Chapter 012. Forbidden Demon Forest (2)
Dam Jeok-san looked at the wolf monster with calm eyes.
Its eyes trembled finely, unbefitting its intimidating appearance. It swung its front paw wildly even though there was no enemy in front of it.
It was literally in a state of terror.
'Then it will be easy to deal with.'
Although I am worried about what kind of bastard made such a huge monster terrified…….
Dam Jeok-san sharpened his senses against the approaching threat and simultaneously swung his sword to cut the enemy in front of him.
SWISH!
Dam Jeok-san's sword cut across the empty air with a fierce sound of tearing air.
The sword strike he thrust drew a half-moon shape and instantly rushed towards the wolf monster.
Truly a ghost-like trajectory.
GRRRRR……?
The wolf monster, which had rushed in as if it had lost its mind, spat out a flustered cry.
It tried to twist its heavy body even belatedly, but it was already too late.
Dam Jeok-san even utilized the force of the monster rushing in violently against it and cut its torso deeply.
A practical technique that produced mighty destructive power with minimal force.
Dam Jeok-san's sword tore apart the monster's hide and even crushed the ribs beneath it.
However, the wolf monster was not dead yet.
'Tsk.'
Dam Jeok-san clicked his tongue lightly.
The sword strike was too shallow to cut off its breath.
No matter if his dantian had returned or whatever, it was still true that he lacked strength.
It could not be helped.
There was no way he could recover in an instant what he had built up for over ten years.
However, there was no need to kill it in one go.
Dam Jeok-san tenaciously pushed his sword into the monster's open wound.
The sword strike exploded in the place where the ribs were crushed and internal organs were exposed.
AWOOOO……!!
The wolf monster spat out a groan filled with pain.
Listening to that sound, Dam Jeok-san twisted his sword once.
With a SQUELCH! sound, blood poured out from the wolf monster's body as if exploding.
That was the end of it.
Along with the notification that he had predated on the monster, the demonic energy possessed by the wolf monster flowed into Dam Jeok-san's body.
'Is it still insufficient for the ability of predation to grow?'
It was a pity.
However, it was also true that he had not yet defeated a monster powerful enough to be worth mentioning.
Dam Jeok-san slowly gathered the energy flowing into his body.
However―
'Something is strange.'
Dam Jeok-san thought, frowning.
Some of the demonic energy that should have settled completely in the dantian flowed into the meridians of its own accord.
Just like when one failed to properly absorb a spiritual elixir because of a lack of understanding in operating genuine qi.
However, that was impossible.
Dam Jeok-san had once reached a much higher realm than now.
Yet he could not control merely this amount of genuine qi?
Thinking that could not be the case, he recited the chant of the Extreme Heaven Strange Sovereign Technique.
And at that moment.
Dam Jeok-san could realize what was wrong.
The chant he used to recite every day felt unfamiliar.
No, he himself reciting that chant felt unfamiliar.
Ah.
I see.
He had already lost his dantian once due to qi deviation.
Although he miraculously recovered his dantian, he had become a completely different person from before.
He could not regain his martial arts in the exact same way as back then.
'No, simply not being able to is not the problem.'
I must not do that.
If I train in a way that has already collapsed once, I will only collapse again.
I must find a better method by overcoming failure.
Perhaps the reason why the status of the ability of predation itself does not rise even though Karma is continuously accumulating lies there.
According to Seo Woo-joo's memories, the ability of predation also resembled martial arts in some parts.
'Still, there will be no hindrance to fighting right now.'
The wolf monster's energy had settled in the dantian, albeit in a small amount.
And the energies accumulated in the meridians were also things that could be gathered in the dantian again someday.
If he found the right path.
Dam Jeok-san put aside his worries about what he could not achieve immediately for a while.
The thing he had to do was one anyway.
It was true that Dam Jeok-san entered this place to become stronger, but if he had a soft heart, he would end up dying.
This was the Forbidden Demon Forest.
Because it was a dangerous forest treated as a Forbidden Land even in the Martial Sovereign Castle.
Sure enough.
Another monster rushed fiercely towards Dam Jeok-san.
With a momentum as if to split his body in half right away.
Dam Jeok-san swung his sword with an expressionless look.
That sword embedded itself straight into the torso of the rushing monster.
Fresh blood spurting from the monster's body drenched his body, but Dam Jeok-san moved forward without caring.
And he thrust his sword into the monster's body again. Not once, but twice, thrice, almost as if hacking it to pieces.
