noveltune Chapter 195:
Chapter 195:
Blood Successor
The Cave of Repentance was quite a large space.
Initially, Mu-jin and his group were only supposed to train by facing the wall at the entrance of the cave, but they continued to venture deeper into the cave in search of the Blood Demon.
After walking a certain distance, the sight that unfolded made them realize that this place was truly a ‘prison.’
Throughout the cave, there were spaces that seemed either artificially dug or naturally formed. Each of these spaces was barred with iron bars, and inside these bars were people with shackles on their limbs.
Though their appearances were similar, their reactions varied widely.
“You bastards! Let me out of here!!”
“I will never forgive you! Once I get out of here, I will kill every single one of you Shaolin bastards!”
Some madmen were yelling and provoking Mu-jin and his group.
“Heh heh heh. What brings young monks here?”
“Hahaha. Aren’t you tired of playing monk? If you get me out of here, I will gift you gold and silver.”
“You poor souls who don’t know the pleasures of the world. Come closer if you’re interested, and I’ll teach you about the joys of carnal pleasure.”
There were also those who tried to entice Mu-jin’s group with trivial words.
Every time Mu-jin encountered these prisoners, he approached the bars.
He wasn’t trying to fight the prisoners inside.
The ones locked up here had their danjeon destroyed and their limb meridians partially ruined, making them only barely able to live normally. The result of a fight was obvious.
Nevertheless, Mu-jin approached the prisoners for a reason: to find the Blood Demon.
“Could you please tell me your nickname when you were active in the Jianghu?”
“Heh heh heh. It seems you’re interested in carnal pleasures. I was known as the Absolute Lustful Demon.”
But the old men Mu-jin talked to were never the Blood Demon.
After hearing their nicknames, Mu-jin clicked his tongue and stepped back.
“What a waste. A nobody.”
“Nobody!? Are you insane and want to die?”
“Try killing me if you can.”
Whether the deranged prisoner yelled or not, Mu-jin dug his little finger into his ear and responded.
The ones who really troubled Mu-jin weren’t the prisoners who shouted like that.
“Damn, another dead end.”
As they wandered through the Cave of Repentance, they often saw such prisoners.
Those who lay there with completely vacant faces, almost like corpses. Alive but no different from the dead.
“Elder?”
These people didn’t respond at all, even when Mu-jin approached the bars and called out to them.
“Damn it. Could that old man be the Blood Demon?”
Every time Mu-jin encountered such people, he worried that the Blood Demon might have already given up on life and become like them.
“Phew. Let’s move on to the next one.”
But Mu-jin decided to check every person thoroughly before drawing any conclusions.
If they found nothing even after inspecting the innermost parts.
“Then it means one of these lifeless ones is the Blood Demon.”
There was the problem of persuading someone who was practically a vegetative state to teach martial arts, but Mu-jin decided to check the sane ones first.
As Mu-jin and his group moved deeper into the Cave of Repentance, Mu-gung spoke as he looked ahead.
“...This seems to be the last one.”
At the end of the long passage inside the Cave of Repentance was the last cell with a prisoner inside.
And within the iron bars, there was an old prisoner with shackles on his limbs, just like before.
“Tsk.”
Despite their voices, the old prisoner, who sat on the floor with his eyes closed, looked no different from those who had given up on life.
Mu-jin, staring at the old prisoner for a moment, slowly approached the bars.
Since they would have to start persuading such people from now on anyway, he thought it wouldn’t hurt to try.
“Could you tell me your nickname, Elder?”
At Mu-jin’s question, the old man, who had been sitting like a corpse with his eyes closed, suddenly opened his eyes.
The sight of the old man opening his eyes was truly fitting of the onomatopoeia ‘sparkle.’
While he had appeared like a corpse with his eyes closed, the moment he opened them, a sharp aura emanated from the old man.
‘He should have lost his internal energy due to his danjeon being destroyed, though?’
As Mu-jin harbored such doubts, the old prisoner asked.
“Why does a Shaolin disciple ask about this old man’s nickname?”
