Pay‑to‑Win King of Martial Arts (Novel) - Chapter 214 - Emperor Beneath the Sea (2)

Chapter 214 – Emperor Beneath the Sea (2)

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Quietly, I drew back my Primordial Mixed Qi. At a glance, the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea no longer looked nearly as threatening as before.

Perhaps that immortal who had called himself emperor had worked some art upon him as well. After all, he had restored even a pierced heart, so perhaps he could also heal the madness rooted deep in one’s mind.

Now that the green skin had all vanished, the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea was a handsome middle-aged man with clear features.

Now turned into such a handsome middle-aged man, the former Great Toad of the Eastern Sea looked around as though he could not make sense of his own situation.

“…Where is this?”

“I do not know either.”

“And who might you be?”

“I am Muk Hui-yeong, Company Lord of the Radiant Crystal Merchant Company.”

“Is that so? I have never heard of such a merchant company.”

The former Great Toad of the Eastern Sea looked up at the distant ceiling.

“It does not seem as though escaping will be easy.”

“Even if we do escape, there is only the sea.”

“The sea?”

“Yes. We are beneath the sea. Do you not remember how you came here?”

At my words, the former Great Toad wore an expression of hearing something utterly new. Soon his face grew grave as though he were trying to search through his memories, but he did not look to be making much headway.

“No, this won’t do. I cannot remember at all.”

“When does your last memory date from?”

“…Hm.”

After thinking hard, the former Great Toad clapped his hands.

“Ah, yes. That’s right. The dogs of the Imperial State attacked us. I was captured by them…”

“Attacked?”

“Indeed. Ah, I have not introduced myself. I am Mun Hwan, sect leader of the Heavenly King Sect.”

The masters had called him the Heavenly King Sect Leader, and indeed the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea truly had been the Heavenly King Sect Leader.

Since Mun Hwan, the former Great Toad of the Eastern Sea, seemed to have hazy memories, I decided to offer him a clue.

“For reference, the Heavenly King Sect I know disappeared more than ten years ago.”

“What are you talking about?”

“To be precise, it should be thirteen years.”

“A strange sort of joke.”

“Not strange at all. I am serious.”

Mun Hwan looked at me. Had he read the truth in my eyes? His expression turned troubled. It seemed he was sinking down into his own memories.

“…”

Mun Hwan’s expression grew more and more severe. It looked as though memories were returning to him.

“Do you remember now?”

“Remember what?”

“The years in which you were called the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea. Did you not kill countless people?”

“I do not know what you mean by that. The only thing I remember is…”

Mun Hwan carefully opened his mouth. His expression suggested he was wondering whether it was all right to tell me this, but he must have judged the situation extraordinary enough to warrant it.

The fragments he remembered were horrifying. The Heavenly King Sect had suddenly been attacked by masters from the imperial palace, and the Heavenly King Sect Leader had been subjected to terrible torture in an underground prison of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

At about that point in the story, I raised my hand.

“Wait a moment. Why were you attacked, and why were you tortured?”

“…That is…”

Mun Hwan closed his mouth. I voiced my own guess.

“It was because your surname was Zhu, wasn’t it?”

“…!”

Mun Hwan’s reaction told me I was correct.

It was only natural, really. Many corpses must have ended up sinking beneath the sea. But why had only the Heavenly King Sect Leader and I been saved in particular?

The Emperor had said that he saved me because he sensed the aura of Great Ming’s imperial house in me. If so, then the Heavenly King Sect Leader must also possess the aura of Great Ming’s imperial house.

And later, after I had emerged from the Cave of Repentance, I had heard that the spiritual medicine I had taken back then was the Heavenly King Divine Pill. That had been a pill composed of demonic qi and spiritual qi.

The aura of Great Ming’s imperial house had been, in the end, nothing other than demonic qi.

“Please do not think of hiding it.”

“…How mysterious. How is it that you know that? It was something we hid even from the sects and clans with whom we shared close ties.”

