Read Novel Full Chapter 1196: How On Earth Did You Endure This? (1)
Chapter 1196: How On Earth Did You Endure This? (1)
“How is it?”
“I know that’s unlikely... but there’s no problem, right?”
“Is he all right?”
Tang Soso turned her sullen face. Her gaze landed on Chung Myung, who was lying on a futon, groaning in pain.
“Uh... well...”
She hesitated slightly, squeezed her eyes shut, and said.
“It’s anger sickness.”
“Anger sickness?”
“Yes, anger sickness.”
Yoon Jong blinked.
“So... uh... you mean...”
Glancing at the ailing Chung Myung, he asked awkwardly.
“Is there really such a thing as anger sickness?”
“There is. You’ve probably heard many stories of someone suffering a great trauma, wasting away, and dying.”
“...I’ve heard of that.”
“That’s anger sickness.”
Yoon Jong turned his head back to look at the lying image of Chung Myung. Sitting carefully beside the groaning man, Hae Yeon gently wetted a towel and pressed it to his forehead with tender hands.
From him being extremely careful in caring for the patient, one could tell how kind-hearted a nun Hae Yeon was.
There was, however, one minor issue...
“Maha Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra, Kuan-Yin Bodhisattva, practicing the Prajnaparamita...”
“Monk! Don’t chant sutras while caring for the patient!”
“It sounds like you’re laying out a corpse!”
“No chants! No chants!”
When the Five Swords shouted, Jo Gul, who had stepped up beside Hae Yeon intending to chant the sutras with him, flinched and slunk back. Yoon Jong clicked his tongue at Jo Gul and looked at Tang Soso.
“But anger sickness—what the hell is that...”
“It’s unusual, for sure.”
Tang Soso pursed her lips.
“Usually this sickness hits the faint-hearted or old folks full of pent-up anger, but that fellow...”
“Doesn’t fall into that category.”
“Not just one bit. That’s not a disease he should get.”
“Of all the people I know, Chung Myung is the least someone you’d call faint-hearted, sahyung.”
“Right?”
Yoon Jong clicked his tongue repeatedly as he looked at the writhing Chung Myung.
“Even if he caught anger sickness, to see a murim warrior collapse and writhe like that...”
“Ah, no, sahyung. It’s not something to say like that.”
“Huh? Why?”
Jo Gul said with a slightly pale face.
“Come to think of it, isn’t this really serious? That bastard didn’t make a sound even when he was soaked in blood at the Northern Ice Sea.”
“If that kind of man is clutching his head and lying like that, he’s really in pain.”
“...There’s sense to that.”
After hearing that, the ailing Chung Myung even looked a bit pitiful... well, actually not really pitiful... anyway!
“How much rage must have built up in him...”
“Indeed...”
The moment that was said, their gazes naturally turned to one place.
Baek Cheon, slumped against the wall, had the face of someone who’d lost everything, his head turned to the side. He even looked a little drained of color...
Feeling their gaze, Baek Cheon slowly opened his dry, cracked lips.
“I...”
A dying voice slipped through his trembling lips.
“That I rose to the position of Acting Sect leader...”
“...is something worthy of collapsing and moaning like that?”
“...”
“Huh?”
Well, who knows, sasuk. Who could say.
“So what I’m saying is... for that fellow, me becoming the Acting Sect leader is more infuriating than Jang Ilso being ready for sabotage... the Demonic Cult rising again... Southern Edge running rampant or Shaolin dancing a victory jig?”
“...Is it really like that?”
“I should die, I should... what riches or glory am I to enjoy...”
Baek Cheon began to wither away before their eyes. Yoon Jong, looking back and forth between the blank-stared Baek [N O V E L I G H T] Cheon and the ailing Chung Myung, let out a heavy sigh.
This must be what they mean by a no-win fight.
“I’ve lived to see a warrior get anger sickness. That bastard’s something else.”
“I wouldn’t say that’s wrong.”
“Ah! You scared me!”
“Speak up when you appear, monk!”
Hae Yeon had moved up, leaving Chung Myung tossed aside, and shoved his shiny shaved head forward. When everyone jumped, he looked a bit embarrassed and said.
“...Amitabha, sorry. You were saying something interesting.”
“But you said that’s wrong?”
Hae Yeon nodded and continued.
“It’s not strange for a murim warrior to get anger sickness. In truth, by another name, murim people are the ones most prone to it in the world.”
“Eh? I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a murim warrior dying of anger sickness.”
“Change the phrase a bit and you’ll hear it often. In the Jianghu there’s a term for when accumulated anger harms the body, isn’t there?”
“Huh? O-oh, do you mean Heart Demon?”
“Yes.”
Hae Yeon smiled faintly.
“And Turning Into Demon, broadly speaking, can be the same phenomenon. It’s not rare for a mental shock to bring someone into the process of Turning into Demon.”
“I see.”
“So if you think about it, none are as prone to anger sickness as the murim people. Those living in the secular world don’t guard against anger sickness the way us murim folk watch for Heart Demon or Turning Into Demon.”
“...Come to think of it, that’s true.”
“Aren’t murim people, when you come down to it, the weakest?”
“They’re the kind most likely to get anger sickness.”
After all, the murim folk don’t care about civil affairs; if things go wrong, they draw their blades first. They are the sort who would crash in rather than resolve matters with words or petition the magistrate.
So they’re precisely the type to develop anger sickness.
