Kael barely registered the words, but his body reacted nonetheless. The violent instability inside him lessened slightly, the burning in his chest settling into something that, while still painful, no longer felt like it would tear him apart at any second.

Then, just as suddenly as it began, the flow stopped.

The absence of it was almost as jarring as its presence had been. Kael’s body lurched forward, his hands catching him as he struggled to breathe properly again. Air rushed into his lungs in uneven bursts, each inhale still painful, but no longer suffocating. Another cough escaped him, weaker this time, and when he looked down, there was still blood, but noticeably less.

He stayed like that for a moment, steadying himself, trying to understand what had just happened.

Behind him, the Fist King finally removed his hand.

"You’ve bought yourself a little time," he said casually. "Not much. Half a month, maybe less if you’re careless."

Kael let out a rough breath, wiping his mouth as he slowly sat upright again. His body still felt heavy, still damaged, but the overwhelming sense of imminent collapse had eased just enough to think clearly.

"...That," he said after a moment, his voice hoarse but steadier than before, "is what you call treatment?"

The Fist King gave a short, dismissive hum.

"No," he replied. "That was me stopping you from dying on the spot."

The Fist King watched Kael steady his breathing for a moment longer before he finally moved, circling around him until he stood directly in front.

There was no urgency in his steps, no concern in his expression, just a quiet, measured look, as if he were examining a tool rather than a dying man.

"You felt it," he said, not as a question but as a statement. "That heat inside you. That pressure tearing you apart from the inside. That isn’t poison. It isn’t a curse. It’s you."

Kael frowned slightly, still catching his breath. "Doesn’t feel like something that belongs to me."

"That’s because your body isn’t worthy of it yet," the Fist King replied bluntly. "What you have is called the Nine Yang Destruction Body. In Murim, that’s not something people train for. It’s something they pray never to be born with."

He stepped closer, his shadow falling over Kael like a weight.

"Your body produces Yang energy, pure, violent, blazing internal force, at a rate that defies reason. For a normal martial artist, cultivating that kind of energy takes decades. For you, it’s there from the start... overflowing, uncontrolled, and with nowhere to go."

He tapped Kael’s chest lightly with two fingers.

"And since your body doesn’t know how to handle it, it’s doing the only thing it can, breaking itself apart trying to contain it."

Kael’s expression tightened slightly. "So I’m just... burning to death from the inside?"

"Slowly," the Fist King nodded. "Painfully. Inevitably. Your organs will fail first, then your meridians will collapse, and finally your body will tear itself apart trying to release what it can’t hold. What you felt earlier? That’s just the beginning."

He straightened, folding his arms.

Kael didn’t want to ask what Meridians were, after all, The Fist King seemed in an interruptive mood.

"To the so-called ’holy’ healers, you’re already dead. They wouldn’t even try to save you. At best, they’d dull your pain and wait for you to rot from the inside. That’s the same thing that merchant was going to do to you, sell you relief, not cure."

Kael let out a dry breath. "You’ve got a real talent for reassurance."

"I’m not here to reassure you," the Fist King said flatly. "I’m here to give you a choice. For the Second time, and the last time..."

He paused, then spoke again, his tone shifting slightly, less indifferent, more deliberate.

"I’ll teach you the Demon God’s Fist. Cheon-Ma-Gwon. That’s the only way you survive this."

Kael blinked once, then frowned. "Demon God...? That sounds like a terrible idea already. I mean, demon, horns, tails, tridents, hellfire... that kind of demon, right? The hell are we talking about man...I’m not signing up to grow horns and hooves or something."

The Fist King stared at him for a long second, then slowly raised a hand to rub his temples, the rough skin of his knuckles scraping faintly as he did.

"Kael," he said, his voice carrying the weight of someone already tired of explaining something obvious, "stop picturing nursery tales. Do you see horns on my head?"

Kael hesitated. "...No."

"Do you see a tail?"

"No."

"Then use your brain."

The Fist King stepped closer again, his presence pressing down in a way that made the air feel heavier.

"In Murim, ’Demon’ doesn’t mean evil. It means obsession. It means abandoning balance, abandoning moderation, and pursuing a single path to its absolute extreme. While monks seek harmony, we seek domination. While they preserve, we destroy. Not out of cruelty, but because destruction is a truth just as real as creation."

He reached down and grabbed Kael’s wrist, his grip firm, unmoving, like iron.

"You have the Nine Yang Destruction Body. Your internal energy isn’t gentle, it isn’t balanced, and it never will be. It’s violent. Explosive. Unforgiving. Trying to ’calm’ it like those so-called righteous fools would preach will only kill you faster."

His grip tightened slightly.

"But to the Demon God’s Fist... you are a perfect vessel A gold mine of opportunity and power. it is a cursed blessing, that I can tell you, but you get to choose which side..."

Kael’s eyes narrowed slightly despite himself.

"The ’God’ in its name," the Fist King continued, "isn’t about divinity. It’s about control. Absolute control. The kind of control where something that should destroy you instead becomes your weapon."

He released Kael’s wrist and gestured outward, toward the mountain around them.

"You don’t suppress your power. You don’t disperse it. You take that destruction inside you... and you compress it. You refine it. You force it into something so dense, so concentrated, that it no longer leaks, no longer burns you alive, but instead answers to you. Bends to you... Obey you..."