Chương 776: Severing Mountain

Kugugugu!!

While I look at the gate of Lianshan City and fall briefly into a sentimental mood...

Kugugugugu!

Something moves in the far distance.

It is a manor.

It seems to be the manor of the Choi family, the richest in Lianshan City.

Dududu— Gwak Am lifts the entire manor out with one hand.

The energy remaining to Gwak Am is at the Qi Refining level.

Matching that Qi Refining-level strength, I also limit my power.

With the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flag undone, my powers fuse even more and become one, and energy rises.

My energy is currently at the Integration stage.

However, I cram all that Integration stage strength elsewhere and aim my sword at Gwak Am with strength at the Qi Refining level equal to his.

"Are you taking pity?"

"... I need to pay attention to the situation outside, you see."

Words are unnecessary.

Kugugugugu!!

With the energy I barely recovered, I wrap my whole body and create a Heavenly Pillar (天柱) that heads for the sky of the Head Realm.

The recovered spiritual energy becomes a pillar that connects Heaven and Earth.

Wo-woong— The huge Heavenly Pillar that pierces through the firmament of the Head Realm goes straight outside the Head Realm.

It takes root in the battlefield of my and Gwak Am's main bodies.

Immediately after, I bloom a sensory domain over that battlefield and synchronize a part of my mind with my main body.

Kugugugugu!!

'In a contest of strength... my main body loses.'

The power of Kim Young-hoon that dwells in my main body has waned. Even if some energy arose as the Northern Dipper Sealing Immortal Flag was released...

The opponent is the Great Mountain Supreme Deity Gwak Am.

He shouts as if it is a waste to consume the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea, but in truth his Corpse Mountain Blood Sea is a limitless storehouse, so my main body is gradually being pressed down and crushed.

Even without Gwak Am's main personality, the personalities of the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea, which can be called sub(副)-personalities, move Gwak Am's body, and consuming themselves, press my whole body with a great mountain.

In the fight between us who split personalities and made them into consciousness bodies, the fight is in my favor, but in the fight between our main bodies, I am being pushed back.

Dududududu!!!

Even though my Ender comrades help, the sheer weight class of the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea lets it ignore all the authorities of the Enders, and the main body of the Great Mountain Supreme Deity crushes my main body.

And Gwak Am laughs, perhaps reading something from my bearing.

''My main body seems to be winning, right?"

"That's right. You are winning."

"I wonder who is being forced more into a short match. Heh heh... Now..."

Kugugugugu!

Smiling faintly while holding the manor, the Great Mountain Supreme Deity throws the manor at me.

Jjeeooong!

As with the situation between the main bodies, I am pinned under the manor like a giant mountain.

"I will crush you to death!!!"

And I look at the sword held in my hand.

'Lend me your strength. Everyone...'

With the silver-white sword in hand, I swing the sword as is.

Huuuu...

I exhale.

Breathe.

Why do all cultivation methods including every internal energy method begin by learning 'breath'?

Why does the mysterious power called Qi follow one's 'breath' and dwell in us?

'Qi is intent. Intent is fate.'

When Qi, Soul, and Fate are one.

To imbue Qi is the same as to infuse Soul and Fate.

How can a person, with just the breath by which we breathe and live, even imbue fate?

I exhale and breathe the answer I think of into the sword.

'Because breath... is what a living being can exchange the most with another existence.'

Food is eaten periodically.

Water is drunk more frequently but still is taken periodically.

However, if one does not always breathe, one dies.

Always.

The most basic movement that a human can control, while being able to exchange with the world at all times.

That is precisely breath.

In other words...

Be it Qi (氣) or Fate (命).

All of it dwells in the exchanging and communicating between the world and me.

'If I control breath.'

I can connect with the world.

I can know the world.

I can know others.

I hear it.

In the present world where I shut off Void Perception, Spirit Perception, Nether Perception, Star Vein Eye, and Fetal Movement all together, I begin to hear the breathing of other existences.

Even the manor that Gwak Am throws down to crush me has breath.

'The place where the connection of breath is weak...'

I sever it as is.

A meager strength no more than the Qi Refining stage.

Breathing that power into the sword, I extend a single stroke.

Chwaaaaa!!

The manor gets cleaved clean through.

Originally, the sword should not be able to endure the impact and should shatter, but the sword of Sword Spear endures for me.

'This is a sword forged from a Heavenly Lord.'

And this is a sword in which my friend dwells.

No matter what I do, it will not break.

