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Chapter 180. Eight Years of Hardships and Suffering

With that, Ma-Ra had fulfilled her plan—to create a force that could support Woo-Moon. It was thus time for her to return to his side.

“Are you planning on leaving? I’ll attach an escort to you,” said Black Assassin, now Vice Gate Master of the Assassin Gate.

Ma-Ra opened her mouth to refuse but changed her mind in the process.

Considering her escort would only be assassins anyway, they would escort her through the shadows, not out in the open. In that case, it wouldn’t be much of a bother to have them around when she joined Woo-Moon’s side once again.

As she nodded, twelve of the Assassin Gate’s most powerful assassins melted into the darkness around her.

“I’ll be leaving in an hour. Black Assassin, you stay here.”

“Understood.”

Since the leader was leaving, she needed someone to handle matters for her. Black Assassin would remain behind and play that role. Black Assassin was the perfect man for the job: he was extremely competent, but even though he had all the authority and could practically do whatever he wanted, he would never even dream of betraying her.

For one, she was at the absolute peak of the Assassin Dao right now; even if he wanted to take her down, it was simply not possible. Moreover, Black Assassin believed in her wholeheartedly and thus didn’t entertain any thoughts of betrayal in the first place.

Ma-Ra glanced at the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor.

He was a puppet of Martial Heaven and wasn’t an enemy she could just ignore.

She could tell that he had come to the Assassin Gate on orders from Martial Heaven—orders to kill her, specifically.

At first, Martial Heaven seemed to have forgotten about her, assuming she was dead. However, she became an unavoidable issue when she resurfaced during the unification of the assassin sects and began to form her own force. Thus, they sent the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor after her.

So far, he hadn’t been much of a threat to her. Moreover, even if she were to kill him, the same issue would arise again if Martial Heaven sent another person after her, leading her just to leave him alone as long as he didn’t bother her.

Even so, she couldn’t just let him follow her around like that. She had to get back to Woo-Moon.

‘Should I kill him?’

She wondered if she could kill him herself.

After contemplating it seriously, she realized that the answer was like a coin toss.

Although they were both Absolute Masters, the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor was still stronger than her.

Ma-Ra was currently similar in strength to the Imperial Government\'s Formless Flying Sword and the lower half of Martial Heaven\'s Seventy-Two Heavenly Dippers. By that token, if she fought the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor, she was as good as dead.

However, she naturally had her own advantages; she was an assassin, after all. Nobody said she had to fight him head-on. If she went for a sneak attack rather than engage him in a head-on confrontation, she would have more than a fifty percent chance of killing him.

Moreover, around her was her force, the assassins she had recruited as her subordinates.

What would happen if she joined forces with them?

Although the Assassin Gate would take a good amount of damage, they were practically guaranteed to kill him.

There were several reasons why she would want to shake the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor off her tail.

First, Ma-Ra didn’t know how Woo-Moon was doing right now. What if he still hadn’t come to his senses? She was worried that if the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor followed her, things would escalate the moment he was to see Woo-Moon in his comatose state.

Second, Princess Namar, Su Ran, Hye-Rim, and the others were there, too.

They led a secret organization created to fight against Martial Heaven, and taking the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor to their base was absolutely out of the question.

‘I have to either shake him off my tail or kill him.’

Ma-Ra looked over at the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor, pondering whether to kill him.

However, the emperor never felt any bloodlust coming from her.

Let alone the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor, not even Paragons, including Woo-Moon, would be able to sense any.

That was one of the key abilities that Ma-Ra had obtained after becoming an Absolute Master using the Death God’s cultivation method.

It wasn’t a matter of hiding her bloodlust or having a weak bloodlust. It was just that her killing intent was different from others’. To her, all lives were nothing but grass; how could one feel bloodlust toward grass? Nothingness within, nothingness without.

In the end, she finally made her decision.

She would kill him.

Yet even though she had just made up her mind to kill him and was fully intent on carrying it out, she didn’t exude even a hint of bloodlust.

