WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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Chapter 41: Episode 6: Heaven-Demon Dual-Meridian Physique (4)

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Ise slowly pulled himself together.

It took a long time before strength returned to his limbs. Once he had barely managed to kneel, he gave the salute due to a master.

“An entry disciple asks the Azure Dragon Hall Master for instruction.”

Even one day of teaching made someone no different from a master.

Haeil still sat in midair, looking down at Ise.

His gaze slowly traveled over Ise’s entire body.

Was he measuring the amount of spiritual energy within him, or examining his physique? Ise could not fathom the depth behind those eyes.

“So you truly have the Heaven-Demon Dual-Meridian Physique.”

It was a quiet murmur. Something like longing crossed Haeil’s face before vanishing.

“Looks like making time for a shabby fellow like you was worth it.”

“I would consider it an honor to receive your instruction.”

“It’s hardly instruction. I’ll simply tell you what I know. Before that, though... let me take a look inside your head.”

Haeil landed from the air and stepped closer to Ise. Then he reached out and pressed his palm to Ise’s forehead.

After tilting his head for a moment, Haeil’s eyes gradually narrowed.

“What have you been carrying around in that head of yours?”

“What do you mean...?”

When Ise asked what he meant, Haeil gave a warning instead of an answer.

“I wondered why the Dao of Heaven kept urging me to turn back when I was busy enough already. It seems meeting me was part of your fate. This will hurt a little.”

Haeil removed his hand and crooked his index finger.

At that instant, pain exploded from deep inside Ise’s skull.

“Urgh...!”

It felt as though his brain were being torn apart. Pressure surged through his entire head as if it were swelling from within. His eyes felt ready to burst from their sockets, and something hot ran from his nose and ears. The pain twisted his whole body against his will.

“Don’t struggle. If anything goes wrong, you could die.”

At Haeil’s words, Ise clenched his teeth.

What in the world...?

Soon, the pain in his head vanished, and everything before his eyes turned white.

Through his fading consciousness, the skin of his forehead wriggled. It felt as though something were being forced from the inside out.

The next moment, something tiny wriggled out of his ear amid a pain sharp enough to tear apart his eardrums.

“You endured it well.”

With a motion of his hand, Haeil restored Ise’s injured brain and eardrum. Only then did Ise’s fading consciousness return.

“...?”

It was an insect no bigger than a fingernail.

A grotesque insect Ise had never seen before, its black segmented body and legs wriggling like a larva.

The instant it emerged, Haeil gestured.

The insect, bound in midair, was placed into a glass bottle Haeil had taken from his storage pouch.

When Haeil touched a finger to the bottle’s opening, chains formed from spiritual energy wrapped around it.

Wiping the blood from his chin, Ise stared at the bottle.

Something like that had been inside his head?

“This is a type of parasitic demon known as a gu parasite.”

A gu parasite, a poisonous insect implanted in someone’s head or body.

Ise knew such things were generally used to control or restrain people...

“We’ll have to study it at headquarters to know the details.”

Haeil raised the bottle to eye level.

“You somehow raised your realm with something like this attached to you. Judging by how deeply it had settled in, it was implanted quite a long time ago.”

The insect in the bottle writhed as though struggling desperately.

“Have you ever encountered a demonic cultivator?”

“I recently fought a Foundation Establishment Realm demonic cultivator, but...”

“It wasn’t implanted by some Foundation Establishment demonic cultivator.”

Haeil’s voice grew low.

“It was planted long ago by someone at least in the late Core Formation Realm, and carefully concealed at that. That’s why neither Mongryeon nor Kang I-tae discovered it.”

Late Core Formation Realm.

Someone had implanted a gu parasite in Ise’s head, one subtle enough to escape even the notice of Hall Master-level great cultivators.

When? And who?

Haeil closed his eyes as if searching his memories and fell into thought before continuing.

“Fewer than five people in the Eastern Continent could be responsible. Someone does come to mind. What matters is not who, but why. Tell me everything you can remember about your life, from the beginning.”

Ise slowly looked back over his life and recounted everything he could remember.

He began with the stories his adoptive parents had told him about his childhood and his earliest memories, then continued until he had entered Great Exorcist Order and arrived where he was now.

Haeil only listened with his arms crossed. He asked no questions and gave no responses.

When Ise finished, Haeil nodded once as if he understood.

“Keep this matter to yourself. Don’t think about it, and forget it. This is not something you can involve yourself in.”

“Yes. I’ll focus on cultivation.”

Satisfied with Ise’s answer, Haeil changed the subject.

“Adopted, huh. Did the Great Exorcist Order Lord perhaps have a child?”

