Light Novel: Volume 20 Episode 5
Manhwa: N/A
The Red King frowned deeply as he observed the island where the Eight Directions White Mist Ghostly Array had been activated.
“Keuk!”
“Keugh!”
Death cries echoed continuously.
The unceasing cries meant that his own men, who had entered the island, were dying off one by one.
If Pyo-wol, Eunyo, or Nam Shin-woo had been killed, there would have been no more screams.
“To resort to such petty tricks.”
The Red King ground his teeth in frustration.
His men were elites who had survived the harshest battlefields in the world.
But now, they were dying without a chance to properly exert their strength because of a mere formation. This fact infuriated him to no end.
He had originally intended to wait until the Ten Thousand Man Slayer joined them.
That was how uncomfortable he was with the existence of Pyo-wol. However, for some reason, there was no sign of the Ten Thousand Man Slayer joining them.
If he waited for the Ten Thousand Man Slayer to come, then all of his men would all die.
He could no longer stand by and watch as his men continued to die.
“Damn it!”
The Red King drew his sword and lunged into the Eight Directions White Mist Ghostly Array.
Inside the array, everything was as white as a snow-covered plain in deep winter.
Even a supreme expert like the Red King felt like he might go insane if he stayed in such a space for too long.
What was surprising was that as soon as he entered the mist, he could not sense his men. No matter how amazing the formation was, it couldn’t expand the actual size of the island.
The fact that he couldn’t even sense the presence of his subordinates on the small island, which was only about ten meters long, was a testament to the power of the Eight Directions White Mist Ghostly Array.
The Red King closed his eyes and muttered,
“I just need to ignore the formation.”
Humans process eighty percent of their sensory information through their eyes.
First, they see with their eyes, and then they confirm with the rest of their senses.
Therefore, to deceive someone, the eyes must be beguiled first.
The formation worked the same way.
It used white mist to disrupt visibility, then fed false information. Thus, the warriors trapped in the Eight Directions White Mist Ghostly Array could not make proper judgments and became enchanted by the strange phenomena happening before their eyes.
That was the state of the Asura Vagabonds and his men who had leaped into the array.
But the Red King was a warrior of a different caliber.
Even without his sight, he could discern true information with his other senses.
When he closed his eyes, darkness came.
But it was only for a moment.
Soon his senses expanded frighteningly.
Blocking out the false information entering his eyes, he now relied solely on hearing, touch, and intuition. Then he distinctly felt the presence of his men struggling within the Eight Directions White Mist Ghostly Array.
He excluded the presence of his men.
Since he was quite familiar with his men’s auras and energy, he didn’t find it difficult to disregard their presence.
Once he had erased the familiar auras, only three remained.
Each one belonged to a different person.
All of them were moving with their presence suppressed as much as possible.
The Red King focused all his senses on one of them.
The human with the strongest presence.
‘It’s him.’
The Red King knew instinctively that it was Pyo-wol.
No one else could emit such a powerful presence.
Swish!
The Red King swung his sword in the direction of Pyo-wol’s presence. A red sword aura ripped through the white mist, striking Pyo-wol squarely.
Boom!
With a loud explosion, the white mist cleared momentarily, revealing Pyo-wol who had been hit by the sword aura.
Flutter!
His left arm, which had blocked the sword aura, was trembling.
Before the sword aura struck, he had clearly concentrated his inner energy into the armguard for defense. It was unclear what material it was made of, but despite being struck by the sword aura, the armguard was intact.
That alone indicated it was no ordinary object.
“Pyo-wol–!”
The Red King shouted as he continued to swing his sword at Pyo-wol.
When facing someone like Pyo-wol, it was crucial to gain the upper hand first.
The saying ‘the one who strikes first wins’1 didn’t come from nowhere.
The person who attacks first has that much of an advantage.
There is also the saying ‘he who strikes later controls the encounter,’2 but this doesn’t apply as much to experts of the same level.
