Chungui was deeply moved.
For the words “we can give it a try now” meant that he had been thinking about her illness all this time.
On those nights when the pain was too great for her to sleep, this young cult leader before her must have been worrying about her somewhere.
Deep gratitude filled Chungui’s gaze as she looked at Geom Mugeuk.
“I’m grateful that you cared, but my illness cannot be cured.”
She had spent her entire life searching for and researching rare venomous insects. In the process, she had been poisoned by deadly toxins several times, and her body had been ruined. Ordinary medicine had no effect, so she was only barely holding on by using poison to counter poison.
“Please entrust it to me once.”
The look Jin Hagun gave Geom Mugeuk held respect beyond mere surprise. It was a moment that confirmed anew how Geom Mugeuk treated the bonds he had formed.
“There’s no need to waste your strength treating this old body. It’s already ruined anyway.”
Just then, Pyo Gigwang came running over and pulled her along.
“Master. At times like this, you’re supposed to say, ‘Fine, this body’s ruined anyway, so do whatever you like.’”
“You rascal, let go.”
“Being stubborn in your old age is what makes the young ones expend their strength. Now, hurry and go inside.”
“I told you to let go.”
Pyo Gigwang forcibly dragged her into the room. Geom Mugeuk followed behind them and said to his friends,
“It’ll take some time.”
Bi Sain nodded and said,
“Take your time and do it well.”
Bi Sain, too, knew the reason Geom Mugeuk had come here, and thought, As expected! If one simply said he had come to keep a promise, it might not seem like anything special.
But Bi Sain took it this way. The reason he had brought them all the way here was because he had wanted to say this.
Rather than for honor, live sincerely for someone else; once you make a promise, be sure to keep it; let us live like this from now on.
Geom Mugeuk entered the room Chungui had gone into.
Even after entering the room, Chungui was still arguing with Pyo Gigwang.
“I’m telling you, I’m fine. I know my own body best.”
“Have you ever seen a monk shave his own head? Even a physician has to seek out another physician when he’s ill. Sit down first.”
“I said I’m fine.”
Reluctantly, Chungui sat on the edge of the bed.
After seating her, Pyo Gigwang asked Geom Mugeuk,
“Is there anything you need?”
He did not say it aloud, but the look in his eyes showed just how desperate this old disciple was.
“It’s all right.”
“If you need anything at all, call me. I’ll be waiting outside the door.”
Before leaving, he whispered into her ear.
“Don’t be stubborn for no reason, and do exactly as the Young Cult Leader tells you!”
After he left, Chungui shook her head.
“If I was going to take on a disciple, I should have brought in a young one. He nags even more than I do.”
“These days, young people are terrified at the mention of venomous insects. Just think of that old child as the youngest one.”
Chungui, who had been wearing a faint smile, spoke with a serious expression.
“Listen, Young Cult Leader.”
“Yes, elder.”
“There is no need to overdo it. I mean that sincerely.”
She said it because she knew just how difficult it would be to fix her body.
“As I told you, I am in a state where poison is being suppressed by poison. As time passed, I developed a resistance, and I had to use stronger poison.
“But those poisons became entangled with one another and turned into a mess. It has reached a dangerous point where they will burst if touched even slightly.
“No matter who you are, you cannot handle it. So just go out and say you tried but failed. Stay and talk with me for a while, then leave.”
It seemed that had been her intention from the start when she allowed herself to be dragged in.
“If they’ll burst if touched slightly, then I just have to touch them even more lightly.”
Compared to when he had made that promise with her, Geom Mugeuk’s martial realm had risen beyond comparison, and his internal energy, which had once held the profundity of the Six Paths Primordial Qi, had become incomparably pure.
“Yes, I know very well how extraordinary you are. But even so, it is impossible.”
Chungui told him the reason.
“Even if my body could withstand the treatment process, it cannot be done alone. Separating the clumped poisons is impossible to begin with, but even if you did manage to separate them,
“those two poisons must be expelled from the body in an instant. One person can never handle that simultaneously.”
In other words, two people were needed.
After pondering for a moment, Geom Mugeuk said something unexpected.
