Absolute Regression

Chapter 474: If You’re Short on Money, Take This Too

Once again, the reactions split in half.

The larger group—by a wide margin—reacted as if they were dealing with a lunatic. The sheer sense of absolute relief that came with the number ninety-nine brought sneers to their faces.

Some, however, felt tense.

A single worry rose in their minds.

What if he wasn’t insane?

If that assumption turned out to be true, then those words—“let’s reduce the number of mouths”—were no different than the Grim Reaper opening the Book of the Dead.

Among those who worried was also Yeom Je. He stared at Geom Mugeuk as though trying to pierce through him, desperate to gauge the hidden depth of his power—but he could reach no conclusion.

He looked too young—far too young. No matter how hard one tried to see it, he didn’t look like a true master. And yet, he was saying this, in this situation.

“You must have grown fond of them, since you’ve spent so much time together, Gang Leader. So let me handle it for you. Which mouth should I deal with first? Honestly, they all look disposable to me.”

The Immortals all frowned at once. There was no shortage of those who wanted to charge in and kill this insolent bastard on the spot.

For Yeom Je, this was a first. No expert in the world had ever spoken such madness in their presence. When they were all gathered like this, even the Martial Alliance would hesitate to act rashly.

‘Could it be... that’s his plan? Pretending to be a master by saying such absurd things?’

He wouldn’t have even entertained the thought—if not for how confusing this person was the more he saw of him.

‘Fine, let’s start with his skills first.’

Before the guy could make a move, they’d strike first.

Yeom Je smiled leisurely and said,

“Those mouths might be tough to shut, considering how persistent they are.”

At Yeom Je’s signal, nine people stepped forward—from the ninety-first to the ninety-eighth line. It wasn’t too late to properly assess the opponent’s strength before deciding what to do next.

They surrounded Geom Mugeuk.

After briefly scanning them, Geom Mugeuk said,

“Are these the youngest?”

He asked as if speculating, but he had already gauged their strength with pinpoint accuracy. Judging by their aura, they were weaker than the others.

Among so many people, Geom Mugeuk was able to pinpoint their abilities with just a glance. But that wasn’t all.

“Doesn’t seem like they’ve ever fought together before.”

Again, he was spot-on. They’d never had the chance to engage in a joint assault. Most of the time, they simply swarmed in for revenge and carried out one-sided massacres. Even that had become rare lately. ℞ãɴÖ₿ЁŞ

‘Trying to see how strong I am?’

Of course, Geom Mugeuk wasn’t the type to dance to their tune.

Letting his sword hang loosely, Geom Mugeuk appeared to start walking slowly toward the one standing at the front.

Fwhoooosh.

He suddenly twisted to the right and charged in. The movement was so fast and so unexpected that the one to his right had his throat slashed before he could even think to swing his sword.

Puaaaak!

As blood sprayed in all directions, Geom Mugeuk was already rushing toward another Immortal. The opponent instinctively thrust their sword forward.

The two swords sliced through empty air. Because he had thoroughly concealed his true abilities, Geom Mugeuk’s sword came ahead by just half a step.

Puk!

That was why, when he killed the second Immortal, sighs echoed from all around. The regret came from the belief that had the other been just a bit faster, they might have won.

The sword that pierced the second opponent’s heart spun wide and flew toward another one rushing in from the opposite side.

Paat!

The blood on Geom Mugeuk’s blade flew through the air and splashed into the Immortal’s eye. Whether it was intentional or accidental, no one could tell—but the man closed his eyes reflexively. And those eyes never opened again. Again, sighs erupted from every direction. Of all things, blood in the eyes?

By the time he cut down the third man, a sneak attack came from behind.

The one who launched it was confident in success, but the strike barely missed.

It had come so close that the thought, "Just one more time," rose in his mind. But no second chance was given.

His blood sprayed violently in every direction, obscuring the remaining Immortals’ vision.

Could it be—was he spraying blood like this on purpose to block their sight? No, surely not… right?

That’s the kind of thoughts the onlookers found creeping in. That’s how much blood was spraying like a fountain. Geom Mugeuk’s fighting wasn’t graceful. It was wild and savage. A battle saturated with the scent of blood.

Of course, there was a reason Geom Mugeuk fought this way.

