Myst, Might, Mayhem (Novel) - Chapter 148 - Repayment (1)

Chapter 148 – Repayment (1)

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Translated by Jinmu

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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-Crkssss! Crack! Craaack!

Cracks were spreading, the skin shell was peeling away, and the muscles were twisting.

At that change in him, Blue Spirit clicked her tongue and said,

-Why did you bother giving him the hint of enlightenment?

What she wanted was the downfall of the current Heaven and Earth Society.

Yet because of what Mok Gyeong-un had said, Baek Sa-ha, the Annihilation Poison King, had gained some sort of enlightenment.

Because of this, he had become able to cross the wall.

That also meant he would become far stronger than he was now.

-You did something pointless. Tsk tsk.

Blue Spirit was not pleased by this at all.

But no answer came from Mok Gyeong-un.

He had learned voice transmission and ordinarily replied unless it was a special case, so why was he not answering?

Puzzled, she looked at Mok Gyeong-un’s face.

“……”

‘This boy?’

Mok Gyeong-un was staring fixedly at Baek Sa-ha, the Annihilation Poison King, who was undergoing Transforming the Bones and Replacing the Marrow.

It was not an expression of amazement or fascination.

It was as though he were observing.

Seeing Mok Gyeong-un like this, Blue Spirit grew curious what exactly he was thinking as he watched.

‘What are you watching so intently?’

And what he was thinking was something rather unexpected.

Rather than the outward process of Baek Sa-ha’s flesh being rebuilt, Mok Gyeong-un was carefully observing how the energy within him was changing.

‘So this is how it works?’

After watching for a while, the corner of Mok Gyeong-un’s mouth twitched.

* * *

To a martial artist, Transforming the Bones and Replacing the Marrow was a realm like a dream.

It was the phenomenon in which, upon crossing the wall, the body was rebuilt to suit the new realm, and that body could be said to be the most ideal form for oneself.

“Ha……”

An exclamation flowed from Baek Sa-ha’s lips.

Unlike ordinary cases of Transforming the Bones and Replacing the Marrow, he had become a complete Poison Person, so nearly all his clothes had melted away and he was little different from being naked.

Baek Sa-ha’s lips curled upward.

The reason was simple.

‘I thought I might never stand again.’

He was standing on his own two legs.

How long had it been since he had felt this sensation?

He was so excited and moved that his heart pounded.

Then Mok Gyeong-un’s voice sounded by his ear.

“Congratulations.”

At that, Baek Sa-ha turned his head to look at Mok Gyeong-un.

“You….”

“I was worried you might die after drinking my blood, but instead you even underwent Transforming the Bones and Replacing the Marrow.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, Baek Sa-ha was once more made to realize what had happened to him.

He had been aware himself that he had undergone Transforming the Bones and Replacing the Marrow.

But hearing it from another person’s mouth felt quite different.

“Heh heh.”

“That laugh does not quite suit the moment.”

“It does not suit it?”

“No. At a glance, you look to be in your late forties. No, perhaps your mid-forties. You have grown younger.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, a strange light appeared in Baek Sa-ha’s eyes.

He had grown younger?

Unconsciously, Baek Sa-ha touched his own face.

The wrinkles he had always felt on his face were almost gone, and the skin felt elastic.

“Huh……”

There was no mirror in the training chamber, so he could not confirm it in detail, but seeing that even the wrinkles on his hands had greatly smoothed out, he really did feel that he had grown younger by a step.

Come to think of it, the two Five Kings who had received the title of Eight Stars had also looked far younger than their actual ages.

‘I had only hoped to walk again.’

Yet he had not only become a Poison Person, but had crossed the wall as well.

Now he could truly be said to have reached the domain of the Eight Stars.

To the man who could not contain his emotion, Mok Gyeong-un said,

“It seems you have obtained the result you wanted. If so, then the proposal from earlier is no different from being voided.”

“Proposal?”

“Yes. You already seem to have become a Poison Person. Am I wrong?”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, the corner of Baek Sa-ha’s mouth rose.

“Heh heh. Are you disappointed?”

“I thought I might be able to hear that story from you more easily, but it seems you obtained what you wanted by your own power.”

“By my own power……Do you take this old man for someone so shameless?”

“What do you mean by that?”

Baek Sa-ha spoke with his hands clasped behind his back, perhaps out of old habit.

