Chapter 398: Our World (3)
The sun, which was hanging bright in the sky, suddenly wavered.
The Sword Emperor made his move.
He struck like a bolt from the blue, without warning or herald. Following the skewed trajectory of sunlight, the sword flashed once, and immediately after, a missile-like white flash soared through the air.
“Three moves,”
I, too, raised my sword in response.
A shadow stretched over the flower bed beneath me, resembling the remnants I was riding on.
“Won’t you yield even three moves!”
The shadow flickered along the path of the sword.
Demonic Heavenly God Sword
The First Form
Sword of Starving Death – Heart
Shadows sprawled on the ground bit into the earth in unison.
Vital energy was sucked from the ground. It was more akin to harvesting than training, closer to vampirism than harvesting. It was as if a swarm of hungry ghosts had crashed into a feast, gulping down food without even breathing. With the world’s energy voraciously absorbed in such a manner, I hurled it straight up into the sky.
The surging blood-red shadow cleaved through the Sword Emperor’s dragged-down flash of light in a thunderous manner…!
The Sword Emperor’s vital energy was peeled away like an apple skin. The peeled layers of vital energy turned into a white hailstorm, pouring down.
The world flashed as if a million firecrackers had gone off at once.
I took that flash as a signal for my counterattack.
Demonic Heavenly God Sword
The Seventh Form
Sword of Contusing Death – Heart
Brightness and darkness mixed within the flickering world like a dance. From each appearing shadow, crimson vital energies were spewed forth. With no rhyme or reason, and nowhere to escape, the Sword Emperor faced the crimson tendrils with a smile.
“You, of all people,”
His fully revealed teeth gleamed like those of a lion.
“Aren’t going to let me off with three moves, are you!”
The tip of the Sword Emperor’s sword moved.
A sound reminiscent of a tongue clicking echoed.
If it was indeed the sound of a tongue clicking, it surely would have been made by the void itself.
—Whoosh……!!
The void opened up.
It was as if a transparent giant was opening its lips to take a breath. The world’s energy I had shot through the shadows like a conduit was sucked into the rift opened in the world.
It was sucked in.
And then it burst forth.
Boom……!
Not vertically, but horizontally, a waterfall of light poured down.
The moment I saw the oncoming barrage of light, I realized what was happening.
“The vital energy I shot—”
Before I could even utter my retort about him swallowing and spitting back my energy, the Sword Emperor responded.
“As if it were yours to claim—”
Before he could finish, I reacted.
“Hup—”
I gripped a dagger.
Lifted it.
And buried both heels deep into the ground.
“Haa…”
Shadow is the offspring of light. If there exists something infinitely vast and boundless as light, it must be the shadow. With the oncoming flash of light, the shadows became as distinct as if they were anchored to the ground, to the world itself. I anchored my whole body in place.
I stood firm.
Then, as if a lightning rod was struck by a bolt of lightning, the wave of light struck the tip of the dagger.
“Urgh……!”
Blood burst forth from my lips.
The blood quickly dried up and crumbled away. I could feel the blood flowing through my veins depleting from within, as if a desiccant was injected into them.
If being struck by the strike of the Constellation Killer felt like being burnt up by lightning in an instant, this strike from the Sword Emperor was like having the scorching sunlight beat down right in front of my face.
“Ugh…”
I breathed.
I breathed deeply.
With my heart burning up, I took a breath… and then,
“Hryaap……!!”
I began my energy circulation.
Demonic Heavenly God Sword
The Second Form
Sword of Parched Death – Heart
Like a parched old woman guzzling seawater, I drank in the light mass just as it was, with its scorching thirst. I gathered the absorbed light mass into my heart.
In sync with that thumping heartbeat, I sent it toward my dantian and brain.
My vision flashed.
The light mass spread and burst along my veins and spine. It filled my trembling body, my drying blood. Gritting my teeth to take the shock in, I replenished it with the light I had taken in.
I exploded it.
“Swo……!”
As I screamed, the streaks of light extending from my body burst forth from every pore.
“……!”
The Sword Emperor flinched, raising his sword to block.
He was fast enough. But it was too late. Like a porcupine shooting its quills all at once, the light mass I had expelled from my entire body whipped past the Sword Emperor.
“Keuk!”
Although the impact of the wide and thin rays of light wasn’t significant, it was enough to disrupt his stance, and that was sufficient.
The void closed up.
The scent of incense burning in a temple wafted through the air.
“Thanks for purging the impurities… very, very much appreciated….”
While emitting smoke from my body, I spoke.
The Sword Emperor burst into a scoffing laugh.
“Crazy zombie bastard.”
“It was you who started it… Whirling it around like that… It’s not like it’s noodles or something….”
“It was mine in the first place.”
“Since when was there mine and yours in external energy….”
“Right here.”
The Sword Emperor said.
Before I could retort further, he gripped his sword.
“Now you understand why I didn’t yield those three moves.”
Of course.
“Yeah.”
I understood. I had no choice but to.
I…
“You have become stronger than that master of yours in winter.”
“Yes.”
