WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 36: Episode 5: Cheoryang Thunder Gate (6)
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“Demon butcher.”
“Demon Crusher.”
“Could you put that head down already?”
Pi Garam, Seolryeong, and Hong Wonseo each threw out a comment in turn.
Ise neatly set the Flesh-Virtue Hawk’s head, still dripping blood, before its body. Then he pulled out the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner and retrieved it.
Hong Wonseo’s eyes lit up when she saw it.
“Did Hall Master Hong make that banner spear?”
“You recognized it right away. Is it that obvious?”
“That Vermilion Bird emblem is the seal of Jucheon Clan, the predecessor of the Vermilion Bird Hall.”
Hong Wonseo lightly tapped the round plaque hanging at her waist.
“The one I received is a defensive spirit artifact. I suppose Hall Master Hong didn’t want me to die.”
Defensive spirit artifacts were especially precious, and always expensive.
It was a choice that showed Hall Master Hong Mi-hee’s affection for her descendant.
Hong Wonseo calmly looked over Seolryeong and Pi Garam.
By revealing information about her sacred relic first, she was likely trying to encourage the other two to share theirs naturally.
Asking about another person’s spirit artifacts was a serious breach of manners, but it was different when they were companions entrusting one another with their backs.
Pi Garam took a small metal cylinder from a sleeve.
“It’s a spirit artifact that lets me set formations quickly and with greater power. I haven’t mastered many formations yet, but I’m mainly learning ones useful for defense and escape.”
Seolryeong pulled a small pouch from her robes with a regretful expression.
“Mine is a sacred relic related to making spirit artifacts, so it’s useless in battle. Sorry.”
“You don’t need to apologize.”
Ise gave a brief nod, then changed the subject.
“Hong Wonseo. You purify it.”
“Me? I didn’t really do anything.”
“We’ll take it into account when dividing spoils and mission rewards, so go ahead.”
“All right. Then I’ll gladly do it.”
Without complaint, Hong Wonseo took out the Purification Staff. She knelt before the corpse and smoothly recited the formula for the Spirit Release Incantation.
As Ise watched, another thought kept circling through his mind.
This area was Gwisu Temple’s territory.
Yet there were demonic cultivators from Cheoryang Thunder Gate, Four-Wind Black Tigers, and even a Flesh-Virtue Hawk. There were far too many demons.
Was it coincidence, or was it inevitable?
After placing the Flesh-Virtue Hawk’s corpse in the Demon-Sealing Talisman Book, Ise glanced toward the eastern ridge.
Toward Gwisu Temple.
‘Nothing has happened, right?’
Mongryeon was one of the continent’s strongest people. It was only natural for him to worry about his master, but it was no different from a cat worrying about a tiger.
Ise turned away and ordered them to resume the search.
With Pi Garam in the lead, the four made their way deeper into the forest.
The Four-Wind Black Tigers seemed to have no intention of erasing or concealing their tracks. Their trail was obvious.
No, it was almost too obvious.
“Seolryeong, what do the heavenly omens say? Is it still bad?”
At Ise’s question, Seolryeong blankly looked up at the sky. Then she turned back to the group.
“Yeah. It still points to grave misfortune.”
Troubled by the ominous divination, Ise stopped the group for a moment.
He did not really feel it himself, but Seolryeong was known among the entry disciples as a fairly accurate fortune-teller.
“There was nothing about heavenly omens or divination in the Shaman section of the cultivation manuals. Did you learn separate spellcraft?”
“Huh? Oh, this... has nothing to do with my specialization. It isn’t spellcraft, either. It’s just part of my constitution. And I’ve heard that cultivators who reach a certain level can usually read simple heavenly omens.”
“How accurate is it?”
“...Who knows? Fifty-fifty, I guess. Either it’s right, or it isn’t.”
“You sound like a sham fortune-teller no matter how I look at it.”
Seolryeong let out a soft laugh at Ise’s teasing.
But remembering the independent cultivator Kim Siwon... they could not take it lightly.
“Let’s slow down. We need to be careful.”
Ise reduced their pace. Seolryeong’s words and their current situation kept clashing in his mind, sounding warning bells.
At last, they found Yeombo’s trail.
Though a long time had passed since the disappearance, the strong smell of blood still clung to the area.
“There was a battle.”
Pi Garam gave a brief analysis. Gouges in the dirt, claw marks on tree bark, and blood sprayed across a wide area.
“Yeombo was attacked by two Four-Wind Black Tigers. Yeombo tried to escape, but the retreat route was blocked...”
Pi Garam’s steps shifted little by little, then stopped.
“Yeombo fell here.”
“The body...”
Seolryeong trailed off as she looked around.
While Pi Garam searched the area, Hong Wonseo scattered a strange powder. The blood trail that had seeped into the ground and vanished appeared once more.
Not far away, at the end of that trail, Yeombo’s body had been thrown into the middle of tall weeds.
More precisely, only part of the body remained. Just a single head lay there.
The flesh was severely damaged, as though birds had pecked at it.
All four stopped.
The entry disciples’ faces went pale. It was not their first time seeing a corpse, but the disgust of seeing a fellow disciple’s severed, mutilated, decaying remains was worse than they had imagined.
“I’ll examine the body.”
Hong Wonseo covered her nose and mouth with cloth, then began collecting the remains as though she were simply doing what needed to be done.
Kneeling down, she first examined the area around the head. She checked the cut, then removed a piece of Great Exorcist Order robes caught on the nape.
Slowly and carefully examining the condition of the remains, she gently wrapped Yeombo’s head in the white cloth she had taken from her robes.
“It’s definitely a body attacked by Four-Wind Black Tigers. The bite marks and claw marks match. There are no other traces. The head was torn off after death.”
