Chapter 476: Finale (1)
Fate.
From the moment I first received it, I realized that fate was a power that should never be used.
And all those who had perceived the fragment of fate strongly advised against its use.
Even if a being’s power reached the level of a deity, the extent of that power was merely to reinforce or distort laws.
However.
‘Fate tears apart all the laws of creation.’
It was a power rejected by the world itself, and the price to be paid for wielding it was far too great for an individual to bear.
To be honest, it was too extravagant to call a privilege, and originally, it was a power that should never have been given to a mere human.
Even so.
Still, I desperately needed this power right now.
“…You, have you lost your mind?!”
The Golden Hand Technique of the Cheon Clan unfolded, aiming at my wrist.
It violently brushed off my grasp and urgently widened the distance between us.
“You are truly insane. No matter how much of a supreme inheritance that power is, it is a sword that must never be drawn.”
Its eyes were filled with unspeakable horror and loathing.
“If it doesn’t work on me, then you could essentially live eternally. Even if your body perishes, you could maintain your essence like me and enter the cycle of reincarnation.”
“……”
“And yet you would throw away that privilege and choose eternal annihilation?!”
As expected, the opponent had noticed some part of my trump card.
But it must have never imagined that I would actually use it.
“Heh, hehehe….”
“…What? Why are you laughing like that?”
“Of course I’d laugh.”
I looked up at the sky and laughed.
“Because you’re clearly not Yura.”
Yura knows.
She knows I value her more dearly than my own life.
That’s why she knows better than anyone that I wouldn’t weigh gains and losses in situations like this.
Now that I am certain my opponent is not Yura, I can unleash my hand freely.
“Bright Spiral Opening the Heavens.”
Reciting the name of the first of the Bright Net Ten Swords, I sliced through space.
“To activate such power, and that’s all you can do?!”
“That’s all…”
Will you still say the same a moment from now?
I continued pouring out sword intent and true qi, unleashing the Ten Swords one after another.
“Bright Net Ascending to Heaven.”
A massive slash capable of cleaving mountain ranges followed.
From Opening the Heavens to Ascending to Heaven, from Heavenly Trap to Thousand Loves, then Harmony, Fish and Water, Roof and Crow, and Dual Walls.
“Heaven-Piercing.”
Bright Net Heaven-Piercing, which I proudly consider the most powerful among the Ten Swords, crushed the very space where the being existed.
“Guh!”
As the space cleaved by Heaven-Piercing distorted, something pitch-black emerged, collapsing the surroundings in an instant.
Kwagwagwagwang!!
Unable to withstand the force of Heaven-Piercing, space crumbled and the peaks of Mount Tai began to literally erupt.
“You lunatic! Are you trying to destroy the world with your own hands?!”
Escaping the aftermath of Bright Net Heaven-Piercing, it instead scoffed and ridiculed me.
“You gained power beyond your means and lost your reason!”
The earthquake triggered a landslide.
Fragments of shattered demonic beasts and pieces of Mount Tai scattered in all directions as if in zero gravity.
A few surviving demonic beasts howled for survival, and the spiritual energy across the Central Plains, including Shandong Province where Mount Tai resided, began to tremble violently.
Truly, it was a scene as if I had driven the world into an apocalypse with my own hands.
“There’s no need to bother with someone drunk on power. Run wild like a madman, and you’ll disappear on your own!”
“No, not at all.”
I am not like my opponent.
No matter what power I obtain, I will never be ruled by power itself.
Everything I’ve done so far, all the noise and destruction—
Was solely to seize the right moment to land this strike.
As the energy between heaven and earth shook and all of the opponent’s senses wavered in that brief instant—
The Ten Heavenly Record Sword in my hand vanished.
Transcendent Technique
True Heart’s Path Transcending Resentment
“…Huh?”
It dumbfoundedly lowered its head and looked down.
Before it knew it, a green blade was buried deep in its heart.
“How…?”
It wasn’t just a matter of crossing space.
