Chapter 414: The Dark King’s Nightmare (2)

The Dark King’s Nightmare (2)

I simply have to wake up from a nightmare.

Those words said by Wi Seol-Ah continued to linger in my mind.

…Wake up from it huh.

I didn’t get the answer as if lightning struck my head, but I at least knew I had to figure something out from these words.

Wi Seol-Ah was tilting her head in confusion after noticing my strange expression.

As I continued to think in my mind,

Oh?

I was reminded of something.

It wasn’t anything groundbreaking.

There was one thing that I never tried in the past month of this training, but I was reminded of that for some reason after hearing Wi Seol-Ah’s answer.

“…Now that I think about it, why have I never tried that?”

“Huh?”

Wi Seol-Ah reacted confusedly, but I didn’t respond and instead pat her head.

“Young Master Gu…?”

“Thanks. Because of you, I think I became a bit cleverer.”

“T-That’s a compliment, right?”

“Yes, of course it is.”

You had to be clever to survive in this world.

With that said, what Wi Seol-Ah said was going to be extremely helpful later.

However.

Would that really work against him?

I wondered if the method I thought of was going to work against the Dark King.

The solution to this was simple.

If it doesn’t work, then so be it.

I just had to look for a different solution if the current one doesn’t work.

It was that simple.

It became night time.

Beneath a slender crescent moon in the middle of a dark forest, a man stood with his hands behind his back.

He was a man with an atmosphere so strange it felt as if it was only quiet around him.

He had fascinating white hair and it so strangely complemented very well with darkness.

The man continued to stand still without a single movement as if he was a statue. Then, a change started to occur.

Starting from his feet, his shadows started to expand itself.

Swoosh-!

The aura felt mysteriously uneasy.

It expanded and covered the whole field and started to darken the surroundings.

Not long after, it even devoured the small light formed by the crescent moon, and complete darkness came.

Rustle-

A heavy sound of footsteps came from in front of him.

It was the footsteps of the person the Dark King was waiting for.

He was also the person the Dark King had met the most in the past month.

The Dark King watched the young man walk up from afar and moved his eyes.

He came today as well.

It had already been a month.

This time was extremely meaningful for the Dark King.

First, the Dark King had to change his opinions on the young man as he believed that he would only last a week or so.

I must show him my admiration on this part.

The Dark King nodded.

The young man experienced many deaths every night.

On average, he died more than twenty times a night. An average person would’ve lost their mind in less than three days, yet the young man only looked a little exhausted in the Dark King’s eyes.

He didn’t seem all too different compared to the first day.

Even the Dark King had to admit that the young man was impressive.

It may have been painless deaths every time, but the young man was already well over his limit.

Because of that, it only confused the Dark King more.

An average person wouldn’t be able to stand like that after experiencing that many deaths, so how come that child was able to maintain his mind?

In the Dark King’s eyes, there were only two answers.

One of them,

Is that he had already lost his mind a long time ago.

Perhaps his mind was already destroyed.

It was possible, but the Dark King didn’t think that was the case for the young man.

That meant that there was only one other answer.

If the young man had gone over the limit of an average person,

It means that he isn’t human himself.

The Dark King nodded after that thought.

That seemed most probable.

He felt this way ever since he first met him.

Looking at the young man made the Dark King’s heart beat crazily fast.

Thump- Thump-

It was still the same.

The cursed blood and heart of the Dark King resonated itself without control.

It was telling the Dark King that the young man was the same as himself.

Because of that, it was telling him to kill him.

It was giving him the desire to kill.

Because of the boiling desire to kill, the Dark King forced his instinct down.

The Dark King had no intention to kill the young man.

The young man may have been the key to free him from the ‘Curse’ and he couldn’t afford to kill him as he was a similar being to himself.

The Dark King watched the young man after hiding himself.

Whether the young man was a human or not, or if he had something special in him, it didn’t matter.

The important part was,

How pointless.

This wasn’t the best way for the young man to spend his time.

Does the bastard not know this?

The Dark King frowned after being reminded of when the Dishonored Venerable asked him to do this training with the young man.

The young man repeatedly experienced deaths in the Dark King’s ‘Territory’, but all of those deaths were all pointless in the Dark King’s eyes.

Just like the first time, the young man couldn’t even touch the Dark King’s clothes.

That was obviously the case.

This darkness was a territory the Dark King ruled over, and those inside the territory had their five senses disordered and made it difficult for them to efficiently use their Qi.

There was one thing that increased however.

Despite their five senses being disordered, the pain they felt increased.

This ability was used by the Dark King to torture others to begin with.

This only made the Dark King more speechless.

The Dishonored Venerable knew all of this, yet he threw his disciple into such a situation.

