Whirl!
The strangely shaped sword of the masked man, which had been caught by Bu Eunseol's seizing the naked blade barehanded technique, suddenly began to spin fiercely.
When Bu Eunseol let go of the sword.
The masked man's arm writhed like a living snake.
Swish!
The strangely shaped sword, which was close to one jang (1 jang = 3m) in length, bent at a bizarre angle and cleaved the air.
In an instant, the blade vanished from Bu Eunseol's sight.
However, he had already studied the variations of this vicious demonic swordsmanship hundreds of times over.
The trajectory of that sword path was etched into his mind, no, deep into his bones.
The moment the sword vanished,
Swoosh.
Bu Eunseol defied gravity, using only one leg as an axis to lay his body horizontally.
At that moment, along with his fluttering clothes in the air, the blade energy brushed past his side, and then,
Slash.
Simultaneously, a sword strike faster than a sparking lightning bolt grazed past his forehead and severed a few strands of his hair.
Swaaak!
Bu Eunseol barely evaded the attack, but the masked man's sword strike had already completed its next variation.
The sword strike had been heading from bottom to top.
It had cleverly changed direction once again and stabbed straight at his two eyes as he lay horizontally.
It was a lethal, unavoidable, and unblockable strike flying in from an absolute blind spot.
Clang!
A metallic sound that tore at the eardrums resounded loudly.
Bu Eunseol had been using his bare hands all along.
He had quickly drawn the Silent Tiger Soul Sword and blocked the sword that was trying to pierce his two eyes.
Clash!
But suddenly, dozens, hundreds of sparks burst out in succession from behind Bu Eunseol's back.
Before he knew it, the assassin had fired hidden weapons using a hidden weapon device covertly worn on his left wrist.
Pew, pew, pew, pew!
The moment the hidden weapons that flew like a swarm of bees were about to lodge into his back,
Fwoosh! Rumble.
The space behind Bu Eunseol's back wavered like a haze, and soon a Dark Wall harder than steel was created.
He had deployed the Wishful True Binding to block the hidden weapons pouring onto his back.
"It was you!"
A blood-red radiance soared straight up to the ends of the sky from Bu Eunseol's pupils.
The masked man before his eyes.
He was using the swordsmanship of the culprit who killed his grandfather and even Sahyang's hidden weapons in the exact same manner.
Crack.
The masked man stared at the wall of black true energy created behind Bu Eunseol's back and tilted his head.
That appearance seemed to say, 'To think the Martial Soul Society Leader was the Martial Soul Command Lord?'
"Sahyang's hidden weapons, that bizarre demonic swordsmanship..."
The red radiance flowing from Bu Eunseol's eyes was, before he knew it, dyeing even his entire body in the color of blood.
That appearance closely resembled the Returning to One Realm Lord wearing a dark red blood armor.
"Of course, you must also have the Rotten and Decaying Poison, right?"
Clang.
In the meantime, the masked man found Bu Eunseol's weak point and stabbed his neck, but the sword did not go in.
The wall of the Wishful True Binding that had been created behind his back had already moved to his front.
[Why.]
Bu Eunseol's voice was low and damp, as if drawn up from the abyss.
That single voice spread out like a living creature, seeming to become a black mist that swallowed the light of the entire world.
[Did you kill my grandfather.]
Even the ashen sky and the dreary wind were being dyed ink-black by Bu Eunseol's voice.
"Heh."
The masked man laughed like a low groan at first, and then burst into a bizarre laughter.
"Kekeke!"
As he burst into laughter, he captured Bu Eunseol's weak point and deployed his sword art once again.
It was a bizarre sword move where a single move divided into three branches of flashes.
The blade edge that bloomed like an illusion aimed at Bu Eunseol's brow, neck, and heart simultaneously.
But Bu Eunseol did not dodge.
No, as if there was not even a need to dodge, he received the blade energy that permeated into his bones without moving a muscle.
Slash!
The sound of cutting flesh and severing bone resounded.
It was the masked man's sword that could cut even steel like a sheet of paper, but what remained on Bu Eunseol's body were only shallow wounds like hairline cracks.
Three sword strikes brushed past like a storm, but there was not a single fatal wound.
"Khaat!"
The masked man swung his sword like a madman, but the more he attacked, the duller his sword force became.
The extreme speed of the sword moves remained the same.
The destructive power contained within them was gradually weakening.