Beyond the manor, Gwak Am thrusts a fist.

But I very naturally bring the sword tip to Gwak Am's fist, then, using redirection, I let his very body flow and twist the trajectory.

"You!"

'I hear it.'

By now the body structure of the Fighting Ghost Race is becoming familiar in my head.

Because it differs from the body structure of a human, and because my superhuman consciousness domain and thought-acceleration ability are gone, the analysis took some time.

However, I start to face Gwak Am having perfectly seen through his body structure.

'Eleven combat spines.'

Even Jin Wol-ryeong of royalty did not have so many of the Fighting Ghost Race's unique physiological feature called the 'combat spine.'

In addition to the basic spine, there are two spines in each arm.

Two in each leg.

One spine that crosses not the back but between the internal organs.

And one on each side that, from the medulla, crosses the ribs vertically on both sides and additionally reinforces the ribs.

Kaang!!

My sword sinks into Gwak Am's forearm.

But besides the arm bones, the combat spines that protect the arm two each deflect my sword.

Yet I do not panic, and I quickly circle behind and rip out Gwak Am's basic spine.

As one spinal cord gets torn free, Gwak Am exhales a groan.

"Geuaaaaaa!"

But even with the spinal cord cut, he moves his body using the combat spines and grabs hold of the city wall of Lianshan City.

Jjeojeojeojeok!!

The city wall gets torn out.

Gwak Am lifts the wall and swings it toward me.

'The greatest characteristic of the Fighting Ghost Race.'

Even if you cut the spinal cord, as long as the combat spines remain, the body moves.

Therefore, to neutralize movement against the Fighting Ghost Race, you have no choice but to grasp all the positions of the combat spines and sever them.

Kugugugu!

Sensing the breath of the city wall flying toward me, I directly cut through the gap between the breaths, fly to Gwak Am, and feel his attack.

'I feel it.'

At this moment when he has fallen into a mortal body, he has no possibility of defeating me.

'What is called Martial Arts (武) is the will of mortality (必滅).'

Because it is certain to perish, it is instead the strongest.

Gigigigik— Listening to the grinding sound from Gwak Am's muscles, I calculate all of his attack routes.

Not only humans but all living beings make sounds from their muscles as well.

That sound is too faint, so ordinary people simply cannot hear it.

Therefore, if you just listen to that sound, and recognize what each sound means, Then you can complete a flawless response technique like Heavenly Clothes Without Seams (天衣無證).

While I fought Gwak Am, I grasped his entire body structure.

And in this moment when I discerned all the sounds coming from his muscles, he lost the possibility of defeating me.

Tudududududu!!

A vicious claw technique rips through the four directions.

The city wall gets torn into the shape of the claw technique, and the houses inside Lianshan City collapse.

But I burrow through the gaps between the shockwaves of that brute strength and, through optimal responses, find his openings.

And at last, Cheok— One of the artifacts I obtained in the Sea Dragon Palace.

Gripping a stake made from a Sea Dragon King's 'tooth', the Sea Dragon Spike (海龍丁), in my hand, I seize the optimal chance and, through the handle, drive it into Gwak Am's forearm.

Jjeooooong!!

As the Sea Dragon Stake lodges in his forearm, it smashes two combat spines at once.

"Hmph, this kind of thing..."

Gwak Am snorts, but his gaze sours.

If he pulls it out immediately, regeneration is possible together with the combat spines, but if it keeps staying lodged, there is no way for them to regenerate.

And there is no way I would just sit by and let him pull it out.

I keep pressing the offensive against him.

Tudududududu!!

We trade offense and defense while smashing the interior of Lianshan City.

'Lightly.'

I use Mountain Lord Transcending Peaks Flight.

At this very moment, I am the Mountain Lord.

'Nimbly.'

Gwak Am's claw technique targets me.

If by even a single chi I misstep.

If by even a single span I move my head a little more.

By the aftershock of that dragon-shaped claw technique, my whole body will be torn apart.

Gwak Am, by the mere aftereffects of his movements alone, turns Lianshan City to powder.

'Faster!'

I make my body endlessly light and trade dances with him.

Kaang— Then, I begin to drive all twenty-two, made as pairs, of the Sea Dragon Stakes into his whole body.

A Sea Dragon Stake lodges in Gwak Am's left shoulder and breaks one combat spine.

Right knee, a Sea Dragon Stake smashes a combat spine.