The young man wasn’t any saner either, since he accepted the challenge just because his master told him to.

The Dark King didn’t have a disciple, but he at least knew that the relationship between them was very strange.

However.

That was it.

The Dark King didn’t think further into the Dishonored Venerable and the young man’s relationship.

All he had to do was do what he was asked of so that he could get something he asked of the Dishonored Venerable in return.

Moreover, the Dark King didn’t believe that the young man, no, Gu Yangcheon was going to be able to overcome this challenge in the first place.

His belief didn’t change after a month.

It probably wasn’t the Dark King that thought this way. The person who knew better than anyone than this,

Should be that child.

It was Gu Yangcheon himself, who had experienced all of this.

He didn’t seem to have lost his mind yet, but his exhausted expression was a proof of it.

The Dark King held his dagger while looking at Gu Yangcheon’s expression.

He wondered just how long Gu Yangcheon could endure.

Gu Yangcheon managing to last this long had already broken the Dark King’s expectation, but in the Dark King’s eyes, Gu Yangcheon didn’t seem to have much in him left.

At most, he was going to last a week.

As long as nothing special happens, the training would end in that time.

Then, the Dishonored Venerable would realize his mistake and choose a different method of training.

He may have been an insane martial artist, but even he wouldn’t want to see someone who could accomplish his goal, go insane and destroy himself.

As the Dark King was about to move along with that thought,

Hm.

The Dark King suddenly felt a change from Gu Yangcheon.

Gu Yangcheon didn’t seem different from the usual, but he had something in his hand.

The Dark King frowned his eyes after checking what it was.

A dagger?

Gu Yangcheon was holding none other than a dagger.

Judging by its shape, it seemed like it was from Tang Clan.

It seemed like he borrowed it from the daughter of the Poison King.

A dagger huh.

The Dark King wondered why he brought a dagger all of a sudden.

In the last day, Gu Yangcheon thought of many different methods in order to reach the Dark King.

Because he couldn’t reach him in a hand-to-hand fight, he tried to light up his surroundings even though he was barely able to use his Qi.

He also tried using his flames to burn the Dark King.

The most efficient method was when he tried to grab the Dark King as a dagger stabbed into his neck.

In the Dark King’s mind, that was when it was the closest.

The dagger in his neck was more than enough to kill him, but Gu Yangcheon held onto his consciousness using his determination and tried to grab the Dark King.

Then, the Dark King was able to realize.

Bijuu that bastard, he found someone completely same as him and took him as a disciple.

Whether it was the master or the disciple, the Dark King was certain of one thing.

They were both very twisted.

The Dark King gave a strange gaze towards Gu Yangcheon.

He still has something up in his sleeve after everything he has tried huh.

It seemed like he had a plan with that dagger.

Your persistence is admirable.

Even the Dark King was impressed by the fact that Gu Yangcheon had something left in him after this long.

Though of course, his persistence alone wasn’t going to bring a different outcome.

As long as the secret of this territory stays hidden, Gu Yangcheon wasn’t going to be able to overcome it in the end.

With that thought, the Dark King continued to watch Gu Yangcheon’s movements.

Then, Gu Yangcheon pointed the tip of his dagger at not anywhere else, but at himself.

Right as the Dark King wondered what Gu Yangcheon was going to do with that dagger,

“…!”

Gu Yangcheon started to reach his dagger towards his neck and the Dark King immediately flew towards him after seeing the sight.

He had no time to think.

The Dark King instantly charged towards Gu Yangcheon.

Right as the tip of the dagger was about to stab into Gu Yangcheon’s neck,

Kwak-!

The Dark King grabbed Gu Yangcheon’s wrist and stopped him.

Then…

Kwak-!

Gu Yangcheon’s other hand grabbed the Dark King’s wrist.

It all happened in an instant.

The Dark King opened his white eyes in shock, staring at Gu Yangcheon.

Gu Yangcheon then spoke with a big smile as he looked back at the Dark King.

“I caught you.”

“…Hah.”

He seemed happier than ever judging from the tone of his voice.

The Dark King had to let out an incredulous laughter.

He was left speechless.

“…How did you know?”

The Dark King asked Gu Yangcheon.

After hearing him, Gu Yangcheon tilted his head and asked back.

“Know what?”

“This method. How did you figure it out?”

The Dark King was sincerely curious.

If a person died in this territory in the hands of someone other than the Dark King himself, they cannot revive.

It meant that they would be dead for real.

This meant that Gu Yangcheon wouldn’t have been able to wake up again if he killed himself then and there.

The Dark King couldn’t afford to let Gu Yangcheon die, which was why he quickly acted to stop that from happening.

This also meant that Gu Yangcheon chose this method knowing that it would make the Dark King come to him.

