WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Episode 9: Screaming Mountain Demon Beast Farm (2)
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The moment the demonic cultivator's bearing changed, Ise immediately fired an Earth Spear.
A sharply pointed lump of earth shot straight toward the woman's heart.
She reacted quickly as well.
In the brief motion of bending backward to let the Earth Spear pass, the flute tucked at the corner of her mouth rose at once.
Piiii!
A sharp note that scraped at the nerves spread through the valley.
The demon beasts within the pens rushed out together, blood vessels bulging in their dark red eyes.
Three-Headed Chickens with beaks full of teeth, demon beasts somewhere between foxes and wolves, and serpent-shaped demon beasts charged at him with piercing cries.
The sight of so many demon beasts rushing him at once was chilling.
Ise did not move. To the enemy, he probably looked terrified and frozen in place. He only tightened his grip on his hatchet.
‘A little closer.’
The beasts closed the distance. Through spirit sight, Ise could clearly see each one's position and speed.
When they came dangerously close, a strange satisfaction spread across the woman's face.
She seemed certain he could not handle this much.
A Three-Headed Chicken opened its beak, its sharp teeth just about to reach Ise.
He poured spiritual energy into the armor beneath his Daoist robes.
Chwaaaak!
The Needle-Launching Armor unleashed hundreds of large needles around Ise's body.
The power of the treasure artifact, which pierced everything within Ise's radius, revealed itself.
The Three-Headed Chicken's three heads were skewered at once as it flailed in midair. The demon beasts pierced from their flanks through their backs stiffened without even managing a breath.
One strike.
With a single activation, the entire pack of demon beasts became hedgehogs pinned in the air.
“Ah, ahhh, no!”
Despair filled the demonic cultivator's face, then turned to terror. The creatures she had raised over a lifetime had lost their lives in an instant.
One demon beast that had luckily avoided instant death clacked its teeth despite having a hole through its belly.
It was a foolish attempt to drag its impaled body toward Ise.
Ise indifferently swung his hatchet once and severed its neck. Then he withdrew his spiritual energy and recalled the large needles.
Thud, thud, thud.
The pierced demon beasts fell from the air all at once.
Ise stepped across the scene of blood and flesh mixed together.
Then he suddenly quickened his pace and closed in as though kicking off the ground.
The woman reacted a beat too late. The shock of losing all her demon beasts at once had apparently not faded yet.
It was a clear opening, but Ise remained careful.
There might have been a hidden trump card, so as he approached, he stopped and sprang backward.
Only then did the demonic cultivator snap out of it. She took out talismans and fired them in rapid succession.
‘No separate defensive spirit artifact.’
Nothing activated even when he had gotten fairly close.
Other than the demon beasts, she did not seem to have any special means.
Basic spells came flying at him one after another, Fireball Talismans, Thunderflow Talismans, and more.
Ise raised the Yellow Great Parasol to block them. Fire and lightning scattered harmlessly against the shield.
“Argh! Aah! Don't come any closer!”
Ise advanced toward the demonic cultivator one step at a time, moving slowly enough that he could retreat at any moment.
The closer he came, the paler her face became.
Every talisman was blocked. The moment Ise's hatchet flew toward her arm and cut it off, she dropped to her knees.
“Please spare me, Senior!”
Her fighting spirit had completely broken. Without lowering his guard, Ise summoned an Earth Spear and drove it through her abdomen.
The demonic cultivator struck the wall with the Earth Spear piercing through her, then vomited a mouthful of blood.
“Cough...!”
Only after deploying the Shadow Net Formation to bind her entire body did Ise look down at the battered demonic cultivator.
“P-please, Senior... I'll give you everything you want, resources, dual cultivation, anything at all, so please spare my life...”
Rather than answer, Ise slowly approached her.
Carefully moving his feet to avoid the pool of blood, he placed his palm on her forehead.
The Root-Severing, Meridian-Cutting Art.
It was a new spell he had learned from the first archive pavilion at headquarters after paying Spiritual Stones.
As his energy swept through the spiritual meridians in her body and cut them apart piece by piece, the demonic cultivator's eyes widened from the pain.
“This is...!”
A nightmare-like art for demonic cultivators, used by the Great Exorcist Order to interrogate and enslave cultivators from demonic sects they had captured.
The demonic cultivator's body convulsed violently once.
A faint cracking sound echoed from within her body, audible only to those with keen senses, as her spiritual root shattered from its very foundation.
“Ah... Aaaagh! No!”
At last, the woman who had lost her spiritual root jerked her head up.
Her face showed that she had finally understood something would never flow through her body again.
“Y-you bastard...! Th-this art...”
The demonic cultivator's lips trembled.
“Y-you're a dog of the Great Exorcist Order! How can a demonic practitioner betray comrades and call himself a dog of the Great Exorcist Order?”
“Who do you think is your comrade, you disgusting demonic cultivator?”
Ise looked down at her without expression.
Leaving only those words, he put his hatchet to her neck.
“Now. Let's finish our conversation.”
The woman’s eyes went bloodshot. Ise ignored it and calmly asked, “Do you know a Foundation Establishment Realm demonic cultivator who controls a Four-Wind Black Tiger? Or one who controls a Snail-Headed Scholar?”
Information on the demonic cultivator who had attacked him. Or the enemy who had killed his family. Either would do.
