Chapter 412

Pyo Wol slightly lifted his Dark Dragon Robe to check the situation inside.

Ghost Fang had uncoiled and was wriggling. However, the Horned Dragon’s Inner Core, which it had been incubating like an egg until now, was nowhere to be seen.

‘Has it absorbed it all?’

It was the Inner Core of a Mystical Creature that had failed to become a Dragon.

It contained that much immense power.

Pyo Wol had thought it would take a considerable amount of time for Ghost Fang to absorb the entire Inner Core. But as if to deny Pyo Wol’s thoughts, Ghost Fang seemed to have already absorbed it completely.

Having absorbed the Horned Dragon’s Inner Core, Ghost Fang’s appearance had changed significantly.

Its already red body had turned an even deeper crimson. Its red scales seemed to hold an intense heat, as if they had been dipped in lava.

If the previous Ghost Fang was small enough to barely wrap around Pyo Wol’s forearm, it now seemed to have grown at least twice that size.

Above all, the biggest change was on Ghost Fang’s forehead.

A small horn, about the size of a child’s pinky finger, had sprouted.

As if finding its own transformation fascinating, Ghost Fang twisted its body this way and that, tickling Pyo Wol’s chest.

Perhaps sensing Pyo Wol’s gaze, Ghost Fang raised its head and looked at him.

The eyes of the man and the beast met in mid-air.

Ghost Fang’s eyes were as red as its scales.

It was as if red jewels had been embedded in its eyes.

Its red eyes were filled with trust for Pyo Wol.

Looking at Ghost Fang, Pyo Wol gave a slight smile.

Ghost Fang stared intently into Pyo Wol’s eyes before coiling up in his robe again.

It was trying to rest and recover its strength, having exhausted its energy absorbing the Horned Dragon’s Inner Core.

“What are you doing?”

Yong Seol Lan looked at Pyo Wol with a puzzled expression as he stared into his robe without eating the rabbit meat.

“It’s nothing.”

“Are you hiding a jewel in your robe?”

“Something more precious than that.”

“You have something like that?”

When Pyo Wol silently nodded, Yong Seol Lan showed her curiosity. But Pyo Wol, seemingly having no intention of saying more, began to tear at the rabbit meat he was holding.

Yong Seol Lan looked at Pyo Wol with a disappointed expression.

Pyo Wol’s face, illuminated by the campfire, was beautiful. It was enough to sway her heart, even as a woman herself.

She thought she had finally forgotten him, but he had reappeared and was shaking her heart to its core.

The feelings she had for Pyo Wol were truly complex.

Pyo Wol was the main culprit behind the downfall of her Martial Sect, the Emei Sect, but looking into the details, the Emei Sect and her Master, Elder Nun Guhwa, bore greater responsibility.

If Elder Nun Guhwa hadn’t been greedy, Pyo Wol might have lived an ordinary life instead of becoming an Assassin.

The great Assassin Pyo Wol was created by the desires of Master Elder Nun Guhwa and the Emei Sect.

Therefore, Pyo Wol’s revenge was justified.

The Emei Sect became Closed-off, and Elder Nun Guhwa lost her life.

She knew this in her head. And she tried to understand Pyo Wol. But a person’s heart does not always remain rational.

She was human, too.

No matter how rationally she tried to judge, resentment and guilt towards Pyo Wol would suddenly rear their heads. That was why she couldn’t look at Pyo Wol properly.

“Haa!”

Yong Seol Lan sighed and shifted her gaze.

Swaaaa!

The rain was still pouring down with a terrifying force.

Her already complicated heart became even more troubled at the sight of the rain.

The rain continued to fall after that.

It only stopped the next morning.

Yong Seol Lan had spent that long time with her eyes wide open.

Unaware of her complex state of mind, Pyo Wol and the Ghost King had each found a spot and fallen into a deep sleep.

One sleepless night wouldn’t do much harm.

Although she had put down her sword for a long time, she had never missed a single day of Internal Energy Training. The reason she felt so tired despite this was probably because of her complicated state of mind.

It was then.

As if on cue, Pyo Wol and the Ghost King woke up at the same time.

Pyo Wol stretched his hand out from under the rock. The rainwater that had been trickling down the rock pooled in his hands.