“Had it not been for you, this old man would have lost his life today or spent the rest of his life unable even to open his eyes as a half-cripple.”

“I appreciate you saying it plainly.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, one eyebrow of Baek Sa-ha shot up.

As expected, it was another thing the boy did not mean from the heart.

He believed that it was by his own merit that Baek Sa-ha had gained enlightenment and undergone Transforming the Bones and Replacing the Marrow.

Of course, that was not wrong in the slightest.

“In any case, you truly are an insolent fellow.”

“My apologies if that is how it seemed.”

“Do not say things you do not mean. I know at least this much, that I owe you a debt I could not repay even in a lifetime.”

“Then I suppose you can grant at least one request of mine.”

“Of course.”

Baek Sa-ha answered readily.

He had made him walk again on his own two legs, brought him to the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture that he had desired so much, and made him become a Poison Person.

He was no different from a benefactor to him, so what could he not do?

“What is it that you wish to know?”

“First, please promise that you will answer no matter what.”

“A promise? This old man already said with his own mouth that I would grant it. Do you think I would change that midway through?”

“I only say it just in case.”

At those words from Mok Gyeong-un, Baek Sa-ha shook his head and said,

“I promise it. I will answer any question.”

“Thank you.”

“What is it that you wish to know?”

“Ghost Sword.”

‘!?’

At those words, Baek Sa-ha frowned for a moment.

He had wondered what he wished to ask badly enough to demand a promise first, but an unexpected question came out.

“……Why in the world are you asking about that?”

“That is difficult to explain, but I suppose I can answer simply that I am curious who Ghost Sword is.”

“Curious?”

“Yes.”

“Huh……”

“To speak plainly, I heard that you fought Ghost Sword. Is that not so?”

“……It is true.”

That was such a famous anecdote that everyone knew it.

But though many had asked Baek Sa-ha about it, he had never once answered properly.

There were two reasons for that.

The first was,

‘One can hardly even call that a fight.’

He had only endured for a short while through his long experience and the unique combat methods of poison arts, which followed a track different from other martial arts. If the fight had dragged on, the one who would have lost in the end would have been himself.

Baek Sa-ha opened his mouth.

“Why are you curious about Ghost Sword?”

“I believe I told you.”

“Is it that you cannot reveal the reason?”

“Yes.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s answer, Baek Sa-ha narrowed his eyes.

It gave him pause.

What in the world was this child’s purpose in wanting to know about Ghost Sword?

If it were pure curiosity, that would be one thing, but he worried it might perhaps stem from negative feelings.

Still, a promise was a promise.

“……I said I would tell you, so regardless of the reason I will. But I too would like to ask one favor of you.”

“A favor?”

“Yes. It is not difficult.”

“May I ask what it is?”

“Do not reveal the things you hear here today from this old man.”

“You mean not reveal them?”

“Yes. Since you too are a member of the Heaven and Earth Society, you will soon understand why I say this.”

“……Understood.”

When Mok Gyeong-un promised he would do so, Baek Sa-ha answered his question.

“First, as to whether I know who Ghost Sword is, I cannot answer, because I do not know either.”

“Pardon?”

What was this supposed to mean?

If he had fought him directly, should he not know his face?

To the puzzled Mok Gyeong-un, Baek Sa-ha said,

“It is true that I fought Ghost Sword, but his face was hidden behind a black mask, so there was no way to confirm it.”

“His face was hidden? Then what is this story that Ghost Sword stopped the fight in the middle?”

“Exactly what it sounds like.”

“So you are saying that in the middle of the fight, Ghost Sword said he wanted to stop, and you simply stopped?”

If that were all, then this would amount to a rather empty errand.

Just as he was beginning to feel deflated, Baek Sa-ha shook his head and said,

“Would that make any sense? No matter how much the signs of defeat were already turning against me as I fought him, I too am a martial artist. I would not accept such a proposal in the middle merely to save my life.”

‘Signs of defeat……So he had been losing?’

Baek Sa-ha was calmly revealing that he had been pushed back.

Judging by the fact that he had never revealed it until now, he seemed to have kept it hidden out of pride, but perhaps he had become more detached after gaining enlightenment.

It was strange, but that was not what Mok Gyeong-un had truly been curious about in the first place.

“……Then is that rumor also true?”

“Rumor?”

