Myst, Might, Mayhem (Novel) - Chapter 108 - Master of Corpse Cadavers (4)
Chapter 108 – Master of Corpse Cadavers (4)
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Translated by Jinmu
Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net
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“Cough, cough….. it is really hard just to get you to take my hand once.”
Mok Gyeong-un, his mouth covered in blood, muttered with a grim smile.
In the briefest instant, Mok Gyeong-un had gone through countless thoughts about how he could make contact with this existence called a spirit beast.
‘How do I get close?’
That thing had seen him absorb aura.
Perhaps because of that, it had tried to control and attack him from a distance through demonic aura.
In a situation like this, by what method could he make it approach?
It was suspicious by nature, so unless he had drawn his last breath, it would never come close….
‘Ah!’
Then, as a desperate measure, the method that came to mind was precisely this.
‘Lucky.’
This method was a kind of gamble with his life at stake.
That thing regarded him as an insect, yet also as the key to getting outside.
That was why he had been certain it would try to keep him alive somehow.
And that certainty had proven true.
-Suuuuuuuu!
Demonic aura beyond imagination was sucked in through his palm by means of the Form of Attachment.
It could not even be compared to a vicious beast or a monster beast.
Its density and sheer volume were beyond imagination.
It was almost hard to believe that this was in a weakened state after having been sealed for thousands of years.
If so, to what level had it stood at its peak?
-Ha!
Blue Spirit, weakened from having her spirit power stolen, swayed with a haggard face as she looked at Mok Gyeong-un.
She always felt this, but he was a fellow who exceeded prediction.
What sort of person would stake his life on something this insane?
‘Only that mortal could do such a thing.’
It was the result of cunning and insight combined with the daring to carry it out.
Whatever happened, that spirit beast had to keep Mok Gyeong-un alive.
Only then could it leave this place.
‘This will not do.’
More than eighty percent of her spirit power had been taken, bringing her to a precarious state, but if she helped Mok Gyeong-un now, the chance that she herself would survive grew all the higher.
A blood-red glow flowed from the eyes of the nearly dying Blue Spirit.
It was right then.
-Will you not stop at once!
The white-haired middle-aged man pressed Mok Gyeong-un.
The lush hair hanging down had stood bristling upright, and his anger seemed to have reached its peak.
‘You insect-like wretch!’
How dare you deceive me and target my demonic aura?
No matter what, he had to tear that fellow’s hand off.
The white-haired middle-aged man tilted his head and raised demonic aura to tear off Mok Gyeong-un’s adhered hand.
However,
-Ssssss!
‘Damn……’
After adhering to the human bastard, his energy would not regulate properly.
It seemed to be because it was draining away far too quickly.
‘If that is the case.’
At this, with his other hand the white-haired middle-aged man tried to forcibly peel off Mok Gyeong-un’s attached wrist.
But at that very moment,
-Shwaaaaaaaa!
The cave chamber spread with blood and the space warped.
-This is……
It was Blood Boundary, Blue Spirit’s Domain of Ghost Intent.
Turning his head, the white-haired middle-aged man made a disbelieving expression.
Blue Spirit, who was nearly dying, had detonated all of her remaining spirit power to create a Domain of Ghost Intent.
-Chwaaaaaa!
The bloodwaters of the opened Blood Boundary flew in like whips and bound the left arm and two legs of the white-haired middle-aged man.
The sticky whips of blood became as tough as leather and restrained him.
-You petty ghost!
The enraged white-haired middle-aged man tried to tear them off by force.
-Paaaaaak!
The bloody whips stretched under the tremendous force.
But Blood Boundary, raised by Blue Spirit at the cost of even her own extinction, was no easy thing either.
-Chwaaaaaa!
Even more blood transformed into whips and seized the body of the white-haired middle-aged man as he tried to break free.
-Uaaaaah!
The white-haired middle-aged man’s rage reached its extreme.
If only he had recovered even thirty percent of the power he possessed at his prime before being sealed, no, even ten percent, he could have annihilated insects like these with a mere gesture.
