Chapter 180

The object that pierced through Hwa Yu-cheon’s instep was a sharp piece of bamboo.

The bamboo, cut diagonally at the tip, was a sharp weapon in itself.

The ground where Hwa Yu-cheon had stepped was densely packed with such sharpened bamboo stakes.

“Manor Lord!”

“Who set a trap?”

His Subordinates, horrified, rushed to Hwa Yu-cheon.

“Keuk!”

“Ugh!”

But they too screamed and rolled on the ground. Their feet, like Hwa Yu-cheon’s, were covered in blood.

It wasn’t just near Mae Bul-gun’s body; identical bamboo traps were set up all over the place.

“What kind of madman…”

Hwa Yu-cheon looked around with bloodshot eyes.

His face had long been contorted like a ferocious demon.

It was a simple trap, one that even a five or six-year-old child could set. But it was just as effective.

After all, Hwa Yu-cheon and five or six other Martial Artists had already been injured. Moreover, they were all Hwa Yu-cheon’s trusted men.

They had met with disaster while rushing over, worried for Hwa Yu-cheon’s safety.

Whoever had set the traps possessed a truly vicious mind.

It looked like a simple trap, but it contained a high level of psychological warfare.

“Everyone, stay where you are. We don’t know what other traps there might be.”

Hwa Yu-cheon raised his hand to stop the Subordinates who were trying to approach him.

Having seen what happened to those who went first, the Subordinates obediently followed his command.

Hwa Yu-cheon carefully pulled out the bamboo that had pierced his instep.

“Keuk!”

His expression contorted in agony.

A large hole was gaping in his instep where the bamboo had been. The wound was so large that it seemed applying pressure to the Acupoint wouldn’t achieve Hemostasis.

Hwa Yu-cheon quickly tore his sleeve and tightly bound his instep. The blood still seeped through. But any further treatment was impossible.

To treat it properly, he needed to see a Physician.

But he couldn’t turn back, not when he hadn’t even obtained the Gongpo Sword yet.

If he returned like this, the reputation he had barely earned would plummet, and the Heavenly Eunuch Clan would once again be pushed aside by Bamboo Sea Manor.

He had come too far to turn back.

Whether it turned to mush or rice, he had no choice but to see it through to the end.

“I don’t know who you are, but if I get my hands on you, I’ll make you beg me to kill you.”

Just as Hwa Yu-cheon gritted his teeth and stood up.

“Gasp!”

One of the Martial Artists standing idly was suddenly yanked up into the sky like a fish on a line.

Everyone saw it.

“……”

The sight of a perfectly fine person being pulled up into the sky was so shocking that for a moment, everyone was at a loss for words.

The one who broke the silence was the Manor Lord, Hwa Yu-cheon.

“What are you doing? Go find him at once.”

“Ah!”

“Q-Quickly, find him.”

Only then did the Martial Artists barely regain their senses.

They moved to find the Martial Artist who had just been pulled up. But their movements were as slow as a turtle on land.

The Martial Artists of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan, who had always shown perfect discipline around Hwa Yu-cheon, showed no trace of it at this moment.

Everything was just chaotic, as if they were possessed by ghosts.

They hadn’t even caught Mok Ga-hye yet, but too many things had happened in a short time. It was too much for ordinary Martial Artists to handle.

Anxious expressions were plain on the faces of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan’s Martial Artists.

Their eyes darted about uncontrollably, and their hands trembled as if they had a tremor.

“What are you doing? Hurry up and find him.”

In the end, only after hearing Hwa Yu-cheon’s roar did they hastily move.

Hwa Yu-cheon was furious.

He was just as confused.

Contrary to his expectations, the situation was spiraling into the worst-case scenario, and his Subordinates were terrified by the threat of an unknown enemy.

‘Who the hell is it? What bastard is targeting this Manor Lord? Is it someone hired by Bamboo Sea Manor?’

Countless thoughts flashed through his mind in an instant.

The unknown enemy was truly cunning.

He knew how to stir fear in a crowd.

While keeping himself completely hidden, he maximized the fear of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan’s Martial Artists. The strong bond the Heavenly Eunuch Clan had possessed until now crumbled like a sandcastle before the fear he instigated.

