A Regressor’s Tale of Cultivation Chapter 842 Chapter 839: Side Story - Mythical Relic (4)

While Makli Hyun-ah lavishes Makli Hweol with heaps of honey-glazed potatoes,

In a concealed section of the puppet-hunting team's ambush zone, Ha-eun partially awakens his gaze.

Ha-eun stands up from his position, clutching a pair of short spears, and transmits a message via voice to Jo Yeon, who observes the vicinity from afar using a magical tool.

[Miss. I sense it. The puppets approach.]

Moments later, beginning with Jo Yeon upon receiving Ha-eun's transmission, a broadcast echoes to the whole subjugation team.

Before long, every member of the subjugation squad spots ominous clouds billowing from one side of Cold Yin Marsh.

Wiiiiiing—

A buzzing reminiscent of a hive of bees emanates from those shadowy clouds, and as they near, the faces of the hidden cultivators in Cold Yin Marsh grow taut with strain.

Comprising those dark clouds are individual puppets at the Heavenly Being level, absorbing the yin energy from Cold Yin Marsh as they move toward the team's location.

With each forward push of the puppet horde, even the yin energy of Cold Yin Marsh gets drained by them, transforming the area bit by bit into barren desolation.

Then, the instant the puppet swarm passes a designated [boundary] in Cold Yin Marsh,

Wiiiiiiiiing!

The Integration stage puppets scattered amid the Heavenly Being flock simultaneously sense something amiss and command the group to halt.

[Stop. Irregularity identified. Likely divine power from Hundred Families cultivators. Determining ambush sites...determination finished.]

Click, click, click!

The Integration stage command puppets swiftly locate the hidden spots of the cultivators, then direct commands to the myriad puppets.

[Calling for backup. Sending signal to the Star Shattering stage marquis puppet. Signal received...failed. Noted spirit-wave disruption. Evaluation: probable interference from Novelist Family Method and Legalist Family Method cultivators.]

Kiririririk—

Managing vast numbers of puppets simultaneously, the command puppets realize they're in a disadvantaged position.

Yet, the command puppets rapidly devise countermeasures and ready their defenses.

[Link to the factory severed. Factory likely to soon reach out to the Star Shattering stage marquis puppet for an inquiry. Until the marquis arrives, gather data on Hundred Schools cultivators' assaults maximally, prioritizing intel acquisition to stall for time.]

Resolving to hinder the Hundred Schools cultivators and endure as long as possible, the command puppets organize formations and unleash assaults upon them.

[All units form ranks. Unleash focused barrages.]

Thus, the clash erupts.

Kwagwagwagwang!

Myriad blasts of radiant explosions burst forth, while innumerable Heavenly Being stage puppets emit light rays and launch volleys.

Diverse gadgets they release hurtle forward, overwhelming the cultivators and Heart Dao Blooming martial artists like Ha-eun.

Meanwhile, a handful of Heart Dao Blooming martial artists including Ha-eun, alongside several Integration stage cultivators, advance to intercept the puppets' relentless bombardment,

From the rear, the Hundred Schools Method cultivators are shielded and start manifesting their unique divine powers.

The proclamation from Legalist Family Method cultivator Ga Beop booms throughout Cold Yin Marsh.

[We, the Human Race, via a prior accord with Cold Yin Marsh's dominant Leaf Race, established a treaty safeguarding the region's natural surroundings. Under this treaty, I declare the enactment of Cold Yin Marsh's 'Natural Environment Protection Law'. Effective from this proclamation, any entity damaging Cold Yin Marsh's natural environment, irrespective of race, phenomenon, or form, faces sanctions.]

With the law's announcement, the Legalist Family Method's influence activates.

[Defendants, the puppets gravely harm Cold Yin Marsh's natural surroundings, so from now, you stand trial. Any objections?]

In Cold Yin Marsh, where solely Heaven and Earth spiritual energy flows, the Legalist Family Method's law integrates, ensnaring the puppets in immediate peril.

Concurrently, the puppets desperately counter the Legalist Family Method, employing tactics analyzed from past encounters.

[Command puppet, unit 86041. As proxy for Cold Yin Marsh puppets, I raise an objection.]

Via the command puppet's protest, the Legalist Family Method's implementation slows down.

But simultaneously, additional techniques activate.

Flash!

A Vertical-Horizontal Family Method cultivator materializes amid a blaze of light.

