The Great Orthodox-Demonic War had broken out, he was told.
As Tang Mu-jeong had once said, the Demonic Cult was an organization filled with bastards who had given up something of their humanity for power.
Where would bastards who had gained horrific power at the price of loss put that power to use?
For madmen to spur others toward loss was a natural progression.
An invasion of the Central Plains: the Great Orthodox-Demonic War.
From the standpoint of a martial artist of the Central Plains it was absurd reasoning, but madmen are not called madmen for nothing.
It did not amount to an annual event, but it happened once every few decades, whenever the master of the Demonic Cult changed.
The problem lay in the martial prowess of the present Heavenly Demon.
He was a transcendent martial artist who erased a mountain ridge with a single sword stroke.
A mountain ridge, with a single stroke.
That was not merely a phrase meant to embellish his prowess.
In fact the Heavenly Demon had blown away a ridge of Mount Kunlun and forced the Kunlun Sect into closure.
Countless people said that the Heavenly Demon's prowess reached the heavens.
Never mind a head-on confrontation — a monster whose defeat was hard to predict even if the renowned peerless masters of the orthodox murim attacked together.
The Murim Alliance fell and the land of the Central Plains was trampled. In practical terms it was a defeat for the orthodox murim.
The answer produced after long deliberation by those who nonetheless would not bend, the leadership of the orthodox murim, was precisely the Bottomless Abyss.
A pit from which no one had ever returned alive. Let us cast him into that place.
Of course, the Heavenly Demon was not a man who would be cast anywhere simply because they tried, so they prepared the Three Paths Transference Formation with all their strength.
It was an operation with the World's Five Oddities at its core, headed by Jaegal Gi-cheon, the greatest formation master of the age.
And astonishingly, the Heavenly Demon descended upon the center of the formation on his own two feet.
'......Alone?'
Jeong I-shin, listening to Tang Mu-jeong's explanation, asked sourly.
'And knowing everything?'
—......Yes. Even knowing it was a trap, he came like that.
The moment Tang Mu-jeong finished with a sigh, as though to say he would understand once he saw it.
SLAAAASH—!!!
The Heavenly Demon severed the world once again.
Dozens of heads flew into the sky, and at the same instant the Three Paths Transference Formation activated.
THUD—!
Red lines starting from beneath the Heavenly Demon's feet spread out along the ground in an instant. The moment their intertwining trajectories completed an enormous circle.
FWOOOSH—!
A blood-colored pillar erupted from inside the formation and swallowed the Heavenly Demon's figure.
'......'
The momentum that had been crushing the world vanished just like that, as though it had been a lie.
Astonishingly, the Three Paths Transference Formation had succeeded in flinging the Heavenly Demon over the Bottomless Abyss.
The problem was that the four old men were included in that transference. Naturally, it was a thing never discussed beforehand.
'......'
An outrageous betrayal.
Jeong I-shin, witnessing a scene he had only heard described, lost his words.
The place had changed in the blink of an eye.
The fog that bound the four old men in an instant was far thicker and murkier than the fog far below in the Bottomless Abyss.
He could feel Tang Mu-jeong's inner arts scattering in a heartbeat.
"Jaegal Gi-cheon!!!"
Tang Mu-jeong, plummeting, grasped the situation at once.
There was no room to consider it an error.
Inner arts were pouring out of a qi center wrecked by the formation.
"How dare he......!"
But however he cried out the betrayer's name with a seething heart, reality did not change.
Tang Mu-jeong clenched his teeth and shouted.
"Sword Ghost! Yeo Hwi! Hold back the Heavenly Demon! Gongheon! We must get to the cliff face! We have to reduce our speed!"
KABOOM! THOOOOM!
Attempts to somehow slow their fall by striking the cliff followed one after another.
It was then.
Tang Mu-jeong, who had grown sharply quiet since the formation activated, conveyed his intent.
—Jeong I-shin, concentrate. From here.
At the same moment a pitch-black wave of qi burst outward with the Heavenly Demon at its center.
For an instant it pushed back even the fog that filled the surroundings.
Then a voice of utter indifference rang out and shook the canyon.
[From the look of things, this much was not part of the plan.]
Even while plummeting through fierce wind, the Heavenly Demon behaved as though it were no concern of his.
At that, Tang Mu-jeong, his temper twisted, shouted.
