Lee Sungmin’s spear moved and shot forwards at Kang Seok.
‘It’s coming from the front…. Wait- the front?’
Kang Seok’s eyes widened. He strained to see the spear approaching, but the spear Lee Sungmin had only moved forwards a little bit before dispersing into a fog.
The swaying fog that surrounded Lee Sungmin started to scatter and suddenly disperse. Then there was nothing. Lee Sungmin was just standing there.
Kang Seok didn’t dare to act rashly because he had no clue what had just happened. Instead, he even took a step back.
The scattered fog started to re-materialize and surround Kang Seok. Kang Seok knew what to do, and twirled his spear.
For Kang Seok, the meaning of obtaining ‘The Spear of Creation’ signified that his spear was him, and he was the spear. It was an extension of both his body and mind.
Kang Seok let his spear tear through the fog and let his mind relax.
Pababak!
The entire fog that had been surrounding Kang Seok was torn apart by his spear.
But there was no shape in the fog, it was as if he cut through nothing. Kang Seok grew startled as the fog started to move once more, and he glanced back to where Lee Sungmin was standing. But, Lee Sungmin wasn’t there. He completely disappeared.
‘Oh my God.’
Kang Seok realized what type of technique Lee Sungmin had used. It was a technique that utilized illusions. It was rather unique for a spearmaster to use, but Kang Seok was still wary.
Lee Sungmin’s technique had far passed the realm of a mere illusion. There was no way that through an illusion, that Kang Seok could sense such a murderous intent all around him that threatened to kill him at any moment he was off guard.
As Kang Seok thought, he recalled what the basis of the Sama Order’s techniques were. The Sama Order made sure that every martial artist that came under their wing gained a foundational text to illusions and one that practiced extreme speed. Yet, Kang Seok knew that Lee Sungmin was the next successor to the Order, and had most likely inherited techniques that passed through the Realm of Transcendence even.
The technique that Lee Sungmin was using was something that clearly would require a great deal of internal energy to pull off. But, Kang Seok realized that something was off with Lee Sungmin, as he kept getting even stronger throughout the fight. The techniques he was using were something that he most likely had not been able to even replicate before, and was likely to be his first time truly using it.
That vast internal energy reserve that Lee Sungmin had was likely the requirement that was needed to maintain the fog.
But Kang Seok was still stuck, even if he had an idea of what was going on. Lee Sungmin’s spear was completely untraceable. Kang Seok was called the Spear King and was a Transcendent martial artist who had great senses, but he couldn’t even grasp Lee Sungmin’s whereabouts in the murderous fog.
‘It’s full of mixed energies.’
It was because of the odd powers blending together within Lee Sungmin’s body. There was no way a living being could possibly contain so many diverse energies and keep them in balance, like Lee Sungmin had, but he had done it. It baffled Kang Seok, and it made finding Lee Sungmin that much harder due to the several mixed energies spread throughout the fog.
The worst part was that the technique was not over yet. It was a technique that had surpassed the realm of Spear Mastery.
Whoooooosh-
Kang Seok listened carefully. The fog was flowing around him and was growing larger by the second. Kang Seok knew that martial artists tended to leave traces of their body’s movements through sounds.
He was well aware of the fact.
If one was a Spearmaster though, they wouldn’t make such a trivial mistake.
‘You’re trying to mislead me.’
Kang Seok looked around. Before he knew it, there was fog everywhere around him. Kang Seok bared his teeth and laughed out loud.
‘It’s a technique made for the spear, yet it isn’t at the same time. It goes beyond simply establishing a domain as well. Since I could overwhelm his domain through sheer force, he decided to create an entirely new space that was dependent on his large and vast amounts of internal energy. How amazing!’
Kang Seok was well versed in fighting against illusions. In fact, when it came to Musin, the Martial God that led their group, he was a master of illusions. Kang Seok had challenged him once and suffered a miserable defeat to him. The illusion Lee Sungmin was using was also at that exact level of Musin’s techniques.
There was only one way to break the illusion that Kang Seok knew of. He had to overwhelm it with a force capable of destroying the illusion’s center-point head-on.
Whoosh!
Kang Seok started to swirl his spear and move the fog through the force of his spear.
He was slowly establishing his own surroundings as his spear grazed against the ground and helped him pinpoint his surroundings.
But, when Kang Seok was about to continue swinging his spear, he was forced to come to a halt.
Whoosh!
Through a random part of space within the fog, a spear shot through and aimed at Kang Seok. He immediately turned his body to block the incoming spear, but at the point of collision, or what was supposed to be a collision, the spear that aimed at him completely disappeared and scattered into the fog.
‘Hm!’
Kang Seok immediately and instinctively felt another threat coming at him. He twisted his upper body to block the incoming projectile.
