then Jeong Yeon-shin needed to recover at least the body. He had to leave behind some great trace that the man had lived.
“Where is Senior Ha’s body?”
“You truly have... no interest in me at all.”
Peng Yeo-ran gave a self-mocking laugh.
Even now, her breath was growing fainter. Her face carried a detachment that did not suit Ghost-Cry Tyrant King.
Jeong Yeon-shin frowned.
“If you don’t answer properly, I’ll spread word of it outside the formation.”
“Of what? Everything is meaningless. This body will soon cross the Sanzu River...”
“I’ll go around saying the former Peng Family Head’s ultimate technique was pathetic. That it could not even match a single move of mine.”
“What?”
“The Golden-Wing Sect Master will hear it first. Once we leave here, we’ll be in Sichuan.”
Jeong Yeon-shin spoke quietly.
The smile vanished from Peng Yeo-ran’s face at once.
A brief battle between masters could not truly be belittled as being decided in a single move. Still, the phrase carried a vastly different implication depending on how it was heard.
That was especially true for martial artists who valued their personal honor dearly.
Peng Yeo-ran let out a small sigh through her ragged breaths.
“The price of taking the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit from you and Desolate Fortress is steep. I have lost the pride of my entire life...”
“Weakling, answer properly.”
“...Swift Heaven Wing Squad Leader Ha Do-un did not leave behind a body.”
Peng Yeo-ran suddenly spoke in a clear voice.
Was it a final resurgence? Colorless flames flickered in the eyes she fixed on Jeong Yeon-shin.
“What?”
“Unlike you, that bastard had to endure Dragon-Manifesting Heaven-Rending Cannon with his entire body.”
“...”
“His bones and flesh were torn to pieces, so there was nothing left to collect. If you want someone to blame, resent the Golden-Wing Sect Master who used him as a human sacrifice.”
Peng Yeo-ran finished calmly.
No further regrets showed on her increasingly bloodless face.
She had killed the Swift Heaven Wing Squad Leader and even lured away the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit.
She had left behind no failures.
She had toyed with the seventeen precious swords of the Divine Sword Corps, which was said to uphold the world, down to the bone. For a martial artist who had lived indulging in every pleasure, it was an unsurpassable end.
“...”
Jeong Yeon-shin silently adjusted his grip on the hilt.
Behind him, Wind Lord Lee Si-myeong, who was trading blows with Heaven-Treading Forest Squad Leader Xiahou Wi-jin, looked urgent.
One of his legs was broken. He was struggling to turn aside Xiahou Wi-jin’s huge fists when Peng Yeo-ran’s words, which sounded like her last, ended. He suddenly twisted backward and leaped away.
He headed toward the cliff where the wedding had originally been held.
Boom!
The ground split in every direction.
Lee Si-myeong was a master of Leg Arts. The strength in the legs he had honed all his life was tremendous.
As he exposed his back to the Heaven-Treading Forest Squad Leader’s fist and kicked off the ground, a long straight line was carved through the air. He crossed the distance in an instant.
At its end, Cheon So-so, the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit, stood alone in a daze.
Her expression could not be seen behind the reddish face veil, but she had done nothing but stand there blankly ever since chaos broke out because of Jeong Yeon-shin.
Crack!
Wind Lord seized both her shoulders in one motion.
“Cheon So-so...! Cheon So-so! Follow my command! Your husband is in danger!”
The Immortal Wood Spirit Squad martial artists taken hostage.
Sorcery arts that placed restrictions within the mind.
Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s dalliance, which seduced people regardless of gender.
Ice Soul Cheon So-so had completely turned her back on Desolate Fortress.
Nothing belonging to the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit was truly her own. Neither body nor mind, not even the World Tree sapling held against her chest.
‘Sister Peng can still be saved!’
Madness flickered in Lee Si-myeong’s eyes. The martial arts of wind he had pursued his entire life could not be completed without Peng Yeo-ran. She had to be there.
[You bastard! Where do you think you’re running?!]
The bald-headed man was charging at his back with terrifying speed, yet Wind Lord only glared into the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit’s eyes and rapidly muttered through lip-speech.
“Use the sapling! Make the power of all living beings reach your husband in full! Then everything will...”
“...A disgrace to your clan.”
Cheon So-so’s quiet voice rang out. Her lips moved beneath the veil.
“You are foolish.”
“What?”
“You really believed it. That a Squad Leader of the main fortress had been bewitched by a woman. Even after seeing Seom-ye...”
“How did...?!”
Lee Si-myeong’s eyes widened.
The Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit should never have been able to speak so clearly and calmly as she was now. She could not have been in such a state.
How could she still retain a clear mind? She had even spent the night before the wedding with Ghost-Cry Tyrant King.
Her reason should have been shaken. She should have obediently followed commands.
How much effort had it taken to control even one Black Uniform martial artist of Desolate Fortress?
The Hidden-Realm Peng Family had practically poured out every dharma implement accumulated in the formation over the years. Killing her outright would have been incomparably cheaper.
“Why do you think the color signifying a main fortress Squad Leader is Black Uniform?”
