Chapter 1053

The shock was so great that the world seemed to stop. For an instant, Jin Taekyung forgot to breathe.

At the sight of this guess flashing through his mind—a guess he didn’t want to believe—a corner of his chest throbbed as if he’d been stabbed.

“What happened…?”

“Wait. Just a moment.”

Jin Taekyung had gone still as a statue. Jeok Cheongang seemed to realize something and raised a hand, cutting off the Bow Saint’s question.

Of course he knew every moment counted. A fierce battle was still raging below the hill.

But by now, he and his young Disciple understood each other with a glance. They hardly needed even that. The old Master was certain Taekyung had a reason for stopping, and he was right.

Step. Step.

Though he staggered with exhaustion, Taekyung walked on as if entranced.

The scene ahead drew closer, its details coming into sharp focus.

Shreds of a white robe fluttered in a breeze from somewhere. Nearby lay a small pool of blood.

They were the last traces of someone who had been there. Taekyung reached out with a trembling hand and touched the largest of them.

A woman’s arm and leg, slender and so pale that the veins showed through her skin.

Even now, dark red blood was gushing from their cross sections. They were cut with unbelievable precision, smooth and sharp.

As if the limbs hadn’t been cut off, but separated.

This… definitely wasn’t a wound caused by Force.

At last, faced with the truth, Taekyung let out the breath he’d been holding.

There was no mistaking it. He belonged to two worlds, after all. He was both a Murim martial artist and a Hunter.

That was why he could recognize the marks on the arm and leg, each separated from her body, better than anyone.

“Teleport…”

The word escaped his lips before he knew it. Jeok Cheongang, now beside him, asked with a rigid face, “Tell me it isn’t what this old man thinks.”

Taekyung didn’t answer.

But Jeok Cheongang already knew what his silence meant.

“That bizarre sorcery again. No—Magic?”

Yes. Magic. That damn Magic.

Overcome by a helplessness he couldn’t put into words, Taekyung nodded. Jeok Cheongang’s eyes flashed.

He was already worn down by injuries, both large and small, and by exhaustion. Yet there wasn’t a trace of resignation in those eyes, where flames seemed to pour forth.

“This isn’t the time. Before it’s too late, we need to—”

“It’s already too late.”

“What?”

Taekyung clenched his teeth.

Teleport.

A spatial travel spell notorious for its difficulty, even among the countless kinds of Magic.

Unlike Blink, which was limited to short distances, Teleport could cover dozens¹ or even hundreds of kilometers² at once, depending on the mage’s Grade and how much mana they possessed.

Not hundreds of jang.³ Hundreds of kilometers.

Then how far could Grand Mages, who had reached the limits of Magic, go?

If… every condition were perfect, maybe they could cross half the continent.

Taekyung didn’t know the exact distance. What mattered was that the Grand Mage—a big catch—had already torn through the net and fled far away.

Exhaustion pressed even more heavily on him as he spoke.

“She’s beyond our range. By now, she must be at least dozens of ri⁴ away.”

“What do you mean…!”

Jeok Cheongang’s eyes widened, but he swallowed the rest.

Traveling dozens of ri⁴ in the blink of an eye was beyond anything reason could account for. Yet he already knew such things were possible. He had seen them with his own eyes.

The inexplicable phenomena tied to Dark Heaven. The ghostly power called Magic, which defied both words and common sense.

“Goddamn it!”

Boom!

Jeok Cheongang stamped his foot in fury, and cracks spread across the ground like a spiderweb.

Through the crash came the Bow Saint’s low voice.

“Even if you’re right, she’s lost an arm and a leg. Her life must be in danger. Is there no chance she died?”

Taekyung shook his head weakly.

“I don’t know. But I doubt it.”

“Why?”

“There must be mages there, too—or sorcerers, as they call them here.”

“Then…”

“Yes. She returned to her allies. We can’t guess where that is, but the Grand Sorceress would have known exactly.”

Jin Taekyung added, staring at the arm and leg submerged in the pool of blood,

“She must have believed she could survive. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have taken a gamble like this.”

Teleport was a difficult spell for long-distance travel. The coordinates of both the starting point and the destination had to be exact, without the slightest error. It demanded more preparation than any other spell.

