Chapter 248 Blood-Witch Trio – Part 2

Chapter 248: Blood-Witch Trio – Part 2

While Seon Woo-jin defeated the first of the Blood Three Elders, Chak Hwasup, in a stealth technique duel and dragged away the third elder, Nusan Tuma, Jin So-eun remained completely unaware, focusing solely on Gokmusang, who now stood just six paces away from her.

Her spiritual perception had grown frighteningly fast in a short time, but it still couldn’t grasp the subtleties of the enemy’s movements or Seon Woo-jin’s concealment.

She was now completely focused on her opponent, waiting only for him to come closer.

Given her current state, she felt certain she could block any dagger thrown at her, even from a much closer distance.

‘My body and mind feel so light and clear. Even with my eyes closed, everything is perceived so vividly and distinctly. How is this possible? Has Master Seonwoo always lived in such a world?’

Thinking that way, a sudden surge of purpose welled up inside me.

Exhaustion didn’t even cross my mind. Instead, a burning desire to test my limits against the opponent before me surged within me.

‘Come on. I’ll block it all. I can do this!’

Jin So-eun focused like the edge of a blade, imprinting every single move of her opponent onto her mental canvas.

But just as she waited like that for a moment.

For some reason, the opponent wasn’t advancing any further.

“…What? Why aren’t they coming closer?”

Jin So-eun was puzzled for a moment.

But soon, she dismissed it as unimportant.

‘If you won’t come, then I’ll just have to go myself.’

Thinking this, Jin So-eun immediately took a step toward the other person.

An immediate reaction followed.

The other person flinched and hurriedly stepped back as far as Jin So-eun had advanced.

Only then did Jin So-eun realize why the other hadn’t approached.

‘That person is afraid. Afraid of me approaching.’

And she could guess the reason right away.

‘This distance was his safety line. The distance where he could launch a hidden weapon attack without fear of retaliation. He lacks confidence in close combat.’

Through that realization, Jin So-eun came to understand another truth.

‘Then, if I can just block this memorization…’

If the author’s safety line was at this distance, blocking this attack would carry a different meaning than before.

Because this attack would be the last one he could possibly unleash.

Blocking just this one could mean this fight might end in her victory.

Jin So-eun exhaled deeply.

“Huuuuuu!”

Her mind focused into a single point, beyond any further concentration.

Thin and sharp.

He began slowly approaching his opponent in that state.

Swoosh!

Meanwhile, Gok Musang, who had flinched unconsciously at Jin So-eun’s approach, was gritting his teeth.

He was, without question, one of the strongest members of the Blood Wolf Clan, the world’s foremost assassin group.

But for someone like him to fear that young girl and back away…

It was utterly humiliating.

‘How dare she!’

Crunch!

Gokmusang gritted his teeth.

He hadn’t honed his secret arts all this time just to be made a laughingstock by some young girl like that.

Had he not prided himself on his dagger skills, believing them superior even to those of the world’s greatest assassin, Am Hyeol-hyang?

So if he just focused properly, a woman like that would never be his match.

Gokmusang no longer dismissed Jin So-eun as an amateur.

He began targeting her with his full attention, as if facing the greatest adversary of his life.

He coiled like a venomous snake, waiting for the final strike.

‘Come closer, if you dare!’

As Jin So-eun approached, she suddenly halted.

She could immediately sense the sudden shift in her opponent’s aura.

‘Her aura has sharpened.’

It was nothing like the sloppy aura from just moments before.

Like a scorpion preparing its venomous sting to strike at the last opening.

That prickly, hedgehog-like intensity made her skin tingle.

Jin So-eun instinctively realized.

Her opponent no longer looked down on her, nor were they intimidated.

‘This is where it really begins.’

Jin So-eun swallowed hard, halting in place without closing the distance any further.

She felt that if she rushed even slightly or showed the slightest opening, the opponent’s dagger would pierce her body in an instant.

A suffocating feeling, as if her entire body were tightly bound by vines, unable to move.

She could only stand still as a stone, her staff thrust forward.

Meanwhile, Gokmusang, who had been waiting for her to move, was equally immobilized.

The distance between them now was between five and six zhang. This was inevitably her last chance to throw the dagger.

Therefore, she absolutely had to hit the mark.

But so far, no opening had appeared in her opponent.

It seemed the opponent also realized that making the first move would reveal an opening.

Gokmusang now felt pure admiration.

‘He’s no pushover, after all. Even at such a young age, he possesses remarkable instincts.’

Having fully acknowledged his opponent, Gokmusang now decided to wait for the other to make the first move.

After all, this girl was a formidable opponent worthy of such respect.

And waiting was precisely what he, the assassin, did best.

The duel between the two was now converging into a contest of patience.

***

“Caw! Caw! Caw!”

A crow flew noisily overhead, cawing loudly as it passed between the two people.

