Chapter 601: Bird Trapped In A Cage (2)
However, that person quickly disappears among the trees, making it impossible to determine who they are.
'Who is that?'
For so reason, I start feeling an intense curiosity about them.
At that mont, Hong Fan strokes his beard and speaks in a very glad tone.
"Oooh...! Did Master see that just now? Just now...I believe I saw Lady Kim Yeon in that mountain valley! Haw haw! So she was in this world within the painting!"
"...!"
At those words, the three of us exchange glances.
Without hesitation, we all imdiately soar towards the mountain valley.
I use Glass True Fire, while Jeon Myeong-hoon and Kim Young-hoon rely on the powers of fire and voice transmission they have obtained.
Reaching the location where Kim Yeon was sighted, I search for her.
Just then.
"Agio, she's already moved all the way over there?"
Hong Fan looks into the distance and points sowhere.
At the spot he indicates, a woman clad in a light pink attire is walking in the distance.
"Ham Jin, Yu Hwi! Stay here for a mont!"
I leave Ham Jin and Yu Hwi behind and quickly begin pursuing her.
Only a single crow clings to my shoulder, following along.
Once again, we soar towards the mountain.
But in an instant, Kim Yeon disappears from the mountain, and Hong Fan finds her again in the next mountain.
We continue, frantically crossing valley after valley, chasing after Kim Yeon.
How many mountain valleys have we crossed like this?
"Hmm?"
I suddenly notice sothing strange about the scenery.
Kim Young-hoon and Jeon Myeong-hoon seem to have sensed it as well.
Little by little, we are delving into the depths of the mountain valley.
And the deeper we go, the more the surroundings begin to change.
The contours of the world start to take on an ancient appearance.
The outline of the mountains seems to overlap with sothing that looks like they've been painted over with ink, and the once three-dinsional world begins to flatten into a two-dinsional plane.
Kim Young-hoon, seemingly understanding the nature of this phenonon, widens his eyes.
It is the phenonon similar to when he once transcended dinsions through sheer speed!
"What is this? I'm flying at the speed of voice transmission...in other words, the speed of sound. But can sothing like this really happen at just this speed?"
"C-Could it be that we are regaining our abilities?"
Jeon Myeong-hoon looks at the doubtful Kim Young-hoon with eyes full of hope.
But Kim Young-hoon, looking startled, widens his eyes further.
"No. This isn't happening because we got faster."
"Huh? Then...?"
"Kim Yeon! Kim Yeon, who is leading us forward ahead of us... She is accelerating us!"
"What?"
Jeon Myeong-hoon furrows his brows in confusion.
But I can feel it.
Unlike the others, I still retain a portion of Glass True Fire and the Impermanence Sword.
'I can roughly feel it through the Impermanence Sword...'
Kim Yeon's will is binding us and dragging us along.
'Where are you taking us? How far are you leading us? Yeon-ah!'
The world gradually transforms into the form of a painting, and we find ourselves flying over an enormous drawing.
Then, all of a sudden!
We feel the 'paper' the painting is drawn on rippling.
'Yeon-ah...?'
Each ti Kim Yeon steps forward ahead of us in the distance, the force of her movent causes the paper to ripple.
That force, in a way, could be called attraction force.
Then, at the exact mont when the rippling of the paper reaches a certain threshold—
Paaaatt!
Kim Yeon pierces straight through one of the curved surfaces of the rippling paper.
"Eeoooot!"
"Wait! Let's go together!"
"..."
Shiiiiii!
The part she pierced through vanishes in an instant.
But the rippling remains, and for so reason, I feel like I understand how she broke through the painting.
"Everyone, gather the power of this world that you have trained!"
Jeon Myeong-hoon and Kim Young-hoon seem to understand imdiately, gathering fla and the power of sound into their hands.
I gather the power of soap bubbles.
And the mont the rippling surface of the painting blocks our path—
We unleash the power of this world just as Kim Yeon did.
Hwiiiiiiii!
The next mont.
The force we release disperses in the form of [ink].
The ink that forms this world.
That ink seeps into the surface of the painting, causing it to fade, and at a certain mont—
The painting lts away under the 'ink' we have released.
"It's now! Let's go!"
Hong Fan, using his imnse strength, pushes us into the lted opening while leaping in himself.
Flash!
With that, we arrive in a new world.
In other words, the reverse side of this Liberation Peach Garden Village.
"Heooook...! Heok...!"
"Huuuuuu..."
Jeon Myeong-hoon collapses onto the ground, gasping for breath, while Kim Young-hoon steadies his breathing.
I scan the surroundings.
"This place is..."
Laughably enough, this is the exact spot where we first departed from.
Nothing is different.
The only noticeable change is that everything in the world appears slightly 'hazy.'
But even that vanishes if I focus my mind, making wonder if there's simply sothing wrong with my vision.
Kim Yeon is nowhere to be seen.
"Hong Fan, did you see Kim Yeon?"
"Mm, Master. For now, you should look over there instead."
He points sowhere.
"...!"
Before we realize it, we are surrounded.
'I didn't sense them? Wait...these people!'
The figures encircling us in this hazy world all emit a presence similar to our own.
Like us, they possess the presence of those who have beco 'characters' in this world.
And beyond that presence, I can faintly sense...
Cosmic authority and overwhelming power.
That's right, these people are—
"...Junior Crystal Glass Being..."
Without a doubt, they are True Immortals trapped in this world.
"Greet the seniors."
"...Welco to the back side of the painting. In this world, the front of the painting, Liberation Supre Deity Bong Myeong's Immortal Art, 'Liberation Peach Garden Village', can be freely observed. Here, if we use the power we gained from Liberation Peach Garden Village, we can even influence it to so extent... We have been watching you all this ti."