Even in the modern world, the high-ranking mages who specialized in Teleport and made their living from it were no exception. If anything, knowing the danger made them more careful.

If even the slightest figure went wrong as the spell took effect, they could die instantly, fused with a rock or a tree.

Or…

Their limbs could be separated.

The thought passed silently through Taekyung’s mind. He looked down at the flesh left behind. It was no longer a sign that someone had died.

It was proof that the Grand Mage had gambled her life—and succeeded.

I made a mistake. I should’ve finished her off myself. Made absolutely sure.

He hadn’t expected her to attempt Teleport in the middle of that frantic struggle, with her starting position changing every moment. Much less for the spell to succeed under such unstable conditions.

But regret always arrived a step too late. Taekyung still had to walk the path before him.

The narrow, treacherous path that now seemed clearer and closer—and yet, for some reason, more distant and beyond reach.

Toward the being waiting at its end.

Lord of Heaven.

The title lingered on the tip of his tongue, never spoken. Taekyung turned it over in his mind, bitter as bear gall.

Who was he?

Why was he staining the world with blood and beckoning to Taekyung from behind that dark red curtain?

And what connection did he have to the other being who had haunted Taekyung’s thoughts for so long?

The Demon King. Asmodeus.

Ruler of the Demon Realm. Lord of demons.

An invader who’d torn through the boundaries between dimensions with his overwhelming power, shattered every convention and civilization, and driven billions of people to terror and death.

Yet in the end, he had fallen at the hands of one human. Now he would be remembered forever as part of history.

That’s right. He’s dead. I know he is.

Then why?

Why couldn’t Taekyung get that accursed being out of his head?

Crack.

He bit his lip until it bled.

Over the years he’d spent moving between the modern world and Murim, he’d seen countless lights and shadows. But the darkness cast by Dark Heaven was deeper than any of them. The Lord of Heaven stood at the center of it all, and Taekyung could scarcely deny his existence any longer.

First came all those strange phenomena that overturned everything he knew. Now, Magic.

What the hell is waiting at the end of this?

Taekyung turned his head toward somewhere far to the west.

The Demon King and the Lord of Heaven.

The Lord of Heaven and the Demon King.

He didn’t know whether they’d originally been one being or two entirely different people. The greatest enemy of his life was somewhere beyond the western horizon.

Beckoning to the Chosen One.

For a reason no one else yet knew.

Even knowing that, Taekyung had to keep walking the path he had chosen. Quietly, desperately, with everything he had.

Splash.

He rose, his foot landing in the pool of blood, and forced himself to take a step.

The battle wasn’t over. Countless enemies were still killing and dying like soulless puppets. He headed toward them to finish it.

“Can you hold on?”

“No.”

His Master was watching him with concern. Taekyung looked ready to collapse, but he gave him a faint smile.

“But I have to. Somehow.”

In the past and in the present, that was what he had always done.

Whoosh!

Taekyung charged toward the enemy without hesitation, shoulder to shoulder with his old Master. Force arrows were already streaking through the air above them.

And the three of them weren’t the only ones racing toward the battlefield to end this vast, horrific fight.

Bwooo!

A horn sounded without warning. Those who turned toward it saw a pale cloud of dust sweeping across the vast range of the Great Snow Mountain toward the battlefield.

At the head of thousands of men and horses, a group waved a torn banner and shouted as if coughing up blood.

“Subdue the Demons! Destroy Heaven!”

Hundreds of voices, charged with pure internal energy, burst through the air. The banner billowed in the wind as it advanced with them.

Neither the blood spattered across its white cloth nor the pieces torn from it could erase what it stood for.

It was their pride.

Long ago, it had also been a line of verse written by an old man called the Poet Sage,⁵ praising the Daoists who lived in the remote mountain valleys.

“With one long sword to guard the body, one would seek support from Kongtong.”

Jeok Cheongang’s voice scattered on the wind. Then the Bow Saint parted her tightly closed lips.

“If you would defend yourself with a single long sword, turn to Kongtong.”

And at that moment—

Rrrrrumble!

In less than two shichen,⁶ this brutal battle had swallowed more than ten thousand lives.

Now the scales that would decide its outcome tipped completely.

No—they broke.

Just as some unknown person, somewhere thousands of ri⁴ away, had intended when they prepared the stage for this day.