Chapter 2
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Part 2 Prologue
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"……What became of my younger sisters?"
The scholar, who could well predict their tragic ends, asked in a self-deprecating tone.
[Your eldest sister, in an attempt to restore even a shred of the family's former glory, went about hunting down Demonic Cultists, only to encounter a Demonic Master from a previous generation and be torn limb from limb. As for your second sister, after losing her twin in such a manner, she lost her sanity and wandered the streets until she froze to death on a night when the rain fell mercilessly.]
"Is that so……."
It was.
It was only natural that it would be so.
With the clan torn into pieces and effectively destroyed, there was no way those children could have remained safe.
[However, your youngest sister is fortunately still alive.]
The scholar’s face brightened.
"Is that true?! You mean Nan-i is alive? Where is she now?"
[Your youngest is addicted to drugs. Likely to escape from reality. To earn the money needed for them, she is living as a prostitute in a brothel in Luoyang.]
The voice soothed him gently.
[Still, it is a good thing she is alive. It is good. I am glad that I can finally deliver some good news.]
"Keuheuhe……."
The scholar burst into laughter that sounded like he was coughing up blood.
No, he was sobbing as if he were laughing.
Every time his body heaved, the chains tightly bound to his shoulder blades let out a mournful shriek.
The chains, as thick as a grown man’s forearm, were a deep, ink-like color.
They were undoubtedly made of a metal known as Ink-Iron, which was unparalleled in its hardness.
After shedding tears mixed with blood for a while, the scholar offered an excuse to the voice.
"I, ……I had no choice."
It was the path they had chosen, and the result of it.
"I had long ago decided to sever all ties with the world."
[I am already aware of that. Of your resolve. And the processes that led you to that decision.]
The scholar sank into reminiscence for a moment.
He reflected on memories that had been submerged in deep darkness.
Though they were memories from long ago, they were as vivid to him as if they had happened yesterday.
[The human world is undoubtedly filthy and ugly. It is surely humans themselves who created such a world. Ending the age of myths and establishing civilization to open the age of history was a massive corruption by humanity.]
"……I wanted to become like Laozi."
[You wished to remain merely a passerby, like him. Like the one who founded the great philosophy of Taoism, yet left behind no proper trace of himself, and eventually ascended to immortality and vanished.]
"I only wished to live without action and without desire. I did not want to be involved in the mundane world."
[That is why you lived as The Swordless One, is it not? Despite being the eldest son of the Sword Clan, you did not grasp a sword, and you lived finding joy in locking yourself in your room to read books. Your wife understood that as well, did she not?]
"……Now that you mention it, what of my wife? What became of Un-jeong?"
He and his wife, Moyong Un-jeong, had not truly shared their hearts.
But even so, she had never treated him poorly.
Even though she suffered because of her useless matrilocal son-in-law, she had shown him much consideration so that he could live comfortably.
They were merely a nominal couple who did not even share a bed, but she was one of the few people for whom he felt deep gratitude.
[She eventually lost in the political struggle. All of her factions were purged.]
"……Did she lose her life?"
[It happened a while ago. While attending to the King of Terror in his bedchamber, she bit off his manhood and tore it to shreds. Even at the execution ground, she laughed heartily. Truly a remarkable woman. Had she been born in a chaotic era, she would surely have become a great monarch.]
The voice chuckled.
"……She lived without a single point of shame under the heavens, yet the heavens did not help her in the end."
The voice scoffed.
[Nonsense. What she needed was not the heavens, but you. It was you who abandoned her.]
"……I once divined my own fate."
The scholar lifted his sightless eyes to look at the sky.
"I was born with a destiny governed by the Heavenly Killing Star. If I, such a person, were to involve myself in worldly affairs, many would have bled because of me."
To this, the voice replied.
[Do you still not understand? That destiny of yours has already been realized.]
"……How can that be?!"
The scholar suddenly realized.
Everyone he cherished had been wounded, suffered, and killed.
He had tried to do nothing for them, but because he had tried to do nothing, everyone had fallen into the abyss.
"……In the end, am I, a mere mortal, unable to escape the solemn shackles of fate?"
If there was a very small, trivial difference, it was only that he had not stained his own hands with blood.
[Do you see now?]
The scholar bowed his head.
"……Then, from here on, I have no choice but to leave everything to the will of heaven."
[How foolish!]
It was a sound so loud, a rumble that threatened to shatter his eardrums, unlike anything he had ever heard before.
[Do you still not understand?]
Unlike the atmosphere until now, the voice was clearly agitated and furious.
[Heaven and Earth are not benevolent; they do not care for the weak humans!]
The voice rebuked the scholar without hesitation.
[If that is the case, humans should at least help humans. It is said that even the sages are not benevolent! Looking at you, is that not the perfect example!]
The scholar stood his ground against the voice.
"But it is also said that the net of heaven is vast, and though it is coarse, it misses nothing. Even if I do not step forward, those who have committed evil will surely be judged according to the law of cause and effect."
