The necromancer could not even tell how Jeok Wigang had attacked.
He had not sensed the slightest trace of energy.
Had Jeok Wigang used martial arts, there should have been some indication, yet there had been nothing whatsoever.
The three reanimated corpses had literally vanished.
No matter how thoroughly he searched the surroundings, he could find no trace of them.
As he stood there in a daze—
Hm?
Jeok Wigang was holding something strangely familiar.
It was—
“Huh? Wh-What? Why is my arm in your hand?”
His own arm.
“Here. I’ll give it back. Try reattaching it.”
The necromancer stared dumbfounded as Jeok Wigang held out another man’s severed arm as though doing him a favor.
“Wh-When did you...?”
“Huh? You didn’t notice? I thought you were standing still because you were checking where your arm had gone.”
What?
This lunatic.
He had not seen Jeok Wigang sever his arm at all.
Even more unbelievable was the fact that the arm should not have been so easy to cut through.
He severed the Inner Golden Bone I tempered with Golden Blood Water before I could even notice....
His skeleton, composed of Inner Golden Bone, was durable enough to withstand even sword aura.
Yet Jeok Wigang had sliced through it as easily as tofu.
The necromancer had underestimated him because of his appearance, but no longer.
This was a powerful expert worthy of his utmost caution.
They say the martial world is still full of hidden eccentrics whose identities have never been revealed.... Where do monsters like this keep coming from?
The necromancer raised Jeok Wigang’s threat level to the highest possible rank and prepared an attack befitting it.
Black liquid, rather than red blood, dripped from the severed end of the arm in Jeok Wigang’s hand.
“Ugh! That stinks!”
Jeok Wigang pinched his nose and tossed the arm away.
That smell—
It was the stench of rotting flesh.
In that instant, Jeok Wigang discerned the necromancer’s true nature.
“Just as I thought. That body is fake, isn’t it?”
The necromancer smiled proudly, as though eager to show off.
“Sharp of you to notice. This is the ultimate form desired by every necromancer—the Living Corpse.”
“Where’s your real body?”
“Do you truly think I would tell you? You asked whether my severed arm could reattach itself, did you not? I shall show you what you wanted to see.”
The arm lying on the ground rose into the air and rejoined his body.
“Are you satisfied now?”
“Hmm. Fascinating. How does it work?”
Jeok Wigang regarded him with undisguised curiosity.
“You wish to know? Then—”
CRRK— CRACK—
Rotting hands burst from the earth and seized both of Jeok Wigang’s legs.
The necromancer had never expected that alone to capture him.
It only needed to halt his movements for an instant.
“—find out in hell!”
PFFFT—
SWIIIIISH—
The dagger he hurled tore through the air and flew viciously toward Jeok Wigang.
Jeok Wigang moved as though the hands protruding from the ground did not exist.
The necromancer had expected as much and was not particularly concerned.
CLACK—
Jeok Wigang caught the speeding dagger in one hand.
Even though his weapon had fallen into the enemy’s grasp, the necromancer did not panic. Instead, he cried out triumphantly.
“Ha ha ha ha! I have you now! You caught it barehanded instead of dodging! That dagger drains inner power and life force! It will suck every last drop of energy from your body! Let it consume everything you have until you drop dead!”
As he ranted in delight, Jeok Wigang tilted his head.
“I don’t feel anything.”
“What?”
“So when is it supposed to start draining my life force?”
Only then did the necromancer realize that something was wrong.
Jeok Wigang should have been writhing in agony as his inner power and vitality were sucked away, yet he stood there as though nothing was happening.
The flustered necromancer looked back and forth between Jeok Wigang and the dagger.
“Th-That cannot be. Is it asleep?”
He was so baffled that he genuinely wondered whether the dagger’s spirit had failed to awaken.
Something was indeed happening.
It was simply the opposite of what he believed.
Rather than draining Jeok Wigang’s life force, the dagger was having its own energy absorbed by him.