Tremble.
Bewilderment appeared in the eyes of the masked man, who had stopped his attacks.
He had clearly pierced the vital acupoints accurately.
Why was that guy moving freely as if he had no injuries?
Why did the blade energy scatter like mist the moment it touched that guy's body?
Only then did the masked man realize.
His internal energy was slowly slipping away like grains of sand squeezing through the gaps between his fingers.
The Inverse Phase Qi Fusion Art.
Bu Eunseol had pushed the secret art of manipulating by colliding the internal forces in his body to its absolute limits.
He was using a secret technique akin to self-destruction, forcibly mixing the masked man's power with his own and annihilating them together.
Swooosh.
The masked man was gradually losing his strength.
His gaze changed significantly, and he endlessly poured out sword moves like a waterfall.
But the more he swung his sword, the heavier his body felt, as though it had turned to lead, and the duller his blade became.
Conversely, Bu Eunseol's sword art became even more agile and sharp.
Until now, he had lost his strength countless times, and he had defeated formidable enemies even in those disadvantageous situations.
Furthermore, Bu Eunseol judged those mighty powers to be abnormal and unnatural things that humans could not possess.
Because of that, his ultimate goal followed the same principle.
He had pursued the realm of facing and striking down enemies with humanity's innate strength.
Swish, swish, swish!
Bu Eunseol, having seized the chance of victory, continuously poured out sword moves toward the masked man.
His sword art was profound and exquisite.
Strangely, the tip of the Silent Tiger Soul Sword cleaved the air while maintaining a distance of five or six feet from the masked man's body.
Pat!
Instantly, the masked man turned pale with fright and began to widen the distance from Bu Eunseol with all his might.
He had grasped why Bu Eunseol's sword tip kept a constant distance from his body.
If he tried to block it or counterattack, his weak points would be immediately exposed, and his vital acupoints would be struck in a flash...
It was because Bu Eunseol was deploying an extremely wondrous and high-level sword art.
Under normal circumstances, he would have used his mighty strength to push away or interrupt that persistently clinging sword art itself.
Now, because he had absolutely no internal energy or strength, he could not dare to attempt such a thing.
Snick, snick, snick, snick!
Before long, Bu Eunseol's sword moves became even faster, reaching the point where the Silent Tiger Soul Sword held in his hand could not be seen.
The blade energy did not touch the masked man, but the tip of the sword was aiming at all of the masked man's vital acupoints.
If he dodged to the right, it came from the right, and if he blocked to the left, it came from the left.
The unpredictable afterimages of the sword clung like ghosts, interrupting the masked man's evasive maneuvers and cutting off even his attempts to counterattack.
Such a sword art was more lethal than simply cutting flesh and severing bone.
It pierced through the enemy's thoughts and intentions to collapse the psyche.
And it left one floundering in extreme pain and terror, as if their entire body were being slashed to pieces by invisible blades.
To counter the sword moves of the one who killed his grandfather, Bu Eunseol had created another demonic sword technique.
Snick, snick!
The more he cleaved with his sword, the more the masked man felt a severe pain as if his whole body were being torn apart.
Swish!
Instantly, Bu Eunseol's Silent Tiger Soul Sword bent like a snake.
He too, highly similar to the Tianzhu Confucian Fist, had made his own arm as flexible as a whip.
"Uaaagh!"
A miserable scream resounded.
The Silent Tiger Soul Sword, which had not touched his body all along, had finally pierced the masked man's left eye.
"Keuh."
Even amidst the terrible sensation of the world shrinking by half, the masked man instinctively gave a deep slash to Bu Eunseol's left arm.
Pat.
Along with a sharp cutting sound, blood flowed profusely from Bu Eunseol's forearm.
It was a severe wound to the point where the bone was exposed, but he did not bat an eye.
Bu Eunseol's coldly frozen pupils seemed to freeze even the burning pain.
[It was not you.]
His voice, like a demon king of the Netherworld, was filled with disappointment.
That sword move that killed his grandfather was much more exquisite and cruel than this.
Because the cross-sections of the two severed arms had been cut as cleanly as glass.
The sword art used by the masked man before his eyes merely had the same moves; it did not reach the level of the sword art fired by the culprit.
[From whom did you learn that sword art?]
"Kihihihik."
Instead of answering, the masked man let out a bizarre laughter.
[Right.]
Bu Eunseol wore a smile.
