Myst, Might, Mayhem

Chapter 146 – Poison Master (3)

Drip! Drip!

The thick blood droplets falling from Mok Gyeong-un’s palm.

The Annihilating Poison King Baek Sa-ha, who had been staring at it with unbelieving eyes, finally opened his mouth,

“Young lad, do you know what you just said?”

“Well.”

“You saying that your blood is poison means that you have reached a realm that even I haven’t ascended to. Does that make sense to you?”

He was only 17 years old.

An age too young to even be called a youth.

Was he saying that he had reached a realm that even he, who had cultivated poison arts all his life, had not attained?

It was something he absolutely could not accept.

To that, Mok Gyeong-un smiled and said,

“For someone who claims to be the top expert in poison arts, is it that difficult for you to simply taste my blood? Seeing how you’re denying it so elaborately.”

“What? You, right now, to whom…”

“Then taste it. It’s not that difficult.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, the Annihilating Poison King Baek Sa-ha’s eyes narrowed.

If the kid’s blood was truly poison itself, it would be a genuine shock to him.

After hesitating for a moment, Baek Sa-ha finally extended his hand.

And he grabbed Mok Gyeong-un’s wrist, pulled it, and let the blood flowing from his palm drip into his mouth.

-Drip drip drip!

Mok Gyeong-un’s blood wetting his tongue.

The moment it touched his tongue, the Annihilating Poison King Baek Sa-ha’s eyes widened.

‘!?’

He had lived his entire life with poison.

The moment he tasted the blood, he could instinctively realize it.

‘This is…’

It was undoubtedly poison.

The burning sensation as it touched his tongue and the complex taste spreading out.

This flavor, which was one yet could be felt as numerous changes, was a kind of poison he had never experienced before.

‘What on earth…’

Baek Sa-ha’s ability to identify poisons was at the highest level, to say the least.

Yet, he couldn’t identify what kind of poison it was.

That meant it was proof that the blood itself had become poison, not formed through poisoning.

“Hah…”

A gasp escaped from Baek Sa-ha’s mouth.

Even he, who had preserved poison within his body through the Wave Demon Poison Scripture, couldn’t have his blood itself become poison.

However, Mok Gyeong-un’s blood was truly poison itself.

If that was the case,

“… Poison Master.”

Mok Gyeong-un had truly reached the realm of a Poison Master.

Baek Sa-ha stared at Mok Gyeong-un’s face with shocked eyes.

What the hell was this kid?

How did such a young lad reach the realm of a Poison Master that even he, who had cultivated poison arts for decades, had not achieved?

It went beyond the realm of understanding, so he was filled with questions.

After being at a loss for words for a while, Baek Sa-ha finally managed to part his lips.

“How… How did you ascend to the realm of a Poison Master?”

“What even is a Poison Master?”

“… You’re asking what a Poison Master is?”

“Yes.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s question, Baek Sa-ha’s head ached.

This kid didn’t even know what realm he had reached.

It was utterly absurd.

“Are you trying to mock me?”

“It’s not mockery. I’m asking because I truly don’t know.”

“Hah…”

“Is it because my blood is poison?”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s question, Baek Sa-ha clicked his tongue and answered,

“Yes. The person themselves becoming poison. That is the realm of a Poison Master.”

“Ah. Is that so?”

Baek Sa-ha felt inwardly dumbfounded yet envious at Mok Gyeong-un’s attitude of answering as if it was nothing.

He had struggled to the point of death but failed to achieve what this young lad had accomplished so easily.

‘It’s utterly disheartening.’

A young lad who hadn’t even cultivated poison arts, no, who couldn’t even properly utilize poison, had ascended to the realm of a Poison Master.

It was enough to make his efforts feel meaningless.

It was like discovering a pig with a pearl necklace around its neck.

“… Fine. Let me change the question. How did you get poison to permeate your blood? You should know the answer to this yourself.”

“Well, I suppose.”

“Then tell me.”

“Are you referring to the method?”

“Yes.”

At his answer, Mok Gyeong-un scratched his head and let out a groan of contemplation.

“Hmm.”

“Do you not want to tell me?”

“It seems like you really want it.”

“Want it? It’s more than that. This is a long-cherished wish for me.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. So tell me what you know. If you do that, I will properly teach you poison arts so that you can utilize that poison qi of yours.”

“Not a bad condition.”

“Ha! Not a bad condition? You fool. If you learn poison arts from me, you will undoubtedly be called the best among the younger generation.”