The dagger was screaming.
And Jeok Wigang could hear it.
Before long, every trace of power within it had been devoured, leaving behind nothing but ordinary scrap metal.
Jeok Wigang tightened his grip around the dagger.
CRRRK— CRACK—
“Wh-What?”
The necromancer recoiled in alarm.
“Good grief. Why is this dagger so full of sinister energy? How many people did you kill with it? After neutralizing all that filth, there was barely any energy left to absorb.”
“Wh-What? D-Do not tell me... you absorbed the power of the Hell Demon Blade?”
“Oh, so this filthy thing was called the Hell Demon Blade? Not anymore. Now it’s just scrap.”
“Wh-What? That is not how this is supposed to work. It should have been the other way around!”
The necromancer stared in confusion.
CRUNCH— CRACK—
The dagger’s shape vanished within Jeok Wigang’s hand, crushed into a round lump of twisted metal.
The necromancer was horrified.
If the Hell Demon Blade could be crumpled that easily, then its spiritual essence truly had been completely drained.
Could he have absorbed its power and crushed it like that?
He shook his head.
Had he attempted such a thing, the Hell Demon Blade would never have allowed him to survive.
That was how immense the weapon’s power had been.
In truth, the Hell Demon Blade’s aid had played a major role in allowing him to rise within White Horse Heaven as a necromancer.
It had been an indispensable treasure that doubled the strength of everything he possessed.
Yet the Hell Demon Blade had been rendered powerless and reduced, quite literally, to a lump of scrap.
“I’ll melt this down and put it to better use.”
As Jeok Wigang finished speaking, a black shadow appeared in midair. He tossed the lump that had once been the Hell Demon Blade inside.
The shadow swallowed it and vanished in an instant.
Everything had happened so quickly that the necromancer could only stare blankly at Jeok Wigang.
When he finally regained his senses, he drew a pill from within his robes and looked at it.
To escape from that monster... I’ll have to erupt with all my energy at once and flee.
He regarded the pill with visible reluctance.
The Soul-Blood Secret Pill.... It is a waste to use it like this, but losing the Living Corpse would be far worse....
A Living Corpse could not be created whenever one pleased.
First, a suitable body had to be found. Then that body had to be subjected to countless procedures before the vessel was complete.
He could never afford to lose it.
GULP—
The moment he swallowed the Soul-Blood Secret Pill, an enormous amount of energy began writhing within his body.
Black vapor poured from every part of the Necromantic Divine Demon’s body like steam.
“Hey! That stinks! It’s absolutely vile!”
Jeok Wigang recoiled in horror and stepped backward.
The Necromantic Divine Demon’s eyes gleamed when he saw it.
That bastard truly despised Corpse-Poison Incense.
Perhaps escaping would be easier than expected.
Then take this.
The corpse poison you hate so much!
The necromancer gathered the poison and sprayed it toward Jeok Wigang.
PFFFT—
Black vapor spread like fog, making Jeok Wigang recoil in disgust.
The necromancer would have loved to enjoy that damned bastard’s dismay a little longer, but now was not the time.
He had to escape first.
He was about to flee when—
FWOOOOSH!
A sudden gale swept through the area, instantly dispersing the poisonous fog.
That damned bastard had blown it away with a fist wind.
Did he think that would make him give up?
He would simply release more.
The necromancer was about to spew out another wave of corpse poison when—
“Damn it! That smell is unbearable! Let’s deal with the stench first.”
Jeok Wigang irritably recited a mantra.
“Poison qi, break apart. Abyssal corruption, vanish. Fragrance, gather. Turn gently into harmony.”
“Wh-What? A mantra? Are you a sorcerer?”
What sort of sorcery was that?
The necromancer had no idea, but an ominous feeling told him to evade it.
Before he could, an unpleasant sensation enveloped his entire body.
