Chapter 322

“In the past, the Millennium Demon Cult ruled the world through strength. It created a perfect order where the strong existed. There was no one in the entire martial world who did not fear those four characters—let alone the unification of the martial world. But.”

Unhwi paused, then picked up the record that had fallen to the floor and continued.

“Even in a world ruled by the Millennium Demon Cult, there were many who did things like this.”

“......”

“The world of martial artists and the world of commoners must be kept separate. Of course, in living through the world, you can’t draw a perfectly clear line. All kinds of complicated things happen. But there is one thing you can separate with absolute certainty.”

“What is it?”

“Martial artists playing with the lives of commoners. That has nothing to do with the logic of a world where the strong survive. It is common for the strong to exploit and devour the weak, but when the worlds people live in are different, and you ignore that boundary and massacre commoners—if that becomes justifiable, then a nation loses all meaning, and the king of that nation becomes nothing more than a lackey of martial artists, or a martial artist wearing a mask.”

“......So?”

“You already know. You know what I’m trying to say.”

“......”

“This is the reason Ye Wonje died, but it also isn’t something Ye Wonje and Mae Wuidong could have done alone.”

“......Then.......”

“Yes. They’re in the Mukse Society. A martial artist who followed Mae Wuidong, helping him while avoiding Senior Hwa’s eyes.”

“Are you certain? Mae Wuidong could have killed them to destroy evidence.”

Unhwi shook his head.

“Given his temperament, he wouldn’t have killed them himself.”

“......Hm?”

“Someone who shared his secret. Even within the Mukse Society, they’ll be someone with considerable standing. Casting off a person like that doesn’t fit his temperament. Using them, maybe—but not discarding them.”

“Using them... You’re certain.”

“Yes. I’m certain. And the Mukse Society was clearly formed to rebuild the Millennium Demon Cult, but not everyone in it is a demon person. If anything, I heard there are many who came from orthodox and unorthodox factions.”

Hwa Munyeom nodded.

“There is a crooked one. Can you find them and kill them?”

Hwa Munyeom’s eyes flashed.

“Of course. I will find them and turn them to ash.”

Unhwi nodded.

“Cut off the rotten branch and tell me after. Then I will prepare your inauguration as Alliance Lord of the Heavenly Alliance. Is that acceptable?”

“It is, but there’s something we need to address.”

“What is it?”

“If I carve out the rotten branch of the Mukse Society, I will spill blood beyond what you’re imagining.”

“You mean the Mukse Society will weaken.”

“That’s right.”

“It can’t be helped. What matters is will.”

“Will?”

“I believe one righteous will is worth more than one hundred crooked powers.”

Hwa Munyeom nodded.

“Yes. That’s right. We can’t stand together with those who took part in filth like this.”

A brief silence fell. After Hwa Munyeom reined in his anger, he looked at Unhwi.

“Before, when I met Mae Wuidong alone, we once had this conversation.”

“What conversation?”

“Whether you truly want the Millennium Demon Cult rebuilt, or whether you don’t.”

Unhwi let out a small laugh.

“Do you want a clear answer?”

“I do.”

“Then my answer is the same now as it was then. I don’t care whether the Millennium Demon Cult is rebuilt or not. But if someone asks me to help with the rebuilding, I can.”

“You have no intention of becoming the Cult Leader?”

At Hwa Munyeom’s sudden question, Unhwi turned his head.

“In the end, both the Mukse Society and Cheonrim were created by one man’s will. You know it well. Preceptor Yucheong of the demon path. The man we usually call ‘that man,’ or ‘the Preceptor.’”

Unhwi listened without a word.

“You have an ill fate with that man. Don’t you.”

“That’s right.”

“With your temperament, you are not someone who will go under him. Then in the end, one of the two men must die—yet you say you will help with the rebuilding?”

There was a very large barb in Hwa Munyeom’s words.

Watching Unhwi up close, he had finally realized it.

“In the end, your target is Yucheong. Is that correct?”

“Yes. That’s correct.”

He did not deny it. Denying it now would be shameless.

“......Let’s make one thing clear.”

“What do you mean?”

“I hold you in very high regard. Perhaps even more than Yucheong.”

Hwa Munyeom had always called Yucheong “that man,” with reverence, but at some point he had started using his name.

“When I saw you use Blood Demon Soaring-Heaven Art, I had a sense of it... but I’ll be honest. I want you to lead the rebuilding of the Millennium Demon Cult, and become its Cult Leader.”

Unhwi’s brow twitched.

It would be a lie to say he had never considered it. But he had no desire to sit on the Cult Leader’s seat. He had planned to help and then leave.

“Are you serious?”

“There was not a single moment I was not serious.”

“.......”

“If you kill Yucheong, then even if the Millennium Demon Cult is rebuilt, can it truly create order?”

“.......”

“You are a genius who created the Triple Profound Realm itself. And if you steel yourself for mutual destruction, you can even face Unity of Heaven and Man—the threshold of the Realm of Martial Divinity. In the far future—no, at most ten years, as few as five—within that span, you will become a being who can rule the martial world with ‘strength.’”

Hwa Munyeom was serious.

“I’m around ninety now. At this age, you start to see it. Whether a person’s essence is real or fake.”

“So you’re saying I’m real.”

“......Honestly, if you grabbed any passerby and asked, they’d answer the same. You’re real.”

Unhwi brushed his hair back.

“I think I understand what you mean. But I can’t give you a definitive answer here.”

“.......”

