Chapter 114 : Forbidden Area
Kwa-ang—!
Along with the explosion sound shaking the underground hollow, purple flas evaporated the blood water of the Blood Pond and soared up.
"Aaaagh!"
Ji Myeong scread and flew backward.
As the fla mixed with my poison qi swept over the bastard's whole body, the Blood Snake Worms squirming inside his skin could not withstand the high heat and burst out.
Ma Seok-du was also not safe.
His huge body beca a shield and took the explosion, but his proud Blood Eye Axe Art was shattered without leaving a trace.
"Keuheok! T-This can't be..."
Ma Seok-du knelt and spewed out fresh blood.
The bastard's red eyes shook with fear.
He thought the Seventh Blood Lord Yeon Jeok-ha was defeated because he was weak, but that was not the case.
I walked leisurely out of the smoke.
The purple flas remaining at the tips of my clothes made sizzling sounds and pressured the bastards.
"Unlike what I expected, the Blood Cult's Blood Lords are nothing special."
I looked down coldly and flicked my finger.
Then, the embers lingering in the air beca butterflies and surrounded Ji Myeong and Ma Seok-du.
-Keulkeul, the hidden door in that corner is opening.
-Ji Myeong is trying to run away!
At the Demon Queen's shout, my gaze fixed on Ji Myeong.
Ji Myeong, with his body in tatters, was fumbling under the Buddha statue behind the Blood Pond.
"Lord Sixth Blood Lord, we must retreat for now. Even if it's just you, Lord Sixth Blood Lord, you must run away first...!"
"Where are you trying to go?"
I threw my body forward.
The mont I was about to burn Ji Myeong from the top of his head to the tip of his toes.
Ma Seok-du squeezed out his remaining inner force and blocked my path.
A blood-colored mist spewed out from the bastard's whole body like an explosion.
"For the sake of the other Blood Lords-"
Ma Seok-du's eyes were dyed red.
-It's dangerous!
-Be careful!
Following the shouts of the Sword Venerable and the Demon Queen.
Blood Eye Exploding Death.
As the entire body of the Sixth Blood Lord, Ma Seok-du, exploded, the Blood Pond reacted.
The blood qi of the Blood Pond and Ma Seok-du's blood qi shot toward explosively.
***
"Captain!!"
Wi Ji-yeong, who was turning the fake monks into ice statues on the ground, scread.
It was because the frenzied blood-colored energy spewing from the underground passage of the Scripture Pavilion dyed the night sky red.
"Third Young Master!"
Seol Ye-rin's complexion turned pale.
The vibration felt just now was not a simple collision.
It was truly a destructive energy where a massive amount of blood qi exploded all at once, sucking in all the vitality around it.
"Young Palace Head, it's dangerous!"
"Move!"
Seol Ye-rin shook off Baek Mu-yong's restraint and threw herself toward the collapsing underground passage.
The Ice Art spewing from the tip of her toes instantly froze the collapsing pile of stones, creating a temporary foothold.
Following her, Baek Mu-yong, Eun Bin, and Wi Ji-yeong fixed their grip on their weapons and followed.
"Eit, these bastards who are worse than bones dared to touch our Young Master!"
Wi Ji-yeong scattered flying daggers in all directions, executing the remnants, and jumped into the darkness.
The underground hollow was a shambles.
Due to the aftermath of the blood qi Ma Seok-du detonated, the Blood Pond revealed its bottom and dried up twistedly, and huge rocks were pouring down like rain from the ceiling of the hollow.
And in the center, where the thick blood-colored mist was coiling, stood Hyeokryeon Yeom.
"...Haa. Haa."
Hyeokryeon Yeom's clothes were tattered, and purple flas and red blood qi were mixed all over his body, burning while making grotesque sounds.
The bastard's self-destruction was threatening, but I avoided a fatal wound by wrapping my whole body in the Corpse Decay of the Ten Thousand Heavens Poison Hand and rotting the blood qi.
"Third Young Master!"
Seol Ye-rin appeared through the dust cloud.
As soon as Seol Ye-rin confird Hyeokryeon Yeom's safe appearance, she let out a sigh of relief and approached Hyeokryeon Yeom's side.
"Are you okay? The energy was so ominous that..."
"...I'm fine."
It was a little dangerous.
I spat out saliva mixed with blood and reassured Seol Ye-rin.
At that mont, Eun Bin and Wi Ji-yeong, who arrived late, could not hide their astonishnt.
"Hiik! Just what is that monster..."
In the place Wi Ji-yeong pointed to, Ma Seok-du, whose upper body was half blown away and had beco a rag, was kneeling.
His breath had already stopped, but his body did not collapse because the unique demonic nature of a Blood Lord remained.
"What happened to Ji Myeong?"
When Baek Mu-yong asked while looking around, I pointed to the collapsed Buddha statue behind the Blood Pond.
"He ran away like a rat taking advantage of the opening."
"We must chase him. If that guy ran away with the Great Thunder Temple's treasure..."
Before Eun Bin could finish speaking, a thin golden radiance flowed out from between the pile of collapsed stones in the corner of the hollow.
"Wait."
I raised my hand to stop the group, then slowly approached the pile of stones.
There was an old monk sitting in a lotus position with even his kasaya turned into rags.
It was the 'sacrifice' the bastards had stuck in alive to maintain the energy of the Blood Pond, Abbot Beop Jeong.
"...Amitabha."
Beop Jeong's eyelids trembled, and slowly began to find the light in his eyes.
Beop Jeong looked at the martial artists of the Ice Palace surrounding him and Hyeokryeon Yeom, and wore a benevolent but sorrowful smile.
"...Thank you."
I placed my hand on the old monk's shoulder and pushed in warm yang energy.
