Chapter 104

Sa Hyokyung’s face was utterly pale.

The feeling of the Silver Thread digging into his flesh was shudderingly gruesome.

He had no time to feel shame.

Because everything had happened in the blink of an eye.

The time it took for Jo Samcheok to be dragged into the darkness, for Jeungsanwi to lose his life, and for him to be subdued by the man was no more than a few breaths.

In that brief moment, Pyo Wol had eliminated the survivors of the Seven Stars Hall and completely overpowered him.

It was like having a nightmare.

He had always thought that living in the Jianghu meant he would one day face a grim end, but he never imagined that moment would come so without warning.

‘To think an Assassin like this existed in the Jianghu?’

Even after experiencing it himself, he couldn’t believe it.

Pyo Wol was a being who thoroughly defied the common sense of Assassins.

None of the common sense they knew applied to Pyo Wol.

The very fact that such an Assassin existed in the Jianghu was a nightmare. The problem was that the Martial Artists outside of Sichuan Province knew nothing of this.

‘A monster was lurking within Sichuan Province.’

Sa Hyokyung didn’t dare to move, only darting his eyes around. In his field of vision, he saw the pale face of Yo Seol-yeong.

Once Sa Hyokyung was subdued, Yo Seol-yeong, unable to do anything, looked back and forth between Pyo Wol’s and Sa Hyokyung’s faces.

A curse escaped him internally.

‘You stupid bitch! You should be trying to save me, not just watching.’

But the Silver Thread was choking his throat, so the voice couldn’t escape, only swirling inside his mouth.

At that moment, Pyo Wol opened his mouth.

“Why are you trying to kidnap that child?”

The moment Pyo Wol’s voice echoed in his ears, Sa Hyokyung felt a chill run down his spine.

“That is…”

Yo Seol-yeong stammered.

She knew nothing.

She was simply following Sa Hyokyung because he had accepted the request; she had no interest in the truth.

Pyo Wol’s gaze turned to Sa Hyokyung.

“Speak!”

The Silver Thread choking Sa Hyokyung’s neck loosened slightly.

“Cough! I, I don’t know either. I just took the request… Keuk!”

Instantly, the Silver Thread tightened around Sa Hyokyung’s neck again.

Sa Hyokyung’s eyes bulged as if they would pop out at any moment.

Pyo Wol could tell whether a person was telling the truth or not just by listening to their breathing.

The sound of Sa Hyokyung’s heart pounding erratically told him it was a lie.

“I won’t ask a second time. Who hired you?”

“Kugh!”

Sa Hyokyung’s face turned beet red.

Seeing him on the verge of suffocation, Yo Seol-yeong bit her lip.

“Wait! Let’s resolve this with a conversation.”

“A conversation? We are having one.”

“Don’t speak so frighteningly, be gentle…”

Yo Seol-yeong dropped the sword she was holding.

After raising both hands to show she had no weapons, she cautiously stepped toward Pyo Wol.

With every step, her sensual figure became more pronounced.

Pyo Wol’s gaze naturally fell upon her chest.

A smile flickered on Yo Seol-yeong’s lips.

‘So you’re a man too.’

Yo Seol-yeong was confident she could bewitch any man, even the Jade Emperor himself.

She seduced Pyo Wol with the most alluring expression and gestures she could muster. Then, she exchanged a look with Sa Hyokyung.

They could read each other’s thoughts with just a glance.

Even in a situation where he was about to suffocate, Sa Hyokyung understood Yo Seol-yeong’s intention and nodded.

Thud!

Yo Seol-yeong took off her outer garment.

Her white cleavage was clearly revealed.

“If you just let my senior go, we can have a good time. I don’t like this hostile atmosphere. Let’s have an ecstatic time in a good mood. I’ll give you the greatest pleasure of your life.”

Yo Seol-yeong’s seductive charm exploded.

Her gaze, her whisper, her gestures exuded a fatal allure, tempting Pyo Wol.

It was impossible for any man to resist such a temptation.

At least, every man Yo Seol-yeong had seduced until now had been unable to endure and had fallen to their knees.

Believing it would be the same this time, Yo Seol-yeong approached Pyo Wol with the most beautiful smile she could manage.