In the end, Mun Hwan revealed the truth. The Heavenly King Sect that had vanished ten years ago had been descendants of the fallen Great Ming. The imperial palace had somehow learned this and exterminated them. The pieces were fitting together.

I gave him a rough account of what the immortal had told me, that the being who called himself the emperor of Great Ming had saved us.

“That our ancestor saved us…”

Muttering in a moved expression, Mun Hwan looked at me anew.

“Then does that mean you too are some sort of relative of ours?”

“No. As I said, I am of the Muk Clan. I merely came to possess demonic qi by chance.”

“I see.”

Mun Hwan, or should I now call him Zhu Mun-hwan? In any case, Zhu Mun-hwan looked slightly disappointed.

“In any case, please continue your story.”

I pressed Zhu Mun-hwan onward. Stumbling a little, he drew more memories forth.

“They tortured me, and even used soul-seizing arts upon me to demand that I reveal where the descendants of Great Ming were hidden. But I did not tell them.”

“Then even soul-seizing arts didn’t work on you.”

“Hmph. How could the dogs of the imperial palace ever dominate the mind of a descendant of Great Ming’s imperial house? It was impossible from the start.”

After showing that pride in being a descendant of Great Ming’s imperial house, Zhu Mun-hwan continued.

“After that, they stopped trying to draw information out of me and began conducting experiments upon my body. They injected me with strange medicines they had made.”

“I see.”

I knew not what sort of medicine it had been, but it seemed certain that it was because of that drug that Zhu Mun-hwan had become the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea.

“To tell the truth, from that point on my memory is blank. I do not even know what sort of drug it was.”

“Then I think I can roughly explain what happened after that.”

I explained to him what had happened in the Zhoushan Archipelago.

That the Five Great Clans and the Nine Great Sects had gathered in search of Longyuan. The conspiracy between the imperial palace and the Martial Alliance. And the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea.

Zhu Mun-hwan did not readily accept the fact that he had been the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea. After all, the Great Toad had slaughtered countless masters of the jianghu.

How could one easily accept being told that the moment one’s memory vanished, one had begun butchering people with cruelty? But he soon sensed that I was not lying, and his expression darkened.

“…It seems the imperial palace truly did turn me into a monster called the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea.”

“Most likely.”

Zhu Mun-hwan said that he himself had never been a master capable of toying with the experts of the Nine Great Sects and Five Great Clans in such fashion.

If so, then one could surmise that the imperial palace had been testing some drug that dramatically raised the level of martial prowess while causing one to lose reason.

“To think I committed such sins.”

Zhu Mun-hwan lowered his head, seemingly crushed by guilt.

“That was the Imperial State’s wrongdoing. If a man used a blade, how can one blame the blade itself?”

I offered Zhu Mun-hwan what comfort I could. He too understood there was no time to remain dejected, and he recovered quickly enough.

“Now that I keep reaching for my memories, I think I can recall things as though they happened in a dream. Countless masters rushing at me, and me killing them.”

“It was no dream.”

“So it seems. It also feels as though, at the time, I was blindly trying to protect Hachido. The shrine of Great Ming was there.”

“I see.”

Though by now it would have sunk beneath the sea.

The imperial palace had used Zhu Mun-hwan’s sense of duty toward Great Ming’s imperial house as its own executioner’s tool.

“In any case, I think I understand the broad outline now. In other words, more than ten years have passed.”

“Thirteen years.”

“Yes, thirteen years.”

But even with the broad outline understood, the situation remained just as bleak.

“Come to think of it, I’ve spoken only about myself. I would like to hear your story as well.”

“What story?”

“The aura of Great Ming. Or rather, the thing people now call demonic qi. Earlier I let it pass, but I would like to ask in concrete terms how you came to possess it.”

“I would rather not tell you that.”

“…Your answer is so shamelessly direct that I hardly know what to say.”