A moment later, she added, “But this is not a corpse left behind after being eaten.”
“What do you mean?”
“It wasn’t left over after a meal. It was deliberately torn apart. The cut is too clean. If it had been torn apart while feeding, the flesh should have ruptured unevenly. This was separated in one motion through brute force. It was probably discarded because it wasn’t a part they wanted to eat.”
“There are no signs of feeding nearby.”
Pi Garam answered while looking over the surroundings.
Seolryeong asked in a trembling voice, “Why take the body away? If feeding was the goal, they could have eaten it here.”
“There’s a blood trail, but no sign that they ate it. That means they carried away the entire corpse.”
“A reason to take the body away. A reason...”
While the three fell into thought, Ise silently examined the surrounding traces.
Seolryeong saw his expression and asked, “What do you think, Ise?”
“I have an idea.”
Ise paused before speaking.
“Four-Wind Black Tigers in the wild don’t raise their young. Once their cubs are born, they abandon them and move to another habitat.”
“Yeah. You explained that earlier.”
“What if they aren’t in the wild?”
He had been suspicious ever since learning there were two Four-Wind Black Tigers.
It was uncommon, but such people certainly existed on the continent. Demonic cultivators called demon beast tamers.
The other three turned their eyes toward Ise.
“If the demonic cultivator from Cheoryang Thunder Gate whom Senior Gwak Chan is tracking is a demon beast tamer, and they have tamed adult Four-Wind Black Tigers while raising their cubs as well...”
Ise pointed to where Yeombo’s head had been lying.
“Then the body was taken to where the cubs are. As food.”
A short silence passed.
Ise immediately reached a conclusion.
It was only an assumption. But when there were two or more pieces of evidence pointing toward a hypothesis, it became a highly probable danger.
“Seolryeong, tell the outpost our location with a Message Talisman.”
“Okay.”
“Give up on recovering the rest of the body. We have investigated enough. We’ll leave the rest to Senior Gwak Chan and withdraw.”
As though he would not accept objections, Ise swiftly turned around.
Then Dokkaebi Senses screamed. A dreadful feeling ran from the top of his head down his spine.
“...I think we are already too late.”
Ise looked northwest, toward the top of a cliff beyond a distant ridge.
A man in dark robes stood there.
His face could not be seen, but the sinister aura flowing from his body was enough to identify him.
At that distance, an ordinary mortal could not even have told whether the distant shape was human. Yet Ise’s spirit sight showed him clearly.
A Dharma-Flower Dantian that existed not as veins, but as a vessel.
A Foundation Establishment Realm demonic cultivator.
No one here lacked the talent to understand what that meant.
“It looks like the Flesh-Virtue Hawk was a tamed demon beast too.”
At his self-reproachful words, everyone understood the situation.
The Flesh-Virtue Hawk that had attacked them had been under the demonic cultivator’s control, and the danger had begun the moment that demon beast discovered them.
The man atop the cliff slowly raised one hand.
Crackle.
Sparks of lightning scattered from his fingertips. They were not small sparks. Lightning qi formed a sphere over his palm, swelling as it tore through the air.
The pressure of the spell was enough to make every hair on their bodies stand on end.
If that came flying at them, they would die.
There was no time to think.
“Run!”
The instant Ise shouted, all four kicked off the ground.
Ise took the lead with Dokkaebi Steps and chose the quickest route, while the other three followed close behind.
Branches clawed at their faces, and stones shattered beneath their feet, but they did not slow down.
They knew without looking back.
The lightning qi was growing larger. The fact that it had not yet been fired meant the demonic cultivator was gathering that much more power.
‘Can we escape?’
Impossible. He had never experienced the power of a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator, but the fact that their pursuer was preparing a spell rather than simply chasing them showed confidence that a single spell could hunt them down while they fled.
‘If I plant the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner and seal the demonic qi, can it block the attack?’
He could not be certain. He had never confirmed whether sealing demonic qi could neutralize a spell that had already been cast.
If they were unlucky, it would only mean taking the attack head-on.
Even so, they had to block it at least once. Only then would they have a chance to flee or hide afterward.
The instant Ise pulled the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner from his back, Dokkaebi Senses howled again.
It was coming.
The presence of death drew close.
Ise planted the banner spear in the ground and turned around. At the same time, he raised the black iron shield before him.
A massive bolt of lightning flashed toward them like a calamity.
Time seemed to slow.
It was quite a rare experience, seeing lightning that should have fallen from the heavens fly at him horizontally.
Crack!
Just as Ise prepared himself for death and tried to block the spell, a round mass of spiritual energy enclosed all four of them.
A translucent sphere. The pattern of spiritual energy flowing across its surface was familiar. Hall Master Hong Mi-hee’s sacred relic had activated.
The lightning struck the sphere.
Boom!
With an explosion that tore at their ears, the lightning that struck the surface spread along the sphere’s pattern like an earthquake.
The ground shook. Nearby trees burned away or were uprooted by the shock wave and hurled through the air.
The sphere held.
As expected of Hong Mi-hee, Hall Master of the Vermilion Bird Hall.
A sacred relic used by a Qi Condensation Realm cultivator had blocked a blow from a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator.
Inside the cracked defensive spell, the four sat sprawled on the ground and stared at one another.
Hong Wonseo released the plaque at her waist and spoke. Her face had gone pale, and her open hand trembled violently.
“...It needs a day to recharge after one use.”
At those words, Ise looked toward the cliff.
Lightning fire was beginning to flicker at the demonic cultivator’s fingertips again. A second attack was being prepared.
Without waiting for anyone else, all four ran again at once.
Footnotes:
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