Left ribs. I try to drive in three Sea Dragon Stakes, but two shatter, and barely one Sea Dragon Stake slips in, barely lodging in a combat spine.

Gradually, stakes begin to lodge in Gwak Am's body.

Severing Mountain Swordsmanship.

Landscape Painting, Deep Mountain and Secluded Valley.

Seven Lights Sunrise Peak.

Flowing Ridge.

With Landscape Painting I break the balance, and with the moves of Deep Mountain and Secluded Valley I slip into his chest and drive in a Sea Dragon Spike.

With Seven Lights Sunrise Peak I block his view. With the move of Flowing Ridge, I cut off his little toe and then drive a Sea Dragon Spike into the right rib.

Center of the back.

Right thigh.

Right scapula.

Gradually the number of spikes sticking into his body increases.

At the same time, as his bodily control drops, his movements grow even larger.

Gwak Am, to cover the openings from his enlarging movements, starts to exert more 'strength' into his hands and feet.

Kugugugung!!

By his claw technique, a mountain near Lianshan City gets shaved away.

By the aftershock alone, the city wall shatters. By the wind pressure made by his movements, a waterspout rises and covers the whole area.

But as the energies he has stored gradually drain away, his realm drops to Qi Refining third star in an instant.

However...

Even when his whole body is almost devoid of energy, each and everyone of his punches still smashes mountains and triggers earthquakes.

"Huuuuup!!"

As Gwak Am inhales air, all the air of the area entirely enters Gwak Am's lungs and the surroundings become a vacuum.

By the pressure difference my whole body is about to swell up, but I quickly make a hole in Gwak Am's lungs and, between the organs, locate the position of the combat spine that runs across the exact center of the body.

'Now, if I just drive this in...'

All of Gwak Am's combat spines will be neutralized.

If that happens, Gwak Am is finished.

I relentlessly shave down Gwak Am's strength and keep aiming for his last remaining combat spine.

One Sea Dragon Spike, struck by the aftershock of Gwak Am's claw technique, breaks.

It must be Seo Hweol's tooth when he reached the Heavenly Being stage, but seeing it break just from the aftershock is enough to make me aghast.

'Two Sea Dragon Spikes remain.'

The spikes I embedded into Gwak Am total sixteen.

If I expend the remaining two, I will completely run out of usable weapons.

I want to make use of things like nails or stakes from the homes of commoners, but the reality is, unless they are at the level of Seo Hweol's tooth, they cannot even pierce the skin of Gwak Am, who has fallen down to mortality at the Qi Refining level.

"Guaaaaaaa!!!"

Gwak Am's roar pushes everything in the vicinity away.

By the roar alone, the earth splits, earthquakes occur, and nearby mountains collapse.

I cut apart the shockwave of the roar and approach.

With two spikes in my left hand, I slowly wait for an opportunity.

'Just as I grasped all of Gwak Am's bodily structure and the sound of his muscles, Gwak Am has also grown familiar with me.'

He is getting a sense of how to deal with me, including the nature of my martial arts.

'The difference in weight class is too great. Now his energy is not even at the level of a cultivator, only a second-rate martial artist. Yet with a single kick he makes a tsunami... with a roar he makes a shockwave of this degree...'

Even after exhausting all his energy, that mutant monster shows Heavenly Being level brute strength with a bare body.

The frightening part is, this body is one made by hastily projecting our consciousness bodies, and thus it is a body made from our deepest consciousness.

My deepest consciousness is tied to Martial Arts, so even when manifested as a consciousness body, it is the body of a mortal somewhat trained by martial arts in the first cycle of regression...

But Gwak Am's deepest consciousness is simply at the level of an adolescent in his mortal being days.

Perhaps because his mother died in his arms around that age, his self from that time is embedded in his deepest consciousness.

And Gwak Am, who has the body of an adolescent, is a body 'with no training at all'.

With a body without any training, he shows the calamity of the Heavenly Being stage.

If it was the body from a time he was properly trained...

He might have shown a myth of collapsing Heaven and Earth with pure bodily strength without using any energy at all.

'But you are... nothing more than a natural disaster.'

Whether it is a storm, a tornado, a tsunami, or a meteor strike...

Gwak Am now is only about that much.

He is a disaster that is fully resistible with the body of a mortal.

Enduring Gwak Am's shockwave with the move of Endless Mountains Beyond Mountains, I slowly approach him and at last bring Gwak Am within my sword range where I can cut him.

Gwak Am seems to notice that too, as he starts to pour all his strength into his hand.

