King Shura

His clothes had turned yellow with time, and the beard on the man’s face was extremely messy.

Clack-

The entrance of the cave opened up.

The man inside didn’t even bother to look back; however,…

“So you won’t even acknowledge me anymore, junior brother?”

“……”

The person who stepped inside the cave was, surprisingly enough, the man who once was called the strongest of his time.

One of the three sovereigns.

Baek Mu Ryang.

He looked at the dirtied man inside the cave and opened his mouth.

“Are you even eating well? You’re getting me quite worried.”

“……”

The dirty man didn’t say anything and continued to stare at the wall in front of him.

Baek Mu Ryang walked up and sat next to the man.

“We need you.”

“……”

The man still did not move.

Baek Mu Ryang slowly opened his mouth.

“The Demon Church already made their move. The Pope himself is out this time. Sichuan has already fallen to them.”

Twitch-

The man’s shoulders twitched slightly.

Baek Mu Ryang saw this and continued to talk.

“I made you go into secluded training because you begged for a punishment, but… by doing this won’t bring back someone who’s already dead. You should stop.”

The man’s eyes shook at Baek Mu Ryang’s words.

His mouth opened for the first time.

“……When?”

“Hm?”

It was a dry, crackly voice.

But his voice carried some sort of heat within it.

“When did the rats of the Demon Church dare crawl out of their hole?”

Paa-!

A powerful aura exploded out of the man’s body.

A seemingly impossible amount of power came out of the skinny man.

Baek Mu Ryang nodded.

“You grew. Good.”

The dirty man.

Was Yu Sul Bin.

The man who used to be called the Lion Sword King.

The man who killed Cho Ryu Hyang’s first teacher, Jo Gi Chun.

“Will you go out and face the Demon Church in Sichuan?”

Demon Church!

Those words intensified the emotions in Yu Sul Bin’s eyes.

Hate.

“Ju Sang San… Is that demon that killed my teachers there?”

“He’s there with the Pope.”

“I’ll go.”

Baek Mu Ryang nodded.

“You can’t go alone, though. You need to prepare.”

“How long?”

“A year.”

“Too long.”

“We need that much time to gather up the forces of the Nanman Beast Gate and the North Sea Ice Palace.”

“……!”

“We decided to take down the Demon Church together. I, too, am planning on moving then.”

Yu Sul Bin showed a face of surprise.

Baek Mu Ryang smiled at this.

“Unfortunately, I don’t think I can take on the Pope alone. I needed help.”

Yu Sul Bin looked at Baek Mu Ryang confusedly.

To think that his confident senior brother would be like this.

He was surprised.

This was the first time he saw his senior brother try to borrow someone else’s power.

“Don’t look at me like that. This was hard for me as well.”

Yu Sul Bin calmed himself and asked a new question.

“……Have you finished talking things out with the others?”

“Kind of. They’re afraid of the church as well, and…”

Baek Mu Ryang seemed to wonder if he should tell Yu Sul Bin this, then ended up opening his mouth.

“This is a secret, but one more person is planned to assist us when we hunt the Pope.”

Yu Sul Bin became curious.

The person who would be of any help was someone above the harmonious level. In fact, it had to be a person who was almost at the peak of this level.

“Someone from the palace. Chuk Gye Gwang. You probably heard about him before.”

“You mean the great general?”

“Yes, that’s him.”

“……”

Yu Sul Bin made a dumb face.

While he had been hiding inside this cave, the world had changed greatly.

* * *

What is strength?

What is power?

The answer to this primitive question had been answered a long time ago.

Baaang-!

Young Gonson Chun Gi. His youthful body rippled violently and made the air scream in pain.

The earth that he kicked shattered away as if a meteor had just hit it.

[Damn monster…]

Gongson Chun Gi grinned at the pestle-wielding rabbit from afar.

He didn’t go crazy now despite going all out.

His only weakness was gone.

“Hey, Mr. Rabbit. Stop playing around, will you? I’m getting tired trying to match with you.”

Maksu, the white rabbit, complained loudly to himself.

[I had thought that the glasses kid’s teacher would be quite a monster of his own, but…this is too much, isn’t it?]

Gongson Chun Gi laughed as he looked down at himself.

He slapped his chest a few times.

“I had this body when I was young but was unable to fully mature at that time. I was a bit… unrefined. Only that when I finally perfected my skills, my body had become weak. Now that is no longer a problem for me anymore.”

He didn’t even need to restrain his power with the bracelets.

The reason for the existence of the rings was to stop him from going insane by his own art.

But that side effect had disappeared. He didn’t need the rings anymore.

‘The reason for those rings in the first place was…’

The reason was fairly simple.

He just had too much power.

(E/N: No, you just were disrespectful to the first Pope)

He needed something that could restrain it.

If he didn’t, his power would destroy everything near him in his sleep.

[By the way, why are you still here?]

“Hm? What might you be talking about, Mr. Rabbit?”

