CREEEEEEAK—!!
The enormous iron gate opened, and we entered the Demonic Cult. I forced down my tension as I watched the slowly widening gap between the doors.
The sight before me was intense, in a sense. They had carved out a vast mountain range and raised buildings there, and the pillars thrust up here and there to support them all looked impossibly heavy.
Powerful.
It was different from the refinement and scale the Murim Alliance displayed.
The Demonic Cult’s violent roughness had its own charm. It was funny that I was explaining it like this, though.
It really is impressive.
So this was what the inside looked like. I had not paid much attention to the outside because they kept repairing it.
[Not bad.]
The Heavenly Demon’s impression did not seem poor either. Even I saw it that way, and judging from the Heavenly Demon’s reaction, it did not seem to be exactly the same place as before.
It looked like they had done a certain amount of organizing inside.
As we walked along the well-maintained road, the person at the front turned back and spoke.
It was Gu An, elder of the Holy Cult and the man called Demon Command.
“What do you think? Quite decent, is it not?”
“......Yes. It’s magnificent.”
“Kk-k-k. The artisans of the Holy Cult are working hard to build it back up.”
His attitude was so calm that it was hard to believe he had killed someone just moments ago.
He was proudly showing off the Holy Cult, but the attitude he had displayed earlier dulled the effect of that pride.
“I would like to show you all of it, but I must apologize that I cannot, given the eyes of others.”
“By the eyes of others, you mean?”
“The elder old men are all greedy, you see. They will not much like that I came out alone. And.”
Gu An’s gaze shifted behind me. He was looking at Sword Emperor, who was walking close to me.
“That frightening gentleman over there bothers me as well. Do not glare at me so. At this rate, you may cut off my head.”
“That would not be especially difficult.”
“Ho-ho-ho. Still frightening as ever.”
Gu An started to continue forward, then seemed to remember he still had something to say and turned back again.
“Severing Demon.”
[......Yes, Elder.]
“Go to Flower Garden Bridge. Wait there.”
[Understood.]
The moment Severing Demon heard the elder’s order, she vanished. The feeling of command was nearly absolute.
The road was long, but not endlessly far.
When we drew close to a towering building, Gu An spoke.
“Go inside. I have seen you now, so my guidance ends here.”
People were already waiting inside. They seemed to be there to guide us.
“We greet the honored guests.”
“Well then, I shall see you again later.”
Gu An waved and disappeared. For a Demonic Cultist, he looked quite relaxed. It made me wonder whether the Demonic Cult I had imagined was different from reality.
No way.
I had already witnessed that savage, cruel hand of his. I understood that he was not simply some relaxed and freewheeling existence.
An absolute master. A being on the level of those beyond heaven.
That was what I had felt.
And there was not much that could be called guidance after that. They had simply brought us to the residence prepared inside the Demonic Cult.
“We will see you later. Please unpack, and after a short while, we will escort you to Shadowless Pavilion.”
After giving that explanation, they disappeared.
Shadowless Pavilion? Was it a place where guests were received?
Once we arrived at the residence and the Demonic Cultists vanished, the others loosened the tension from their bodies.
“......So it feels like this?”
“Huaaah......”
Peng Dojun looked around as if fascinated, while Poison Dragon and Cloud Dragon let out the breaths they had been holding.
Yu Yeon was......
She doesn’t seem especially interested.
As always, she did not pay attention to other matters. I had been worried about something, so that was a relief.
I was worried she might react.
Perhaps because I suppressed the Heaven-Slaying Star near her from time to time, it was not showing. I had wondered whether she might be provoked by something here, but fortunately, that did not seem to be the case.
That aside.
I looked toward Sword Emperor now.
“Elder.”
“What is it?”
“That old man we met earlier. Gu An. What kind of person is he?”
“.......”
Anyone who was not a fool could tell that he and Sword Emperor knew each other. At my words, Sword Emperor’s eyes shifted slightly.
“A bizarre bastard.”
“......A bizarre bastard.”
“Yes. If we are talking about strength, he is one of the strongest. He certainly was back then as well.”
“By back then, do you mean during the Orthodox-Demonic War?”
“That’s right. There was a time when not only the Eight Demons of that generation, but the elders as well entered the war. Gu An. That bastard—”
Sword Emperor paused for a moment, then narrowed his eyes and finished.
“I am certain I killed him. I cut off his head, so how is he alive?”
“.......”
Sword Emperor declared that he had killed him. His words were sincere. I could tell just by looking at his eyes.
He killed him.
Sword Emperor had killed Gu An. Yet Gu An was alive and well right now.
What was going on? I narrowed my eyes and thought.
Sky-Crushing Palace?
The first thing that came to mind was, of course, the Heretic Cult Leader and the bastards called Sky-Crushing Palace in the Central Plains. I wondered if they had pulled some trick.
I don’t know yet.
There was no visible difference or change. If they were Sky-Crushing Palace’s people, I should have glimpsed some kind of energy, but there was none of that either.
What is it?
I still did not know what had happened.
“In any case, you’re saying he is an alien sort of existence.”
“More or less.”
“......Hmm.”
The existence called Gu An felt distant somehow. Most absolute masters were like that, but perhaps because he was a Demonic Cultist, that feeling was even stronger.
A dangerous man.
I could feel that.
To begin with, this place called the Demonic Cult is like that.
The greatest sense of wrongness I felt the moment we arrived was this:
Why is the spiritual energy so deep here?
The thing I felt as soon as I entered the Demonic Cult was spiritual energy.
