Chapter 204
The news that threw the Central Plains martial world into shock had arrived.
It concerned the Martial Alliance.
The death of Song Il-do, the Meteor Sword Emperor and Martial Alliance Leader.
And the fact that the culprit behind it was none other than Jang Cheong, the Martial Alliance’s Chief Elder.
What was more, it had happened in front of everyone inside Alliance Leader’s Hall.
How on earth had this happened?
The sequence of events and reasons that were revealed afterward were even more shocking.
It was said that when the Nine Great Sects unexpectedly visited the Martial Alliance, an investigator exposed the crimes Jang Cheong had committed in secret all this time, and Jang Cheong, driven into a corner, revealed his true colors.
He had even used the horrifying demonic arts he had secretly learned.
“…No, does that make sense?”
At a certain inn, one of them, who had just heard this news from an acquaintance, stopped drinking and tilted his head.
They were martial artists who had made a name for themselves as members of the orthodox faction in their respective regions.
“They say the heads of the Nine Great Sects were all there, and he still did something like that?”
“After learning about Jang Cheong’s crimes and the true state of the Martial Alliance, they were disappointed and all left. This happened afterward.”
“Heh, so that’s how it was.”
“And perhaps because he thought something would happen sooner or later, that Jang Cheong fellow had prepared a large number of combat units as well.”
“Huh!”
Jang Cheong had once been a fixture of the Martial Alliance, respected by everyone.
Yet to think that the face he had hidden was so hideous.
“You can fathom ten feet of water, but not even one foot of a person’s heart. Isn’t that right?”
“Indeed. People are more frightening than ghosts.”
“No, wait a moment. Then who stopped Jang Cheong?”
They said he had been strong enough to kill the Martial Alliance Leader with a single strike.
But the heads of the Nine Great Sects, including the Fist Emperor, had already left. If so, who on earth had done it?
At that question, someone else joined the conversation.
“Why are you asking something so obvious? Naturally, the Martial Alliance’s remaining martial artists must have joined forces and captured him.”
“You clearly don’t know what a true expert is. If he was strong enough to kill even one of the Ten Great Experts with a single strike, that wouldn’t work. And if things went badly, he would simply kill everyone in sight and disappear before more people arrived. How could they possibly capture him?”
“I heard that the commander of the White Wolf Unit captured Jang Cheong.”
“The White Wolf Unit? You mean the one that’s been beating down those demonic fiends lately? Huh. Is their commander really that strong?”
“They say he cut all of Jang Cheong’s subordinates in half with a single sword stroke, and Jang Cheong himself was dealt with in an instant.”
“Heh. The Martial Alliance really overreached.”
One of them let out a hollow laugh, causing another to tilt his head.
“What do you mean, overreached?”
“Think about it carefully. Do you really think that makes sense? They say some young expert who had never even made a name for himself cut down Jang Cheong and his subordinates, even though Jang Cheong had killed Song Il-do, one of the Ten Great Experts, with a single strike. Honestly, wouldn’t that put him on the level of the Twelve Supremes Under Heaven? Do you really think that makes sense?”
“Well, that’s…”
“You’re such a naive fellow. In a situation like this, shouldn’t they create a hero to divert people’s attention from the Martial Alliance’s ugly reality?”
Hearing it put that way, it sounded plausible.
“Then who do you say captured Jang Cheong?”
“Whether the Fist Emperor, who had been about to leave, came back or they used some other method, someone must have pulled something. But I guarantee it wasn’t the commander of the White Wolf Unit. That’s obviously nonsense. It would be more believable to say that the mysterious expert Mu-myeong suddenly appeared there. They might as well say the Heavenly Demon appeared there. Tsk, tsk.”
“Heh. I-is that so? But I only brought you what I heard.”
“Right. It’s not your fault. If anyone’s at fault, it’s the Martial Alliance, which has a fire under its feet and is spreading baseless rumors. Enough. Let’s drink.”
Before long, one of them downed several cups in succession before speaking with an extremely serious expression.
