Absolute Regression

Before going to meet the Evil Smiling Demon, I stopped by the residence of the Blood Heaven Blade Demon. I had something to confirm with him.

Gu Cheonpa was sitting by the window, reading a book under the warm sunlight.

“You really do read books often.”

“It’s just for show. When I hear your footsteps from afar, I rush to the bookshelf.”

He put the book down and asked,

“What brings you here?”

I stood outside the window and spoke to him without going inside.

“I came to ask you about someone.”

“Who?”

For a moment, I sensed the Blade Demon flinch.

“Why are you asking about him?”

“I’m thinking of bringing him to our side.”

The Blood Heaven Blade Demon’s expression slightly twisted.

“Damn it. You gossip like a nosy woman.”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t play dumb.”

With his sharp intuition, the Blood Heaven Blade Demon realized that the One-Slash Sword Supreme had told me about it. Since he wasn’t the type to spread this around, I spoke comfortably.

“The person who told me about persuading her was not me, but you, elder. For your sake.”

“It’s not for my sake. It’s because of my moral scruples.”

“Why do you two fight so much when you know each other so well?”

“Does anyone fight with strangers? We fight because we know each other so well.”

Unable to refute his words, I chuckled.

“So, what do you want to ask?”

“How did you persuade the Evil Smiling Demon?”

The reason I met with Gu Cheonpa today was to ask that.

Then an astonishing fact was revealed.

“He came to me first.”

“The Evil Smiling Demon approached you first?”

“Yeah. Why would I go to that unpleasant guy and ask for a favor?”

“Senior Sword Supreme was wrong then.”

“What did she say?”

“She said you persuaded him because you’re both villains.”

“What? She lumped me together with that guy?”

The Blood Heaven Blade Demon jumped up, visibly upset.

Although it felt like tattling, this was also part of my effort to reconcile the two of them.

I needed to keep mentioning each other like this. To remind them they hadn’t forgotten, that they still hated each other. Only then, when the right moment came, all these pieces would come together, leading to reconciliation. Reconciliation never happens overnight.

“What conditions did he set?”

“He said he’d endorse Cheong Seon and asked for help when he needed it later.”

“Did you accept knowing what he might ask for later?”

“He’ll ask for something for his benefit. If he asks for something ridiculous, I won’t do it.”

“Why didn’t you at least take credit? You could have said, ‘I have a debt to repay because of you. What will you do about it?’ Why did you just stay silent?”

“What’s there to take credit for!”

The Blood Heaven Blade Demon I first met was truly a calculating and meticulous person. He seemed like the type who would take all the credit and collect all the debts.

But once I opened the door to his heart, there was another Blood Heaven Blade Demon inside. One who threw things like credit into a corner and enjoyed reading books under the sunlight.

“Elder, taking credit and such is necessary for the other party to understand.”

“It’s not necessary. And it didn’t seem like the Evil Smiling Demon helped with this to ask for something from me later. Him, asking me for anything?”

Gu Cheonpa looked at me with an expression that said, ‘Even you don’t think that, do you?’

If that intuition was correct, why did he help us?

“Anyway, thank you. I’m off to meet the Evil Smiling Demon.”

As I bid farewell, old man Blade eagerly reopened his book.

“I’m going to meet the Evil Smiling Demon, and you’re not worried?”

“About whom? You? Or the Evil Smiling Demon?”

I turned away with a smile.

After leaving the Blood Heaven Blade Demon’s residence, I headed towards the Valley of Villains located in the northeast of the Inner Sanctuary.

The Valley of Villains was, as its name suggested, a valley.

Not a natural one, but an artificially made valley, with residences of various sizes for the Faceless Swordsmen lined up along the stream.

Although it seemed like they were built randomly, it was a kind of fortress, meticulously planned according to the skills and status of the Faceless Swordsmen, and also to prepare for external invasions.

When I announced at the entrance of the valley that I was there to see the Evil Smiling Demon, a Faceless Swordsman wearing a white mask guided me.