The flowers of this world were living their lives with strong and resilient poison.
Despite the exchange of strikes that could split the heavens and scorch the earth, the flowers remained. They sang the song of their lives, entrusting themselves to the wind.
Among the scattering dandelion seeds, a man nodded.
“Are you happy?”
I was happy.
“Are you sad?”
I was sad.
“Both?”
I just felt a little like crying.
Amidst the emotions swirling like a double helix, only the Sword Emperor’s eyes shone clearly like the midday sun.
“It’s too early to be submerged in either.”
I took a breath. I roughly erased the dampness sneaking deep into my nose.
“This.”
The Sword Emperor gripped the hilt of his sword.
“This right now.”
The tip of the sword moved.
“Needs to be received first.”
And then.
Martial Sword
Formless Art
Sword of Singularity
The world turned upside down.
I pulled my arm back, holding the sword. I took a step forward.
I put strength into my shoulder.
I thrust forward.
As a conclusion, it was a single stab.
And with that one stab, the world flipped over.
From below to above? From above to below? From left to right? From right to left?
No.
The world turned inside out, from within to without.
Like shoving one’s hand into a stuffed doll and turning it inside out, the world expelled itself from the single point where the Sword Emperor’s stab exploded.
Spring arrived. Summer burst forth within spring. Before summer even reached the edge of the world, autumn exploded. And from the core of autumn, winter, and then spring again, summer, and once more autumn spewed out.
A mandala made of greenery, leaves, flowers, fruits, grains, falling leaves, and bare branches swirled in a storm.
I knew that strike.
“It was the sword technique, used by “master.”
“Yes, the final,” strike that was unleashed.
“Now I see,” it was such a sword technique.
“Do you only—” see?
“That’s not,” it.
Words spoken and unspoken passed between the Sword Emperor and me.
“Ah…”
I watched as the strike, not slicing through space but through time, time, and countless times layered upon each other, possibly in a spherical shape, leisurely flew towards me.
It was beautiful.
It was impossible not to be overwhelmed.
“This isn’t—”
Just a simple Sword Heart.
It wasn’t about shooting the gathered external energy.
“Your world……!”
The sanctuary the Sword Emperor had built.
His life.
[The Garden of Thundering Flowers unfolds before you.]
His life covered me.
[In the beginning, there was it] [Nothing else existed] [Day of the Sword] [Moon of the Sword] [Day of the Sword] [Hour of the Sword] [Minute of the Sword] [Second of the Sword] [In the moment when gears perfectly meshed] [Oh! It became!] [Finally, it was forged!]
[The Primal Blade]
As if a dam had burst, countless images flickered before my eyes.
[Our] [Waiting] [Anguish] [Hunger] [Thirst]
[This world exists,]
[Only for you]
[All other humans are mere phantoms] [I am] [Alone]
[What is]
[So full of worry]
[On]
[Your] [Your] [Your] [Your] [Your] [Your] [Your face]
Semi-Divine Eye.
[What is so full of worry on your face]
That which occasionally opened after glimpsing into the life of the Tower Master, from this strike, was finally reading into the Sword Emperor.
“You…”
You were born alone.
You were forged.
“You…”
You longed for a sibling. You felt loneliness. You didn’t want to be alone. You were seeking an opponent who could fight without holding back, someone into whom you could pour your entirety, someone like that. Then you met the master— the master taught you that you weren’t so special.
You were…
“Satisfied,”
[He realized he wasn’t alone.]
“Sword Emperor, you are satisfied—”
“I am satisfied!”
The Sword Emperor shouted aloud.
“I was a created life! A given life! I knew how to run before I could walk and was revered before I could shake hands, a shitty life!”
“Sword Emperor…”
“But!”
If the sun had vocal cords, it would have sounded like this.
“It was a life mired in happiness!”
With a shining voice, the Sword Emperor exclaimed.
“I affirm my life! Every meeting! Every parting!”
“Ah ha…”
“Brilliant Heavenly Demon!”
The Sword Emperor, still in his thrusting pose, shouted.
“How about you!”
“I…”
“Did you laugh! Did you love! Did you live! Were you happy!”
“I—”
“I know because I was there with you!”
The man who climbed the tower with me smiled proudly.
“But not as much as me!”
“Sword Emperor,”
“Accept my life! Feel it! Look up to it!”
I smiled.
“That’s…”
I reversed the grip on my dagger.
The feel of the duct tape, freshly wrapped but already peeling and burnt to tatters, moistened my palm.
I saw the incoming strike from the Sword Emperor, the sphere of the mandala.
I made my mark.
Demonic Heavenly God Sword
The Ninth Form
Sword of Solitude Death
The dagger, twisted horizontally to avoid my ribs, cleanly pierced through my heart.
Blood flowed.
Slower than a snail creeping along a rainy window, the trickling blood ran down my wrist, soaked my sleeve, and then dropped, plink, onto a blooming flower at my feet.
“You…”
The moment the Sword Emperor hesitated, the flower that drank my blood began to wither.