“Then I will have to call an assistant.”
Since that meant he intended to call one of his friends outside, Chungui shook her head as if it were out of the question.
“They cannot endure the poison dwelling in my body. Do you want to see that precious heart of yours, at such a young age, spending every day having his shoulders and legs massaged?”
Geom Mugeuk was fine because he was impervious to all poisons, but it was a poison that others could not handle.
At that moment, astonishing words flowed from Geom Mugeuk’s mouth.
“There is someone else who can withstand that poison.”
“!”
For an instant, Chungui’s eyes widened, her face stricken with shock.
“Poison does not work on my assistant.”
Chungui’s eyes opened wide.
“There is another besides you who is impervious to all poisons?”
She had used the materials she had gathered over a lifetime to make him impervious to all poisons, and yet there had been another such fortuitous encounter?
“You will understand when you see. But please don’t be surprised.”
Though he had warned her in advance, Chungui could not help but be surprised.
“Hah!”
Chungui’s eyes bulged. A sight more shocking than surprising unfolded before her.
A being stood behind Geom Mugeuk. It had appeared silently, without any indication of when it had arrived, and it was none other than the Heavenly Demon Soul descended in human size.
“Relax your eyes! She is someone precious!”
Geom Mugeuk eased the mood with a joke. Even though it had shrunk to human size, the presence exuded by the Heavenly Demon Soul was not something a person could easily withstand.
“It is the Heavenly Demon Soul manifested from my martial arts. No poison can affect it.”
It was the Heavenly Demon Soul she had only heard of in stories.
“As far as I know, I heard it was enormous in size.”
“It is originally, but my neck hurt from looking up while chatting with it.”
Geom Mugeuk turned to the Heavenly Demon Soul and said,
“Friend, I need your help.”
The Heavenly Demon Soul, which had been gazing at Geom Mugeuk, gave a slight nod.
At that sight, Chungui was even more shocked. He was exchanging intentions with a being born from martial arts.
Geom Mugeuk spoke honestly.
“To tell the truth, this is my first time performing a treatment like this together with the Heavenly Demon Soul, so I cannot be certain either.”
Geom Mugeuk looked at his Heavenly Demon Soul.
“But if I am with my Heavenly Demon Soul, I feel that we can do it.”
From time to time, Geom Mugeuk would use the Sicheon Secret Art and spend time by the seashore with the Heavenly Demon Soul.
All they did was sit quietly, watch the waves, and feel the sea breeze, but he felt himself growing closer and closer to the Heavenly Demon Soul. Geom Mugeuk could clearly sense the Heavenly Demon Soul’s emotions and its potential.
“What do you say? Will you entrust it once to me—no, to us?”
Chungui’s hesitation did not last long.
He was saying he would treat her, even summoning the Heavenly Demon Soul. If the bond with this young cult leader was to continue so deeply.
Chungui, looking at Geom Mugeuk, gave her permission.
“Yes, even a physician must seek out another physician when she is ill.”
Delighted, Geom Mugeuk seated her in the middle of the bed.
“Now, please sit comfortably here.”
Chungui sat in the lotus position.
“It will be difficult if you remain awake. Please sleep for a short while, then wake.”
Chungui nodded and followed Geom Mugeuk’s will. Even if she were to die like this, the last thing she saw would be the state she had longed for: imperviousness to all poisons.
Yes, it could not be better than this.
After pressing her sleep acupoint and putting her to sleep, Geom Mugeuk said to the Heavenly Demon Soul,
“Now, the two of us are going to draw out every last bit of poison from the elder’s body. Do as I instruct.”
The Heavenly Demon Soul sent him a reassuring look. Together with the Heavenly Demon Soul, he felt confident that he could do it.
Geom Mugeuk sat behind Chungui and placed his palm on her back.
The Heavenly Demon Soul sat in front of Chungui and placed its palm on her chest.
“Now, let’s begin.”
First, a strand of Geom Mugeuk’s internal energy flowed into Chungui’s body. He slowly examined her interior. As expected, her blood vessels had been badly damaged.
‘This won’t do as it is.’
