Chapter 140: True Despair
“Hohoho. A brat like you dares say you'll kill me?”
Sa Eumryeong sent me a cold, mocking smile.
I had only heard her laugh...
yet my ears tingled painfully.
It felt as though dozens of thin needles were scraping against the inside of my eardrums.
“Heavenly Demon's Kindred Spirit.”
Her smile deepened.
“I'll show you what true hell is.”
At the same time...
every sound around me suddenly became unnaturally loud.
Sa Eumryeong's laughter.
Her breathing.
The sound of her clothes brushing against the floor.
Even the faint friction of her fingertips cutting through the air.
All those sounds began blending together...
resonating in a strange harmony.
I immediately understood.
So this is Phantom Demon Musician's sound art.
Sa Eumryeong wasn't holding any instrument.
But she didn't need one.
Her voice.
Her footsteps.
Her breathing.
Her laughter.
She was using all of them like instruments.
“Mujin, be care—”
Yeom Yuhwa shouted.
But she couldn't finish.
“Kugh...!”
She suddenly staggered and braced herself against the wall.
Her face turned white in an instant.
Her pupils lost focus.
Her fingertips trembled as though convulsing.
Sa Eumryeong glanced sideways at her and smiled.
“Flame Attendant.”
Her voice was almost gentle.
“This is as far as you go.”
“S-Stop....”
Yeom Yuhwa gritted her teeth as if trying to resist.
But that was all.
Her strength left her body, and she collapsed to the floor.
Sa Eumryeong's gaze returned to me.
“Heavenly Demon's Kindred Spirit.”
Her lips curved.
“Now you're the only one left.”
I tightened my grip on my sword.
“Shut up, you wicked bitch!”
“Hohoho.”
She began circling me slowly.
“Good spirit.”
Her steps were light...
almost as if she were dancing.
Each time she moved, the lamps around the room trembled faintly.
Then—
Tiiing.
The sound of a single plucked string rang inside my ears.
My head throbbed violently.
“Kugh...!”
My vision swayed.
The walls around me seemed to move farther away...
then suddenly closer.
I can't let myself be drawn into her illusion.
I immediately circulated the Kunlun Blue Soul Scripture.
Pure qi rose from beneath my dantian and flowed through my entire body.
But even then...
what I saw didn't improve at all.
“Yes.”
Sa Eumryeong's whisper circled my ears.
“Keep resisting like that.”
Her tone was sweet.
“The more you resist...”
“the greater your suffering will become.”
The moment she finished—
WHOOOSH!
A massive blaze erupted before my eyes.
"...!"
I instinctively stopped breathing.
Inside the enormous flames before me...
was Kunlun.
It was hot.
Insanely hot.
Heat licked across my skin.
The smell of burning filled my nose.
Even the sensation of my hair singeing felt painfully real.
And within that inferno...
Kunlun was collapsing.
The halls of Kunlun Sect were burning crimson.
Flame-covered pillars cracked and fell.
People were trapped within the ruined buildings.
“...Mu...jin.”
The first person I saw was Hyeongwon.
He staggered through the flames with one arm missing...
reaching toward me.
Everything below his elbow had already burned black.
Bone was visible through the charred flesh.
Yu Seola was beside him.
Her lower body was crushed beneath a collapsed pillar.
Half her hair and face were burning away.
She glared at me through a face twisted in agony.
Myeongjeon was there too.
Most of his face had melted beneath terrible burns.
He was screaming something desperately...
but what reached my ears wasn't language anymore.
Only torn, broken shrieks.
Behind them...
Sogwang.
Wang Dusik.
Sect Leader Cheon Gwangcheon.
My master, Jin Gwangung.
Every person whose life had crossed mine...
was writhing within the flames.
All of them were dying.
And every one of them was staring at me with resentment.
You were late again.
You couldn't save anyone in the end.
You're going to be the only one who survives again.
Resentment.
Contempt.
Resignation.
I couldn't endure those eyes.
“Ah....”
A hoarse breath escaped my lips.
The flames grew larger.
It wasn't only Kunlun anymore.
The Myeong Family Merchant Group.
Mount Hua.
Every connection I had touched...
was melting together inside that enormous fire.
Then—
“Fated One.”
A voice sounded.
Low.
Heavy.
The flames slowly parted.
A single figure stepped out from within.
I stopped breathing and stared.
I knew that face.
...True Immortal Cheongun.
But his expression was different from the one I remembered.
Colder.
Harsher.
He stood amid the flames and stared down at me without speaking.
That silence was more terrifying than anything else.
Then at last...
his mouth opened.
“Fated One.”
“You have failed once again.”
It was only a short sentence.
But my chest felt as though it had collapsed inward.
He stepped forward.
Behind him...
the corpses became clearer.
Dead disciples of Kunlun burned by the flames.
Some had lost their limbs.
Others lay facedown with half their faces melted away.
All of them had died horribly.
Then Cheongun spoke again.
“You failed to continue the Flow.”
"..."
“You failed to stop the disturbance of the workings of heaven.”
"..."
“In the end...”
His eyes hardened.
“you accomplished nothing.”
My body trembled.
There was an emotion in Cheongun's eyes that I never wanted to see.
It wasn't anger.
It wasn't condemnation.
Disappointment.
The gaze of someone who had completely withdrawn every expectation he'd once held.
“The Flow was passed to the wrong person.”
"..."
His voice became colder.
“It was a mistake from the beginning...”
“for the Flow to be inherited by a failure like you.”
The moment those words ended...
everyone standing behind him opened their mouths at once.
Why couldn't you protect us?
Were you late again?
You said you could do it.
But you failed again, didn't you?
Their accusations and screams poured over me all at once.
My ears felt like they were going to rupture.