“This... If this happens...!”
“Cultivating a mind untouched by the martial world. Its depth is beyond you worldly martial artists.”
Cheon So-so spoke softly.
Peng Yeo-ran was on the verge of being lost forever.
Lee Si-myeong fell into a panic too deep to contain, then abruptly raised his head. Beyond the reddish veil, his eyes met a pair of calm blue eyes.
Ice Soul Cheon So-so.
Squad Leader of Desolate Fortress’s Immortal Wood Spirit Squad.
Even among the elven race, she possessed noble blood like the Lord of Desolate Fortress.
That was why she could draw out the power held by the World Tree sapling, and why the Hidden-Realm Peng Family had targeted her.
Having long seized control of the formation, they had pressed the World Tree sapling they possessed against the Lord of the Immortal Wood Spirit’s chest to control her as they pleased.
Cheon So-so, who had arrived here after falling victim to the Golden-Wing Sect Master, had instead aimed for that very point.
She knew the mysterious power of the World Tree better than anyone within the formation.
‘It blocks unauthorized intruders and preserves the places where people live exactly as they are...’
To avoid being swept away by the formation as it dissolved, to stop that dissolution, she needed to hold the sapling.
Even if the World Tree’s immense spirituality disturbed her reason.
It had been a time of endurance. She had endured much. There were times when she had nearly lost her mind.
But it was over.
Their youngest had arrived on this land, grown beyond recognition.
Like certain Purple Uniform martial artists from the main fortress who would sweep away complicated battlefields alone and establish a new order.
She straightened her mind like a divine sword and glanced at Jeong Yeon-shin, who faced the Two Kings and Two Lords in the distance. The youngest of Wonpyeong One Sword Hall was watching her.
“What goes around comes around.”
Cheon So-so mouthed the short words to herself like a battle cry.
She meant the price Wind Lord and the other foreign masters had to pay. The karma of taking Desolate Fortress Black Uniform lightly.
An icy light flashed in her eyes, as though they held frost from the northern sky. She possessed a divine art as well.
She had displayed it in the spar fought with Jeong Yeon-shin and his subordinates at stake.
Whoosh!
Cheon So-so’s black hair rose with the suddenly chilling air.
Immortal Wood Spirit Squad, Frostless Heavenly Ice Art.
Wind Lord Lee Si-myeong, who had worn a vacant expression, hurriedly tightened both hands around her shoulders.
One of his knees had been badly injured by Xiahou Wi-jin. If he lost his balance here, it would be over.
Cheon So-so did not care.
Three Black Uniform martial artists had manifested on this land. One among them had changed beyond recognition and gained even the qualifications of Purple Uniform.
Desolate Fortress had to display overwhelming power here.
Whoooosh!
Pure white wind swept out in all directions around her. With sharp cracking sounds, the ground began to freeze in an instant.
Then, beyond Lee Si-myeong’s shoulder.
―Ha! So that was it! I lost to those two in both martial arts and wits...?!
The terrifying sword strike of Leader of Demon Wings Seom-ye raced through the air like a ray of light, then cleanly swept across Ghost-Cry Tyrant King’s neck in an instant.
Perhaps Lee Si-myeong sensed that utterly unbelievable presence.
As he unconsciously turned his head with shock on his face, Cheon So-so’s hand blurred amid the white frost wind.
Crack!
“Guh...!”
It was an Ice Arts palm strike. It smashed through Lee Si-myeong’s solar plexus as though breaking a confection, and he spat out an empty gasp before baring his teeth like a demon.
Despair could not be hidden from his expression.
“You... Imperial lapdogs...!”
Splat!
His twisted head exploded.
Xiahou Wi-jin landed behind him, then struck with his fist. Wrapped in a force wave like a compressed typhoon, it ground through Lee Si-myeong from the crown of his head to his neck bone, spraying blood in every direction.
“Support has arrived, Seom-ye.”
“I saw.”
Xiahou Wi-jin and Cheon So-so exchanged brief words.
At that moment, they were watching their junior’s body wrapped in formless, colorless lotus petals while pure white dandelion seeds circled around him. His presence was overwhelming.
―Swift Heaven Wing Squad, Immortal Wood Spirit Squad, Heaven-Treading Forest Squad. If there is anyone else involved in the deaths of main fortress martial artists, confess now.
Jeong Yeon-shin’s words, which rang out from afar, were close to a verbal assault.
They were not words to speak before the gathered grandmasters of the Huangbo Family, Beggars’ Sect, and Kunlun Sect. Yet his nearly growling tone and overwhelming aura made it sound like a declaration of war from a peerless master of a major faction.
Xiahou Wi-jin and Cheon So-so kicked off the ground toward their junior at the same time.
They did not intend to stop him. They only meant to stand behind him.
Boom!
As their figures rose together and fell in broad arcs, the troubled voice of Divine-Hand Radiant King Huangbo Gon rapidly drew closer.
“...How about putting away those dangerous weapons for now? The liquor made from the tea leaves here is quite enjoyable...”
Footnotes:
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