The Undefeatable Swordsman

Chapter 34. Twin Swords of the Wind and Clouds (9)

Chapter 34. Twin Swords of the Wind and Clouds (9)

Chae Noh-Cheol looked back in surprise.

“Who the hell are you? Huh?”

Song Woo-Moon was walking over to them, having jumped over the Leebi Guild’s courtyard wall.

As soon as he entered the hall of the Leebi Guild, Woo-Moon realized what had happened as he saw Jo Mu-Jae and the others under the control of Chae Noh-Cheol and Chae Young-Ryong’s underlings.

He glared over at the father-son duo and spoke with venom.

“You dare try to poison my family?”

As he saw Woo-Moon standing alive before them, Noh-Cheol’s mind fell into disarray.

However, he was already riding the tiger, and there was no getting off. All he could do was steel his resolve.

‘Seeing that the Palm Emperor and the others are nowhere to be seen, they must have already been poisoned. I’m already past the point of no return. I have to see this through to the end.’

According to what his son had told him, Song Woo-Moon supposedly had great martial skills. However, Noh-Cheol assumed there was a limit to how strong he could be. After all, didn’t they say that the fist was weaker than the brain?

Reminding himself of that phrase, Noh-Cheol was about to call the attack before he noticed that his son and the warriors had all turned pale.

‘These bastards are already terrified!’

Seeing the warriors’ morale had plummeted, Noh-Cheol shouted with vigor, “What the hell are you doing?! Don’t you all already know there’s no turning back?! Are you going to stand there like idiots? That bastard is here alone! He’ll bleed if you cut him and he’ll die if you stab him! Wake the hell up and attack!”

At the words ‘there’s no turning back,’ a venomous glint appeared in the warriors’ eyes. They gripped their swords even tighter and rushed toward Woo-Moon, letting out fearsome roars.

However, Woo-Moon, merely amused by their determination, smiled coldly. “Well, you’re not wrong...”

He suddenly leaned forward and darted at the opponents.

“Shall we test out how that works, then?”

He swung his sword at the two warriors in front of him.

As he used the North Wind technique, his sword moved without the slightest warning, severing the tendons of the warriors’ wrists in one cut.

“Aaaargh!”

Crack!

As screams erupted, Woo-Moon quickly kicked two other warriors standing behind him, their wrist bones also shattering with a terrible sound. Like a wasp diving into a swarm of bees, he then proceeded to trample on all of the warriors of the Leebi Guild. He was a fierce beast, a beast with an impenetrable hide and fangs that could cut an enemy in half.

Every stroke of his sword brought down not one enemy, but three or four of them, and they grabbed their wrists simultaneously as they collapsed in pain.

With this simple injury, their lives as warriors—no, even their lives as normal people came to an end.

In the first place, the disparity between their skills was so great that it was embarrassing to even call it a fight. It was more like a great lightning-wielding Bodhisattva descending from heaven to smite down a newborn baby.

Woo-Moon quickly subdued all the warriors who had attacked him, all with their wrist tendons cut or their wrist bones shattered.

“Well, I think that does it. Now, do you still feel like bullying a lonely young man?”

“You... you crazy...!”

Had it taken him half an hour? No—it didn’t seem to have taken even half of that time.

A single Song Woo-Moon had easily taken down thirty warriors in that short time.

As Woo-Moon slowly approached him with a bloody sword in hand, Noh-Cheol stumbled backward.

“It must have been you and your son who gave the order to kill my family, right? I guess we can’t just end things by crippling your hands, then.”

Woo-Moon had already made up his mind to take lives today.

“FIIIIIIIGHT!!!!”

As he walked forward, unexpected cheers resounded from all directions as hundreds of people dressed in black and masked stormed through the main gate and jumped over the wall simultaneously.

An exceptionally large man among them was swinging a three-section staff. “Chae Noh-Cheol! Hand over the Luminous Night Pe—Huh?”

Gwak Bu-Dan, the masked man with the three-section staff and the Hall Master of the Guan-Un Martial Hall, looked around the hall in confusion.

“What the hell is this? What happened here?”

As Bu-Dan muttered to himself in surprise, one of the masked men standing next to him asked, “Hall Master Gwak, what is going on?”

