Surviving as a Genius on Borrowed Time Chapter 561

◈ Northern Emperor

* * *

A place where three people are facing each other in the cool breeze. Each of them is a middle-aged one-armed man wearing a bamboo hat, a young man in black robes, and a woman with the hem of her black clothes hanging down to her feet.

Cheon Geuk Moon Ju Man Hwi.

The Heavenly Dragon Pearl and the Yeoui Heaven Pearl.

Saaaaa―

White snow piled up on the land where there were no ruins. It was a sight that gradually filled the land as it melted repeatedly.

The northern land will return to its original state as if nothing had happened.

Covering the barren land with pure white snow, and covering the twin northern kings and the foreigners from the south with pure white blankets, one by one.

On the other hand, there were also things that were not restored.

“Private, private…!”

“Your Majesty! Why… … .”

The surviving disciples of Gong-dong and Hyeong-san.

Their bodies were dry, but their voices were moist. This was because, apart from the famine, their hearts were fertile.

It was a common occurrence in troubled times.

The Taoists gathered the remaining flesh of the deceased into one place with the bloody fragments. Then, with a sound of Hwaruk, they lit up the Samadhi Fire.

It was an attitude of not caring whether the owner of the Divine Sword, Dongmong, was nearby or not.

It is not their formal funeral.

Originally, people would make proper tombs and place things like swords and mirrors in them to receive protection from the gods of the Taoist underworld and to wish for the deceased to safely ascend to the heavenly realm.

But this too was part of the troubled times.

If you dig a tomb in the middle of the northern rivers and come back after time has passed, the tomb will have long since disappeared, having been absorbed by the absorption method. The Taoists of Gongdong and Hyeongsan were right.

Phew―

A cloud of smoke rose.

It rose upwards, thinly but endlessly, like the incense burner in a Taoist temple.

Until it blends into the unusually vast and deep blue northern sky.

“Primitive eye diagnosis.”

The left hand of the Cheon Geuk Moon Ju tilted towards the tip, but no one responded.

The best swordsman of Oedo, smiling bashfully under his hat.

In the midst of his great sorrow, there was no Taoist priest to watch over him.

We had been together for a long time and talked a lot. Even if we found out their true identities now, there was no one who prioritized hearsay over what they experienced firsthand.

Cheon Geuk Moon Ju soon gestured over the shoulders of Yeoui Cheonju and Cheonryong Daeju.

“So what you’re saying is that all of those guys have studied the art of the island martial arts?”

Sunlight bordered transparently along the ridge.

They were approaching with two flagpoles raised. Perhaps because they were wary of the northern powers, the flags were not yet hung.

Dozens of people holding those two flagpoles.

Of course, they are the warriors of Yeouicheon and Cheonryongdae, and the energy they emit causes the long flagpole and even the vast ridge to appear distorted.

It was a completely unified wave.

They are all masters of martial arts on the battlefield.

Unlike other Shingeomdan units, they were not individually assigned to carry out independent missions, but were instead operated like a martial arts force.

In some circles of the Iphwangseong clan, these people are evaluated as having no rivals in group battles, except for the originally strong Shingeomdae or Ma Gwang-ik who has been learning the Gwangyegyeol since long ago.

“They are definitely the islanders. Your qi sense is the most dense among the five swords in the world. Do you feel like my words are false?”

When the Heavenly Dragon Lord Wi Ji-geuk asked with a grin, the blind man who had become the most clouded-eyed swordsman shook his head. He seemed a little angry.

“Of course it wouldn’t be a lie. How could I tell a lie that would be obvious when there’s a knife under my neck?”

“There’s nothing on my neck right now…?”

“Is that really true?”

Wi Ji-geuk closes his mouth at Cheon Geuk-mun-ju’s quiet question. The next words come out of the mouth of the black-robed woman who has turned her back on them.

“If the combined attack of the Yeo-ui-cheon and Cheon-ryong-dae, including the great lords, were to occur, even the great Cheon-ha-o-geom would be able to take one arm or a leg.”

The back of Bukgung Ah, the Princess of Yeoui Heaven, with her long, exotic black hair flowing down her back. Her voice was not clear, as if she was slightly hoarse, but it still had a pleasant resonance.

“Are you confident that you can completely shed your skin like the Shaolin Master?”

She asked.

It meant that one could become like the great monk Beomheo, who was the best without both arms.

