Chapter 27: Demonic Martial Divine Manual (2)

—”The wall of the Master Level was high, but it only took me about three years to overcome it. However, no matter how much I poured into it, I couldn’t reach the Transcendent Level. So, I thought I couldn’t go on like this and set out into the Martial World at a later age. I wanted to see if there was anything I could gain. I should have started earlier, but I’ve always been a coward by nature.”

After setting out into the Martial World, Kim Min-soo experienced many things. He even killed people to survive.

Eventually, after twenty years, he broke through the wall of the Transcendent Level.

—”I don’t know how skilled you are, the one reading this right now, but you do know that there’s a stage beyond the Transcendent Level, right? Yeah, the monsters known as Absolute Experts. While wandering the Martial World, I eventually found myself standing before the wall of the Absolute Realm. But do you think it was easy to surpass? Once again, it was some so-called realization or whatever that held me back. So, this time, I stopped caring and just kept building up my Internal Energy. Strangely, it kept accumulating without end. What happened? Even though I was still a Transcendent Expert, my Internal Energy grew greater than that of Absolute Experts. Turned out, when I had reached the Transcendent Level, my Internal Energy had already been at the level of an Absolute Expert. In terms of sheer amount, I had become the greatest in the world.”

—”But what’s the point of having more if you can’t use it properly? It’s like a well turning into a river, but the ladle remains the same size. With a larger reserve, I could fight against many enemies for a long time, but against real experts, the battle was still difficult. If it was against Second-rate or First-rate Martial Artists, I could’ve killed tens of thousands. The energy I used would be less than the energy I continued to accumulate.”

His martial arts, which hadn’t surpassed the wall, had started to become distorted.

—”So I lived on, awkwardly stuck in that unbalanced Transcendent Level… and then one day, something changed. A complete transformation? Or maybe something else? My whole body was reconstructed—it felt like I had become a completely different person. And that’s when I realized: the Absolute Realm isn’t the end.”

“What?”

Startled, Jang Woo-hyun muttered to himself. There was no one around to answer.

Absolute Experts.

Those who had reached the pinnacle of martial arts—the Absolute Realm. They were known as the Eight Sovereigns of the current martial world, living legends.

Across the vast Central Plains, only eight existed. And yet Kim Min-soo said there was a stage beyond even that.

—”How do I know? It’s hard to explain, but I just instinctively knew once I reached the Absolute Realm. I met a few other Absolute Experts and talked with them—some knew, some didn’t.”

The story continued. Kim Min-soo, who had become one of the greatest martial artists in the world, kept traveling across the land. He also began searching for others who might have come from Earth like him.

—”I didn’t care about the orthodox or unorthodox. I even made requests to the Beggars’ Sect and the Hao Sect. I even went to the Demon Cult. But no matter how hard I searched, there was no one. Sadly, I was the only one who ended up in this world.”

As he searched for people from Earth, he began showing sentences that only Koreans could understand. Rumors began to spread that Kim Min-soo spoke in strange languages.

—”While wandering around, I met a strange fellow.”

An old fox monster.

That coincidental encounter brought unexpected thoughts to Kim Min-soo’s mind.

—”That guy said he came from another world. So I asked what he meant, and he said someone summoned him from a world of monsters to this one. I came from another world too, so why not a monster world? Then suddenly, I had this thought: then maybe it’s possible to go back?”

Jang Woo-hyun’s eyes widened as he read that passage. He had never considered the idea—going back to Earth.

With trembling hands, he turned the page.

—”From then on, strange thoughts started to creep in. Isn’t this place called the Martial World kind of weird? It has names you know, but they’re all slightly different. Shaolin, Wudang, Beijing, Mount Hua… they’re just like the ones in martial arts novels, but a bit off. So what is this world? A world from a novel? Or a parallel world with different history? That’s when I started searching the Central Plains again—not as a martial artist, but from a different perspective.”

Kim Min-soo scoured every corner of the Central Plains, eventually traveling beyond it—to the Korean Peninsula.

—”I expected to find countries like Goryeo, Joseon, or even Ju-shin or Haedong. But there was nothing. Just shattered lands. It was once the dwelling place of immortals, but one day it disappeared in a war. I don’t know whether those immortals were really immortals or something else, but either way, there are no countries left on the Korean Peninsula. Almost no people either.”

These were things Jang Woo-hyun had never even considered.