Shwinnnng!
A spear shot through the fog and grazed the abdomen of Kang Seok. That was just the start. Soon, several spears started to shoot through the random areas of the fog with no rhyme or reason to their attack patterns, and assaulted Kang Seok relentlessly.
If Kang Seok did not defend himself properly here, he would be butchered and skewered by the several spears aimed at him.
As the image of his death suddenly popped into his mind, Kang Seok simply laughed again.
“Hahaha!”
With a big smile, Kang Seok seemingly moved his body around at random.
Quaddeuk!
The fog that was part of the illusion started to slow, and the ‘real spear’ shot through the fog, aiming at Kang Seok. Kang Seok looked at the spear and shouted. Lee Sungmin’s spear had been moving endlessly through the formation to maintain the fog.
“Are you there!”
Kang Seok shouted. He stabbed the spear at Lee Sungmin’s true spear that was maintaining the illusion. The figure of Lee Sungmin started to come into view as the fog started to slowly settle a bit.
All Kang Seok observed within Lee Sungmin’s shadowy figure beyond the dense fog, was his bright gold eyes that shone eerily.
Suddenly, Kang Seok felt his spear tip move unpredictably in a way he had not wanted it to move.
“Huh?!”
Kang Seok quickly exhaled a deep breath as he felt his senses become completely muddled. It was as if the ground he was standing upon had just lowered itself randomly.
It was an incredible illusion that befuddled even the Spear King’s senses for a brief moment.
It was but a moment, yet within that instant Lee Sungmin’s spear moved as if it had been aiming for that sudden gap.
Whoosh!
The spear shot from a close distance aimed at Kang Seok’s chest. However, Kang Seok was a truly veteran warrior.
He immediately divided the spear he was holding into two, and stepped back with his body and spread his distance from Lee Sungmin’s spear.
BOOM!
The two spears collided in the space, and Kang Seok relentlessly poured out attacks despite the unfavorable situation where it was unsure whether or not he could really pull off delicate and practiced attacks.
But as soon as Kang Seok saw the tip of Lee Sungmin’s spear again, he realized that his distance with Lee Sungmin had seemingly increased much farther than he thought.
Was it real or was he still in an illusion?
But in the end, he didn’t care and shot the spear. Lee Sungmin’s body, which had been moving away, approached him. It was disturbing for Kang Seok to not be sure of his distance. He was sure the illusion had been weakened, but it really felt like it hadn’t. Regardless, he stabbed forwards at Lee Sungmin.
Pooh!
Lee Sungmin’s body was penetrated by the spear of Kang Seok.
However, it didn’t feel like Kang Seok actually pierced anything, there wasn’t even blood.
Before he knew it, Kang Seok was locked back into the illusion in full. Lee Sungmin’s body dispersed into the fog and scattered. Kang Seok looked around and knew he couldn’t avoid it now. The fog was all around his body and too close to dodge. No matter how strong he was, he could not avoid this.
“Huap!”
Pabababak!
Though he moved his spear in a hurry and tried to dodge all of the spears that came out of the fog, the numbers were too great, and he suffered blow after blow.
Even in such a situation, it was Kang Seok’s best situation, to somehow get out of this illusion with a few cuts and bruises.
Despite this, Kang Seok laughed and smiled from the throbbing pain he felt in his body. How long had it been since he was actually injured like this in a fight? It had been far too long. He was truly pleased and let Lee Sungmin know it too.
“Good!”
Lee Sungmin was feeling a dizzying headache.
The illusion world technique was something that was incredibly difficult to maintain. It required intense focus on maintaining the illusion, and he could not move his spear outside of the actions required to maintain the illusion. One wrong move meant that the illusion would be broken on the spot.
It was such a powerful martial art, but there were many disadvantages to it. It lacked efficiency. No matter how plentiful Lee Sungmin’s reserves of internal energy were, he couldn’t maintain this technique for an extended period of time.
His own internal energy had already been exhausted, and now he was only continuing the illusion on the borrowed power he had received from Heoju and another source.
“Whoa, what…….”
Lee Sungmin took a deep breath and stared at Kang Seok. The bloodied and laughing Spear King did not feel like falling down here. Lee Sungmin didn’t know who the true monster was here at this point.
[Why don’t you back off here while you can?]Heoju advised him.
[You’re only using borrowed power right now, and I’m already growing wary of that thing in your mental world. I can hear it right now, and if I grow any weaker, he might swallow your consciousness whole again.]
‘I know.’
[If you know that, then back off.]‘I don’t think he’ll let me go.’
Lee Sungmin suppressed his throbbing headache and stared at Kang Seok through the illusion.