"Cripple. Can you not see? It seems you threw away your eyesight for power as well. They say the number of things the Heavenly Demon has given up exceeds ten thousand — it would have been better had you given up your life!"
[You were all so very tiresome. Your end has become a laughable thing. Now go.]
The conversation ran on parallel lines, but the Heavenly Demon, as though not the least bit interested in it, finished what he had to say and indifferently raised his sword.
He too was in the midst of falling at a tremendous speed. The point of his sword should have been shaking and then some, yet the Heavenly Demon leveled it at them without a hair's motion.
—It is coming.
With Tang Mu-jeong's words, a pitch-black energy came unspooling strand by strand from the Heavenly Demon's center.
Soon that energy wrapped around him. It was as though an enormous vengeful spirit's face were blooming with him at its center.
"Ha."
A gasp of admiration whose owner he could not tell.
Right after, the vengeful spirit swung the sword.
It was a sight like the night sky collapsing.
An overwhelming hegemony with the demonic at its head.
Even the fog that scattered a peerless master's inner arts was crushed by that force.
Truly suffocating true qi came whirling down.
And the Heavenly Demon turned away indifferently without even watching that strike reach its end.
Behind him, the sword blow he had left as though announcing an ending fell upon Tang Mu-jeong.
———!
"Kuhh......!"
Jeong I-shin clutched his chest and gasped for breath. He stared at the floor of the hut with vacant eyes.
From the moment the Heavenly Demon raised his sword, he had not taken his eyes off him for an instant.
In that moment alone, it truly felt as though it were he, not Tang Mu-jeong, who was there.
It felt as though he had received that sword blow with his whole body.
A pounding heart and trembling hands.
The lightning rotating faster than usual and the true qi of the Sinew-Transforming Marrow-Cleansing Scripture vibrating low.
All of it came from the mere fact of having seen the Heavenly Demon's sword. It was appalling.
"Is your body all right?"
Only when his breathing returned somewhat did he sense Tang Mu-jeong's presence.
Jeong I-shin snapped his head up and nodded hard. There was something he badly wanted to ask.
"Yes, I'm fine. More than that, how did you......"
"Survive, you mean?"
"......Yes, that strike was......"
The night sky collapsing.
It was a sword hard to believe had been unfolded with a mere human body.
Which was to say, blocking it was likewise hard to even imagine.
Tang Mu-jeong nodded as though he understood, and wore a wry smile.
"The Sword Ghost blocked it. Though we helped."
"......Sorry?"
"That is how his arm was lost."
"Ah."
"I did not wish to show it to you. But I believed that you, of all people, would surely have something sprout from it. It galls me, but the Heavenly Demon is...... a monster for whom even the phrase 'first of his age' is laughable."
How was it?
Before Tang Mu-jeong's question was finished, Jeong I-shin closed his eyes.
The Heavenly Demon. A man who burned like the sun.
A presence one could fairly call overwhelming.
Perhaps it was because he had seen him while falling, but he did not seem to stand in the same line of species.
He felt like something beyond human, standing in a very high place.
He was solitary and aloof. He behaved as though he were the finest thing in the world. He did so even while draped in impure demonic qi.
It was a sword worthy of it, but even so, was it not deeply arrogant?
And to Jeong I-shin's sense...... that was the core of it. Behaving as though he were the most exalted thing between heaven and earth.
'I know something else that behaves as though it's the finest thing in the world.'
Something that watched its landlord's face, yet permitted no other qi at all beside it.
This thing that seemed to look down on every energy in the world!
The lightning.
RUMBLE!
At the low cry that seemed to ask why he was picking on it, Jeong I-shin snorted a laugh.
He did not think deeply.
He simply added his impression of the endlessly arrogant Heavenly Demon to the martial path he had learned so far.
'All things brim with qi; to take that qi and wield it is called the martial.'
HUMMM—
At that single verse formula, the qi that had entered on his breath changed direction.
The qi that would ordinarily have left with his exhalation stubbornly coursed through Jeong I-shin's body.
Had Tang Mu-jeong known, he would have been horrified and stopped him.
The path of true qi and the verse formula that guides it must be assembled with the utmost care.
If one intended to refine that true qi into the nature of lightning qi, there was nothing more to be said.
It was a sight in which it would not have been strange for every blood vessel and acupoint in his body to burn away!
Yet Jeong I-shin stubbornly stacked the next verse formula.
