Chapter 226

“Ah, Nan-ah. I found this on the way, can you take a look? They say it’s from the Parasitic Sect.”

“Huh? Parasitic Sect? You shouldn’t just pick up things like that. The side effects and effects can vary wildly.”

Cheap Parasitic Sect stuff doesn’t do much and just eats away at your essence, making it almost a suicide poison.

On the flip side, the high-quality stuff is known for explosive power or minimal essence damage, or sometimes both, among other things.

Going on about harmful substances, Tang Nan-ah furrowed her brow as she opened the box and grimaced.

“What’s this? It’s bright red.”

“Is red bad?”

“It can be made red, sure. There’s peony, safflower, or goji berry in there. But usually, you don’t see red. Generally, if a remedy shows red, they deliberately turn it black to get rid of that, you know? It’s just unsettling…”

Hearing that did make sense.

The remedy given by Dorai-man looked like blood, and just looking at it gave me a cold shiver.

“So, can you find out if it’s a good thing or not, and how bad the side effects are?”

“Hmm. Do we need to sneak around to find out? Can’t we just ask the elders?”

“Hmm.”

Qing thought for a moment.

Because it had the name of the Merchant Shintu attached to it, if it turned out to be junk, it would be a big deal.

If word got out that Shintu peddled toxic drugs, oh, how unfair that would be for the Master.

“Yeah. I’ll ask you to investigate secretly.”

—-

The next day.

After sucking on the drug, Qing’s entire body was ballooning up, tightly bound to the torture bed.

Fear was creeping back.

As each joint was secured with iron shackles, there wasn’t even a finger that could be moved.

It felt like standing at the top of a free-fall ride back in my hometown.

What was I thinking, thinking I could handle this?

I regretted it all too late.

Couldn’t I just be let down now?

In the meantime, Cheon Yu-hak came back dragging ropes, wrapping Qing up tightly with them.

“Master? You didn’t do this before.”

“After checking the training station last time, the cuffs were about to fall apart. I’m not an expert in metalwork, so if it breaks, I won’t have any way to fix it, so I have to prevent damage like this.”

Even if you can do a maintenance check, if something breaks, you’ve got to send it to a blacksmith, and who knows how long that will take? That would delay the Yulryu Yeonryeon training.

So he’s reinforcing it in another way.

“What kind of girl has that much strength?”

“Ugh, can you ease up a bit? It’s too tight. And it hurts, what is this?”

“This is a new torture tool called Gyoryongsak. Once the swelling goes down, it’ll fit just right, so just endure for about two hours and a half.”

“You’re saying the torture lasts for three hours and I should endure two and a half hours?”

“Once we start, the tightening will be the least of your worries, you know?”

When I thought about it, it wasn’t just a single rope.

Both arms were bound tightly, both legs were secured, even my waist was thickly wrapped, and a rope was wrapped around my neck.

These weren’t just ordinary ropes; they were named weapons, and Qing didn’t want to know that kind of knowledge.

They were weapons called 승繩 or 삭索, a type of rope.

“Master, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe! My neck feels too tight!”

“It’s your belly that’s being squeezed. You can’t breathe because your chest is compressed. But three hours should be fine, probably.”

“Probably? What does that even mean?”

No matter how human-like one’s body is, once you’re bound and gagged, you can’t string a sentence together.

Qing struggled to protest, but every joint was so tightly bound that there was no room to even quiver.

More so, trying to exert effort only pushed the air out of his lungs.

That left no room for his belly to expand, so the lungs couldn’t exert pressure.

I can’t breathe…!

Qing was desperately gasping for air.

As the training station bent in the opposite direction of his joints, every joint from his fingers to his shoulders twisted outwards at once, bringing a flood of pain—

Qing saw a familiar ceiling.

It was the one-room place he used to live in before leaving, a home for factory workers.

Right, it looked like this.

He hadn’t thought of it in a long time, so it was all but forgotten.

Then, Qing tilted his head.

“But why am I here?”

Trying to recall, the rush of terrible pain flooded back—

“Ah, right. I fainted.”

Qing realized his condition.

It genuinely hurt so bad he felt like he’d rather die, and it seemed he’d lost consciousness for a moment.

That was when he heard an otherworldly voice.

– Hhhiik! Hahhh, uhh, ahh!

Turning his head, he saw a muscular man with long hair had trespassed into his one-room apartment, stunned, rolling around like a crazy person.

– Uhh! Uhhh…!

It was the Heavenly Demon’s Soul.

Huh? But what’s wrong with the mental parasitic state?

The soul was squirming, trembling as it looked at Qing, but its eyes were unfocused and no human sounds were coming from its mouth.

“What’s up with him? Why is he like this? Hey?”

– Aaaahhh!

The previous Heavenly Demon shrieked like a girl, pressing his head against the floor as if trying to cover his ears.

Was it said that an ostrich buries its head in the sand when it meets a predator, thinking that if it can’t see them, they can’t see it either? Was that a fable or truth? I wasn’t too curious about that, but the former Heavenly Demon was definitely acting like that.

What gives? Why did he become such a fool?

Surprisingly, the culprit was Qing!

A person’s subconscious won’t tolerate intruders who can seize their body.

