Reincarnated Sword Ghost

Sophisticated Footwork Technique

It was a face he could not fail to recognize. Even though they had hardly exchanged a single word, it was so.

He had first seen him during the entrance examination of the Heavenly Martial Hall.

That perfectly honed ki like a finely tempered blade.

The image, fit to exemplify a swordsman itself, was vivid in his mind even now.

It was the same after entering the hall.

Even while being assigned to different units, that name continued to circulate.

On the ranking wall listing their entrance exam results, their names had been set side by side.

When people discussed the rising stars, their names always came up together.

He had even heard firsthand from the disciples of a prestigious sect during the Shaolin Assembly.

They said that among the new experts, Jeong-un, Namgung Hui, and Yong So-myeong were considered the very best.

’They called him the Wudang Prodigious Sword.’

From the Wudang Sect of the Nine Great Sects and One Union.

And a man of noble status, as the chief disciple of that sect.

Rumors abounded along with his name.

They said that every time he went on a mission, he made an impressive showing with incredible martial skills.

Some said that, had it not been for Jeong-un, he would have advanced to two-stripes faster than anyone else in the hall’s history.

And now, Jeong-un had the chance to meet such a figure again.

”Keugh!”

A groan rang out from the man who had been sent flying.

Jeong-un’s fist had shattered his body-protecting enhanced ki and landed a clean blow to his ribs.

The attack was tightly wound with true ki.

As expected, the man coughed up blood. Even so, his eyes still shone with a clear expression.

He had not delivered a fatal blow. The sensation in Jeong-un’s hand told him as much.

He was tougher than expected.

Then again, his energy alone had marked him as one of the strongest.

It would have been overreaching to think his death could be secured with a single blow.

’But it landed.’

Still, there was something to be learned.

His fist-and-palm arts had broken through that thick layer of body-protecting enhanced ki. That much was enough.

The man staggered as he stood.

At the same time, Jeong-un had mixed the subtleties of his heavy striking technique into his swinging fist.

Yet the man immediately rose, quickly urging his true ki to repair his damaged insides.

It was much like Jeong-un himself had once done, swiftly mending internal injuries.

”You damned bastard...!”

He spat out his curse with clenched teeth, swathing his body in burning killing intent.

The saber he gripped made a strange vibrating sound, as though it were even more savage than its owner.

’Without a doubt.’

Only now did Jeong-un understand the words of the High Priest he had killed with his own hands.

These foes had, indeed, set foot into the ranks of experts.

It was said that Yeom Baek, the corps leader of the Blue Scale Corps, possessed martial skills on par with the elders of any great sect.

The so-called top hundred were usually of such a level.

Yet the energy he felt from this man was nearly equal to that of Yeom Baek he had met before.

That would place him among the rarest of experts in the martial world.

At the same time, Jeong-un realized just how unreasonable his own growth had been.

Not only was he facing such a man as an enemy, but he was even aiming for his throat.

He had even been prepared to face two at once.

’If that’s the case...’

Naturally, his worry shifted elsewhere. To Yong So-myeong, who had intervened earlier to block a surprise attack.

Just how much progress had he made during this time?

Had he, too, become a full-fledged swordsman with a foot in the realm of true experts?

It was hard to say for sure. Yong So-myeong had certainly been a genius ranked among the greatest.

However, it seemed unlikely he had reached the same level of martial prowess as Jeong-un.

After all, Jeong-un had undergone a string of extraordinary strokes of fortune.

Even if one were a disciple of a prestigious great sect who had taken rare elixirs since childhood, it was hard to imagine anyone matching his current self.

”...”

Jeong-un glanced toward the ongoing fight between Yong So-myeong and another High Priest.

Jjeoeong! Jjeong─!

The High Priest and Yong So-myeong collided, unleashing bursts of ki wave. At a glance, it looked like an even match.

’No.’

Unlike Yong So-myeong, who was clearly giving it his all, the High Priest he faced wore a relaxed expression, even keeping his left hand clasped behind his back—a clear enough act of insult.

