After the collision in which he had poured out his full power, Ling Wehao let out a cry of astonishment.
‘It went out?’
For a moment, the Blue Flame that should have been burning fiercely around his fist had died away.
It meant that the flames, which could melt even steel if he set his mind to it, had been snuffed out by nothing more than a single collision.
But what was even more astonishing was that this was not due to compatibility or the power of some special ability.
‘He simply crushed it?’
The unidentified enemy was grumbling as he held his shoulder.
“This body is not holding up well at all.”
It was said that if one mastered the Black Heaven Return-to-Origin Art, one could erase an opponent’s abilities with extreme nothingness. However, Jeong Hyeon-su had not even taken his first step into the Black Heaven Return-to-Origin Art yet.
He had simply extinguished Ling Wehao’s flames through overwhelming force based on Tyrant Heaven Energy.
However, because his vessel had not yet been properly refined, his joints creaked, and his muscles, unable to absorb the recoil, felt as though they were being torn apart.
Of course, Jeong Hyeon-su showed none of that. He merely pointed his fingertips at Ling Wehao and crooked them lightly.
It was a simple beckoning challenge. No matter how one looked at him, he did not have the body of a martial artist who mainly used the Fist-and-Kicking Arts, and yet the man had the audacity to engage him in a provocative close-quarters fight.
“Come. Should you not prove to that old man that the Blue Flame Calamity Annihilation Style amounts to more than this?”
Ling Wehao’s expression crumpled at once.
“Why? Is it some great secret? Would it be a problem if people found out you are the disciple of the proud black-warrant criminal of China, the ‘Flame Emperor’?”
Ling Wehao was the hidden youngest disciple of the Flame Emperor, who controlled China’s criminal underworld.
The reason the Flame Emperor had hidden him was primarily to protect him from his other disciples.
Rather than cherishing his disciple, it was closer to giving an unprepared disciple an opportunity.
“It is the ugly side of an old man who always tries to make everything perfect.”
That was also why Ling Wehao did not fear South Korea’s Ten Great Guilds.
Even if they were the Ten Great Guilds, it was true that they fell short before the Flame Emperor’s forces.
“You are as good as dead anyway, are you not? You failed to do it the way the Flame Emperor told you to.”
For an instant, Ling Wehao’s eyes widened.
“You, could it be?”
“What do you mean, could it be?”
It was a conversation without any context, but Ling Wehao was certain.
The first floor of the Tower. It was there that the Flame Emperor had created a method to obtain the greatest reward by using numerous test subjects.
Ling Wehao, who had been sent in for that purpose, had intended to raise his skill proficiency against his clone, but he had been expelled immediately.
— This is a method defined as prohibited by the Tower.
Fortunately, he had been allowed to pass through extenuating circumstances, but how furious had he been upon learning that someone had snatched away the loophole they had presumed possible?
“You will not answer how you found out, will you?”
“Would you, you idiot?”
“But if your younger sister suffers pitifully before your eyes, you will not be able to keep from talking.”
“That will not happen.”
His words were smooth, but Jeong Hyeon-su’s movements were fierce and sharp.
He closed the distance in an instant and dug into a blind spot in Ling Wehao’s vision. For a moment, Jeong Hyeon-su’s body blurred.
It was a mature preemptive strike that perfectly understood the opponent’s field of vision and reflected even the smallest details.
‘What is this bastard?’
No matter how Ling Wehao looked at it, this was not the fighting style of an ordinary Hunter.
Because it carried the heavy scent of a back-alley life that had passed through blood-soaked battlefields where one had to kill the other person to survive, Ling Wehao was bewildered.
A preemptive strike meant seizing the initiative.
“Tch!”
Immediately after knocking Jeong Hyeon-su’s left hand aside horizontally, a blow aimed for his neck came in. That opening had clearly been one Ling Wehao had induced.
Like flames naturally linking together, Blue Flame erupted violently toward Jeong Hyeon-su’s face, accompanied by the mana he had strongly released.
But even that was a feint. He had naturally assumed Jeong Hyeon-su would dodge and had prepared an irregular attack.
CRUNCH!
Ling Wehao’s hand, extended in a false strike toward the face, was caught.
He put all his strength into it, but he could not pull it free.
Even if he did not specialize in strength-based combat, he was still at least Gold Rank. Yet he was being overpowered by a brat who had only just started climbing the Tower?
BOOM!
“Guh!”
