Haaa... Haaa...

Yangcheon’s face, even in unconsciousness, looked calmer than expected.

His breathing was steady, and his complexion was red like a young man’s. Judging by the muscles visible on his bare arm, his body did not seem to have any major problem either.

And yet he had lost consciousness.

“The physician says it is difficult to determine the Lord of the Manor’s condition exactly at present. Still, he says the Lord of the Manor’s Inner Qi is gradually moving toward the Upper Dantian, and he suspects that may be one of the causes.”

“Does he usually drink heavily?”

“He does. But I do not believe something as trivial as alcohol could harm the Lord of the Manor’s body.”

It was the natural conclusion.

Once a person reached Peak, he could use Inner Qi to expel the alcohol from his body almost immediately. If someone’s understanding of Inner Qi was excellent, it was a feat possible even without reaching Peak.

Besides, Inner Qi circulated through the body without pause. Several times, or even dozens of times, more True Qi coursed through the entire body than in an ordinary man who had not cultivated Inner Qi, so no matter how strong the liquor, it was difficult for it to damage a master’s body.

And if the man in question was the Fighting King, one of the transcendent beings of the present martial world, there was even less to say.

“And one more thing.”

“Mm?”

“There is a golden handprint on the Lord of the Manor’s chest.”

Lightning struck across Yeon Hojeong’s pupils.

“A golden handprint?”

“That’s right.”

“...Are you saying you think he was attacked in secret?”

“No.”

White Rat answered in a voice that was unusually stiff. He was probably trying to steady himself.

“I heard that scar was an injury the Lord of the Manor suffered in the past while crossing hands with a certain master.”

“......”

“Among the Twelve Zodiac Gods, I alone heard of it. Of course, I have never seen it myself.”

“If the mark has still not disappeared, does that mean he has been suffering from internal injury all this time?”

“That is something no one but the Lord of the Manor himself could know. Still, since the physician said nothing of the sort, I believe it is unlikely.”

Yeon Hojeong looked at White Rat.

White Rat still wore the same impassive face.

“Why did you call me?”

“......”

“Even if I have earned the Lord of the Manor’s trust, it would be too much to call me one of his closest men already. Haven’t you seniors of the Twelve Zodiac Gods served him much longer?”

“The Lord of the Manor trusts you more than anyone.”

“......”

“At the very least, within Ink Dragon Manor, there are no more than three people who receive as much favor from the Lord of the Manor as you do. Considering that he is not a man who even trusts the countless disciples he himself has taken in, the trust he places in the Director of the Intelligence Division can only be called extraordinary.”

Disciples.

The madman Yeon Hojeong had once clashed with during the Evil-Smiting Corps’ first battle surfaced in his mind.

“The authority to deal with major and minor affairs within Ink Dragon Manor belongs only to the Lord of the Manor. At least, for now.”

“......”

“If it had been the Lord of the Manor, he would have summoned you before anyone else. That is why I kept the other leaders back and let you in.”

White Rat truly was no ordinary man either.

He was not a vessel fit to rule an organization as its overlord. But Yeon Hojeong had to admit that when it came to assisting a leader, there probably were not many with an eye as sharp as his.

“But do not misunderstand. The Lord of the Manor may trust you, but I do not.”

Yeon Hojeong nodded.

“That is exactly how it should be.”

White Rat nodded back.

“You’ve seen the Lord of the Manor. Go speak with the physician now. If anything is needed, handle it under the authority of the Director of the Intelligence Division, and send people to locate other physicians as well.”

“I’ll do that. Before that...”

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes deepened.

“May I take the Lord of the Manor’s pulse once?”

White Rat’s eyes turned cold.

“You know medicine?”

“To some extent.”

“I cannot allow someone who only knows medicine to some extent to lay a hand on the Lord of the Manor’s person.”

“You never know. Maybe with my modest skill, I’ll catch something the physician missed.”

“......”

“I understand your unease, but I too came to the Lord of the Manor carrying great ambitions. For my own sake as well, this is not the time for him to die.”

It was a remarkably blunt thing to say.