The man who spoke was Yeop Gu-Saeng, the Hall Master of the Tiger Martial Hall. While smaller than the Gwan-Un Martial Hall, this martial arts school still held considerable power.

Bu-Dan, who had felt burdened by the prospect of having to not only betray Noh-Cheol—an acquaintance he saw every day—but also kill and rob many people, had turned to Gu-Saeng to share the burden and raid the Leebi Guild together.

With their eyes only seeing the great treasure that was the Luminous Night Pearl, they quickly conscripted the mercenaries they knew and gathered all of the disciples that were loyal to them, about a hundred people in total. In a very short time, they had already gathered at the gate of the guild.

Woo-Moon was also surprised by their sudden appearance.

“Luminous Night Pearl? What are you talking about?”

While he stood there murmuring to himself, Noh-Cheol realized the newcomers’ identity and purpose right away. He shrewdly pointed his finger at Woo-Moon and shouted, “That... that bastard stole the Luminous Night Pearl from me!”

Hearing that, Bu-Dan and Gu-Saeng’s eyes shone.

"What are you all doing? Catch and kill him!"

When Noh-Cheol confirmed that Bu-Dan and Gu-Saeng were running at Woo-Moon, he immediately bolted in the opposite direction..

“Huh? Father!”

Unlike his father, Young-Ryong was standing too close to Woo-Mun and couldn’t do a single thing. As he called out to his father in bewilderment, Woo-Moon frowned and thrust his sword.

“How could a father really abandon his son and flee like this? Tsk.”

Struck by Woo-Moon's sword, Young-Ryong fell backward, blood spraying from his punctured forehead.

Shing!

Woo-Moon drew the decorative sword hanging from the dying Young-Ryong’s waist and threw it toward the fleeing Noh-Cheol.

“Ugh!”

In the end, Noh-Cheol, who had tried so hard to preserve his life through any means possible, breathed his last as he looked down at his son’s sword piercing his chest.

Seeing Woo-Moon’s decisive actions, Bu-Dan and Gu-Saeng’s group all froze for a moment, and it was only then that the two Hall Masters really took the time to look at Woo-Moon.

‘Who the hell is that guy? Huh? Wait a moment. Now that I look at him, doesn’t he look familiar?’

As the two Hall Masters wondered who he was, Gwak Gyeom, who was also among the masked crowd, suddenly recognized him and shouted, “Huh? You’re the idiot from the Deungpyeong Inn!”

‘The idiot?’

Only after Gwak Gyeom’s scream did Bu-Dan and Gu-Saeng seem to remember who he was. The young man before them was the idiot they would meet from time to time whenever they went to Unhan, the one who always walked around with a blank expression.

‘But why is he here? No, forget about why he’s here, that idiot just killed Noh-Cheol and Young-Ryong?! Just what the hell is going on?!’

Although they didn’t know what had happened, the two Hall Masters were relieved that the person standing before them was that famous idiot.

Even so, the image he had just shown them was completely different from their expectations, so the two Hall Masters secretly took a step back in fear as they cried out to their subordinates.

“Kill that idiot right now! Whoever slits his throat will be given a gold tael!”

As soon as they gave this command, their subordinates rushed forward without hesitation to kill Woo-Moon, going so far as to climb over each other to earn the gold tael.

At the irritating word ‘idiot,’ Woo-Moon frowned.

“Shut up! If you’re not even going to pretend not to know me, then why the hell did you bother with the masks?!”

As if getting angry alongside him, Eun-Ah cried out from his chest pocket.

“Growl!”

At the same time, Woo-Moon took a step forward and twisted his hips.

“Ugh!”

“Argh!”

The three masked assailants at the forefront of the crowd rushing toward him grabbed their wrists at the same time and fell down.

Then, as he was rushing forward to meet the masked assailants, Woo-Moon suddenly stepped back as something flashed across his mind. He climbed the stair railing and shot a question at Bu-Dan and Gu-Saeng.

“Wait, why are you here again? Did you come to steal that lecherous night herb or whatever? So what, did you really intend to kill all of the people of the Leebi Guild for it?”

Woo-Moon’s question had come out of the blue, and Bu-Dan was already well enraged at the fact that three of his favored disciples had been crippled in such a manner.

