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Chapter 220. Nine in the Fifth Place (16)
Chapter 220. Nine in the Fifth Place (16)
Chapter 220. Nine in the Fifth Place (16)
Time passed quickly, and after seven days, Woo-Moon and his party left the Baek Family to go to the Heavenly Demon Cult.
While Ye-Ye and the others were saddened by the farewell, it was not something they could avoid. Woo-Moon and the others eventually departed, comforting the others by saying that they would visit as often as possible.
Clip clop, clip clop.
Since they had gotten fine horses from the Dark Soul Squadron, the party was able to ride comfortably during their travels.
“This makes me think of that day long ago,” Si-Hyeon said.
Woo-Moon smiled, knowing what she was referring to.
“When you first came to the Baek Family?”
“Yes, hehe. Time really has gone by so quickly. We've been through so many things.”
“We really have.”
As they continued forward, a small scream echoed from somewhere far away.
It hadn't come from the official roads but from deep in the mountains off to the side.
“Did you hear that?” Si-Hyeon asked.
“Yeah. It's the scream of someone who has never cultivated.”
“Let's go see what it is.”
“Okay,” Woo-Moon said while turning to Yeo-Seol.
“We'll be back shortly, so wait here.”
“Okay, Gege.”
As the obedient Yeo-Seol smiled at him, Woo-Moon leaped off his horse’s back. His target was, of course, the source of the scream coming from somewhere in the forest.
Si-Hyeon followed behind him, while the Dark Soul Squadron followed along as fast as they could.
Ma-Ra ordered her subordinates to wait by Yeo-Seol before following Woo-Moon under stealth.
“Hehe, I should give some of this to Mommy,” a cute little girl who had been digging for herbs said as she picked some flowers before returning to the village.
Unbeknownst to her, some things were going on in the village that she couldn’t quite comprehend.
Holding a precious basket of herbs that she had to sell to put food on the table, the girl headed to her house on the outskirts of town.
“AGH!!!”
“P-Pease, save me!”
“Mother, mother!!”
Whenever there was a famine, mountain bandits, horse bandits, and pirates would run rampant.[1] Most of them were poor farmers who had picked up knives instead of hoes to feed themselves and their families.
However, even after the famine ended, most of these farmer-turned-bandits didn't return to their lands.
After all, they had already tasted it.
They were addicted to the comfort of being able to exploit others and easily satisfy their desires by simply relying on violence.
The majority of those who had just attacked the girl’s village were people like that. As for the few bandits who weren't part of that majority... They were the remnants of the Black Bull Gang.
After the Black Bull Gang was destroyed, the entire Black Hand structure collapsed, leaving those who escaped to assimilate into bandit dens and gangs of thieves.
The girl returned home, slightly afraid, only to be stunned by a horrifying sight.
Her mother and her older sister were being raped by vicious men, while her brothers were all lying on the ground with serious injuries.
“Kekeke! This is pretty great! Huh? And what might that thing be?”
“A new bitch has arrived, bro.”
The bandits, mad with rage and lust, walked toward the girl as she peed herself in shock and fear.
“D... d-daddy....”
There was only one person who could save her right now.
The one who had always protected her family, the one person she thought of as more steadfast than a mountain.
Her father.
The girl backed away, hoping for her father to save her.
“You fucking animals!”
The girl’s father appeared with a shout.
He was a hunter who had been hunting far into the forest and had come running when he heard the village's screams and saw the smoke.
Twang!
The man happened to be the best marksman in the village. His arrow flew true even though he was shooting while running, and it pierced the throat of one of the bandits.
“Urgh!” The bandit tried to say something but failed and fell on his back.
Nocking another arrow onto his bow, the hunter took aim and shot again, aiming at one of the other two bandits who were approaching the girl.
Ting!
However, the arrow hit the bandit's chest and bounced off weakly.
The hunter’s eyes narrowed.
“Armor?”
This time, he aimed for the head.
Ting!
The arrow didn't penetrate through the bandit's head either, even though it hit him right in the forehead. In fact, it didn't even leave behind a scratch.
The hunter's gaze was filled with despair at the sight.
“M... martial artists?”
That was the term for people with such abilities. Beings who had learned martial arts and became far, far stronger than those who hadn't. Not just normal strong people, but people with supernatural abilities. Naturally, they were the object of awe and fear to ordinary people.
To think those very same martial artists were mixed in with the bandits....
The former member of the Black Bull Gang smirked. He was a physique cultivator, and after years of practice, he was quite literally impervious to blades and arrows. The hunter attacked him with his bushcraft knife, but he simply knocked the blade aside and proceeded to slash the man’s chest with his palm.
Squelch!
The edge of his palm split open the hunter’s chest like a blade, and blood spewed out.
“D-d-d-daddy!!”
Seemingly unaware of the pain, even as blood flowed from his mouth, the girl's father looked at her. “Little one... r-run... Run...”
“Keke, catching someone who's running away is a different flavor of fun,” said the bandit. He cackled and pulled out his bloody hand.
Thud.
The girl’s father fell to the ground, looking around at his family with bloodshot eyes. Then, he died with a single tear on his cheek.
“D... dad...”
The girl backed away as if she had lost her mind, and the enemy who had killed her father walked over, licking his lips.
As he reached out to her with his hand covered in her father’s blood, the girl screamed so loudly that it seemed like she would tear herself apart.
“N-noooo!!!!”
Woo-Moon’s face hardened as he got closer to the source of the screams. Si-Hyeon, who could sense the uncontrollable anger rising in his heart, grabbed his hand.
“N-noooo!!!!”
It was the scream of a young girl.
The moment he heard it, Woo-Moon disappeared.
Then, he appeared right in front of the girl.
“Huh?”