Yet that very bluntness won White Rat’s trust. The fact that he said it was for himself rather than out of loyalty suited Yeon Hojeong with startling perfection.

White Rat stared at him for a moment, then stepped back once.

“I’ll allow only the pulse.”

“Thank you.”

Yeon Hojeong carefully rolled up Yangcheon’s sleeve.

Yangcheon’s hand was covered with calluses. Even though his Inner Qi had reached such an extreme that it should have peeled them away layer after layer, calluses still remained. That likely meant he had never neglected his training to this day.

Yeon Hojeong took hold of Yangcheon’s pulse gate.

......

As expected, it’s extraordinary.

The elasticity of his blood vessels and channels is astonishing. Still weaker than I was in the past, but...

Open admiration rose on Yeon Hojeong’s face.

As expected of the Fighting King.

One of the countless reasons the Thirteen Seats of the Sacred Heavens were called the strongest beings in the martial world, monsters none could oppose, was precisely this Inner Qi.

There was no need to even speak of quantity. The quality of that Inner Qi itself was on a completely different level from that of ordinary masters. If the flow of Inner Qi in a Transcendent Peak master was like a stream, then the flow of Inner Qi in one of the Thirteen Seats of the Sacred Heavens was like a river on the brink of flooding.

Power overflowing beyond measure. Even if the same amount of Inner Qi were released, the speed and destructive force could not even be compared.

If something is interfering with a flow this powerful...

Yeon Hojeong already knew that the flow of Yangcheon’s Inner Qi when he used Void Seizing had gradually been moving toward collapse.

It was an extremely subtle flaw, but also a great one. At first Yeon Hojeong had found it strange that Yangcheon himself had not noticed it, but on second thought, perhaps it was something easier for a third party to notice.

A man walking a familiar road did not think much of the pebbles by the roadside.

Hm.

As Yeon Hojeong examined Yangcheon’s body throughout, he could not hide his confusion.

At least the flow itself doesn’t seem abnormal.

He lowered his eyes to Yangcheon’s # Nоvеlight # chest.

The chest hidden beneath the clothes. White Rat had said there was a golden handprint there.

Should I check the subcutaneous nerves in the chest?

WOOOOONG.

A blue-green Azure Dragon Qi entered through Yangcheon’s pulse gate. The mysterious True Qi, like something out of a hidden heavenly cave, climbed his wrist and gave off a faint glow.

Before long, the True Qi passed his upper arm and shoulder and then sank straight into the skin of the chest.

At that moment—

CRZZT!

It was as if a single streak of lightning had flashed.

WHAM!

Yeon Hojeong hurriedly pulled his hand from the pulse gate.

White Rat asked in a startled, flustered voice,

“What is it?”

“......”

“Director of the Intelligence Division.”

“...?”

“What is it? Have you discovered something?”

Yeon Hojeong said nothing. He only looked down at Yangcheon’s chest with eyes that were endlessly deep and cold.

White Rat felt like beating his chest in frustration.

“Speak!”

“...I did not discover the cause.”

“......”

“But I felt something abnormal from the wound engraved on the Lord of the Manor’s chest.”

“...?!”

“It is difficult to say anything rashly. Call the physician.”

With those words, Yeon Hojeong left Ink Dragon Hall. For some reason, he seemed to be in a hurry.

White Rat hurriedly tried to stop him, but by then Yeon Hojeong had already exited Ink Dragon Hall.

So it really was you.

After leaving Ink Dragon Hall and returning to his quarters, Yeon Hojeong’s eyes were bloodshot.

Perverse Lust Cult Leader!

Yin Desolation Divine Palm.

One of the Perverse Lust Cult Leader’s personal arts, and together with Yin Desolation Finger, one of the secret techniques he favored most.

The Yin Desolation arts were not the strongest martial arts the Perverse Lust Cult Leader possessed. Even so, the reason he liked to use those two arts was simple: if one was struck by a Yin Desolation art and did not immediately expel the force, the heart channels would rupture without fail.

Ruptured heart channels. Which meant instant death. Not a single person had ever survived after his heart channels had been torn to pieces.

No—there had been exactly one.

Dang Gwan.