'Among qi, the utmost extreme — under heaven there is only lightning.'
CRACKLE!
The qi racing through his whole body gradually stained gold and began to take on a lightning nature.
Unlike the previous energies, the golden lightning qi did not much mind the pure white lightning circling his heart.
That was so even when the lightning, discovering the golden lightning qi belatedly, rose up violently.
RUMBLE—!
A few strands of pure white lightning qi leapt up above Jeong I-shin's shoulders.
"What......!"
Tang Mu-jeong, who had thought Jeong I-shin was merely organizing his thoughts, jumped where he stood.
'Th-this out-of-his-mind boy!'
Even then he clamped a hand over his mouth and swallowed his cry, lest it affect him.
Tang Mu-jeong saw through what Jeong I-shin was doing in an instant.
'I intended for us to lay the framework together if he had realized something!'
Tang Mu-jeong believed that he valued Jeong I-shin more highly than anyone in the Bottomless Abyss.
That was why he had staked a year, rather than "impossible," on creating an inner arts mind method that took lightning as true qi.
And the goal had not even been to assemble it perfectly. Merely laying the framework would have sufficed.
'And yet what is this......!'
CRACKLE—
The white lightning leaping again and again above Jeong I-shin's shoulders was unmistakably identical to that of the boy who had been carried in Gongheon's arms two years ago.
Then what in the world was the golden lightning qi rippling alongside it?
"Haaa......"
The moment Tang Mu-jeong let out a gasp he could no longer hold back.
Jeong I-shin was likewise driving his true qi to the final gate.
The golden lightning qi plunged down toward the lightning circling his heart. The two energies mixed as though they had been one body all along.
RUMBLE!
The lightning holding lightning qi cried roughly.
'Got it!'
Jeong I-shin exulted.
This was the thing that had burned away every qi that did not satisfy it until now.
But this time was plainly different.
The lightning had taken in the new lightning qi. It was a reaction one could fairly call permission.
HUMMM!
But the reaction that followed was also unlike before.
The lightning qi drawn in through breathing cultivation, following the verse formula's guidance, headed ceaselessly for the lightning at his heart.
The lightning that had been scattered around the heart like a cluster of stars began to gather gradually, using the golden lightning qi as glue.
HUMMM! HUMMM!
The lightning pulsed and rotated as though it had become a heart itself.
The clotted strands of lightning qi connected thinly, seeming about to break and yet not breaking, and drew a single long trajectory.
And the moment its beginning and its end finally met.
WHIIINE—
A golden ring rose up, rotating with the heart as its axis.
Jeong I-shin knew instinctively that now was the time to begin settling it.
He had already thought of the verse formula with which to close.
'The way that reaches the apex of the martial lies in achieving heavenly thunder.'
WHIIIINE!
The golden ring rotated rapidly and disgorged lightning qi.
The lightning qi, escaping the circuit around the heart, headed straight downward.
The place the lightning qi reached was the qi center.
The place where a prior occupant, the Sinew-Transforming Marrow-Cleansing Scripture, resided.
GONG—
Sure enough, grand true qi rose to receive the guest.
Just as he was fretting that it might go awry at the very end.
RUMBLE—
Along with a low resonance, the golden lightning qi settled quietly beside the Sinew-Transforming Marrow-Cleansing Scripture.
'Haa......'
And so two energies took their places in the qi center.
At last Jeong I-shin gave it its name.
'The Ultimate Heavenly Thunder Art.'
Taking the Heavenly Demon's arrogance as its model, declaring that the strongest energy under heaven is lightning.
It was Jeong I-shin's inner arts mind method.
***
"You witless boy!"
"Gah!"
Jeong I-shin, who had been beaming as he boasted of what he had done, clutched his head.
It was because Tang Mu-jeong, his face gone crimson, had rapped him on it.
It hurt quite a bit, but he could not bring himself to protest, because Jeong I-shin too had realized, belatedly, how dangerous his own actions had been.
'......Still, didn't I do it well, exactly as I was taught?'
The creation of the Ultimate Heavenly Thunder Art had been carried out thoroughly on the basis of what Tang Mu-jeong had taught him.
He had not run counter to the natural order, nor forced the flow along.
If one had to categorize it, could it not be said to belong to the branch of orthodox martial learning?
It was only that the energy thus completed was just a little rough!
"Still, isn't it cute? Heh heh."