Pyo Wol washed his face simply with the water he had collected.

Yong Seol Lan followed Pyo Wol’s lead and washed her face with the rainwater.

The cold water on her face jolted her awake.

Pyo Wol said.

“Let’s go now.”

The land was a mess from the rain that had fallen all night.

The ground had turned into a complete mudflat, and large puddles had formed everywhere.

Not a single trace of human passage remained. Yet, Pyo Wol relentlessly tracked the trail of the Martial Artists.

Yong Seol Lan looked where Pyo Wol was examining. In her eyes, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. But it appeared that Pyo Wol’s eyes saw something different.

Pyo Wol determined a direction and moved just by briefly examining the ground. After tracking for more than half a day, they arrived at a small clearing.

It was originally a place full of grass that grew up to a person’s waist. But it was all lying on the ground, as if it had been knocked down by the wind and rain. Pyo Wol was certain that the men had stayed here.

“They camped here.”

The terrain was higher than the surrounding area, so water hardly collected. Not only that, but trees grew densely behind it like a folding screen. It was an environment that could sufficiently block the wind, even if it couldn’t avoid the rain.

If he were leading a large group and suddenly encountered a downpour, he would surely camp in a place like this too.

When he lifted the bent grass, he saw the footprints of men and horses that had not yet been erased.

Only then did Yong Seol Lan realize that Pyo Wol had been tracking them accurately.

‘If I ever make an enemy of this man, he would surely chase me to the ends of hell.’

A fearful thought crossed her mind.

If a man with Pyo Wol’s level of obsession and patience possessed such terrifying tracking skills, it seemed there would be no place to hide perfectly anywhere.

“Hoo!”

Yong Seol Lan let out a sigh without realizing it.

It was then.

“Hhhh!”

Suddenly, the Ghost King let out a bizarre breath.

Since he had never been like this before, Yong Seol Lan looked at the Ghost King in surprise.

The Ghost King stood stock-still like a dead tree, his body trembling.

At his unusual state, Yong Seol Lan faltered and stepped back. Pyo Wol, on the contrary, approached the Ghost King.

“What is it?”

“The smell…”

“Is it stronger?”

“Yes! And it makes me… angry.”

The Ghost King gritted his teeth.

Through the cloth covering his eyes, Ghost Fire flickered.

Tssss!

The moisture beneath his feet instantly evaporated and vanished.

It was truly a formidable Internal Power.

Yong Seol Lan was so astonished by the Ghost King’s divine presence that she didn’t dare to approach. But Pyo Wol, fearless, brought his face right up to his and said.

“Find your reason.”

“Kngh! I can’t…”

“You are the Ghost King. If you’ve lived by switching between other people’s bodies, then have a sense of responsibility to match.”

Pyo Wol’s voice was chillingly cold.

It was enough to make Yong Seol Lan, who was listening from a distance, flinch.

Fortunately, Pyo Wol’s words seemed to have worked, as the Ghost King slowly calmed down.

“Hoo!”

The Ghost King let out a low sigh and tightened the straps binding his eyes and ears even more forcefully.

The Ghost King said.

“I’ve blocked my sense of smell. But I’m not confident how long I can suppress my anger.”

“I’d appreciate it if you could hold out for as long as possible.”

“I’ll try.”

With those words, the Ghost King blocked his hearing as well.

He had completely isolated his own consciousness in darkness. It was an act he couldn’t have done without completely trusting Pyo Wol.

Pyo Wol had a gut feeling that the Ghost King couldn’t last that long.

Something nearby was provoking the Ghost King.

“Move.”

Pyo Wol pulled on the Silver Thread connected to the Ghost King.

The Ghost King ran, relying solely on the Silver Thread.

They ventured deeper and deeper into the forest.

The undergrowth was so dense that despite it being broad daylight, almost no light came through.

Just as Yong Seol Lan was doubting whether there could be a place for humans in such a location.

“Hurry up!”

“If we’re late, the ingredients we worked so hard to get will spoil.”

Suddenly, voices of people were heard from beyond the bushes.

Yong Seol Lan held her breath and carefully pushed aside the bushes. Then she saw the figures of men moving busily beyond.

It was Jang Sachun and his Subordinates.

