Chapter 9: Flames Beneath Steel

Back in his quiet rented room in the bustling inn near the base of Mount Mugang, Jinmu Yeon sat cross-legged, the soft hum of qi curling in his veins.

He placed his hand on the wooden floor and exhaled slowly.

"PASTE."

A faint glow pulsed from his fingertips, fading as quickly as it came. Then silence.

But inside, something changed.

Something tangible shifted behind his eyes — not like the graceful flow of Blossom Vein Arts or the explosive precision of Crimson Flow Sword Arts.

This was... denser.

Thicker.

Weightier.

His fingers curled instinctively, forming a grip around a hammer that wasn't there.

So this is what it feels like...

The Ironshaping Craftsmanship.

That's what the technique whispered to him the moment it settled into his mind — Ironshaping Craftsmanship (강철조형술 | Gangcheoljohyung-sul).

Not just the ability to forge weapons, but the culmination of muscle memory, material intuition, and precise ki control to manipulate metal without flaw.

Every part of it made his arms ache with phantom burns. His lungs filled with phantom soot.

He smiled.

"Now I just need the right steel."

He stood, stretching his back as the first rays of sunlight touched the distant ridges. Outside, the streets had already begun to stir — peddlers barking about incense, dried mushrooms, and tea leaves. Swordsmen and mercenaries wandered half-awake with weapons on their backs and hunger in their eyes.

Jinmu descended to the common area for breakfast, but his mind was elsewhere.

I can't use ordinary steel for this sword.

If I'm going to carve a path in the Murim world, I need something stronger. Something no one else carries.

He picked at his rice and bean porridge distractedly.

Then, like fate had ears, a shout rang across the street from the nearby tavern.

"You're insane! That thing burned through a caravan of eight martial artists! You really think your cheap blade's going to pierce it?"

"I'm telling you," another voice barked. "It sleeps near the volcanic ridge just outside the third pass. The city's full of cowards who won't do anything."

Jinmu's spoon froze in midair.

He stood, walked out into the street, and stood near the tavern door without drawing attention to himself.

The conversation inside grew louder.

"The damn thing breathes fire. Charred two merchants and melted their horses into slag. They say it's half-lizard, half-ox. A molten beast."

"They say it's a Bulbore."

Jinmu narrowed his eyes.

Bulbore?

He searched the name in the buried memories of the body he now occupied — the Murim-world knowledge he'd absorbed.

It came to him in pieces.

Bulbore (화우 | Hwau) — a beast known to inhabit volcanic valleys and flame-touched peaks. Covered in blackened, cracked stone-like hide. Its body emitted heat like a furnace, and its breath could melt steel.

Most considered it unkillable unless you were a Peak Expert or Master.

And apparently one's right outside the city.

Another martial artist inside the tavern scoffed.

"The Crimson Flow Blade Union already sent scouts. Probably planning to kill it themselves and sell the core."

"They'll burn alive. Let 'em try."

Jinmu's expression didn't change.

But his heart began to beat faster.

The hide of a Bulbore… if I can kill it, I can forge a sword from something no one else has.

It breathes fire. Lives in stone. Fights like a berserker. Its body is made for war.

It's exactly what I need.

He turned without a word and walked down the street, heading for the outer quarter's armory stalls to find out more about this "third pass" near the volcanic ridge.

At the same time, in the other end of the city — tucked in a narrow alley where roof tiles curved like fangs — sat a shaded tea house with its doors closed despite the daylight.

Inside, five martial artists dressed in crimson-lined robes sat in a half-circle around a table that hadn't seen tea in years — only blades, maps, and silent threats.

Their robes bore a mark in dark red: a twin-bladed insignia in a broken crescent.

The Crimson Flow Blade Union.

One of the older men leaned forward and tapped a spot on the map with the butt of his pipe.

"Here. Just outside the southern crater bend. The beast was last seen burning a path through the ash fields."

Another man scoffed. "You sure it's not just some merchant hallucinating in the steam?"

"I already confirmed it with a tracking scout. Broken hoofprints. Ash fused to glass. It's real."

A younger martial artist clicked his tongue.

"What do we even need that beast for? We're not blacksmiths."

"Not for forging," the older one said coldly. "We want the core. If the Bulbore's been alive this long, it's formed a Flame Core in its chest. Sell that to an alchemist, you can buy five villages. Or trade it to the Death Puppet Sect and get a Blood Contract in return."