The subordinates of the Evil Smiling Demon were called Faceless Swordsmen. They all wore masks, white masks with only eye holes.

The eye holes were shaped like a smiling crescent moon. Though the eye holes looked like they were smiling, the real eyes behind them weren’t, making the masks seem even more eerie.

The residence of the Evil Smiling Demon was at the deepest part of the valley. The building was modeled after the white masks. The only windows were where the eyes would be, likely marking the Evil Smiling Demon’s quarters.

I walked in, feeling like I was being swallowed by the Evil Smiling Demon, through an entrance that wasn’t depicted on the mask.

As I ascended the spiraling staircase, I reached the Evil Smiling Demon’s room.

The moment I entered his room, I felt a chilling sensation.

The walls and floor were all painted white, and there was nothing in the room. No table, no cabinet, not even a chair or a cushion. 1

In this completely empty space, only the Evil Smiling Demon stood.

Facing the wall, he wore white robes. If it weren’t for the black hair visible at the back of his head, I might not have even noticed him standing there, so perfectly did he blend into the space.

Even though I had entered, he continued to stare at the wall, so I slowly walked over and stood beside him.

“What are you looking at?” 2

The Evil Smiling Demon turned his head towards me. He wore a white mask like the Faceless Swordsmen, and through the smiling eye holes, his gaze was clear and cold.

The specially made mask of the Evil Smiling Demon was designed so that his eyes couldn’t be seen from the outside. However, my New Eye Technique allowed me to see his eyes clearly through the darkness.

At last, the Evil Smiling Demon spoke.

“I wasn’t looking at anything.”

His deep, resonant voice was pleasing to the ear, and his tall stature with long limbs gave the impression of an elegant figure. Contrary to his name, he was polite.

Polite to the point of being eerie—this was the kind of impression he gave.

“It’s been a long time, Elder.”

In fact, it could be said that this was our first time meeting in both lives. Aside from seeing him from a distance at formal events, this was after all our first personal encounter.

“Elder? I’m still young, so please feel free to treat me like a friend.”

“How many people have left this world, deceived by those words?”

The Evil Smiling Demon laughed. As his name suggested, he was someone who laughed often.

“What about you, Second Young Master? Do you usually get deceived, or do you deceive others?”

“If I had to choose, I’d say I pretend to be deceived.”

The Evil Smiling Demon habitually laughed.

“Isn’t it hard to always smile like that?”

For a moment, his eyes, visible through the wide eye holes, glimmered.

“Why would smiling be difficult?”

“I thought smiling might be harder than crying. It’s easy to live while crying, but living while smiling is tough, isn’t it?” 3

“Finally, someone who understands my hardship has appeared.”

Even as he said that, he laughed again. This time, it was a loud and exaggerated laugh, like that of a street performer.

I did not trust his laughter.

That laugh was like the tentacles on the head of a fish that lived in the deep sea. If you got mesmerized by the waving, colorful tentacles, you’d soon find yourself being sucked into a large mouth.

Never forget. He isn’t smiling because he likes you.

“Second Young Master, why have you come to see me?”

I couldn’t reveal that the One-Slash Sword Supreme had broken the rules and told me about the voting results.

“We’ve never had a chance to talk like this before, have we? So, I came to learn about you. To be honest, I came hoping you would support me instead of my brother.”

“Shall we take a walk?”

The Evil Smiling Demon slowly began to walk along the white wall.

“When I need to organize my thoughts, I walk like this.”

I followed him. The string of his mask dangled from the back of his head. No one in the martial world could untie that knot, even though a child could easily pull it.

As he walked, he spoke.

“If you answer one question, I will consider supporting you.”

“Please ask.”

“How did you kill the Soul Reaper Demon Supreme?”

He asked this critical question casually, and I answered just as calmly while following him.

“I didn’t kill the Soul Reaper Demon Supreme.”

“No. You definitely killed him. I’m not asking whether you did or not. I’m asking how you did it.”

He was certain that I had killed him.