Severing Mountain Swordsmanship.

First Move.

Mountain Lord Transcending Peaks Flight is a movement method optimized for Severing Mountain Swordsmanship, made so it can return infinitely to the first move.

I prepare the stance to unfold the basics of the Severing Mountain Swordsmanship with the momentum of a tiger.

Gwak Am is still larger than me.

No, in fact, if we look at the battle between our main bodies taking place outside the Head Realm...

I cannot defeat Gwak Am.

The one actually losing now is rather my side.

Gwak Am, who consumes the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea, is not someone I can dare defeat.

However, it does not matter.

At least in this very moment...

I, Will surpass that Great Mountain!

"Transcending Peaks!"

A habit from being of the orthodox martial world.

The shouting of technique names, after crossing long and longer years, bursts out at the finale of the battle.

A single restrained horizontal cut.

In response, Gwak Am swings his left arm.

Gwak Am's left arm and the tip of the Sea Dragon Spike lodged in his left arm meet my sword that unfolds the move of Transcending Peaks.

His plan is to use my hand to get rid of the Sea Dragon Spike and regenerate one battle spine in the left arm.

But my sword force bends very gently and slices off only Gwak Am's left hand.

"But you failed to cut the body."

Gwak Am sneers and clenches his right hand.

A gigantic straight fist readies.

An attack aimed at the moment right after I use the move of Transcending Peaks.

If that attack extends, the aftershock alone will crush my body like tofu.

But I smile back.

Answering through Martial Arts is enough.

Fighting Monster Hidden Weapon Technique.

Twin Snake.

The two Sea Dragon Spikes held in my left hand, through the move of the Fighting Monster Hidden Weapon Technique that unfolds before Gwak Am for the first time, shoot toward him.

Originally my specialty is the peerless duplet of sword and hidden weapon.

On top of that, because I even use poison, there was a time when I was given the epithet of Triple Supreme.

Huuuk!

Gwak Am's response is simple.

In an instant, he blows a short breath from his mouth.

A simple 'breath'!

And, with just the breath, the Sea Dragon Spike that is going a little ahead shatters and a hole opens in my body beyond it.

If Gwak Am turns his head and brings the breath's direction to the second Sea Dragon Spike, it will be the end.

But in that moment, the Sea Dragon Spike's trajectory twists.

In midair, the Sea Dragon Spike twists its trajectory like the head of a living snake, avoiding Gwak Am's breath, and flies to the inside of the holes pierced all over his body.

From inside there, toward the last remaining combat spine faintly seen, it shoots.

A throwing technique that twists the trajectory by turning the wrist to give a spin when shooting a hidden weapon!

'But with just that, it won't embed.'

For that mutant half-human half-ghost monster, the power of a mere throw is insufficient!

It probably won't even pierce his rock-like organs.

Therefore!

Hwoong!

I take a step.

I push my body inside Gwak Am's attack range.

And I raise my sword and block Gwak Am's claw technique that attacks me reflexively with beast-like senses.

Kwaak— The Sea Dragon Spike gets wedged in the muscle between the organs inside Gwak Am's body and does not reach the combat spine.

With the sword, I am blocking his claw technique.

Therefore, only the left fist remains.

This fist!

The most primal martial art technique I first learned in this world.

Huuuuup!!

Violence!

That intense fist that once sunk into Jeon Myeong-hoon's face, That primal fist that the Tuho Group's leader planted in my face while burning my house!

It crashes down strongly toward Gwak Am's belly.

My fist strikes the Sea Dragon Spike, and I feel the fingers of my left hand directly shatter.

But with the left hand as a sacrifice, at last the final Sea Dragon Spike rams into the bastard's final combat spine.

''Kuaaaaa!!"

For the first time, from Gwak Am's mouth comes not a roar but a scream.

But the scream is only for a moment.

The bastard starts to laugh.

"Don't be ridiculous!!!"

Kwarururuung!!

The instant I approach right before him.

He shoves me hard.

Even though I smashed eleven spines in total, the bastard is still moving.

Jjeoeeong!!

It is not even a swing, just a shove, yet I am flung away, punch through the outer wall of Lianshan City, and get slammed into a low hill.

Huuk... Huk...

I gasp for breath and regulate the pain with breathing so that my body does not go into shock from the pain.

After that, I use all remaining energy for healing.

If I use the Celestial Pillar that connects outside the Head Realm for healing, everything can regenerate, but I keep the Heavenly Pillar maintained and heal myself to the state where moving is possible.