Geom Mugeuk’s internal energy gently wrapped around her blood vessels. He protected and regulated her blood vessels and vital energy first. Like reinforcing a collapsing embankment, he overlaid his own internal energy upon her blood vessels.
After slowly soothing her interior, Geom Mugeuk was able to find the poison deep within her blood vessels.
“So this is it.”
The poison was clumped together. Just as she had said, multiple poisons had piled upon one another, tangled like one great mass.
Geom Mugeuk approached the poison cautiously. If he touched this poison incorrectly and caused it to flare up, it would be the end.
Slowly, very slowly, he examined the poison.
As she had said, the poison was largely divided into two parts.
However, they were entangled with each other like a spiderweb, and separating them did not look easy.
It was too large to move as it was.
‘I have to untangle them and split them into two pieces.’
Geom Mugeuk sent a signal to the Heavenly Demon Soul, which was waiting.
—Now it’s your turn to help.
The Heavenly Demon Soul infused a strand of internal energy. He had only recently learned that the Heavenly Demon Soul could use internal energy. He did not know whether it had originally been capable of it, or whether his Heavenly Demon Soul was special, but the Heavenly Demon Soul could move its internal energy with caution, just like him.
When the Heavenly Demon Soul’s internal energy arrived at the location of the poison, Geom Mugeuk began separating the tangled poisons in earnest. Geom Mugeuk’s internal energy moved like the hand of a living person.
Untangling poisons entwined with each other using only internal energy—without Geom Mugeuk’s martial realm, it would have been impossible.
The Heavenly Demon Soul assisted in that work. Because it was the Heavenly Demon Soul born from Geom Mugeuk’s body, it knew what its master wanted without him having to say it. At that moment, the Heavenly Demon Soul was a better assistant than anyone else in the world.
Just as only a true master could display the aesthetics of patience, Geom Mugeuk worked so slowly that one could have asked, When on earth are you going to treat her?
Whenever poison tried to shoot out into the blood vessels while Geom Mugeuk worked, the Heavenly Demon Soul’s internal energy wrapped around it and calmed it again.
Geom Mugeuk was truly acting as the physician, and the Heavenly Demon Soul was fulfilling the role of assistant physician.
He could understand why Chungui had been unable to remove the poison. All sorts of unknown poisons were entangled together. It was to the point where one would not dare touch them, unable to tell what to do or how to remove them.
But Geom Mugeuk calmly untied one knot after another. He was someone who had spent an entire lifetime searching for the materials for the great art. No matter how tangled you are, could you be harder to unravel than my life before regression?
Like that, one hour passed, then two hours passed. Time continued to flow, but Geom Mugeuk’s concentration remained the same as at the beginning.
As he began undoing the last tangle of poison, he conveyed to the Heavenly Demon Soul,
—Now, get ready.
They had now reached the most important moment of today’s treatment.
At the end of those minute movements of internal energy, the instant the tangled poisons completely separated and broke apart.
Geom Mugeuk and the Heavenly Demon Soul instantly wrapped the poisons in internal energy, then began moving them along blood vessels in opposite directions.
—We have to draw them out before the poison runs wild.
Once the entangled poisons were separated, both the poison that had been suppressing and the poison that had been suppressed began to rampage. Both natures—the nature of continued suppression and the sense of release—had activated.
Geom Mugeuk’s and the Heavenly Demon Soul’s internal energies surrounded them and moved them as quickly as possible toward the blood vessels where their respective palms rested.
“Ugh!”
A short scream burst from Chungui’s mouth. Though she was asleep, she seemed to have sensed the poison expanding and trying to burst.
—A little faster!
The poison swelled the blood vessels and was on the verge of exploding.
Swaaaak.
At that moment, the half of the poison that arrived was sucked into Geom Mugeuk’s palm.
Just as the poison was about to spread in all directions from his palm.
Fwoosh.
Geom Mugeuk burned it away in an instant with Samadhi True Fire.
There was not only one flame.
Fwoosh.
On the Heavenly Demon Soul’s palm as well, the poison vanished together with flame.