“Is it to that extent?”

“Indeed.”

Mok Gyeong-un had already reached the realm of a Poison Master.

If taught, he had sufficient talent to even ascend to the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture.

However, completely unexpected words flowed out of Mok Gyeong-un’s mouth.

“Can I change the condition a bit?”

“What?”

“It’s not that difficult.”

At Mok Gyeong-un’s words, Baek Sa-ha clicked his tongue again.

Sensing that he was in a disadvantageous position, the kid was now trying to make a deal with him. He was truly a brazen fellow.

“… What do you want?”

“It’s not very difficult. I just want you to tell me what I want to know…”

It was at that very moment.

“Ugh.”

Baek Sa-ha suddenly clutched his chest.

Then, his eyes became bloodshot, and he looked at Mok Gyeong-un with a perplexed expression.

‘This… What the…’

The reason for Baek Sa-ha’s bewilderment was simple.

It was because he felt a burning pain starting from his chest.

Baek Sa-ha could instantly identify the cause of this pain.

‘Impossible.’

This was a phenomenon that occurred when being poisoned.

Baek Sa-ha was dumbfounded.

As someone who had reached a high realm through poison arts, he possessed the ability to neutralize other poisons invading his body with the hundreds of poisons he carried within him.

However,

“Cough… Cough…”

Dark red blood flowed from his mouth.

Baek Sa-ha’s eyes trembled violently.

“How can this be…”

It was absurd enough to be preposterous.

Did it make sense for a poison to exist that he, known as the Annihilating Poison King, couldn’t neutralize?

[Deadly? This?]

Suddenly, Mok Gyeong-un’s words from earlier came to mind.

He had spoken as if Baek Sa-ha’s wave poison was nothing, causing him displeasure.

However, with the rapidly spreading poison qi, Baek Sa-ha realized.

‘This kid… Was he serious?’

It wasn’t bravado to provoke him.

Baek Sa-ha hurriedly circulated the Wave Demon Poison Scripture, trying to neutralize Mok Gyeong-un’s poison that was penetrating and spreading further into his internal organs.

-Sizzle!

Dark red vapor flowed from his shoulders.

It was a phenomenon that occurred while dissolving the poison.

With his profound internal energy, he was somehow expelling the poison, albeit belatedly.

However, the problem lay elsewhere.

-Crack!

“Ugh!”

Baek Sa-ha, who had been circulating his energy, grabbed the back of his neck.

“Elder?”

“Argh.”

Mok Gyeong-un looked at him with a puzzled expression.

He had been watching, thinking that as a master of poison arts, Baek Sa-ha would be able to dissolve the poison on his own, but something seemed strange.

The eyes of Baek Sa-ha, who was holding the back of his neck, were becoming clouded.

Something seemed to have gone wrong.

‘Hmm.’

So, Mok Gyeong-un tried to lay Baek Sa-ha down to check his condition.

However,

-Thud!

‘Huh?’

The legs that were crossed in a sitting position wouldn’t straighten.

No, it wasn’t just that they wouldn’t straighten, but it seemed that this posture had been fixed for a long time, and the bones and muscles of his lower body had significantly weakened.

Mok Gyeong-un placed his hand on the acupuncture points there.

‘… Is this why he kept sitting?’

As he touched the acupuncture points, Mok Gyeong-un discovered Baek Sa-ha’s secret.

It seemed that the flow of the acupuncture points in his lower body had become blocked due to the clashing of the reversing poison qi and his internal true energy, causing paralysis.

‘Was he continuously using his true energy to block the reversing poison qi?’

That seemed to be the reason why he had been sitting all the time.

Mok Gyeong-un slowly traced Baek Sa-ha’s acupuncture points upward.

The poison seemed to have finally reached his brain as it reversed along the path where the true energy moved through the main acupuncture points.

The cause was probably,

‘My blood?’

In order to dissolve Mok Gyeong-un’s blood, or rather, the new poison, Baek Sa-ha had further dispersed his internal true energy and failed to block the reversing poison qi.

‘What should I do about this?’

If left alone, Baek Sa-ha would either become a vegetable or die, one of the two.

If true energy was injected at this point to help block the reversing poison qi, there might be some hope, but the problem was,

‘Will death energy work?’

His death energy would rather scatter the true energy.

It could even have the opposite effect.

As he was pondering what to do, Cheong-ryeong’s voice reached his ears.

