Chapter 34: The Young Master of the Sunghwa Palace 3

If Jin Sohye’s fiery temper was a problem, then it was a problem. Emerging through the dust, Jin Sohye glared at Baek Mujin and thought.

‘Whether I kill Lord Baek or he kills me… I’ll settle this once and for all.’

Jin Sohye took a few steps toward Baek Mujin, then stopped unconsciously, scanning his entire body.

‘What? Was he not at full strength just moments ago?’

Her resolve to fight on was firm, yet a sense of despair seeped in—that nothing would work against Baek Moo-jin. Jin So-hye frowned, sensing Baek Moo-jin had grown stronger. Yet, her expression was striking, like Xi Shi frowning. Even Baek Moo-jin, absorbed in the martial arts duel, couldn’t help but utter a momentary gasp of admiration.

“Huh…”

But Jin Sohye, who had thought she was being pushed back, seized that instant and lunged in with lightning speed. Yet the surprise attack had no effect whatsoever. Baek Moo-jin saw Jin Sohye’s movements with crystal clarity, and soon the two clashed their martial energies in a perfectly honest exchange.

CRASH············!

Baek Moo-jin’s hand and Jin So-hye’s hand touched, their eyes locked on each other.

This time, Jin Sohye stood her ground without retreating even a single step. Yet, her entire body was gradually turning pure white. It was as if the red pigment were leaching out. Jin Sohye had now released the protective energy shield she normally maintained around her body. She was channeling her entire power into her attack, relying solely on her inner strength. It was literally an attack that disregarded life and death.

Jin Sohye felt as if she were facing a wall.

As she resisted the frigid cold emanating from Baek Moo-jin’s martial energy, the surrounding scenery faded away. She found herself falling into a hallucination, as if standing alone on an icy plain in the North Sea. The cold seeped into her very bones, making endurance no easy feat. Moisture began to form in Jin Sohye’s eyes, but the icy cold emanating from Baek Moo-jin made it nearly impossible to keep them open. Watching her, Baek Moo-jin sighed and thought.

‘She’s incredibly stubborn.’

Baek Moo-jin, his own stubbornness ignited, pushed forward with the battle of wills. Having no intention to kill her, he waited leisurely for Jin So-hye’s energy to deplete, responding with ease.

But just how much time had passed…

Jin Sohye’s energy reserves were strangely deep, allowing her to stubbornly hold her ground against Baek Moo-jin for quite a while.

But if they continued this standoff, the outcome was obvious. Jin Sohye imagined her entire body turning to ice, then shattering into pieces and scattering into the void.

‘Create a variable while I still have enough power left to attack.’

Jin Sohye boldly seized the moment. She instantly adjusted the intensity of the energy she was channeling. The result was that she pulled her energy away as if repelled by Baek Moo-jin, rapidly retreating backward.

Baek Moo-jin was startled by her quick thinking, feeling as if he had been taught a lesson by Jin So-hye.

‘Is such a technique even possible?’

Baek Moo-jin’s energy was undeniably stronger. Yet Jin So-hye’s unconventional retreat, displayed just now, was such a brilliant move it made Baek Moo-jin’s eyes widen in awe.

Meanwhile, Jin Sohye, the one who executed it, was drenched in cold sweat.

It felt like sticking her head into a tiger’s den and then scrambling out in a hurry.

The moment she created distance, Jin Sohye whipped her Heaven-Shattering Flame Blade through the air, drawing a vertical slash as if cleaving the void.

A strange sound erupted… The blade Jin Sohye had unleashed, a manifestation of her external energy, sliced through the air and poured down onto Baek Moo-jin’s shoulder.

Whoosh!

But Jin Sohye prepared a follow-up attack the instant she projected the blade-shaped force. She thrust off the ground once, changed direction, and flicked away the left and right blades with an intricate movement.

Then, from both hands, the flames that had once consumed Lim Gaso, the former master of the Sword Sect—the Scorching Heat Flower Prison—spun and shot toward Baek Moo-jin.

Whoosh!

The Scorching Heat Prison… a name borrowed from the Scorching Heat Hell, one of the Eight Hot Hells… It was a bizarre martial arts technique where the moment one touched a flame cluster, a prison-like form of fiery blossoms unfolded.

Even after unleashing such a barrage of attacks, Jin Sohye still felt uneasy. She hurriedly pushed off the ground and followed after the Scorching Heat Prison she had sent forth.

2.

Baek Moo-jin watched with his hands hanging limply as Jin So-hye moved beyond his grasp.

At first, a crimson blade flew toward him, which he easily deflected with his sword.

With a loud bang! the blade shattered. This time, a truly bizarre shape of flames surged in, undulating through the air. Simultaneously, Jin Sohye followed at an incredible speed.

Baek Moo-jin frowned.

‘What kind of martial arts is that, exactly…?’

The first thought that came to mind upon seeing the flickering flames was ‘unease’. Unable to comprehend it rationally, he relied on instinctive judgment.

As Baek Moo-jin shifted his body backward to evade… an even more astonishing thing happened. Jin So-hye, who had followed his Superheated Fireball, twisted its trajectory mid-flight as if connecting it with a transparent string.

That direction, of course, was where Baek Moo-jin was retreating.

In an instant, a chase ensued.

With each stomp on the ground, the two retreated an immense distance, only to catch up again. When Baek Moo-jin evaded being caught, Jin So-hye immediately created another variable. She thrust off the ground with both feet, infused with her inner energy, then spun her body like a whirlwind as she soared upward.

Soaring through the air, Jin Sohye unleashed all her power, wrapping her twin blades to create a massive fireball unlike anything seen before.

Her intent was to detonate the scorching fireball pursuing Baek Moo-jin with this flame sphere.

“Huh…!”

Baek Moo-jin vaguely grasped why Jin So-hye was attempting to hurl an explosive gas. He marveled not only at the bizarre nature of her martial arts but even more at the sheer freedom of thought behind her attack.

The Superheated Fireball surged toward Baek Moo-jin, while a colossal fireball plummeted from the sky, threatening to lay waste to the entire area.

At that moment…

Baek Moo-jin froze, standing rigidly as he stared expressionlessly at the fiery calamity pouring down from the sky.

There were many ways to respond, but the situation was truly perilous.

Ending it with superior martial arts was the right choice.

A white chill instantly formed on Baek Moo-jin’s hands, followed by the energy of the White Flower Divine Art surging through his entire body.

It was a situation demanding the use of one of the Four Great Mysteries of the White Flower Divine Art.

At this moment, Baek Moo-jin felt it was not at all a waste to prepare the Four Great Mysteries.

Jin Sohye was a formidable opponent worthy of such a response, someone deserving of being met with the highest-level martial arts.

Feeling the heat pressing in from two directions, Baek Moo-jin concentrated his mind, chanted one of the Four Great Mysteries, and released the cold energy.

[Absolute Cold Qi: One Band of White Night]

The frigid energy exploding from Baek Moo-jin’s entire body spread out in a circular wave.

······························!

In an instant, everything in motion froze solid······

The color of every frozen object turned pure white······

The flying Yanhuaguo, the surging Choyehuaguo, even Jin Sohye’s approaching body—all halted, shrouded in pure white cold.

After the Molten Fireball and Superheated Fireball shattered upon hitting the ground, everything within a radius of over ten feet around the ground Baek Moo-jin stood upon had ceased moving.

The only one who could move, Baek Moo-jin, slowly began to walk, taking steps to check on Jin So-hye. But even the ground beneath his feet was frozen solid, so in the dead silence, a crunching sound echoed.

Then, with each step Baek Moo-jin took, the eerie sound of thin ice cracking echoed chillingly.