“What?”

“That physique is hereditary, passed down through bloodlines. Those old monsters in the mountains endlessly nagged the Great Exorcist Order Lord to find a Dao companion, but the Order Lord acted like a cripple, so I thought the bloodline had died out. Who could the child's other parent be?”

Ise fell silent.

He understood what it meant to be descended from the Great Exorcist Order Lord, but his heart could not keep up with his mind.

If the physique was hereditary, there might be others with the same physique somewhere, even if they were not descended directly from the Great Exorcist Order Lord.

“May I ask you to tell me more about my physique?”

“That’s why I came, so you don’t need to be so cautious.”

Even so, the gap between their realms was impossibly vast.

Feeling a difference in standing so great that even breathing comfortably was difficult, Ise finally understood, deep in his bones, why cultivators revered those of higher realms.

“I don’t know everything. Still, I’ll tell you all that I do know. The foundation of your physique is that both spiritual energy and demonic qi flow through your spiritual meridians. Because of that, it has six traits.”

Haeil spoke as he raised one finger after another.

First, it was a physique capable of both cultivation methods, the way cultivators practiced, and devouring, the way demons cultivated.

Second, the evil karma accumulated so far did not affect the heavenly tribulation faced when breaking through a major realm boundary.

Third, he could learn every kind of spell regardless of his spiritual root’s attribute.

Fourth, he had to continue cultivating while maintaining the balance of yin and yang.

Fifth, his cultivation speed was comparable to that of a single spiritual root cultivator.

Sixth, it was a hereditary physique passed down through bloodlines. The chance of it manifesting was unknown.

Ise hurriedly absorbed the flood of information and fixed it in his mind.

It felt as though a thirst that had plagued him for so long had finally been quenched.

After carefully reviewing all six points, Ise asked, “May I ask a question?”

“You may.”

“What exactly does it mean that heavenly tribulation is unaffected?”

“Exactly what it sounds like. Whether you kill people, hunt spirit beasts, drink medicinal pellets like liquor, or defy the proper way as much as you please, the heavenly tribulation you must face will not change.”

“If heavenly tribulation does not change, that means I will still face it. Does that mean it will be weaker?”

“The opposite.”

Haeil looked straight at Ise with an expression that almost seemed amused.

“The heavenly tribulation you must endure was close to the highest possible difficulty from the beginning. You are not treated as though you have no evil karma when you accumulate it. You are treated as though you have accumulated evil karma even when you have not.”

Ise’s face froze.

“But Hall Master Hong Mi-hee said it was a physique without heavenly tribulation...”

“That information was wrong.”

Wrong? Even Hall Master Hong Mi-hee had been mistaken?

“The Great Exorcist Order Lord crossed the boundary between life and death with every major realm breakthrough. The Order Lord endured heavenly tribulation in secret and pretended nothing had happened to keep everyone from worrying. I stood guard whenever the Order Lord faced heavenly tribulation, so I know better than anyone.”

Ise was speechless. His physique did not lack heavenly tribulation. It was instead a physique burdened with the harshest kind. What use was outstanding talent if he died while crossing a major realm boundary?

Seeing Ise’s despair, Haeil snickered.

“That’s why the Great Exorcist Order Lord went around beating to death anyone who drew the Order Lord's dislike. The Order Lord said that if heavenly tribulation was unavoidable anyway, there was no reason to suffer it while feeling wronged.”

“...”

“It was an age of savagery and romance back then. Good times.”

For some reason, Ise felt he could understand.

“What does maintaining the balance of yin and yang mean?”

“I’ll use an ordinary physique as an example. From the middle stage of the Qi Condensation Realm onward, cultivation requires balancing one’s attributes. If someone has dual water and wood spiritual roots, they must evenly develop water-attribute and wood-attribute cultivation methods. Only when they precisely balance the attributes within their spiritual roots can they advance in realm.”

Ise listened silently. He had read about it in the Demon Hunting, Spirit Release, and Qi Condensation Art.

“You do not need to balance attributes, but you must maintain the balance between the spiritual energy and demonic qi in your body.”

“Do you mean I must match the amount of spiritual energy and demonic qi exactly?”

“Not just the amount, but your attainments in the methods as well. In every realm, you must learn at least one cultivation method that embodies yang and one demonic cultivation method that embodies yin.”

Though Ise looked as if he understood, he also seemed doubtful.

“May I learn demonic cultivation methods while belonging to Great Exorcist Order?”

“If anyone asks, tell them you’re a dokkaebi.”

“...What?”

“You were taken in by Mongryeon, so there happens to be something suitable. Wait a moment.”