Qing’s subconscious continuously shattered the Heavenly Demon’s soul during every moment of unconsciousness.

The pain of the soul breaking apart exceeded hundreds of thousands of times, leading to a complete mental breakdown.

But Qing didn’t know.

If he could understand that, it wouldn’t be called the subconscious, it would be called consciousness; even great heroes like Fr or Jung, the disciple and rival of psychoanalysis, wouldn’t have grasped it either.

Then suddenly, Qing’s senses alarmed him. It was a signal that he was about to wake up.

“Oh no…!”

Qing’s face turned into a state similar to the Heavenly Demon, who had buried his head.

Please let me remain unconscious just a little longer. I hate pain; it’s all my fault. Please, please…!

Then, a thought occurred to him. Huh? What?

Shwaak!

Ice-cold water splashed across Qing’s face. If you were to ask why there was cold water in late May, one could say the ice chunks brought by the ice merchant hit Qing’s face too.

– Ugggh! Uggghh!

Coming to his senses, Qing let out muffled sounds beyond the gag.

I can imagine that Cheon Yu-hak must have expected it to be a slurry of curses. After all, when Cheon Yu-hak had undergone Yulryu Yeonryeon training, he too had spat countless curse words through the gag.

But?

Cheon Yu-hak’s slender eyes narrowed even further.

Is it just me…?

But there was no time for idle thoughts. Yulryu Yeonryeon wasn’t just a severe physical and mental trial for the practitioner; it was demanding for the one conducting the training as well.

Cheon Yu-hak readjusted the apparatus, focusing on the faint sensations prickling through.

Ah, why didn’t it feel like this before? Ah, this feels nice.

Qing lay on the bed, gazing at the screen.

His pupils were shaking so much that the ceiling of the familiar bathing area blurred into an unrecognizable whirl.

Of course, Qing wasn’t just idly watching.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

Focusing briefly on his dantian, as he severed the will of the Heavenly Demon, the malevolent spirit tried to surge up but returned quietly into his dantian.

That Demon barely moved when I was handling it, but now that the mental parasitic entity has gripped the body, it’s causing a ruckus.

However, even when the Heavenly Demon’s soul was intact, they were never a match for Qing mentally.

Now, even if Qing were to die, there was no need to worry about the resurrection of the Heavenly Demon.

The Heavenly Demon’s soul may be immortal, but the already shattered psyche was in no state to seize even a weak child’s body.

So during that painful time, Qing merely watched as he was getting his body wrecked, observing as though it were someone else’s business.

Oddly, it felt like such a dull and taxing time.

Nevertheless, one could not let their guard down, as he needed to suppress the rampaging demon energy within his dantian through concentration.

How much time passed like that?

As he saw Cheon Yu-hak loosening the gag on-screen, Qing trapped the mental parasitic entity deeply within.

Having spent only about two and a half hours on physical exertion, his body felt heavy and achy as if every joint had been abused.

Yet, with the essence draining out, the swelling was also reducing, thus creating sufficient space for breathing.

Cheon Yu-hak’s assurance that three hours would be fine was indeed correct; hence Qing felt a bit indignantly wronged by that.

“Oh man, I’m gonna die…”

After pouring all his energy into a focused three hours, Cheon Yu-hak collapsed just like last time.

Qing desperately shouted.

“Master!? Can’t you release me first and rest?”

“Later, later. We’ll loosen it later… Besides, you’re too tired to move anyway.”

In pain, when a person exerts themselves, Qing’s own muscles were exhausted, leading him to be sprawled out, not bound.

“But maybe in a more comfortable state…”

“Were you the only one in pain? Binding like this is more painful for me. Just let’s both take a nap…”

“Master? That small toilet! Quickly!”

“Why does it matter? It’s a bathing area, just go ahead and do it…”

About to pass out, Cheon Yu-hak said that and immediately conked out.

He started snoring loudly.

“Lady, is that even sensible? Master? Master? Hey! This is still tied up!?”

And thus, Qing’s frantic voice echoed through the bathing area.

—-

Ultimately, while Cheon Yu-hak was knocked out, Qing didn’t manage to get any sleep and trudged over to Muchen Pavilion.

And then, as soon as Tang Nan-ah spotted Qing, she rushed over.

“Qing, where did you pick this up!? You’re not connected to it, are you!? No! Say it’s not true!”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

Qing replied in a hoarse voice.

Yet, there was a certain calmness amidst the exhaustion.

That put Tang Nan-ah at ease for a moment.

Then she said,

“What’s wrong? That’s an ugly instrument made from blood essence. It’s medicine made by melting down people. How could you just pick up something so horrid?”

The easiest way to create a Parasitic Sect item is through the use of poison and antidote.

So, using essence to awaken essence, blood essence Parasitic Sect items have exceptional effects and minimal burdens on the user.

Blood essence is a horrific method where people’s essences are melted down, crafted by the alchemists of the Zhou Dynasty.

After the fall of the Zhou, records were burned, and alchemists were eradicated, but as wickedness often does, it stubbornly lingered on.

And a faction that casually used blood essence existed in the martial world; they were the Blood Sect, those bastards.

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