"... This place is..."

I gasp for breath and look around nearby.

A familiar low hill.

Yeah, this place is...

It is the stronghold of the Tuho Group that plundered everything from my first life.

I stagger and enter the cave where the Tuho Group stayed.

Because Gwak Am devoured all life in the Head Realm into a handful of blood, there is no sign of people, but the traces of their living remain vivid.

I scoop a handful of the drug the Tuho Group's leader usually held in his mouth and bring it to my lips.

The pain subsides.

And...

Soon, from far away, a familiar being starts to walk over.

Kung, Kung, Kung!

It is Gwak Am.

He comes all the way to the Tuho Group's den and blasts away everything from the cave ceiling to the top of the hill.

He, without even thinking to pull out the Sea Dragon Spikes embedded all over his body, looks at where I am.

I stand beside the Tuho Group leader's clothes, and Gwak Am, who looks at the traces of life of this place, mutters curtly.

"I see. So this is where the previous generation lived."

"Previous generation?"

"Well... something like that. The original owner of this Fighting Tiger Claw. Like the dog-bastard he is, even while being sealed into the Head Realm, he seems to live sucking on drugs."

He looks at the drugs rolling around in the Tuho Group's den and sneers as if in contempt, as if chewing and spitting.

I let out a hollow laugh at the unexpected identity of the Tuho Gang's leader.

Perhaps, in my first life, I was plundered by a bigger figure than I thought.

"... I definitely cut all the spines. How are you moving?"

I look at Gwak Am with a dumbfounded face.

Without pulling out a single Sea Dragon Spike, he moves with a far too healthy appearance.

And I soon can know the answer.

"... I see."

Because of the battle between Gwak Am and me, our garments are almost all torn and worn out.

However, that dark-red blood robe, painted with tormented faces and draped over Gwak Am's body, is not completely torn and covers parts of his body.

"... So it is not clothing."

"Hardly necessary to say."

That's right.

His blood robe is not a simple blood robe. It is itself the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea. In other words, a life-form wrapped around him in the form of clothing.

It is only because the Head Realm that Kang Min-hee changed the rules of causing it to be unable to provide full support, but it seems at least possible for it to transmit will throughout the body in place of the severed spines.

"You cannot defeat me."

Gwak Am speaks.

"Your main body is also losing. And though you severed my spines, you did not tear off all the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea wrapped around my body, and you have already exhausted all strength and stamina."

''Well... the fact that our Qi is exhausted is the same for both, isn't it?"

Anyway, both of us have exhausted our energy.

Now both I and Gwak Am are nothing but mortals, not cultivators.

Since there is no way to replenish energy because of Kang Min-hee, we are equal.

"Even in this state, I am of the Heavenly Being level."

Gwak Am swings his fist.

Without energy, regeneration is no longer feasible, so he does not bother to pull out the Sea Dragon Spikes, yet even with an arm embedded thick with Sea Dragon Spikes, he displays an appalling monstrous strength where the shockwave alone blows away a nearby mountain.

"What remains with you? One worn-out iron sword made by catching a single broken Sword Spear Heavenly Lord. Setting aside that weapon... what remains?"

He looks at me and speaks calmly.

"You cannot defeat me. In the fight, I... win."

And I, seeing that, smile.

"You are a Shura."

Only now do I understand why, when combining the Human Race and the Fighting Ghost Race, they are not called 'evil ghost' or 'asura', 'rakshasa', but are called specifically 'shura'.

It seems this too is something that originates from Gwak Am.

Human Race and Fighting Ghost Race.

Why the combination of the Two Evils (二惡) is called is the Shura Race.

That's right.

The existence born from combining the Human Race and Fighting Ghost Race walks the Shura Path as a Shura, thus we are called the Shura Race.

The wickedness of the Human Race.

The fighting spirit of the Fighting Ghost Race.

A monster with the two mixed.

However...

Despite clearly being a Shura, to his mother, he was a child who seemed to [sing of Heaven (गाॐ)].

"What do you mean 'what remains', Shura? It's fun, isn't it."

I smile toward a child who just wanted to be loved by his parents.

While contesting Martial Arts, there is no enmity, no anger, no resentment.

I certainly saw, in the eyes of Gwak Am, who was utterly immersed in the peak of battle with me, that resentment and hatred were not cast down.

A primal joy.

In the moment when the struggle toward life collided, it was the result of our union that mixed together.

