Chapter 188. Me, Chased by the Butcher.

I asked the Demon Cult and the Butcher for a moment’s indulgence.

“……Wait a moment. Even if I’m going to go, a final word or two is fine, isn’t it?”

“…….”

After confirming the Third Young Master’s sneer, I spoke to the Sex Demon in a solemn tone.

“Mongrang.”

“What?”

I spoke to the Sex Demon in the most serious tone in the world.

“If I fall, you take over as the second Hao Clan Leader. You’re not suited to the Demon Cult. Got it? If only for Senior Sword Demon’s sake, you should get out. These bastards won’t be able to kill you while ignoring Senior Sword Demon just yet.”

“What kind of bullshit is that?”

“Martial arts are originally learned to help the weak and the wronged, so don’t forget that. You have to open your heart more to become stronger than you are now.”

The Sex Demon let out a sigh.

“Go screw yourself with that nonsense.”

“Right. You’re the only one I can trust.”

I rose, having thoroughly set the mood, and said to the Butcher.

“You Baek bastard, go to the kitchen and bring your weapon first. Judging by your face, you seem like the type to use some treasured blade disguised as a butcher knife. Let’s see whose arm gets cut off first.”

“Now that is refreshing talk! Good!”

The Butcher grinned and headed toward the kitchen.

I took a deep breath, and the instant the Butcher entered the kitchen…….

I unleashed my qinggong and hurriedly fled the inn. Following a crash and clatter, several voices rang out in alarm.

“Huh?”

“He’s running away?”

Then came the sound of the inn door being smashed apart, and the Butcher began chasing after me like a ghost, unleashing his qinggong.

Ghosts weren’t particularly frightening, but his qinggong was so fast that my knees went a little weak. In other words, it was incomparably faster than Hwan Gwi-ja’s qinggong.

Since I knew the Third Young Master was, for now, afraid of the Sword Demon, I fled while leaving the Sex Demon behind.

A full sprint for the first time in a while, I suppose.

Because I was curious what level the Butcher’s qinggong was at, I truly ran at full speed. Every sense in my body, aware that the time for a life-and-death duel had arrived, had become exceedingly sharp.

When the sound of wind being sliced came from behind, I hastily tilted my head back…….

A tree branch that had been above my line of sight was cut silently and fell to the ground. Before the branch touched the ground, I shot forward and increased my speed even more. The Butcher’s voice came from behind.

“I wonder if the young Clan Leader can truly escape.”

His voice was impressively calm, so I kindly answered as well.

“You stupid bastard. You stink, so stop following me.”

I floated slightly into the air, then turned around as I unleashed a sword-drawing form. While the trees on both sides of the road touched by my sword qi were cut cleanly, the Butcher, who had soared into the air, swung his knife this way and that.

In an instant, three streams of blade wind surged in.

The three streams of blade wind were not straight lines, but were rushing forward like whirlwinds extending unevenly, so it looked difficult to dodge them completely.

I pushed off the ground and retreated, watching the ground where the blade winds struck. Three bolts of lightning seemed to spear into the earth, and piles of stone were leaping up with a thunderous noise.

Pababababak!

The Butcher, who had planted one foot on the ground, surged up with a single leap and caught up to me immediately.

Without even being able to take a proper breath, I swung my wooden sword. Even though the Butcher was displaying an extremely skilled and swift saber art, every time I dodged his knife, something nearby was cut cleanly away.

Because of the depth of internal energy contained in the knife, even the sound when things were cut was extremely faint. I was hearing, through sound, how quickly and precisely things were being severed. In the midst of it, I sometimes met the Butcher’s eyes.

The Butcher was like that, and so was I.

There was no fear.

The Butcher spat out words as though inserting them between swings of his knife.

“You, fight, so, well, so why, did you… run?”

I answered in time with the breaths I took while swinging my wooden sword.

“Because the smell of blood is revolting. My nose is sensitive.”

In that instant, the wooden sword and butcher knife collided, sparks flew, and the Butcher’s grip strength transmitted through the two blades reached all the way to my hand.

A sensation came over me as if my grip would soon be torn apart.

Even then, I continued to exchange blows without using the Flame Realm or the Moon Shadow Heartless Art, then stamped the ground once and fled again.

The Butcher’s chilling laughter seemed to bite at my ears.

“Hehehehe.”

The Butcher, who had retreated to avoid my stamping step, caught up in five steps and thrust his butcher knife toward my back.

Shwaeek!

As soon as I turned around, I raised my wooden sword and received the butcher knife’s thrust with the flat of the thin wooden blade.

Thung!

The wooden sword infused with qi bent like a bow.

In that instant, I took the force of the Butcher’s thrust into my body and, at the same time, pushed off the ground and floated into the air.

