Episode 270
Mount Jomchang, Yunnan Province.

At the heart of the Blood Cult’s stronghold, Ha Cheong-yeon had been training alone. One dusky evening, she received a summons from the Blood Demon.

She turned to the man standing right before her—Gu Yu-eumma, the Blood Demon’s emissary—who seemed utterly intangible, as if he barely existed.

“He says he wants to see me?” she asked.

“Yes. He insisted there’s something he must show you,” Gu Yu-eumma replied.

His face was hidden beneath a deep cloak, his expression unreadable, but his tone was remarkably respectful—so much so that a stranger might mistake him for a servant petitioning his master.

Ha Cheong-yeon knew better than to think his polite invitation was optional.

With a blank expression, she answered, “Understood. Let’s go.”

She began walking slowly, deliberately stalling, but Gu Yu-eumma said nothing about it.

Though she sensed no presence behind her, she suddenly asked, “Do you know what it is he wants to show me?”

From the void behind her came a voice, as if spoken from thin air.

“I dare not answer that.”

Ha Cheong-yeon kept walking in silence, but inside, her mind churned with unease.

Though the Blood Demon had visited her before, this was the first time she’d been summoned alone.

What could it mean? Was he already preparing to enact that Great Ritual?

She feared the summons was to bind the Reverse Heaven Blood Demon to her.

If not that, then what else could warrant such a call?

Her lips felt parched.

What should she do?

Her plan had been to strengthen her martial prowess before escaping the Blood Cult’s grasp.

But judging by Gu Yu-eumma’s invisible presence, she knew she wasn’t strong enough yet.

Any clumsy attempt to flee now would only raise their suspicions.

She could only pray the Great Ritual wouldn’t be carried out—or that it would fail.

Clenching her jaw, she scolded herself for relying on luck when her own strength fell short.

After a while, she reached the mid-slope of Mount Jomchang.

The scene that greeted her made her eyes snap wide open.

“Ugh!”

In the Blood Demon’s grasp was a young girl, no older than ten.

She was drenched in blood, frozen in place, unable to move or speak—but her eyes writhed with desperate terror.

No matter how the girl looked at him, the Blood Demon didn’t care.

He muttered incantations, plunging one hand into the child’s chest.

Her eyes bulged wide—then the light vanished from them.

At the same moment, the Blood Demon tore out her heart.

He tossed the lifeless body aside and let the blood drip onto the altar before him, continuing his murmured chants.

Around him lay countless bodies of young girls, victims of the same horrific ritual repeated over and over.

The sight was so gruesome that Ha Cheong-yeon was grateful she hadn’t arrived sooner.

Her gaze shifted to the altar itself.

There, a figure lay sprawled—covered in blood and shattered heart fragments, unrecognizable, but the outline suggested a man.

Watching the ongoing ritual and the man on the altar, Ha Cheong-yeon drew a grim conclusion.

“At least this isn’t the ritual to bind the Reverse Heaven Blood Demon to me.”

A fleeting sense of relief washed over her.

But it was quickly replaced by self-disgust.

“To feel relief at such a horrific scene… You’re the worst, Ha Cheong-yeon.”

Though she hadn’t yet been possessed by the Reverse Heaven Blood Demon, she already felt like a monster.

A monster who fed on human blood to increase her power.

She shook her head, banishing the dark thoughts, and looked back at the Blood Demon.

He stopped chanting, as if the last child had been sacrificed, and turned to face the onlookers.

A calm smile played on his lips, utterly unfazed despite the massacre he’d just committed.

“All the spectators have gathered,” he said. “Today’s matter concerns both General Jegal and Lady Ha. I wanted to show you both personally.”

Startled, Ha Cheong-yeon glanced sideways.

There, Jegal Ji-gang met her gaze with equally surprised eyes.

“Uncle Jegal? How did you get here?”

“Cheong-yeon… You’re alive?”

Though a few others had arrived earlier, neither had expected to find the other present.

The ritual’s intensity had made that seem impossible.

The Blood Demon addressed the two, his voice calm but ominous.

“This ritual is the Reverse Heaven Soul Resurrection Great Ritual. Soon, General Jegal will gather the materials needed for Lady Ha to perform it.”

Ha Cheong-yeon and Jegal Ji-gang exchanged shocked looks.

“Gather the materials?”

“You mean… for you to perform this ritual on me?”

Ha Cheong-yeon immediately understood the implication.