The battle was razor-thin. If they had been just a little faster. If they had attacked from a slightly different angle.

Those regrets remained as the rest of the Immortals fell one after another. Sighs of disappointment continued to spill out, and when the ninth sigh ended, they were all collapsed as corpses.

The smell of their blood filled the entire hall.

The silence in the hall was naturally heavier than when the ninety-ninth line died earlier. No one had expected that nine masters would die without leaving even a scratch on their opponent.

And yet, it wasn’t awe they felt toward Geom Mugeuk.

Rather, most of the onlookers thought, “What a lucky bastard.”

To their eyes, it had been a series of near-losses that somehow ended in victory.

On top of that, Geom Mugeuk’s swordsmanship seemed far too ordinary.

‘That’s how you defend, and that’s how you attack.’

It was the kind of fight that would be perfect to show to beginners just starting to learn martial arts. You could draw it out exactly as it was and publish it as a training manual.

Of course, through Yeom Je’s eyes, the fight looked different.

‘It looked like he fought wildly on instinct...’

The nine subordinates had not managed to coordinate a proper joint attack even once.

If just two or three of them had struck at the same time, they might have taken control of the fight more easily. Surely, they had tried to coordinate—but their opponent’s movements never gave them the chance. In the end, they were taken down one by one.

‘What if this wasn’t luck? What if this seemingly reckless and lucky battle was, in fact, completely calculated?’

Yeom Je knew well. How difficult it was to kill like this using only fundamentals. It was far harder than using flashy techniques.

‘This bastard... he’s hiding something.’

After shaking the blood off his sword, Geom Mugeuk looked at Yeom Je and said,

“Now that I’ve helped reduce your mouths, how about you repay the debt?”

Yeom Je said nothing.

‘Where in the world did they find someone like this and send him here?’

Geom Mugeuk saw the unmistakable greed etched on Yeom Je’s face.

Through prior investigation, Geom Mugeuk already knew what kind of man Yeom Je was. He valued money more than his subordinates.

If forced to hand over all his profits, he would rather offer his life.

That’s why, to open Yeom Je’s vault, one must never rush.

He could wipe them all out in a single sweep, but instead, he needed to escalate the atmosphere—slowly building tension through bloodshed to gradually wear down his will. Because today’s goal wasn’t to kill them—it was to collect the debt.

“Killing off a few errand boys and now you’re feeling mighty proud, aren’t you?”

Of course, they weren’t just errand boys, but Yeom Je tried to puff up his authority while suppressing the unease he couldn’t quite name.

‘Who should I send?’

Should he just deploy the Ten Immortals and cut off this threat at the root? He was still weighing his options when—

Geom Mugeuk did something completely unexpected.

“Just passing through for a moment.”

He suddenly began walking toward the Immortals standing on the right.

At his sudden movement, the Immortals on that side unsheathed their swords and stepped back. As they moved left and right, a natural path formed between them.

Though the Immortals on both sides stared with fierce killing intent, Geom Mugeuk passed through them with a face completely devoid of fear.

His natural stride left openings. They debated whether or not to strike—but the gaps were so blatant that none dared to act. It seemed too obvious, almost as if he were baiting them.

But one Immortal couldn’t resist. He had already calculated that with this single strike, his rank would jump ten tiers.

Shwik.

It was clearly a perfect ambush by anyone’s standards—

Puuuk.

Geom Mugeuk twisted his body to evade and thrust his sword.

Once again, he narrowly dodged the attack and succeeded in a barely-timed counter.

Even in that moment, a few Immortals flinched. They were consumed by the desire to strike at the opportunity, but the man who had just died was from the Forty-Fifth Line. One of the mid-level elites here had failed to land a sneak attack.

Whether it was someone from the Ninety-Eighth Line or the Forty-Fifth, the results were equally close.

And yet, from such results, one should draw wise conclusions—but Geom Mugeuk allowed no room for such reflection.

“Is this painting genuine?”

Holding a sword dripping with blood, he walked over to a painting hanging on the back wall.

Yeom Je asked with a puzzled look,

“Why do you ask?”

“If the Gang Leader is short on money, I figured I might try to take this too.”