The Heavenly Demon Soul, too, had succeeded in expelling the poison outside the body before it could flare up within.
“Whew.”
A sigh of relief escaped him on its own. He had truly succeeded by the narrowest of margins.
Geom Mugeuk expressed his gratitude to the Heavenly Demon Soul.
“If it had not been for you, I could not have done it. Thank you, friend.”
Just as a faint smile seemed to form at the corners of the Heavenly Demon Soul’s mouth, it disappeared without a sound.
Geom Mugeuk infused internal energy and examined the rest of Chungui’s body, and only after confirming that no poison remained did he wake her.
Chungui slowly opened her eyes. The light in her eyes had changed from before she received the treatment.
“I survived.”
She had not merely survived. She could feel that the poison that had been so terribly dominating her body had vanished cleanly.
As the poison disappeared, the pain that had made her whole body feel as if it were melting away vanished with it.
She could not even remember the last time her body had not hurt like this.
“You did it.”
Her voice trembled as much as her gaze.
“It wasn’t me. You cured yourself, Divine Doctor.”
“I did?”
“If you had not given me the fortuitous encounter of being invulnerable to all poisons, this treatment could never have been done today.”
Chungui wordlessly took Geom Mugeuk’s hand. These thin hands would no longer need to knead her shoulders and legs.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t treat you sooner.”
The hand gripping Geom Mugeuk tightened. Joy and emotion she could not hide overflowed across her face.
“Now you should be able to spread your ill fame for another thirty years.”
When the two came out of the room, everyone was waiting outside.
The moment Pyo Gigwang saw Chungui, tears welled up in his eyes. Just from the way Chungui walked, he could tell the treatment had succeeded.
“Master!”
Pyo Gigwang burst into tears. From the sight of him lowering his head and weeping, it was clear just how deeply he cared for Chungui.
Looking at her disciple, Chungui spoke spitefully.
“You brat, you’ll still have to massage me every morning.”
Wiping his tears with his sleeve, Pyo Gigwang replied.
“Then promise me. That you’ll be sure to drink a glass of water first.”
Jin Hagun and Bisa-in, Ian and Jin Haryeong, and Han Seol were all looking at Geom Mugeuk. The fact that it had taken this long meant the treatment had truly been difficult.
But as always, Geom Mugeuk had accomplished that difficult task.
“I’m starving to death. Don’t tell me you all ate first without any loyalty?”
Seeing him spout nonsense as always, everyone smiled brightly.
“You’re hungry?”
Chungui swung around the arm that, because of the pain, she had not even been able to lift.
“You shouldn’t move like that yet.”
“Shouldn’t, my foot. Wait here. I’ll cook for you myself.”
At that, Geom Mugeuk said something that sounded like a bolt from the blue to everyone else.
“Does this mean we’ll finally get to taste your insect cuisine, Elder?”
He had eaten it once before, around the time he had received the Great Art of Invulnerability to All Poisons.
Thinking of teasing his friends, Geom Mugeuk grinned from ear to ear.
“It looked disgusting, but it tasted all right.”
Sure enough, not only the women but even Jin Hagun and Bisa-in were startled. It had to be a joke, right? But if Chungui really offered it to them, they could hardly refuse out of courtesy!
Just then, Chungui shook her head.
“No?”
“Pardon?”
This was Chungui, who, because of the pain, had once torn the wings off poisonous insects and eaten their legs raw.
“With guests this precious here, why would I feed them bugs? Gigwang, go buy every ingredient you can find. Buy beef, pork, and chicken, all of it! Today I’m laying out a feast of delicacies from land and sea!”
Everyone was relieved, but Geom Mugeuk alone cried out with an incredulous look on his face.
“You fed them to me!”
“I didn’t think you’d actually eat them just because I told you to.”
Chungui turned to the others and said,
“Wait here. I’ll make you something delicious.”
“Yes! We’ll look forward to it, Divine Doctor!”
As everyone smiled warmly, Geom Mugeuk shouted,
“You said you had to know how to eat poisonous insects to know life!”
With an expression that said even thinking about it was revolting, Chungui walked off and said,
“Who eats bugs these days?”