A True Immortal wrapped in bandages all over their body looks at with dead eyes and greets with a forced smile.
"I am Maek Jin, a Great Net Immortal affiliated with Radiance Hall. Forrly one of the Thirty-Three Heavenly Resplendent Treasure Immortals...and once a candidate for Radiance Hall's Envoy of the Final Age of Dharma."
I do not know exactly what an Envoy of the Final Age of Dharma is, but considering that the Purple Gold Heavenly Lord Heuk Am's title in Radiance Hall was the Fallen Guiding Envoy of the Final Age of Dharma, it seems that Maek Jin was at least a candidate for an Immortal Lord.
"You must be a distinguished one."
"...Not since I got trapped here."
They let out a faint chuckle with a gloomy expression.
Looking at their face, I ask,
"...May I ask why such a promising figure like yourself is trapped in this world?"
"You seem to have already guessed judging by your eyes... Do I really need to say it myself? Kukuk..."
But Maek Jin eventually explains kindly despite their gloomy expression.
"When Bong Myeong was still a Heavenly Lord...I had a brief encounter with Them. At the ti, a monster known as the Vast Cold Heavenly Lord was attempting to annihilate Radiance Hall, and I was in the midst of fleeing. That bastard made an offer—to hide within their Peach Garden Painting for about a hundred years... Needing those hundred years, I hurriedly stepped inside to take refuge, and to avoid being discovered by the Vast Cold Heavenly Lord, I took on the 'role' assigned by this world..."
"..."
As their words continue, not only my face but also those of Jeon Myeong-hoon and Kim Young-hoon harden.
"And on the day the hundred years were up, I asked Bong Myeong. To let out! But..."
Their hands tremble violently.
"No answer ever ca... On top of that...everything I accumulated as a Great Net Immortal...my Immortal Arts...prophecies...the power of my Immortal Treasures... Huhuhu...I could not use any of it."
Maek Jin stares at with eyes full of despair.
"I was reduced to nothing more than a re spirit wandering this world! And in that ti, I discovered and entered this 'back side.' Hahaha! It has been 500,000 years since I ca here!!! 500,000 years have passed!! No matter what I did, I could never regain my authority! Ahhh, and a couple tens of thousands of years ago, I heard from so newcors who arrived. Bong Myeong...has beco a Supre Deity?"
Drip...
They shed tears of blood.
Seeing those blood tears, I feel my sinking feeling in my chest.
That...
That is not my story.
'I see...'
But now, we...
"That was the mont I understood...I will never be freed from this place... We have beco eternal characters in this painting..."
Their body tremble.
I, too, tremble.
We have beco trapped in this world.
I had suspected it ever since I realized neither attraction force, prophecy, nor revision could be used.
Even since Kim Young-hoon's Brahma Nature, the pure 'enlightennt' he accumulated beca restricted, it beca clear.
This world operates under entirely different rules from the outside.
We are rely being gradually consud by this world as we conform to those rules.
Far more terrifying and powerful than even the creation of a Small Heavenly Domain once displayed by the Thirty-Three Heavenly Resplendent Treasure Immortals—that is the Immortal Art of Bong Myeong.
Uguguguk...
I try to exert attraction force.
Just like before, I try to crush and burst the world with my will.
It is impossible.
The world, which once seed like it would squish and burst so easily...
Has now beco an unbreakable prison.
I understand why it has beco so solid.
Karma.
In this world, I have accumulated the karma of a human soap rchant.
Over a hundred years, that karma has gradually solidified and thickened, eventually trapping .
The sa goes for Jeon Myeong-hoon and Kim Young-hoon.
Kim Young-hoon can't draw forth the enlightennt of the Brahma Nature and martial arts that he once realized because of the sa reason.
This prison—
Was built by our own hands.
Because we created it with our own hands, we even lost the power we accumulated.
As we realize this and sink into despair, Maek Jin speaks while watching us.
"At so point...didn't you notice that the Immortal Treasures and subordinates you brought here...simply turned into fools that fit this world's 'perception'...? The crow that's attached to you. That was probably your Immortal Treasure, right? Didn't that crow stop speaking at so point...?"
"..."
Indeed. At so point, Yeo Hwi beca nothing more than a foolish, lust-driven crow that could only caw.
Unlike an ordinary crow, she has no lifespan limit, but she is now just a crow that can neither speak nor use spells.
The sa goes for Golden Shaking Bird.
Golden Shaking Bird turned into nothing more than a hummingbird that likes to perch on Jeon Myeong-hoon's shoulder.
Ham Jin and Yu Hwi are no different.
At so point, they simply beco servants following around.
They can't recall their past mories.
That's right.
Not just , but every being that enters this world eventually becos characters of this world and taxidermized.
"We...within this painting...within this story...taxidermized ourselves with our own hands!!!"
This is...
A true Supre Deity-level Immortal Art.
The power of the Liberation Supre Deity Bong Myeong.
"We are..."
Liberation Peach Garden Village.
"Nothing more...than birds trapped in Bong Myeong's cage."
Only then do I deeply realize from whom the Mad Lord's One-Pattern Law Talent originated from.
Just as the Mad Lord made countless beings live together within his [Wonderfully Mysterious Fortress]...
Bong Myeong has made countless True Immortals live within Their [Liberation Peach Garden Village].
'I thought They felt familiar from the start...and trusted too much.'
The Liberation Supre Deity Bong Myeong is a madman with an abyss far deeper than even the Mad Lord.
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