[Cause and effect, you say?!]
The voice, repeating the words "cause and effect," burst into wild laughter.
At the laughter, which was loud enough to split his head, the scholar forgot even his pain and covered his ears with arms that had lost their hands and wrists.
The Ink-Iron chains vibrating with the laughter rang deep into his very bones.
[Since you speak of cause and effect, I shall show you an old story.]
The space before the scholar brightened.
Suddenly, an unfamiliar landscape spread out vast and wide.
Though he had lost his eyes, he could see everything the voice showed him.
In ancient times, in the age of myths, there were those who had lost everything because of humans.
Even in that era, humans were cruel and selfish.
In the end, a few who turned their backs on the horrific human world devoted themselves solely to their own cultivation.
They believed that there would be a cause and effect that transcended time and space, and they believed that there would be a great order that would eventually make those who committed evil pay the price.
One day, having attained enlightenment, they became immortals.
And they came to realize the truth of the world.
Cause and effect,
The absolute order they had believed in,
Was merely a phantom.
Those whose lives had ended simply returned to a handful of dirt.
Their souls and spirits simply returned to nature.
There was no afterlife, no hell, no judgment that no one could escape.
The wicked committed evil, lived in luxury, and died.
There were times when they died before their natural lifespan due to their own evil deeds.
But that was only a fraction of the story.
No matter how one looked at it, the majority of good people lived in extreme suffering and died without ever enjoying their natural lifespan.
Those who squeezed out even their blood and pus lived on, enjoying the fruits of their labor until they died.
It was terribly unreasonable.
There was no heaven to correct the tilted scales.
There is no great cause and effect.
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[Do you see now.]
The voice asked again.
[Have you seen the truth.]
The scholar did not answer.
The truth he faced was too cold and indifferent.
Divine retribution, judgment—these were merely "fictions" created by those living without a single point of hope.
For them, salvation did not exist.
It would never happen that all the wicked, every single one of them, would pay the price for what they had done.
In the end, if only humans could save humans,
Then only humans could punish humans.
"Then, then……!"
The voice asked him.
[Do you wish to possess power? Do you wish to possess the power to judge them? Do you wish to make them pay the true price?]
"I do."
[Do you wish to obtain a chance? A chance to change everything back? Do you wish to save everyone?]
"I do."
[Even if, in exchange, your soul is to suffer eternally with nowhere to go?]
"I do!"
A cry, along with blood, flowed from the scholar’s throat.
"I will possess the power! I will obtain that chance!"
As he thrashed violently, the Ink-Iron chains clattered and shrieked.
A monstrous cry erupted from his throat.
"I will make those who are swayed by mere desire pay the price! I will bring a heavy hammer down upon those who find pleasure in the suffering of others!"
The cry the scholar let out grew louder and louder, showing no signs of stopping.
"I will mobilize every ability given to me, and I will dominate their fate!"
And in proportion to that, the presence of the voice grew even greater.
[Now you have finally realized! Now you can finally face your true self! Then, look at me!]
The voice grew so loud it shook even the scholar’s soul.
Feeling his soul tremble like a leaf in a typhoon, the scholar stared into the pitch-black darkness with eyes that were now nothing but empty sockets.
[I—we, can give you the power. We can give you the chance.]
'It' was in the deepest darkness.
It was looking at him from the distant bottom of the deepest darkness, which could only be described as a bottomless pit.
It was a book.
It was a scripture.
A scripture made by one who held a grudge against humanity, using their own skin for the cover,
By one who held a grudge against the heavens, writing the contents with their own blood,
And by one who held a grudge against the earth, weaving it together with their own tendons.
[Though our goals differ, our paths are the same. If you enter into a contract with us, we shall grant you a new opportunity!]
"I will enter into a contract!"
[You will never again be able to walk proudly in the light, nor will you ever be able to lift your face to gaze upon the heavens. Do you still wish to contract with me?]
The scholar had never considered any other answer from the start.
"I do. I entrust my soul to you."
The voice—the scripture—seemed satisfied with his answer and erupted into wild, uproarious laughter.
[Vessel. The name of this scripture is the Darkness-Suppressing Heaven-Shaking Classic, a scripture of defiance that shall burn and consume all the darkness of this saha world in place of the indifferent and slothful heavens!]
Darkness surged from the scripture.
The scholar’s soul was swallowed by that darkness in an instant.
As his consciousness drifted away, the manic laughter of the Darkness-Suppressing Heaven-Shaking Classic shook his ears.
[From this moment on, you shall breathe in the darkness, strike down with the sword of judgment, and become the Venerable of Darkness who punishes all the karma of the world!]
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The next day, the guards discovered the scholar dead, his entire body drenched in blood.
Yet, strangely, it was said that the corpse was so light that it was hard to believe it belonged to a human.
As if,
As if something essential had been completely drained away…….
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