He did not know what Jeok Wigang had done, but he ignored it and released more corpse poison.
Yet the poison, which should have been black, had somehow become bright.
It gave off a feeling almost like a spring breeze.
Because the necromancer was possessing the Living Corpse rather than inhabiting his true body, he could not smell anything. He merely stared in bewilderment.
Then he saw Jeok Wigang’s expression.
“Mm! Much better.”
Seeing the satisfaction on Jeok Wigang’s face, the necromancer realized what had happened.
“Do not tell me you neutralized my corpse poison.”
“That’s right. I changed the smell into something pleasant too.”
“What?”
The necromancer hurriedly examined his body.
Even his skin seemed strangely lustrous.
“Th-That’s impossible. Damn you!”
FWOOOOSH—
He released more corpse poison, but what emerged from his body was clean vapor that looked harmless to anyone who saw it.
“No....”
This could not be happening.
It was not supposed to be like this.
How much effort had he poured into creating this Living Corpse?
That damned sorcerer had ruined everything.
But why was a sorcerer so absurdly strong?
Jeok Wigang was immensely powerful, could use sorcery, and even that sorcery felt like something from a heaven beyond heaven.
The necromancer sensed that continuing the fight would be disastrous.
He had to escape immediately.
He turned to move—
“Gah!”
Jeok Wigang was standing directly in front of him.
That scared him.
He hurled himself backward in shock, but the distance between them did not increase at all.
“Damn it!”
He accelerated and tried to evade him, yet Jeok Wigang remained directly before his eyes.
Worse, Jeok Wigang showed no sign of exerting himself.
He was merely observing.
That made it all the more unsettling.
KWOOOOOO—
Powerful energy condensed in the Necromantic Divine Demon’s hand.
KWA-KWA-KWAAANG!
He unleashed it at Jeok Wigang.
He did not believe the attack would kill him.
Without hesitating for even an instant, he spun around, kicked off the ground, and attempted to flee.
Something seized him, preventing his body from moving.
When he looked back, Jeok Wigang was holding him, completely unharmed.
He had attacked with everything he had.
Why was Jeok Wigang uninjured?
Where had a monster like this been hiding all this time, only to appear now?
“Doesn’t it hurt when someone hits you?”
This was unbearably irritating.
Was that really what he was curious about in this situation?
But the necromancer could do nothing.
Escaping this absurd predicament came first.
What do I do?
The corpse poison does nothing. My attacks do nothing. How can I distract this damned bastard long enough to escape?
As he struggled to think—
WHUMP—
He felt his body rise into the air.
THUD—
That damned bastard had apparently been unable to restrain himself and punched him.
Fortunately, this was not his true body, so he felt no pain.
“Huh? So you can’t feel pain.”
Jeok Wigang sounded genuinely curious.
“Now that your question has been answered, may I leave?”
“No. I still have more questions.”
He had not lived this long merely to satisfy the curiosity of a lunatic like this.
A wave of sorrow washed over him.
“How would I make you feel pain? And how exactly is a Living Corpse controlled?”
This madman—
He was openly demanding the necromancer’s secret art.
“Do you... truly think I would tell you?”
He gathered his energy and fired again.
CLACK—
Hm?
Jeok Wigang casually ignored the attack and caught his hand.
The necromancer had never experienced anything like this in his life and froze in confusion.
Then Jeok Wigang began muttering again.
Ominous.
He had to get away immediately.
CRRRAAACK—
The necromancer forcibly tore off his own arm and hurled himself away with all his strength.
“Mind’s Eye, open.”
He had clearly leaped away, yet Jeok Wigang’s voice came from directly beside him.
“Trace the spirit meridian.”
Trace the spirit meridian?
The necromancer understood instinctively.
He is... tracing the soul channel that leads to my true body!
Was there anything this man could not do with sorcery?
“Bind the sign. Mark the target.”
Something terrible was about to happen.
But he could not escape.