Wijihoyeon opened her eyes and blinked subtly at the scene before her. Her eyelids felt heavy alongside the steady and terrible pain inside her body, like a rat is gnawing at her innards. Wijihoyeon managed to swallow the groan that was creeping up her throat.
“Whoa… are you okay?”
Rubia’s voice was shaking, as she noticed the look on Wijihoyeon’s face. It was the only thing words Rubia could come up with when she had seen everything.
The surroundings were in complete ruins.
Although the Crazy Heavenly Demon was still restrained by Amzone’s rings, Lee Sungmin had succeeded in combining the three powers he had learned: Nine Heavenly Spears, Blood Ring techniques and the power of the yokai. Among the three powers combined, the yokai was considered the most difficult because of its oppressive nature, and it was hard to see because it would naturally distort the space with the other auras.
It really was a jaw-dropping scene. Amzone’s body was ragged with blood strewn across the floor. Amzone, one of the Six Divinites of the Transcendence realm from Beyond the Heavens, suffered such wounds because he failed to respond to Lee Sungmin’s explosive and violent increase in power.
“Urgh…Kyack!”
Lee Sungmin tilted his head downwards in exhausting motion and vomited out a black clot of blood. His vision was blurring like a drunken man. He managed to lift his head after throwing up a couple of bloody lumps from his throat one after another. Although his dantian was feeling overheated from the massive and constant use of his internal energy, Lee Sungmin desperately coursed his internal energy into his hand on the spear.
It wasn’t over yet.
It was a good idea from Lee Sungmin to combine the 3 auras even if it was by force. As a result, it directly threatened Amzone who was without a scratch before it. However, still wasn’t enough to kill him. Lee Sungmin was already going all out, using every single auxiliary magic he knew like haste, strength and even fatigue recovery right now. He didn’t know how many wounds he had accumulated to get to this point but, it wasn’t for nothing, as he saw Amzone finally injured.
“…hmph!”
Lee Sungmin pounced at Amzone like a tiger and expected him to react accordingly, but Amzone couldn’t give strength to his legs and was expending his internal energy at a fast pace. He looked down at his body as if he could not believe it. Then he jerked his gaze upwards and looked at Lee Sungmin.
“You incompetent garbage…”
Amzone’s facial expression was contorted with rage and contempt. The 3 auras had successfully racked up enough of a toll on Amzone to make his foundations shake.
Lee Sungmin’s last attack was bizarre. Obviously, even though there were enough gaps to avoid the attacks, the attacks that had penetrated the Amzone’s self-defense aura caused fatal internal injuries.
It was absurd and incomprehensible to Amzone. Even with the powers of the yokai.. This was too much.
Amzone clenched his teeth. Did he underestimate his opponent too much? No, he just didn’t expect this kind of development. The impossible scenario that couldn’t have possibly happened, did in fact happen, but it has only just happened.
Lee Sungmin, whom Amzone saw, was never a master in the realm of Transcendence. Even with the added power of the yokai, the difference could never be filled, and indeed it never was. Even after Lee Sungmin used his powers, Amzone overwhelmed Lee Sungmin for most of the duration of the battle.
Nevertheless, the results came out. He was faithful to his words that he would not kill Lee Sungmin, even as Lee Sungmin used the power of the yokai to try and kill him.
Thud!
Lee Sungmin ran forward, biting on his lips. It wasn’t easy to move in his current state, but he had to do something about it. Lee Sungmin forced his strength into both of his weak and tattered hands. The current strength he exuded was weakened compared to his previous surge of strength, but the same was true for Amzone. He panted raggedly and drew a blade from the sleeve of his right arm.
Caang!
Amazon was pushed back with a dull sound of the spear and blade clashing. His internal injuries were piling up and his internal energy circuits were damaged so the flow of his energy was distorted. His face became contorted in pain. It was the same result for Lee Sungmin as the spear was pushed back along with his body. His spear suddenly cracked from the constant rugged clashes that had been going on for days as he drew the remaining energy for a last attack using Void Rendering.
In the swirling attack, Amzone folded his arms and swung his fist at the attack that was cracking the weapon mid-stance. Although he managed to fend off the attack, he realized the danger of the situation as the once intense battle turned into a messy brawl.
The rings that were still restraining the Crazy Heavenly Demon were starting to break and the Crazy Heavenly Demon continued to thrash about in the weakened restraints. It was impossible for the deeply wounded Amzone to deal with the combined force of Lee Sungmin and the Crazy Heavenly Demon in his current state.
Amzone twisted his arm and put his hand in his sleeves. He took out a metallic cylinder the size of a palm. He aimed at Lee Sungmin, who was rushing in for an attempt to keep the pressure on him.
Changggg!
Hundreds of miniature spiked balls were fired at the same time. It was too fast for the exhausted Lee Sungmin to stop his attack and avoid the hundreds of beads that smashed against his tattered body. Lee Sungmin was pushed back several feet although his armor where Heoju was residing was unfazed.
Amzone found an opening, ignored the internal injuries in his body and pulled up his internal energy. His arms moved in a half-crescent arc. His hands moved along with the afterimages. The hundreds and hundreds of those afterimages were all holding different hidden weapons.
Amzone shot out the hundreds of hidden weapons with a shrewd sound.
Pavavabak!