A rabbit also paused briefly between them, seemingly oblivious, before bolting toward the thicket in fright.

But the two remained utterly still, pouring their razor-sharp focus toward each other.

How much time had passed?

Their faces began to drip with sweat.

And in truth, they were far more exhausted than they appeared on the surface.

Concentrating all his mental energy to face off against his opponent demanded tremendous physical and mental strength.

But the two were not in exactly the same state.

Jin So-eun suddenly thought.

‘I might suddenly pass out like this, you know?’

The struggle was equally grueling for both, but she felt it was more likely she would be the one to tire first.

She had momentarily forgotten due to her heightened alertness, but her stamina had already been depleted before this confrontation.

Moreover, her opponent was an assassin.

A seasoned assassin at that.

So in situations demanding such patience, he must have been far more accustomed to it than I.

Ultimately, the conclusion was clear.

If things continued like this, it would be his defeat.

Gulp.

‘What should I do?’

Jin So-eun agonized.

She couldn’t let this situation continue.

If more time passed and her stamina completely drained away, she wouldn’t even have a chance to try anything.

So the answer was obvious.

It was time to take a risk.

‘But… how?’

Taking a risk was clear.

But that didn’t mean I could just blindly approach the opponent like this.

Approaching without a plan would have been a surefire way to get wiped out.

If I had to approach, I absolutely had to shake them up somehow beforehand to create an opening.

‘Create an opening. What method could there be?’

But no matter how hard he thought, no suitable means came to mind.

The opponent could attack from a distance, but since I used a club, I absolutely had to get close to do anything.

It was a dilemma.

Jin So-eun bit her lip.

‘What can I do? I can’t just throw my only club….’

As a creeping sense of despair began to surface, she found herself thinking that.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to Jin So-eun.

It was the kind of thought she would never have entertained before.

She swallowed hard as she thought.

‘But that’s completely absurd, isn’t it? Still, I can’t just sit idly by…’

After a moment’s hesitation, Jin So-eun finally made her decision.

Now was not the time to debate whether to do it or not.

If she didn’t want to die without trying anything, she had to focus all her energy on the one remaining option.

“Huuuuuu.”

Jin So-eun exhaled deeply.

Her momentum was growing fiercer by the moment.

Gokmusang could immediately sense Jin So-eun’s growing intensity.

It seemed the opponent could no longer endure and was about to make a move.

‘Just as I thought.’

He smiled smugly to himself.

He knew better than anyone that whoever made the first move in this situation was bound to lose.

It seemed that no matter how great a genius one was, the gap in experience could not be deceived.

It was at that moment.

Jin So-eun finally moved.

Shhhhhhh!

“?!”

Gokmusang was instantly horrified.

Jin So-eun’s attack came in a way she hadn’t anticipated at all.

Jin So-eun’s baton was flying toward him like a beam of light.

She had fired the baton she was holding at herself.

‘What a stupid move?!’

Gok Musang frantically twisted his upper body, barely dodging the baton hurtling toward his head.

Whoosh!

The club, moving at tremendous speed, grazed his head, sending shards of shattered hair flying through the air.

Even to him, a master of hidden weapons, it was clearly a threatening speed.

But that was all.

Gokmusang was now certain the fight was over.

It was utterly foolish to let go of one’s strongest weapon during a battle against a formidable foe.

‘This is the end!’

Gok Musang’s eyes fixed on Jin So-eun.

The club she had hurled was now flying toward him.

Now the distance between them was three paces.

‘Whoosh!’

Gok Musang aimed to shoot his hidden weapon.

At this distance, Jin So-eun, without her club, had no way to block his dagger.

But at that moment, Jin So-eun’s movements changed again.

Swish!

“!”

Gok Musang’s eyes flickered.

Her figure had split into three in an instant.

It was the Samhwanbo.

The Three-Ringed Sword, having reached its pinnacle, had instantly split Jin So-eun’s form into three.

For a moment, Gokmusang, unsure of her exact location, could only pause.

Now the distance between them was just one zhang.

But further disruption was futile.

As a master of hidden weapons, Gok Musang’s internal cultivation also surpassed imagination.

Finally, when the distance between them closed to a single step, his eyes could confirm Jin So-eun’s true form.

‘Got her!’

Without further hesitation, he threw the dagger.

Shh!

Jin So-eun could see her opponent staring straight at her as he hurled the dagger.

They hadn’t even closed the distance of a single step yet.

A beam of light faster than sound reached the space before her forehead in an instant.

The next moment, the sound reached her ears.

Crack!

It was the sound of something exploding.

Then, Jin So-eun’s legs gave way, and she collapsed with a thud.

And she collapsed onto the ground.

“Haah! Haah! Haah!”

Even if someone beat her to death now, she couldn’t move anymore.