“Hmph. If you can’t memorize the mnemonic of the first move, you don’t even qualify to learn my martial arts.”
At the Blood Demon’s scoff, Mu-jin almost showed a vein on his forehead.
‘Damn it. Acting so high and mighty even though he’s lost his martial arts and is imprisoned here.’
Considering the fact that anyone imprisoned here must have lived a pretty trashy life, respecting the elderly didn’t cross Mu-jin’s mind.
‘If it weren’t for the Blood Rain Demon Technique, I would have punched him.’
As Mu-jin pondered how to coax the old man into repeating the mnemonic, he realized it was unnecessary.
When he turned around, he saw that Mu-gyeong had already closed his eyes and entered deep meditation.
Despite the mnemonic being as long as a few pages of a book, Mu-gyeong had memorized it all in one go.
Perhaps because Mu-jin and the others’ gaze was fixed on the meditating Mu-gyeong, the Blood Demon also looked at him with interest.
‘Hmm. That boy seems to be somewhat capable.’
The fact that Mu-gyeong had memorized a mnemonic the length of several book pages in one go meant he had met at least the minimum requirements.
The problem now was to interpret the essence of that mnemonic, which, when fully understood, could fill an entire book.
Could that young monk solve that complex interpretation within three days?
As the Blood Demon watched Mu-gyeong, who was meditating with his eyes closed, Mu-gyeong suddenly opened his eyes and took a specific stance.
“!!!”
While the Blood Demon made a surprised expression for the first time,
“Hoo.”
Mu-gyeong, who took a deep breath and exhaled, began to manipulate his internal energy. A portion of the internal energy flowing through his body was emitted through several acupoints, including his palms.
Whiiing.
In the air, tiny drops resembling raindrops began to form.
The Blood Rain Demon Technique. First move. Blood Rain Formation.
The initial move of the Blood Rain Demon Technique, which used internal energy to create blood rain.
The subsequent moves described how to use the created blood rain for various attacks and how to manipulate the energy to do so.
Ultimately, if one couldn’t freely perform the first move, learning the other moves was pointless.
In that sense, although Mu-gyeong could create only one drop, that wasn’t the important part.
‘To think he succeeded in this in less than a day after hearing the explanation only once!’
The Blood Demon, suppressing his astonishment, spoke.
“That’s enough. Withdraw your energy. That color doesn’t suit ‘Blood Rain.’”
The drop Mu-gyeong created was golden. It was because his internal energy originated from Shaolin.
‘It will naturally turn red after mastering the Celestial Blood Absorption Technique.’
After organizing his thoughts, the Blood Demon asked Mu-gyeong.
“Why did you assume that stance to perform the move even though I didn’t teach you the preparatory posture?”
Unlike his interaction with Mu-jin, the Blood Demon asked in a softer tone.
However, there was a hint of suspicion in his question.
No one should have known the correct preparatory posture for the Blood Rain Demon Technique unless taught.
‘Could this boy be someone Shaolin prepared in advance to steal my martial arts?’
Such doubts arose in the Blood Demon’s mind.
But Mu-gyeong’s response was far beyond the Blood Demon’s expectations.
“From interpreting the mnemonic, it seemed like the most appropriate stance to perform the move.”
“The most appropriate stance?”
“Yes. Once I become proficient, I can perform it in any stance, but since it was my first time, I prepared thoroughly.”
“Huh...”
To deduce the most suitable stance just from hearing the mnemonic... if true, that was...
‘There’s no other word for it. He’s a monster.’
Moreover, this monster wanted to learn his martial arts.
Of course, that answer might have been prepared by Shaolin, but it would be revealed during the process of teaching the other moves.
Thus, the Blood Demon decided to pass on his martial arts to Mu-gyeong.
If it were that boy, he could master his martial arts.
No, more than that.
‘That boy could surpass me!’
He could spread the name of the Blood Rain Demon Technique and the title of Blood Demon throughout the world.
After that thought, the Blood Demon felt his heart, which had been cold and hardened for twenty years, beat rapidly once again.