Not only that, but he was struck by an accurately timed counter and had no choice but to stagger backward.
Ling Wehao was no fool. In the first place, if he had been a fool, the Flame Emperor would have had no reason to take him as a disciple.
‘I cannot win like this.’
Ling Wehao judged that he could never defeat Jeong Hyeon-su through an ordinary method of fighting.
Jeong Hyeon-su looked at him and grinned.
“You would be better off bringing it out quickly. I was just starting to get bored.”
“What?”
“Do not pretend not to know and ask again. Forget it. Just die.”
At Jeong Hyeon-su’s words, Ling Wehao unleashed all the power from the source of mana located below his navel.
In the West, it was called a Mana Hole, and in the East, it was called the dantian.
This was not a situation where hiding his identity halfheartedly would suffice.
The reason the Flame Emperor was called the Flame Emperor was not merely because he had trained in fire-attribute techniques.
He was the emperor of fire. It was because he had written an undefeated legend based on destruction like karmic flames that burned away everything in the world.
FWOOOOSH!
His innately base nature. Using the mad, beastlike violence that arose from it as a catalyst, fierce flames surged and swept in every direction.
“I will turn you to ash!”
BANG!
Ling Wehao’s speed itself changed. Now that he had released his limiters, he aimed for Jeong Hyeon-su like flames spreading across a desolate field on a fierce wind.
Jeong Hyeon-su raised his Tyrant Heaven Energy to meet that strike.
ROOOAAAR!
Ling Wehao’s palm force, which made even the air burn, was powerful.
It was a flame that seemed to burn even himself. The power contained within it was releasing shock waves in midair.
BOOM! BOOM!
BOOOOM!
The sound that rang out was like artillery fire against a Monster Wave swarming from a place where a Dungeon Break had occurred.
In response, Jeong Hyeon-su likewise unleashed the Heavenly Tyrant Ghost King Art.
He did not even evade.
He merely bent his legs slightly, then thrust out a straight punch against the blazing Blue Flame.
BOOM!
Jeong Hyeon-su’s condensed Tyrant Heaven Energy punched a hole through the flames.
FWOOOSH!
At the same time, the hem of his clothes caught fire, giving off an acrid smell.
Once again, Jeong Hyeon-su prepared a straight punch. Ling Wehao prepared a decisive strike.
It was a powerful heel-kicking technique. Just as he was about to swing his heel, wreathed in flames like an iron mace,
Ling Wehao suddenly changed course, shifting direction as if he had stepped on empty air and leaped.
“What are you doing?”
Was Jeong Hyeon-su’s waist, which had been meeting him head-on until now, not bending like a bow and perfectly avoiding his attack?
‘He read that?’
The Blue Flame Annihilation Style was a combat technique that focused entirely on offense, but while it gave the impression of stubbornly insisting on frontal clashes, it was actually an extremely flexible martial art.
Ling Wehao had always exploited that point to break through crises, but Jeong Hyeon-su had already experienced direct confrontations with both Ling Wehao and even the Flame Emperor.
There was no way he would fall for it.
On the contrary, Jeong Hyeon-su had perfectly guided him into that move, and his fist struck Ling Wehao hard.
“Try to do better. This is why the Flame Emperor released his brats everywhere to obtain another disciple.”
THUD!
It was humiliation beyond measure.
Jeong Hyeon-su stopped attacking and widened the distance, as though telling him to do it properly this time. To anyone watching, it was blatant contempt.
In pain that felt as if his waist would snap, Ling Wehao clenched his teeth.
“You Bangzi bastard!”
“What did you say, Chinese bitch?”
Due to his extreme rage, Ling Wehao’s eyes flashed.
The foundation of Ling Wehao’s power was anger.
‘It is finally coming out.’
Ling Wehao’s flames, as he rampaged like a beast whose reason had been devoured and only fury remained, became hot enough for Jeong Hyeon-su to feel their heat for the first time.
And now, all Jeong Hyeon-su had to do was crush that Ling Wehao, who had temporarily surpassed even Gold Rank-level power.
Yes, he had to crush him.
The power of the Overlord he desired.
That was the quality demanded by the Southern Exalted Overlord, one of the Five Kings, who never tolerated showing one’s back to an opponent.
For reasons unknown, it was said that the Overlord would only extend his hand to one who achieved feats on the lowest floors of the Tower that an ordinary Hunter could never accomplish. Jeong Hyeon-su’s fist, seeking to obtain that true quality of the Overlord, clashed with Ling Wehao.