Pyo Wol had tracked them down precisely.

Unaware that the three were watching, they were unloading the luggage from their horses.

‘But where is this place?’

It was a deep rainforest in the middle of Yunnan Province.

It was a place known to be uninhabitable due to poisonous insects and ferocious beasts. Although there were occasional tribes adapted to the rainforest, their numbers were not that large.

Even they lived in clusters on the outskirts, not in the middle of the rainforest. A rainforest this deep was a dangerous place even for them.

Yong Seol Lan carefully examined the place where the men were.

‘Ruins?’

The place where they were was also overgrown with bushes. But here and there, collapsed walls and foundation stones could be seen. The scale, however, was beyond imagination.

At a glance, it seemed to stretch all the way to the distant horizon.

It was not the trace of a village, but of a huge city.

‘Did such a place exist in All Under Heaven?’

Yong Seol Lan’s brow furrowed on its own.

After searching her memory for a while, Yong Seol Lan’s face slowly filled with astonishment.

She had pulled out a fragment of a long-buried memory.

‘Yunnan, rainforest, city… Don’t tell me, the Divine Demon Association?’

The base of the legendary Sect that had stained the Jianghu with blood decades ago was right here in Yunnan Province.

She had heard from her Master that the Divine Demon Association had built a huge fortress deep in Yunnan Province.

The city was abandoned when the Divine Demon Association advanced into the Jianghu, and it was said to have collapsed along with their downfall. The abandoned city became ruins and was forgotten from people’s memories.

‘Is it really the Divine Demon Association?’

Yong Seol Lan hoped her guess was not true. But the ruins of a huge city in the middle of a rainforest could not be explained if it wasn’t the Divine Demon Association.

‘Surely the Divine Demon Association isn’t stirring again, is it?’

Decades ago, the Divine Demon Association was thoroughly destroyed by the joint attack of the Radiant Martial Gate and the Martial Artists of All Under Heaven. In particular, its lineage was known to have been completely severed when Jang Cheon-hwa, who founded the Heavenly Martial Fortress, took the life of the Divine Demon Association’s leader, Go Geom-wol.

She was so nervous that her palms were drenched in sweat.

Yong Seol Lan carefully looked at Pyo Wol.

Pyo Wol was also looking at the ruins. But he didn’t look as tense as she did.

‘Does he not know about the Divine Demon Association?’

The thought suddenly occurred to her. But that couldn’t be.

She knew how obsessed Pyo Wol was with gathering information. A person of Pyo Wol’s caliber would probably know the history of the Jianghu by heart by now.

It was then.

“Hhhhh!”

An unusual breath escaped the Ghost King’s lips.

Riiip!

As if he could no longer bear the stuffiness, the Ghost King tore off the cloth that covered his eyes and ears.

His revealed eyes were bloodshot, and madness flickered within them.

The Ghost King glared at the ruins as if they were his mortal enemy.

“Dis…gusting smell! This is the place.”

In that moment, the Ghost King suddenly shot his body into the air. Reaching a height of over a hundred feet, the Ghost King then flew like a meteor towards one part of the city.

“Wh-what?”

Yong Seol Lan covered her mouth with her hand in shock.

Fortunately, the people unloading things from the horses did not notice the Ghost King flying over their heads.

“Huh?”

The only one who looked up with a strange feeling was Jang Sachun. But by the time he looked at the sky, the Ghost King had already vanished.

Pyo Wol looked in the direction the Ghost King had disappeared.

The Ghost King had clearly said, ‘This is the place.’

He had arrived at his desired destination.

‘I’ve kept my promise.’

In exchange for sparing Hong Ye-seol’s life, he had promised to guide the Ghost King to the place he wanted.

Now that they had arrived at the place the Ghost King so desperately sought, the promise was as good as kept.

Whatever happened from now on was the Ghost King’s business.

In that case, he should be free to move without being tied to the Ghost King.

Pyo Wol looked at Jang Sachun.

The men led by Jang Sachun were putting the luggage unloaded from the horses into a certain ruined house.

The ruined house was nothing more than a small pavilion.

It was impossible to accommodate all thirty men. Yet, the men who went inside did not come out again.

There was only one conclusion.

‘There must be a space underground that can accommodate them.’