I had opened some distance, but the Butcher’s speed was so fast that I was in no position to try anything. I did no more than observe the Butcher’s gaze and expression, then swung my wooden sword again.

The Butcher dodged the wooden sword while attacking my lower body at the same time. While avoiding most of my attacks with swift movements, he also attempted to cut off my arms or launched counterattacks. Strangely, because his movements did not involve defense, he looked even faster. Each movement contained the intent to perish together.

Moreover, among the masters I had met since returning, he was certainly the opponent with the fastest movement and blade speed.

Perhaps the Butcher was impressed by my skill as well, for he said while swinging his butcher knife.

“Hao Clan Leader, if you come under me, I’ll spare you. That skill of yours—I want it.”

While deflecting the butcher knife, I answered in a calm tone.

“……Confirmed.”

The Butcher, who had stopped attacking on his own, tilted his head and said.

“Oh, are you considering it?”

By the time the Butcher said, “considering,” I had already unleashed my qinggong and begun running away. Behind me, the Butcher burst into laughter again and followed.

“What an amusing bastard.”

This time, the Butcher’s voice was thick with killing intent.

“It won’t end with just two arms.”

A man whose tone carried killing intent even when he spoke with a laugh—that was the Butcher.

Even while fleeing, I answered like a diligent man.

“Confirmed.”

“What the hell does confirmed even mean?”

Ignoring his question, I ran while thinking. His saber art and my sword art were more or less evenly matched, and both our internal energies were deep, so there was no chance either of us would run dry for now. As I ran, I recalled whether there had been any openings in the Butcher’s saber art or movements.

Strangely, there weren’t any in particular.

Since the Butcher did not try to defend, the only way I could think of to decide the match was for us to injure each other.

That was the reason I was running away.

Moreover, perhaps because he thought I was hiding something, the Butcher had not shown any special techniques whatsoever and was focused only on his saber art.

My swordsmanship, truth be told, was in a shoddy state with no real foundation…….

But the Butcher’s saber art was just as foundationless, to the point that I couldn’t tell where he had learned it. And yet he was strong because his speed was so great that black-path experts like So Gunpyeong or Nam Garak would lose an arm in two or three swings.

He was quick on the uptake, too…….

If I tried to prepare something with my left hand, his butcher knife became even faster.

I needed to fight, flee, think of countermeasures, face him again, and have more time to think.

All the while, the Butcher stuck close behind me, never falling more than twenty paces away.

The Butcher’s voice reached me.

“Even if you run for two days and nights straight, you won’t be able to shake me off. Let us see whether you tire first, or I do.”

I answered briefly.

“Confirmed.”

The only thing that came to mind at once was mutual destruction. When my arm was cut off, I could pierce the Butcher’s neck or chest as well.

But that was not the right response.

As I ran, I recalled the sword curtain that Master Yukhap had spent several days teaching me.

‘One move following an ironclad defense.’

The moment had come for me to use the techniques of the Ghost Demon from my past life.

Unfurling the sword curtain itself was not a problem, but with the Butcher’s internal energy, the sword curtain would be useless. Even if I blocked with a shield made of steel, the shield and my arm would probably be cut through at the same time.

But the sword curtain could briefly obstruct his sight. As I fled, I combined several consummate techniques.

Sword Curtain, Ice Curtain, Flame Realm Great Hand Seal, White Flower Sword Qi, Flame Flower Fragrance, Flash Dagger, Ten Thousand Swords Form, Single Sword Form, and even Qi Sword Form.

I considered the Butcher’s state of mind, the speed of his lightness skill, and the speed of his blade. I thought about how I would respond if my combination failed midway.

For a while, I kept running until the Butcher opened his mouth.

When the Butcher’s voice sounded…….

“……How long.”

While suspended in the air, I turned and scattered a sword curtain with my wooden sword. A sword curtain formed from wood-attribute qi unfurled before me. I infused cold qi into my left palm and spread an ice curtain made of palm force as I retreated. Even with the two curtains crossing, I expected them to be blown away by a single slash.

Crack!

As expected, I poured the palm force of the Flame Realm Great Hand Seal into the spot where the curtains shattered.

As I launched sword qi infused with the Waning Moon Ice Art, the instant I flicked my finger, I sent the Flame Flower Fragrance floating into the air.

Then, the moment I saw the sword qi vanish and the Flame Flower Fragrance scatter in the saber wind.

I pulled the Flash Dagger from my robes and threw it at the Butcher.

Swish!

I unfolded the Ten Thousand Swords Form infused with ice art, scattering it in a fluttering spread, then used the Single Sword Form to compress qi and threw my wooden sword without hesitation. I hurled everything while confirming the Butcher’s responses with my own eyes.