The spiritual energy in the air was extremely dense.
That kind of thing was usually only possible at Mount Tai, where a mountain god resided, or in a place where a guardian spirit existed.
But here.
It was Mount Tai, yes, but this was terrain where life could hardly exist. It was closer to a rocky mountain and cliffs, so how could life exist here?
And yet sacredly deep, heavy spiritual energy was spread throughout the entire Demonic Cult.
Every time I breathed in and out, I could feel a difference in my body.
[Enjoy it. It comes from the Holy Cult’s product that exists in the depths of the Demonic Cult.]
Perhaps the Heavenly Demon had read my thoughts, because he explained.
The Holy Cult’s product?
What is that?
[If you wish to know, become the Heavenly Demon. Then you will know.]
......Then I don’t need to know.
I lightly ignored him and moved. There was no need to hear more.
To sum things up.
The elder called Gu An was someone Sword Emperor had killed, yet he was alive and perfectly fine.
In the midst of that, now that we had come to the Holy Cult, what we had to do was......
Do we need to enter something like their Assembly Hall?
Whether there was something else we needed to do would have to be confirmed now that we were in the Demonic Cult.
What each side pursued was different too.
The biggest problem is......
The fact that the Young Cult Leader had not perfectly seized power. The greatest problem was that this was not a space where everything followed his will.
How will this turn out?
As I kept arranging my plans and smacked my lips—
“We greet the honored guest. You have waited long.”
The scheduled time had arrived.
“We will escort you to Shadowless Pavilion.”
*****
After the meeting ended, Gu An returned to his room.
Rustle.
As soon as he arrived, he stripped off the clothes he had been wearing. They had been terribly stifling. After that, he took the side of his neck in one hand and applied a little pressure.
Crack.
His stiff muscles reacted and made a sound.
“Mm. Now I feel alive.”
Gu An smiled as if refreshed. A clear scar was visible on his neck.
“Well, well. To think I would see that man again.”
Sword Emperor.
The man who had once cut off his head.
He remembered the monster who had cut through the sky and slaughtered countless Demonic Cultists.
When Sword Saint and the Heavenly Demon had been engrossed in battle, overturning heaven and earth—
Sword Emperor had massacred the elders and the Eight Demons, trying to help win the war.
The slaughter he had displayed then still made Gu An’s palms sweat.
Perhaps the person Demonic Cultists fear most is......
Perhaps it was not Sword Saint, but Sword Emperor. The path he had shown truly contained that much cruelty.
But.
Why had Sword Emperor, who had disappeared after the war ended, come all the way here?
When Gu An had first heard the report, he had not believed it.
So when he heard they had arrived, he went to see for himself.
It really was him.
It really was Sword Emperor. Gu An had been more curious about Sword Emperor than about Sword Saint’s inheritor.
Even if he is Sword Saint’s inheritor.
That was because Gu An had been certain he would be inferior to Yoo Cheongil.
But my certainty keeps being shattered again and again.
It had been true with Sword Emperor.
It was true when he saw that child called Moon Hero as well.
A monster has given birth to a monster.
He felt it the instant he saw him. His pressure and bearing were refined.
Gu An had heard the boy had just barely passed twenty. Yet his pressure did not fall behind even when compared to absolute masters.
It was an absurd fact. He had entered the ranks of absolute masters at that age?
Even the Young Cult Leader was bizarre enough.
The Young Cult Leader, who had claimed to be of the Heavenly Demon’s bloodline, possessed talent that horrified every Demonic Cultist and elder, as if proving that claim.
But compared to that Young Cult Leader.
Moon Hero looked stronger. And not only stronger.
His mind......
It was firm. Gu An could tell that the other younger-generation prodigies of the orthodox faction were outstanding, but in the end, they were still younger-generation prodigies.
What is that child?
Moon Hero alone was different.
As if he stood in another space by himself, he possessed more rational judgment and a sharper energy sense.
He was so fascinating that I played a small prank.
Gu An had released a faint pressure, wondering whether Moon Hero would sense it.
The one who reacted first at that place was naturally Moon Hero.
The way he responded as if he would immediately draw his sword was splendid.
At the same time, the eyes with which he judged the situation were not something Gu An dared evaluate carelessly.
A great talent.
A genius.
There ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) was something there that resembled Sword Saint, with the violence removed.
What a pity.
Truly a pity.
That child should have been a talent of the Demonic Cult.
If he had been—
The position of Young Cult Leader would have been his.
Perhaps a different Young Cult Leader would have been born, not the one they had now. To Gu An, who did not support the current Young Cult Leader, that was deeply regrettable.
And—
Sword Emperor’s concern for him, too.
Gu An knew that when he had tried to threaten the child, Sword Emperor had attempted to unleash his full power.
For what? That selfish Sword Emperor, who cared only about himself? The reason was obvious.
You covet him too.
He desired the inheritor Sword Saint had left behind. It was obvious. Anyone with eyes could not possibly fail to understand the value that child possessed.
“Ha-ha-ha.”
Gu An laughed.
A child coveted by all beings beyond heaven. He was nothing less than the eye of the storm piercing through the age.
Therefore—
“I will have to eliminate him.”
He had to kill him.
Gu An’s eyes gleamed coldly.
If he could not obtain him, he had to remove him. He was an obstacle to the Holy Cult’s revival.
It did not matter who became Young Cult Leader.
But that child must disappear.
Another Sword Saint must not be allowed to appear.
Gu An decided to remove that child.
Faster than anyone else.
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