Haeil sent a Message Talisman flying into the air. It vanished as if cutting through space, and a reply returned shortly after.

After checking it, Haeil let out a laugh.

“She still has the same temper.”

Ise looked curious at what seemed to be a reference to Mongryeon.

Ise could not bring himself to ask, but Haeil seemed rather fond of Mongryeon. Smiling, Haeil explained what the Message Talisman said.

“I asked whether you had the same physique as the Great Exorcist Order Lord and whether you were the Order Lord's child. She sent back a message filled with curses. What kind of dokkaebi is so good at human insults?”

Ise’s lips lifted before he could stop them. He could vividly picture Mongryeon cursing someone out.

“She may not be my birth mother, but she is like a mother to me.”

Chuckling, Haeil took two cultivation manuals from his storage pouch and placed them before Ise.

「Dokkaebi Shadow-Hunting Demonic Art」

Ise already knew the name of the secret manual on the right.

“The Dokkaebi Shadow-Hunting Demonic Art is the demonic art practiced by the dokkaebi people from the Qi Condensation Realm through the Foundation Establishment Realm. Mongryeon has given permission, so you may learn it without concern.”

“Master...”

Haeil pointed to the second cultivation manual.

“The other is the Great Exorcist Order Lord’s secret cultivation method, called the Two Principles Return-to-Origin Art.”

Ise stiffened at Haeil’s words. A secret art of the Great Exorcist Order Lord. That meant it was a cultivation method exclusively for the Heaven-Demon Dual-Meridian Physique.

Was this not exactly what he had needed most?

Could he truly accept something so precious?

A Nascent Soul Realm great cultivator’s generosity was truly on another level.

Full of awe, Ise carefully opened the cultivation manual.

The first page bore the name Two Principles Return-to-Origin Art and a brief preface.

A cultivation method that allowed someone capable of wielding both spiritual energy and demonic qi to form primordial qi, maximize its power, and ultimately ascend.

Ise tried to turn the page with trembling hands, but it would not move. It was sealed, just like the manuals at the secret-manual bookshop.

“I never said I would show it to you.”

“...”

Haeil burst into laughter at Ise’s expression, which resembled that of a puppy whose bone had been taken away.

Ise could not even resent him. He only looked at the great senior with an expression on the verge of tears.

“I’m joking. I cannot undo it either. There are three volumes, and the seal only opens when all three are gathered. This is the first volume. I do not know where the middle and final volumes are. The reason I wander the continent is to find the other two.”

Haeil returned the Two Principles Return-to-Origin Art secret manual to his storage pouch.

“If I find them all, I’ll show it to you too.”

“Thank you for your great kindness.”

Ise bowed deeply.

He had only been promised one day of instruction as the top scorer of the entrance examination, but the great cultivator before him was giving him far more than that.

“On the condition that you promise to complete the three tasks I give you.”

Ise raised his head. Determination showed on his face, as though he would accomplish anything asked of him.

“First, raise your realm quickly.”

Haeil held up one finger.

“As a benchmark... Woo Yu-hui should do. Break every record she holds for the fastest advancement. If you are descended from the Great Exorcist Order Lord, that much should be natural.”

“Am I truly descended from the Great Exorcist Order Lord?”

“How would I know? Second.”

Instead of answering, Haeil raised a second finger.

“You must become my blade.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“When you reach the Core Formation Realm, kill every Core Formation Realm cultivator in the Zheng Empire.”

It was a rather harsh statement to hear from the mouth of a Daoist.

Rather than answering, Ise waited for Haeil to continue.

“Recently, thirty Core Formation Realm cultivators joined forces against me. They think that if I disappear, they can get rid of Great Exorcist Order. It would be easy enough to kill them all, but I am close to reaching the Spirit Transformation Realm and do not want to accumulate unnecessary evil karma, so I have been holding myself back.”

Spirit Transformation Realm.

The final realm attainable in the mortal world. The distant realm inspired something beyond respect, something close to awe.

“So you kill them.”

Ise closed his mouth.

To become Haeil’s blade meant eliminating Great Exorcist Order’s enemies in his place.

Ise had always considered himself cold enough to kill if necessary. Yet being tasked with killing people against whom he held no grudge did not sit well with him.

Still, the cultivators of the Zheng Empire sought the fall of Great Exorcist Order. They threatened to destroy his world.

“If possible, I will.”

Satisfied with the answer, Haeil revealed the final task.

“And lastly...”

A third finger rose.

“Have children. The more, the better.”

“...What?”

Even though Haeil spoke seriously, Ise could only ask again with a blank expression.

Footnotes:

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