Boom boom boom!
The sword aura, accompanied by a storm-like flurry, lashed out.
Pyo-wol, seemingly unable to take the strikes head-on, chose to dodge instead.
He moved agilely, evading the Red King’s attacks.
Crash!
A series of explosion erupted, and the ground where Pyo-wol had stood was blown apart.
The earth turned inside out, revealing a black core.
The power was like an explosive force of a wall-breaking cannon.
The aftermath of the explosion caused the blood-red robe and hat Pyo-wol wore to shake violently.
The Red King pursued Pyo-wol with terrifying speed.
“Show your face. I will slash it to pieces!”
The Red King had already heard rumors about Pyo-wol’s good looks.
He wanted to carve scars into that non-humanly beautiful face, just like those on the Ten Thousand Man Slayer.
He thought it would be satisfying to mark his face with scars like a checkerboard.
“Ha!”
The Red King attacked Pyo-wol with an even more terrifying momentum.
In the relentless onslaught that gave no room to breathe, Pyo-wol seemed unable to dodge any longer and countered.
“Ha!”
With a shout, Pyo-wol threw a punch at the sword aura.
A powerful force emanated from his fist, colliding with the sword aura.
Boom!
With an explosive sound, Pyo-wol was sent flying backward.
An ordinary person wouldn’t usually be able to withstand the power of a sword aura.
It was only thanks to the armguard that he remained relatively unscathed.
The armguard had absorbed most of the impact.
But the Red King’s reaction was odd.
Instead of delight at confirming his upper hand, he looked at Pyo-wol with a puzzled expression.
“Who are you?”
“What?”
Pyo-wol stopped mid-reply and felt his head.
The hat that had been pulled down was now pushed back, revealing his bare face.
According to rumors, it should have been a face more beautiful than a woman’s. However, the face that was revealed was not so devastatingly handsome.
It was just a slightly good-looking face with a hint of youth.
To anyone, this was not Pyo-wol.
The Red King yelled angrily,
“Who are you?! Who are you to impersonate Pyo-wol and deceive me?”
“Shit, I’ve been found out. Hoo!”
Sighing and straightening up, the man was none other than Do Yeonsan.
It was Do Yeonsan who had been disguised as Pyo-wol, wearing his blood-red robe and armguard. And the Red King had mobilized all his men to chase after Pyo-wol without knowing this fact.
“Where did the real Pyo-wol go?”
“Who knows!”
Do Yeonsan shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly.
The Red King’s jaw twitched.
He wanted to grind his opponent’s impudent face into dust. But he barely restrained his anger, maintaining his rationality.
‘Since he put this kid as a stand-in, where did he disappear to?’
It was especially troubling because it was Pyo-wol.
The Kowloon Assassin Guild had already completed their analysis of the man known as Pyo-wol.
His temperament, martial arts, and even his associated contacts had been profiled.
The Pyo-wol they had assessed was not one to flee without a calculated plan.
The fact that he had used a stand-in indicated that he had a clear objective.
He had used his comrades as bait for some purpose.
The question was, what his purpose was.
‘His nature is that of an assassin. And the essence of an assassin is assassination. Assassination?’
The Red King’s eyes widened.
He finally seemed to realize Pyo-wol’s goal.
The distance from here in Shaoyang to Qiyang, where the New Moon Manor was located, was only a few hundred li. It was a distance that could be traveled in a day if one hurried.
That’s why the Red King and the Ten Thousand Man Slayer could receive elite martial artists as reinforcements from the New Moon Manor within a day.
The martial artists currently with the Red King were the elites of the New Moon Manor and the Kowloon Assassin Guild.
The military strength of the Kowloon Assassin Guild was indeed formidable.
Their network, like a spider web, stretched over thousands of martial artists. However, they did not always reside in the New Moon Manor.
Some were engaged in wars in Saibei, while others belonged to the Phantom Fleet sailing the far seas.