Cheon Geuk-mun-ju smiles faintly under his hat.

“That would be difficult. Who else could put himself down as much as Shin Seung?”

“then?”

“But your words should have been spoken after those vicious men arrived. There is no reason to wait a month for a joint attack, is there?”

For a moment his hands became blurry.

Kwaaaa …

With a loud noise, the air tore apart countless times, and a gray line was carved into the atmosphere.

The trajectory of the Shingeom Dongmong. It was a single piece of gold that was created with hundreds of swings in an instant.

“… … !”

Before they knew it, Bukgung-ah and Wijigeuk were each unleashing their divine secret techniques and piercing skills like lightning, sending whitish shockwaves pounding the ground.

“We should be together for a hundred years. With a wife who is my greatest asset…”

Cheon Geuk Moon-ju left that one word behind and stepped onto the translucent thread.

As he was putting the blue sword he called himself, Jo Gang Ji Cheo, into its scabbard, none of the hundreds of sword strikes were aimed at the Yeoui Heavenly Pearl or the Cheonryong Great Pearl.

Phew!

A new model that disappears like smoke.

He used his sword to spread the profound emptiness that was one of the most profound in the world. There was no trace left of him having been there.

Within a moment, the Heavenly Dragon Lord Wei Zhijie slightly slumped his shoulders.

“Oh, I almost died.”

As he whistled, the air waves that had been tangled around his body began to loosen like threads. The faint wind blew the sleeves of his wide black robe and subsided.

Meanwhile, Bukgung-ah was looking back at the ridge her men were running towards. Her back was still indifferent.

“There are more matters that I need to report to you.”

She continued speaking slowly.

“The Heavenly Sword Master is wandering around the northern martial arts world… I don’t know how he’ll react. I don’t even know what the purpose of the Outer Sword Master is right now.”

“It’s the first time I’ve seen the Lord of the Heavenly Heavenly House worrying about a colleague. Anyway, rumor has it that he has a connection with one of the six constellations here.”

“He said he tore out his own eyeball here too,” Wi Ji-geuk blurted out.

At that moment, Bukgung-ah’s dark back of hair rippled slightly like an ice haze.

“Be polite to your direct superior.”

It was an order too strong for someone of the same color, but Wi Ji-geuk just smiled faintly and shrugged his shoulders.

Yeoui Cheonju, who was the youngest black princess before Jeongyeonsin, was originally of the northern royal family’s bloodline.

At that time, one of the Taoist priests who had performed a simple funeral approached.

Damn it.

A middle-aged swordsman wearing a dusty robe.

He was a Taoist monk whose name was Chwipung (取楓), and he was a disciple of Hyeongsanpa, who had recently learned the Chodun Sword Technique (憔鈍劍法), which had become somewhat less well-known in the north.

Even with a face stained with sorrow, he respectfully raised both hands to Bukgung-ah and Wijigeuk.

“I have received grace from you two great lords.”

Wi Ji-geuk responded respectfully in the same posture.

“I just happened to see Mr. Chwipungsan lying down on the way. It’s fortunate that he passed away before he closed his eyes.”

Despite his impeccable demeanor, his words were likely to cause trouble, but the Taoist priests of Gongdong and Hyeongsan did not listen to him.

No one was looking for perfect conduct from the black-haired Ip Hwang-seong, who was full of fighters.

Masters who were active in the northern rivers and lakes.

In the first place, both sides are spherical.

The swordsman of Hyeongsan, who was facing Wei Zhijie, lowered both his hands and asked.

“Are you really up there?”

“For now, yes.”

Cheonryongdaeju, whose older sister was Jongnam Jangmunin, was also friendly to the older man.

The swordsman who had lost his disciples barely raised his lips, but it was a smile worn down by the martial arts world.

“That’s good. The situation in this land has changed strangely recently.”

“What do you mean by strange?”

“Betrayals, uprisings, and clashes between the various Northern Kings have begun to run rampant. There are already rumors that two of the Six Heavenly Kings have appeared in the land of Sagwang and the great city of Okyohee. The world is turning upside down. It makes sense… If there is more than one person like the Outer Sword, where would that be a place where people can live?”

“ah.”

“It is clear that someone is inciting chaos, so we must be on guard. Don’t most people who move the world have sinister intentions?”

“Well, I don’t know. He may have good intentions.”