“I also have things I must do, and I have no intention of staying with the Heavenly Alliance to the end. And a Cult Leader of the Millennium Demon Cult in the far future? No one knows what lies ahead, so making a promise here without any plan would be nonsense. However.”

“However?”

“I will think about it seriously.”

Hwa Munyeom understood.

“It’s nothing new that you’re not an easy bastard, but those words—‘I’ll think about it seriously’—they strike this old man right in the heart.”

Hwa Munyeom gave a small laugh, and Unhwi laughed as well.

“Let’s do well from here on.”

“Yes. More importantly, do you have anything you’re curious about?”

“I do. I said I would take the Alliance Lord’s seat, but I need to settle Mukse Society matters first. I don’t know when that will end—shouldn’t we settle it as soon as possible, even one day earlier?”

It was a reasonable doubt.

But—

“First, there is something I need to handle.”

“What is it?”

“Settling the friction with the Ihwa Sword Heaven Sect.”

When Hwa Munyeom tilted his head, Unhwi added,

“I’m saying we need justification.”

“Justification?”

“You are a figure who turned your back on the martial world after the Gold-Dust Ablution Rite. Under the name Flame King, you once shook the entire martial world.”

“I did.”

“If someone like you suddenly becomes the Alliance Lord of the Heavenly Alliance as if you were waiting, how will the world see it?”

“They’ll find it strange.”

“That’s right. It can look as if it was planned from the beginning.”

Unhwi continued explaining.

“We need a process like making three visits with sincerity. It has to look like you were persuaded again and again, and only then step forward reluctantly.”

“Persuasion...?”

“Originally, I was going to offer you the seat of Vice Alliance Lord, but the Alliance Lord suddenly died, so you must naturally rise as Alliance Lord—and in that process, the Heavenly Arbiter persuaded you again and again... That is the justification we need.”

Hwa Munyeom looked impressed.

“Ah... so that’s what you meant. You meticulous bastard.”

After that, a strange silence settled in.

The two men looked at each other without speaking.

The one who broke the silence was Hwa Munyeom.

“That... Han Murin. I’m thinking of passing one martial art down to that brat. Can I borrow him for a moment?”

“Please do.”

Hwa Munyeom scratched his head and spoke briefly.

“......I’m going.”

“Yes, Senior.”

***

News of the death of Mae Wuidong, the Heavenly Alliance’s Alliance Lord—the Lesser Heaven Gentleman—hit the entire martial world like a hammer.

From the moment he killed Jo Taehwa, the Diamond Sword Hero and Vice Sect Master of the Ihwa Sword Heaven Sect, people had thought: so the man who had been Vice Alliance Lord will finally step to the front. But was impatience the problem? The detailed inside story spread through the Beggars’ Union and Cheonrim, and everyone was shocked.

The Heavenly Arbiter, Seol Unhwi, truly played go well. It went beyond being called a go genius—among those who had played a match with him, quite a few raised their realm. With a man like that before him, there was no way Mae Wuidong, the Alliance Lord of the Heavenly Alliance, would sit still.

He asked Seol Unhwi for a ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ match, and Unhwi did not refuse. It was when the two men had played for three days and nights. Mae Wuidong attained enlightenment and began his leap toward No-Extremes Incarnation—only to be devoured by a heart demon.

Unhwi rushed in to save him, desperately trying to stabilize him, but he failed, and in the process he suffered severe internal injuries.

The problem was Mae Wuidong. Mae Wuidong exploded to death.

It was a catastrophe so complete there was nothing to say.

Just as the Heavenly Alliance was about to soar, a heart demon—on top of that, an explosion to death before even fifteen days had passed since taking the Alliance Lord’s seat.

Everyone pitied Unhwi.

Because Unhwi had clearly done everything he could.

It was obvious he was a genius, and though he was a monster who had founded the Triple Profound Realm, how could he possibly calm a martial artist within the Realm of Martial Divinity?

This was not Unhwi’s fault. It was entirely Mae Wuidong’s fault.

Mae Wuidong remained as a pitiful case of a man who was devoured by his own impatience, and everyone was curious. What would become of the Heavenly Alliance now?

Would Seol Unhwi, the Heavenly Arbiter, sit in the Alliance Lord’s seat?

Even the Vice Alliance Lord’s seat was vacant—how would that be resolved?

Would they really bring in Realm of Martial Divinity masters from the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Palace?

Everyone began paying attention to the Heavenly Alliance again.

And the most decisive point—how would they resolve the problem with the Ihwa Sword Heaven Sect? That was the true core.

In the deep night, Unhwi was circulating his energy, focusing on recovery.

He didn’t say it out loud, but during the fifteen days he had been lying down, Unhwi had crossed the line of death countless times.

Coughing blood was routine. The tendons and meridians in his limbs spasmed like madness, and blood flowed from his seven apertures. It was an injury that should have killed him, yet there were two reasons he was alive like this.

One was Unhwi’s recovery.

After eating the Ten-Thousand-Year Fire Pear, the recovery ability of his body—already high—met Void-Manifest Qi and was driven to an extreme, and even now it was being driven.

The other was experience from his prior life.

He knew from experience what measures made recovery easier, depending on what kind of wound it was, so before he lost consciousness, he had taken measures of his own.

That was why he hadn’t died.

If Mae Wuidong learned that, he would feel so wronged he’d spit blood, but what could be done? He had already flown up to the heavens.

As Unhwi slowly steadied his breathing and circulated Void-Manifest Qi, his brows suddenly knit.

Something was off. The flow of air had subtly changed.

As if someone had entered this space.