With a clang, the Flash Dagger was deflected…….

The cold qi fluttering from the Ten Thousand Swords Form was also annihilated by the Butcher’s two slashes. In that opening, the wooden sword grazed past the Butcher’s neck by a hair’s breadth. In that instant, the Butcher sprang into the air with an enraged expression and raised his butcher knife high.

It was a consummate technique that seemed to leave nowhere to dodge.

I had originally intended to wrap Qi Sword Form around my bare hands and decide the match, but I instinctively gave up.

I judged that the Butcher’s consummate technique was stronger.

The sword aura wrapped around the butcher knife smashed the area around my body like a whip falling from the sky, and I fled while wrapping Sun-Moon Radiant Stream around both hands.

“…….”

Uneasy that this might end with us dying together, I applied the principles of the sword curtain that Master Yukhap had taught me and the Great Star-Absorbing Art to separate the Sun-Moon Radiant Stream.

‘……Ah, hell. I’m screwed.’

Sun-Moon Radiant Stream was created by cramming together energies that could not be joined, like Taiji, to produce a heaven-defying power. But if it exploded this close, the Butcher would die, and I would certainly die with all four limbs blown apart, so I combined the Sun-Moon Radiant Stream again in reverse order.

‘Damn it.’

In that instant, sword aura surged in from behind me.

Of course, there was light in my hands as well. The moment I rose into the air, I blocked the sword aura with the nameless light curtain I had created from both hands.

In my ears, I heard the swish overlap twice.

The light curtain deflected the sword aura entirely.

One of the Butcher’s arms flew off with a splatter, and the now one-armed Butcher lunged at me the moment he landed on the ground.

I shifted the energies of Sun-Moon Radiant Stream wrapped around both hands into each hand respectively, then struck the Butcher’s body, as he attacked while spraying blood, with the Flame Realm Finger Art and the Waning Moon Finger Art in succession.

Despite having lost an arm, the Butcher’s momentum was so vicious that I retreated while continuing to use finger arts.

Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!

Each time his body was pierced by the finger arts, the Butcher’s speed slowed noticeably, yet in the end he reached right near my face and thrust out his intact hand with considerable speed.

But I had already seized the Butcher’s wrist with my left hand.

A sharpened iron chopstick was jutting out from that hand. Looking at the chopstick, I said,

“……Chopstick, confirmed.”

I infused ice art into my left hand, and also infused ice art into the Butcher’s right shoulder. Only then did the blood that had been gushing like a mad frenzy begin to stop.

The Butcher’s eyes were completely bloodshot.

Even though I had one of his arms in my grip, the murderous intent in his gaze remained unchanged.

The Butcher glared at me and asked,

“……What the hell are you? You were weaker than me the whole time we fought.”

I slammed ice art into the Butcher’s upper body, then twisted the Butcher’s left hand and slowly drove the sharpened chopstick into his shoulder.

Thuk.

It was strange that no scream came from the Butcher’s mouth.

I loosened the front of the Butcher’s clothing and checked his bare body. It was covered in burns. They were not the sort of torture marks one commonly saw. Holding the Butcher’s chin, I examined his expression, then asked,

“Who tortured you like this?”

The Butcher answered.

“The White-Clad Scholar. He did.”

I nodded.

“Confirmed.”

The Butcher asked me with a strange look in his eyes.

“Do you know my master?”

“I do. He’s one of the Five Evils. The man who was called the White-Clad Scholar, then became the Evil Emperor.”

The Butcher asked,

“What are the Five Evils, and what is the Evil Emperor? I’ve never heard of them.”

I felt chills run down my spine as I answered.

“There is such a thing.”

It was certain that the Five Evils I knew had not yet been designated as the Five Evils by the Murim Alliance. Suddenly, this thought occurred to me.

Just as the Third Young Master had commissioned the Butcher to carry out a killing.

The Demon Cult must have made all sorts of commissions to the greatest masters of the unorthodox and heretical factions, those who were best at murder in the current jianghu. Naturally, the Third Young Master would not be the only client.

In a tone with no great expectation, I politely asked the Butcher, who was still breathing.

“Senior Baek, would you happen to know the White-Clad Scholar’s hideout?”

“Can you kill him?”

I nodded.

“I’ll have to try.”

“Train more. You’re still lacking. I can’t tell you yet.”

The Butcher looked at me, then opened his mouth and laughed, revealing the blood pooling thickly between his teeth.

I drove a palm strike straight into the Butcher’s forehead and killed him instantly.

Thud!

Since the Butcher hadn’t let out a single scream while fighting me, I had no choice but to ask.

“Butcher, are you dead?”

“……”

There was no answer, and only then did I let out a long breath.

“Confirmed.”