The room fell silent.

Even the cockiest of the group clenched his jaw.

A Blood Contract from the demonic path wasn't something you earned easily. Or survived long with.

But it was power.

And the Crimson Flow Blade Union had always traded in that currency.

The leader — a lean man with thin eyes and a scar running from lip to chin — finally spoke.

"We'll move at dusk. Two in the front. One to bait. The rest to flank and strike while it sleeps."

The youngest among them frowned. "And if it doesn't sleep?"

"Then we run."

"And if it doesn't let us run?"

The leader smiled faintly.

"Then we die spectacularly. Either way, we're remembered."

A few chuckled grimly.

The Crimson Flow Blade Union didn't fear death.

But none of them knew that someone else had heard about the Bulbore before them.

And that someone wasn't planning to share the kill.

Back in the city, Jinmu crouched beside a sketchy merchant stall where an old man sold hunting maps etched into dyed leather.

The old man squinted at him. "You sure you want to go near the crater paths, son? That place's cursed. Nothing grows there. Air tastes like burnt iron."

"I'm not going sightseeing," Jinmu replied.

The old man scratched under his chin. "You want a map, I got it. You want to come back alive, that's a different price."

"I'll take both."

He slid a few bronze coins onto the table.

The old man nodded and handed over a rolled strip of red-tinted hide, drawn in crude but surprisingly accurate lines.

"Third pass. There's a path marked with twin rocks. Looks like ox horns. Go past that, and you'll smell it."

"Smell it?"

"Yeah." The old man grinned, showing yellow teeth. "Smells like death cooked in lava."

Jinmu tucked the map into his robe and turned without another word.

Time to hunt.

That evening, he returned to the inn, spread the map across his bed, and studied every route leading from Mount Mugang's southern ridge.

According to the lines and rumors, he'd need at least a full day of travel — and even then, the crater fields were unpredictable. Volcanic gas, shifting terrain, and the Bulbore's own heat might cause hallucinations or ki distortion.

But it didn't matter.

He had a plan.

Kill the Bulbore.

Harvest the hide.

Use Ironshaping Craftsmanship to forge the blade myself.

Simple.

But one thing nagged at him.

The blacksmith's advice.

"Steel doesn't care about intentions. It only remembers the ones who hit it right."

And that brought him back to the forge.

Tomorrow, he would begin shaping. At least practice once.

But first…

He needed to ensure the Ironshaping Craftsmanship worked the way he imagined it.

He walked to the window, held his palm out, and flexed.

The internal flow was there — muscle memory he hadn't earned, breathing patterns he'd never practiced. Grip strength distribution, heat timing, metal flow sense.

Everything a real blacksmith took years to master.

All compressed into his mind.

It's like having an old master living in my hand.

But that made him chuckle.

And I'm about to forge a sword with the help of someone whose hands I've barely touched.

A plan began forming in his mind.

One that would make tomorrow's work easier… or at least, more entertaining.

He tilted his head back.

"Alright, let's see…"

He rubbed his chin with a grin.

How do I convince the blacksmith to 'guide my grip' without making it weird?

Maybe I trip into the anvil?

No, I'd die. Definitely die.

What if I pretend I don't understand the bellows mechanism and force him to adjust my stance?

He stared up at the ceiling.

"...That's just stupid enough to work."

The thick scent of sulfur hit Jinmu's nose the moment he passed the twin boulders shaped like ox horns.

He covered his mouth with his sleeve and narrowed his eyes. Even with his heightened senses, the air burned his throat like dry smoke left in a forge too long.

"Smells like cooked death," Jinmu muttered under his breath. "Old man wasn't joking."

He adjusted the mask on his face — plain black cloth that covered the lower half, nothing extravagant — and stepped into the crater path.

The ground here was cracked and scorched. The dirt no longer looked like dirt, but brittle, blackened glass, and the air shimmered with invisible heat. Pools of thick smoke drifted low to the ground like wounded animals.

Jinmu kept his stride steady.

Every few steps, he exhaled slowly, letting the Blossom Vein Arts circulate through his body.

Mist gathered beneath his feet.

His breathing became gentler, his steps lighter, his presence—fainter.

This place… it's perfect for hiding.

If Blossom Vein Arts is about movement like mist, then there's no better battlefield than a misty volcanic field.

He dropped his stance further, lowering his ki signature so much that even a nearby Expert wouldn't sense him without direct line of sight.

Not far ahead, loud roars tore through the mist.

Screams followed. Then—

Clang!

A blade skidded across the stone, followed by a furious shout.

"Get back—he's going into another charge!"

Jinmu moved forward carefully, crouching low as he approached the edge of a cracked ridge. From behind a large stone slab, he peered out.

The Bulbore was real.

And terrifying.

Easily the size of a house, its body was covered in jagged obsidian scales that shimmered with lava-light. Red veins pulsed underneath its skin like molten rivers, and its horns curved backward like twin scythes.

Even now, it snarled as fire burst from its nostrils.

It stood in the center of a torn battlefield, surrounded by five martial artists dressed in crimson robes — the Crimson Flow Blade Union.

They were the same ones Jinmu had heard about in the tea house.

And they were struggling.

"Cover his right flank!" one shouted.

Another screamed back, "I can't get close! His body's too hot!"

The leader, a tall man with twin sabers and a deep facial scar, bellowed a command.

"Circle! Don't engage directly! It's already exhausted—we wait for the moment!"

But the Bulbore didn't seem tired at all.

Its eyes glowed like furnace coals.

One martial artist leaped from behind a rock, aiming for the beast's hind leg.

"Crimson Flow Blade—Moon Severing Fang!"

The blade arced.

It struck.

The blow dug into the Bulbore's hind leg—and bounced off with a clang.

The martial artist barely had time to register the failure before a tail — long, thick, and blazing like metal fresh from the forge — slammed into his body and hurled him into a rock wall with a sickening crack.

Jinmu's lips pressed into a tight line.

One down.

They're not even scratching it.

The leader cursed.

"Damn it! Its hide's harder than blacksteel! We're not cutting it deep enough—!"

Then the Bulbore lifted its head and let out a soundless roar.

Soundless because all sound around it vanished in the shockwave that followed.

The air rippled, then ignited.

A blast of flame surged out from its mouth, spreading in a cone and melting the nearest boulder to slag.

The Crimson Flow Blade Union members scattered — or tried to.

Two of them screamed as their robes caught fire. One rolled violently across the ground. The other… didn't move at all.

Jinmu's eyes didn't blink.

So that's what a monster above Expert level looks like.

That's not a beast anymore. It's an elemental furnace wrapped in hate.

He crouched lower, activating the third form of Blossom Vein Arts — Misting Blade Fingers — and moved silently behind another ridge.

From here, he could watch everything without being seen.

Let them wear it down.

I'm not here to play hero.

I'm here for the loot.

And by that, he meant the body.

If the Crimson Flow Blade Union managed to kill it, even barely, all Jinmu needed was to wait for the right moment. When they were weakened… distracted…

I'll snatch the hide. The core. Whatever I can use to forge the sword.

One chance. One strike. In. Out. Like mist.

Another explosion rocked the battlefield.

The Bulbore had slammed its hooves into the ground, creating fissures that cracked like thunder.

The leader cursed again, blood on his cheek.

"We need to force a breakthrough strike!"

"You think we didn't already try that?!"

"We need to bait it to overheat!"

"You bait it, then!"

But just then—

A change.

The beast's breathing slowed.

Its nostrils flared, steam erupting like a geyser from its back.

Then a low hum filled the area.

The martial artists stopped.

Jinmu's eyes widened slightly.

That sound…

He recognized it.

A breakthrough.

The Bulbore's body quaked.

Its veins pulsed brighter.

Its legs grew thicker. Its claws cracked and reformed like molten glass hardening into sharper edges.

Flames licked its eyes.

The leader's jaw clenched. "No… no, that's not—"

One of the martial artists shouted, "It's breaking through!"

Another screamed, "It's going into Peak Master Realm?!"

Too late.

The Bulbore raised its head and let out a roar so deep it shook the earth.

The mist around it evaporated instantly.

The leader stepped back in disbelief.

"No… this can't be…!"

Jinmu's pulse spiked.

His hiding mist dispersed.

But his mind was calm.

Dead calm.

If that thing was dangerous before...

Now it's a catastrophe.

And everyone here is about to die.