Even a single strike from the Bright Net Ten Swords held the power to rend space asunder.
But even the dozens of divine sorcery barriers that had withstood the assault of the Bright Net Ten Swords had, for some reason, completely failed to block it this time and allowed the heart to be pierced!
But that wasn’t the only reason for its panic.
“This is… that hateful bastard’s…!”
As if something had suddenly come to mind, its face began to contort.
“The technique of that bastard who rejected my love to the end…!”
Its expression began to change little by little.
The face still belonged to Yura, but the impression itself gradually began to deviate from hers.
“Unforgivableunforgivableunforgivable!”
It suddenly raised the sword high into the sky.
Then the blood-red energy that had dyed the sky suddenly formed a giant spiral and began rushing toward it all at once.
Even I, who had activated Fate, momentarily felt overwhelmed by the transcendental pressure.
A clear will to crush with brute force surged from it.
“…Who’s the one drunk on power now, I wonder.”
I cast a baffled gaze toward it.
“Are you sure you’ll be alright? Reabsorbing scattered spiritual energy without a proper ascension ritual might cause problems, you know?”
“Silence!”
It had nearly regained its essence, nearly identical to Heavenly Evil, but had intentionally delayed the ritual in its obsession to devour me.
And that very decision was its fatal mistake.
“Yoo Jeoooon! I will erase every trace of that bastard that exists in this world!”
It, consumed by hatred, began pouring all the Heavenly Time power it had recovered into the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword.
‘Impressive.’
True Heart’s Path Transcending Resentment was not simply about crossing space.
It was a strike that severed the essence itself. In a way, Heart’s Path Transcending Resentment was similar to the function of the Star-Slaying Sword.
‘And to overcome such Heart’s Path Transcending Resentment with sheer force alone…’
Originally, its entire true qi should have reversed, causing severe internal injury. But it suppressed even that qi reversal using the external power of Heavenly Time it had absorbed.
However.
“Sorry, but even that was part of my plan.”
“…What?”
I mocked it in the most irritating manner possible as it concentrated all its strength.
“Why do you think I so willingly handed you the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword?”
“…!!”
I never had any intention of a fair fight from the beginning.
I only aimed for openings with one trick after another.
Even now is the same.
The reason I first handed her the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword was solely for this very moment.
Chchchchch!
“Th-this is!”
The sword suddenly rejected her touch.
The Heavenly Demon Divine Sword was, in essence, no different from the Heavenly Demon Founder itself.
Back when it was ‘Cheon Yura’, it resonated with the Heavenly Demonic Divine Art and accepted her touch without resistance. But now that it had become something other than Cheon Yura?
Papapapat!
The muscles of the arm gripping the sword twisted grotesquely, and the veins on the forearm all burst open at once.
“Aaaaagh!”
The fact that a single sword could contain the overwhelming energy of Heavenly Evil that had filled all of Heaven and Earth proved the greatness of the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword.
But because of that, the backlash was something a mere mortal body could not withstand.
Even if it was the Divine Demonic Physique.
“Guaaaaaaah! Kyaaaaaaaaagh!!”
Unable to endure the agony of its nerves snapping strand by strand, it screamed at the top of its lungs.
“T-the sword… why is the sword…! Gaaaagh!”
Had it released the sword hilt quickly, it could’ve minimized the damage.
“But you can’t let go, can you?”
The Heavenly Demon Divine Sword stuck to its hand like glue, refusing to detach.
Of course.
“Because right now, the true owner of that sword… is none other than me. Unless I allow it, there’s no way it would let go.”
“…!!”
“Underestimating the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword was your downfall.”
Had it remained fully as Heavenly Evil from the beginning—
Or even if it had just had a bit more leeway to assess the situation—
Such a trick likely wouldn’t have worked.
“It may be hard to land a finishing blow, but it should at least be enough to draw your attention.”
I approached it as it writhed in pain.
“You bastard! Stay away from me!”
Even in agony, it burst its energy to push me away, but it lacked the leeway to shake off my hand.
