136 – Martial Exchange (4)

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Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon
Chapter 136 – Martial Exchange (4)
Translated by : moonchildkhz

***

After the first victory, Gwan Tae-ryang continued to fight several more rounds.
And after each round, he would roar in victory. 

By the fifth round, Gwan Tae-ryang’s voice had become a horror of the Orthodox faction.

Like right now. 

Clang—

Gwan Tae-ryang had once again cut off the opponent’s head. 

As with Jang Seo-ah, Gwan Tae-ryang caught the head in midair and burst into a roar. 

“Ooaaahhh!!!”

Whoosh—

The sound caused ripples to spread across the surface of the lake. 

At the roar, the Orthodox tried to retreat. 

Does that monster never get tired? 

Their faces were pale with horror. 

Given the situation, no one was willing to fight against the Demonic Army anymore. 

At this point, normal people would be so exhausted they would feel like dying.
But Gwan Tae-ryang continued to fight and win with his weary body. 

Even the sight of his heaving chest seemed like a hallucination. 

As opposed to the Orthodox peoples of Qinghai, the morale of the Cult of the Heavenly Demon was soaring. 

Holding the corpse, Gwan Tae-ryang shouted loudly, “Next!” 

Cheering came from the Demonic Cult, as if responding to him. 

“Woahhhhhhhh!”

The bodies of his enemies were floating around the small boat Gwan Tae-ryang stood on, which the Demonic Cult had entrusted him to. 

There were five. 

Exactly the same number of enemies that he had cut down today. 

Gwan Tae-ryang’s gaze went to the Orthodox faction. 

“I said, next!!”

No one came out and Gwan Tae-ryang shouted once more; the Orthodox faction trembled. 

But no one stepped forward. 

At that, Gwan Tae-ryang took some deep breaths and shouted, “Are there only cowards in Qinghai? And yet you call yourselves martial artists of Kangho?”

It was a clear provocation. 

How many people had been killed because they fell for that taunt?

Qinghai did not respond this time. 

Woon-seong exchanged glances with the Strategist. 

“Looks like any more rounds will be meaningless.”

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Sang Gwan-chuk seemed to agree with that.
It was a waste of time to continue trying to fight in the absence of opponents. 

“Thanks to the Charred Dragon Captain’s prowess, the morale on our side has greatly increased.
So, I will start the attack.”

When Woon-seong nodded, Sang Gwan-chuk fluttered the large fan in his hand. 

That was the signal.

Those who were watching the Strategist began to sound the drums. 

Bang, bang, bang. 

The sound of drums echoed across Qinghai Lake. 

They sounded like the beating of a human heart. 

The drumbeats were enough to create a strange tension on the battlefield. 

“What are they going to do?”

“What’s going on?”

The Qinghai Alliance tightly grasped their weapons. 

Their palms were already slick with sweat. 

The drumming was from the Cult of the Heavenly Demon, so they could only feel terror. 

Meanwhile, Gwan Tae-ryang listened to the drumbs and turned his boat around. 

Shua, shua, shua. 

Bang, bang, bang.
That was because the drums signalled for Gwan Tae-ryang to return.

Of course, there was also another meaning. 

The Demonic Cult’s fleet began to move. 

Each of the large and medium-sized ships moved to the side, opening a channel down the middle.
In this gap, small vessels began to emerge. 

There were pieces of wood, thin like chopsticks; pieces of wood which were covered in white cloth. 

One side of the wooden sticks were iron points. 

“Oh no!”

One sect leader recognized what the weapon was and screamed. 

He then shouted at the others in a rush. 

“Disconnect the boats!”

“Pull out the planks and break the chains!”

It was an urgent cry.
But the Demonic Cult moved faster. 

***

As the drum sounds changed, a flurry of fiery arrows arced from the Demonic fleet. 

They were fire arrows, powered through oil. 

They drew parabolas in the air, burning the fog above Qinghai Lake. 

Some of them fell on boats carrying something. 

Fwoom—

The white cloth covering the contents of the boat were burned away, as the contents of the ship began to ignite. 

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It was straw. 

These flaming ships approached the Qinghai Alliance. 

“Stop them!”

“Those who can do handiwork, dive in and flip those ships upside down!”

At the end of the shout, several people had jumped in Qinghai Lake with a fwoosh. 

They then moved to clear the flaming boats.

But there were too many of them. 

In addition, the Qinghai Alliance were not the only ones with martial artists. 

According to Sang Gwan-chuk’s orders, there were already demonic practitioners waiting in the water.

Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr—

Bubbles rose rapidly as the demonic practitioners approached the martial artists trying to get to the flaming ships. 

And then…

“Knng!”

“Cough!”

Daggers and blades were stabbed into the backs of the men trying to approach.

They groaned and gagged, blood flowing from their mouths. 

The flames continued to spread. 

“Damn it, we should just burn them down too!” Yeon Seong cried out. 

“But we don’t have boats to sacrifice!”