Coincidentally, just as she was about to make her move, the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor called out to her.

“Do you see the moon in the sky?”

A tiny sliver of moon, so small it would be embarrassing even to call it a crescent, was floating in the night sky.

Still, a sliver of moon was still the moon. So Ma-Ra nodded silently.

While she didn’t know where or when the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor had gotten any alcohol, he looked extremely drunk.

The slight blush on his face made Ma-Ra, a woman, think that he looked quite beautiful in the moonlight.

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor had a beauty that wasn’t inferior to that of Ma-Ra, who was a beauty hard to find across the continent.

After single-handedly destroying the Blood Cult a long time ago, the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor satisfied his thirst for blood by killing countless innocents before suddenly disappearing one day.

It was only a few years ago that he had returned. Yet, while he was still committing massacres, he was killing far less frequently and in fewer numbers than before.

Thud.

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor sat down right next to Ma-Ra.

With a faint smile, he pointed to the moon, which was as thin as a thread.

“When we were young, my younger sister would cry every time she saw the moon like that. She said she felt pity for it for some reason, it looked so thin that it felt like it was about to break...”

“...”

Ma-Ra said nothing.

She felt a little uncomfortable as the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor started to open up to her.

Everyone in the world had a story. There was a cause and effect in every action, a reason for someone to do something. When a person performed any action, there was a hint of that story, whether it was done consciously or unconsciously.

It was the same for the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor. There was a reason, or rather a cause, for everything he did.

‘But so what?’

Those that Ma-Ra had killed, those that Woo-Moon had killed, they all had their own stories, too.

Woo-Moon had killed them because they committed evil deeds. However, there must have been some unavoidable circumstances or another that led them to commit such evil deeds. Something that, after hearing their side, would make one nod in understanding, saying, “I see what brought you to this.”

However, he couldn’t take all of that into account.

No matter how unfortunate or sad those people’s pasts may have been, that didn’t mean it was enough to forgive them for killing and tormenting others.

In conclusion, Ma-Ra didn’t care about the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor’s past, nor did she have any sympathy to give him just because he was reminiscing about his sister with her.

“My younger sister is currently in the Hidden Palace of Martial Heaven. As long as they have my sister, I can’t disobey their orders.”

“Are you seeking sympathy? Or would you like me to save her or something?”

The Blood Cloud Devil Emperor grinned.

“As expected, you’re quite cold. Rest assured, it’s neither of the two. Well, they won’t make too big of a fuss just because I didn’t follow a single order, now would they? I’m leaving now.”

With those words, the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor disappeared, leaving behind a dark trail of blood.

Knowing that she would need to sacrifice her subordinates if she insisted on killing him, Ma-Ra just stood there and let him go.

“Yeah, yeah, run away. You crazy bastard!”

With the Blood Cloud Devil Emperor gone, Black Assassin looked refreshed and cursed as if a rotting tooth he had been suffering from had finally fallen out.

***

A short while later.

“I’m leaving. I’m not going to wait for you even if you fall behind. Keep up on your own.”

As her words faded in the air, Ma-Ra dashed forward, using her movement art to the utmost, and headed to where she and Woo-Moon had last parted ways.

No matter how loyal her subordinates were, she couldn’t risk telling them where Princess Namar and her companions were. So, Ma-Ra made sure to leave them behind so she could ask about Woo-Moon\'s whereabouts first.

Hearing that Woo-Moon had headed north, she followed his tracks and eventually arrived where she was now.

Because she had left so quickly, her subordinates struggled to keep up, only able to follow her based on the marks Ma-Ra left behind for them.

Meanwhile, Ma-Ra discovered Woo-Moon’s traces and joined him, just in time to help him out. And now, she was hiding herself at his request, waiting for an opportunity.

‘We can’t make any mistakes!’

***

“You have to die,” the Great Darkness Palace Master said as he faced Woo-Moon\'s bloodlust.

Martial Heaven couldn’t tolerate the existence of a Paragon who wasn’t a part of their fold.