-Do you have the Moonlight Pill?

-Pardon?

-The one you called the Heavenly Earth Pill.

-Ah, that? I’m carrying it with me.

Since he hadn’t cultivated the energy of nourishing life, Mok Gyeong-un couldn’t see any effect even if he took it, so he was just carrying it in his pocket.

-Yes. Put the Moonlight Pill in that old man’s mouth and try to block the poison qi that has risen to his brain.

-The poison qi that has risen to his brain?

Mok Gyeong-un looked at the back of Baek Sa-ha’s neck.

Then, he removed the hand that was holding the back of his neck and placed his fingers on the acupuncture point connected to the brain.

-Swish!

And then he unleashed the Ritual of Binding.

Through the Ritual of Binding focused on a single finger, the rising poison qi concentrated into one point and then entered Mok Gyeong-un’s finger.

“Cough.”

At that moment, Baek Sa-ha, who had lost consciousness, regained his senses.

“Have you regained consciousness?”

“You… How did you…?”

To him, who was clueless about what was going on, Mok Gyeong-un said,

“Rather than directly helping you, it seems difficult, so try doing something with this.”

“What?”

-Plop!

Mok Gyeong-un then put the Heavenly Earth Pill into Baek Sa-ha’s mouth.

‘This is?’

Baek Sa-ha, who had the pill in his mouth, instinctively realized that it was a spiritual medicine.

In the current situation where the flow of his true energy was disrupted while dissolving Mok Gyeong-un’s poison, he couldn’t block the reversing poison qi.

So, Baek Sa-ha, who was in no position to be picky,

-Gulp!

He swallowed the Heavenly Earth Pill as it was.

Indeed, as befitting the spiritual medicine boasted by the Heaven and Earth Society, the moment he swallowed it, he felt a hot energy gradually spreading as it went down his esophagus.

Normally, he should have used it to make it his own, but,

‘Push it out.’

Baek Sa-ha had to utilize the energy of the spiritual medicine to push out the reversing poison qi again.

If he didn’t, not only would his lower body become paralyzed, but his entire body would become paralyzed, and he might become a vegetable.

-Sizzle!

As Baek Sa-ha was exerting all his strength with the energy of the spiritual medicine,

Mok Gyeong-un muttered while watching him,

“It’s strange. I don’t understand why you’re fighting the poison. You could just accept it.”

‘!?’

At that moment, Baek Sa-ha’s eyes trembled strongly.

***

50 years ago.

A young Baek Sa-ha, kneeling, asked a middle-aged man who was lighting incense,

[How can I ascend to the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture?]

[…]

[Are you not going to answer me? Father.]

The middle-aged man was none other than Baek Sa-ha’s father, Baek Yu, who could be called the patriarch of the Baek family and the Myriad Poisons Master.

He was the man who overturned the martial world’s conventional wisdom that the Four Seasons Tang Clan and the Guyang Clan couldn’t be defeated with poison.

With the death of the Tang Clan’s patriarch, Tang Yeon-jong, known as the Thousand Flower Poison Hand, at his hands, the martial world of the Central Plains acknowledged Baek Yu as the new supreme master of poison arts.

The Wave Demon Poison Scripture was a poison art created by Baek Yu, the patriarch of the Baek family, and it became a supreme technique that rivaled the fame of the Tang Clan’s Myriad Heavenly Flower Poison Art and the Guyang Clan’s Clam and Horse Technique.

However, the process of mastering this Wave Demon Poison Scripture was not easy, and as one ascended each layer, it became more difficult to gain enlightenment. Apart from Baek Yu, the creator, none of his sons had reached the eighth layer, known as the ultimate realm.

The same was true for Baek Sa-ha, who was originally the second son but became the eldest.

[Is the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture impossible for anyone other than you, Father?]

[…]

Baek Yu remained silent.

The reason he was acting this way was that this place was the ancestral shrine where the spirit tablet of the eldest son was placed.

Baek Seong-ha, the eldest son who was cultivating the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture, had died due to the phenomenon of poison reversing, causing his brain’s blood flow to be blocked, resulting in paralysis of his entire body.

[Please tell me, Father.]

[…]

[Will I also lose my life like my elder brother if I try to master the eighth layer like this?]

After losing his elder brother, the young Baek Sa-ha began to have doubts about cultivating the Wave Demon Poison Scripture.

The eldest son had lost his life, and the third younger brother had become paralyzed from the waist down.

