Chapter 220: The Secret Manual and Identity

Yong Seo-hee explained how the secret manual her uncle stole ended up here.

“So, according to you, Yong Mu-hwi betrayed the Dragon Emperor of the Heavens and the Head of the Divine Dragon Clan?”

Seo Ryeom was the first to speak.

“Yes. My uncle pretended to follow the Clan Head while secretly waiting for the right opportunity.”

“Is that so?”

After hearing Yong Seo-hee’s full account, Seo Ryeom and Mak Ya-wol exchanged glances. The two didn’t believe everything they had just heard.

“Captain, may we speak for a moment?”

“Can’t we talk here?”

“Then, just a moment.”

Seo Ryeom surrounded them with a qi barrier so the conversation wouldn’t be overheard.

“Is all this necessary?”

Jang Woo-hyun asked, thinking Seo Ryeom was overreacting, but Seo Ryeom nodded. He was unusually serious.

“How much can we trust her?”

“Seo-hee?”

“Yes. Honestly, unlike Ye-ju and Ha-un, the two of us don’t have much trust built with you, Captain, do we?”

Though part of the Annihilation Squad, Seo Ryeom and Mak Ya-wol hadn’t known Jang Woo-hyun for long, and there was no deep bond. Their reason for working with him was purely for the sake of fighting powerful enemies.

“With the amount of trust we have, we ought to question her story.”

“……”

“Her uncle, Yong Mu-hwi, is one of the Divine Dragon Clan’s Eight Swords, just like Yong Jeok-shim. He is a close aide to the Clan Head. If she’s not trustworthy, this could become a serious issue.”

“She might have come here with another purpose. This could be a trap.”

Mak Ya-wol added, backing up Seo Ryeom’s words.

“A trap…”

Jang Woo-hyun echoed the word Mak Ya-wol had said.

And then, he thought to himself.

How much trust had been built between him and Yong Seo-hee?

They hadn’t known each other for long.

He had rescued her from Yang Jeon-gun and simply accompanied her on the way back to the Central Heavens Martial Realm.

Strictly speaking, he didn’t know much about her.

Jang Woo-hyun turned to look at Yong Seo-hee.

Not understanding the conversation, she was simply looking at him with wide eyes.

Seeing that innocent gaze, Jang Woo-hyun let out a soft laugh.

‘She’s not someone who would set a trap.’

When he clashed with the power of a True Immortal. Even when he told her to run far away, Yong Seo-hee appeared to help him.

To Jang Woo-hyun, who had only encountered madmen among the cultivators, Yong Seo-hee’s actions had been exceptional.

“She’s not that kind of person, so don’t worry. She likely just came here because she needed help. And if this were a trap, wouldn’t the other side have lost too much?”

Today, the Divine Dragon Clan had lost one of their Eight Swords, a master representing their clan. No one could have predicted Yong Jeok-shim’s sudden death here.

“I understand.”

Once Jang Woo-hyun made his decision, Seo Ryeom and Mak Ya-wol didn’t argue. They respected the judgment and decision of Jang Woo-hyun, the leader of the Annihilation Squad.

“I get it too. But I still want to ask you one thing.”

Mak Ya-wol’s voice lowered slightly.

“You’re going to be entangled with the Divine Dragon Clan now. Are you alright with that?”

“They’re an opponent I’ll have to face eventually.”

He owed a debt to the Dragon Emperor of the Heavens.

Even if it wasn’t possible now, they were someone he would have to surpass to rise to the top.

At Jang Woo-hyun’s response, Seo Ryeom and Mak Ya-wol smiled. They had expected this answer but wanted to confirm.

Neither of them feared a fight with the Divine Dragon Clan.

With that settled, Seo Ryeom withdrew the qi barrier he had set up to block sound.

Jang Woo-hyun approached Yong Seo-hee, who looked anxious.

“It’s fine now, so don’t be afraid.”

Only then did Yong Seo-hee release the tension in her body.

“But you didn’t lose the secret manual you stole, right? You were captured by them.”

At Maeng Ye-ju’s question, Yong Seo-hee raised her arm and opened her palm. As she closed her eyes and focused, a secret manual suddenly appeared on her palm.