—”As I roamed the land, hunting monsters and beating up anyone who picked a fight, people started calling me the strongest under heaven. I had definitely grown stronger. Ridiculously strong. It felt like I had reached the end of the Absolute Realm, but I couldn’t see the next wall. Just when I thought this was it, I met them—those who stood at the edge of the Absolute Realm, staring at the wall of the next stage.”

Gulp.

Nervously, Jang Woo-hyun swallowed and flipped the page. There, only a single word was written:

[To be conntinued]

“You son of a…!”

He never expected a cliffhanger here. When he flipped to the next page, all he found was a bunch of repetitive notes Kim Min-soo had written for practice.

There was also an explanation about why he wrote things so strangely. He was worried that if he wrote it plainly, some genius in this world might decipher it—so he coded it this way.

“Haah…”

The most important part was missing.

The stage beyond the Absolute Realm. And those who were reaching toward it. They didn’t seem to be ordinary martial artists. If they were, Kim Min-soo would’ve met them easily during his travels.

‘I need the next volume.’

There had to be one—it was labeled as the first. He had to find it.

But before that, there was something he had to do first.

‘I need to recover my body.’

He had no idea what might happen once he returned to the Martial World, so he needed to restore himself. Plus, he had gained something from his fight with Ha Jung-do and received the Heaven and Earth Yin Yang Twin Hands technique. He needed time to train.

Fortunately, the Shangguan Family Head had said he could stay as long as he needed. He planned to stay and train here.

* * *

The first thing he focused on was his body’s recovery.

Using the Resurrection Pill had put out the worst of the fire, but his body was still in rough shape.

“Wouldn’t it be better to take some elixirs or medicine?”

It was Jin Ha-un, who had come to see him upon hearing that Jang Woo-hyun had regained consciousness.

He must have had many questions about Jang Woo-hyun’s sudden rise in level, but he first showed concern for his health.

“Elixirs?”

“Some people do that occasionally. They apply intense force to their meridians or Qi channels, then use elixirs to circulate Qi and build energy while healing. Like tempering steel, you know? Your case is a bit different, but it’s worth trying. You’re already an exceptional person, after all.”

Until now, Jang Woo-hyun hadn’t paid much attention to elixirs since just building up Qi had been enough. The only real elixir he had taken was the one Gal Yoon gave him at the Cloud Sword Sect. The Resurrection Pill was something he had taken recently to treat internal injuries.

‘It was effective.’

That pill had boosted his Internal Energy enough to go against the Cloud Sword Sect Leader. After feeling a lack of energy during his battle with Ha Jung-do, Jang Woo-hyun decided to follow Jin Ha-un’s advice.

With plenty of money still left, he commissioned the Shangguan Family to procure all kinds of elixirs. Since the Shangguan Family couldn’t run the auction house for a while, they had to get rid of inventory—so they sold the elixirs at a discount.

“Can you get more of this?”

“Honey from the Golden-Crowned Peak King? Does that help treat internal injuries?”

“Huh? Uh, yeah…”

Truthfully, he asked just because it tasted so good. It was one of the best things he’d ever eaten in this world.

“Wait here. I’ll go ask Young Master Shangguan and bring it back.”

Not understanding Jang Woo-hyun’s real intentions, Hwang An quickly left to help him. Jang felt a bit guilty, but since it was also good for his body, it wasn’t a total lie.

After spending about two weeks gulping down various elixirs—

Jang Woo-hyun had fully recovered.

* * *

“Ah…”

As he recovered his body and began examining the Heaven and Earth Yin Yang Twin Hands, curses slipped from Jang Woo-hyun’s mouth.

“These crazy bastards, seriously…”

Not a single one of them was normal.

The Demonic Martial Divine Manual was no different from a diary, and the Heaven and Earth Yin Yang Twin Hands technique wasn’t difficult—it was incomplete. Not vertically missing top or bottom halves, but only the odd-numbered pages were there; all the even-numbered ones were missing.

He had thought it strange from the beginning. The explanation started at the head, passed through the chest, then suddenly jumped to the soles of the feet. The flow began with the left hand and then, in the next chapter, suddenly started again from the right hand.

Upon closer inspection, it wasn’t that the Heaven and Earth Yin Yang Twin Hands was incomprehensible—it was just missing half the content. One page missing in between each section.

“This is a total mess.”

To master it, he needed the other half. No matter how exceptional Jang Woo-hyun was, this couldn’t be helped. With half of it missing, not just a small portion, learning it was entirely impossible.

