WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Chen
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◈ The Martial Genius who Remembers Everything ◈
Chapter 36: The Second-Rate Martial Artist Facing a Legend
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“Everyone, stop!”
Namgung Seonhwa’s voice thundered through the cavern.
Those locked in fierce combat began turning their heads one by one, and the battle quickly died down.
“Has someone secured the Mita Sacred Water?”
I had expected this desperate fight to have broken out because the Mita Sacred Water had fallen into someone’s hands, but the answer was unexpected.
“No. Those bastards tried to steal our food.”
The better-dressed people on the right pointed at the filthy people on the left.
“Food?”
“That’s right.”
“If you’re hungry, leave the cave. Is there any need to kill each other over food?”
“We would leave if we could!”
The reply came from the left.
A man in ragged clothes staggered forward, looking as though he might collapse at any moment.
“We’ve been eating nothing but moss for a week already!”
“What do you mean? The waterway only opened this morning.”
“Why would we need to wait until the waterway opened? More people would gather once it did.”
Apparently, they had forced their way through the water and entered before the Hao Sect opened the waterway.
“Then why haven’t you gone back?”
“As I said, we would’ve left if we could. We can’t move because of this damned formation.”
“So no one has found the Mita Sacred Water?”
“If you want to enter that formation over there, go ahead! Though I doubt you’ll return alive.”
Hundreds had already entered the formation deeper inside, yet no one had returned alive.
Namgung Seonhwa remembered what Yu Jiryang had said as soon as they entered.
“I’ll need to investigate further before I can identify the formation.”
At Yu Jiryang’s words, Namgung Seonhwa addressed the gathered people again.
“We’ll investigate it now.”
“Investigate my ass! We’re starving to death!”
“...”
Namgung Seonhwa looked toward the people on the right. Every one of them was brimming with wariness. None looked willing to share their food.
“The Namgung Clan will distribute food. In return, I will not forgive anyone who causes further trouble.”
“My Lady!”
“You can’t! What if we become unable to leave this place...”
“Enough! If we can’t determine the nature of the formation, none of us will be able to leave.”
At Namgung Seonhwa’s sharp rebuke, the clan members said no more.
They each took jerky and Fasting Pellets from their packs and handed them over.
Yet while the Namgung Clan had only thirty people, nearly two hundred stood on the left.
In the end, the Iron Sword Sect martial artists also took out their jerky and Fasting Pellets.
Even after the Namgung Clan and Iron Sword Sect made the sacrifice, many remained dissatisfied with the meager portions. Still, no one seemed inclined to step forward again.
If they could dismantle the formation itself, that would be better than fighting over the food before them.
Yu Jiryang gave a detailed explanation of the formation.
“To be precise, part of the original formation naturally collapsed over time, and some of those remnants formed a natural formation.”
Neither Namgung Seonhwa nor I understood.
A formation was an art in which placing even a single stone incorrectly could disrupt its harmony and render it useless.
It was already astonishing that the formation had endured for so long. Could part of it collapse, then form another natural formation?
“...I hoped that wouldn’t be the case, but I’m confirming it now.”
Yu Jiryang looked toward the formation masters studying the formation on the opposite side under the protection of Namgung Clan martial artists.
Each of their faces had turned pale.
“I hoped otherwise... but it appears I was right.”
“What do you mean?”
Everyone on both sides listened closely to our conversation.
“Have you heard of the Boundless Indestructible Soul-Destroying Formation?”
Gulp.
Instead of answering, everyone swallowed hard. The name alone painted a bleak future in their minds.
“It is a terrifying formation that vanished three hundred years ago, one that should never have existed in this world.”
“...”
Namgung Seonhwa’s complexion worsened by the moment. I stepped forward and asked instead.
“What makes it so terrifying?”
“Once you enter the formation, you cannot leave.”
“Is that even possible?”
A formation fundamentally built a new world upon the framework of its life gate and death gate.
Just as no building could be constructed without its structural frame, a formation could not be established without a life gate and death gate.
“This formation naturally has a life gate and death gate, but they were designed so that even knowing they exist, one cannot possibly find them.”
Concealing the life gate and death gate within a formation was basic knowledge, yet Yu Jiryang’s explanation remained wholly grim.
“It uses the Eight Trigrams as its foundation and the Twelve Earthly Branches as its routes, creating paths for each of the sixty sexagenary combinations. Influenced by the days of the year, it produces three hundred and sixty-five changes. Its changes feel nearly boundless, which is why it was named the Boundless Indestructible Soul-Destroying Formation.”
“...”
Not only us, but both the people who had entered before and those who had entered afterward looked sickly pale.
“Then... then destroy it! The people who came here, including the Namgung Clan, are mostly masters. Couldn’t we destroy it and leave?”
It was a desperate question.
Yu Jiryang shook his head.