I slowly placed my hand on its heart.
The area around the heart, cleaved by Heart’s Path Transcending Resentment, still hadn’t fully regenerated due to the backlash of the Heavenly Demon Divine Sword.
“Don’t tell me… are you trying to kill me!?”
“……”
It glared at me, filled with countless emotions.
“Y-you think killing me will change anything?! Go ahead and kill this body! But what else can you even do in your current state?! What else can you possibly do?!”
What could I do, indeed.
Right now, I could do this.
“You rampaged around quite a bit using Yura’s body, didn’t you?”
“…?!”
My right palm touched the heart.
The final of the Bright Net Ten Swords, not just a sword technique but a technique beyond swords, slowly activated.
“The rental period is over. I’ll be taking back what’s mine now.”
Recalling the moment I brought my previous Master to a final rest, I locked eyes with the startled being.
“Bright Net Karmic Fate.”
The final technique of the Bright Net Ten Swords, Bright Net Karmic Fate, activated.
“……”
“……”
A colorless space where nothing existed.
In that place, the only things that possessed ‘color’ were Yura and me.
I silently looked at Yura, who had collapsed halfway.
Her appearance had changed greatly from usual.
Her body was stitched here and there with something white, resembling a patchwork zombie, almost like a Jiangshi.
If the color had been anything but white, she might have looked like a terminal patient suffering from smallpox or the Black Death.
However.
In truth, it would’ve been a thousand times more fortunate if she were merely plagued by some contagious disease.
With half her face covered in white, she opened her mouth for the first time.
“Jin Yeomyung.”
“Yeah.”
“You idiot.”
A somewhat cute curse flowed from her small mouth.
“Why did you crawl all the way in here?”
“……”
Instead of answering, I scanned her condition.
The Yura who had always stood proud couldn’t even meet my gaze now.
With her eyes lowered and trembling, she avoided looking at me.
I approached her and gently embraced her.
“Do you know where we are?”
“…Of course I do.”
In my arms, Yura gave a small nod.
“This is the innermost part of my unconsciousness, the place that makes up my existence, isn’t it?”
At those words, I chuckled.
“Only half right.”
This was neither the Divine Realm nor a subspace.
This was the place where Yura’s and my consciousness merged into one.
In the truest sense, the place where the karmic bond between Myeong (Bright) and Ra (Net) manifested.
With her face buried in my chest, Yura apologized to me.
“I’m sorry.”
“……”
“It’s true that I wanted to settle things with you. That was a genuine feeling I held in my heart. But… I never wanted it to end like that.”
Her shoulders trembled slightly.
“The me at that time… was me, but also not me.”
“I know.”
I wrapped my arms around her trembling shoulders.
“I know that wasn’t your true will.”
There’s a world of difference between harboring a thought and acting on it.
Whether one is a martial artist or not, how many times in life does one feel murderous intent toward another?
Rules, morals, circumstances, skill—most of the time, thoughts remain as mere thoughts due to countless restrictions.
But in her case, Heavenly Evil forcibly dragged out the thoughts she had kept buried deep inside.
“…Yes. That wasn’t my will.”
She slowly raised her head.
From her eye—untouched by the white corruption—a tear, something I had never seen before, began to fall.
“Then… you must understand that I was too late.”
“……”
This was a space that laid bare the essence of existence more transparently than anywhere else.
For her entire body to be dyed in white even in such a space, it meant her essence had already been deeply intertwined with Heavenly Evil.
Even in our past lives, when we burned together at the Heavenly Demon Pavilion’s end, she had never shed such tears.
Pleading like a desperate child, she begged me.
“Jin Yeomyung. Just kill me with your own hands…”
“No.”
I firmly stopped her.
She probably intended to entrust me with what she thought was her final will.
But the time for leaving final wills should be at least a thousand years from now for us.
“It’s not too late yet.”
I gently pulled her away, then covered the white-corrupted half of her face with my hand.
“Because this is the fate meant for it.”