Chapter 125
Chapter 125
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 125
Chapter Title: Emerging from Seclusion
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“Full moon?”
It hadn’t been as long as he’d thought. Wi Seong-cheon mulled this over as he tore into a chicken leg.
Hwangbo Seong-u, seated across from him, stared with a look of utter dismay.
Only a mere fifteen days had passed. Yet Wi Seong-cheon’s appearance was beyond description.
His cheeks were sunken in, dark circles bruised the skin under his eyes, and his muscles had withered away to leave him gaunt and skeletal.
If you judged by looks alone, it seemed like years had gone by, not a fortnight.
“……What the hell have you been doing?”
“Not eating, not drinking, not sleeping.”
Wi Seong-cheon replied as if it were nothing. Hwangbo Seong-u frowned at the words.
That much was obvious just from looking. But could a few days without food or drink really change a man so drastically?
‘……And…… something…….’
The feeling was strange.
Even sitting right across from him, gnawing on a chicken leg, the sense of distance was unclear. He felt closer somehow, yet at the same time more distant.
Hwangbo Seong-u peered intently into Wi Seong-cheon’s eyes.
Fatigue had blackened the skin beneath them, but his irises gleamed with sharp intensity.
“What’re you staring at?”
“Nothing.”
Hwangbo Seong-u spat the words and rose to his feet.
He swallowed the chicken bone he’d been crunching with a grimace and headed back to the training cave.
He’d thought he was deeply immersed in his cultivation, but seeing Wi Seong-cheon made his own efforts feel half-hearted.
“Urk.”
Only after cleanly stripping several chickens down to the bone did Wi Seong-cheon finally stand.
The steward who had brought the chickens was nowhere in sight, but Wi Seong-cheon bowed politely toward the entrance of the training cave anyway.
Then he reentered.
Hwangbo Seong-u had sensed the change in him, and Wi Seong-cheon was aware of it himself. He hadn’t grasped it clearly, but he felt his ethereal body had stabilized a bit more.
Moving felt different from before. It was deliberate motion, yet his thoughts and actions merged as one.
It meant he could now consciously unleash the reaction speed that had always come unconsciously.
‘Light.’
He’d noticed the change in his body upon waking from deep sleep. His ethereal body had stabilized, and flesh and ethereal form had begun to overlap to some degree.
But they hadn’t fully integrated. He’d pushed his body to the brink, forcibly awakening his innate qi to merge ethereal body and flesh, but qi itself was excluded from that union.
Wi Seong-cheon hadn’t yet perfected Spirit Ignition. He’d only taken a few steps forward.
Yet he felt no disappointment. He’d never expected to grasp the key to Spirit Ignition in just days, let alone complete it.
“Step by step.”
Wi Seong-cheon murmured as he sat on the stone bed and began circulating his qi.
The change wasn’t limited to his movements. With heightened reaction speed, the flow of his inner energy had quickened too.
This was in a normal state—what if he layered on Reversal and Spirit Ignition? No need to even wonder.
‘It hasn’t changed.’
He’d simply become aware of it.
He’d always possessed an ethereal body and had been using it clumsily all along.
He’d had it but couldn’t wield it consciously. Now he knew how.
After completing his Grand Heavenly Circuit, Wi Seong-cheon stood. He shoved the stone bed aside roughly and manipulated the mechanism.
When sight is blocked, the other senses sharpen.
The blind compensate for lost vision by hearing better, smelling better, and feeling more through their skin.
The moment his vision was cut off, Wi Seong-cheon’s senses sharpened instinctively, even though he wasn’t blind.
Then he amplified them further.
Wi Seong-cheon swallowed unconsciously. His senses went berserk. Was he standing or had he fallen?
He thought he was still, but pain like being pummeled assaulted him. His body instinctively shrank back.
‘One by one…….’
His eyes saw nothing, but he squeezed them shut anyway. At the same time, he focused his mind.
He sorted through the rampaging senses, one by one. It was training he’d done before.