“You madman! Fine, yes, I came to kill them all! You will die here too!”

Facing this threat, Woo-Moo’s expression actually relaxed as he went down the stairs.

“Really? Alright, then. That means I don’t have to feel bad about what I’m about to do.”

Woo-Moon’s figure faded and he disappeared from view.

“Huh? Where did that bastard go?”

Gu-Saeng looked over to where many of his subordinates had gathered.

“Over there!” he shouted.

Using the Divine Phantasm Step to the limit, Woo-Moon landed in the midst of the enemies as he swung his sword dazzlingly around him.

Countless Raging Wind, Heavy Rain, and North Wind blasts flew through the air in every direction. The only technique he omitted was Cold Snow, as it wasn’t suitable for fighting such a large number of unskilled assailants.

In an instant, dozens of people collapsed with blood spraying out of their wrists.

~~~~

The Luminous Night Pearl was a rare jewel, and its price was astronomical. Even a single one could allow one to live a comfortable, carefree life. However, even though he was blinded by his intense greed for this jewel, Bu-Dan began to acknowledge that something was strange.

‘This... this doesn’t feel like it will turn out well.’

The forces brought by Gwak Bu-Dan and Yeop Gu-Saeng were unquestionably of a higher caliber than the warriors of the Leebi Guild.

However, just as they could easily overpower the guild’s warriors, Woo-Moon could also overpower them all by himself as easily as taking a stroll. Before five minutes had even passed, forty of their ranks had become crippled and dropped their weapons.

‘This... this damned bastard. He still has that much concentration to spare while he’s fighting at that speed?’

Woo-Moon hadn’t killed a single person outside of Chae Noh-Cheol and Chae Young-Ryong, a fact that Bu-Dan and Gu-Saeng now belatedly realized.

They both knew it was more difficult to take down an enemy by only aiming for their wrists and crippling them than it was to kill them directly. However, Woo-Moon was not only doing it to a large group of people, but also at a ridiculous speed.

Woo-Moon had been the village idiot, the kind that one could find in any old town. Because such a stupid fellow was their opponent, the two Hall Masters were too late in judging his strength.

The same went for Bu-Dan’s son, Gwak Gyeom.

‘What...what the hell is with that bastard? It hasn’t even been a month. How could he change so drastically?’

Not even a month ago, Gwak Gyeom had roughly shoved the idiot, who had bumped into him, and sent him tumbling on the ground.

Was he supposed to believe such an idiot had changed like this? Gwak Gyeom knew that it was normal for people to change, but was something this drastic even possible?

“Aaaagh!”

“Ugh!”

“Nooooo!”

“Ugh!!”

Screams filled the room for a while. Eventually, when the sounds of flesh being cleaved ceased, Woo-Moon was the only one that still stood upright, among a crowd of masked assailants who were rolling on the ground, groaning.

He looked at the three people standing still at the entrance—Gwak Bu-Dan, Yeop Gu-Saeng, and Gwak Gyeom.

“These guys followed you because they were ordered to, but you bastards are the masterminds, right? Well, allow me to treat you the way you deserve.”

Bu-Dan looked over at his son and Gu-Saeng.

‘I refuse to die!’

The situation had already reached the point where it could no longer be solved unless one party died. And it sure as hell wasn’t going to be the three of them.

“You’ll be the one to die!” Bu-Dan said as he made the first move, swinging his three-section staff from a distance.

‘Cold Snow!’

Woo-Moon's sword slid down the first part of the three-section staff like a snowflake floating in the wind, and when the edge reached the chain links, Woo-Moon flicked the sword, wrapping the chain around the blade and swinging it wide.

As if Woo-Moon’s sword was manipulating the three-section staff, the staff clashed with Gu-Saeng and Gwak Gyeom’s swords at the same time.

Clang!

Bu-Dan was trying his best not to let go of the three-section staff, but the shock tore the skin on his hands; Gu-Saeng and Gwak Gyeom, whose weapons had been struck by the three-section staff, suffered the same fate, and blood flowed down their wrists.

“Ugh!”

However, that wasn’t the end of it.

Right in front of the three of them, Woo-Moon suddenly faded into nothingness.