There was no way I intended to reveal that I had consumed the Divine Demon Pill and regressed to the past.

It was a story no one would be able to empathize with, and not one that would do me any good if anyone knew.

“Then does that mean all who possess demonic qi are members of the imperial house?”

“Ah, no. Not at all. Demonic qi is simply what arises naturally when one practices the martial arts spread by the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.”

“Is that so? Then the imperial house’s aura is something different?”

“Even if it is the same basic aura, there are ranks within it. The aura of the imperial house’s direct line, its collateral line, and that of commoners. Those auras form an absolute hierarchy that cannot be defied.”

I nodded. Zhu Mun-hwan’s face bloomed into a smile.

“Which is to say, when I raise my aura, you should naturally have no choice but to submit to me.”

Saying that, Zhu Mun-hwan raised his aura. Naturally, I felt nothing at all.

Unaware of that, he called to me in a dignified voice.

“Subject of Great Ming. Come before me.”

“I don’t want to.”

“…Hm?”

At my crisp refusal, Zhu Mun-hwan looked slightly taken aback. He raised his aura again, stronger this time, adding resonance to his voice.

“Subject of Great Mi…”

“You’re too loud. This is a cave as it is. The sound is already echoing.”

“…”

At my irritation, Zhu Mun-hwan was left speechless. He had probably expected me to crawl over like a dog and lick his shoes.

“What?”

Zhu Mun-hwan’s expression turned grave. He seemed to wonder whether there was some defect in his aura. But that was not it. It was simply that my rank was higher than his.

I raised my own aura in return and lowered my voice as much as possible.

“Zhu Mun-hwan. My child.”

“…Hah!”

As expected, Zhu Mun-hwan was greatly startled. According to the immortal’s own words, I had been born with the Heavenly Demon’s aura, something not found in the mortal world.

If the imperial house’s aura was the greatest demonic qi of the human world, then mine, being from the divine realm, naturally stood on an entirely different level.

“Come here.”

Zhu Mun-hwan moved before even understanding why he was obeying my words. That was what hierarchy meant.

I almost told him to lick the tops of my feet, then thought better of it. If he had lived ten years as the Great Toad of the Eastern Sea, there was no way he had brushed his teeth during that time. I could not very well let such a rotten tongue touch my feet.

Once I withdrew my aura, life returned to Zhu Mun-hwan’s hazy eyes.

“W-what did you just do?”

Stammering, Zhu Mun-hwan looked thoroughly flustered. I gave him a small smile.

“What else could it be? Didn’t you say there are ranks among aura as well?”

“…What in the world…”

When I had met the demonic man in Gansu, he had immediately submitted the moment I released my aura. But Zhu Mun-hwan, possessing a relatively high-grade aura, had resisted, so it really did seem that there were ranks within demonic qi.

“Immortal grandpa, come out now.”

I tapped the jade-colored coffin lightly with my hand. With a deep sigh, smoke rose from the coffin. Zhu Mun-hwan was nearly out of his wits at the miraculous sight.

“You truly are a child difficult to handle.”

Zhu Wenjing emerged. Sensing something from him, Zhu Mun-hwan at once prostrated himself.

“This descendant greets Ancestor. I am Zhu Mun-hwan, eighteenth-generation descendant of the Zhu Clan.”

“So. I am Zhu Wenjing.”

“I beg forgiveness, but I know nothing of those ancestors who ascended.”

“Naturally not. Those who ascend step beyond the perception of men.”

In a grave voice, the emperor continued introducing himself to his descendant.

“I bear the posthumous title of Emperor Sungcheon Jido Seongye Gongsun Heonmun Gyeongmu Yeonin Uihyo Myeong.”

“Ah! So you are Emperor Sungcheon Jido Seongye Gongsun Heonmun Gyeongmu Yeonin Uihyo Myeong. This humble descendant greets you, Ancestor.”