“Second Young Master, I will keep this a secret from everyone else. Just tell me. I will give you another vote, just like I did for Cheong Seon.”

“I repeat, I didn’t kill him.”

Then the Evil Smiling Demon suddenly stopped and walked back towards me. He reached out his hand.

“Let’s be friends.”

I knew well that he was prone to such sudden actions.

And this was the second time I heard these words from him.

When I returned to the Divine Cult to find the Secret Demonic Soul, I had a connection with the Evil Smiling Demon. At that time, he had said the exact same thing to me.

“No.”

“Why not?”

Everyone who became friends with him had died. Except for one person.

“There are three reasons why we can’t be friends.”

“Oh, you have three reasons?”

He showed an active interest.

“What’s the first reason?”

“If we act like friends, one day I’ll make a mistake. Feeling comfortable eventually leads to disrespect. Formality will prevent me from making that mistake.”

“What’s wrong with making a few mistakes?”

“Well, it’s fine if the person isn’t the Evil Smiling Demon.”

The Evil Smiling Demon laughed loudly.

“Second Young Master, you’re even more amusing than the rumors say. So, what’s the second reason?”

“The Underworld Pavilion Lord and the Evil Smiling Demon don’t mix.”

“They say good and evil are like two sides of the same coin. Learning about evil from me will help you uphold good.”

“That’s probably something made up by those on the evil side.”

“What do you mean?”

“How could good and evil be stuck together like two sides of a coin? Evil is at the bottom of a bottomless pit, while good is at the top of a high mountain. It’s just a saying created by evildoers to justify themselves.”

Of course, his earlier statement was a metaphor indicating that good and evil can coexist within a person. However, I deliberately spoke only of good and evil, placing them far apart from each other.

“Then you must think I’m a hypocrite.”

“Not at all. How could a person who proudly puts ‘evil’ in their nickname be a hypocrite?”

“Do you think I’m cool, then?”

“Evil can never be cool under any circumstances. The only time evil can be cool is when it suppresses another evil.”

He laughed. He laughed heartily, but his eyes behind the eye holes of the mask were cold. Without the New Eye Technique, I wouldn’t have known.

It was astonishing that he could laugh so heartily while having such a sunken dead gaze.

“The rumors were true.”

“What rumors are you talking about?”

“The rumors that you’ve become a stubborn and frustrating orthodox fool.” 4

“If you feel that way, it might be because of this. At some point, we became worse than those stubborn and frustrating orthodox fools. So now, I’m trying to set things right.”

The Evil Smiling Demon, who had been laughing quietly, asked,

“Is this the new Demonic Path you dream of, Young Master?”

“You could say that.”

“Then we can never coexist. I will continue to support the Eldest Young Master.”

“It can’t be helped. I will take my leave now.”

I bowed politely and turned to leave.

Then, from behind, he asked,

“By the way, what is the third reason?”

I stopped my steps towards the door and turned back to him.

“I don’t make friends with people who wear masks.”

It was a moment that should have been filled with laughter, but he didn’t laugh.

I saw it.

Though he didn’t laugh aloud, his eyes behind the mask’s eye holes were smiling. It meant he was truly angry.

Until now, he had never taken off his mask in front of anyone. Thus, naturally, no one had ever seen his face beneath that mask. No one knew what he looked like or how old he was. Asking him to remove his mask was a taboo, an unforgivable offense.

Yet, once in his life, he had shown his face to someone.

To me, before my regression, when I had returned to the cult to find the last ingredient for the Great Regression Technique. To me, the only one who had survived being his friend.

I had seen the face behind that mask. 5

1: Fuuuuck, he’s a mental asylum patient….

2: A smiley made with blood. Who else knows the name of this show ? Answer in the comments !!!

3: Yeah, everyone considers you a weirdo. Look at Fire Force, MC was considered a psycho for keeping his promise (that reminds me I need to finish it… Like so many others….)

4: Well he sure isn’t ‘demonic’, but he is much less hypocritical than an ‘othodox’

5: I wonder what will be their fate this time.

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