As the man said, since they weren’t intending on fighting like this, the Qinghai Alliance had prepared neither fireproof ships nor a large amount of flammable material to fling. 

It was all because they did not think that the Cult of the Heavenly Demon would have their own boats. 

Damn it, cursed Yeon Seong.
He then took an arrow from a nearby soldier and dipped it into oil. 

“Shoot fire arrows!”

A flaming arrow was shot from his hands, flying towards the demonic practitioners. 

Fwoo—

Sha, sha, sha.

The flaming arrow arced through the air, then landed on the surface of the water.

The Cult of the Heavenly Demon was outside the range of an arrow. 

That was not the only bad news for Qinghai. 

Taeng.

Crack. 

One flaming ship successfully crashed into a Qinghai boat.

Fwoom!

The oil and fire struck the Qinghai boat all at once. 

Not only did it not break the chains connecting the ships to one another, the flames ignited the wooden planks, which had not been removed yet. 

The flames quickly spread from ship to ship.

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“Ahhhh!”

“It’s hot! ”

“Disconnect, move quickly! ”

Yeon Seong slashed at the chains with his sword.
However, the chains were so thick that he couldn’t cut them in one move. 

Clang, clang. 

After two swings, the chain snapped. 

If that was the case for a fairly high leveled martial artist in Qinghai, the other soldiers were doomed. 

“Uack, it’s hot!”

One soldier tried to remove the chain with his bare hands and screamed.
The flames around the chain cooked the palm of his hands. 

Meanwhile, the flames were still eating away at the rest of the Qinghai fleet. 

The flames were so great that the water around the fleet was starting to heat up. 

Nevertheless, many of the martial artists jumped into the water, finding that it was better than burning to death. 

But they did not know. 

There were demonic practitioners in the water. 

Puchi—

“Khh.”

“Agh—”

The practitioners protecting the flaming ships had not yet returned to the Demonic fleet.

Instead, they swam around, attacking anyone who leapt from the fire. 

It seemed that for the Qinghai Alliance, being on the boats meant death and jumping into the lake also meant death. 

This situation continued.
But there was good news for the Alliance, too. 

“I cut it off!”

“We’ve disconnected! ”

Thanks to the restless efforts of the soldiers aboard the ships, they had been able to cut off the ships caught in the fire. 

Of course, a few sacrifices were made in the process. 

“Get on a boat that’s not on fire! ”

The surviving martial artists scrambled and moved to a ship that was intact.

The number of remaining vessels was about a dozen, including one large and one medium. 

That was less than a quarter of the original fleet. 

They had survived, but there was another problem.

“What do we do now?” someone muttered to themselves. 

These words were met with silence. 

Dozens of boats had disappeared in the fire; the number of defenders had decreased a lot. 

But was that all? 

The Demonic fleet was still intact, with very little damage. 

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Additionally, while the Alliance had been cutting off the chains, the Demonic fleet had moved to surround them. 

If the Alliance was to fight in this situation, they would be defeated, both in number and in circumstance. 

“Ugh…”

One of the sect leaders heaved a sigh of mixed regret.
Was this the price they had to pay for burning all those small fisherman’s boats?

His gaze turned to Yeon Seong. 

They shouldn’t have trusted him from the start. 

They shouldn’t have yielded to his power or words. 

If he had objected to burning the fisherman’s boats…

“We might have been in a better situation.”

But it was always too late for regrets. 

While some of the sect leaders were filled with regret, Yeon Seong was bursting with fury.

 “What the hell are they doing? Qinghai is being trampled upon by the Demonic Cult.
You can say that we do not belong to Murim, but this is too much! Things would have been different if you helped!”

The worst things in the world are always the fault of others. 

Yeon Seong blamed someone else.

As a result, several of the sect leaders turned to him with looks of pity. 

It was only when faced with obstacles that a man’s true nature was revealed. 

An answer to Yeon Seong came. 

“Because the rest of the alliance is not faux Orthodox like you.”

It was a heavy voice, ringing in the heads of the Qinghai Alliance members. 

Everyone turned towards the voice. 

It came from someone of the Demonic Cult, standing on a ship’s deck. 

A man wearing a black dragon embroidered robe. 

The main warship.
Black Dragon Robe. 

There was no fool who could not guess the identity of the man after seeing both of those. 

Yeon Seong, of course, also recognized the symbols. 

“The Heavenly Demon!” Yeon Seong cried out in surprise.

The others swallowed saliva. 

As they said, it was Woon-seong who appeared on deck. 

He was younger than they expected, but they could not take him lightly. 

It was because they had heard what this young man had done in Qaidam Basin. 

The Heavenly Demon had dropped burning rocks from the sky, which fell like meteors upon Qaidam Basin. 

According to the rumors they heard, the Heavenly Demon was not human.

So instead of underestimating him, they chose to be afraid. 

The Qinghai Alliance felt their backs drenched with sweat.

On the contrary, Woon-seong’s gaze was filled with magnificence and dignity. 

Towards such a Woon-seong, one of the sect leaders had a question.