If someone threw a dagger, she’d have no choice but to take the hit.

“Haah, haah, haah!”

I couldn’t catch my breath.

It felt as if her entire body had melted into a liquid state and was about to stick to the ground.

Jin So-eun, who had been lying flat on her back for a moment, suddenly turned her head to look beside her.

Then she could see Gokmusang’s body, his head split open, finally collapsing slowly.

Thud!

Jin So-eun exhaled sharply, staring blankly at his corpse for a moment.

Somehow, it didn’t feel real.

But after staring at his motionless body for a long while, she finally found her voice.

“We… actually won.”

A hollow laugh escaped her.

Ha, ha ha, ha ha ha ha.

Suddenly, the final moment from just before flashed through her mind.

The moment the opponent’s dagger had nearly pierced her head.

In that life-or-death instant, Jin So-eun managed to lightly touch the dagger with her index finger, which she had been preparing.

And that slight contact had saved her life.

Because the slightly deflected dagger had grazed the side of her forehead instead of the center.

As a result, her side temple was sharply split open as if sliced by a blade, and blood still flowed from it. But that was more than enough.

At least compared to the opponent whose head exploded at Samhwangak right after that.

Jin So-eun chuckled like a man and muttered.

“Heh heh heh heh, this really works, doesn’t it?”

The reason she’d thought to abandon the club and use her fingers in that critical moment was because of the hand-to-hand combat techniques she’d learned from Seonwoo Jin not long ago.

When learning hand-to-hand combat from him, Jin So-eun had easily mastered using the baton alongside the Samhwangak technique. But letting go of the baton to fight bare-handed? That was something she simply couldn’t get used to.

Letting go of the baton felt too awkward.

Then Seonwoo Jin suddenly asked her this.

‘The sword techniques of skilled swordsmen can sometimes be as threatening as real swords. What about you, young lady? Could your hands serve as a substitute for a club?’

Hearing those words, Jin So-eun felt as if she’d been struck on the head, leaving her dazed and stunned.

She had never once considered that her hands could replace a club.

But she soon realized it was merely a matter of her own fixed mindset.

She could wield the natural bow regardless of whether the bow’s length was long or short.

To her, it made no difference whether it was a finger or an arm.

And upon realizing this, she soon succeeded in using her hands and fingers not as an extension of bare-handed combat, but as an extension of staff techniques.

That was just two days ago…

‘But that realization ultimately decided the outcome, didn’t it? Good heavens.’

Jin So-eun, recalling that thought, let out another hollow laugh.

Wasn’t that saying she absolutely wouldn’t have been able to defeat him just two days ago?

It was astonishing how that two-day difference decided the outcome.

‘Is this what they call fate?’

Thinking that somehow gave me a little strength.

It felt like he had been chosen by fate.

Then another thought suddenly occurred to him.

‘Fate? Master Seonwoo?’

Somehow, his face appeared in her mind at the word “fate.”

And that thought was quite convincing.

‘Come to think of it, the Divine Eye, the Three-Ringed Treasure, the Three-Ringed Pavilion—when you get right down to it, it’s all thanks to Master Seonwoo, isn’t it?’

That was true.

Excluding the natural technique, everything used in this fight was learned from Seonwoojin.

He even began to wonder if he hadn’t learned more from Seonwoojin than from his grandfather, Jinsamong.

‘…….’

As he pondered this, it suddenly struck him that his current situation felt rather peculiar too.

Why had Master Seonwoo vanished from his side when he was supposed to help in times of danger?

The answer to that question came to him before long.

The answer lay in what he had gained from this fight.

‘I mastered the Divine Eye, completed the Three-Ringed Sword Technique, and learned to harmonize the club with hand-to-hand combat? Plus… I defeated a peerless master? What the hell is this?’

Thinking about it again, it was an absurd situation.

Just a short while ago, he had been struggling, unable to defeat even a peak master.

Jin So-eun suddenly sat bolt upright.

She felt ashamed lying there comfortably, as if she had accomplished something.

Glancing around, she saw the assassins who had fled far away cautiously approaching her once more.

“Huuuuu!”

Jin So-eun let out a deep sigh and pulled herself up again.

Her entire body screamed in agony, but she couldn’t let those scum kill her.

She couldn’t face Seon Woo-jin, who had helped her grow this far, if she did.

Jin So-eun suddenly realized her hands were empty and gazed at her staff, which had flown far away and was now deeply embedded in a tree.

To fight, she would have to retrieve it.

But after staring at the staff for a moment, Jin So-eun turned her head and began trudging toward the assassins, unarmed.

Somehow, it felt like she could manage without it now.

She twisted her stiff body and muttered to herself.

“Alright, shall we start over?”

It was time to fight again.

But this time, it wouldn’t take as long as before. And it wouldn’t be as hard as before either.

A sense of ease and confidence welled up inside her.