When he first began martial arts, he learned the types of pain. In Cheonhwa Sect’s bare-handed techniques, pain must never be feared.
Remember the varieties of pain, distinguish them. It was also training to hone tactile sensitivity.
It felt like revisiting his childhood drills, and Wi Seong-cheon chuckled softly.
He distinguished the sensations. It wasn’t just pain. There was itching, stabbing, stinging, aching, burning, chilling……
Where and how.
Knees, elbows, armpits, toes. Flanks. He separated and categorized each sensation from every part of his body. The sensations kept shifting.
He distinguished the changes anew, and before he could, they shifted again, pushing the act of “feeling” beyond its limits.
His sensory edge sharpened. Once accustomed to distinguishing, Wi Seong-cheon’s face settled into calm.
This much was familiar from childhood, so it wasn’t too hard.
What came next was uncharted territory.
Thud!
Wi Seong-cheon’s foot struck the ground. His eyes were still closed, and there was no reason for him to leap sideways.
But he did.
Pain had flared in his flank.
He leaped, then immediately used Thousand Jin Drop to plummet downward. He rolled on the spot, snapped back up, let his left shoulder droop, and twisted his waist sharply.
Until now, Wi Seong-cheon had stood motionless, merely distinguishing sensations.
The same held true. He distinguished while yielding to them without resistance. His body loosened and tensed in cycles.
From Heavy-Light Reality Position’s release of power, he instantly tensed into Unyielding Mind’s rigid body.
It was identical to flowing endlessly against invisible strikes.
Yes, the attacks were invisible. They didn’t exist in the first place. What Wi Seong-cheon countered and flowed with were his own “senses,” hypersensitized by the Mysterious Phantom Steps Array—not actual strikes.
In other words, he was fighting himself.
The cycle repeated. He couldn’t respond to everything.
Sensations came from his entire body. He prioritized them.
From strongest to weakest. And once that grew familiar, he reversed it.
From weakest to strongest.
Picking out the “weakest” sensation amid those assaulting his whole body was no easy task.
If you pinched and twisted the inside of one thigh, then the other, the natural response is to just feel leg pain or prioritize the harder twist.
But Wi Seong-cheon didn’t. He meticulously gauged pain intensity, identified the faintest, and moved accordingly.
His movements slowed to a crawl as a result. But he moved with precision.
Slowly, slowly.
Wi Seong-cheon kept moving without pause.
“Urgh!”
Until he vomited.
Fifteen days more had passed—right about time, he figured.
Lowering the amplification he’d held for the full fortnight, his senses returned to “normal.”
The sensation felt profoundly alien. He staggered and collapsed onto the spot.
But he wasn’t as exhausted as after the first fifteen days.
He’d repeated qi circulation, snatched bits of sleep here and there, eaten wall grain pills, and drunk water.
All while shrouded in pitch darkness, senses raging wildly.
He’d thought he could never get used to it……
“I got used to it.”
Wi Seong-cheon murmured, steadying his breath. Once calm enough, he stood.
Had seeing with his eyes always felt this awkward?
The thought crossed his mind.
He’d clung only to his rampaging senses in total blackness. Now everything was back to normal, yet it felt deeply uncomfortable.
Wi Seong-cheon rubbed his aching eyes and sat on the stone bed.
He finished qi circulation and was about to head out when—
Knock knock!
Someone pounded on the sealed iron door.
Wi Seong-cheon opened it calmly.
“I figured it was about time.”
Wi Seong-cheon said with a grin.
Seo Il pitied the sight of Wi Seong-cheon’s emaciated frame. Without a word, he patted his shoulder.
“It’s a training cave, sure, but you don’t need to push yourself that harshly.”
“Since I’m in here, might as well do what only this place allows.”
“Don’t overdo it.”
“Psh, gotta overdo it. Wouldn’t wanna come back here ever again.”
Wi Seong-cheon replied with a grin.