The only one who was still intact was himself, but no matter how much he thought about it, this Wave Demon Poison Scripture seemed to be a martial art that no one could master except for his father, the creator.

[The Wave Demon Poison Scripture is the path to becoming a Poison Master.]

[That again?]

[The ultimate realm of poison arts is to become poison oneself.]

[How? From the moment one cultivates poison arts, one has to live in constant tension, unable to sleep properly. How can a person become poison?]

[Just adapt to it.]

[… What exactly is this adaptation?]

[You can’t understand it now, and I know you have many grievances against this father. But it’s something you have to realize on your own.]

[…]

‘Adaptation… Adaptation… That damn adaptation…’

Such vague advice even to his son.

Because of that, one son died, and another son became crippled. Is this how it is?

From that day on, Baek Sa-ha made a resolution.

Rather than recklessly following his father’s shadow, he decided to forge his own path.

33 years later.

[Hah… Hah…]

Baek Sa-ha, wiping the blood from the corner of his mouth, was exhaling rough breaths.

It was the first time in nearly a decade that he had been injured in a one-on-one match against someone, and he couldn’t hide his shock.

He had never faced the Society Leader, known as the supreme master of the Heaven and Earth Society, in the first place.

However, he had once directly sparred in a friendly match with Ho Tae-gang, one of the Five Kings who held the title of Eight Stars and had surpassed the wall.

Even then, although he felt a certain gap, he had never experienced such a sense of powerlessness.

‘How can this be possible?’

Even Ho Tae-gang, who had surpassed the wall, couldn’t directly withstand his poison qi.

That’s how much he knew the danger of the power called poison.

However, that person had directly clashed with him and deflected all the indiscriminately unleashed fog of poison.

The poison that didn’t touch him had no effect on him.

‘The high-level technique of transferring flowers and grafting trees, capable of lightly deflecting even poison qi.’

It was something that could only be possible by handling true energy as if breathing.

‘Ghost Blade…’

That bastard was truly a monster.

He felt a sense of self-loathing.

However, through this confrontation, Baek Sa-ha realized his shortcomings.

If he couldn’t handle true energy as delicately as that person, he could no longer advance upward.

So he honed himself once again.

If he could handle true energy delicately and move it freely as if breathing, he might be able to succeed in the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture that he had given up on.

However, his judgment was half right and half wrong.

Baek Sa-ha, who was confident that he could handle true energy as delicately as breathing, challenged the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture.

The eighth layer realm that only his patriarch and father, Baek Yu, had succeeded in.

This time, he was confident that he would succeed.

However,

[Argh…]

Baek Sa-ha failed to ascend to the eighth layer.

Since he could handle true energy delicately, he tried to achieve harmony with the poison qi.

However, due to the phenomenon of the poison qi reversing, his lower body became paralyzed instead.

He had become the same as his third younger brother.

‘… Is the ultimate realm of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture truly impossible?’

Perhaps the realm of a Poison Master was an impossible domain for anyone other than his father, the supreme master.

With his lower body paralyzed, Baek Sa-ha went into seclusion under the pretext of a three-year mourning period.

His goal was not to achieve the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture.

He simply hoped to suppress the reversing poison qi and restore his paralyzed lower body to its original state.

However, even now, he was still at square one.

‘Do I have to live like this, half-crippled?’

He was gradually becoming exhausted.

However,

[It’s strange. I don’t understand why you’re fighting the poison. You could just accept it.]

The moment he heard those words from Mok Gyeong-un, he suddenly recalled what his father, Baek Yu, had said.

[Just adapt to it.]

‘Adapt?’

It was at that very instant when he recalled those words.

Baek Sa-ha released the poison qi that had been reversing and the true energy that had been blocking it.

And he discarded all the thoughts of separating them.

Then,

-Rumble!

Baek Sa-ha’s true energy and poison qi, which had been unable to mix like water and oil, began to harmonize with each other.

And then,

-Crack! Crackle!

Cracks appeared on Baek Sa-ha’s skin.

That phenomenon was none other than,

-That old man is lucky. To undergo a transformation.

It was just as Cheong-ryeong had said.

Transformation.

His body was mutating anew to match his enlightenment.

Into a body befitting the eighth layer of the Wave Demon Poison Scripture that he had longed for.

It didn’t take very long.

Baek Sa-ha’s body was already sufficiently prepared.

He had just been forcibly suppressing it.

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