Chapter 713
The wait wasn’t long.
After moving the survivors into one area, and with Jeok Cheon-Gang’s help, the Beast Miao King managed to force his eyelids open.
Crack. Crackle.*
The change began.
It was a resonance everyone could feel—me, Jeok Cheon-Gang, the Hundred Heavens Corps members who hadn’t fully recovered yet, and even the Beast Miao King, who had only just regained consciousness.
Whoosh.
Space warped. The darkness, which had writhed as if alive, stopped moving, and the wind began to flow in a single direction.
Beyond the deep darkness that had swallowed the Guardian Spirit, through the cliff’s crevice that gaped like the mouth of an ancient beast.
At the same time, I could see it and hear it clearly.
-Kuaaaaaang!
A roar like a reverberation, and a streak of light cutting through the darkness, growing clearer by the second.
“…This is…”
I stared at the light with stunned eyes. No—everyone here did.
Survivors with wounds large and small forgot to even groan.
The Beast Miao King, barely conscious, reached out toward the distant light that alone illuminated the darkness, his face blank.
Light warmer than sunlight, carrying a clear energy like water.
As silence fell, as if the world had stopped, Jeok Cheon-Gang’s low voice pierced my ears.
“It’s coming.”
“……”
And with that one word, time began to move again.
Goooooong. Paaaang!
A massive explosion.
Everything compressed and burst at once, sweeping in all directions. An invisible shockwave crashed down like a flood, accompanied by a roar that made my ears ring.
Beyond the raging wind, I heard Jeok Cheon-Gang shout.
“Be careful—”
Kwaaaaaa!
The wind—no, the storm—swallowed the rest.
A dizzying flash, mixed with darkness and light, obscured my vision, and the shockwave struck, blowing away everything within range.
But.
‘Now.’
Knowing the moment had come, I slashed White Flame diagonally downward.
Karmic fire surged along the transparent blade and burned the wind itself. The flames dug into something invisible yet undeniably present, colliding head-on with the shockwave.
No, it negated it.
Kwaaaaaaang! Crackle!
The earth shook with a roar. The impact was so violent that even my firmly planted legs were pushed back.
Jeok Cheon-Gang, who had stepped forward to shield the survivors just as I had, snapped both sleeves.
Whirr. Whoosh!
The Flame God Palm at its peak.
Unlike mine, two fully formed Fire Dragons rampaged, biting into the storm.
Flames surged, engulfing dozens of yards, devouring the wind, turning the countless fragments of debris—shot out like hidden weapons by the shockwave—into ash.
Crackle!
Acrid smoke and steam flooded the area. In the hazy world, I finally exhaled the breath I’d been holding and thrust out my hand.
Paaang!
Compressed air burst outward, blowing the smoke and steam aside.
And as my vision cleared, the scattering darkness—and the collapse that had already begun—waited for everyone.
Thud. Rumble!
It was collapsing. The massive cliff, towering over two hundred yards.
Bizarre rocks, both large and small, filled the sky and came crashing down in an overwhelming, terrifying torrent—and the sunlight beginning to spill through above it meant only one thing.
‘The Gate… is closed.’
It’s over.
The long, brutal battle had finally ended. We stopped a disaster that could have taken hundreds of thousands—maybe even millions.
So why?
Why did emptiness outweigh joy?
Maybe because I knew better than anyone that there was still something left unfinished.
Tring.
[The Gate has been closed.]
[Demonic Energy is disappearing.]
[The power of the Divine Stone purifies the energy contaminated by Demonic Energy.]
[A sudden quest, Sacrifice and Rest, has been created. You cannot refuse this quest.]
As the system notifications rang in my ears, I lifted my hand without thinking.
The darkness, writhing painfully like a living creature, scattered between my fingers.
Sunlight filtered through the thinning clouds, warm against my skin, and in the semi-transparent hologram window floating before me, there were only a few short lines.
It was the first time.
The quest description had been this brief.
The quest restriction—always written with my name—wasn’t limited to anyone.
Maybe the system understood his sacrifice, too.
An existence worthy of being called a Divine Beast, choosing to become a corrupted Guardian Spirit and offering himself up.
Step.
I pushed forward as the darkness scattered with ash and vanished into the wind.
Jeok Cheon-Gang followed quietly, and amid the countless bizarre rocks still collapsing even now, someone’s presence came through.
No, I could see it.
[Lv.155 Mutated Guardian Spirit]
Fur that had shone silver even in darkness, clear blue-white eyes like the pond of the Sacred Land—now dyed black.
Fangs, twice as long as before, glinted toward us.
-Grrr. Rrrr.
A low growl, thick with ferocity.
And then he moved like a flash.
Whoosh!
His blurred figure erased a dozen yards in an instant. Blood-soaked forepaws struck the ground, and his body soared.
Flash.
As the massive torso cast a shadow over my head, Jeok Cheon-Gang and I poured everything we had into a single blow.
Remembering what he’d asked of us before he left.
‘Kill me. Without any hesitation.’
And we kept that promise.
Swoosh, rustle!
—
That place was deep and cold.
Not a single point of light could enter. Not even the faintest warmth could be felt.
He lay curled up there, collapsed—feeling the aura of death that would soon come, or had already come.
And then, at some point, he felt a strange heat and opened his eyes.
No. It wasn’t warmth. It was a heat too harsh to call that.
Through his blurry vision, someone with a familiar face stood waiting.