As if her seduction was working, the Silver Thread tightening around Sa Hyokyung loosened a little.

‘This is my chance.’

Sa Hyokyung spun around like a thunderbolt and unleashed his twin palms.

Kwaaa!

The palm energy, imbued with all his Internal Power, struck Pyo Wol’s chest.

In that instant, Sa Hyokyung realized something was wrong. He hadn’t felt any impact on his hands.

It was then.

“Behind you! Orabeoni.”

Yo Seol-yeong’s urgent cry was heard.

Sa Hyokyung instinctively turned around. But again, Pyo Wol was nowhere to be seen.

Yo Seol-yeong stared at Sa Hyokyung with eyes full of terror. To be precise, she was staring at Pyo Wol, who was standing like a ghost behind Sa Hyokyung.

Pyo Wol had been standing behind Sa Hyokyung from the very beginning. Yet, Sa Hyokyung had not noticed it at all.

“Behind, behind you say…”

Yo Seol-yeong’s words were cut short.

A streak of lightning had pierced through her forehead.

“Yo-mae!”

Sa Hyokyung’s desperate scream echoed through the night sky.

A Ghostly Rain was embedded in Yo Seol-yeong’s forehead.

Unaware of even that, Yo Seol-yeong’s body was collapsing.

At Yo Seol-yeong’s death, Sa Hyokyung went berserk.

“Uwaaah! You crazy bastard! I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you.”

He recklessly unleashed his palm energy without looking.

Kwakwakwang!

Everything struck by his palm energy was destroyed. But not a single one of his palm strikes hit Pyo Wol’s body.

Pyo Wol unfolded his Serpentine Steps to evade all the palm strikes, then delivered a blow to Sa Hyokyung’s chest.

It was Jade Destruction, which focused all power into a single point.

Poong!

With a sound like a leather drum bursting, Sa Hyokyung’s body was thrown backward.

A large hole was gaping in Sa Hyokyung’s chest.

“You, you…”

Sa Hyokyung lay on the ground, looking up at Pyo Wol.

The sight of Pyo Wol looking down at him dispassionately did not seem human.

“Death… god…”

Those were Sa Hyokyung’s last words.

Pyo Wol gazed at Sa Hyokyung’s corpse for a moment before turning away.

With this, the Seven Stars Hall that had entered Chengdu was annihilated.

A martial arts group renowned in Hunan Province had been massacred in a single night.

It was a major incident that would have caused a stir if the Martial Artists of the Jianghu knew, but Pyo Wol, the main actor in the event, wore an impassive expression.

Fame or status in the Jianghu could not stir any emotion in Pyo Wol.

He only divided people into two categories.

Those he could kill, and those he could not.

And today, he had confirmed it.

There was almost no one he couldn’t kill if he set his mind to it.

Pyo Wol disappeared from the scene, holding Nam Shin-woo in his arms.

Long after he was gone, a man and a woman appeared at the scene where Sa Hyokyung, Yo Seol-yeong, and the others had died.

“Good heavens!”

The one who was horrified at the sight of Sa Hyokyung’s body was none other than the Shadowless Hermit, Yoo Shinpoong.

He stared back and forth between the bodies of Sa Hyokyung and Yo Seol-yeong, his mouth agape. It was the same for Lee Soha, who had followed Yoo Shinpoong.

“The Seven… Stars Hall was annihilated? And by a single person. Does that even make sense?”

In her common sense, it was an impossible feat.

A scene she would never have believed if she hadn’t seen it with her own eyes was unfolding before her.

Yoo Shinpoong muttered blankly.

“A walking disaster has made its nest in Chengdu. What is to be done about this?”

＊＊＊

Pyo Wol walked, holding Nam Shin-woo.

Pyo Wol’s expression as he looked at the unconscious Nam Shin-woo was not bright.

Nam Shin-woo had been turned into a Blood Human by Sa Hyokyung’s brutal violence. But on closer inspection, his wounds were healing at a frightening speed. Some had almost healed, leaving only faint scars.

It was a sight that defied common sense.

Pyo Wol himself was a being who defied the common sense of others, but Nam Shin-woo was defying even Pyo Wol’s common sense.