“Speaking of which, I wonder who will become the next Alliance Leader. They’ll have to decide soon.”
“Whoever becomes Alliance Leader, I think that place is finished.”
“Finished?”
“The Nine Great Sects have said they’ll sever ties, and everyone knows they already have a poor relationship with the Five Great Families. Even so, with those groups, which make up most of the orthodox martial world’s strength, having left, what can the Martial Alliance do now?”
“It functioned perfectly well even without the Nine Great Sects.”
“That’s nonsense. It only looked that way when there weren’t any particular problems. No matter how poor their relationships were, history shows that whenever the orthodox martial world faced a major crisis, the Nine Great Sects, the Five Great Families, and the Martial Alliance always joined together to overcome it. But now that the Heavenly Demon has appeared and both the Nine Great Sects and the Five Great Families have left, the Martial Alliance has become nominal.”
The Martial Alliance had originally been founded through the efforts of the Nine Great Sects and the Five Great Families.
Could a Martial Alliance without them truly be a proper Martial Alliance?
On top of that, it had never built an independent foundation or gathered its own strength.
All because of one man, Jang Cheong, who had wielded real power from behind the scenes and controlled the Martial Alliance as he pleased.
As these shocking reports spread, the members of the orthodox faction slowly began to feel uneasy.
The Black Martial Emperor’s Apostle Alliance remained as strong as ever, and the Demonic Cult had seen the appearance of the Heavenly Demon.
Yet the Martial Alliance, which should have served as the orthodox martial world’s greatest center of unity, had become nominal.
Wasn’t this like destroying itself before it even had a chance to fight the Demonic Cult with the Heavenly Demon at its head?
Could things really be all right like this?
One thing was clear: the current situation looked extremely precarious.
It was an entirely normal reaction.
Just then, astonishing news that dispelled the orthodox faction’s anxiety shook the entire martial world.
‘The Nine Great Sects have founded a new alliance called the Justice Alliance!’
Led by the Fist Emperor, Great Master Muhu, the Nine Great Sects had finally taken center stage.
At last, it felt as though things were moving in the right direction.
Could there have been a more appropriate time to leave the rotten Martial Alliance behind and unite anew around the Nine Great Sects?
Naturally, the public reaction was intense.
They were still afraid of the Heavenly Demon’s continued overwhelming presence, but even so, the news of the Justice Alliance was extremely encouraging and stirred the hearts of the orthodox martial artists.
And the supreme figures at the very pinnacle of the martial world found the news intriguing as well.
First, in a beautiful palace that boasted dazzling colors,
“The Fist Emperor and the Nine Great Sects have stepped forward? Hmm. I see.”
A woman plucking a zither gave a peculiar smile after hearing the news brought by her disciple.
Next, inside a deep cave,
“Hooh. Yes. Interesting. Aren’t things in the martial world getting more and more interesting these days? Kahahaha!”
A rough-looking middle-aged man burst into loud laughter.
And then,
“The stagnant, rotten things are all being swept away, and the age of a true great upheaval is arriving. I’m already curious to see who will survive and who will be swept aside by the currents of the new age. Though in the end, I’ll smash them all with my own hands. Heh heh.”
Inside a vast chamber filled with flickering dark flames,
A man with a massive spear decorated with five-colored cords at his side wore a twisted smile.
The Sound Emperor, Cheon Iryeong.
The Blade Emperor, Jo Yeop.
The Spear Ghost, Go Dogun.
At long last, their gazes had begun to turn toward the martial world once more.
Thus, the landscape of the martial world was being newly reshaped.
***
Meanwhile, as a tremendous upheaval shook the martial world, the White Wolf Unit was well on its way back to the Hebei Peng Clan.
The White Wolf Unit’s journey back was a little more like a proper trip.
Perhaps because they had caught demonic fiends indiscriminately on their way to the Martial Alliance,
they did not encounter many such people on the way back.
Thus, instead of pushing themselves, they stopped at whatever inns they came across, ate together, and spent more time than usual talking.
Above all, they felt such time was necessary because they had new members among them.
