Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Chirp, chirp. Chirp, chirp.

"......Ah."

After the eyelids that had been resting as still as death gave a single twitch —

The boy lying beneath the thick blanket slowly raised his upper body upright.

'It's been...... fifteen days now.'

Blue eyes that shone with a faint, cool luster, starkly contrasting with his jet-black hair.

'......This isn't a dream.'

Possessing eyes as deep as a still lake — uncharacteristic of a boy his age — he had been, until only recently, Annihilation: the elite assassin of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult's Phantom Slaughter Sect, the one the world had called the Soul-Severing Wanderer.

'Far too peaceful for this to be hell.'

After being consumed by the greatest fury of his life and detonating everything within himself —

His consciousness, snuffed out like a flicker, had reawakened inside this ice-cold body for reasons unknown.

'It's cold.'

A body so wracked with bitter chill that he had unconsciously pulled the thick blanket tighter around himself.

Given the almost unnervingly pale color of his skin, one could not help but wonder whether this truly belonged to a living human being.

'I can't stay like this forever.'

A full ten days since first awakening in this body.

Still unable to release the anguish and rage churning inside him, Annihilation — unable to accept the sudden change in surroundings — had been incapable of maintaining a clear state of mind like this.

He had merely screamed and howled and raged, seizing anything within reach and hurling it wildly.

And even that had not lasted long, on account of a body so pitifully weak it drew a sigh just looking at it.

During the four days that followed, he had devoted all his energy to forcing himself to accept the changed circumstances and gathering information.

"All his energy" amounted to nothing more than piecing together inferences from the chatter exchanged by the women who came and went from his room.

But it was not entirely without gain.

At the very least, he had been able to determine where this was, who this body belonged to, and what condition it was in.

'Taewon, of all places......'

This place was Taewon, the provincial capital of Sanseo — a province that even the martial world deemed the hinterlands.

And within it, a small martial family of middling standing at best.

The Taewon Yul Family.

A paltry house so obscure that even he — having roamed across the whole of the Central Plains for over twenty years — was hearing of it for the first time.

And to make matters worse, the unloved duckling born as a concubine's child within such a family was the original owner of this very body.

"Haah......"

A long sigh escaped him before he could stop it.

But he had to accept it all now and embrace his new reality and identity.

Because only then —

'I can take my revenge.'

Clench.

Thin veins bulged across the knuckles of the fist gripping the blanket tight.

And his pupils, their original blue overtaken by a vivid, blood-red flush.

'I should've killed every last one of them...!'

The final memory from his days as Annihilation.

The upheaval that had struck at the very moment he ignited his innate true qi to trade his own life for his enemy's had ultimately made a complete act of vengeance impossible.

Because the toll had come due for forcing a grueling march while bearing the grievous injuries — internal and external alike — sustained from the Fist God.

That did not mean it had been entirely in vain, however.

The self-detonation art — one he had acquired long ago during his wanderings through the Central Plains.

By deploying it and rupturing his own body, he had branded scars upon those wretched bastards nearby that would never fade.

Of course, the elite assassins of the Phantom Slaughter Sect would not have lost their lives from something of that degree alone, but at this point he considered even that irrelevant.

'I'll hunt down every last one of them and tear them to shreds...!'

Now that he had been given a second chance at revenge, he need only seek them out in due time and kill them all.

And before any of that —

"......First, I need to do something about this body that just makes me want to sigh."

Shiver, shiver, shiver!

The sorry sight of himself trembling and quaking even now was enough to breed doubt.

'Even so, I will see it through no matter what.'

To Annihilation, who had already whetted a cold blue blade within his heart, even that was merely another obstacle to be overcome unconditionally.

***

Yul Hwi.

That was the name of the body's original owner, whose vessel Annihilation had unwittingly claimed.

And it had now been one year since living under that name.

During that time, Annihilation — no, Yul Hwi — had been pouring himself into producing modest results of his own.

If one asked what the greatest of those results was, it would be that he had learned to manage the cold qi that had been ravenously devouring his body's warmth day and night.

'I don't know whether to call this heaven's fortune or not.'

What this body originally suffered from was the notoriously dreaded severed meridians.

And among them, the very worst: the Nine Yin Severed Meridians.

He had no idea why a heavenly curse that normally manifested only in young girls had appeared in a male body, but regardless, Yul Hwi had managed to wrest even that into becoming a new source of power for himself.

'I had no idea the Nine Yin Severed Meridians would pair this well with killing arts.'

The Phantom Slaughter Demonic Art — the murderous discipline he had previously mastered as his core practice.

That vicious art of killing, in which he had achieved full mastery at the tenth stage, had proven an immense help in slowing the progression of the Nine Yin Severed Meridians, if only partially.

It was merely that he had broken through one of the nine walls of ice that sealed his meridians shut.

But this alone was enough to be certain that his lifespan — originally said to be unlikely to reach even twenty — had been extended.

'For now, that's enough.'

After all, the Phantom Slaughter Demonic Art had only just reached the third stage.

If he continued to gradually raise his achievements in the mental cultivation, surely he could topple a few more of the brutal ice walls within his body?

On top of that, there was an ability he had recently gained as a bonus — one that had not existed in his previous life.

Hissss.

"......This is astounding no matter how many times I see it."

It was the ability to wield cold qi.

To be precise, he had become able to generate and command cold qi of his own.