They were really going all out groveling and praising among themselves. And what kind of name was that, anyway? Folding my arms, I watched the ridiculous sight.

“It would seem you failed to persuade that child.”

At Zhu Wenjing’s rebuke, Zhu Mun-hwan bowed his head, embarrassed.

“This small descendant has erred.”

I clapped my hands to break up the scene.

“All right, all right. That’s enough playing emperor.”

“…Playing?”

Zhu Wenjing and Zhu Mun-hwan both looked at me in simultaneous disbelief. But there was nothing they could really do to me. After all, I possessed the Heavenly Demon’s aura they both served.

What interested me more were all the questions I still had for this immortal.

“But once one ascends, what happens in reality? Immortal grandpa, even as emperor you must have accomplished many deeds in life. In whose name are those remembered?”

“People simply think, Ah, those must have been the deeds of the ancestors who ascended.”

“Are they forgotten completely from memory? Even by family?”

“Yes. Only traces remain.”

“That seems rather sad for the family.”

“Heh. To a human way of thinking, perhaps.”

That human way of thinking again. If a human did not possess a human way of thinking, was he meant to possess a dog’s way of thinking? Then again, there certainly were men in this world fit to be called dogs.

“By the way, where exactly is this place?”

There were still many things I wanted to ask. The immortal’s voice felt slightly unstable somehow. As though he might vanish soon. I needed to ask as much as I could before then.

“It is the tomb I made while still alive.”

“So it really is beneath the sea?”

“It is.”

“But if you ascended, why would you need a tomb? If ascension means being erased from memory, there won’t even be anyone to tend the grave.”

“It is not merely a tomb. This place was made as a safe house that only the emperors of Great Ming could come and go from. That is why those who enter may breathe even beneath the sea.”

That made sense. Though the emperor of Great Ming had probably died before ever making use of this safe house.

“There are also many formations laid upon it. Temperature maintenance, ventilation, prevention of corrosion…”

“Spare me the boasting.”

“Ahem. There are many other formations here that would truly astonish you.”

“More importantly, immortal grandpa, tell me how to get out of here first. After I leave, you can play emperor as much as you like.”

“Insolent to the extreme.”

“Isn’t the bloodline that first tried to suppress me by aura and make me a subordinate the truly insolent one?”

“…Ahem.”

Zhu Wenjing could not refute that. The immortal cleared his throat and changed the subject.

“In any case, you wish to leave this place?”

“Yes. Since you dragged me here, you should be able to let me out too, shouldn’t you?”

“No, I cannot.”

“What?”

That was an absurd thing to hear. I stamped my feet and protested.

“Hurry up and send me out. Other people are worrying about me. I have many things I need to do.”

“At present I am no more than a lingering thought. I had little power I could grant to begin with, and even that has almost all been spent protecting the two of you. Even this conversation is possible only because I am wringing out what remains.”

“Then can I just leave on my own?”

“This place lies roughly ten thousand li beneath the sea. Even a transcendent master would find it difficult to leave here with nothing but his own body.”

I was aghast. Ten thousand li. Would even the distance from Yunnan in the far southwest of the Central Plains to Heilongjiang in the far northeast amount to ten thousand li? It was beneath the sea, yes, but I had not imagined it would be such a depth. Certainly there was no way I could hold my breath through such a distance and get out.

“Then what do I do?”

“There is a way to leave, even so. However…”

“However?”

Suddenly the emperor’s voice wavered. Unease rose in me, and I pressed him.

“My strength has run out. From here on, you two will have to…”

“Instead of saying that, tell me something more useful while you still can.”

“…The diagram upon the stone wall.”

With those words, the emperor vanished like smoke. Even so, because he had saved my life, I did not feel inclined to curse him.

I turned sharply to look back at Zhu Mun-hwan. Startled, Zhu Mun-hwan drew his hands together before him respectfully.

“Let’s search.”

“Y-yes!”

It was time to explore the burial mound together with the now obedient Zhu Mun-hwan.