Hundreds of weapons fired from the afterimages. Lee Sungmin opened his eyes wide and unfolded the Lightning Annihilation technique to counter the fast and precise attacks. As fast as Lightning Annihilation, his fastest technique, and even with the yokai’s powers enhancing him, it couldn’t stop the Amzone’s last resort technique.
Lee Sungmin was pierced heavily this time as the armor couldn’t hold out from the fierce attack. His body flew back, smashed against a rock. The rock cracked heavily, it looked like a spiderweb. Amzone threw up a lump of blood as he didn’t fare well from the backlash and shook his shoulder.
Wijihoyeon was struggling to get up. She was incredibly frustrated at the state her body was in, now more than ever as Lee Sungmin was seemingly on death’s door for her, risking his life. She tried to open her mouth but no sound followed.
“Bastard…”, Amzone spat out.
Lee Sungmin, who was pierced by the needles and blades, started to raise his body from the crash. He did not die, although he looked as if he could collape the next second and died on the spot. He let go of his left hand holding the cracked spear as he tried to inhale a wisp of oxygen, but instead inhaled a staunch patch of dried up blood from his mouth.
Lee Sungmin was processing the situation quite well despite his disposition and started to sort through his memories to extract and get rid of the unnecessary movements from his injured body and tried to situate himself in a somewhat manageable stance.
Amzone was speechless. Although he failed to spread his last resort 100 hidden weapon explosions, Lee Sungmin still took it head on. He couldn’t understand what the hell was happening and what kind of perseverance this man called Lee Sungmin possibly had.
“Stop it!”
Wijihoyeon managed to shout out with a raspy voice, looking at Lee Sungmin’s back soaked in such copious amounts of blood, it started to look like someone dipped his entire body in red paint.
“I can… I can go. So please leave me here and live!”
“No.”, Lee Sungmin answered with a short and curt voice.
He didn’t even look back to reply her. He staggered along with his ghoulish-looking body and spat out the words.
“You don’t have to do that for me. You… you said you didn’t want to go to those bastards.”, he continued.
“But you…!”
“It’s all right.”
It really wasn’t though. The wounds Lee Sungmin suffered to this point were fatal. But he had to say he was okay.
“I don’t want to let you go.”
Amzone distorted his face and was silent. He never expected in his wildest dreams the current situation he was caught up in. He needed to take Wijihoyeon with him for their plans.
[Quit the act you fool!]
Heoju spat out a curse at Lee Sungmin for being so reckless. He couldn’t let Lee Sungmin die, however there was nothing he could do. He had already intervened several times with Lee Sungmin’s dantian, trying to take possession of his body to save him from death and to help balance the forces of the yokai powers. But, it was impossible to do anything. Lee Sungmin’s mental barrier was much stronger than before.
Lee Sungmin trudged his body slowly to face Amzone. When Amzone saw Lee Sungmin lifting the spear silently with his fierce and cold gaze, he trembled.
“Only if I die will you touch her…”
“I can’t help it then.”
It was at that moment Amzone took back his word and decided to kill Lee Sungmin.
Pazizik!
A black current splashed into the air. The sight of it made Amzone’s eyes widen with surprise. In the tangled current, someone rose up from the dark and sinister aura. The man with his long hair neatly tied up was wearing a half mask covering half of his face. The large long robe in which it was hung was red as blood.
“YOU! The Lord of the Samaryunju!”
Amzone’s face turned white when he saw the man standing in the ominous current of aura. Lee Sungmin’s face was forced to harden to study the identity of the man who had arrived.
A few hours ago, the Lord used the manager of the branch to speak to Lee Sungmin by taking advantage of his body. Now, the Lord of the Samaryunju suddenly appeared before Lee Sungmin.
“Long time no see. Party weapons ahaha!”, he called.
“Don’t call me by that name!”
“You hate it so much, don’t you? That’s a pretty good name. I think it suits you very much!”
Behind the mask, Lord Sima put on a smiling face. The frivolous way of speaking made Amzone’s shoulders tremble. Amzone knew the Lord Sima in front of him was not the original. It was hard to know where the real Sima Ryunju (T/N his full name) was, but the Sima Ryunju that appeared here was nothing more than a mere alteration.
“Why don’t you let this go and back down?”
Sima Ryunju stood with his hands behind him and urged Amzone to do so.
“Do you want to get involved in the affairs of Beyond the Heavens?!”, Amzone spat out, gnashing his teeth.
“Is that how this will play out? Well… then I’ll say it’s just an intervention. I didn’t want to worry about it. That boy’s desperate act melted a little cold heart like mine, that I just had to act.”
“Bullshit!”
“I mean it.”, replied Sima Ryunju.
Without turning his back, he glanced lightly at Amzone’s reaction.
“Even if it’s my alteration here, it’s not that hard to kill you when you’re hurt. Would you like me to try?”
“Now… are you threatening me?!”
“It may sound like a threat, depending on what you hear.”
“What was I even thinking trying to reason with you…”
“There are only three opponents that this old master finds himself uncomfortable with. One is the God of Mudang, the God of the Heavens at the top of your little organization, and the Predator of Massacre.” (T/N : Ooh Predator of Massacre we haven’t heard of this guy yet.)
The conversation started to unfold in a rather tense manner.