“Uh… what is this?”

It wasn’t an inner robe technique. It literally appeared out of nowhere.

“I’ve been told that although it looks like this, it’s not an ordinary book. Once you become its owner, you can hide and summon it like this.”

“May I take a look?”

Curious about the mysterious item, Cho-su stepped forward.

Receiving the secret manual from Yong Seo-hee, Cho-su turned it over and examined it closely. Occasionally, the third eye between his brows glowed faintly.

While Cho-su focused on the manual.

Jang Woo-hyun concentrated on the text on the cover.

‘Heavenly Escape Sword Art.’

It felt familiar, but he couldn’t recall where he had seen it.

Just as he struggled to remember, Yong Seo-hee added more.

“They say it was left behind by the first person to be called the Sword Immortal.”

“Ah.”

Only after hearing the word Sword Immortal did Jang Woo-hyun’s memory become clear.

It wasn’t a memory from the Central Plains.

It was a name he knew from before coming here. Just like he had met Wudang’s Jang Sam-bong, this was another trace of a legendary figure.

‘Sword Immortal Lü Dongbin.’

A name passed down as a myth. Today, he encountered something related to that name.

‘There’s the Seven Great Saints—why wouldn’t the Sword Immortal exist here too?’

Though this was another world, it was one that connected with Earth’s legends and myths. In such a place, things like the Sword Immortal could certainly appear.

‘Someday, I should look into these connections.’

The Nine Suns, the Seven Great Saints, Jang Sam-bong, Lü Dongbin… there were countless links to Earth’s myths and legends, yet he had never taken the time to explore them. He thought he should’ve been more curious.

Though a bit suspicious, he figured he had simply been too busy until now, and let the thought pass once more.

“Brother Cho, anything you can see?”

“I’m not sure. This isn’t a Dharma Treasure. It doesn’t have any special mechanisms. How does this even work?”

Seo Ryeom and Mak Ya-wol also took the secret manual from Cho-su and examined it closely. Neither could find anything unusual about it either.

“Do you have to keep it with you? Can you give it to someone else?”

“I’m not completely sure, but if I give up ownership, I think I can. That’s how I received it at first, too.”

“Really?”

Listening to Yong Seo-hee, Jang Woo-hyun received the secret manual from Seo Ryeom.

And at that moment—

“Huh?”

Jang Woo-hyun suddenly felt something leave his body, and from his fingertips, sparks and lightning burst out.

“Ahhh!”

“Uhh?”

He had definitely stabilized the Five Elements’ energy, but it suddenly went out of control.

The secret manual ignited in an instant from the energy Jang Woo-hyun emitted and turned into ash.

Everyone fell silent at the sudden situation.

The most flustered was Yong Seo-hee. As the secret manual vanished, she felt something connected to her disappear.

Yong Seo-hee closed her eyes and tried to summon the manual again. Normally, it should’ve appeared on her palm, but no matter how much she focused, nothing happened.

“Uhh…”

Jeok Tae-ryung had said that the Heavenly Escape Sword Art only appeared in the form of a manual, but wasn’t actually a book. It couldn’t be burned or discarded—but it had vanished.

With a vacant expression, Yong Seo-hee looked at Jang Woo-hyun. He, too, wore a puzzled face and gave her an awkward smile. Judging by his expression, he had no idea why this had happened either.

“What… what just happened?”

“Orabeoni, do you feel like you’re in possession of the secret manual?”

“No, I don’t feel anything at all.”

“Close your eyes and imagine that the Heavenly Escape Sword Art manual is in your hand.”

Jang Woo-hyun did as she said. But nothing happened.

“Did I burn it?”

“That’s probably not it.”

Cho-su shook his head and continued explaining.

“To me, it seems like it recognized you as its owner.”

“Me?”

“It didn’t seem like an ordinary item. Normally, with things like this, the owner is already determined. Sometimes the item itself chooses its master.”

That was true for divine weapons and artifacts.

He didn’t need to look far—Dragon King’s Scale and Black Wilds Sword had chosen Jang Woo-hyun on their own.

“I can’t recreate it again. Doesn’t that mean I burned it?”