Fortunately, Munho and Jegal Gil were adapting to the White Wolf Unit quite quickly.
“The night sky is so beautiful.”
“Indeed. It looks as though the stars are pouring down.”
They were camping out for the night.
Staying and eating at an inn was nice, but doing this from time to time wasn’t bad either.
“Hmm.”
Amid the members of the White Wolf Unit, Yeo Un-hwi suddenly looked up at the night sky and fell into thought.
He had heard about it too.
He knew how things had begun unfolding in the martial world.
The Martial Alliance Leader’s death and the Martial Alliance’s collapse into a mere name.
The founding of the Justice Alliance by the Nine Great Sects.
None of these things had happened before his regression.
Hadn’t the Martial Alliance and the Nine Great Sects, after all, been the ones who had driven him to the brink at the end of his time as the Blood Demon?
Four of the Twelve Supremes Under Heaven, including the Fist Emperor, had even been there.
Yet the current situation was unfolding in an entirely different direction.
The future he knew no longer existed.
‘Maybe it’s because of me.’
Perhaps every one of Yeo Un-hwi’s actions, so different from those before his regression, was having a tremendous impact on everyone’s future.
No, that was surely the case.
Then Yeo Un-hwi suddenly recalled what the Heavenly Secrets Reader had said to him.
‘From now on, many things in the martial world will be very different from what you know. No, perhaps things began changing that way long ago.’
Had he already known?
Only then did Yeo Un-hwi begin to understand what the Heavenly Secrets Reader had meant.
He felt as though he had suddenly been jolted awake.
His heart began pounding at the thought that an entirely unknown future awaited him from this point onward.
Yet he was not particularly afraid.
The Heavenly Secrets Reader had said that he would have to bear responsibility for his tremendous power, but Yeo Un-hwi had already been prepared to accept that responsibility from the moment he began searching for the Martial God’s cave.
And no matter what hardships and adversity came afterward, he would overcome them all and seize a happy future together with his family.
Yeo Un-hwi made that resolve once again.
“Commander.”
Peng Do-hwan suddenly spoke to Yeo Un-hwi.
When Yeo Un-hwi looked at him as if asking what was wrong, Peng Do-hwan asked carefully,
“How strong are we now?”
Realizing what his question meant, Yeo Un-hwi grinned.
“You’ve become much stronger. You must have felt it clearly enough on the way to the Martial Alliance.”
“That’s true, but…”
Peng Do-hwan recalled the combat units Jang Cheong had secretly raised.
It had been quite a shock.
He had thought they had become fairly strong, but each one of those fighters had been no weaker than anyone in the White Wolf Unit.
He later heard that their strength had only been possible because Jang Cheong had created them as combat dolls through all sorts of secret arts, elixirs, and even brainwashing.
Even so, he felt as though his confidence had taken a blow.
In the end, Peng Do-hwan felt sorry and ashamed that Yeo Un-hwi had once again been forced to step in alone and bring the entire situation to an end.
The others felt the same way as Peng Do-hwan.
Before he knew it, the entire White Wolf Unit was listening closely to their conversation.
“At a time like this, it’s best to be completely honest. You’re certainly stronger than the forces of most clans. But you’re still a long way from where you need to be. If you truly want to help me in the battles I’ll have to fight from now on, your training will be a little different from before.”
Their basic training would remain the same, but they also needed proper experience.
Experience fighting truly powerful opponents.
Yeo Un-hwi smiled at the White Wolf Unit as they tilted their heads in confusion.
“Simply saying it like this probably won’t help you understand. Fine. We have time to spare, so all of you come out to that clearing over there.”
Once the White Wolf Unit had gathered in the clearing, Yeo Un-hwi spoke.
“From today onward, we’ll change how we spar. We’ll start again by practicing drawing your swords against me.”
“What?”
Starting with practicing drawing their swords—what exactly did that mean?
Surely that would be very easy…
It was then.
Kuuuuuuung.
An overwhelming aura, unlike anything they had ever experienced, swallowed the entire area.