He meant it. Holing up in an empty cave for training was boring and grueling.
If possible, he never wanted to enter the training cave again.
“Can I come in?”
“It’s not my house—what permission do you need?”
Wi Seong-cheon spun around with a chuckle and led the way inside.
Seo Il’s visit was, of course, for the grade evaluation’s written exam.
He plunked down thick stacks of test papers in front of Wi Seong-cheon and handed over a prepared brush and ink.
“If I ask about something I don’t know midway, you’ll tell me, right?”
“As if.”
[Even via transmission?]
[Absolutely not.]
Seo Il was strict about this. Wi Seong-cheon chuckled and looked down at the test paper.
Good thing he’d paid attention in class. Nothing was completely unknown, and the iffy ones he answered by feel.
Seo Il marveled at how Wi Seong-cheon wrote answers without hesitation.
“You’re actually getting them right?”
“Of course. I paid attention in class.”
Wi Seong-cheon shoved the finished paper aside and moved to the next.
“How’re the others doing?”
“Professors say Paeng Yeon-hwa’s enthusiasm for class has shot up. Bang Jun’s reluctant but working harder than before.”
“Must be thanks to the Weirdo Crew. Oh, about the sparring evaluation opponent—I picked one.”
“Who?”
“Bi Yeon’s Sang Irin.”
Wi Seong-cheon grinned as he answered.
Seo Il wasn’t surprised. Wi Seong-cheon had already beaten Kwon-gol Hwangbo Seong-u and Little Buddha Jin-u.
He’d lost to Geom-bong U Ha-yeon, but he’d taken down two of the Dragon Peaks already.
“That’s unexpected.”
“What is?”
What’s unexpected when you’re not even fazed? Wi Seong-cheon glanced up at Seo Il.
“I thought you’d pick Mu Yeon-jun.”
“Hmm, I considered it. But I don’t think I can beat him yet.”
Wi Seong-cheon answered honestly.
“Actually, the academy students have all picked their sparring opponents already.”
Seo Il said.
“Paeng Yeong-hwa picked Hwangbo Seong-u, Bang Jun picked Yeong So-jin. Dang Hee-ran picked Ha Ji-tae.”
“And Mu Yeon-jun?”
“He picked you.”
Wi Seong-cheon’s brush paused.
“I can refuse, right?”
“Yes, picking doesn’t force the match.”
“Bang Jun picking Yeong So-jin—hmm, wants an easy win?”
“Paeng Yeon-hwa picking Hwangbo Seong-u isn’t surprising?”
“I figured she might.”
Same with Mu Yeon-jun picking him.
He’d half-expected it.
But Wi Seong-cheon had no intention of accepting Mu Yeon-jun’s challenge yet.
“Then I’ll fight Sang Irin. She said she’d pick me too.”
“Likely. Mu Yeon-jun will face whoever’s left without an opponent.”
“Whoever it is, poor guy.”
“No helping it. No one else will pick Mu Yeon-jun.”
Seo Il smiled wryly.
“And while you were in the training cave, next year’s academy schedule was announced.”
“Anything special?”
“An exchange with the Black Forest.”
Wi Seong-cheon blinked at Seo Il.
Seo Il continued slowly.
“Top class from each grade, seven per year—thirty-two in total. They’ll head to the Black Forest once next semester starts.”
“……I’ll go too?”
“Probably. If you make top class, Wi Seong-cheon.”
“What do we do there?”
“Not sure, but they’ll stay until semester’s end. Next semester, Black Forest will select students to send to Uicheon Academy.”
“What about demon beast subjugations?”
“With seven top-class students gone per grade, professors will have to handle it. No big issue.”
“Black Forest…… that’s in Gangdong, right?”
“Yes.”
Gangdong. The southernmost tip of the Central Plains.
Wi Seong-cheon chuckled and flipped the test paper.
“First time seeing the ocean, then.”
Gangdong had the Black Forest, the sea.
And the Black Death Society.