The “materials” were the children the Blood Demon had just slaughtered.

Judging by the pool of blood around the altar and the scattered hearts, the victims were not limited to those children alone.

If the Blood Demon’s words were true, Jegal Ji-gang was the one collecting all these ingredients.

Ha Cheong-yeon’s voice dripped with contempt.

“Uncle Jegal… No, you’ve sunk lower than I thought—burrowing beneath the earth itself. How could you do such a thing?”

Jegal Ji-gang turned away, discomfort etched on his face, and protested to the Blood Demon.

“This breaks our agreement. You promised to eliminate that child…”

The Blood Demon smiled serenely.

“Do not worry. That will happen soon—on the day General Jegal gathers all the materials.”

His words carried a heavy weight.

Jegal Ji-gang swallowed hard, while Ha Cheong-yeon clenched her teeth.

The Blood Demon’s gaze shifted back to the man lying on the altar.

“This one was my inadequate disciple. Foolishly, he lost his life over a trivial matter. But now, through the Reverse Heaven Soul Resurrection Great Ritual, I intend to return his soul to his body. His rank is incomparable to the Reverse Heaven Blood Demon’s, so gathering the materials was easy.”

Jegal Ji-gang frowned.

“So… you mean to bring the dead back to life?”

The Blood Demon smiled again.

“Yes. It seems even General Jegal finds it hard to believe, just like Lady Ha. That’s why I summoned you both—to witness it together.”

He turned his gaze once more to Gu Yu-sang’s corpse on the altar.

Once a man who had tried to seize Guizhou but was killed near the Sunwoo clan, his body had been reforged into a Blood Demon vessel.

If his soul truly returned, he would wield far greater power than before.

Blood Demon vessels made from those at the cusp of the pinnacle could rival the absolute peak.

He might even possess the strength of one of the Thirty-Six Heavenly Stars.

“Dorak Surao Muko…”

The Blood Demon focused, continuing the ritual.

Moments later, as his chant ended, he sensed a sudden change.

The air around him thickened, heavy and viscous, as if something unseen filled the space.

Then, bubbling sounds arose.

The pool of blood around the altar began to bubble and churn.

There was no heat—this was no boiling from warmth.

It was the effect of the Great Ritual.

“Ho.”

The Blood Demon’s eyes gleamed with excitement and anticipation.

The onlookers, too, looked around in astonishment.

Especially Ha Cheong-yeon, who had believed raising the dead impossible, now looked pale as death.

Could it be…?

At that moment, the bubbling blood began to creep up the side of the altar, slowly oozing upward.

The thin flow thickened, moving like living mud, climbing against gravity.

“Whoa!”

The crowd gasped in awe.

The blood finally reached Gu Yu-sang’s body, enveloping him like a cocoon spun from sticky webs.

The thick, viscous blood wrapped tightly around him.

Watching this grotesque spectacle, the onlookers swallowed hard.

It was a scene fit for the darkest legends—horrifying and surreal.

Time passed.

Gu Yu-sang’s body was now encased in a massive, blood-soaked cocoon.

Then, after a moment, the cocoon began to move.

No, it began to swell.

Ha Cheong-yeon couldn’t help but frown at the sight of the cocoon grotesquely inflating.

But just as it seemed ready to burst, the swelling slowed and the cocoon deflated again.

Then it swelled once more.

Deflating, inflating, inflating, deflating—over and over.

Someone watching muttered in a daze, “Is that… breathing?”

Yes.

It looked as if it were breathing.

As if truly alive, the cocoon itself seemed to inhale and exhale slowly, like a beating heart.

Hyulma couldn’t hold back a gasp.

“Whoa!”

And then it happened.

The thick blood that had clung stubbornly to Gu Yusang’s body suddenly gave way, streaming down like a broken dam.

The viscous mass vanished in an instant, replaced by the thin, watery blood from before.

With the blood washed away, Gu Yusang’s body inside the cocoon was revealed naturally.

It was the same as before.

But those watching closely, focusing all their attention, realized something had changed.

Gu Yusang… was breathing.

Hyulma muttered in disbelief.

“Yusang…”

At that moment—

The bloodied figure’s eyes snapped open.

And with a voice filled with pure hatred, he roared,

“Seonwoo Ji-in! You bastard!”

Gu Yusang had returned from death, resurrected from the trap set by Seonwoo Ji-in.