Chapter 209
Guangxi Province, Heapsan.

At the main gate of the Heapsan Sect—undeniably the strongest faction in Guangxi Province—there was never a shortage of wandering martial artists coming and going.

Unfortunately, most of these visitors did not come with good intentions.

Today was no different. Countless martial artists pleaded desperately with the gate guards.

“Please, let us meet the Sect Leader! All the members of our Pyeongdo Sect were brutally slaughtered overnight! There are witnesses who saw Heapsan warriors nearby that day! Please, help us clear our names!”

“My daughter was assaulted! And there are testimonies that Heapsan’s famed swordsman, Gye Juseok, was drinking nearby and then disappeared that day! Please, let me confront him!”

“Please, help us seek justice!”

“Let us meet the Heapsan Sect Leader!”

The crowd outside the main gate was in an uproar.

But the gate guards of Heapsan met them with cold, unyielding expressions, pushing them back without a word of sympathy.

“We have conveyed your grievances to the Sect Leader. Now, return to your homes and wait for further contact.”

The guards tried to dismiss them with these words.

But the crowd refused to leave so easily.

“You said the same thing when we came days ago! How much longer must we wait?”

“Just tell us when we can expect an answer! Then at least we can go back and wait properly!”

The martial artists were desperate for a proper response.

Yet the gate guards remained as firm as ever.

“The Sect Leader is busy, but he would never ignore the grievances of the Eastern Sects. Wait patiently, and you will receive a reply.”

As the crowd continued to shout, there were two figures watching from the trees not far from the gate.

An elderly man and a teenage girl.

The girl suddenly asked the old man, “Grandfather, do they really think that by throwing such a tantrum, the Heapsan Sect will give them answers?”

The old man took a long swallow from his gourd and replied, “They believe they have no other choice. They lack the strength and courage to oppose Heapsan. Besides, they probably trust that a righteous sect like Heapsan wouldn’t harm them.”

The girl frowned. “It’s so foolish. Begging the very people who might be the culprits to clear their names. If they looked around, they’d notice some of their comrades who protested yesterday are already missing.”

The old man sighed, taking another drink. “They probably think that after returning home to wait, things will settle. They can’t imagine that a righteous sect like Heapsan would deal with people so harshly. Even the sanest person becomes foolish when trapped by fixed ideas. You, I-rang, be careful too.”

The girl, I-rang, shook her head. “It’s both sad and pathetic. But… I’m not so sure these Heapsan men are just righteous. They seem like villains wearing the mask of a righteous sect. But are they really puppets of the Hyungsan Sect? We’ve been watching for a week and haven’t found any clear connection.”

The old man comforted her, “The intel we gathered from inside is reliable. A week isn’t enough; we need at least a month. If they were so careless as to leave obvious traces, we wouldn’t have struggled so much.”

“But it’s so tedious and exhausting. It feels like a waste of time.”

“Hmph. That’s why I told you not to follow.”

“Still…”

As the girl pouted and the old man tried to soothe her, the commotion at the Heapsan main gate grew louder.

“We’ve waited a whole month! How much longer must we wait? I can’t take it anymore! Let me see the Sect Leader now!”

“That’s right! We’re tired of waiting! Let us meet the Sect Leader immediately!”

Suddenly, about twenty martial artists who had been pleading lost their patience and tried to push past the gate guards.

“Waaah!”

“Come out, Heapsan Sect Leader!”

“Come out! Heapsan Sect Leader Eo Jeong-gi! Show yourself!”

The guards were caught off guard and tried to shove them back with their spears.

“What are you doing?!”

“Step back! Or we’ll strike!”

As the pushing and shoving escalated to a peak, the main gate suddenly swung open, revealing a man.

“What is this commotion?!”

His voice was thunderous, charged with powerful internal energy.

The sheer force of his voice made everyone cover their ears and step back.

The man with a cold, stern expression shouted again.

“How dare you cause a disturbance at the Heapsan main gate! Do you want to die?!”

The girl hiding nearby urgently asked her grandfather, “He’s a master, isn’t he? Who is he?”

The old man frowned. “Hmm, that’s Gye Juseok, the pinnacle swordsman of Heapsan. Of all people, he comes out now? This is going to get serious.”

“Why him?”

At that moment, one of the martial artists who had been covering his ears recognized Gye Juseok and shouted with wide eyes.

“Gye Juseok! So you’ve finally come out!”

Gye Juseok glared at the man and asked, “Gye Juseok? Who are you to speak my name so freely?”

The man’s voice burned with rage. “I am Ji Seok-jung, the head of the Doan clan! Answer me! Aren’t you the one who assaulted my only daughter that night?!”

Gye Juseok’s eyes narrowed sharply. “Doan… clan head?”

He scoffed. “I wasn’t even there. What nonsense is this?”

Ji Seok-jung’s fury only grew. “Don’t lie! There are countless witnesses who saw you drinking at the Doan tavern that night! And at the exact time you disappeared, my daughter was attacked! If you’re innocent, why lie?”

Gye Juseok frowned and muttered, “What a nuisance.”

His sharp gaze swept over the roughly twenty people gathered.

Then, with a deadly smile, he asked, “So, if I did it, what will you do about it?”

Ji Seok-jung exploded in anger. “What?! Are you confessing to your crime?!”