CRACKLE—
Above the palm Jeong I-shin held out with a foolish smile, golden lightning qi — the true qi now called Heavenly Thunder Qi — undulated.
"Haah...... this is maddening."
Tang Mu-jeong shook his head, yet could not take his eyes off Jeong I-shin's palm.
It was plainly not the lightning of before. It was not as pure as that.
But that was an impression only he could form, having seen Jeong I-shin's lightning.
To anyone else, the Heavenly Thunder Qi was true qi of a nature endlessly close to lightning, indistinguishable from it.
And it was obviously that strong, and that vicious.
"......I do not know whether this will be a gain for you or a loss."
"Why? Isn't stronger true qi always better? Like that Heavenly Demon bastard's?"
"Haah......"
Tang Mu-jeong sighed and put out a hand.
At that Jeong I-shin naturally extended his own hand to meet it.
The eyebrow of Tang Mu-jeong, who had been about to speak of true qi, twitched.
"......You brat."
His sigh deepened further.
"I told you any number of times that you must never allow your pulse to be read carelessly, and yet......!"
"Come on, between us."
"Boy! Letting things slide like that will only settle strange habits into your body!"
Tang Mu-jeong was afraid.
Jeong I-shin was a boy who remembered and accomplished anything done with the body.
He had created a mind art — no, a divine art — merely from experiencing the Heavenly Demon's sword, so discussing Jeong I-shin's senses was laughable at this point.
But that made it more of a problem.
'He is not some puppy wagging its tail because any human hand will do!'
The Jeong I-shin that Tang Mu-jeong had watched over this while had extremely little wariness toward people.
Of course, that affection was for now limited to them, but were strange bastards in jianghu ever few?
This unwary behavior had to be corrected starting now.
And so, when Tang Mu-jeong did not relax his stern expression, Jeong I-shin's shoulders drooped slightly.
"Understood. From now on I'll think fifteen times before answering anything you say, Elder Tang. You told me to think thirty times before exchanging words with people of the unorthodox sects, so I'll do exactly half that."
"......"
Jeong I-shin, looking dispirited by anyone's reckoning, said something that dug straight into the chest.
A cunning display one might well call the very model of a modern man who fights with his tongue instead of his fists!
"......Ahem!"
"Shall I raise it to thirty?"
"Enough! We shall discuss this another time."
Tang Mu-jeong shook his head and began examining Jeong I-shin's body in earnest.
"As expected. The nature has not changed greatly from before."
"Hasn't the quantity increased enormously?"
"Yes, compared to before it is a considerable level. However, measured against the general standard of jianghu...... the total of your inner arts does not even reach third-rate. Even counting the Sinew-Transforming Marrow-Cleansing Scripture."
"Huh!"
Jeong I-shin's eyes went round.
In truth the classification of realms in jianghu still did not register directly with him, but more than a year ago he had received Namgung Baek's assessment that in body alone he was equal to first-rate.
So taken purely at Tang Mu-jeong's word, there had never been a regression like it.
For Jeong I-shin, who had been thinking that he now had to take responsibility for the four old men, it was a deeply shocking fact!
At Jeong I-shin's wavering eyes, Tang Mu-jeong hurriedly added,
"Do not misunderstand. That is when discussing only the total of your inner arts. If one also considers the class of the true qi, it becomes an entirely different story."
"Ah!"
"But two kinds of true qi coexisting is...... hard to comment on offhand. There is no chance you would know Wudang's Dual Principles either."
"Dual what?"
"......Never mind."
In truth there were several more problems scattered about.
The accumulation, still insufficient however much it had grown; the ring of lightning encircling his heart, and so on.
He had not the faintest idea how to advise on the latter in particular.
'Focus on what you can do for him right now. There is no time.'
Tang Mu-jeong took out his needles and wiped them, gauging Jeong I-shin's inner arts for a long while.
The moment he wiped the fifth needle, Tang Mu-jeong's mouth opened.
"From now on the Space-Crossing Palm is forbidden."
"Sorry?"
"Not to mention sword strikes like the one you showed in the northern White Silk Web Forest."
"Uh...... well, that was......"
"Now. I shall carve this into your body. Repeat after me."
Tang Mu-jeong spoke with an exceedingly serious face.
"I am an inner arts beggar."
"......"
"Repeat it."
There was not a speck of humor in him.