Yeom Je’s expression hardened. The other was blatantly mocking him. And in front of his subordinates, he had a certain dignity to uphold.

But even so, the unease this young opponent instilled in him still loomed larger.

“Do I look like the kind of man who’d hang a fake in a place where people come and go?”

Pride, in a place reeking with the blood of his subordinates? Geom Mugeuk felt a strange sense of dissonance.

But he was the only one who found it odd.

On the contrary, none of the subordinates showed any discomfort at those words. For them, pride and money were more important than their fellow comrades.

Geom Mugeuk began to remove the frame from the wall.

Was he seriously taking the painting? Just as Yeom Je’s expression stiffened at the sight—

Shiiiiik!

An Immortal nearby seized the chance and launched a sneak attack. It happened right as Geom Mugeuk lifted the painting. And once he held it in his right hand, the man couldn’t restrain himself any longer. But in the end, he should have.

Puhk!

The sword narrowly missed, and Geom Mugeuk’s left fist struck the attacker’s jaw as he turned.

A blow like that—if it had been the Thirty-Ninth Line—should’ve been bearable. But the man dropped dead on the spot. It didn’t even look like that impressive of a martial art.

Yeom Je’s eyes weren’t on his dead subordinate, but on the painting. He was falling into a curious line of thought.

‘Why insist on taking the painting now? If he really wanted it, he could’ve just taken it later.’

Geom Mugeuk placed the frame on a table stacked with debt slips. As if to say, everything here is mine now.

“What exactly are you doing?”

To that, Geom Mugeuk calmly replied,

“Thanks to how you people chose to live your lives, I don’t have many options left. So don’t blame me.”

The Immortals stood staring at Geom Mugeuk with expressions that asked, What nonsense is he spouting now?

In that moment, a foreboding thought surfaced in Yeom Je’s mind.

‘No way… could it be?’

And right then—

Shiiiiiiik!

Yeom Je saw a single line.

Not only he—everyone saw it. A clean, straight line that had been drawn crisply and then vanished.

The line appeared to Geom Mugeuk’s right. The very side he had walked toward to take down the painting.

The line passed through the Immortals who had been standing there. It went through those in the first row, the second, and the third—all of them.

Immediately after, they saw Geom Mugeuk with his sword extended toward them.

Only then did they realize.

That line they had just seen—it had been a sword line formed by Geom Mugeuk’s blade.

‘Could sword qi really fly like a single, perfect stroke of a line?’

It wasn’t a streak of light, nor did it leave afterimages.

It was a single, razor-straight line, as if drawn with a ruler.

They had never seen such clean sword qi in their entire lives.

Silence fell upon the hall.

Clack.

Geom Mugeuk’s Black Demon Sword slid into its sheath.

Shrrrrrkk.

Then, the bodies of the Immortals on the right began to shift.

Their forms split apart, and in unison, they all spewed blood and collapsed on the spot, cleaved clean through.

“Aaaaaaahhh!”

One Immortal watching from the front screamed. No matter how seasoned a master, the sight of over twenty men being sliced in half in a single strike was both shocking and terrifying.

And now they understood—why he had taken down the painting earlier. The sword qi that had severed the Immortals had also left a long line carved across the back wall.

Yeom Je’s eyes widened.

He had faced countless dangers in the martial world, but had he ever been this shocked?

He had known Geom Mugeuk was hiding something—but never imagined that “something” would kill over twenty of his subordinates in a single move.

The other Immortals felt the same. Now, there was not a single sneer left among them.

The thick stench of blood filled the Grand Hall like rising steam.

“He must’ve used up all his internal energy! There’s no way he has any left!”

It was a line that would never have been uttered had anyone truly seen Geom Mugeuk’s dantian, but at Yeom Je’s shout, the Immortals drew their swords all at once.

They all revealed their killing intent, but Geom Mugeuk showed not a hint of fear.

“I told you not to draw your swords. Just pay the debt.”

Even after thirty subordinates had been slain, no offer of payment came from Yeom Je’s mouth. Not even all these lives had scratched the surface of the three million nyang owed.

“Looks like I’ll have to reduce the mouths even further.”

This time, Geom Mugeuk turned to the left and muttered softly to the Immortals standing there.

“Fortunately, there’s no painting on this wall.”