Gu Yangcheon knew that he would die for real if he killed himself, and that the Dark King would come to him to prevent that from happening.

But how did he know?

The Dark King couldn’t figure out the answer.

In response to the Dark King’s question, Gu Yangcheon answered as he stared at the Dark King.

“I didn’t know.”

“What?”

The Dark King frowned after hearing his response. He didn’t know…?

“How would I know that? I didn’t learn any assassination arts.”

“Then, how come you did such a thing?”

After hearing the Dark King’s question, Gu Yangcheon responded with an expression and tone that made it sound as if it was obvious.

“I just did it, for no reason.”

“What…?”

…He did it without a reason?

Gu Yangcheon continued to speak while staring at the Dark King who still couldn’t understand.

“I thought about some ways to wake up from a nightmare.”

The Dark King opened his ears when Gu Yangcheon suddenly started to talk about nightmares.

“The first thing a person would try to do is wake up from it, right?”

“What does this have to do with this?”

“Well, it’s nothing special, but I never actually tried to wake up from this nightmare. Because of that, I chose the simplest method. This is what a person would do to wake up from a dream.”

“…”

The Dark King was left speechless after he heard Gu Yangcheon’s calm answer.

Because of that mere reason, he tried to kill himself?

He didn’t know what kind of situation he was in, nor did he know what would happen if he actually killed himself.

Yet he tried anyways because of that simple reason?

The Dark King became certain after hearing Gu Yangcheon.

“…You are crazy.”

He was seriously insane.

“What do you think would’ve happened if I didn’t come and stop you?”

“If you didn’t, then I would’ve revived like any other time. Then, I would just have to come up with a different method.”

The Dark King couldn’t help but tell Gu Yangcheon what would’ve actually happened after hearing his answer.

“Child, you would’ve died if I didn’t come stop you there.”

“I believed that you would come and save me if I were to seriously die.”

“Why? What made you believe that I would prevent you from dying?”

It was understandable for a person to think that someone would come and save them from death, but it was a completely different story for someone to believe that the Dark King would do such a thing.

What reason did he have for him to be certain in such a thing?

The Dark King was very curious of his reason, but Gu Yangcheon gave this response.

“Oh, well I never thought of a reason for that.”

“What…”

“I honestly just believed that you would do that.”

“…”

“It’s just a feeling I had, you know.”

The Dark King gave up on thinking after hearing Gu Yangcheon’s answer.

I didn’t think a bastard like Bijuu would appear again.

That damned bastard’s disciple, was even worse than him.

The Dark King didn’t think that he would overcome this training in such a way.

“Sigh…”

The Dark King brushed his face with his hand for the first time in decades.

Whichever it was, it didn’t change the fact that Gu Yangcheon succeeded in reaching the Dark King.

The Dark King thought about the face the Dishonored Venerable would make after hearing this outcome.

It was obvious that he was going to make an annoying smile, and the Dark King already felt annoyed by it.

Then,

Blaze-

He suddenly felt heat.

He didn’t need to check where the heat came from.

It was only him and Gu Yangcheon in this area after all.

The Dark King asked the possessor of this heat with cold eyes.

“What are you doing?”

“I was personally curious about this, and I might as well try it now.”

Gu Yangcheon continued to increase his heat and spoke despite hearing the Dark King.

His pupils had turned red and his heat now felt threatening.

Just what was he planning after he finally finished his training?

The Dark King continued to watch, as he didn’t think that Gu Yangcheon was dumb enough to challenge him.

“There was something I couldn’t do because I died every time I tried using it.”

“And you are trying now?”

“Yes.”

He had an expression of a dying man just yesterday, but now he had a rather bright expression.

He almost looked cheerful?

Just what was this bastard?

Could he really recover that quickly just because he accomplished one thing?

No matter how many times the Dark King looked at him, he couldn’t understand.

“I’m wondering if this Formation is really indestructible.”

“…”

“It’s just a small curiosity of mine.”

The Dark King didn’t give any answer to Gu Yangcheon.

It wasn’t a ‘Formation’ to begin with.

This wasn’t something that a martial artist specializing in Formations could create.

This was in a way, an ‘Authority’ that the Dark King had due to his curse.

In some ways, judging by how the Dark King saw Gu Yangcheon similar to himself, it might’ve been possible for Gu Yangcheon to use the same ability, but he felt no need to teach him such a thing.

There was nothing positive about learning this power after all.

The Dark King decided to remain silent.

He also didn’t try to caution or stop whatever Gu Yangcheon was trying to do.

He was willing to let Gu Yangcheon try anything.

While staring at the Dark King, Gu Yangcheon quietly spoke.

“Red Heaven.”

In that moment, dense heat poured out from Gu Yangcheon’s body and scattered everywhere.