What was most terrifying was that they hadn’t seen the enemy’s face even once as the situation deteriorated to this point.

“Come out! Stop hiding and launching sneak attacks like a coward.”

Unable to bear it any longer, Hwa Yu-cheon let out a lion’s roar.

His shout shook the trees of the Forest of the Dead, and the Martial Artists of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan covered their ears in pain.

It was then.

A black shadow fell behind Hwa Yu-cheon.

The black shadow appeared from behind the tree Mae Bul-gun was leaning against.

Even with an unfamiliar figure standing right behind him, Hwa Yu-cheon did not notice his presence.

The black figure was Pyo Wol.

Due to Hwa Yu-cheon’s shout, everyone’s attention was scattered.

To avoid Hwa Yu-cheon’s anger, they deliberately avoided even looking in his direction.

Pyo Wol reached out his hand.

A single strand of Soul Restraining Thread shot out like a snake. And it dug into Hwa Yu-cheon’s Dazhui acupoint.

Puk!

‘Gack!’

Hwa Yu-cheon felt a sharp pain in his neck as his entire body became paralyzed.

He tried to shout, but his whole body was already paralyzed and he couldn’t move.

The only things Hwa Yu-cheon could move were his two eyes.

He rolled his eyes back to look at his Subordinates. But they all had their backs turned, completely unaware of what was happening to him.

‘My god!’

Fear washed over him.

The fact that so many of his Subordinates were here, yet not a single one was looking at him, was terrifying beyond measure.

Only then did Hwa Yu-cheon realize that this entire situation had been orchestrated by the unknown enemy.

He had used Mae Bul-gun’s corpse to cloud their rational judgment, and simple traps to instill caution and fear in everyone. Then, he showed them a Subordinate being snatched away by something unseen to distract everyone’s attention. And then he subdued Hwa Yu-cheon.

The entire process was chillingly smooth. That made it even more horrifying.

If one had watched this scene from the outside, they would have applauded without reservation.

The problem was that he had become the sacrificial lamb.

The Martial Artists of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan were all around, but the fact that none of them knew he had been subdued like this terrified him.

Ssk!

An arm suddenly shot out from behind his neck.

The flawless, pure white fingers were impressive.

It was a hand so beautiful it could have been mistaken for a woman’s delicate one.

The hand grabbed Hwa Yu-cheon’s jaw.

‘Please, spare me!’

Hwa Yu-cheon screamed internally. But his voice only echoed inside his mouth, unable to escape.

Tears welled up in Hwa Yu-cheon’s eyes.

Until the situation had come to this, he had not seen his enemy’s face even once.

He didn’t want to lose his life like this, without knowing why, without even seeing the face of the enemy who threatened his life.

The summit was just ahead; he wanted to refuse such a dog’s death. But Pyo Wol did not grant Hwa Yu-cheon’s plea.

Crack!

As Pyo Wol applied force, Hwa Yu-cheon’s neck snapped like a reed and twisted around. To a direction he could never look in under normal circumstances.

Only then could Hwa Yu-cheon see the being who had taken his life.

An exceptionally pale face, more beautiful than a woman’s.

‘A…demon!’

That was the last sight Hwa Yu-cheon saw in his life.

Pyo Wol silently laid the dead Hwa Yu-cheon’s body on the ground and disappeared.

It was a long time before the Martial Artists of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan discovered Hwa Yu-cheon’s death.

“Aaargh!”

“The, the Manor Lord is dead.”

＊＊＊

“What is this?”

Yeo Hwa-yeong could not hide her bewildered expression.

When she entered the Forest of the Dead, she had been prepared for some sacrifices. But if they were pushed back any further, she couldn’t even guarantee the survival of Bamboo Sea Manor, so she had made a difficult decision.

She had deployed Bamboo Sea Manor’s full force into the Forest of the Dead, and they clashed with the Heavenly Eunuch Clan’s Martial Artists everywhere.

Because of that, the entire Forest of the Dead was as noisy as if it were on fire. But at some point, all that noise vanished.

The sound of Martial Artists clashing, the curses erupting from their mouths, all disappeared. It was as if sound had been erased from the world.

At some point, the reports that had been coming to her also stopped abruptly. So she had no way of knowing the situation inside.