Dang Gwan, who had endured to the bitter end even after suffering a fatal wound to the chest from the Perverse Lust Cult Leader’s Yin Desolation Finger, had finally driven a featherless needle into his own solar plexus.

When it came to poison, Dang Gwan had been the greatest master in the Central Plains, so it was possible that he had somehow delayed the rupture of his heart channels. Of course, in the end, even Dang Gwan had probably died from ruptured heart channels all the same.

That isn’t what matters right now.

Something bubbled up violently inside his chest.

But as time passed, he recovered his composure before long. There was no point in getting angry now, since it would not let him seize the Perverse Lust Cult Leader anyway.

Yeon Hojeong sank into thought.

What matters is why Yangcheon didn’t die immediately.

He did not know whether history had changed. But in this cycle of history, Yangcheon seemed to have fought the Perverse Lust Cult Leader quite bitterly.

A golden handprint. That is the 대표적인 mark of the Yin Desolation Divine Palm. But if the victim dies, even that handprint is supposed to disappear.

Step.

Stopping in a secluded passage, Yeon Hojeong found a patch of shadow and leaned against the wall.

Arms folded, he sank into thought.

Other than losing consciousness and collapsing, Yangcheon’s body was perfectly normal. The flow of Inner Qi behind Void Seizing was abnormal, but his dantian, channels, and blood vessels themselves had no real problem.

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes deepened.

It’s the Yin Desolation Divine Palm. The handprint of the Yin Desolation Divine Palm has been gradually eating away at Yangcheon.

The truth of it had not yet been confirmed. But it did not matter. Yeon Hojeong was certain that Yangcheon’s condition was due to the Yin Desolation Divine Palm.

The reason was simple: the fundamental principle of the Yin Desolation Divine Palm was the Hidden Palm.

And Hidden Palm meant penetrating force. Penetrating force specialized in causing internal injury, but it did not necessarily kill the target at once.

Depending on the user’s ability, it could either kill a person instantly or continuously induce internal injuries over time.

And the Perverse Lust Cult Leader Yeon Hojeong knew was skilled enough to control force to that degree as naturally as breathing.

So that’s what this is. Just like the existence of Black Sheep, the Perverse Lust Cult Leader never joined hands with Yangcheon in the first place. He deceived Yangcheon, turned him into his hound, and planned to use him thoroughly as a foothold for entering the Central Plains.

To be honest, that much had always been easy enough to suspect. He simply had not been able to confirm it.

But then how was he supposed to interpret the fact that Yangcheon had collapsed this early? The Perverse Lust Cult Leader was not the sort to make mistakes.

Don’t tell me he’s already preparing to reach into the Central Plains?

If that really was the case, then this was no ordinary matter.

......

After thinking for a long while, Yeon Hojeong suddenly smiled coldly.

“This is getting interesting.”

So many incidents had erupted all at once that even his own head had been spinning for a moment.

But after thinking it over carefully, it was not as though there were no way at all to solve every one of these problems.

“I can’t be certain, but the Perverse Lust Cult is slowly trying to infiltrate the Central Plains. Mo Yonggun is rampaging like a madman, and I and the operational team have to escape Ink Dragon Manor safely...”

Fire blazed in Yeon Hojeong’s eyes.

“Yangcheon, you’re going to owe me for this.”

That night.

“Senior.”

“Have you put out word for the physicians?”

“I have. And I came back because there is something we need to discuss.”

“Discuss?”

Yeon Hojeong spoke in a blunt tone.

“The Lord of the Manor agreed to meet Clan Head Mo Yonggun. And within three days, contact is expected to come from Clan Head Mo Yonggun.”

White Rat’s eyes deepened.

“But the Lord of the Manor has collapsed.”

“That does not mean we can pretend this meeting never existed. The reason is simple: it was the Lord of the Manor who proposed the meeting first.”

“...And what the Director of the Intelligence Division means is?”

“That’s right.”

A wicked light flashed in Yeon Hojeong’s eyes.

“Attach leaders and troops to me. I will go meet Clan Head Mo Yonggun in the Lord of the Manor’s place.”

In life, it all came down to one big play anyway.