[A traitor...]
A strand of Seo Eun-hyun’s consciousness that dwells in the dragonoid lets out a silent exclamation for a moment.
[Well. I do not really know. In my foresight, no sign of betrayal is caught.]
[There is bound to be a difference between the vision of me, the Owner of Liberation, and yours, who walks the Immortal Dao of Repentant Enlightenment. What is betrayal from my standpoint may not be so to you.]
[Indeed.]
Seo Eun-hyun’s clone nods at those words.
The ordeals and hardships Bong Myeong has gone through are not small, but compared to Seo Eun-hyun, they are of considerably lower difficulty.
From Bong Myeong’s standpoint it may be betrayal, yet from Seo Eun-hyun’s standpoint it may be at the level of a ‘trivial prank’.
[Anyway, in that state is it truly hard to undo my seal?]
Seo Eun-hyun sets aside the matter of the traitor.
His thought is not to speak carelessly since there is nothing certain about it yet.
[Reclaiming all the power of Liberation that lies in other timelines is no easy task. Rather, because the power of Liberation has even arisen in other timelines, this Immortal is now regarded as not having completely seized the Seat of Liberation and is in a state of having half-fallen from Supreme Deity down toward Immortal Lord.]
As it is, the most recent being to be enthroned as Supreme Deity is Bong Myeong.
Moreover, among the Supreme Deities, the weakest who depends most on external objects and unorthodox methods is Bong Myeong, so unable to control the suddenly increased power of Liberation, Bong Myeong is in a state of having half-slipped from the Supreme Deity position.
Of course, there is no one anywhere who seized and understands the Seat of Liberation to the degree of Bong Myeong, so he is still the Owner of Liberation, however, to call him the Liberation Supreme Deity now carries a slight contradiction.
[I am not currently the Liberation Supreme Deity. Of course, if given only time, I can succeed in fully seizing the power of Liberation and become the Liberation Supreme Deity again...but until I exit the cocoon, it is hard to recover the rank of Supreme Deity.]
[But that is strange. On the Heavenly Seats, your symbol remains.]
Seo Eun-hyun asks while recalling the seats floating on the [Black Sky].
At those words, a clicking of the tongue comes from inside the cocoon.
[It is true that I slipped a little from the position of Supreme Deity, but only to a certain extent, so it is merely that I did not fall from the outwardly visible Heavenly Seats.]
[I see. Then right now, even if I play rock-paper-scissors with you, the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flag will not get drawn, will it?]
[Since I have not completely slipped from the Seat, if we hold something like a life-and-death duel rather than rock-paper-scissors, it should be possible to draw it.]
[...]
At those words, Seo Eun-hyun lets out a small sigh.
[...If we hold a life-and-death duel, your speed of seizing the Seat will become even slower.]
[...Yes. I am...the arrangement left by the Imperial Venerable. The final stone to give aid when they face the Future King...so please understand that I cannot hold a life-and-death duel with you right now. Instead, in about a hundred thousand years, before the match with the Great Mountain Supreme Deity, I will awaken and fully regain the rank of Supreme Deity. At that time, since the condition of being a Supreme Deity will fit perfectly, rock-paper-scissors rather than a life-and-death duel will be enough to draw the Sealing Immortal Flag.]
[...How troublesome it is. The curse of the Northern Dipper Seven Heavenly Lords...]
[It cannot be helped, since to face Vast Cold they split even half their spirit and their very Origin Essence to make the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flags.]
Looking at the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flags, Bong Myeong continues.
[The Vast Cold of that time was...an opponent for whom it was unclear whether they could win even if they embed all such Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flags.]
[...Indeed, it seems so.]
Using the dragonoid’s hand, Seo Eun-hyun tests once more the ultimate move of [someone] he tried out.
Shukwak!
As attraction force concentrates, his handblade swings toward the direction of the attraction force.
At the same time, the slash sent from his handblade goes straight beyond the space that is the Palace of Bong Myeong and carves a crack in the dimensional barrier of the Earth Boundary Heavenly Domain itself.
Chwaaaaak—
Soon, the crack restores itself, but the trace remains like a scar, recovering only little by little.
[This is the ultimate technique of the Future King that I manifest.]
In the sense that it is just swinging together with attraction force, it is very simple, but what Seo Eun-hyun notes is the will and principle dwelling in that ultimate move.