Yet now he could not.
He did not know what this insect-like human bastard was doing, but the demonic aura inside his body had become unstable and could no longer be properly controlled.
-Suuuuuuuu!
Even amidst that, the demonic aura kept draining away.
It had already gone past thirty percent of what remained.
At this rate, it might become difficult even to maintain his current form.
‘Damned insects.’
It was a situation where neither advance nor retreat was possible.
If only his life were not at risk, he could simply let go first, but if he did that, this feeble human bastard would die on the spot.
But if he did not separate from this fellow, his demonic aura would continue being stolen.
‘If only that damned petty ghost were not interfering…..’
If he tore away the arm absorbing his aura with his other hand, he could stop it.
But that petty ghost would not budge at all, perhaps because she had prepared herself even for extinction.
At this, the white-haired middle-aged man decided to take some risk.
-Fine. Then……
-Paak!
The only places he could move were the hand and arm holding Mok Gyeong-un.
The white-haired middle-aged man lifted Mok Gyeong-un upward.
Then he slammed him down so that Mok Gyeong-un’s head would hit the ground first.
-Kwaang!
‘I will knock you unconscious.’
He intended to stop the absorption of demonic aura by rendering Mok Gyeong-un unconscious.
However,
-You bastard……
Even though he struck his head hard enough to break the floor and blood was pouring out, Mok Gyeong-un did not lose consciousness.
“Haa…. haa…..”
Rather, he was staring straight at him, breathing roughly.
Those eyes were deeply irritating.
How dare a thing no different from an insect look at him with eyes full of such malice?
Was he making light of him?
-Good. Let us see who wins.
-Whik! Kwaang!
The white-haired middle-aged man lifted Mok Gyeong-un again and slammed him to the floor.
This time he made sure the whole body struck.
The white-haired middle-aged man smashed him down so fiercely that cracks spread through the stone floor and it caved in.
“Cough… cough…..”
Mok Gyeong-un’s complexion turned pale as he was slammed into the floor.
And the blood pouring from his mouth would not stop.
His internal injuries had already been severe, so of course repeatedly being smashed down only made them worse.
-Kwaang! Kwaang! Kwaang!
The white-haired middle-aged man hurled Mok Gyeong-un against the floor again and again.
Blue Spirit, trying to stop it, overstrained herself further and made even more whips of blood, trying to bind the white-haired middle-aged man’s right arm as well, but
-Shwaaaaaa!
Perhaps because of the Form of Attachment, the blood wrapped around his right arm liquefied and melted down.
That was why there was nothing she could do about this one thing.
-Kwaang!
“Kuhk!”
For the first time, a scream of pain escaped Mok Gyeong-un’s mouth.
He was repeatedly colliding with the stone floor defenselessly, and not only his insides but his whole body was being wrecked, bones breaking and more.
At this point he should have lost consciousness, but
-Flinch!
The white-haired middle-aged man looked at Mok Gyeong-un with disbelief.
The light in his eyes had not died in the slightest.
With a blood-covered face, half-dead, he was glaring straight at him, and for an instant even a chill ran down the middle-aged man’s spine.
‘A chill down my spine?’
In an instant, the face of the white-haired middle-aged man twisted hideously like an evil spirit.
Was that not the emotion called fear?
He had felt such an emotion toward nothing more than a human no better than a lowly insect?
‘Impossible. There is no way.’
Even thousands of years before being sealed, there had not been many things capable of making him afraid.
No, those things had possessed strength that truly defied reason.
Had not even the immortals of the high antiquity and the ones called heroes feared that golden fox and monstrous monkey?
And yet this fellow, compared to such beings, was no more than an insect, no, a parasite, so how had he made my spine run cold?
Had I truly weakened so much over these thousands of years of sealing?
-Grrrit!
The white-haired middle-aged man ground his teeth hard.
Already, the aura that fellow had drawn in was nearing fifty percent.
Now it was truly dangerous.
At this, the white-haired middle-aged man yanked Mok Gyeong-un, who was glaring at him, in violently.