Even they did not know that the New Moon Manor was the main stronghold of the Kowloon Assassin Guild.
Therefore, the number of people residing in the New Moon Manor was not that large.
About half of them had been drawn away to this place.
That meant the defensive network of the New Moon Manor was now more than half compromised.
‘He’s targeting the New Moon Manor.’
While everyone’s attention was focused on Shaoyang, Pyo-wol had slipped away.
His destination was undoubtedly the New Moon Manor in Qiyang.
Goosebumps rose all over the Red Kind’s body as he thought about Pyo-wol’s cunning plan.
By now, Pyo-wol must have almost arrived at Qiyang.
“Damn it! Pyo-wol is targeting New Moon Manor! Everyone, return to the New Moon Manor immediately!”
The Red King’s shout echoed across the island.
He immediately leaped away and boarded a boat.
He was followed by the Asura Vagabonds and the warriors of the New Moon Manor.
The boats carrying them swiftly sailed away from the island, leaving only Do Yeonsan and others behind.
In a while, the mist that shrouded the island finally cleared.
The scene revealed on the island was truly devastating.
Dozens of martial artists lay bleeding or dying, their lives slipping away.
In the middle of it all, Eunyo and Nam Shin-woo sat, collapsed on the ground.
Their bodies were drenched in blood and sweat.
Had the Red King’s retreat lasted even a moment longer, their lives could not have been guaranteed.
Do Yeonsan approached the two.
“Is everyone alright?”
“It seems we are still alive.”
“Yes!”
Do Yeonsan plopped down beside them.
He didn’t have the strength to move even a finger.
He remained lying on the ground.
“Will brother be alright? We should have delayed them a bit longer.”
Eunyo lay down silently next to him.
Her body felt as heavy as lead.
It was as if she’d been hammered all day by a giant sledgehammer.
In such a short time, she had given it her all.
Originally, her goal was to hold off the Red King for half a day. She thought that if she could keep the Red King occupied for that long, it would be easier for Pyo-wol to achieve his goal. However, the Red King was more perspective than she had anticipated, and it was impossible to hold him off for much longer.
Nevertheless, they had done their best.
As Eunyo thought of Pyo-wol, she muttered,
“We need to find a way to get brother out.”
* * *
Pyo-wol looked up and gazed ahead.
Dust thickly coated his hair and shoulders after running all night using qinggong.
He had chosen to move using qinggong instead of riding a horse to avoid being detected by their surveillance network.
He had handed over the blood-red robe and gauntlets he originally wore to Do Yeonsan and changed into the tattered clothes commonly seen in the marketplace.
Although the Red King’s surveillance network was spread out like a net throughout Shaoyang, no one noticed Pyo-wol escaping.
It was a battle against time.
He wasn’t sure how long Do Yeonsan, Eunyo, and others would be able to hold out.
The only thing that could be said for them was that they were no pushovers. Although they were young, they were much smarter and better than most of their peers.
It was Eunyo who came up with this plan.
Eunyo said to Pyo-wol,
“We will stall for time while brother will head straight to the New Moon Manor.”
She willingly offered for her and the others to act as bait.
Pyo-wol hesitated and thought about the plan for a moment, but eventually accepted her suggestion.
As far as he was concerned, it was the best course of action. That’s why he accepted her proposal.
Normally, he would have taken a short break from using qinggong at this point.
It was his habit to take a break to rest and only move when his body was in its best condition. But he couldn’t afford to do that now.
Although Eunyo, Do Yeonsan, and Nam Shin-woo were outstanding, they were far from being one of the absolute experts of Jianghu.
The longer Pyo-wol delayed, the more certain it was that they would be in danger.
“Hoo!”
Pyo-wol took a deep breath.
Ignoring the mild fatigue, he moved towards Qiyang.
He could see the New Moon Manor in the distance.
The sight of the grand estate resembled a monster crouching in wait.
His enemies were there.
His steps quickened, and soon he disappeared.
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