Yeo Hwa-yeong found herself looking at Ak Chusan.

Facing a situation she had never experienced before, she had unknowingly come to rely on him.

“A great power has intervened.”

“Compared to you, Great Hero Ak?”

“I would have to fight him directly to know.”

Ak Chusan’s voice was deep and sunken.

Yeo Hwa-yeong only saw the atmosphere of the Forest of the Dead and the superficial phenomena, but an Expert like him paid more attention to the Qi Waves flowing from the forest.

The Forest of the Dead had been a cauldron of chaos, with countless Qi Waves tangled together. Because of that, even Ak Chusan couldn’t classify the owners of the Qi Waves. But at some point, numerous Qi Waves began to escape the forest.

Like a herd of deer chased by a tiger, countless Qi Waves shot out at high speed, and then vanished.

They wouldn’t have acted like this even if they had encountered a real tiger.

Something had terrified the Martial Artists of the Heavenly Eunuch Clan and made them Escape.

“Do you have anyone in mind?”

“Not at all!”

Ak Chusan shook his head.

The muscles all over his body were taut and screaming.

It was proof that his body had tensed up first.

“You take your Subordinates and get out of the forest.”

“A…ll of them?”

“Yes! Take them all and leave.”

“What about the Gongpo Sword?”

“Hwa-yeong! The Gongpo Sword is not what’s important. If we stay here any longer, we’ll have to worry about the very existence of Bamboo Sea Manor.”

“Is it that serious?”

“That’s what my gut tells me.”

“I understand.”

Yeo Hwa-yeong nodded.

Although it hadn’t been long since she brought Ak Chusan into Bamboo Sea Manor, she had long heard of his reputation. And she also knew that he was not a man to speak nonsense.

Ak Chusan was as arrogant as his reputation suggested. And he had a cruel disposition.

One could tell just by seeing him cut off Hwangbo Chiseung’s arm.

He was not a man to leave alone anyone who displeased him. The fact that such an Ak Chusan was tense was no ordinary matter.

It meant that something capable of making him tense had appeared in the Forest of the Dead.

If it was a being that could elicit such a reaction from a Martial Artist of Ak Chusan’s caliber, Bamboo Sea Manor’s forces would surely be of no help.

The moment Ak Chusan mentioned a great power, she thought of Pyo Wol. For some reason, his face naturally came to mind.

For a moment, Yeo Hwa-yeong considered telling Ak Chusan about the person she had thought of. But she quickly dismissed the idea. It was still just a guess.

She climbed down the tree.

Below the tree, the Martial Artists of Bamboo Sea Manor were gathered. But quite a few were missing.

Even considering those who died during the clash with the Heavenly Eunuch Clan, the number was too high.

It was clearly a sign of the intervention of the being Ak Chusan had mentioned.

Yeo Hwa-yeong bit her lip.

She had been prepared for sacrifices, but this far exceeded what she had anticipated.

“Is this everyone?”

“Yes, it is.”

“I see. Let’s get out of the Forest of the Dead for now.”

“Are we the only ones leaving? What about Great Hero Ak?”

“He said he will remain here. Let’s go first.”

“But… I understand.”

The Subordinate started to say something but then bowed his head.

Yeo Hwa-yeong led them out of the Forest of the Dead.

From the top of the tree, Ak Chusan watched Yeo Hwa-yeong and the Bamboo Sea Manor Martial Artists disappear.

When their figures finally vanished from his sight, Ak Chusan muttered.

“It’s been a while since my blood boiled.”

He hadn’t earned the Alias Lion Sword for nothing.

It was an Alias given to him by his peers in the Jianghu because he was just as belligerent and showed the courage of a lion.

He had no intention of backing down just because an unseen enemy was strong.

He thought of himself as a lion.

No matter how wounded or bitten he got, in the end, he would be the one to cut his opponent’s throat.

He raised his entire Internal Power.

Then, the surrounding situation felt even clearer.

As the Bamboo Sea Manor Martial Artists left, the Forest of the Dead became even quieter. But one place was different.

Cha-cha-chaeng!

The sound of weapons clashing ceaselessly flowed out.

Someone was still fighting.

To catch a big fish, you need big bait.

Ak Chusan launched himself toward the place where there was useful bait.