Chapter 142:

Chapter 142:

Body

By the time the horrifying barrage of hidden weapons ended.

Surprisingly, the Head of Unhyangwon did not collapse.

However, it was close to just barely standing.

His clothes were tattered from the hidden weapons he couldn’t completely block, and he was bleeding all over.

“Cough...”

With a cough, the Head of Unhyangwon spat out blood and hastily moved his left hand to press several of his acupoints. Suddenly, his veins began to bulge and turn a reddish color.

“Get back!!! It’s a forbidden technique that explodes latent power in exchange for one’s life!”

Recognizing the scene he had read about in novels, Mu-jin urgently shouted and leaped backward.

Since it was a technique that would cause the user to die soon anyway, evasion was the best strategy.

Rather, the Head of Unhyangwon looked at Mu-jin with a shocked expression after hearing his cry.

How does that brat know about this forbidden technique?

But there was no time to torture him for answers now.

The duration of the technique would only last for about one daegang (15 minutes). Killing those two within that time and dying was the best course of action.

Boom!!

With his latent power exploding, the Head of Unhyangwon first rushed at the closer and more troublesome opponent, the Dark King.

“Grr!!”

The Dark King, unable to fully evade due to the close distance, hastily raised both hands to block the Head of Unhyangwon’s strike. However, unable to dissipate the force, he was pushed back and slammed into a wall.

“Cough...”

The impact caused the Dark King to spit out blood. With just one clash, Tang-gak suffered severe internal injuries. But why was this?

“Keuheuheu.”

Even as blood continued to pour from his mouth, Tang-gak was mocking the Head of Unhyangwon instead of showing pain.

“Wh-why...?”

Having just delivered a single strike, the Head of Unhyangwon was also spitting blood, about to collapse to one knee.

Recognizing the opponent’s toughness, Tang-gak had coated his hidden weapons used in the Mancheonhwau technique with deadly poison.

“Do you think just because I am called the Dark King, I wouldn’t use poison? Cough.”

Even while spitting blood, Tang-gak mocked his opponent, who glared at him with a murderous look.

“Damn...”

Thanks to the forbidden technique accelerating the spread of the poison, the Head of Unhyangwon collapsed, bleeding black blood from his seven orifices.

* * *

Shortly after the Head of Unhyangwon fell.

Mu-jin, who had stepped back, approached Tang-gak with the cloaked man slung over his shoulder.

“Are you all right?”

“The young ones these days leave old men behind and run off so easily.”

Tang-gak chuckled nastily as he spoke, then immediately “Cough” spat out a bloody cough.

“This is why aging is frightening. If I were ten years younger, I wouldn’t have to worry about this kind of injury.”

“...Use your Qi Conducting Technique to manage your internal injuries. I will finish things here.”

“Keuk keuk keuk. I shall do that.”

Tang-gak plopped down on the ground and began to regulate his qi.

After observing him for a moment, Mu-jin moved towards the ruins where the Head of Unhyangwon and the cloaked man had initially hidden.

Specifically, he searched through the rubble of the collapsed structure and found a few books and letters.

Though most were crushed and torn by the debris, they might still contain useful information.

When he returned to Tang-gak’s location, Tang-gak, who had been sitting cross-legged and conducting his qi, suddenly opened his eyes wide.

“Cough.”

He spat out another bloody cough.

However, this time the blood was mostly dark, indicating it was the poisoned blood being expelled.

It seemed he had forcibly expelled the bad blood for a quicker recovery.

“It seems I will need to recuperate for a while. Please take me to the Tang family.”

“I will do so.”

Mu-jin set down the cloaked man and hoisted Tang-gak onto his back.

Then he lifted the cloaked man in his arms.

“Just in case, let’s take that corpse too.”

“Do you mean the body of the Head of Unhyangwon?”

“Yes. The bodies of martial artists usually contain a lot of information.”

In the end, Mu-jin had to carry three people: Tang-gak on his back and the cloaked man and the Head of Unhyangwon in his arms.

Even though he had to carry three people, one was an old man and another a woman.

“Combined, they don’t even weigh three hundred geun (180kg).”

Mu-jin felt disappointed that his muscles didn’t even notice the weight.

* * *

After carrying three people along with books and letters, Mu-jin safely returned to the Sichuan Tang Clan.

“Greetings, clan head.”

Mu-jin saluted Tang Pae-jin and entered the hall. After sitting down, he got straight to the point.

“Have you found any useful information?”

“We’ve uncovered a few things.”

Tang Pae-jin, speaking calmly, explained the situation, deliberately avoiding eye contact with Tang-gak, who was visibly unwell.