“Jin Taekyung…”
A cracked voice leaked past his lips.
Jin Taekyung stared silently at Baek Sang, who had finally opened his eyes, and answered calmly.
“Yes.”
With that one word, Baek Sang knew.
It was over.
Maybe it was because sunlight shone over Jin Taekyung’s shoulder.
‘Yes. It ended up like this after all.’
The murmur echoed in his chest as Baek Sang looked at the blue sky where the dark clouds had vanished.
It was strange. Even though he’d lost everything he’d wanted, he felt empty rather than despairing.
“What happened to the Southern Demon Empress?”
The answer came back short.
“She’s dead.”
“The Gate must have disappeared too.”
“……Yes.”
Jin Taekyung’s voice carried hesitation as his head shifted. His gaze lingered briefly on the huge tiger lying collapsed.
No—what Baek Sang saw in his eyes at that moment was the corpses of countless beasts and humans.
“Let me ask you one thing.”
Jin Taekyung’s deeply sunken voice continued.
“Did you know from the beginning that this would happen?”
Baek Sang stared at the bodies filling the surroundings with empty eyes.
And answered.
“Yes. I knew.”
“……”
Jin Taekyung clenched his teeth and glared at Baek Sang. Baek Sang didn’t avoid the gaze that poured out like flame.
“To be exact, I found out a few months ago, after receiving a letter from the Central Plains.”
The letter had come from Henan.
It contained a detailed account of events that had unfolded in Hubei, along with a proposal to join the Martial Arts Alliance that would soon be formed.
“That’s when I realized why Dark Heaven reached out to the Southern Barbarian, which belongs to the Outer Regions, not the Central Plains. What the Southern Demon Empress was talking about was the grand plan.”
“So even knowing that…”
“I followed orders. Because I’m already not a human, but a monster.”
Rivers and mountains could change in ten years.
Sometimes earthquakes destroyed mountains, and floods twisted the flow of rivers.
Baek Sang had spent forty years in earthquakes and floods, becoming a monster who had lost his heart.
The grief of losing his only child.
And the desire for revenge against the Central Plains, who had taken that child from him.
But that wasn’t all.
“After the Great War of Justice and Evil, I hated the Demonic Path more than anyone else. If the Central Plains were unforgivable traitors, then they were enemies who had to be killed.”
Jin Taekyung let out a hollow laugh.
Dark Heaven and the Demonic Sect were trees with the same root, only different branches. If Baek Sang truly hated the Demonic Path, he couldn’t have sided with Dark Heaven—the ones who killed his child.
Yet Baek Sang had joined hands with the Southern Demon Empress and brought disaster.
He allowed Dark Heaven to open the Gate, and even knowing countless deaths would follow, he issued a general mobilization order and gathered ten thousand warriors and beasts into the Inner Palace.
To offer them as a living sacrifice.
“That crazy bastard, are you saying that now—”
The boiling voice didn’t make it to the end.
For some reason, Jin Taekyung’s words suddenly trailed off. Watching him, Baek Sang moved his blood-soaked lips.
“Yes. I had something more important than hatred. More important than anything else.”
In that instant, someone flashed through Jin Taekyung’s mind.
The reason those eyes above the mask had felt so familiar, as if he’d seen them before.
“…Baek Hwi.”
It wasn’t Jin Taekyung who said it.
Baek Sang lifted his blurry eyes toward the figure approaching from afar. Despite Jeok Cheon-Gang’s attempts to stop him, the Beast Miao King staggered closer and asked through a groan.
“Was that child… alive?”
Baek Sang nodded weakly.
That was enough for the Beast Miao King.
He knew what that child meant to Baek Sang, and what his sworn brother could do for his only child.
That was why he was sadder than anyone—and why he couldn’t help but be furious.
“Why… why didn’t you tell me? Why!”
“I didn’t want to… make Palace Lord… Hyung die.”
“And Hwi, that child, would have been lost again.”
A faint memory flickered in Baek Sang’s eyes.
On the day he first faced the darkness, he rejected the Southern Demon Empress’s offer with a single word.
Until he heard that his child—whom he believed had died to the Great Snow Demon—was alive.
“I accepted the Southern Demon Empress’s offer. And I believed her promise that she would save Hwi after all the plans were over.”
I believed it.
No, I had no choice but to force down my doubts.
Because it was the only way to reunite with my only child.
After that, whenever his resolve wavered, he went to the Southern Demon Empress.
To see his child’s face—kept alive by Dark Heaven’s sorcerers, trapped in a deep sleep.
“But even so, I knew. What I was doing, and how many would die because of this choice.”
So he created the Hundred Heavens Corps.
For someone else, not himself.
With the hope that they would stop this disaster.
“That’s… something I couldn’t do.”
Even if a child kills a parent, there is no parent who kills a child.
Baek Sang was a father to one child. Even if he went back to that moment dozens, hundreds of times, his choice would be the same.
Cough.
Baek Sang spat blood, then lifted his blurry eyes to the Beast Miao King.
And at that moment, one of the saddest—and happiest—days of his life flashed before him.
‘Yes. It was that day.’
The day he lost his beloved wife, and gained a child he would love more than anything.
Baek Sang cried that day.
He sat face to face with his only sworn brother, drinking fruit wine as if it were the last day.
Just like the day the Southern Demon Empress came, decades later.
“I have one last request.”
Baek Sang continued with a faint smile.
“Please kill me, Hyung.”