"To fight is an extension of pain. But... if one enters a certain degree of contemplation through pain, it takes on a completely new value.''

"... Are you trying to refute my thoughts? Life is nothing but pain..."

"It is the answer you wanted."

"What?"

"It is the answer to why your mother gave you that name."

I give the answer to what Gwak Am asked me.

"The name your mother gave you... it must be pain to you as well. Why did your mother call you warmly, you who gave her pain? Why do you, even while knowing that the name is something designated by the heavens, still not throw it away until now?"

"..."

"Even though she gave birth to you through pain, even though she knew what she gave birth to was a Shura... the reason that she smiled after giving birth to you is probably because it was the first fruit obtained by going beyond pain. And the reason that she smiled before dying is probably because she knew that even if she died, you will keep living."

"What, are you saying she was happy because she knew that through me, her heart would not disappear?"

"That's not it. To give birth to a child is..."

I smile bitterly.

"It is not the actualization of the self. It is a wonder toward new life."

Even if the heart does not disappear, what more does it amount to than the self being maintained?

Parents, even if it is not the preservation of the self, are gladdened by the very existence of their children.

Even if the self ends, how joyous it is for my child to be able to breathe.

How grateful it is to have a family with whom one can exchange breaths with.

"Wonder toward life. Gratitude toward fate. There, only a part of the heart is mixed in."

Life is like Martial Arts.

When you first train, there is nothing as arduous and painful as that, but if you reach a certain degree of contemplation and can 'immerse' yourself, you can gain a sensation like mixing with the opponent.

Therefore,

"Your mother was a martial artist.''

No, perhaps every mother is a martial artist.

"Because she gave birth to you, felt your breath, mixed with you, and came to know the existence that is you."

"..."

''Is a connection anything special? If you meet another and exchange breaths, mix and come to know the other... is that not connection.''

Why is the meeting of people precious?

It is probably because, as people meet, they can embrace each other's empty places.

If cultivation to fill one's own empty place is repentant enlightenment...

Then meeting with people is the highest repentant enlightenment.

"You also know that yourself. Nevertheless, you bury yourself only in the topic of pain and turn your eyes from the truth. But even if you turn your eyes, the truth does not disappear... That is why you cannot dare throw away the name Gwak Am; is that not so!?"

Wo-woong, wo-woong, wooo-woooooong!

Thump thump thump...

My heart beats.

My senses link with the main body, and the heartbeat beating in the main body's chest conveys a certain will.

It is Hyeon Rang's memory.

—An Immortal Title like Cheon Ra (天羅) suits you.

—What, you say you will flip it and call it Ra Cheon (羅天)? Do as you please. But remember.

—The reason I grant you an Immortal Title symbolizing Heavenly Net Earthly Mesh (天羅地網) is because you absolutely cannot escape under the heavens...

—My friend. Even if you forget your true name, that name will never fall away from you. For it is not a name affixed by the heavens, but a name you yourself cling on to. Because you yourself... are the truth you are turning your eyes from.

"Until you face your name and the truth contained in it... you absolutely cannot escape from under the heavens. You cannot perform true repentant enlightenment. And you cannot inherit Master's robe and alms bowl."

Receiving Hyeon Rang's memory, I harden my conviction, walk up to Gwak Am, and reprimand him.

"How, when you cannot even look into your own disgrace, do you force others to repentant enlightenment!?"

"Shut up!!!"

Gwak Am shouts.

"I have sufficiently performed repentant enlightenment on my own shame!!!"

"You cut off the Heart Demon that embodies your own disgrace, made it into the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea, and absorbed it only as authority, did you not?"

"...!"

"Not knowing even your own shame, how do you dare cry out as if you know pain!?"

"What help does shame give in taking revenge on an enemy!? And you. Are you not ashamed for having mocked and toyed with a mortal's life to take revenge on me?"

"I am not ashamed."

"And yet you dare, to me..."

"I intend to die."

I look at the Great Mountain Supreme Deity's Corpse Mountain Blood Sea.

Inside it, I look at Wol Ryeong, who closes her eyes and performs repentant enlightenment.

That child is, to me, the greatest shame.

Therefore, if the grace-and-resentment that stands before me in priority ends, the only thing I can give to that child is but my life!

"Since I have toyed with one person's life, I intend to give my entire life in return."

"Only babbling with your mouth. If you are that ashamed, then right now, hand me your neck!!!"

"I cannot hand it to you."

"Then..."

"To you as you are now, absolutely not!"