“That is why this formation ultimately disappeared. Formations are used to protect someone or capture an opponent, but this one cannot be dismantled or destroyed once it has been set up.”
“...N-No...”
“Small formations might be broken with overwhelming destructive force, but this Soul-Destroying Formation extends for at least thirty zhang. Furthermore, although part of the formation seems to have been destroyed when this cave collapsed, it still retains its form.”
“Hah...”
One by one, the people on the left dropped heavily to the ground.
I pointed toward one side of the cavern.
“Yu Jiryang, didn’t someone see the Mita Sacred Water here and return? How do you explain that?”
“...I can only presume heaven’s luck allowed them to escape.”
“Heaven’s luck?”
“Yes. The odds may be nearly boundless, but the life gate and death gate certainly exist.”
“Then if one could calculate the formation, couldn’t one find the life gate and leave?”
“But it is impossible to calculate paths that change every moment. If you lose your way during the calculations, you’ll also lose the central axis needed to begin calculating again. You would ultimately be trapped inside the formation.”
“Then what if someone memorized every path?”
“What?”
“What if someone memorized every path created by the Eight Trigrams, Twelve Earthly Branches, sixty sexagenary combinations, and three hundred and sixty-five changes?”
“...Even a rough estimate puts it at more than two hundred thousand.”
The documents I had read in the Martial Alliance’s Mantong Office contained at least five times as many characters.
“I believe I can do it. Calculate them all and tell me.”
“...Are you serious?”
“I do enjoy a joke, but I don’t think this is the time.”
Yu Jiryang thought for a moment, then firmly shut his mouth and nodded.
“It will take time.”
Those who heard our conversation looked unconvinced, but a faint glimmer of hope began to appear in their eyes.
“Namgung Clan!”
At that moment, a group of men burst out from the formation near the exit.
Martial artists in red uniforms, along with Seo Hyeonjae’s group of three.
The number of men in red had been cut in half, while Seo Hyeonjae, Ma Gosan, and Sa Muin all looked utterly haggard.
“Where is the Namgung Clan!”
Seo Hyeonjae looked around, then spotted me speaking with Yu Jiryang by the opposite wall. Using a darting movement art, he flew toward us.
“You bastard! You dared to swindle me!”
The instant his sword targeted Yu Jiryang and me, the Namgung Clan martial artists stepped forward and blocked it.
“Argh! Namgung Clan! You bastards are all the same!”
It was not just Seo Hyeonjae. Ma Gosan and Sa Muin also radiated hostility, as though they had endured terrible hardships.
“Stop!”
The ones who stepped forward were the martial artists from the left and right, who had just been fighting to kill one another.
“They are our only hope of survival!”
“I don’t care! If you don’t want to die, get lost!”
“You fool!”
Three or four martial artists from the right rushed Seo Hyeonjae at once.
Ma Gosan and Sa Muin joined him, swiftly defeating them. Then the martial artists on the right charged the three as one, beginning another fight.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Overwhelmed by numbers, Seo Hyeonjae and his companions each took out wooden boxes and placed pellets in their mouths.
“Huff, huff, huff.”
“Haa, haa!”
An immense surge of energy burst from their bodies in an instant.
As the people pressing them with numbers flinched back, Seo Hyeonjae fired an ice palm and Sa Muin swung his wolf-tooth club, scattering them in every direction amid sprays of blood.
“Who is it? Who will dare stand in our way!”
Bloodshot eyes, ragged breaths, and internal energy that had suddenly doubled. The effects of the Bloodburst Pellet were unmistakable.
Nearly fifteen hundred people from both sides recoiled before the momentum of three men.
When no one moved any longer, the three began striding toward us. Namgung Seonhwa and the others also prepared to face Seo Hyeonjae.
Then Namgung Seonhwa looked behind her and screamed.
“Great Hero Yong Soa!”
Seo Hyeonjae’s group, who had been advancing toward us without restraint, abruptly stopped and turned around.
Yong Soa’s group was still emerging from the formation.
“What is going on?”
They had entered the formation before us, yet we had emerged first. The realization clearly confused them.
“This is the terror of the formation. Take one wrong turn in there, and you may die in a place where you can no longer tell time or space apart.”
As Yong Soa’s group approached, Seo Hyeonjae blocked their path.
“We have business first!”
“Move aside. I show no mercy to the Black Path.”
“You dog...”
Seo Hyeonjae never finished.
The hand he had raised to fire an ice palm and his head both fell to the ground, spraying blood. Yong Soa’s sword had moved too quickly to see.
“Aaargh!”
Ma Gosan and Sa Muin screamed as they shoved Seo Hyeonjae’s body aside.
“You two must be the same.”
“Don’t come closer! Don’t come closer! Unless you all want to die together, don’t come closer!”