He was swinging his spear like mad without caring for his wounds that he was accumulating.
Every time his spear moved repeatedly, his enormous power swelled and burst at the tip. Lee Sungmin gritted his teeth and lifted the spear over his head.
K a-boom! Crackle!
A lightning storm started to form within the fog. It was true to its origin of the Dark Storm Arts developed by Sima Ryunju.
The remaining internal energy Lee Sungmin had within his dantian bubbled up and boiled as it was completely drained into the tip of his spear.
Demonic Emperor’s Dark Storm Arts : Thousand Thunder (萬雷)
The fog that covered the space around started to swell into a tremendous thunderstorm.
Ka-boom! Crackle!
At the sound of thunder erupting within the illusion world, Kang Seok drew a toothy grin and shook his spear.
Bang!
The several bolts of lightning within the storm attacked Kang Seok as he met them head on with his spear. Kang Seok laughed at the amazing rush he was feeling.
‘uh…’
The Lightning suddenly disappeared like a lie, and Kang Seok immediately realized it was completely false.
But it was too late. Within the foggy illusion world, the sky suddenly turned pitch black, and Kang Seok knew the illusion was dispersed since it was the night sky that he saw, but couldn’t fire off his skills in time. A purple stream of lightning divided the sky as if to cleave it in two.
Crackle!
Kang Seok tried to extend his spear and face the lightning as it came at him. He met the lightning head on with his Spear of Creation, but was getting pushed back more and more,
Lightning kept on pouring out from Lee Sungmin’s spear, he thrust all the remaining internal energies he had within his dantian into his spearthat was pushing Kang Seok back.
Ba-dump! Ba-dump!
Lee Sungmin’s heart started to palpitate. His vision started to blur as he felt a nasty feeling within his dantian. His blood and muscles started to writhe abnormally as the feeling of a monstrous entity started to become apparent within his consciousness.
Heoju shouted something in Lee Sungmin’s head, but he couldn’t make it out.
Lee Sungmin bit his lower lip with a terrible hunch on what was about to come. Blood flowed from his lower lip as he tried to forcefully keep himself awake.
It was happening again to him. His muscles were being torn and regenerated constantly for using a technique far beyond his capabilities, but his body was keeping up with it to heal.
However, Lee Sungmin’s consciousness was blurring, and he started to hear the sound of something growling deep in the back of his mind.
Puuut-
The exchange was over. The fog that covered all sides of Kang Seok disappeared, and Kang Seok was holding the spear he had held out until the very end as he endured the fearsome onslaught of lightning and illusions.
Without hesitating, Kang Seok locked eyes with Lee Sungmin and flew towards him. Lee Sungmin hurriedly tried to lift his spear.
Whoosh!
The two spears collided and Kang Seok pushed onto Lee Sungmin’s draining strength. Lee Sungmin could barely even stand as he wobbled back and vomited blood.
“Ha!”
With the sound of Kang Seok’s excited shouts, the Spear of Creation exploded forwards, and Lee Sungmin gritted his teeth and stood his ground. Lee Sungmin was fighting a battle within his own head, grasping onto the thin strand of his consciousness he had left.
Quaddeuk!
Kang Seok rotated his spear and hit Lee Sungmin helplessly on the side of his armor, bursting his ribs and digging his bones into his guts. Lee Sungmin flew through the air and collapsed on the ground, not able to stand back up. Kang Seok lowered his spear as he noticed something was off.
“……what is it now?”
Kang Seok approached Lee Sungmin with worry and frustration apparent on his face.
“Are you too tired?”
Kang Seok approached Lee Sungmin, twirling his spear. He was upset, incredibly upset at that. He had finally had a proper fight in so long. An amazing fight with another Spearmaster that was like a dream come true for him. He wanted to continue fighting,
His whole body was hot and feverish with tense muscles that were strained, his breathing was ragged, but he still wanted to fight as he tried to order Lee Sungmin.
“Stand up.”
Kang Seok urged Lee Sungmin to stand up, yet Lee Sungmin couldn’t move a limb properly. He tried using his hands to push himself onto his feet, and eventually got up on his two legs…
But the moment he stood up, Lee Sungmin fell right back down like a toddler learning how to walk. He had no strength left at all.
“Stand up!”
“Do you seriously think I don’t want to stand up…?!”
Lee Sungmin shouted at Kang Seok, not being able to bear his childish antics. Kang Seok was acting like a little kid who wasn’t able to get what he wanted. It wasn’t as if Lee Sungmin didn’t want to stand. He wanted to continue as well, if he had the proper strength and mind to do so.
“I feel like I was taking a nice shit, and someone walked in on me! Come on!”
It was a rather dirty metaphor, but it accurately described Kang Seok’s feelings to a tee.