“Trust me. No matter how amazing his skills are, he is someone who can unleash a devastating force at any time. Perhaps a new fighter will emerge. It will have an impact on the entire world… It is an unprecedented movement.”

“hmm.”

“… … ?”

The drunken swordsman looked at the Heavenly Dragon Lord of the Divine Swordsman with a puzzled look, but Wei Zhijie turned his gaze askance and looked away.

And somehow he muddled the story with an expression of amazement.

“Anyway, take care. The world is in turmoil. The hungry strong are breaking their retreats one by one.”

“I don’t know what the royal family is doing at a time like this.”

“that.”

Wi Ji-geuk paused for a moment and then glanced at Bukgung-ah as he spoke.

“I know a little about the situation. The imperial family is facing a huge conflict over the operation of the military forces. The civil and military officials and the emperor have different opinions, and recently, in the name of the Danju deputy, a fire bomb was dropped on the Forbidden City…”

“Fire bomb?”

“It’s a letter, to be exact.”

―Now the imperial army has retreated, and the Ip Hwang Seong Shingumdan is providing relief to the common people in the north.

Horrible abuse of authority.

The content made the swordsman laugh in vain even though he was in mourning.

If the power of the Shingeomdan was enough to replace the Imperial Army, it would naturally refer to not only the great lords but also all the warriors of the Imperial Castle.

It was a completely different matter from the case where Yeonhwanata Jeongyeonshin fired a barrage of swords from Jangseong to Hocheonseong.

In order to have it publicly acknowledged, he had no choice but to fight on both civil and military fronts with the entire imperial family, including civil and military officials.

Because it is an empire that cannot help but worry first about civil war caused by the concentration of great power.

“Are you planning to become another emperor of the North to stand against the Southern Emperor of the World? Anyway, Beijing must be in a state of war. I have heard many rumors about the new sword master… … .”

“I almost died in that war.”

Wi Ji-geuk smiled and continued speaking.

“The new chief of the Shingeom unit said in front of the Emperor who had come up to the Forbidden City that ‘the Empress Dowager is afraid of the Imperial City’, and then he meekly walked into the Brain Prison on the condition that the two of us be released. Well, from the Imperial Family’s perspective, it was a way to save face.”

“…What did I just hear?”

“Now that the Three Generals and the Three Great Masters of the Imperial Family are all wandering around Jangseong or the North, there is no one in the Forbidden City who can do anything to the new Lord of the Swords. For some reason, his martial arts skills have improved beyond recognition. When it comes to the art of silver sleep, he may have few rivals.”

What a weird guy. Wijigeuk muttered.

* * *

“What brings you here?”

“… … .”

“I know this is not a place where the Empress Dowager would be present.”

“… Do you recognize the seal of the Shingeomdanju stamped on this letter? Jeongga Seomye contacted you, the Shingeombu Daeju. Read it.”

“I have poor night vision, and as you know, this is the brain prison of the Forbidden City.”

“Read it.”

“Then just for a moment… .”

“There is probably no one in the world with sharper night vision than you. Have you seen it all now?”

“…yes.”

“You are the only one in the entire Savior who can remain so calm in the imperial prison while being completely deprived of your freedom. You have defeated the Ming Dynasty.”

“… … ?”

“As the crop failures continue, the ‘Moon’ becomes more and more exhausted, and the northern wolves who call themselves kings have escaped the shadow of the gods… You have correctly assessed the current situation. The royal family cannot keep the current Shingeombu Daeju tied up for long.”

“Your Highness the Empress Dowager.”

“As you have requested, this country will no longer interfere in the affairs of the Imperial Family. At least until the north is pacified, it will be so… I will persuade King Gungmyeong and send him to the capital of Yangyang. So that Jeongga Seomye will not have even a single worry. This must have been your intention as well.”

“no.”

“You have broken the chains of oppression that have surrounded Ip Hwang Seong for hundreds of years.”

“… … .”

“You may continue north. Go and meet the King of Jeongga, and tell him that all your requests have been accepted.”

Leading all seventeen.

The low voice of the Empress Dowager of the Ming Dynasty echoes faintly.

The deepest prison in Beijing’s Ministry of Justice, it is a prison that holds not people but strange beings.

Suddenly, a bright red light flashed in his eyes.

It was accompanied by rough breath.

ha-

The darkness covering the room naturally faded and took the shape of a bat, and its black clothes mixed with its red aura, causing its body to tremble in a purple hue.