Ma Gosan took a Thunderclap Bomb from Seo Hyeonjae’s belongings and threatened them with it. Even Yong Soa halted for a moment.
“Do you think you’ll remain alive long enough to detonate that?”
“Damn it! Move one finger and everyone here dies today.”
Ma Gosan’s companions surrounded him in layers as though he were their final bastion. Yong Soa turned away as if he had lost all interest.
“Explain what happened.”
When Yong Soa spoke to Namgung Seonhwa, she explained everything in detail.
Even Yong Soa flinched slightly when he heard the words Boundless Indestructible Soul-Destroying Formation.
“So there is a way to perform formation breaking?”
“This isn’t formation breaking. Great Hero Yu Jiryang and Young Master Jin will calculate the paths and guide us to the life gate.”
“There are roughly two hundred thousand possibilities, and if part of the formation is damaged, new paths may have appeared because of it. You are wasting your strength on an impossible task.”
“There is nothing else we can do.”
“...”
#
Fifteen days later.
Day and night, I memorized each path calculated by Yu Jiryang and the formation masters.
During that time, another thousand people entered the cavern. One hundred died in fights, while three hundred entered the formation on the other side, claiming they would find a path, and never returned.
According to Yu Jiryang, the only reason we had entered the cavern at all was because part of the formation had been damaged. Once we entered this formation, which spread over thirty zhang, we would inevitably be trapped in the Soul-Destroying Formation without knowing the paths.
“Everyone has reached their limit.”
Seong Moran and Namgung Seonhwa had also withered like plants dried by drought.
It was because they had shared half their food at the beginning.
They had endured until now only by rationing their food as much as possible.
“How much longer?”
“...It will take another five days.”
“...”
The martial artists had suffered greatly from hunger, but the formation masters were in no better condition.
Their poor nutrition made the calculations take longer and longer.
“...This is meaningless.”
Yong Soa, who had been sitting off to one side, abruptly rose.
The strongest person in this cavern was Yong Soa.
Some Black Path martial artists possessed reputations comparable to his, but they did not openly provoke him, if only because of the other Wudang Sect Taoists.
“Get up.”
Yong Soa walked toward Ma Gosan’s group among the Black Path martial artists.
“Hand over the Thunderclap Bomb.”
“What?”
The moment Yu Jiryang understood Yong Soa’s intentions, he leaped to his feet.
“You can’t, Great Hero! This is not a formation suited to formation breaking with a Thunderclap Bomb.”
“I may not be able to perform formation breaking, but I can open a path.”
“...”
At Yong Soa’s words, not only the White Path martial artists but the Black Path martial artists slowly began rising from the ground as well.
They were prepared to do anything if it meant they could leave this place.
“But if you use the Thunderclap Bomb, we can’t know how the paths will change. Please, trust us.”
Yong Soa looked at Yu Jiryang and me with an impassive gaze.
“Do you believe a human can memorize two hundred thousand paths?”
I answered Yong Soa.
“So you intend to leave alone?”
Only then did I understand why nearly five hundred people had died here.
I also understood how Yong Soa had survived and entered this chaotic place, and why no stories had spread afterward that Yong Soa had ever been here.
“I will leave and bring the Martial Alliance’s formation masters.”
“Didn’t you hear? This isn’t a formation where formation breaking is possible in the first place.”
“The Martial Alliance’s resources cannot be compared to a single sect.”
“Our only chance is to memorize the paths here and leave. If you distort the paths, what do you intend to do about the lives of everyone here? Do they not matter to you?”
“People are still entering from outside even now. If we stay like this, the casualties will continue endlessly.”
Yong Soa held out his hand to Ma Gosan.
Ma Gosan and Sa Muin immediately prostrated themselves.
“We’ll give it to you. In return, please take us with you.”
“...Fine.”
“U-Us too...”
“Please take us with you as well.”
Clang! Craaaack!
As people rushed in from all directions, Yong Soa drew his sword and carved a long line into the floor.
“Anyone who crosses this line will be cut down. I will leave and bring people. Wait here.”
“Damn it! How can we believe that?”
“When have hypocritical bastards like you ever kept a promise?”
Some sided with Yong Soa, while others harbored hostility toward him.
Seventy percent of the people in the cavern belonged to the Black Path.
They firmly believed Yong Soa, the Martial Alliance’s representative rising talent, might abandon them.
“Die!”
At last, someone drew a sword, and the cavern, which had been quiet for so long, filled with screams and desperate cries.
“Urgh!”
“Cough!”
Dozens rushed Yong Soa, but none lasted more than five exchanges.
In an instant, a wall of corpses formed around Yong Soa and the Wudang Sect Taoists. Faced with their overwhelming martial strength, people gradually stopped advancing.
“Great Hero Yong Soa. Stop.”
In the end, Namgung Seonhwa and the Namgung Clan martial artists stepped forward.