[Someone like you should have gone up already… Why are you suspending your ascension?]

Gongson Chun Gi made a confused face.

Moments later, however, his face brightened.

“Ah, are you telling me to ascend right now?”

[Yes, you crazy son of a bitch. You shouldn’t be here.]

Gongson Chun Gi laughed.

“Life’s just got better for me, and I have to go now? You’re a bit too much, Don’t you think?”

[You… Do you even know about the laws of this world? Your existence itself breaks these laws.]

Gongson Chun Gi smiled.

“Not interested in that Buddhist-type of things. I just want to know one thing right now.”

Gongson Chun Gi pointed at Maksu after saying this.

At the same time, Maksu disappeared from his spot.

Bababang-!

A small hill disintegrated with a loud bang.

Maksu appeared on a different hill.

[You crazy brat… Control yourself.]

He had managed to get away with teleportation, but the man’s attacks were something else.

Taking on those attacks with his body like this would injure him greatly.

Maksu looked around for a second, then became confused.

‘Eh? Where did he go?’

The moment he lost Gongson Chun Gi from his sight, his hairs stood on end.

At the same time, he swung his pestle back full force.

Bang-!

Maksu’s body flew back like a kite.

“Hoh, that was pretty good.”

Gongson Chun Gi disappeared after saying this.

He was chasing down Maksu to finish the rabbit off.

But once he got to the impact point, he couldn’t do anything but raise his eyes.

Maksu wasn’t there.

When he slowly turned his head, he could see a muddy rabbit.

Maksu had teleported away at a critical time.

[Damn it…]

His whole body hurt.

Blocking that one hit had damaged him greatly.

He had lost to a human in a contest of strength.

‘Damn it! Damn it!’

He wouldn’t have been humiliated like this if he had his main body’s strength…

He was angry.

He had used the last bits of power facing that glasses kid before.

Maksu thought of excuses in his head and ground his teeth.

He was ashamed of himself for thinking of excuses.

Maksu calmed himself forcefully and looked around for a second. In an instant, he lost sight of Gongson Chun Gi.

That moment.

“Teleportation sure seems convenient.”

He could hear a voice behind him.

Maksu slowly turned back with a frown.

Again, Gongson Chun Gi was looking down on him from behind.

[…Did you just use teleportation?]

Gongson Chun Gi shook his head.

“Don’t know stuff like that.”

[Don’t kid me! How did you catch me, then?!]

“I don’t know? Martial arts has something similar to teleportation. You probably don’t know about it, though?”

[Bastard… I’ll kill you.]

Maksu distanced himself from Gongson Chun Gi and slammed his pestle into the ground.

He realized how he could deal with Gongson Chun Gi.

It was shameful to admit it, but right now, Maksu couldn’t beat Gongson Chun Gi in terms of power.

‘Fine, I admit; I can’t beat him with strength, but…’

Maksu didn’t have just strength.

When he began to prepare for something big by making all sorts of hand and leg motions in front of the pestle, Gongson Chun Gi smiled evilly.

“Oho, magic, is it? I’m down for that.”

He didn’t interfere with Maksu.

Gongson Chun Gi was confident.

Confident in his strength.

He watched Maksu from afar and mumbled to himself.

“Magic, martial arts, they’re all the same thing once you reach the peak with it. What matters most is how much of it you understand. They both yield the same result at the end, after all.”

Vuun-

Maksu didn’t hear Gongson Chun Gi’s words.

He could only focus on his spell.

The pestle in the ground began to send out waves of power out of it.

At the same time, Maksu’s body started to glow purple.

Maksu spoke while grinding his teeth.

[This isn’t my specialty, but this should still work pretty well against humans.]

Gongson Chun Gi laughed.

“Didn’t you just call me inhuman, Mr. Rabbit? You aren’t making any sense here.”

[Shut the hell up.]

Kuaaa-!

A purple mass of power engulfed Gongson Chun Gi.

Maksu looked at this with gleaming eyes.

‘Success.’

Chomp, chomp-

The purple energy around Gongson Chun Gi fluctuated in size.

Inside the cloud of purple energy, the demons of hell were munching on Gongson Chun Gi’s body.

Unless one had an unbreakable body, no human would be able to survive within that cloud.

Not even bones would be left in there.

Maksu made a satisfactory face as he thought this.

But then.

The cloud of purple rapidly began to shrink.

[Eh?]

Maksu made a confused face.

And….

“Huff!”

Gongson Chun Gi inhaled all the purple cloud around him and smiled at Maksu.

“It has quite a dangerous taste. Got any more?”

[……]

“Then I guess it’s my turn, then? This actually happens to be my specialty.”

A red eye appeared above Gongson Chun Gi.

“This is an improved version of the Demon Eye, called the Abyssal Eye. I made it myself.”

[…Are you sure you’re human?]

“I don’t even know anymore.”

The smiling eye began to drip with blood.

This eye immediately turned into a giant mouth and swallowed Maksu.