Chapter 41: Emperor of Flames 3

The heads of the Snow Mountain Hundred Families were silently aiding Baek Moo-jin. It was a scene that pierced Baek Moo-jin’s heart deeply. Therefore, the moment he spotted his grandfather and father, his resolve wavered.

‘Don’t put yourselves in danger because of me.’

Whether their forms were illusions or real, Baek Moo-jin did not want them to be harmed. While his heart wavered like this, the former heads flanking him pressed forward even more stubbornly. As if to say they feared no sacrifice.

How could he not know all this was for his sake?

An inexplicable rage filled Baek Moo-jin’s heart.

‘…You truly needn’t go this far. I beg you. This is something I must bear myself.’

Meanwhile, the flames unleashed by the Flame Lord grew fiercer, threatening to consume every single former clan leader. Yet they bent their upper bodies as if stepping into the flames, struggling forward one agonizing step at a time.

Baek Moo-jin’s heart was being torn to shreds.

‘What am I even doing!’

In a way, perhaps his anger was directed at himself.

Baek Moo-jin knew the previous heads had sacrificed endlessly for him, someone they had never even met. And his grandfather and father had passed that legacy on to him. He had always felt grateful, but he had been too young to truly understand their hearts. It was both a matter of regret and a matter of heartache.

Especially with his father and grandfather, he had maintained such a stifled and awkward relationship that he couldn’t even offer a single warm word to them while they were alive.

As Baek Moo-jin fought to contain the flames, he shouted loudly. His words were disjointed and illogical. They contained only the choking emotion of regret.

“You didn’t have to sacrifice yourselves like this for me…”

At that moment, the fire dragon expanded its body even larger.

Baek Moo-jin also wrapped the White Flower Divine Art even more fiercely around his entire body.

As Baek Moo-jin closely examined the now-enlarged body of the Fire Dragon, he realized it wasn’t composed of leather-like skin, but merely a form made up of countless tiny flames.

‘Then…’

Just as Baek Moo-jin made his decision, the fire dragon roared.

Its eyes burned with fury, and from its enormous maw, primordial flames poured forth ceaselessly, beginning to overwhelm the former patriarchs, each radiating a white, icy chill.

But the moment Baek Moo-jin felt shame within himself, his state of mind had already become identical to that of the former heads.

Sacrifice.

The moment Baek Moo-jin resolved his heart, he prepared the Four Great Mysteries, the most appropriate technique for this situation, using the inner strength of the Eight Stars.

Gripping his sword with both hands, Baek Moo-jin chanted the secret technique.

[Unified Cold Qi, Body and Sword as One]

In an instant, a white chill swept over Baek Moo-jin’s entire body as he resolved to sacrifice himself. Baek Moo-jin never dreamed he would use the Four Great Mysteries’ Sword-Body Union in the sense of ‘sacrifice’.

In truth, he didn’t even know the power or effect of this secret technique.

It was an art even Baek Moo-jin found difficult to wield.

But the moment he resolved to unleash it, there was no regret or hesitation.

Transformed into a white beam of light, Baek Moo-jin, enveloped in frigid cold, boldly charged into the fiery tongues of the Hwaryong, which were driving back the previous generation of clan masters.

Witnessing this arrogant challenge, the Fire Dragon abandoned the former heads of the clan and swallowed the incoming Baek Moo-jin.

The two forces began pouring their power into devouring each other. Then, as if feeling terrible agony, the enormous fire dragon began writhing on the ground, twisting its entire body.

2.

The former heads of the clan watched their son, who had leaped into the fire dragon’s mouth, with both worry and pride.

To someone, the son of a son.

To others, the son born to the son’s son.

Regardless, Baek Moo-jin was their son.

Yet the sight of the former heads of the family watching the son swallowed by the Fire Dragon with such concern was truly awe-inspiring.

They all seemed to appear as they had at the time of their deaths.

But was there some curse upon the Baek family?

The oldest-looking among the former heads was Baek Moo-jin’s grandfather. The rest were mostly in their thirties, and there was even a former head in his twenties, like Baek Moo-jin.

Regardless, their feelings were unanimous.

‘Come back alive.’

The Fire Dragon began to rage wildly, as if madly rampaging through the void of ignorance. It soared into the air, then suddenly plummeted back to the ground. Yet it was in a situation where it could neither spit Baek Moo-jin out nor swallow him whole.

If even the Fire Dragon suffered this much, who exactly had swallowed whom?

The two beings tested each other’s endurance like this.

But when no outcome emerged, Baek Moo-jin’s father stepped forward first. Then his father, and his father’s father… they kept stepping forward.

Amazingly, the former heads of the clan charged into the Fire Dragon’s mouth in the state of Divine Sword Union, just as Baek Moo-jin had done. Some heads, though they had never reached such heights in this world, cast aside their own safety and followed Baek Moo-jin, wrapping themselves in coldness and plunging into the flames.

Before long, all the heads of the Snow Mountain Hundred Families had advanced into the dragon’s mouth. Wielding dazzling swords, they tore through the fiery passageway and met the son who had sacrificed himself for them.

Only then could Baek Moo-jin see the faces of his father and grandfather.

Smiles spread across the faces of fathers and sons in that fiery hell.

In that instant, Baek Moo-jin proposed to the former heads of the clan: “Let us shatter this hellfire to pieces.”

What words were needed for them?

The instant their wills aligned…

Baek Moo-jin and all the heads of the Seolsan Baek Clan simultaneously unleashed the Absolute Cold Qi, the Great White Night, from the heart of the Fire Dragon.

[··································································!]

The writhing dragon’s body began to swell, and through the flickering flames, faint white beams of light began to seep out.

That beam of light multiplied from two to three, from three to ten in an instant, and before long, the entire body of the Fire Dragon seemed to burst forth, enveloped in white light.

Just how many flames had the Flame Emperor been composed of?

The scattering spectacle was truly magnificent.

Before long, around Baek Moo-jin, the frozen white flames of the Great White Night shattered once more, swirling like snowflakes.

Thus, the darkness, once as pitch-black as ink, was gradually turning white like a snow-capped mountain, covered in the scattered remnants of white snow.

Baek Moo-jin and the former clan heads descended to the ground and looked up at the sky.

Snow fell as it had when they were at Seolui Peak. All of them had trained their martial arts under such snow, so the same scenery arose in each of their minds.

As they faced the snow,

the former heads of the clan stood in a line facing Baek Moo-jin.

They intended to bid farewell.

Baek Moo-jin slowly moved his head, meeting the eyes of his father and the former heads of the clan, forcing a smile. Then, Baek Moo-jin’s eyes stopped again, fixed on his father and grandfather. At that moment, the two men uttered the words they had always spoken to him since he was a child. Though it seemed a place without sound, Baek Moo-jin’s ears were filled with their vivid voices.

“Well done, grandson.”

“Don’t cry, son.”

Baek Moo-jin collapsed, kneeling down to bow deeply toward the family heads. As a snowstorm swept in from somewhere, their figures gradually faded. Baek Moo-jin knew they had left, yet he remained bowed for a long time, unable to lift his head.