-Pak!
-You parasite-like insect bastard. All of this is something you brought upon yourself.
-Kung!
Then he pulled Mok Gyeong-un in and smashed their foreheads together.
Mok Gyeong-un wondered what in the world he was doing, but
in that instant, something strange entered his sight.
Something with a faint form suddenly flowed out from the body of the white-haired middle-aged man.
-Srrrrrrrr!
It was as though,
‘A spirit body?’
It had the form of something like a soul.
But unlike humans, whose spirit bodies took the shape of their living form, this thing’s shape was one from which sharp lights jutted out like stars.
Then that thing, which seemed to be a spirit body and had come out like that,
-Srrrrrrrk!
seeped in through Mok Gyeong-un’s forehead.
“Hup.”
At the instant it seeped in, Mok Gyeong-un threw his head back as though some sharp thing had pierced through it.
-N-no!
Seeing this, Blue Spirit cried out.
By sheer ill fortune, she had seen it at the exact moment it entered Mok Gyeong-un’s head from behind.
That was unmistakably,
‘Out-of-body projection.’
It was the spirit beast’s out-of-body projection.
All living beings possess, beyond the physical body made of particles, a spirit body that may be called the soul. After the flesh dies, the will shifts into the spirit body, but while alive, one ordinarily cannot place the will into the spirit body.
Yet there are, on rare occasion, beings who awaken to this and can do so.
‘Is it trying to possess him and control his body?’
It appeared that the spirit beast had projected its spirit body and was directly trying to interfere with Mok Gyeong-un by possessing him.
‘I have to stop it.’
Blue Spirit tried to shake the spirit beast’s fleshly body and disrupt this.
But,
-Kkwaaaaaak!
the body of the white-haired middle-aged man did not budge in the slightest.
Rather, it was maintaining a rigid state by exerting force.
‘This cannot be.’
How could it grant will to both spirit body and flesh body at the same time?
It truly was not for nothing that it was a spirit beast that had lived thousands of years.
As that was happening, spasms ran through Mok Gyeong-un’s head.
‘Mortal!’
It seemed the spirit beast’s spirit body and Mok Gyeong-un’s soul had collided.
Blue Spirit’s expression darkened.
She wanted to help somehow, but she had now spent so much spirit power that her body had grown faint and she faced extinction.
Holding that thing down was her limit.
‘Ahhh.’
Could Mok Gyeong-un really endure this?
No matter how special his constitution was, his opponent was a spirit beast that had lived for no less than thousands of years.
Souls too had ranks.
That thing was a being infinitely close to divinity, so its will was on a completely different level from that of the human Mok Gyeong-un.
Perhaps it would become meaningless resistance.
And as if that expectation had proven exactly true,
-Bulge! Bulge!
Black veins rose under Mok Gyeong-un’s skin, a phenomenon that showed his flesh being dominated through possession.
‘No.’
This was the worst.
The moment Mok Gyeong-un lost his body, everything would be over.
His upturned eyes were trembling wildly, and black blood flowed from his mouth.
Was it truly impossible for a human will to endure the will of a spirit beast that had lived for thousands of years?
-Tuk! Tuk!
Then the blood whips she had been maintaining with all her remaining strength began snapping.
Having exhausted most of her spirit power, she could no longer hold on.
There was no hope anymore.
It was a moment so desperate that everything felt futile.
It was right then.
-Parrrrrrrrr!
The black veins that had been swelling across Mok Gyeong-un’s face began to sink back down.
‘No way?’
And while she was thinking that,
-Ssssss!
the eyes that had been turned over and shaking violently returned to normal.
At that instant,
-Paaaaaaaa!
A star-shaped spirit body sphere shot out from Mok Gyeong-un’s forehead and sank back into the head of the white-haired middle-aged man from which it had emerged.
Then the white-haired middle-aged man suddenly let out a bizarre scream.
-Uaaaaaah!
What in the world was this? As she stared in confusion, the white-haired middle-aged man opened his mouth, his formerly arrogant expression gone, his eyes now filled with tension, no, fear.