BANG!
Ling Wehao kicked up from the tips of his feet. Jeong Hyeon-su let the attack flow past by bending his waist back, then immediately thrust out a straight punch.
Ling Wehao’s upper arm jammed the attack aside, and a headbutt came in.
It was called Overlord, not foolishness.
Jeong Hyeon-su let the attack flow, then drew a circle so that even that movement would preserve its recoil. Using the centrifugal force, he counterattacked in the form of a penetrating fist.
THOOM!
Even in the middle of a fierce head-on exchange where they traded blows with all their strength, Jeong Hyeon-su felt a resonance somewhere in his soul.
The Tyrant Heaven Energy within his body. The Heavenly Tyrant Ghost King Art itself, which had stayed with him as a half-complete thing his entire life, felt as though it was being drawn toward something.
‘It is coming.’
Jeong Hyeon-su had only just properly entered martial arts, and on his first Tower climb, he was fighting an opponent he absolutely should not have been able to face.
WOOOOOO.
‘No, it is not coming.’
Jeong Hyeon-su soon felt something.
It was awakening.
Something that would fill the deficiency he had longed for so desperately.
A little more.
It was still not enough.
At first glance, he might have seemed lost in selflessness, but his eyes alone followed Ling Wehao coldly, and he unleashed the Heavenly Tyrant Ghost King Art from the front with even stronger Tyrant Heaven Energy.
“Urgh!”
Driven by a sense of crisis, Ling Wehao also unleashed an even fiercer attack. Both of them revealed their full power against each other.
In a way, they seemed like equals, but the one facing Ling Wehao, who was above Gold Rank, was Jeong Hyeon-su, who was nothing more than a rookie.
Though he did not show it, Jeong Hyeon-su was suffering from pain as his joints came out of place and his flesh tore.
‘Just a little more.’
But the more it happened, the clearer the sensation became. His survival instinct was telling him that he had to grasp this.
It was difficult. He had no strength left even to extend his hand.
Even so, he had to do it. For himself. For revenge. For his family. There was something he had to obtain.
Jeong Hyeon-su did what he had always done. Even when driven to the extreme, he had always struggled like this, wrung himself dry, and landed a blow on his opponent.
In that instant, he felt power welling up.
‘It is here.’
Jeong Hyeon-su immediately drew out his Illusory Heaven True Energy and outright seized the power that was lingering around him.
[…Huh?]
Had it not been said that a choice was not something received, but something made?
Having forcibly drawn out the surging power, Jeong Hyeon-su immediately condensed it and released it.
THOOM-BANG!
Ling Wehao slid backward from the fist Jeong Hyeon-su thrust out.
Unable to fully neutralize the attack, he had gathered mana in both feet, but he had still been sent flying back.
Ling Wehao’s expression went blank.
“I was… pushed back?”
It was desperate power born from the complete release of his strength and even the burning away of his reason. A brat like that should never have been able to withstand it, let alone strike back.
Yet he had produced this result with pure power alone.
His internal body should have been wrecked by the heat, and his bones and muscles should undoubtedly have been damaged.
He should have had no choice but to lack absolute power and realm, so where had that strength come from?
‘What is that?’
Even in the meantime, something about Jeong Hyeon-su had changed.
He was majestic. No, he was endlessly domineering.
A rough, savage foundation, yet an overwhelming dignity that seemed strongly refined.
It felt as though he were facing a divine general who could uproot mountains, and whose aura alone seemed capable of overturning the world.
[The condition has been completed.]
[As a rookie-grade Hunter, you have succeeded in producing a result that should have been absolutely impossible to handle.]
[The contract shall be upheld. O forgotten kings.]
[…One of the kings of the forgotten and exiled has decided to watch you.]
[You temporarily possess the Trait: Overlord’s Talent.]
[The effect of the Trait: Mountain-Uprooting Strength, World-Overturning Spirit is manifesting.]
Jeong Hyeon-su let Ling Wehao’s next attack flow past, then immediately seized him by the neck.
“Guh, guhaaak!”
Ling Wehao could not even resist the grip, whose very level seemed to have changed, and the Tyrant Heaven Energy pouring out from it forcibly extinguished his Blue Flame.
Then Jeong Hyeon-su threw the choking Ling Wehao into the middle of the battlefield.
CRUNCH!
Those who had once lost their names did not miss the appetizing prey that had fallen before their eyes.