Especially that one — among murim folk he’s notorious for being quick-tempered and vile. Looking back, it’s more surprising he hasn’t already fallen into Heart Demon...
“Wait a moment. Are you saying Chung Myung is now in Heart Demon?”
“Because the sasuk became the Sect leader, he went into Heart Demon?”
“Is he even human?”
As Baek Cheon’s color faded further, Tang Soso cut in.
“No. That’s just anger sickness.”
“...”
“Not Heart Demon or Turning Into Demon—pure anger sickness. If it were possession or Heart Demon, I’d know.”
“True.”
“Right. Soso wouldn’t not know.”
“It has nothing to do with martial arts. Actually, most people might have succumbed to Turning Into Demon, but sahyung’s constitution and martial base are so steady he may have resisted. In any case, it comes down to him losing his temper and collapsing on the spot.”
“...Is that something to be relieved about?”
“Is it relief?”
Yoon Jong smiled contentedly and looked at Chung Myung, clutching his head as he lay.
“I’m reminded of the saying ‘Renew yourself daily, renew yourself daily and renew yourself daily.’”
“Isn’t that a good saying?”
“It’s a good saying. I already know that fellow’s temper is excessively vile, but the more I see him day by day becoming newly more vile, how could that not be a good thing?”
“Just curse him out plainly.”
“That madman.”
At that moment, Yu Yiseol entered, glanced around, spotted the slumped Baek Cheon, and poked him with his finger.
“Sahyung.”
“Sahyung.”
“Uh, uh-huh?”
Baek Cheon, barely holding onto the tail end of his fading consciousness, lifted his head and looked at Yu Yiseol.
“Sect Leaders. Everyone’s gathered. We must go.”
“Sect leaders... the meeting, we must go. Yes. We must go...”
Baek Cheon, drained of color, wobbled like a slug as he got to his feet.
“We must go. I’m the Acting Sect leader... I can’t be late, even if I’m young. Don’t worry. I’ll go now.”
Tang Soso watched Baek Cheon move off with a start, then suddenly had a thought.
“Jo Gul sahyung.”
“Hm?”
“Let the next Sect leader simply be you, sahyung.”
“...What nonsense all of a sudden.”
“The good seat should be yours, sahyung.”
Just as Jo Gul, feeling an inexplicable unease, began to protest, it happened.
“H-hey, where? Where are you going?”
Chung Myung, who had been lying there groaning, suddenly sat bolt upright, his eyes glaring wildly.
“Sect leaders? Meeting?”
“...Why’s he like that again?”
“Soso, do you have any sleeping poison? One dose and he’d sleep for a month.”
“I have sleeping poison, but...”
“Give it. I have some use for it.”
“If misused, it’ll kill him.”
“That might be better. Think about it.”
Chung Myung kicked the blanket off his body, sprang to his feet, then staggered as if dizzy.
“I, I...”
“What’s wrong with you, brat!”
As everyone tried to stop him and asked, Chung Myung rolled his eyes.
“I’m... I’m going too!”
“No, you’re not even well...”
“No, I can’t! Who knows what that man will do! It’s Mount Hua I resurrected! I can’t let him ruin it!”
“Chung Myung... it’s the sasuk.”
“Right. I can’t let that sasuk bastard ruin things.”
No matter how you look at it, Mount Hua is you ruining it right now, Chung Myung. At this rate, you’re just going to make a bigger mess.
“I-I have to go...”
As he tried to move, Chung Myung grabbed the back of his head and staggered.
“Ugh... the back of my head...”
“He’s going to collapse.”
“Shouldn’t someone support him?”
“I know we should, but honestly I don’t want to touch him.”
“Me neither.”
The people around recoiled, but nothing like that reached Chung Myung’s eyes now.
“I, I will protect Mount Hua... Mount Hua...”
The Five Swords all sighed in unison as they watched Baek Cheon lumber out like a zombie and Chung Myung follow like a patient.
What a sect... running just fine.
“First of all...”
Tang Gunak cleared his throat and began to speak.
If Hyun Jong had been here as before, Tang Gunak wouldn’t need to say this, but Hyun Jong was not attending—perhaps to lend support to Baek Cheon.
So, acting as the de facto sect leader of the Heavenly Friends Alliance, he needed to organize the situation and speak.
“It’s something you all know, so it’s redundant to repeat, but Taoist Baek Cheon has been appointed as Acting Sect leader of Mount Hua.”
“Yes, family lord.”
“In that position there was so much chaos it passed awkwardly, but originally it’s something everyone should congratulate him for.”
Those gathered all nodded.
“Yes, well... with fresh young blood joining the core of the Heavenly Friends Alliance, we should offer congratulations for the future Baek Cheon as acting Sect leader will forge for Mount Hua and the Alliance... though, well...”
Tang Gunak, looking somewhat deflated, glanced at Baek Cheon and Chung Myung seated before him.
“...Acting Sect leader.”
“Yes?”
“...Why do you look like that?”
“...”
“Did you run into the Demonic Cult in that short time?”
Baek Cheon spoke sadly with his half-faded face.
“I’m... fine, so please don’t worry.”
Baek Cheon croaked like a sick chicken, but Chung Myung was in a worse state—alternating between brooding, raging, and being a mess, as if he’d lost his mind. He seemed to waver with every breath.
‘Alliance leader...’
Tang Gunak squeezed his eyes shut with a strange feeling of dread.
‘How on earth did you endure this?’
A terrible stomach-ache of responsibility that anyone handling Mount Hua must endure descended on Tang Gunak in that moment.