And, perhaps realizing something from my words, Gwak Am glares and looks up at the sky.

For a brief moment, a very brief moment, we both set aside our fighting spirit and look up at the sky.

Celestial energy twists out of order.

And...

A hole bores open in the principle of the world.

It is time for what we have been waiting for to come.

Kugugugugugu!!!!

Riding Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens and arriving at a far-off, distant timeline, Oh Hye-seo can see someone.

It is someone who stands firm and reveals himself within the Heavenly Tribulation.

He has shoulders and a chest stronger than anyone's, and he faces the Heavenly Tribulation with his chest out as if there is nothing to be ashamed of under the heavens.

She thinks that the figure resembles Oh Hyun-seok.

That frankness.

That free-spiritedness.

And... courage.

Chuaaaaaaaat!!!

Crossing the timeline, Oh Hye-seo realizes at last that she has reached the 'condition'.

Kwajijijijik., Grabbing the arm of a man who exists in the far past and dragging him into Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens, Oh Hye-seo feels Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens and her own power resonate.

'I see.'

She feels an Oh Hye-seo of another timeline pouring Tainted Soul Filling the Heavens into Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens to complete it.

'From the very beginning, to share power with Tainted Soul Filling the Heavens...'

That is Seo Eun-hyun's Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens.

She feels her selves from countless timelines overlapping upon herself.

And she understands every principle and structure with which the Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens is completed, and she understands all of its background.

And also, whose will it is that is melded within Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens.

'... Seo Hweol...'

Drip, drip-drip...

As Oh Hye-seo grabs the existence called Azure Tiger Saint, she comes to look back upon herself.

For the first time in her life, she comes to do something called 'repentant enlightenment'.

Repentant enlightenment is not merely looking back on evil deeds, but looking back on everything.

The heart she harbors toward Seo Hweol.

All the emotions Seo Hweol held toward her brush past her.

Recalling the far-away time when Seo Hweol gave her only hatred and pain and died, Oh Hye-seo cries.

And she laughs.

She cries because she remembers the pain of that time, and she laughs at the fact that she was so very ignorant.

Seo Hweol and Oh Hye-seo, to themselves.

And to each other... have never been able to be frank and honest.

If they simply spoke the truth.

If they just said they liked each other, it would have been enough.

—Child. Do you want to become honest?

Oh Hye-seo sees something inside Azure Tiger Saint.

It looks like a gigantic monkey, and it also seems like a mountain divine spirit that holds up Heaven and Earth.

—Do you want salvation?

"... I want... salvation."

Oh Hye-seo, to lay down the pain, hatred, and resentment that torments her heart for a long time, begs that existence.

Tsuaaaaaaaat...

Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens, which succeeded in crossing a timeline once, starts to lose power.

It is only natural.

What crossed the timeline is the power of Annihilation Advancement Mu, and to cross once more, someone must use something on par with Annihilation Advancement Mu.

At this rate, she cannot return.

If she stays like this, she will only become a lost child of spacetime and disappear.

But the moment Oh Hye-seo faces the will of Mountain-Destroying Demon Ape inside Azure Tiger Saint, she understands.

Rather than dying as a lost child of spacetime, the most fearful thing is failing to receive salvation because she cannot be honest with her own heart.

"Please... let me meet Seo Hweol again someday... and, when we meet again... help me so I am not ashamed!!"

—Then... is there not something you must do first?

Tsuaaaaaaaat!!

As memories from innumerable timelines flow in, they illuminate Oh Hye-seo's own evil deeds.

Seeing those, she understands.

Yes.

Having not even stood in front of her own grace and resentment, how can she decide to stand in front of the one she loves!?

It will surely not be conveyed,, but she does so in order not to be ashamed before her own heart.

"Sorry... I am... sorry... Seo Eun-hyun."

Toward Seo Eun-hyun and everyone she wronged and sinned against, she shouts.

"I'm sorry...!!!"

It is the moment that apology resounds.

Tsuaaaaaaaat!!

"... Ah...!"

Oh Hye-seo feels [someone] behind the weakening Gracious Soul Filling the Heavens push her back.

That someone is a being filled with starlight.

And in that instant, she at last succeeds in crossing the timeline again with Azure Tiger Saint.

Tsuaaaaaaat!!!

Far away, as she advances toward her original time point, she shoves Azure Tiger Saint into the timeline.

Into the very center of the greatest battlefield.

Deeeeeeeeng!!!

