Breaking through

As Gyun was gritting his teeth to overcome the mind demon, it dredged up all sorts of painful memories that he'd rather not have relive.

Memories flashed by, memories of him as child in his past life training until he threw up, memories of his first fight coming to Murim. Memories of taking his first life and watching someones eyes fade blank. Tears flowed as these memories flew by, but he grinded his teeth and refocused his mind, "it's in the past, and I've come to far to die!" he yelled trying to focus on gathering his internal energy in his center.

He felt the unimaginable pain of his meridians and blood vessels begin to burst and his energy started deviate. "Fuck!!!" at his wits end and consciousness fading Gyun bit his tongue as he forced the power to his energy center.

After 20 minutes of the most intense pain Gyun who was bleeding all over his body and practically foaming at the mouth passed out. After finally breaking through to the mythical 'Divine' stage. Which allowed one to age regress their bodies to their prime, and altered a persons physique to the pinnacle of a martial body and significantly improved their appearance. Unbeknownst to Gyun, he was the third person to ever reach the Divine stage in Murim's 1300 year history and the youngest by more 50 years.

He woke up a few minutes later and almost immediately wished he hadn't as his muscles spasmed and his bitten tongue shot pain all across his body. "Damn that shit hurts" was all he could muster with his fatigued state of mind and body as he fell asleep

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1 week later

Gyun awoke in his cave, almost immediately after gaining consciousness he regretted that he had as he felt immense muscle spasms and pain.

"Ugh..... I finally broke through" was all he could manage to say as he lay there. After a few minutes the pain began to subside and he closed his eyes trying to sense the state of his body. If he could he would have jumped for joy, because for once he no longer sensed the cancer in his intestines. "Oh thank god, all that training finally paid off" he cried tears of joy. Those tears of joy signified his hard work of 8 years to overcome the level that was the 'Divine' stage. In truth he was satisfied with being at the 'Demi god' stage which allowed him to fight evenly with any of the 10 warlords (the ten greatest current martial artists in murim). Though that changed when he'd found out he had cancer in his intestines. He'd given up hope of living and progressing as martial artist but after rumors that the legendary 'Divine' stage would reverse age a person and cleanse them of any ailment. Despite being the greatest prodigy of all time he entered seclusion and gave his all to live.

Eventually he reached his goal though, "ha, what would those geezers think if they found out I reached the 'Divine' stage at the age of 29". He chuckled at the thought of their faces, well the other affects were also good but more a bonus then anything, but he was still interested in seeing the changes. He groaned in pain as he stood up he walked to the small mirror he kept next to his cot in the training cave. Every step incurred an intense dizziness but his curiosity got the better of him as he looked at his reflection. "Holy shit!" was all that came to his mind as he looked at his reflection. His looks which were always average had become much more refined and he looked very handsome and his eyes which were always green had become purple. Though that wasn't what surprised him, what surprised him was that his reflection looked to be no older then when he first arrived in murim. "Damn I was expecting me to regress to my mid-twenties since most documents said those who reached this stage reverted to their primes. But as a bonus I guess I get a few extra years on my lifespan." He examined his body while his skin got softer and became unblemished the multiple scars he'd accumulated during his time in murim.

After looking at his reflection and washing the black goo that his pores released in the nearby river he returned to his cave to get his clothes and his sword. As he picked up his sword his voice trembled slightly "I'll get back at all those friends who abandoned me the moment they sensed weakness". He walked out of the cave and left a small book of his personal martial arts there along with a letter addressed to whoever found hit he then sealed the cave with large boulder but left a large enough gap for someone to crawl in. After all he couldn't resist leaving behind a legend, he stood at the cave entry for a while reminiscing about the memories in the cave. But he had already resolved in his heart to return to Murim and become the largest force and revolutionize the divided Murim factions that placed labels on Martial arts with orthodox, unorthodox and demonic. He would create his own faction and it would allow all martial arts short of those that involved killing people or sacrificing people for strength.

As he walked in the direction of the city he'd gotten his food supplies from. He became curious if Murim changed at all from 7 years ago though he doubted it. "Ok I think my bodies recovered enough to use his own movement art. That he'd named "Gliding Wind steps" which focused on speed and maneuverability. Though it was more suited for combat then it was traveling since it required a constant flow of Qi and large reserve of it. But this was solved since Gyun's Qi had increased more the 10 times.

5 minutes later he'd covered the 10 mile distance at what Gyun considered a moderate pace. He stopped a half mile away from the city, and pulled up the hood on his robe, though he had disappeared from the martial stage almost a decade ago and he'd never had any disciples or appeared at any large gatherings. There was no reason to be careless, which is why he had chosen his clothes from when he had been just a wandering mercenary.

As he approached he concealed his qi which was one of the additional perks of the "Divine" stage which allowed him to completely withdraw his qi his center and conceal it. Which was different than concealing techniques which were easily seen through by someone stronger through by those stronger than the user. Gyun considered using a face changing technique but decided against it since he wanted to flaunt his handsomeness that he'd always wanted."One of the few things I wanted was to be good looking, its amazing that I became good looking from training". He joked to himself.

He lined up behind a man who looked well off as he wore expensive clothes and was accompanied by 4 armed guards as well as what looked like a female servant. He glanced around at his surroundings, from what he saw this must be a gate used by the wealthy since most of the buildings visible from the gate looked very fancy and all the guards at the gate wore polished armor and had expensive looking weapons. He saw guards taking identity plaques from visitors, "oh damn I forgot he grabbed the large pouch on his waist which was filled with plaques some were from the big sects both orthodox and unorthodox and even one from the demonic cult. He sighed, as an incredibly strong independent martial artists many factions had given him honorary plaques of status, as they tried to convince him to join them though he ultimately rejected all of them. He couldn't deny their usefulness, as he searched for the plaque that identified him as star level mercenary. Which was from when he was in his 4th year in murim after transmigrating. It was right around the time he'd broken into the grandmaster stage after getting a hold of a 1,000 year ginseng.

The rich man in front of Gyun looked back at him and snorted at his worn out attire. "Hey! this is the west gate this is the gate for those of the privileged class or big name martial artist's its not for someone of your standing." Gyun rolled his eyes in disbelief "oh my go how could I forget how pretentious people are here"

Gyun pulled his hood even lower to avoid the man seeing his face. "Yeah thats right hide your low class face though it'd be better for you to leave since I've had a bad day so far." The rich man blathered on about his standing as magistrates second cousins son and merchant father. 'Should I just kill him Gyun thought. No I can't do that in front of the guards I need to keep somewhat of a low profile. But on the other hand this guy won't shut up.

While Gyun puzzled over what to do an idea popped in his head. He could just send a slowed low impact ball of invisible qi to this man's acupoint to shut him up. He flicked his finger sending a small orb of qi into the man's neck acupoint. The man was in the middle of his entitled speech before he abruptly stopped talking. 'Thank god' Gyun thought as he walked past the panicking man and his entourage to give his identity plaque to the guards.