Instead of answering, the demonic cultivator gathered saliva and spat at him.
Ise only tilted his head slightly to let it pass, then used a Fire Art at his fingertips to scorch the woman's severed shoulder.
“Aaaagh!”
“Next, I'll cut off your ankle. Now that you're a criminal, you should preserve whatever limbs you have left.”
“Y-you...”
“If you cooperate, I'll spare your life. Where is your headquarters?”
“...You ignorant, filthy butchers. You've searched every mountain and valley, so where do you think our headquarters could be?”
The woman let out a laugh mixed with blood.
“You never intended to let me live anyway!”
Ise straightened and said, “If you won't cooperate, it can't be helped. I'll take you to headquarters and make you reveal everything with the Mind-Reading Art. I wasn't expecting much from you anyway.”
At that, the woman's laughter slowly stopped.
Instead, one corner of her mouth twisted strangely upward.
“...You will die here.”
The woman's eyes flicked toward the ridge behind Ise.
“Do you think I spoke to you for no reason...? You worm. You will regret setting foot in this place.”
At that moment, thick demonic qi surged from behind Ise.
It was dense, heavy, and powerful. The demonic qi itself felt like a solid mass. His Dokkaebi Senses rang sharply, too late.
A furious roar followed.
“You bastard!”
Ise's head snapped around at the voice that boomed like thunder.
“Get away from her at once!”
Another demonic cultivator was approaching at high speed.
An immense amount of demonic qi rolled from the figure like overflowing waves.
It was similar to the Qi Condensation Realm cultivators who had competed in the Spell Duel Tournament.
Without question, it was the aura of Great Completion.
“My wife! You bastard! Get away from her at once!”
The enraged roar shook the entire valley. Mountain birds burst from the trees all at once.
The pieces quickly fell into place in Ise's mind.
The formation that removed the Spirit-Veiling Art when it sensed someone approaching. The demon beast tamer who had not used formations.
One person had not been handling two different arts, demon beasts and formations.
There had been two demonic cultivators from the start. Someone else had set up the formations.
Without a word, Ise slowly lowered his body without turning around.
There were always variables when fighting cultivators. He had never faced one this large.
His judgment was quick.
The hatchet flashed once. The demonic cultivator's neck, pinned against the wall, was half severed and tilted to the side.
As her final breaths slipped away, the woman's eyes slowly rolled back.
It stung to lose the chance for information. But his opponent was an enemy at the Great Completion stage of the Qi Condensation Realm.
When facing a dangerous enemy, eliminate even the smallest variables first. That was what Master Mongryeon had taught him.
“I'll kill you! I'll tear you to pieces and feed you to demon beasts!”
“Sorry, but there aren't any demon beasts left to feed.”
Only then did the demonic cultivator notice the demon beast corpses.
The demonic cultivator looked as if he had lost his mind.
‘Stay calm. Make him lose his temper.’
Qi Condensation Realm, tenth star. Setting aside the Foundation Establishment Realm demonic cultivator who had been so far above him that Ise could only flee, this was the strongest enemy he had ever faced.
‘He's in a hurry.’
To save the demonic cultivator bleeding to death behind him, he would want to subdue Ise as quickly as possible.
When someone became impatient, they created openings.
He would aim for that opening and tear it wider.
‘Formations are less effective in a one-on-one fight. If he's a formation master, I can handle him.’
As the man drew closer and saw his wife’s condition, his eyes suddenly went bloodshot.
His pupils stopped looking human and rolled back like the whites of a beast's eyes.
The large brush the approaching demonic cultivator took out moved through the air.
Ise understood the meaning of the motion at once.
The most basic method of formations. Setting up a formation using a formation artifact.
He did not know what formation the man was using, so he could not let it be completed.
Ise pulled out the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner with his right hand and planted it in the ground.
A warding barrier spread out, covering the surrounding area.
The man on the ridge hesitated for an instant. The formation pattern he had half drawn in the air scattered midway through, and the light at the tip of his brush vanished.
At the same time, Ise leaped like lightning and tried to swing his hatchet at the man’s neck.
A killing strike, the hunting method that had subdued most of the enemies he had faced.
He also deployed the metal-aspect spell, Adamantine Chain.
It was a spell that made the edge of a weapon even harder and sharper.
Yet the demonic cultivator seemed to sense something strange the moment the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner's domain spread. He immediately stopped forming the formation and leaped to the side, farther from the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner.
‘He's worked up to the point of madness and in a hurry, yet he's retreating?’
Ise pursued with all his strength, but even with his demonic qi sealed, the Great Completion demonic cultivator's physical ability was extraordinary.
Just before the man escaped the edge of the warding barrier, Ise succeeded in swinging his hatchet at him. Yet he only left a small bloody line across the man's chest before losing him.
Outside the warding barrier, the demonic cultivator caught Ise's next swing head-on.
Clang!
It did not sound like metal striking stone. It sounded like stone striking harder stone.
Ise's wrist went numb.
He immediately stepped back. A red explosion erupted from the spot where he had stood moments earlier.
“You have some tricks.”
The demonic cultivator spoke in a low voice.
“That banner spear is a spirit artifact containing the principle of the Demonic-Qi-Sealing Formation. Clever little bastard.”
For the first time, someone had broken through the Twin-Curtain Spirit-Domain Sealing Banner.
Confusion spread across Ise's face.
Footnotes:
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