Thankfully, although the secret manual was a bust, there was still some gain. The elixirs he had bought with all the money he had helped immensely. Not only did they heal his internal injuries, but, as Jin Ha-un had mentioned, they strengthened his meridians and Qi pathways, allowing him to draw out even more internal energy. Now, he could feel himself standing at the end of the Master Level, right in front of the wall of the Transcendent Level.

On top of that, since he had conserved the energy left after recovering from his internal injuries, the amount of internal energy he had wasn’t just at the Master Level anymore.

‘At this point…’

He could now defeat Ha Jung-do.

He still couldn’t use Qi Projection, but with the increased internal energy, he was more than capable of going toe-to-toe with a Transcendent Expert. Though his efficiency wasn’t perfect, his overwhelming output and internal energy reserve made up for it.

Since he couldn’t learn the Heaven and Earth Yin Yang Twin Hands, Jang Woo-hyun began to reflect on his fight with Ha Jung-do.

Those he had fought previously either lacked in level or were monsters or spellcasters.

The fight with Ha Jung-do had been a real battle between martial artists—a true contest between masters.

Strictly speaking, it was also his first defeat. Had Hwang An and Jin Ha-un not helped at the end, the one left standing would’ve been Ha Jung-do, not him.

Just revisiting the fight with Ha Jung-do brought him valuable insights, and the short sparring sessions and martial discussions he frequently had with Jin Ha-un helped fill in the gaps in his skills.

“I knew you were talented, but I didn’t expect you to grow this strong so quickly. Were you hiding your strength back then?”

When they first met, Jang Woo-hyun had been a First-rate Martial Artist. Yet in just a few months, he had climbed to the Master Level—and even surpassed Jin Ha-un in strength.

What he had shown when facing Ha Jung-do had left a deep impression.

Normally, when a Master-level martial artist who can’t use Qi Projection faces someone who can, they don’t last long. It’s only natural. Without overwhelming internal energy, they don’t even stand a chance. So how could they endure?

But Jang Woo-hyun had done it. And not just held out—he had nearly taken down his opponent. The technique he used at the end had destructive power surpassing even Qi Projection.

“I wasn’t hiding anything. That really was all I had back then.”

“You’re saying you became this strong in just a few months?”

Faced with a fact too hard to believe, Jin Ha-un let out a sigh of disbelief. He had been hailed as a genius in Mount Qingcheng, yet compared to Jang Woo-hyun, he was nothing. How had he grown so fast?

“You’ve gotten incredibly strong. Master Jang, how did you do it?”

Next to him, the Taoist monk Pung-yu from Qingcheng asked. He was also immensely curious—how could someone grow that fast?

“There’s no special method. All I did was train and fight.”

Jang Woo-hyun then told them what had happened at the Demon Extermination Sect and about the entanglement with the Autumn Soul Assassination Sect.

The Iron Armor Monkey, the Five Monsters of the Thousand Demon Sect, and the assassins of the Autumn Soul Assassination Sect. It hadn’t been long, but he had gone through a lot. In fact, even if the factions had been weakened, he had essentially crushed the main force of a sect and a small assassin group. Not to mention the battle against the Demon Cult martial artist at the auction house.

“……”

The one who had asked the question, Pung-yu, was left speechless.

It wasn’t even wartime, and yet he was fighting this much?

“You’ve truly walked the Martial World on the edge of a blade.”

Perhaps now understanding how Jang Woo-hyun had grown stronger, Jin Ha-un nodded in agreement.

“I learn something every time I meet you.”

Last time, he had learned the meaning of walking the Martial World. This time, he learned about Jang Woo-hyun’s relentless drive.

What genius was he, training quietly at Mount Qingcheng in Sichuan? The real genius was right in front of him—and that genius lived a fierce life.

“Well, I’ll be going for today.”

Just as Jin Ha-un and Pung-yu stood up to leave after their goodbyes—

“Are you inside?”

A voice unfamiliar to him came from outside.

Jang Woo-hyun immediately tensed. He hadn’t released his Qi, but for someone to come so close without him noticing… That meant the person was more skilled than he was.

Tense, he stepped outside to find a man standing there, holding an unsheathed sword in one hand.

He had wide tiger-like eyes and a stiff beard—a man with a rugged impression. Judging by the graying hair, he was somewhere between middle and old age. His physique matched his intimidating presence—large and powerful.

He also had a large mouth, which spread into a wide, refreshing smile.

Then the man introduced himself.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Pyo Deuk-won of the Grand Sabre Sect.”

The Sect Leader of the Grand Sabre Sect and top expert of the Xuanwu Alliance had come looking for Jang Woo-hyun.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep