The women's fight wasn't an explosion of pent-up anger.
A single energy had shaken their very nature.
Laughing Evil Heart.
The signature demonic energy of the Evil Heart Laughing Demon, which awakens the fundamental violence in humans.
Exposure to the Laughing Evil Heart makes one's heart pound with the urge to kill someone.
In fact, if a person with weak inner energy is strongly exposed to the Laughing Evil Heart, they might even stab the person next to them to death.
However, assassins are masters of controlling their emotions.
Even with the same inner energy and skill, they are far less affected than ordinary martial artists.
Furthermore, the way they endured and expressed their anger and violence was also subtly different.
Exposed to the Laughing Evil Heart, the women could not escape the sharp eyes of the Evil Heart Laughing Demon, whose understanding of evil was deeper than anyone's.
The Third Assassin recognized her opponent, who had removed his bamboo hat.
Yes, he was someone who had every right to be at ease in front of twenty of them.
"Evil Heart Laughing Demon."
She already knew that he was the one serving as the Heavenly Flower Pavilion Mistress's escort.
What she didn't know was that he would make such a preemptive move today, the day the final stage positions were to be assigned.
She didn't know about the Laughing Evil Heart, but she was certain of at least one thing: the Evil Heart Laughing Demon had used some special technique to single them out from among the women.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon glanced at a chair a short distance away.
It was a gesture for her to come and sit.
The situation required her to at least hear what he had to say.
The Third Assassin walked over and sat down.
The remaining assassins spread out to the left and right, centering on the Third Assassin.
They took positions to immediately join the attack if a fight broke out.
However, the Evil Heart Laughing Demon seemed completely unfazed.
‘Seeing him up close…?’
She could clearly see the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's eyes through the veil he wore.
She had caught a glimpse of him during the main tournament, but this was the first time she had seen him this close.
Before this encounter, she had misunderstood.
She thought the Evil Heart Laughing Demon must be so wickedly ugly or have such hideous scars or burns that it was difficult to look him in the face.
That's why she assumed he wore a mask.
‘To think he was such a handsome man.’
Just looking at his eyes and forehead, she could guess it.
He was a truly handsome man.
‘Perhaps his nose or mouth is disfigured.’
In any case, her first impression made her curious about his real face.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon asked her.
"Do you have the authority to make decisions right now?"
He was asking whether she had to move only as her organization dictated, or if she could make some decisions on her own.
"What if I do?"
"Tell your subordinates not to commit suicide."
She expected him to follow up with something to crush her spirit, like, 'Because I'll kill you cruelly myself!'
But the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's next words were completely unexpected.
"I didn't come to kill you."
The Third Assassin stared at the Evil Heart Laughing Demon in silence.
It didn't seem like a lie, which confused her.
He found all of them, but he wasn't going to kill them? The Evil Heart Laughing Demon, of all people?
The Third Assassin replied softly.
"We don't do things like suicide."
As if that was all that mattered, the Evil Heart Laughing Demon nodded.
The Third Assassin slowly rose from her seat.
He must be trying to lower their fighting spirit by confusing them with words about not coming to kill them.
Riiip.
She tore a long slit in the lower part of her palace gown, revealing her thigh.
A dagger was tucked into a leather strap wrapped around it.
Drawing the dagger, the Third Assassin spoke to the other assassins.
"We must kill him. There's no way the Evil Heart Laughing Demon will let us live."
The assassins simultaneously drew their respective weapons.
Some women, like the Third Assassin, drew hidden daggers.
Another woman wrapped a sharp fishing line around both hands and pulled it taut.
Yet another drew a flexible sword that had been disguised as a belt.
An ornament was disassembled to reveal a small hidden weapon, and another woman drew a hairpin.
A blue-bladed hidden weapon emerged from inside a bracelet.
Twenty beautiful women each drew their hidden weapons.
It was a sight not easily seen even in a lifetime as a martial artist.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon, who had risen from his seat, reached into his robes.
The assassins all tensed, not knowing what would come out.
What came out in the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's hand was his mask.
The mask covered his face, and the veil he had been wearing slid down like a single falling flower petal.
Now, what covered the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's face was not a veil, but a white mask.
The Third Assassin and the other assassins tensed.
It was the first time they were seeing the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's legendary white mask in person.
The feeling was different from when he wore the veil.
Just a moment ago, she was thinking, Such handsome eyes? but once those eyes were behind the mask, the feeling changed completely.
Those unfamiliar, cold eyes smiled from within the mask.
He smiled as he looked at the twenty assassins who had drawn their signature weapons.
Adding to the pressure was something else.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon had drawn a ten-thousand-year cold iron dagger.
As far as the Third Assassin knew.
'I thought the Evil Heart Laughing Demon used finger techniques and palm techniques?'
So she had planned to be cautious of his finger techniques and palm techniques in this fight.
But he was drawing a dagger?
The pressure from that dagger was completely different in the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's hand compared to anyone else's.
Normally, the Third Assassin would have said this before a fight.
No matter who you are, you won't be able to handle all of us.
But faced with the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's overwhelming presence, the Third Assassin had a different thought.
'I should have grabbed those women's hair and left with them earlier.'
She could tell her subordinates were feeling the same pressure.
Having greater numbers didn't necessarily mean they had the advantage.
Fundamentally, assassins were people who moved alone or according to a meticulously pre-arranged plan.
Right now, there was no plan, and of course, twenty of them had never attacked together.
Still, there was one thing she hoped for.
"If each person inflicts just one wound, the twentieth person will walk out of here."
In a situation where their morale was crushed, this would be more helpful than vaguely saying they could win.
If they fought to the death, someone could survive.
And that could be you.
Like a true leader, the Third Assassin was the first to lunge toward the Evil Heart Laughing Demon.
Swish! Swiish! Swish!
The Third Assassin's dagger cut through the air in succession.
Each strike aimed only for the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's vital points.
It was an attack that anticipated many possibilities.
How she would counter if he blocked or dodged, and what her next move would be.
How she would respond if she was counterattacked and dropped her dagger.
But she had not anticipated the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's movements to be this fast.
She couldn't even tell how he had dodged her attack.
In what was truly a flash, the Evil Heart Laughing Demon brushed past her.
Her opponent was so fast that she had no time to raise her protective energy.
She felt something graze her neck.
Ssk.
‘Damn it! I’m cut!’
Just as she despaired, thinking her neck would split open and gush blood.
She did not fall.
'Why?'
She checked her neck.
A slight smear of blood on her hand.
It was just enough to show that the blood on her neck had been wiped away.
She quickly used her dagger to see her reflection.
A single blood line was drawn on her neck.
He hadn't cut deep, just a very slight graze as he passed.
'Was it a mistake?'
But it wasn't a mistake.
The Eleventh and Twentieth Assassins, who had exchanged a move with the Evil Heart Laughing Demon next, were also touching their own necks a short distance away.
It was an attack that would have killed them if it had been any deeper, yet they too stood with only a slight blood line drawn on them.
‘If he had intended to kill us, we would be dead.’
Only then could the Third Assassin objectively watch the Evil Heart Laughing Demon fight.
She had felt she was defeated simply because he was fast.
But that wasn't it.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon's attacks followed completely unexpected trajectories.
Even if she could have handled his speed, she would never have been able to block that peculiar attack.
The hidden weapons thrown by the Nineteenth Assassin were all deflected by the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's dagger, and the Sixteenth and Thirteenth Assassins, who faltered while dodging the ricocheting weapons, had their necks slashed in succession.
'How can he do that?'
What was astonishing was that regardless of the opponent's skill level, the location and depth of the wound were the same.
A level of mastery far more difficult than simply slashing everyone's necks and killing them.
You think we can survive if we inflict twenty wounds?
She could imagine how ridiculous the Evil Heart Laughing Demon must have found that.
They couldn't even inflict a single wound on him.
And not all the assassins submitted to this overwhelming difference in skill.
Ssk!
The Nineteenth Assassin, whose neck had been cut once, lunged again.
Even though she knew she had been spared, she launched another surprise attack.
Whoosh.
Of course, it was useless.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon lightly dodged the Nineteenth Assassin's ambush, grabbed her by the neck, and slammed her to the ground.
Thud!
Just as the Nineteenth Assassin, who was slammed into the floor, was about to charge again.
"..."
She saw the eyes inside the mask looking down at her.
Goosebumps covered her entire body.
She never feared death, but this wasn't a matter of life or death.
Death was not frightening, but those eyes were.
The fear that if she crossed this person, she might suffer a pain worse than death.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon's gaze stimulated a fundamental sense of fear.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon left her and looked at the Third Assassin, asking.
"Didn't you say you don't do suicide?"
His words also carried the meaning that if they continued like this, he would kill them all.
The Third Assassin couldn't say anything.
In the midst of this, the Seventh Assassin was now ambushing the Evil Heart Laughing Demon.
Swoosh!
But when her dagger cut through the air, what she got in return was a blood line on her neck.
Just as she was about to charge again, ignoring the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's earlier warning.
The Third Assassin lunged forward and grabbed her wrist.
The Third Assassin looked at the Seventh Assassin and shook her head.
She knew the Seventh Assassin had a difficult personality, but it was obvious she would die a dog's death if she wasn't stopped.
If they provoked the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's temper, he might kill them all.
Thus, a single gust of wind named the Evil Heart Laughing Demon blew through the Cult of Beauties.
What the wind left behind was a single blood line.
Silence flowed through the hall.
The women looked at the blood lines on each other's necks with disbelief in their eyes.
The Third Assassin could tell.
If the Evil Heart Laughing Demon had actually intended to kill them, this would not have been a fight, but a massacre.
'He's this strong?'
She was well aware that the Demon Sovereigns were fearsome, but she hadn't known his skill was at this level.
If this had been the Evil Heart Laughing Demon from before Geom Mugeuk's regression, he wouldn't have been able to produce such an overwhelming result.
Several women would have died, and this place would have become a sea of blood.
But the Evil Heart Laughing Demon's inner energy and martial arts mastery had both improved since then.
On top of that, he had the experience of numerous desperate life-and-death battles that brought him to the brink of death.
And then there was the new Laughing Fragrance Secret Art he had learned.
The Evil Heart Laughing Demon slowly walked back to the seat he had been in and sat down again.
"Now, everyone sit."
The Third Assassin sighed and sat down.
She had her subordinates sit as well.
"Everyone, sit."
The rest of the assassins now sat in their respective seats.
Then, as if on cue, the door opened and a masked Faceless One entered.
The Faceless One went around to each of the seated women and sealed their mute and paralyzing points.
At that moment, one of the assassins launched a surprise attack, trying to take the Faceless One hostage.
It was the Seventh Assassin, who had been stopped by the Third Assassin when she tried to charge the Evil Heart Laughing Demon earlier.
The next moment.
Thwack!
The Seventh Assassin was sent flying after taking a blow to the chest.
The Faceless One had dodged her ambush and struck her with his elbow.
She collapsed to the floor and coughed up blood, but she wasn't dead.
This Faceless One, who had remained to assist the Evil Heart Laughing Demon, was the strongest among the ten Faceless Ones who had come this time.
That was why the ambush failed.
The Faceless One sealed the fallen woman's paralyzing and mute points, then lifted her back into a sitting position.
With her, who had lost consciousness with her head slumped, there were no more who dared to step forward.
And so, the mute and paralyzing points of all twenty assassins were completely sealed.
'Not everyone has been caught yet.'
The remaining assassins could help Cha Iran and complete the original plan.
Just as the Third Assassin was clinging to that last shred of hope, the sound of a carriage arriving came from outside.
When the Faceless One opened the door of the guest hall, a carriage that had arrived outside came into view.
Hidden weapons were stuck in it like a porcupine's quills, and it was so riddled with holes and broken in places that it was a wonder it still held its shape.
The Third Assassin's eyes trembled as she looked at the carriage.
'No way?'
The carriage door opened, and the Seventeenth, Fifth, and Eighth Assassins got out.
The Third Assassin was greatly surprised to see that they too had been captured.
'How did he find them as well?'
Meanwhile, the Seventeenth Assassin, who was entering the guest hall, saw her comrades.
She didn't see the Evil Heart Laughing Demon standing by the window or the Faceless One standing behind the door.
Instead, seeing her comrades sitting unharmed, she inwardly cheered.
The Third Assassin was there, and she could see the Seventh Assassin as well.
There were twenty of them in total.
'We're saved!'
At the same time, a flicker of concern for the Faceless One following behind her crossed the Seventeenth Assassin's mind.
'You saved me, but...'
She would not be able to save him.
The number seventeen was not a number that could decide such a big matter.
'You're going to die.'