“The rumor that he might have been a royal-body guard carrying out the Society Leader’s secret order.”

“Haa.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, Baek Sa-ha clicked his tongue.

So much time had passed since that incident that it was being forgotten in the memories of many, and younger rising talents could hardly know of it, so he had no idea where this boy had heard such a story.

No.

Since he was the Shadow Sect Master’s disciple, had he heard it from the Shadow Sect Master?

“You know quite a lot.”

“Is it true?”

“I do not know.”

“Pardon?”

“Whether he was a royal-body guard or not, even I do not know.”

“What exactly do you mean by that?”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s question, Baek Sa-ha recalled that time seventeen years ago.

* * *

Ghost Sword, who had displayed astonishing might by letting all of his poison arts flow away harmlessly, widened the distance midway through and requested that the duel be stopped.

[What are you doing? Do you mean to show mercy in a life-and-death fight?]

To a martial artist, that would have been humiliation instead.

They were fighting with their lives on the line, so what sort of behavior was this, to do such a thing even while he held the advantage?

And yet,

[Annihilation Poison King. Do you wish to fight a wounded man?]

[A wounded man?]

To the Baek Sa-ha who asked back, Ghost Sword pulled open his upper garment and showed his chest.

To his surprise, there was a palm-shaped mark there, seemingly from a palm strike, and that area had turned black and sunk inward.

Moreover, judging by the blackened veins standing out around the wound,

‘A poison palm?’

It looked as though he had been struck by a poison hand.

Had he perhaps fought an expert of the Tang Clan of Sichuan or the Guyang family?

But more absurd than that was,

‘……He fought this old man in that condition?’

Baek Sa-ha was dumbfounded.

Ghost Sword’s state was such that calling it a serious injury would not be an exaggeration.

Yet in that condition he had let all of Baek Sa-ha’s poison arts flow away and displayed martial might that nearly overwhelmed him?

It became all the more humiliating.

He no longer had any desire to fight Ghost Sword to the end.

So Baek Sa-ha asked,

[……Whom did you fight to end up like that? The Guyang family? The Tang Clan of Sichuan?]

He had not asked expecting an answer.

But then utterly unexpected words came from Ghost Sword’s mouth.

[Camp-Dissolving Medicine Immortal.]

‘!?’

What was this supposed to mean?

Was Camp-Dissolving Medicine Immortal not the apothecary said to possess the best medical skill of the age along with the Physician of Hidden Cures?

That man was an apothecary, not a martial artist.

[What are you talking about….]

To the puzzled Baek Sa-ha, Ghost Sword threw something.

It was none other than,

[This is?]

[You understand now that there is no reason for us to keep fighting.]

[……How in the world did you come by this?]

[Deliver that to him. And tell him of my injury and that I was interrupted.]

[What is that supposed to mean?]

[You only need to tell him that.]

With those words, Ghost Sword shot his body away and vanished.

Baek Sa-ha had tried to pursue him, but Ghost Sword disappeared with such astonishing lightness skill that it was hard to believe he was seriously wounded, and he could not catch up.

* * *

“……Then you truly do not know who he was.”

“That is right. What this old man learned from fighting that man was….”

“That he had been gravely wounded by the Camp-Dissolving Medicine Immortal, the man called the greatest apothecary of the age. You are saying that is all you know?”

“……At first I could not believe it. Until then, there had not been a single person who knew that Camp-Dissolving Medicine Immortal practiced martial arts. He was an apothecary, after all.”

“He could have hidden it.”

“Yes. That is possible. But one thing is certain. If Camp-Dissolving Medicine Immortal truly wounded Ghost Sword so gravely, then his poison arts surpass even mine by far.”

That made Baek Sa-ha feel even more humiliated than the duel itself.

It meant that an old apothecary famous for medicine had overwhelmed Ghost Sword, one of the Eight Stars, with poison arts superior even to his own, despite his having spent his entire life training poison arts.

‘So that was it.’

Only now could Mok Gyeong-un understand why Baek Sa-ha had glossed over the matter back then and hidden it from everyone.

As a master of poison arts, he must have had his pride as well.

Mok Gyeong-un asked him, “But what exactly was the item Ghost Sword gave you, Elder?”

He had said that by giving him that item, Ghost Sword had said there was no reason for them to keep fighting.

What in the world had he given him?