Kiiiiiiing!

Rays streak in vertical and horizontal paths, forming a cross.

From that light's core, the Divine Path Method cultivator's incarnation emerges and declares.

[Divide asunder.]

Continuous Charge (連衝).

Suddenly, the Vertical-Horizontal Family Method cultivator's radiance envelops the puppets, severing their ties to the command puppet, momentarily granting each an autonomous identity.

The puppets fracture into numerous factions instantly, diminishing the prominence of command puppet 86041 that had advanced.

The Naming Family Method's essence involves twisting via emptiness and substance control, wielding the might of designations.

The Legalist Family Method's core is law manipulation through statute declaration and handling.

Whereas the Confucian Family Method specializes in suppression, sealing, banishment, and denial, the Vertical-Horizontal Family Method's prime trait is division and convergence, assembly and dispersal.

It pursues cohesion and split regarding particular forces, amassing belief amid such splits and unities to advance cultivation and elevate realms. This stands as the Vertical-Horizontal Family Method's defining feature.

The puppets divide in a flash into scores and hundreds of divisions, sparking arguments over puppet representation.

And amid these myriad splits and merges, the Legalist Family Method's statute gradually constricts around the puppets' necks.

Nevertheless, during the fragmentation, the puppets sustain pre-set assaults on the cultivators.

Under the puppets' intense firepower storm, the martial artists and Immortal Family Method cultivators guarding the Hundred Schools Method practitioners clench their jaws.

Ha-eun glances back and yells.

"Seol Ga! How much longer until it's ready?"

Seol Ga, practitioner of the Novelist Family Method.

Resurrected as a ghost soul by Ahn Geum, he employs the Novelist Family Method in ghost form, assuming a narrative role, and gathers intel.

Embodying the character in 'The Child Who Understands Animal Speech,' Seol Ga turns Ahn Geum's ghost souls into beasts, positioning himself as the lead, and nods while absorbing reports from the ghost souls.

Soon, Seol Ga ends the tale and shares the gathered details with all cultivators through voice transmission.

[Discovered the component titles and identifiers of the puppets' inner mechanisms. Relay to cultivator Makli Hyun-ah!]

Thus, Makli Hyun-ah, positioned at the back, understands it's finally his moment to excel.

Chwararak!

Makli Hyun-ah extracts a thick tome from his attire.

Immediately, he applies the Confucian Family Method to convert his form into textual symbols, then incorporates the identifiers from Seol Ga into those symbols and inscribes them in the tome.

Quickly, the tome brims with the mechanisms' identifiers.

Thereafter, Makli Hyun-ah communicates to his spirit beasts.

At once, Badger along with the Rabbit Seven Heavenly Lords deploy banners and flutter them from Cold Yin Marsh's eight cardinal points.

As the Confucian formation's setup completes, Makli Hyun-ah's societal influence extends across the zone.

"Suppression, engage."

Tududududu!

The entirety of Cold Yin Marsh's Heaven and Earth spiritual energy, along with odd forces and disordered spirits, gets subdued.

Abruptly, a brief calm settles between puppets and cultivators.

The cultivators, with their power origins like spiritual energy restrained, stand immobilized, while the puppets temporarily freeze as they shift from spiritual energy to electric power.

Click, click!

All puppets switch power sources collectively.

Should this persist, Cold Yin Marsh's cultivators would linger powerless and suppressed, leading straight to their demise.

Right then,

The Cold Yin Marsh cultivators, faces set in determination, draw forth talismans from their garments and trigger them.

Flash!

From those talismans, spectral duplicates of themselves—infused with prior Confucian Family Method-sealed powers—emerge to resume obstructing the puppets, restoring battlefield equilibrium.

Yet, if prolonged, the assembled Cold Yin Marsh cultivators would face total destruction once the talismans exhaust.

But the very next instant,

Makli Hyun-ah's divine power activates.

Chwararak!

Makli Hyun-ah swiftly pages through the identifier-filled booklet and unleashes the Naming Family Method.

"In the Naming Dao, I bind the gods."

Wiiiiiiing!

Makli Hyun-ah's Ascending Metamorphosis spirit utterance!

This utterance maximally invokes the Naming Family Method, regarding the identifiers on Makli Hyun-ah's compiled pages as [names], and commences 'summoning' them.

Wing, wing, wing, wing!

Responding to Makli Hyun-ah's summons, the steam engine components within the puppets linked to the identifiers in his grasp start vibrating and echoing.