[By concentrating attraction force, he supplements the power of his swing. On top of that, he distorts the very space he swings in with attraction force, ignoring inertia and friction, and with spatial distortion clears away every obstructing particle along the path. And...the speed at which the Future King’s ultimate move is swung...is the speed of infinity that far surpasses light.]
Hearing those words, Bong Myeong looks at the dragonoid’s posture from inside the cocoon.
[He leaps through time itself, striking an opponent of the past from the future.]
Certain Hit, Certain Annihilation, Certain Inevitability.
Not only are all such principles concentrated within, but the intent contained inside is utterly dreadful.
The ultimate of killing that kills everything, uncaring whether even the self who attacks dies or not.
[Normally, everything it touches should have been shattered. But somehow, Vast Cold was merely left dead with their chest [crushed].]
Hearing that explanation, Bong Myeong lets out a silent exclamation.
[So even with that attack, Vast Cold’s defenses were not all pierced, and instead of cleaving them in two it only managed to crush them a little?]
[That is so. Even if the Seven Heavenly Lords succeed in planting all the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flags, they likely still could not pierce Vast Cold’s defenses to kill them. However, the authority of the Immortal Cultivation system that Vast Cold accumulated would surely have been sealed. Yet my Immortal Cultivation system is not much different from Vast Cold’s, and still it is not completely sealed.]
[Is it not because you walk not only the Heaven Dao, but also pioneer the Earth Dao and the Heart Dao?]
[That is what I once thought. But on reflection, it is not only that.]
[Then...]
Seo Eun-hyun raises the Three Great Ultimates above his hand.
[It is because I reached the Original Flow (原流).]
[By Original Flow...you mean the Primordial Origin Immortal Cultivation system?]
[That too. But...perhaps something even more fundamental than the Primordial Origin Immortal Cultivation system...The very fundamental authority by which Immortal Arts Immortal Cultivation itself is founded...]
[...I see. The Imperial Venerable once spoke of it as well. From the beginning, the destination they seek to reach by reverse-calculating reincarnation and excavating history...that is probably something similar to what you call the Original Flow.]
Bong Myeong realizes the reason Seo Eun-hyun brings this up.
Bong Myeong notices why Seo Eun-hyun brings up those words.
[For you to speak of this to me must mean you desire something from me.]
[That is right. If you cannot draw the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flag for me, then I have come hoping you would give me something else.]
[...I can roughly guess. You want my [circuit], correct?]
At those words, Seo Eun-hyun’s clone nods.
Wo-wooong—
By Bong Myeong’s will, the two briefly enter another domain.
It is the domain of star veins.
However, the star veins of the Earth Boundary Heavenly Domain are strangely laid in an artificial pattern, and those artificial forms are connected inside Bong Myeong’s palace, to Bong Myeong’s cocoon.
[They are not circuits simply connected to stars, but circuits linked with the very concept of Liberation across the entirety of Mount Sumeru. Through these circuits, I could amplify the power of the Origin Essence about twofold. And now that timelines have split because of thee...]
[They must also be in contact with the concept of [Liberation] in other timelines. You...through those [circuits], are in contact with the other timelines, are you not?]
To Seo Eun-hyun’s question, Bong Myeong nods.
[It is an unintended result of transcending time and space. Of course, it only draws on the power of other timelines and cannot yet properly influence them. And...these are circuits that cannot be wielded unless one is of the rank of Supreme Deity who has seized the Origin Essence. For they are originally the means to draw out power from one’s Origin Essence in earnest.]
[That does not matter. Hand it to me as well.]
[It will be hard to weild...but if you want it, I will give it. Pay the price, however.]
[Understood. I will give you information about the ‘Original Flow’.]
With those words, they exchange what each needs.
Heavenly King Heavenly Domain.
The center of the Palace of Radiance.
The divine spirit bestowed the name Sword Mountain Devil Lord sleeps and exchanges will with their split souls scattered across the worlds.
And at some moment, as they sleep, they sense their self who has half-stepped into what is called the ‘Original Flow’.
‘The origin of all things...’
In the depths of their consciousness.
Connecting in the form of a dream at the origin of their spirit, they half-open their eyes within the dream.
The Sword Mountain Devil Lord Seo Eun-hyun, in that dream, obtains the information just passed on from his split soul.
“...Heaven, Earth, Heart, followed by...once again Puppet (傀)...”
The [circuit] obtained from Bong Myeong!
It touches to some extent the principle of the puppet circuit created by the Mad Lord, but it is a transcendent principle evolved by more than quadrillionfold.
In a way, it is fair to say it is Bong Myeong’s new Immortal Cultivation system that only Supreme Deities can cultivate.