Only then was the monster's tough breath cut off and demonic energy flowed into Dam Jeok-san.
Although the efficiency was atrocious, like pouring water into a bottomless jar, Dam Jeok-san was not disappointed.
No, it would be correct to see that there was no reason to be.
“Heeheeheeheehee…… H-Human……! S-Swoordman.”
Because a monkey-shaped monster with two long arms that seemed to touch the ground appeared.
Its size was at most slightly larger than a child. However, the demonic energy it possessed was terrifyingly huge.
However, what caught Dam Jeok-san's attention was not the scale of the demonic energy, but the object held in the monster's hand.
It was heavily rusted, and the edge was chipped in places to the point of almost losing its original form.
But it was clearly a sword.
It was not that there were no monsters that used weaponry.
Since it was a situation where humans were contaminated by demonic energy and underwent monsterification.
However, for a monster that was not originally human to hold a weapon, it required a corresponding causality.
And a monster with accumulated causality was much stronger than one without.
So.
It is that guy right there.
The existence that made the monsters terrified and run out to the outskirts of the Forbidden Demon Forest.
Dam Jeok-san felt cold sweat flowing from his hand gripping the sword.
The Predator's Eye.
And the senses he had built up his entire life were ringing alarm bells.
However, Dam Jeok-san's lips were curving up crookedly in contrast.
Because he was also a swordsman whose heart raced when meeting a worthy opponent.
Monsters fundamentally hold infinite hostility towards humans.
Just because a monster can speak does not mean that emotion disappears.
The monkey monster holding the sword rushed towards Dam Jeok-san with an attitude of no questions asked.
“Kiki…….”
Making a bizarre laughing sound as if truly enjoying it.
'Fast.'
Dam Jeok-san thought as he watched the monkey monster approaching him with truly lightning-like speed.
Perhaps because its body was light, in terms of speed alone, it was close to a super peak master.
The moment he raised his sword to counter.
The monkey monster's sword exploded, scattering darkish demonic energy.
Just like its light movements, the sword was also extremely fast.
Dam Jeok-san trusted his sixth sense, not his eyes.
He dodged before the sword even reached him.
WHOOSH!
The monster's sword cut through the empty air in vain.
Truly a paper-thin difference.
If the evasion had been even a little late, he would have been cut.
However, Dam Jeok-san's expression was a little bizarre.
“What kind of trick is this?”
He asked while looking at the monkey monster.
The bastard's arms were much longer and thinner than a human's. That meant the movement of its joints was also much freer.
He naturally thought it would curve in with a trajectory he did not expect.
“Isn't that human swordsmanship?”
He asked towards the monkey monster, not hiding his puzzled look.
Dam Jeok-san had encountered monsters using weapons a few times before. Although he didn't fight them directly, but merely watched his master, the Martial Sovereign, clash with them.
They all used extraordinary moves that humans could not perform.
But that monkey was fighting as if it were a human.
“…….”
However, the monkey monster did not answer Dam Jeok-san's question.
No, it was not that it didn't answer. It couldn't.
Because the bastard didn't know the answer either.
The monkey monster had gained enough intelligence to stammer out words, but that was all.
For a monster to truly act and behave like a human, it had to reach a vastly high status.
Dam Jeok-san continued the fight harboring a shred of doubt.
The monkey monster's sword momentum was truly like a storm.
The demonic energy wrapped around the sword was strong and fierce enough to easily crush even sword qi.
And the raging sword strikes were lofty enough to place most swordsmanship beneath its feet.
How can it reach such a realm while wearing clothes that don't fit?
Dam Jeok-san looked at the monster performing inefficient martial arts with eyes that said he couldn't understand at all.
Because the genius talent he possessed had always derived the best path.
However, that result was the worst.
Because he fell into qi deviation while walking the 'best path' he chose. Perhaps the path that seems the fastest is not the fastest.
In the world, there are moments when one has no choice but to accept inefficiency.
SLASH!
As if to prove it, the monkey monster's rusty sword increased the scratches on Dam Jeok-san's body one by one.
The swordsmanship the monkey monster used was extreme Fast Sword.
It pursued speed single-mindedly without any illusions or variations.
A swordsmanship that could only be properly implemented by swordsmen with immense physical strength.
It did not fit the bastard's physique or characteristics at all.
However, it was strong.
How many hardships must there have been to achieve such strength?
How terribly stubborn must it have been?
And just what kind of story was there for it to be so stubborn?
It was merely a monster, not a human.
But at the same time, it was also a swordsman walking the same path of the sword.