-Y-you, what in the world are you?
“Haa…. haa…. what…. are you…. talking about?”
-Inside you, that thing is…… kgh!
Before he could finish speaking, the white-haired middle-aged man suddenly made a pained expression.
Then he began violently twisting his body.
‘!?’
What in the world was happening?
And then suddenly, the skeleton of the white-haired middle-aged man began changing rapidly.
-Crack! Crrrack!
What kind of phenomenon was this?
The frame rapidly grew larger, and fur began sprouting wildly not only from his face but over his entire body.
The speed was so fast that it was as though the fur tore apart his clothes and covered his whole body in an instant.
Then even a tail sprouted.
A frame and fur so large they reached all the way to the cave ceiling.
It was turning into a shape that could no longer be viewed as human.
As if,
‘A raccoon dog?’
That was right.
The white-haired middle-aged man transformed into a giant raccoon dog roughly twice the size of a human.
Was this the true identity of this spirit beast?
-Kkwaaaaaak!
As the body grew, the hand gripping Mok Gyeong-un also became much larger and turned into a grasping form.
Perhaps because of that, the hand maintaining the Form of Attachment felt as though it might break.
“Kgh!”
The giant monstrous raccoon dog that had once been the white-haired middle-aged man, no, the spirit beast, spoke in a furious voice.
-You bastaaaard. In the end, you have made me into this…..
-Pak!
-!?
At that moment, the eyes of the spirit beast, now transformed into a monstrous raccoon dog, shook.
That was because, before anyone realized it, things made of faint light had been fastened around the spirit beast’s neck, arms, and legs.
With trembling eyes, the spirit beast turned its head.
-Dooong, dooong!
There the scroll from which it had come was floating in the air, and white string-like cords were extending from it, connected to the chains of light binding the spirit beast’s neck, arms, and legs.
Seeing this, the spirit beast shouted in a flustered voice.
-T-this cannot be. I clearly broke the seal and came out…..
-Gooooooo!
It was before those words could even finish.
In an instant, the white cords of light pulled the monstrous raccoon-dog spirit beast at tremendous speed, and its body began being sucked into the scroll.
-N-noooooooo!
-Pak!
At the same time, Mok Gyeong-un hurriedly withdrew the Form of Attachment and kicked the thing away.
-Puk!
-You bastaaaard! Come with me!
The spirit beast, being dragged by the white cords of light, tried to seize Mok Gyeong-un’s ankle, but in that instant,
-Pak!
something grabbed Mok Gyeong-un by the wrist and pulled him away.
It was Blue Spirit herself.
‘!!!!!!’
For the briefest instant, the eyes of the spirit beast, which had lost Mok Gyeong-un from its grasp, widened as though they would split.
But it was already no longer a situation where anything could be done.
-Uaaaaaaah!
With a mad scream, the spirit beast was soon sucked into the hanging scroll.
And once the spirit beast had been completely sucked in, on one cliff in the landscape painting of the scroll there was now drawn the image of a large raccoon dog howling, which had not been there before.
-Tuk!
-Chwarrrrrrrr!
The scroll that had confined the spirit beast then fell to the floor and rolled itself up, as if it had finished its work.
Watching this, Blue Spirit, now faint and insubstantial, spoke with difficulty.
-The…… seal…… was not…… completely…… released. It really seems like heaven’s luck….. mortal?
At that moment, her expression hardened.
The skin at the wrist of Mok Gyeong-un, whom she was holding, was crumbling away.
Once she let go, his arm dropped as though all strength had left it.
-You……..
In an instant, that cracking spread across Mok Gyeong-un’s entire fallen body.
Like the bare branches of winter, no, like a dying tree, the shell of him broke apart and scattered away.
-Paseuseuseu!
And from within that breaking shell,
-Smeeeer!
new skin full of vitality was rising.
Looking at this, Blue Spirit muttered, unable to contain her agitation.
-Transforming the bones and replacing the marrow.