And, within the dream, Seo Eun-hyun begins gathering clusters of light above his hand.
Heaven Dao Immortal Cultivation (天道修仙).
Earth Dao Immortal Cultivation (地道修仙).
Heart Dao Blooming (心道開華).
Formed by them, the Three Great Ultimates (三太極).
Next, the Wheel. Also known as the power of the Cylce of Reincarnation (輪轉輪廻).
And obtained from Bong Myeong this time, the Imperial Throne Circuit (帝座回路).
Five cultivation systems.
Moreover, the Primordial Origin Great Dao (始原大道) he learned from his master, the Salt Sea Supreme Deity.
Lastly, the martial arts realm he and Kim Young-hoon pioneered step by step.
Entering Heavens Beyond the Path Martial Art (越道入天武)!
A total of seven systems spin in an endless spiral within his hand.
What he obtained this time, the ‘Original Flow’, lies beyond all of them.
‘More precisely...’
If a cultivation system is a ‘process,’ then this Original Flow is the ‘result’.
It is the result that can be reached through a cultivation system.
Kiiiiiing—
All those cultivation systems intertwine and, in his hand, become the Immortal Art Impermanence Sword, woven into the form of a transparent sword.
Seo Eun-hyun looks at that sword.
‘Only now...do I feel it.’
Only upon reaching that realm does he hear the call of someone who unceasingly calls him from a faraway place.
All along, [they] have been calling Seo Eun-hyun.
It is from the very moment Seo Eun-hyun heard [their] story from Oh Hyun-seok.
One of the two reasons he deliberately let himself be captured and brought to Radiance Hall is also to be protected from [their] influence.
As much as the light is a subordinate of the Future King, even [they] cannot exert a corrupting influence upon Seo Eun-hyun who is within Radiance Hall.
Seo Eun-hyun reflects, on the sword face of the Impermanence Sword floating above his hand, the being that causes that [call].
And at last, through the sword face, Seo Eun-hyun and [they] face each other.
[Greetings, Silver Basket (銀籃). Or...should I call you the divinity of another world.]
Seo Eun-hyun, looking at the sphere in the ashen world with which he finally comes face to face, smiles faintly, and from that sphere a dumbfounded hollow laugh bursts forth.
[...I had expected it from the moment you sprouted...but in the end you face me only after taking root. Why does this Mount Sumeru crawl with only those like you...]
[When you say those like me...]
[■■■■, Ryeong, Bong Hwa, Gwak Am, Je Pa, Vast Cold...and you. In the first place, monsters like you all are beings for whom even one is hard to be born among hundreds of millions of worlds, but I do not know what kind of accursed place this devilish world is.]
Feeling the rank of this being who speaks casually the true names of overwhelming existences such as the Future King, the Salt Sea Supreme Deity, the Heavenly Venerable of the Underworld, the Obsidian Devil Heavenly King, and the Tridacna Vast Cold Heavenly King, Seo Eun-hyun lets out a hollow laugh.
But soon he composes himself and questions the being.
[You speak of root. Then this realm of ‘Original Flow’ I reached...seems enough to face you directly.]
[That is so.]
[And...the ‘True Devil Forty-Nine Treading Divine Art’ you gave to Hyun-seok Hyung-nin...that too is something you lowered from the ‘Original Flow’ is it not?]
[Indeed. I too now want nothing more than to escape from this world. I cannot remain forever crushed beneath the Future King, so I gave it, to place hope...upon you all.]
After finishing those words, Silver Basket seems to fall into silence for a moment, then opens their mouth again.
[...You call it the Original Flow, I call it root, and the names are all tangled...so let us use the name that the Future King bastard has decided.]
[...What name is that.]
[Great Mantra (大眞言). Or Divine Art (神術).]
[...From the moment I heard that what you gave Hyeon-seok Hyung-nim was the True Devil Forty-Nine Treading...Divine Art, I had guessed as much.]
Seo Eun-hyun nods, accepting the name, then asks.
[A being of your level must see far wider. Hence, I will ask plainly. If we fight against the being called the Future King, what are our chances of victory?]
At that question, Silver Basket gives an answer immediately as though there is nothing to ponder.
[Four pun.]
Hearing that answer, Seo Eun-hyun’s eyes fill with hope.
[...So there is...even that much...of a chance. Thank you.]
[Yes. For you all are...in the history of this Mount Sumeru, the ones with the highest chance of victory against him. Even higher than I.]