Dam Jeok-san even felt a shred of respect for the monkey in front of him.
'That is that, and a fight is a fight.'
However, just because the bastard achieved remarkable progress, he couldn't just stand by and get beaten.
No matter how excellent that monkey was, wasn't it just a beast devoured by demonic energy?
Dam Jeok-san, who flipped his thoughts like flipping a palm, gripped his sword again.
That he must not walk the exact same path as before.
Looking at that monkey, he felt like he understood what that meant just a little bit.
The single-mindedness to carry through what one has decided to the end, whether it works or not, which looks foolish at a glance.
'I didn't have that before I lost my dantian.'
Because if I got stuck, I found a shortcut and went around.
It was after losing his dantian that he first possessed that foolish single-mindedness.
Wasn't recovering his dantian also started from that will?
All he could do right now was not forget that heart.
“Here I come.”
The moment Dam Jeok-san muttered that and rushed towards the monkey monster.
His momentum changed completely.
CLANG!
Once again, the monkey monster's and Dam Jeok-san's sword strikes crossed.
Dam Jeok-san realized instinctively at that moment.
To resolve this uncomfortable feeling even a little.
He had to predate on the bastard.
However, it wouldn't be solved simply by predation.
Before devouring, he had to break it first.
That monster's sword.
His eyes flashed eerily.
* * *
Monkey monster.
The guy was originally a monkey living in a forest in the South.
A monkey that was small and weak, weeded out from the pack and bullied.
The day it was finally chased out of the pack.
A swordsman appeared in front of the monkey.
That swordsman was a martial artist wandering the forest and hunting monsters.
That martial artist found the monkey wandering the forest alone cute for some reason, and the monkey chased out of the pack obsessed over the warmth it felt right away.
Before they knew it, the two were wandering the forests of the South together.
However, as is usual for those who live by the sword, that swordsman was also someone who could not guarantee his life tomorrow.
Some days his arm was broken, and some days his leg was crushed, but the swordsman continued to fight.
Because he had lost all his seniors and juniors, who were no different from family, to monsters.
Even knowing that what he was doing was meaningless venting of anger, he had no choice but to do so.
The monkey could not understand him, but thought that the trajectory of the sword he swung was dazzlingly beautiful.
Then one day.
The swordsman who was with the monkey died.
While facing a Great Monster powerful enough to be counted on one hand even in the forests of the South.
Whether fortunate or unfortunate, the swordsman died together with that monster.
And in the forest covered with thick demonic energy, the monkey was left alone blankly. Powerful demonic energy sometimes turns even ordinary animals into monsters. It is a trivial story that wouldn't even pass as a street joke.
The monkey became a monster like that, and in front of the guy's eyes was the sword that used to draw brilliant trajectories.
The monkey who became a monster instinctively grabbed that sword.
And swung it. Following the trajectory the swordsman used to draw.
It was a terrible contradiction.
He had honed his sword his entire life to kill monsters, but the legacy left at the end of his death was passed on to a monster.
However, the monkey did not have the intelligence to judge such things.
The memory that was intensely engraved simply became desire, and it lived chasing that desire.
It attacked and killed people, thoroughly following twisted instincts.
However, if it saw a swordsman among them, it dealt with them a little more tenaciously.
Until one day, it was captured by the hand of the Martial Sovereign who appeared in the South and imprisoned in the Heaven-Honoring Forbidden Demon Formation.
After being imprisoned in the Forbidden Demon Forest, it thought everything was over.
Losing freedom was not the problem. There were only monsters inside the forest. The monkey monster could no longer meet swordsmen.
However.
Dam Jeok-san appeared.
A swordsman exuding a strong spirit enough to ring the alarm of a monster's wild nature.
The energy he possessed seemed meager, but he looked strangely dangerous.
Aside from his presence as a swordsman, the guy felt like an inherently dangerous existence.
It felt as if the helplessness of facing a predator before becoming a monster was wrapping around its whole body again.
At first, it seemed to have seized a slight chance of victory, but after the guy's eyes changed like those of a predator, it was continuously pushed back.
However, the monkey monster swung its sword ceaselessly.
Following the trajectory it considered most brilliant.
Extreme Fast Sword.
It was a posture that didn't fit at all.
Therefore, every time it swung the sword, all the arm bones broke, and repeated recovery by the monster's regenerative power.
However, the sword forged at the end of hardship was terrifyingly powerful.
With this, I can kill that human swordsman too. To the extent that such conviction arose.
And a deep smile had risen on Dam Jeok-san's lips watching that.