“First, we tried to trace the martial arts of the Head of Unhyangwon by examining his corpse, but it turned out to be a completely unknown martial art.”

“...Doesn’t that mean we gained nothing?”

Mu-jin asked, incredulous, but Tang Pae-jin shook his head.

“Our clan has analyzed martial arts from the Nine Great Sects, the Five Noble Families, and even some demonic and unorthodox martial arts. The fact that we cannot trace such a high-level martial art is, in itself, a gain. It means we can identify others who use similar martial arts in the future.”

As Mu-jin nodded at this reasonable explanation, Tang Pae-jin continued.

“And the woman you captured, no matter what kind of training she’s undergone, wouldn’t speak under any torture. We had no choice but to use the Simnyeong Pill on her.”

“Using the Simnyeong Pill means we can only interrogate for about one daegyeong at best.”

“Still, it wasn’t without gain. We deciphered their code and extracted some information from the woman.”

“What information did you get?”

“First, the organization they belong to. The name of the organization is Shinchun (New Heaven).”

It was a moment when he learned the name of an organization that had not been directly revealed in the novel.

‘It sounds like some sort of cult.’

As a modern person, Mu-jin couldn’t help but think the name had that kind of connotation.

“They call themselves a new heaven, how arrogant.”

“It seems they are indeed an arrogant group. Deciphering the code confirmed that they prepared the traps in Sin-tu Bi-dong. Their goal, as you suspected, was to cause a bloodbath in Sichuan. Moreover, it looks like they are planning similar operations across the Central Plains.”

Mu-jin’s eyes gleamed at Tang Pae-jin’s words.

If they could uncover these plans, they could deal a significant blow to this so-called Shinchun.

However, the response he received was disappointing.

“All we found were mentions of ‘operations ongoing in certain areas,’ but nothing concrete.”

“Is that so...”

“There’s no need to be too disappointed. This alone indicates the organization’s considerable scale. And it allows us to infer their objectives to some extent.”

An organization sowing discord among various sects across the Central Plains. Given their name, New Heaven, their objective was clear.

“They aim to weaken the orthodox sects through internal strife, paving the way for their domination of the martial world.”

“Exactly.”

—

A few days after the collapse of Unhyangwon. A vast manor located somewhere in the Central Plains.

“Sichuan branch has been destroyed? What do you mean?”

The information about the incident in Sichuan Province had reached this place, crossing the vast continent.

“...Exactly as I reported. The Unhyangwon, which served as the Sichuan branch, was utterly devastated. Moreover, all those present have gone missing.”

“Gone missing? Are you suggesting they betrayed us?”

“From the traces we found, it appears they were ambushed.”

“So, they’ve been tracked?”

“Yes. It seems the Sichuan Tang Clan traced us back due to the Sin-tu Bi-dong incident. We found traces of the Five Captains and the Sichuan Tang Clan’s martial arts. Also, most of our infiltrators within the Sichuan Tang Clan have gone missing as well.”

“If they fell despite the Five Captains being there, it seems the Dark King must have moved personally.”

“...It seems so.”

The elderly man fell silent, deep in thought, at his subordinate’s response.

‘Though they say to do one’s best and leave the rest to heaven, things have been going wrong more often lately.’

The grand plan they had been preparing for nearly a hundred years, spanning generations.

Even before his birth, during his ancestors’ time, they were losing most of their power.

According to his predecessors, plans went awry more often than not during those times.

They had to move in secret, and their strength was insufficient.

However, after generations of preparation, failures became rare in the elder’s generation.

They had accumulated power and experience over generations.

But now, it seemed as though heaven itself opposed things going too smoothly.

After the setbacks with Cheonryu Sangdan and Yongbongji Conference, and now Sichuan, disruptions were becoming more frequent lately.

‘If it is heaven’s will, we will simply make it so that not even heaven can stop us.’

Shaking off his idle thoughts, the elder gave an order to his subordinate.

“Continue with the operation in Sichuan.”

“What? But, the Sichuan Tang Clan might have uncovered our information...”

“The Five Captains are not careless. Minor information might have been compromised, but they wouldn’t have found us completely. And even if they did, do you think the Sichuan Tang Clan can suddenly unite with Emei and Qingcheng?”

The ancient sages said that an invisible enemy is more terrifying than a visible one.

But the reason this obvious saying is repeated is because it is a difficult principle to uphold.

To Emei and Qingcheng, they were the invisible enemy, whereas the Sichuan Tang Clan was a visible enemy right in front of them.

Moreover, they had also planted some operatives within Emei and Qingcheng.

Their original plan had more connections with the Tang Clan because it was the core.