“That’s not something that would vanish so easily.”

“That’s right. The person who gave it to me said that though it appeared as a manual, it couldn’t be burned or thrown away.”

“It looked dangerous, so it’s better that you have it now, Woo-hyun.”

If it was something the Divine Dragon Clan desired, it was safer in Jang Woo-hyun’s hands than in Yong Seo-hee’s.

“Could it really have disappeared?”

“If it’s gone, then so be it.”

“…Huh?”

“It wasn’t something we needed anyway. If it’s gone, it’s gone.”

“…That’s true.”

It was disappointing since it was a manual left behind by the legendary Sword Immortal.

But it hadn’t been something they needed from the start, and now there was no way to retrieve it.

Jang Woo-hyun quickly let go of any attachment.

‘If it hasn’t disappeared, I’ll see it again eventually.’

Thinking simply, he decided to be content with having saved Yong Seo-hee.

“Seo-hee, what do we do? It just vanished.”

“I—it’s probably fine? I was going to hand it over to another sect anyway, so if Orabeoni keeps it…”

With the sudden disappearance of the Heavenly Escape Sword Art, even Yong Seo-hee wasn’t sure how to respond.

But thinking it through, it didn’t seem like a big problem.

At the very least, with Jang Woo-hyun in possession of it, the Divine Dragon Clan wouldn’t be able to take it so easily.

“I think it’ll be fine. Ah, and I have something else to tell you.”

Yong Seo-hee’s gaze shifted to the Dragon King’s Scale at Jang Woo-hyun’s waist.

“It’s about that sword.”

“The sword? Dragon King’s Scale?”

“Yes. In an ancient record, I came across a dragon that resembled that sword.”

She began sharing what she had read in a book.

“That dragon came up from the Lower Realm twenty thousand years ago and accompanied a martial artist.”

“Twenty thousand years ago?”

“You know something?”

“No, not really…”

When he heard twenty thousand years, Jang Woo-hyun felt a strange sense of déjà vu and tilted his head.

‘What is this?’

He tried thinking, but nothing came to mind.

“Orabeoni?”

“Huh? Oh, right. Go on. I think I was mistaken.”

“Yes. It’s not an exact time, but about twenty thousand years ago, there was a dragon that came up from the Lower Realm. It’s said that it devoured countless Dharma Treasures. The book even described the dragon devouring them—and it was very similar to how the Dragon King’s Scale absorbs Dharma Treasures.”

Yong Seo-hee paused briefly before stating the dragon’s name.

“Devouring Dragon of a Thousand Treasures. It’s a dragon said to have swallowed countless Dharma Treasures.”

Upon hearing the name, Jang Woo-hyun asked the experienced Cho-su and Mak Ya-wol if they knew of it.

“Never heard of it.”

“Same here.”

Both seemed unfamiliar. Cho-su, especially, looked more curious than Jang Woo-hyun.

“A dragon like that existing yet remaining unknown is odd.”

Twenty thousand years was a long time, but by Central Heavens’ standards, it wasn’t that long. There were species that easily lived over a thousand years in Central Heavens.

“Could it be related to the Dragon King’s Scale?”

“I’m not sure, but I think so. That thing’s no ordinary item. And the name is literally Dragon King’s Scale.”

Jang Woo-hyun had already suspected some connection between the sword and dragons, so he agreed with Cho-su’s assessment.

Jang Woo-hyun and Cho-su continued talking about the Dragon King’s Scale based on what Yong Seo-hee had shared.

“But didn’t you also have something to tell us, Brother Cho?”

Jin Ha-un, who had been quietly listening, asked Cho-su.

“There were so many fascinating stories, I forgot.”

Cho-su chuckled awkwardly and continued.

“We received a message.”

“A message?”

“We have to go to the Nation of Mechanical Marvels.”

“Huh? Don’t tell me—”

At the mention of the Nation of Mechanical Marvels, Jang Woo-hyun realized what he meant.

“They’re ready to use the Divine True Steel.”

Before coming to find Jang Woo-hyun, Cho-su had received word from Cho-yul, who had taken the Divine True Steel to the Nation of Mechanical Marvels.

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