[That makes it fun.]
And then he took out two jade bottles from his embrace and swallowed their contents simultaneously.
They were the Sleep Demon Divine Pill and the Clear Spirit Stone Oil.
[Endure it for as long as possible.]
Up until now, he had never once consumed these two life-saving spiritual medicines all at once for his own sake.
But now, to pull out the information contained within the masked man's head entirely.
He was trying to perfectly recover his exhausted body.
[That way you will be able to feel a hellish pain for a long time.]
Shaaaa.
A five-colored radiance began to spread out from the body of Bu Eunseol, who had swallowed the spiritual medicines.
Since stepping into the martial world, his body had been constantly exhausted and overworked.
He had not slept properly to formulate plans, and he flew around the one hundred and eighty thousand li of the Central Plains day and night to save people.
No matter how great his internal energy was, no matter how profound his martial arts were, no matter how tremendous his mental fortitude was.
He was not an immortal, but a human with a body where flesh and blood flowed.
That terrible fatigue and the limits of his physical stamina took their toll.
He was always in a state where he could only use eight-tenths, no, seven-tenths of the strength he possessed.
But then the two legendary spiritual medicines permeated into his body.
The wounds he had suffered up to now healed in an instant.
The fatigue that had accumulated all this time vanished, and his depleted strengths rose up like river water.
Paaaa!
He recovered his body to its optimum state.
A brilliant vibration wave spread out from Bu Eunseol's body, and the masked man's body shook like a sheet of paper.
He tried to dodge his body out of an instinctive sense of crisis, but Bu Eunseol's movements far transcended his reactions.
Papapapat!
Bu Eunseol, who had vanished from his sight, appeared behind his back before he knew it.
Slash!
Along with a sword strike like a flash of light, a spine-chilling cutting sound resounded, and then,
Thud, thud.
All of the masked man's left fingers fell to the ground.
"Kkeui!"
Bursting out with a bizarre shout, the masked man counterattacked desperately and gave a long slash to Bu Eunseol's side.
But Bu Eunseol was smiling.
Even while blood flowed from his wound, it was a smile so cold and bizarre that it chilled the spine.
Tremble, tremble.
The masked man raised his sword again, but his body would not listen.
The sensation starting from his fingertips was paralyzed, and he felt as if the blood flowing in his blood vessels was turning sticky like mud.
"Keueu."
[To not collapse even from the poison of the Poison Saint, and to the point of using the Rotten and Decaying Poison smeared on a hidden weapon... you must have considerable attainments in poison arts.]
Bu Eunseol wore a chilling smile.
[From now on, I will make you reach the realm of the Poison Saint. Within exactly one quarter of an hour.]
At the same time as those words, Bu Eunseol moved.
Along with his internal energy, he began to pour the mysterious power of poison he had accumulated up to now into the masked man's meridians.
His realm of the Poison Saint was highly unique; even without learning poison arts, he could create and detoxify poisons freely.
Because of that, his was unlike general poison arts.
It was not injecting poison, but rather the power of its origin could also be injected into another.
Craaack.
A radiance instantly flowed on the masked man's skin, and his complexion improved.
If used properly, poison exerts a more miraculous efficacy than a spiritual medicine.
Due to the power Bu Eunseol injected, a phenomenon equivalent to the shedding of the mortal body and exchanging of bones was occurring within him.
Vwoom, vwoom.
But because Bu Eunseol poured out his power without stopping, the masked man could not move his body.
Above all, the masked man's body could not handle the sudden flood of poison.
Craaack.
Gradually his eyes turned transparent, and he began to wear a somewhat dazed expression.
A forced amplification of martial prowess inevitably breeds a massive weak point.
Through Bu Eunseol's power he had suddenly arrived at the realm of the Poison Saint.
It had seemed like something that would absolutely never break.
A crack slowly began to form in the masked man's solid psyche.
[I caught it.]
Before long, Bu Eunseol's form had sunk into deep darkness and become a black shadow, and a black mist was rising from his mouth.
It was truly an appearance as if he had become a demon king of the Netherworld.
Grab.
Bu Eunseol pressed against the frozen masked man's brow.
[In exchange for reaching the realm of the Poison Saint, I will take your memories.]
Ziiiing.
And through Illusion Upon Illusion, he forcibly rummaged through his mental world and began to dig out his memories.
"Khehehe."