Beop Jeong coughed and pointed to the deeper darkness of the underground passage.
"Ji Myeong, that child... went to the Forbidden Area holding the 'Spirit Bead', the holy relic of the Great Thunder Temple. Sleeping there is... the Great Demon of the West that even the past Abbot could not seal."
At those words, my eyebrows twitched.
As per the Demon Queen and Sword Venerable's advice, the real crisis was starting from now.
"Forbidden Area... There are many things that really don't suit holy ground."
The Abbot of the Great Thunder Temple, Beop Jeong, made a bitter expression.
"I am truly sorry to ask this favor in this situation. But I hope you go quickly and stop Ji Myeong before he commits any more wrongs."
"You are protecting him even after he did this?"
"Everyone makes mistakes."
Beop Jeong was a big person.
***
Ji Myeong ran madly through the underground passage thick with the sll of blood and dust.
When he felt the massive energy of the Sixth Blood Lord Ma Seok-du falling from behind his back disappear in an instant, Ji Myeong's heart pounded as if it would burst from fear.
'It doesn't make sense! To think the Sixth Blood Lord fell to just such a guy...!'
However, what was ahead of fear was mad obsession.
Inside Ji Myeong's embrace, the holy relic he stole by breaking the taboo of the Great Thunder Temple, the 'Spirit Bead', was flashing blood-red and burning his chest.
Ji Myeong reached the huge stone door at the end of the passage.
Tens of thousands of Buddhist scriptures were carved on the stone door, but they were already corroded black by the Blood Cult's evil arts.
This place was the Forbidden Area that the Great Thunder Temple had kept silent about for a thousand years, and the place where the Great Demon of the West slept.
"Haa, haa...!"
Ji Myeong inserted the Spirit Bead into the groove in the center of the stone door.
Kiiiiiing—!
When the Spirit Bead, which should have been holy, combined with the turbid blood qi flowing from Ji Myeong's palm, a scream burst out along with a creepy tallic sound.
The Sanskrit characters carved on the stone door were dyed in blood color and began to twist.
"The old man was wrong. rcy? Patience? You can't change anything with such things! Power is the true salvation!"
Ji Myeong slashed his own wrist and sprinkled the pouring fresh blood on the stone door.
The Spirit Bead greedily sucked in that blood, and finally, the firmly closed door of the Forbidden Area began to open slowly.
What flooded in from beyond the door was neither a cold chill nor hot heat.
It was a terrible void that rejected all vitality, and demonic qi close to the primordial darkness.
"Oh... Ooooo!"
A huge shadow shimred in the darkness.
When that existence, whose form was unclear, opened its eyes, the entire Great Thunder Temple began to vibrate as if an earthquake had occurred.
Ji Myeong watched that spectacle with madness-filled eyes while kneeling.
"Awaken! Master of the West, enemy of the Buddhist Dharma, and true ally of the Blood Cult! Bring eternal darkness to this pitiful land!"
Ji Myeong's shadow stretched abnormally long and mixed as one with the darkness beyond the door.
Ji Myeong's eyeballs were now dyed pitch black so that not even the whites could be seen.
Ji Myeong could feel it.
Because the power of the Great Demon transmitted through the Spirit Bead was flowing through his blood vessels, changing Ji Myeong into sothing other than human.
"Hyeokryeon Yeom... This place will be your crematorium."
The mont Ji Myeong turned his body and completely disappeared into the darkness, the door of the Forbidden Area closed again making a boom sound.
I arrived in front of the door of the Forbidden Area, leaving Abbot Beop Jeong to the Small Snow Squad mbers.
I realized that the fishy blood qi of Ji Myeong that was felt until just a mont ago was eaten and disappeared by the demonic qi raging like a huge storm beyond the door.
-This is no joke.
-...I feel a death qi more terrible than the Cold Snow of the North Sea. You must really be careful this ti.
Even the voices of the Demon Queen and the Sword Venerable were full of tension.
I clenched my fists while staring at the firmly closed stone door.
***
Beyond the stone door, a grotesque beating sound was heard from the heart of the Forbidden Area that swallowed even light.
Thump—!
It wasn't a simple heartbeat.
It was a pulse of destruction shaking the earth's veins and changing the air of the entire Great Thunder Temple like thick lead.
The black smoke flowing out from the cracks in the stone door was sucked inside for an instant, and then, breaking the silence, a huge rupture sound burst out.
Kwa-a-a-ang—!
The huge stone door that had kept its place for a thousand years beca powder and scattered.
What slowly revealed its appearance through the dust cloud was a huge existence beyond human common sense.
"...Ah, finally."
It was Ji Myeong's voice, but it was no longer human.
The body of what used to be Ji Myeong was abnormally swollen, and four grotesque shadow arms created by the tangling of the Spirit Bead's blood-red radiance and the Forbidden Area's demonic qi had sprouted from behind his back.
However, what caught my eye was not Ji Myeong himself.
-Keulkeul, this is the first ti I've seen such a monster.
-It's a monster I haven't seen either. It seems to have hatched using a human as a vessel.
It was as the Demon Queen said. Ji Myeong had only beco a vessel for that monster.
The essence of the Great Demon was descending to the present world using Ji Myeong as a dium.
Soon, black mist poured out like a waterfall and covered the floor of the underground hollow.
The stone fragnts touched by the mist instantly corroded and turned into dust.
"It is the hunger of a thousand years."
A voice mixed with the will of Ji Myeong, no, the Great Demon, rang out.
When the bastard opened his eyes, purple flas burned inside his pitch-black eyeballs.
The mont I faced that gaze, I felt a creepy pressure as if my soul was being torn away entirely.
At that mont,
Woo-woong-
The divine objects of the Iron Venerable, Fighting Venerable, and Poison Venerable that I had obtained began to react.
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