“Only a few days remain. Please wait a little longer.”
“We have already wasted enough time because of you. I cannot delay any longer.”
“Even so, we cannot gamble with three thousand lives.”
“Do you have the strength to stop me?”
“...Prepare the Firmament Sword Formation.”
“Activate the formation!”
“Activate the formation!”
As the Namgung Clan activated the Firmament Sword Formation, the Wudang Sect Taoists began deploying the Taiji Sword Formation as well.
Namgung Seonhwa and Yong Soa fought separately from their sword formations, but even Namgung Seonhwa looked like a child before Yong Soa.
‘Is this for real...?’
I could not help but sigh when I saw the mass of sword force blooming around Yong Soa’s sword.
He had not even turned thirty, yet he had already manifested sword force.
Namgung Seonhwa unleashed her decisive Emperor Sword Art, but she could not contend with Yong Soa.
In the end, I was the only one in this cavern who knew the Shattering Form needed to counter the Wudang sword art.
“No. Yong Soa is not like my brother.”
Seong Moran stopped me when I tried to step forward.
“If I don’t act now, we’ll die here without any recourse. I have a way, so don’t worry too much.”
Leaving Seong Moran behind, I fired the Flying Dragon Claw into the wall and pulled the Heavenly Silkworm Thread taut.
Whiiing.
A pulley-like mechanism spun rapidly within the Flying Dragon Claw, launching me like an arrow.
“Lady Namgung, duck!”
Namgung Seonhwa bent low at my shout, and I swept the Black Dragon Sword over her.
Clang!
Yong Soa took two steps back from the sudden attack, then immediately steadied himself.
I charged him at once, using the Shattering Form against the Taiji Divine Sword, the Wudang Sect’s foundational martial art.
Shararararang!
A trace of surprise appeared on Yong Soa’s face, which had not changed even once since entering the cavern.
“What is this?”
Yong Soa looked back and forth between his sword and me.
I used the Shattering Form again, refusing to give him time to think.
Bang! Bang! Craaash!
Sensing something strange about the sword form, Yong Soa immediately drew up his power.
A glow roughly two chi long appeared above his sword.
‘Damn it!’
Though it was short, it was unmistakably sword force.
Bang! Bang!
Each time I clashed with the sword force, I desperately redirected its power, but the impact raced from my palm to my arm as though I had struck an anvil with a hammer.
Fortunately, the Black Dragon Sword, made from Vajra Indestructible Iron, did not chip or scatter sword fragments like ordinary swords.
“Did the Taeul Sect possess such a sword art?”
“Maybe you should have learned how strong the sects of the One Hundred Eight Peaks were beforehand.”
Even while using the Shattering Form, I kept changing positions with the Flying Dragon Claw.
‘I can’t hold out for long.’
Although Jegal Cheongi created the Jegal Three Forms, Yong Soa never used the Shattering Form.
His reason was absurd. He claimed it damaged the spirit of Wudang.
Even so, he had never once been defeated. Not even when Wudang Sect Taoists used the Shattering Form against him. If he grew even slightly more familiar with it, he would undoubtedly begin counterattacking.
“A sword art that breaks an opponent’s martial art...”
As expected, he had already begun grasping the foundation of the sword art.
Unlike Namgung San, who had immediately switched to the Emperor Sword Art when the Changgung Great Lotus Sword Art failed, Yong Soa continued using the Taiji Divine Sword with obsessive persistence.
He intended to uncover the identity of the sword art I was using.
His intention succeeded perfectly. The gaps when his sword art halted began to grow fewer.
“You must leave with me.”
“So you truly intend to kill everyone here.”
“...”
The moment I thought I had no more way to resist, I used the Flying Dragon Claw to fly toward the ceiling.
At the same time, I drew out every scrap of internal energy in my dantian.
“Eat this!”
A sensation of explosive force poured out as though I had emptied my dantian in a single blow.
Immense true qi surged through my hand.
The Mad Heaven Divine Palm shot toward Yong Soa as if to erase him from existence.
Craaash!
For the first time, Yong Soa’s brow furrowed deeply.
‘It worked.’
The moment relief washed over me, Yong Soa desperately employed the principle of Four Ounces Move a Thousand Pounds, redirecting the Mad Heaven Divine Palm’s force aside. He leaped from the ground and kicked me away.
Thud!
With what little power I had left, I fired the Flying Dragon Claw.
Ping.
As if he had been waiting for it, Yong Soa fired a finger wind.
The Flying Dragon Claw fell limply to the ground.
“Young Master Jin!”
Seong Moran screamed so sharply that she sounded ready to faint.
Only then did I turn my head and realize my body was already flying into the Boundless Indestructible Soul-Destroying Formation.
“No!”
It happened too quickly for me to react.
My vision blurred, and I was dragged into an unknown space.
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