He had heard of one other such being in the Jianghu.

‘Was he called the Ghost King?’

Hong Yushin had called him the greatest mystery in the current Jianghu.

It wasn’t simply because his Martial Arts were profound.

It was because people believed he held the secret to Immortality.

Pyo Wol shook his head.

It was an absurd thought.

Being born human, it was the natural order to one day die. He didn’t know if it was possible to defy such an order, and even if it were, he didn’t know what price would have to be paid.

“…”

Pyo Wol’s impassive gaze suddenly turned forward.

Someone was walking from the opposite direction.

For the first time, a crack appeared on Pyo Wol’s face.

He could clearly see someone’s figure, yet he couldn’t feel any presence or sign of life.

This was the first time this had happened since he came out into the Jianghu.

There had been countless times when people couldn’t sense his presence, but this was the first time he couldn’t sense someone else’s.

All of Pyo Wol’s nerves were on edge.

Like a hedgehog raising its quills, his nerves stood up sharply, and his senses expanded.

Thwack!

But Pyo Wol’s senses were blocked midway.

Something faint, as if veiled in a thick fog, was disturbing Pyo Wol’s senses.

A Crimson Light flashed in Pyo Wol’s eyes.

It was the first time he had felt a sense of crisis.

His muscles tensed, and his shoulders stiffened.

Placing Nam Shin-woo to one side, Pyo Wol stood tall and watched the approaching figure.

In that moment, a gust of wind blew, swirling around Pyo Wol’s entire body.

It wasn’t just Pyo Wol’s imagination that the wind, which should have been refreshing, felt eerie.

The wind held a will, and it was scanning Pyo Wol’s entire body.

The Crimson Light in Pyo Wol’s eyes grew deeper.

Now it looked as if only two red lights were floating in the darkness.

In that instant, he felt the being on the other side flinch.

Pyo Wol fully opened all his senses. Then, he felt the wind scanning him even more strongly.

It was as if a snake was slithering all over his body.

That feeling was by no means unfamiliar to Pyo Wol.

Snakes sense, gauge, and grasp their opponents with their entire bodies.

Pyo Wol felt the senses of snakes in the wind.

The wind was trying to grasp everything as it swept over Pyo Wol’s body. To be precise, the one who wielded the wind was trying to grasp Pyo Wol.

But he did not know.

That Pyo Wol was not one to show his inner self to others. That he preferred, in fact, the opposite.

Pyo Wol’s Qi began to move.

It constricted the wind that was scanning his body and began to seep into it in reverse.

Like a single drop of ink contaminating a basin of clear water, Pyo Wol’s dark Internal Power contaminated the wind and traced it back to its source.

Pyo Wol’s Internal Power moved, split into countless fine threads like tiny snakes.

“Hut!”

A gasp escaped from the one who had been trying to gauge Pyo Wol using the wind.

Although his face was not visible, a sense of dismay could be felt from his entire being.

This was the first time something like this had happened.

He hurriedly tried to cut off the wind to sever the connection between Pyo Wol and himself. But Pyo Wol would not let him.

Pyo Wol’s Internal Power tenaciously clung to the wind. Like thousands of thread-like snakes clinging to their prey, Pyo Wol’s Internal Power clung to the wind and finally reached the source.

Pyo Wol did exactly what he had done.

He mimicked the act of the opponent trying to grasp him with the wind.

It was an act tantamount to humiliating the opponent.

But Pyo Wol didn’t care about such trivial emotions.

The other person had first made a move to figure him out, and he was simply mimicking his action.

There was no room for petty emotions like guilt to intervene.

This was a fight.

A fight the opponent had started.

Pyo Wol was prepared to do anything to win a fight. Even if it meant stealing and learning the opponent’s techniques.

He didn’t care if it was called cowardly.

Because that was how he had survived.

He had no intention of becoming complacent just because his Martial Arts had reached a certain level.

If there was something better, he would steal and learn it, even seize it by force, to climb to a higher place.

At that moment, a Lion’s Roar erupted from the opponent.

“Gal (Drink)!””

The Lion’s Roar became a storm and swallowed Pyo Wol.