Facing her own shame, Oh Hye-seo attains a complete rank, and at last obtains the rank of Heavenly King.

Oh Hye-seo's dharma form that is nothing more than a Shura changes.

Though its outer appearance may be a Shura, it is no longer a form full of resentment as before.

Deeeeeeng!!

With the sound of the brahma bell, her Heavenly King name begins to be engraved upon one of the Heavenly Thrones of the Mount Sumeru Three Heavens Great Thousand World.

Agate Auspicious Heavenly King (瑪瑙瑞天王).

With auspiciousness in those eyes, the Shura who rises to the rank of a Buddha, together with a peaceful smile, stretches out upon their hand the last fragment of the shame of the Great Mountain Supreme Deity.

Tsuaaaaaaa!!!

Azure Tiger Saint, who is abruptly dragged from another timeline and made to intrude into a great cosmic war, wears a briefly dazed expression.

However, he soon bursts into a hearty laugh.

It is because his disciple Oh Hyun-seok is taking a familiar stance beside him.

"Let's go, Master."

Tsuaaaaaaat!

Protected by Oh Hyun-seok and the ranks of countless divine spirits, Azure Tiger Saint throws his fist without doubt.

"Good. Let's go!!!"

Tsuaaaaaaaat!!!

The wings of Ten Wings and the wings of Zero Wing spread from their backs.

Streaks of silver and purple light stretch out.

The ultimate technique that shakes Heaven and Earth.

The final profundity of the Azure Heaven Creation Sect bursts from their fists and crashes toward the chest of the Great Mountain Supreme Deity's main body.

[Azure Wing Heavenly Shatter!] [Azure Wing Heavenly Shatter!] A flash explodes, and the greatest Heart Demon that sleeps within the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea— Cheong Min opens his eyes.

At last, the sense of shame of the Great Mountain Supreme Deity returns.

"... I feel it."

"Of course."

As if he also receives the influence of his greatest Heart Demon as a split consciousness body, Gwak Am's face grows even redder.

"How is it? Can you finally face it now?"

"... Even so... nothing changes...!"

Gwak Am glares at me.

Those eyes are full of shame he faces for the first time in a long while, but the resolve to bring me down does not die.

"This is the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea I have built up. This is the authority I have accumulated!!"

"..."

"It will not lose to the likes of you...!!!"

Kugugugugu!!!

On Gwak Am's arm, the ferocious momentum of a dragon settles.

And seeing that, I raise my sword.

''Look carefully."

Wo-woong— It is merely an iron sword.

Though I melted the entirety of Sword Spear into it, it is an iron sword with few functions.

However, something else is imbued in that iron sword.

It is something transparent.

"Wh-What...!?"

And my main body, which has been overpowered by the Great Mountain Supreme Deity's main body, for the first time begins to push him back.

Slowly.

But surely!

The power of the Impermanence Sword that coiled around his body begins to flow out of the Great Mountain Supreme Deity and begins to settle in me.

The Impermanence Sword is a double-edged blade even to its master.

And because it always transparently reflects the opposing existence, those who suffer against the Impermanence Sword feel their own sins and die to that Retribution.

That's right.

The side upon which the Impermanence Sword acts even more sharply is the side with strong shame.

It is the side that is even more ashamed.

''The reason you could handle the Impermanence Sword all this time... is simply because you did not know shame...!''

Having regained shame, the Great Mountain Supreme Deity, a lump of karmic retribution, cannot possibly dare to use the Impermanence Sword.

"Now, here I go."

Tsuaaaaaaaaat!!!

Oh Hye-seo's Origin Essence.

The Seat of Severing Evil spews light and begins to judge the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea.

At the same time, having regained the Impermanence Sword, I begin to unfold with all my strength the profundity of the Severing Mountain Swordsmanship.

Severing Mountain Swordsmanship.

Profundity My main body and I, in the same posture, grasp the true Impermanence Sword in our hands and shout vigorously.

:: Severing Mountain!::

"Severing Mountain!"

Kugugugugugu!!!

The sword of Severing Mountain that splits the Great Mountain begins to unfold from human hands.

All the clothing, blood vessels, and tendons clinging to Gwak Am's body begin to be cut away.

The entirety of the Corpse Mountain Blood Sea clinging to the Great Mountain Supreme Deity main body begins to turn into light and fall away within the storm of Severing Mountain.

[TL: Severing Mountain and Severing Evil have the same Hangul so the chapter's title could be interpreted as both Severing Mountain and Severing Evil.]