The masked man, who wore a pained expression for a moment, soon let out a bizarre sneer as if to show off.
He was injecting poison essence while using a highly advanced Mind-Seizing Secret Art like Illusion Upon Illusion.
That was the same as burning one's own soul and destroying one's physical body.
If it were an ordinary martial artist, their body would burst immediately, and even for Bu Eunseol, it was a situation where at least one of his limbs would burst.
[It does not matter.]
Bu Eunseol muttered in a low voice.
Then he endlessly injected the power of poison circulating within his body into the masked man's body.
[Because even if one arm is severed, I can still get my revenge.]
Craaack.
Before long, Bu Eunseol's forearm began to crack heavily like a rice paddy cracked by a drought.
Through those cracks, a light mixed with vitality and internal energy leaked out faintly.
He was simultaneously using the power of the Poison Saint and a supreme art from beyond the heavens like Illusion Upon Illusion.
That explosive power was instead crumbling his physical body.
Crack, craaack.
His skin cracked open and deep red flesh burst out.
But Bu Eunseol did not stop.
Trickle.
At that time, red blood began to flow from the masked man's pupils.
The power of Illusion Upon Illusion was slowly burrowing in along the cracks in the masked man's psyche.
"Kkieh!"
At that time, the masked man shrieked a bizarre sound and struggled.
As he thrashed about like a madman, the mask covering his face came undone and an indescribably bizarre figure was revealed.
The tongue inside his opened mouth had been cut off, so only a purple lump of flesh could be seen, and in the place where his nose should have been, the sound of breathing was leaking out from two holes.
His lips had completely vanished, and his gums and teeth were exposed bare.
The reason the masked man had made bizarre sounds was not to instill fear, but because he could not speak in the first place.
Swoosh!
But at that time, perhaps the masked man's internal energy had briefly returned; the original strangely shaped sword he had directly thrown away was grasped in his left hand.
"Heh-eh!"
The masked man stabbed Bu Eunseol's chest with that sword without hesitation.
Crack.
But the wide blade of the strangely shaped sword could not squeeze in between the ribs.
As if his strength had drained again and he no longer had the reserve power to push the sword in further, the blade of the strangely shaped sword scraped against Bu Eunseol's ribs and stopped askew.
"Ueuh!"
Craaack.
The masked man gritted his teeth and applied force once more, but only a rattling vibration occurred with the blade wedged into bone and flesh.
Blood flowed out endlessly, but he had failed to inflict a fatal wound.
Vwoom, vwoom.
In the meantime, Bu Eunseol's pupils had turned deep yellow.
Originally, Illusion Upon Illusion was a secret art of Infinite Reversal Power that seized the enemy's psyche and destroyed their physical body.
In particular, the method of piercing through the enemy's psychic barrier to scan their memories only works on the likes of peak masters who have not properly built their psychic barriers.
But Bu Eunseol, in order to find his grandfather's enemy, in order to look into the mind of a grand master who had reached the pinnacle of mastery...
He had resolved himself not only for the decline of his internal energy and the forfeiture of the Poison Saint's power, but even for his limbs being blown off.
Craaaack.
The moment a handful of skin from Bu Eunseol's left arm was eventually torn off,
Ziiiing.
All scenery vanished, and a faint door began to be seen far away before his eyes.
Step, step.
Bu Eunseol walked toward that door without hesitation.
Sizzle.
In an instant, the soles of his feet melted down and an indescribable pain spread out.
But he walked toward the door, paying it no mind.
Craaack.
At that moment, along with the sound of bones, a severe pain that could not be expressed in words spread through his entire body from the vicinity of his ribs.
Perhaps it was the masked man in the real world.
He was gathering all his strength once again, attempting to shatter Bu Eunseol's ribs and pierce his heart.
His consciousness nearly flew away time and time again due to that terrible pain, but Bu Eunseol endlessly walked without stopping his steps.
The moment he finally arrived in front of the door,
Stagger.
He felt a sensation as if something cold and sharp within his chest was penetrating his heart.
Grab.
Bu Eunseol quickly opened the door with all his might.
Flash!
Then, along with a pure white light, the figure of his grandfather from his younger days could be seen.
'Grandfather!'
Bu Eunseol quickly ran inside toward the door.
Having entered inside, he soon had to stop his steps.
There was much he had not known until now.
His grandfather's past mistakes and tracks... began to pour out before his eyes and into his mind.
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