Makli Hyun-ah fully comprehends his battlefield duty.

'Identifiers of devices uncovered by Novelist Family Method. Those are for the puppets' internal steam engines...specifically, turbine-associated units.'

Remembering Jo Yeon's strategy, he executes the maneuver swiftly.

'The Naming Family Method allows treating product identifiers as names, controlling and sealing them. Meaning...'

"...I, Makli Hyun-ah, wielding the Name Owner's societal authority, decree. Every entity responding to the names I uttered must, without fail, be sealed!"

'By invoking those names, I can seal the puppets' turbines right away! I might not extract the turbines fully...but at minimum, I can siphon the turbines' energy!'

Kwaduk, kwadudududududuk!

The puppets' internal pinwheels powering the steam engines eject collectively and seal into Makli Hyun-ah's tome.

Though Integration stage command puppets reroute internal circuits to resist, their pinwheels' spin gets pilfered, halting the steam engines.

The battlefield's momentum shifts dramatically.

The rough, relentless puppet forces that once dragged the Human Race into endurance fights now falter upon depleting stored electricity, grinding to a halt.

Now, the puppets endure the attrition war.

Kwagwagwang!

The puppets' forte—overwhelming numbers and energy blasts—gets neutralized.

Simultaneously, the Legalist Family Method's statute increasingly ensnares the puppets, finally imposing legal penalties.

[This court condemns the puppet forces to execution!]

Bang, bang, bang!

As Ga Beop, the Legalist Family Method cultivator, delivers the verdict, hordes of puppets crumble en masse.

Their energy cores shatter utterly, forcing Integration stage command puppets to erect shields and expend all residual power to fend off the laws' application.

All this unfolds roughly one shichen into the fight.

Kugugugugu!

Even the command puppets, who briefly defy the law via energy barriers, see their barriers shatter and succumb once electricity depletes.

Witnessing this, Ha-eun, Makli Hyun-ah, Ahn Geum, and every cultivator cry out together.

"Victory is ours!!"

"Haha, take that, you mechanical scum!"

Patstststs!

Makli Hyun-ah deactivates the Confucian Family Method, restoring Heaven and Earth spiritual energy.

Makli Hyun-ah recalls and assembles the spirit beasts dispersed in the Eight Directions, then tuts disapprovingly.

"The Hundred Schools cultivation system... When combined, their abilities yield massive synergy. Such potent paths, yet...why can't they extend influence in the Purple Gold Realm like this?"

To Makli Hyun-ah's query, Makli Hweol replies.

"In essence, it stems from the Heart Tribe. No matter how many Hundred Schools cultivators unite, compensating for flaws and amplifying strengths...it falters against the Heart Tribe."

"Mm, what's the reason?"

"Hoho... It's their inherent resistance. They excel at shattering established laws with their own. Unlike the robust Immortal Cultivation framework of the Immortal Family Method, the Hundred Schools system has certain vulnerabilities, rendering it susceptible to the Heart Tribe. View the Heart Tribe's key trait as chaos. Regardless of the order any cultivation imposes, the Heart Tribe's near-primordial chaos proves hard to counter."

"Heok."

Makli Hyun-ah tuts and inquires.

"So, does the Heart Tribe lack any counters whatsoever?"

"Not entirely. Their intense individualism makes them counters to one another... Moreover, the puppets you battled embody raw violence and ruin, so massed puppets via swarm tactics and firepower can wear down even the Heart Tribe to death."

"Huh, ultimately then, excluding externals like puppets, no system holds an innate edge over the Heart Tribe?"

"Not quite. Take the Buddhist Family Method probing heart's essence...or the Shaman Family Method invoking superior entities—they hold advantages against the Heart Tribe."

"Ooooh...!"

Only now does Makli Hyun-ah exhale in relief, knowing counters exist against those fiendish Heart Tribe or martial artists.

'That technique I acquired via odd forces and disordered spirits in the Makli Clan archives...the Canvas of Myriad Forms and Star Genesis?'

Reflecting that it falls under the Shaman Family Method invoking higher powers, Makli Hyun-ah gains some comfort.

"I aspire to master the Shaman Family Method or Buddhist Family Methods one day too."

Makli Hyun-ah ponders the Confucian Family Method's flaw.

The foremost vulnerability of the Confucian Family Method is bandits, meaning those c