He seemed thoroughly delighted at the prospect of killing an orthodox rising star known throughout the martial world.

At that moment, the man before Jeong-un let out a snarling voice.

”Daring to look away with me before you?”

Jeong-un turned back to face him. The cracks in his body-protecting enhanced ki had vanished.

His recovery was alarmingly fast. He might have forced his true ki to repair himself.

’Doesn’t matter.’

It was enough to see that Yong So-myeong was holding his own.

Whether his opponent showed leisure or not, that simply meant Jeong-un had some time left.

He would deal with the man before him and then go to help.

With his mind made up, Jeong-un spoke.

”Shouldn’t you thank me?”

”What?”

”If I hadn’t given you that opening, you’d be dead.”

”Shut up!”

Kuung!

The man exploded toward him, unleashing a surge of ki wave from his whole body.

The bursting energy from his planted foot rattled the ground, pulverizing the earth as if in an earthquake.

Hwaak!

In the next instant, he was right in front of Jeong-un. By then, Jeong-un had already raised his lowered sword.

He thrust one foot deep into the ground, lowering his stance solidly.

Sword poised, ready to swing at any moment—a textbook position for a masterful draw.

Saaaak! Kwaang―!

He completely parried the saber slash that came whipping toward him.

Then, with his stance still low, he lunged forward.

Kwaang! Kwaang! Kwaang!

He swung horizontally, targeting each of the man’s flanks in succession.

Every time the sword met the saber, a ki wave exploded through the air as if rending it.

As he swung from the side, Jeong-un was simultaneously initiating another strike from the opposite angle.

The combination of trajectories should have been impossible to maintain, yet he linked them in rapid succession—a sublime skill.

He forcibly twisted the flow of true ki running through his body, shifting his center of gravity to sustain these transitions.

An average martial artist’s muscles and meridians would have torn apart under such strain.

Jeong-un endured the tremendous recoil throughout his body as he wielded his blade.

Kwaang! Kaang!

The initial ferocity of the enemy’s assault vanished.

Alarm etched on his face, the man hastily swung his saber in defense.

Still, he was a seasoned expert in his own right.

He knew perfectly well that, when pressed, footwork was more important than simply continuing to block.

He moved his feet through narrow gaps, seeking to escape the disadvantage.

The man barely dodged a blow by shifting his upper body and pulling his feet back.

The bursting energy of Jeong-un’s sword strike grazed the tip of his nose.

Whoosh─!

The blast broke through his body-protecting enhanced ki, slicing past his nose by a hair.

A spray of blood flickered and vanished in the air.

Yet, he succeeded in opening a gap. It was a truly exquisite footwork.

He took another step to the side, spinning his body half a turn.

Channeling the force of rotation into his saber, he hammered it furiously at Jeong-un’s sword.

Kwaang─!

”Kuh.”

A stifled groan escaped Jeong-un’s lips. It was a tremendous slash.

As the man spun and swung, the incoming energy was crushingly heavy. For a moment, his sword hand tingled from the shock.

Seeing Jeong-un falter, the man shouted,

”You thought you’d kill me and then run to your companion? You thought one hit was enough to guarantee victory? Arrogant brat!”

His countenance now fully relaxed, he taunted non-stop, convinced of victory.

”This is why your types in the orthodox factions are so disgusting. Always preaching altruism, but when their own life is at stake, they’ll abandon everything and flee! Isn’t that always how it goes with people like you?”

With that, he lunged ahead, using his forcible stride to close the gap.

Was the jeering merely pretense masking another scheme?

Jeong-un sensed a torrent of immense true ki gathering at the man’s waist, swirling downward to his feet.

Kung─!

It was said that, in a formal duel, martial artists announced the name of their techniques.

Yet even after several duels, Jeong-un had never done such a thing.

His independent martial arts were secret.

He felt it now—the opponent was about to invoke a sophisticated footwork technique, something meant to be fatal, not worth revealing to a dead man.