“You…”
“I…”
[He realized he wasn’t alone.]
“I sought refuge in the tower.”
“Kim Gong-Ja,”
“I had no parents. I respected the director, but at that time, I was still too young, I couldn’t truly see him as my parent. I couldn’t make contact. I couldn’t ask for help. I…”
I thought of the Black Dragon Witch.
A strong and noble person. A formidable figure facing the tower alone and the world outside. But even she, when she first stepped into the tower, did so because there was nowhere left for her outside. She…
“Sought refuge.”
I thought of the Sword Saint.
There were those in the tower who had left behind their achievements outside, entering with a light heart. There were those who entered to challenge.
The Black Dragon Witch was not one of them.
Neither was I.
“I had nowhere to belong.”
Everywhere I went, I seemed like an unwelcome guest.
Among people laughing and chatting, where everyone had places to go and homes to return to, rushing their steps on the streets, but only I seemed to be floating adrift.
In a city overflowing with light, my star, moaning in fever, seemed not to want me.
“So I came here.”
Appropriately, I had no parents.
It was symbolic.
“Unlike you.”
If you were forged by the world, I was discarded by the world. If you had all who shaped you as parents, I was an orphan abandoned by my parents.
So,
“Just like you.”
We both left the worlds we grew up in behind and came here.
“Kim Gong-Ja,”
“Sword Emperor, sir.”
Blood flowed.
The slowly trickling blood drenched my feet. My blood, spreading along the shadows, withered everything it touched.
It made everything rest.
“Don’t you feel unsatisfied?”
The Sword Emperor hesitated once more.
I lifted my lips into a smile, still with the dagger plunged into my heart.
“I am satisfied—”
“Satisfied…”
[He realized he wasn’t alone.]
“You weren’t satisfied, were you!!”
Just like I had considered my master not wanting any more of life,
[He realized he wasn’t alone.]
But just like every time I awoke, I wavered,
[He realized he wasn’t alone.]
In the end, you were the same.
“Satisfied,”
You were satisfied with that – you weren’t satisfied with that – you could have been satisfied with that – you wanted to be satisfied with that.
That you,
“Ahah,”
For some reason, Bambolina flitted through my mind.
The golden-haired child who truly found everything in this world beautiful, the eternally youthful boy who smiled so brightly without a care, but even he yearned for something beyond. Because he was human. Because we are all merely human.
Because you, too, are just human, I,
“You!”
Screaming at you like this,
“I’ll satisfy you!”
You roar at me like a beast.
“If you can,” you say, challenge me,
“I will!” I scream back in response,
[The Garden of Withered Flowers unfolds before you.]
From my heart, I spread my shadows.
The shadow with both Yin and Yang swallows the bright sunlight. My sanctuary, a resting place for weary souls, encroaches upon the Sword Emperor’s flower garden.
“Ha!”
The Sword Emperor laughed.
Like a dragon taking a deep breath, he laughed heartily, very heartily.
“Ah ha,”
I laughed.
Like whispering, softly, very softly.
“Ahaha,”
“Ahahaha,”
“Ahahahahahaha!”
The Sword Emperor’s time mandala unraveled.
Spring, summer, autumn, winter, and spring again, were all unrolled and unfolded.
The once unstoppable torrent of time, within a halted world, folded its wings.
“To have blocked that…”
The Sword Emperor stamped his foot down.
“It’s not over yet!”
I stamped my foot down too.
Our swords— my dagger and his greatsword— clashed, making a clear, chilling sound.
“Good!”
“Yes, it’s good!”
Ding!
“Good! It’s good! Ah!”
“Yes, yes, it’s thrilling!”
Ding!
“You’re quite something, Wailing Heavenly Demon!”
“And you, Primal Blade!”
Shadows flowing from my heart shot toward the Sword Emperor. The Sword Emperor, gathering light in one hand as if grabbing the neck of a dragon, parried and slashed with his sword. Ding! I barely managed to deflect with the dagger raised. Then, I spun around and aimed the dagger at his neck.
Even that was blocked, and I laughed.
The Sword Emperor laughed.
“I am not alone!”
He laughed even louder.
“I am not special!”
He laughed with genuine satisfaction.
“I am!”
The Sword Emperor swung his greatsword. He slashed.
Thunder struck.
“I am ordinaryaaaaaah!!”
“Yes, Primal Blade! And I am!”
To you, I am.
“I am not lackingaaah!!”
I swung my dagger. Ding! Ding! Ding……! I did not let go, clinging to the Sword Emperor, who parried with his greatsword, like a wolf biting and hanging on.
“I am not incomplete!”
I am,
“I was not born wrong!”
Now I,
“Have a place to return!”
“Yes! There is! Of course, there is!”
“Like you,”
“Like you!”
Ding!
Our weapons collided.
Our gazes met.
Then separated.
“So, I am,”
“We are!”
With a final intertwining of light and shadow, and a ding sound, the moment it all dissipated…
My dagger and his greatsword were crossed in the air, locked into an unseen keyhole.
“Living is alright!”
And then, the world shattered into pieces.