As the warm teacup in his hand had somehow already gone cold, a peculiar gleam flickered across Yul Hwi's eyes.

'If I use this well, it'll be useful in all sorts of ways.'

Freezing the wounds and internal qi pathways of a target to obstruct the flow of their inner power, for instance.

Or projecting cold qi in advance to mask his own presence.

'There's no shortage of methods.'

Inside the mind of someone who had lived his whole life as an assassin, half a dozen applications for cold qi bloomed in an instant like flowers.

And the direction in which every one of those sinister blossoms pointed was the Phantom Slaughter Sect, there in Cheonsan.

"Ten years. I'll kill them all within that time."

Even now, the severed heads of his mother and two younger sisters, impaled atop those poles, kept circling through his mind unbidden.

So much so that he began to wonder whether this second chance had been given to him precisely for the purpose of carrying out that vengeance.

Of course, there were a number of pressing problems that came before any of that.

For instance —

"He's here again."

SLAM—!

KYAAAAH!

Without warning, a violent crash and a piercing scream erupted from outside.

The scream, no doubt, belonged to the woman who tended to him day after day.

And the one who had caused the noise before that was obvious.

The face that showed up like clockwork every fortnight to dutifully wreck the place was always the same.

Sure enough —

CRASH—!

"You filthy half-breed vermin of the north. Had a pleasant time, have you?"

"......"

A young man of the next-generation age, draped in fine silk robes.

He was none other than Yul Hwi's one and only half-brother, and the young master of the Taewon Yul Family — Yul Ho.

'How tiresome.'

That incessant harping about northern barbarians.

Every visit brought the exact same words and provocations down to the last syllable, making it thoroughly insufferable even for the one on the receiving end.

"How dare you glare at me with those goblin eyes? A lowborn savage's whelp."

"......My apologies, elder brother."

"Who is your elder brother?!"

'......Should I kill him?'

After the hundredth repetition of the exact same exchange, Yul Hwi found himself in genuine deliberation over whether or not to kill the wretch.

Until a fortnight ago, he had been too consumed with breaking through an ice wall to bother paying attention.

But now, he could kill a trifling brat hovering around second-rate in an instant, could he not?

The problem was that doing so would mean abandoning the shelter of the Taewon Yul Family, and whether he could yet survive on his own in the martial world was still an open question.

In any case, the priority right now was recovering his former level of martial prowess at minimum, and for that, a stable environment like this was indispensable.

"My apologies."

And so, after a deliberation that was not particularly long, Yul Hwi bowed his head and assumed the posture of submission the other desired.

He judged that, for now, the benefits gained from a bit of head-bowing far outweighed the costs.

"A spineless piece of garbage. If not for Father's strict orders, I'd have beaten you to a pulp long ago."

"My apologies."

"GRRR! That hollow 'sorry, sorry, sorry' with not an ounce of sincerity! Mark my words — once I become family head, you'll be the first one I kill!"

"My apol—"

CRASH—!

The flat, dispassionate words did not even reach their end.

As always, Yul Ho — unable to contain his own temper — kicked the door open and stormed out first.

"......"

'Another fortnight, then.'

Naturally, Yul Hwi paid it no mind whatsoever and simply sat back down cross-legged, returning his focus to what he had been doing.

Since he could not physically train under that wild colt's watchful eye, he intended to at least raise his mental cultivation first.

After all, if he wanted to regain his caliber as an elite assassin, he would need to shatter at least three more severed meridians besides.

And so, in the quiet of a room whose only interruptions were mealtimes twice a day, he devoted himself wholly to training for roughly four double-hours.

"......"

By the time the room had grown thoroughly dark, Yul Hwi rose to light a candle — and froze mid-step at a chill that raced down his spine.

It was not the usual spite of cold qi that this accursed body liked to inflict.

'This is—!'

Killing intent.

Not cold air, but a blind, indiscriminate killing intent radiating from someone — and the aftermath it brought.

RATTLE—!

Just as he was frantically rummaging through a drawer, snatching up anything that could serve as a weapon —

SHRIEK—!

I-intruders!

"Hmm!"

A shout from the direction of the main gate, far in the distance, set Yul Hwi's nerves even more sharply on edge.

'Who......?'

Having spent his entire life ambushing others and never once being on the receiving end, it was a situation that caught him considerably off guard.

On top of that, having focused solely on his own training inside this room where meals arrived punctually, he did not even know what sort of external threats the Taewon Yul Family was exposed to.

SHRIEK—!

Hold them! Hold them off!

"......It's over."

After quietly monitoring the flow of events outside for a time —

Yul Hwi completed his rapid assessment of the situation.

He had heard that the martial prowess of this body's father, the family head, was at the level of wounding with sword qi.

Yet several of the presences he could already sense outside had reached that same level, so the outcome was blindingly obvious even without looking.

'I withdraw for now.'

He did not entertain any foolish notion of standing to fight.

He owed no particular debt to this household, which had simply left the concubine's child to rot in neglect, and he had an absolute obligation to carry out his family's vengeance.

So he had resolved to slip away in silence.

And he surely would have, had he not run headlong into an obstacle the moment he stepped outside his door.

"Blue eyes and skin like white jade. Found him."

"Are you the one called Yul Hwi?"

The loaded words of the two masked figures who rushed at him the instant he opened the door.

'......Don't tell me?'

That alone was enough for Yul Hwi to grasp with certainty that the source of this midnight mayhem was none other than himself.