“Me? No, you’re the one who has to die!”

Sssss!

Woo-Moon’s figure disappeared like smoke and reappeared in front of the Great Darkness Palace Master, firing out forty-eight strands of keen sword qi simultaneously.

Clang, clang, clang!

The Great Darkness Palace Master swung his outer robe, which was made of steel links, in a wide arc, deflecting the sword qi. Then, he formed a black bead of aura right before Woo-Moon’s head.

Bang!

Woo-Moon used Illusive Shift to escape the ensuing storm of aura before reappearing with Lightflash pointed toward the ground.

BOOM!

His veins and tendons bulged and the arms holding Lightflash swelled terrifyingly. Then, a golden brilliance arose and gathered like a whirlwind around Lightflash.

“Ha-a-eup!”

With all his might, Woo-Moon swung his sword, coated in an immense golden aura, at the Great Darkness Palace Master.

In response, the Great Darkness Palace Master created a dark red palm aura and blocked the attack.

BOOM!

An explosion rang out, and the aftermath of the collision caused the Great Darkness Palace Master to fly into the air. There, he continuously created beads of aura, causing the space around Woo-Moon to explode.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

A thick cloud of dust rose where Woo-Moon was.

Then, a sharp light flashed through it.

“Tsk!”

The Great Darkness Palace Master let his guard down for a moment after launching his wide-area attack, allowing for an opening. Lightflash flew right past his cheek.

If he had taken just a fraction of a second longer to react, Lightflash would have pierced his head.

Under Woo-Moon’s Sword Control, Lightflash flew around the Great Darkness Palace Master and continued to attack.

‘One, two, three, now!’

Woo-Moon had been watching the Great Darkness Palace Master deal with Lightflash while levitating in the air. He suddenly kicked off the ground and flew forward like an azure dragon, unleashing Northern Blizzard with Inkblade.

At the same time, Lightflash moved even faster than before, dividing into eight sword shadows that targeted the Great Darkness Palace Master’s upper body.

There was nowhere for the Great Darkness Palace Master to escape, whether below or above.

Realizing this, the Great Darkness Palace Master let his qi explode outward and coated his entire body in aura.

Clang, clang, clang, clang!

Lightflash was unable to overcome the Great Darkness Palace Master’s defensive qi and bounced away first. At the same time, Inkblade penetrated halfway through the defensive barrier that the Great Darkness Palace Master was barely able to erect.

Then, countless small aura beads appeared in the air. Countless small flashes of light erupted as the aura on Inkblade was slowly whittled down.

‘Damn it!’

Inkblade eventually slowed to a halt. As Woo-Moon cursed under his breath, he suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.

‘What?’

The moment Woo-Moon disappeared, a bead of aura the Great Darkness Palace Master had formed behind him exploded.

There was a brief lull.

Woo-Moon and the Great Darkness Palace Master glared at each other while floating in the air.

“You’re pretty impressive,” said the Great Darkness Palace Master.

Right as Woo-Moon was about to respond, a sword flew like a beam of light from a blindspot behind Woo-Moon.

It was the sword of a Cruel Sandstorm Rider Transcendent.

Those who reached the peak of the Transcendent stage could use Sword Control, but only barely. Not only were they unable to move the sword freely, but they had to exert all of their mental effort to supply and control the qi within the flying sword continuously.

Therefore, a Transcendent using Sword Control was unable to move and was completely defenseless, as if they had entered a state of deep meditation.

The sword, controlled by the elder of the Twin Monsters, came close to Woo-Moon.

‘It’ll work!’

The elder of the Twin Monsters was quite excited. If he could put an end to Woo-Moon, the battle would be as good as won, and his contribution would be massive.

“Martial Heaven... all of you really are out of your minds.”

By the time Woo-Moon finished his sentence, the sword had already reached his feet.

Twang!

The sword under the elder Twin Monster’s control flinched for a moment before suddenly changing directions and flying toward the Great Darkness Palace Master at a speed dozens of times greater than before.