The Black Bull Gang member opened his eyes wide at the sight of Woo-Moon appearing in front of him.
Swish.
The moment Woo-Moon’s hand rose, those who had been raping the girl’s older sister and mother were lifted into the air and flung to one side.
“Agk! W-what the hell?”
“Ahhh!!!”
The bandits screamed, surprised by the sudden incident. The eyes of the Black Bull Gang member widened with shock and fear as he realized what had just happened. He panicked, gasping for air and almost pissing himself.
Woo-Moon's cold gaze seemed to pierce through the eyes of the remnant bandit of the Black Bull Gang and stab directly into his brain.
Thud!
The commoner bandits, who had acted like demons and committed all kinds of atrocities against their fellow commoners, were brought down to their knees.
“You... you pieces of shit...”
Woo-Moon’s hand grabbed the throat of the Black Bull Gang member, lifting him into the air and glaring at him with a gaze colder than the eternal ice of the North Sea.
Crack.
The bandit's body slowly began to rupture—bones, muscles, organs, and skin alike.
“ARGH!”
Woo-Moon saw six bandits running away from the corner of his eye. However, he didn’t even move a finger. As they were running, their throats somehow split open so wide that their spine was visible through the gaping injuries.
Ma Ra’s figure appeared through the curtain of blood.
Woo-Moon let go of the man he was holding.
The bandit rolled on the ground, quivering as if he had been struck by lightning
It was only natural. Woo-Moon’s power had broken everything that could be broken in his body. The bandit was now dying slowly and in extreme pain, and Woo-Moon had no intention of putting an end to his torment.
Woo-Moon's hand moved, and the girl, her sister, and her mother, who were staring at the scene, fell asleep at the same time.
If they were to keep looking at this horrific sight and endure this trauma, their minds could simply collapse.
“How horrific.”
This wasn't the first time Si-Hyeon had seen such a sight. She had occasionally seen villages plundered by bandits as she traveled with her merchant caravans.
However, this was the first time she had seen such a horrifying sight in the midst of plunder.
Woo-Moon rose into the air.
After reaching a position where he could see the entire village at a glance, he stretched his hand and pressed down.
At this time, the members of the Dark Soul Squadron also arrived, only to be met with the nauseating situation. They were all immediately enraged.
Although they worshiped the demonic character they called the Heavenly Demon and revered strength and nothing else, they would never, ever stoop so low. And they would grow as angry as everyone else at this kind of inhuman deeds.
Endless qi spread out from Woo-Moon's palm.
There were about one hundred and twenty bandits sweeping through the village of around three hundred people.
Woo-Moon’s qi lifted the entire bandit force into the sky.
“Agk!”
“W-what the fuck is going on?”
“Why are we floating?!”
The bandits were confused.
One of them happened to look up and saw Woo-Moon.
“O-over there!”
The leader of the remnant bandits of the Black Bull Gang, the one who had taken over this bandit force, stared at the sky. This was because someone was floating there, in front of him, and that someone looked an awful lot like a young man he had once seen from a distance.
‘Those white clothes and the three swords hanging from his waist...!’
“I-i-it's the Undefeatable Sword Hero...! The P-Paragon, the...”
The sound of his subordinates groaning in shock could be heard from here and there as they all digested what their leader had just said.
“What?!”
“S-Song Woo-Moon... The Paragon, Song Woo-Moon!”
“What?!”
His title had the word “hero” in it. That meant that Woo-Moon had done many heroic acts in the name of justice. And generally, “heroic acts done in the name of justice” meant punishing villains.
In other words, to them, Woo-Moon was no different from the King of Hell!
They immediately began to struggle to escape.
However, considering that not one of them was even Second Class, escaping Woo-Moon's Paragon Qi was just wishful thinking.
At that moment, Woo-Moon pointed at one of the bandits with his finger.
“Are you talking about me?”
As soon as he finished speaking, the man fell down.
Woo-Moon had withdrawn his qi.
The group of bandits was over a hundred zhang above the ground. Even for First Class experts, this was a height that could threaten their lives.
“AAAAHHH—”
Thud!
Naturally, the man turned into a bloody pancake upon contact with the hard ground.
“Ah, AHHHHH!!!”
“S-spare us, Great Hero Song!”
“I'll repent if you let me live, I beg you!”
Woo-Moon looked at the one who had just said that he would repent.
The focus of Woo-Moon's cold gaze, the man who had just said he would repent felt as though his entire body had been plunged into ice water.
“Let me ask you a question.”
“Wha... what is it?”
“If you repent, will the owner of the blood on your hands come back to life?”
“U-u-u... I...”
The man couldn't answer.
Woo-Moon raised a corner of his mouth in a little smile.
“Thought so. Well, do one thing for me, and I'll let you live.”
Hope appeared in the eyes of the man and the other bandits.
“What would you have us do, Great Hero?”
“Y-your generosity is as wide as the ocean, Great Hero Song!”
“Thank you!”
The bandits cried out in tears, as if they’d been drowning in a well and someone had just thrown them a rope.
The eerie smile on Woo-Moon’s lips grew even deeper.
“Go to the afterlife and beg for forgiveness from those you killed. Then I'll spare you in your next lives.”
The expressions of the bandits, who had been filled with hope, turned to despair again as the bandit who had replied to Woo-Moon’s question also fell to the ground.
His eyes then moved to another man. He was a rough-looking man who gave off a warm and steady impression, like the kind of honest and hard-working farmer one could find anywhere.
The bumpkin shouted at Woo-Moon, “I-I'm a commoner who never learned any martial arts! I'm not a martial artist! If you kill me, the world will look down on you!”
Woo-Moon shook his head.
“I don’t care about what the world thinks.”
1. Yes, there is a different term for each type of bandit. ?