He could die if he got this wrong. The thought shot through his mind in an instant.

The man wielded his saber from below in a rough, diagonal slash, forcibly yanking up his internal energy from its roots.

He was unleashing his most confident move.

’If I use the secrets of Moonlight Swift Steps and dodge... No. There’s no time to pull my foot back now. If I counter with Powerless Steps and try to offset his momentum and block...? With this kind of force, could I really negate all of it? I doubt it. Then...’

In his head, Jeong-un rapidly ran through every possible way to break the enemy’s unknown secret technique.

The life of a martial artist comes down to the moment.

Having chosen to bear a sword and walk the martial world, you are never certain when death will come.

If you can foresee your own death, perhaps that alone is a blessing.

But, at the same time, to foresee your own death is a humiliation to a martial artist.

It means you made the wrong choice with your life at stake.

Now, Jeong-un stood at such a moment. A wrong choice would be his end.

’... Fine.’

At last, he selected the optimal defense.

Jeok Cheong Subdues the Dragon (狄靑降龍).

By chance, he was already in a forward stance with one foot planted on the ground.

The second move of his independent sword technique began by drawing up true ki from a forward-planted leg.

Without intending to, he had fallen into the optimal position.

The man’s saber was coming up from below, in a diagonal slash.

Jeok Cheong Subdues the Dragon struck down from above. Thus, it was the best defense.

Paaang!

He drove his internal energy from both Yongcheon acupoints beneath his feet, bursting from the ground.

The earth shattered like a spiderweb beneath the surge of ki wave.

Jeong-un absorbed the rebound, then sent it through his lower body and up.

’...!’

A powerful shock shook his well-trained body to the core.

He withstood it and, with his newly cleared central channel, funneled it upward.

The surging cultivated power forced his meridians to expand, channeling true ki without restraint into his upward-striking wrist.

’Kuh.’

His laborious acupoint gripping the sword guard throbbed as if about to burst.

Still, he focused all his strength into the tip of his sword blade, resolved to leave nothing out.

Finally, like a bolt of lightning, he brought his sword crashing down.

Kwakwagwang─!

At the moment sword met saber, a sound like drums split his eardrums and his vision flashed white.

The upsurging saber aura and the descending sword aura knotted together, as if creating a flash of blinding light that vanished instantly.

”You crazy...!”

The man’s eyes widened as a sound of pain escaped him. Jeong-un’s sword strike pushed his saber back.

The subtlety of the move, the direction of the surging cultivated power—all were superior.

The man trembled as he desperately held on.

His face turned pale as he sensed, in every fiber, the overwhelming force of Jeong-un’s attack, unconvinced even as he lost ground.

Wuooong!

Jeong-un drew up more true ki.

He poured everything from his boundless dantian until there was nothing left but emptiness.

He had seized the momentum. He would press his internal power down from above until it was over.

”Kuaaah!”

Unable to resist the immense pressure any longer, the man’s knees hit the dirt with a crash.

To endure, he clung tightly to his saber, looking up in desperation.

Udeud! Jjeojeok─!

His saber split with a groan, as if screaming.

The true ki that had wrapped fiercely around his blade began to dissipate as the weapon shattered, the energy he had gathered scattering into the air.

Seizing the empty space, Jeong-un drove his sword down until the end.

Chwaaak!

From the man’s shoulder down to his waist, Jeong-un slashed him open.

Blood gushed high and whipped through the void.

The man’s once-formidable body-protecting enhanced ki was now shredded, fading away.

Clatter.

The half-broken saber slipped from his grip and dropped to the ground.

The man’s eyes turned toward Jeong-un’s face.

In them was the knowledge of defeat and certain death.

Slowly, he began to speak.

”I-I will tell you my—”

”Be quiet.”

”...?”

”I’m not interested anymore.”

A flash of golden sword aura swept across the man’s neck, leaving a thin line behind before vanishing.

Thud.