Gye Juseok grinned and drew his sword with a hiss.

“Then I ask again—if I did it, what will you do?”

The deadly smile and drawn sword made his intentions clear to everyone.

Ji Seok-jung flinched and shouted, “You! A righteous Heapsan warrior, you wouldn’t dare commit murder! There are many witnesses here!”

But Gye Juseok paid no mind.

“Heh heh heh, many witnesses? They won’t be for long.”

“What?!”

In an instant, golden sword energy surged from Gye Juseok’s blade.

Whoosh!

He lunged at the man.

“Die!”

From their hiding spot, the granddaughter watched with a pained expression and whispered to her grandfather.

“Grandfather!”

But the old man only shook his head grimly.

Haah!

Shuaak!

“Ahhh!”

Gye Juseok’s golden sword energy sliced toward Ji Seok-jung’s chest, who couldn’t defend himself and screamed.

At that moment, something flew toward Gye Juseok.

Zhaaaak!

It was a throwing dart, flying at incredible speed.

“!”

Gye Juseok couldn’t ignore it and had to block it with his sword.

Clang!

“Ugh!”

The dart struck the blade with such force that Gye Juseok’s hand trembled.

It was a powerful strike.

But when he saw what the dart actually was, he was stunned.

It was just a stone.

They blocked my sword with a mere stone?

A chill ran down his spine.

He pointed his sword toward where the stone had come from and shouted.

“Who’s there?! Who dares challenge the Great Heapsan Sect?!”

All eyes in the courtyard turned toward that direction.

There, a handsome young man dressed in pure white robes, wielding a pristine white sword engraved with a white tiger, strode forward with a cold expression.

The young man curled one corner of his mouth into a sneer and muttered.

“Great Heapsan Sect? What a joke.”

Though he spoke quietly, his voice was clear to everyone present.

Gye Juseok ground his teeth and shouted, “You dare mock our Heapsan Sect?! You must want to die!”

The girl hiding nearby urgently asked her grandfather, “He’s incredibly handsome! Who is he, Grandfather?”

But her grandfather, eyes wide with surprise, shook his head.

“I don’t know. I’ve never seen him before. But that white sword with the white tiger engraving… could it be…?”

Just then—

Sensing something was seriously wrong, Gye Juseok barked orders at the gate guards.

“What are you waiting for?! That insolent brat dared to mock us right at the gates of the Daehapsan Sect! Kill him!”

The ten gate warriors, who had been staring at the young man with confused expressions, instinctively raised their spears in response.

“Yes, sir! Understood!”

But at that moment, the young man smiled faintly, gripped his sword, and took a step forward.

What happened next left not only the gate warriors but even the supreme master Gye Juseok utterly stunned.

“Gah!”

“W-what?!”

The instant the youth stepped forward, something suddenly appeared between them.

It was as if he had unleashed a supernatural technique.

Without hesitation, he struck with his foot.

Shu-shaak!

The strike sliced through the air so swiftly and cleanly it felt like the world itself had been cleaved in two.

Those watching suddenly experienced a strange optical illusion, as if the glowing line cut through space, slightly distorting reality.

Then, in the next moment, red lines appeared across the bodies of the bewildered gate warriors.

They were completely unaware of what had just happened.

Only after a brief pause did those lines split open, spraying blood.

Pfuah!

“Ughk?!”

“W-what is this?!”

“Ahhh!”

Gye Juseok, who had been standing back, now pale as a ghost, muttered in disbelief.

“W-who dares… to attack the warriors of the Hapsan Sect…”

The young man smiled coldly and said, “Don’t worry. They’re all going to die anyway.”

“What…?!”

At that moment, the youth in white charged straight at Gye Juseok.

Bang!

His assault was blindingly fast.

Gye Juseok was caught off guard and scrambled to defend himself with his sword.

But it was impossible.

Tang! Shiiik!

The youth’s blade cut twice—once horizontally, once vertically.

The two strikes came so close together they seemed to carve a glowing cross in the air.

With that single attack, Gye Juseok’s body was split vertically in two.

He didn’t even have time to scream.

Pfuah!

Blood gushed like a fountain from the two halves of his body.

Those who witnessed the scene were too shocked to even cry out.

In fact, they barely understood what had just happened.

Only one person, an old man hiding nearby, fully grasped the horror unfolding before him.

He muttered in disbelief, “C-could this really be…?”

All it took for the youth in white to kill Gye Juseok—the renowned supreme master of the Hapsan Sect—was this single sword.

A horizontal slash that pushed aside Gye Juseok’s defense, followed immediately by a vertical slash that split him apart.

The old man was speechless.

To see the famed Hapsan master, Gye Juseok, reduced to a lifeless corpse by just one sword, and to witness the massacre of the Hapsan warriors right at their own front gate—it was beyond shocking.

But what shocked the old man most of all was something else entirely.

He whispered, eyes wide with terror, “C-could it be… the Southern Cross Sword?! H-how is that possible?!”

The girl beside him looked puzzled. “The Southern Cross Sword? What’s that?”

“That sword technique is from Haenam…!”

Before he could finish, the old man was struck with fresh horror.

The youth in white turned his head and locked eyes directly on the old man’s hiding spot.

Their gazes met in midair.

The old man swallowed hard, unable to stop himself.

Gulp.