A Breath Shared in the Abyss
Splash—
Water cold as ice carved into every wound on his body. For an instant, his breath stopped, and darkness black as ink swallowed him from all sides along with a crushing water pressure. Ouyang Qiangang circulated his internal energy desperately, refusing to lose consciousness.
And then it happened. A powerful current dragged them deeper, toward the bottom of the pond. Helpless against the surging water, Ouyang Qiangang caught sight of it—beyond clumps of moss giving off a faint glow, a pitch-black hole yawned open. It was an underwater cavern leading outside, like the abyss itself opening its maw.
That's the only way!
He wrapped his arm firmly around Heo Cho-ryeong's waist and shot Geum Wang a meaningful glance. Entrusting their bodies to the violent current, the group was sucked into the darkness of the cavern, which seemed to devour every last trace of light.
Time crawled through the dark waterway. Thanks to the help of the spirit beast Geum Wang and Akasha, Ouyang Qiangang had no trouble breathing and could hold out. But for Heo Cho-ryeong, it was another matter entirely.
Mmph...!
As the moments stretched on without a breath of air, her lungs began to scream with burning agony. No matter how much internal energy she used to endure, no human body could hold its breath this long. Her vision blurred at the edges, and her consciousness began to drift.
Geum Wang, clinging to Ouyang Qiangang's shoulder, realized her condition was dire and made frantic gestures. Then, cutting through the silence of the ink-black water, Ouyang Qiangang's clear voice sounded directly in Heo Cho-ryeong's ear.
"Sister, stay with me. From now on, I'm going to breathe for you—so don't be alarmed, and close your eyes. You have to trust me."
What he employed was the Secret Sound Transmission, a technique that converted qi into sound, carrying it to one specific person alone. Heo Cho-ryeong was startled, but in this desperate, life-or-death situation, there was no choice but to trust him. Quietly, she closed her eyes.
At once, she felt a cold yet soft sensation against her lips.
"Open your mouth."
The moment she parted her lips, fresh air flooded deep into her lungs. Her fading consciousness sharpened back into clarity.
But the kiss did not end with just one. The undersea cavern was simply too long. And with each repeated kiss, Heo Cho-ryeong's heart began to race wildly—for an entirely different reason. The first kiss had been a desperate act, done purely for survival. But as the second and third followed, something in the situation shifted, subtly and inexorably.
Strange as it was—exchanging body heat and breath in the darkness—it wove an unfamiliar, delicate tension between the two of them that had never existed before. Heo Cho-ryeong could no longer see Ouyang Qiangang as merely her martial uncle's son. In the sight of him kissing her without a moment's hesitation to save her life, she felt the fierce, unyielding will of a man determined to protect her. Her cheeks burned hot, even in the freezing water cold enough to sting.
Before they could fully escape the undersea cavern, the two were forced to repeat those desperate kisses more than a dozen times.
By the time more than an hour had passed, a thread of light finally appeared ahead. The end of the undersea cavern. The pair, emerging from the tunnel, surged upward with the last of their strength and broke the surface.
Splash—
"Kahh! Cough, cough!"
"Hahh..."
They had come out beneath a sheer cliff on Dayangsan Island, in a place where nothing could be heard but the sound of waves. The cold pre-dawn air drove deep into their lungs along with the breath that burst out of them. Heo Cho-ryeong and Ouyang Qiangang leaned against each other for a while, surrendering to the swells as they heaved for air. All around them, the world was still sunk in deep blue darkness before the dawn.
When her senses returned, Heo Cho-ryeong started in shock and pulled away from his embrace. Her face was flushed so red it was visible even in the dark.
Just then, Geum Wang shrieked and pointed at something. Kki-ek! Kki-ek!
Ouyang Qiangang and Heo Cho-ryeong followed the creature's fingertip to a small dot, swaying on the waves of the shoreline beneath the cliff. It was a single small fishing boat, and atop it stood a shadow, utterly motionless like a waiting-wife's stone, gazing out at the island. It was Hwang Nodae.
He had been keeping a sleepless vigil through the night, all alone, for his lord—whose return, in the midst of the ink-black darkness and the boundless sea, was far from certain. The moment they saw that devoted figure, warmth flooded Ouyang Qiangang's and Heo Cho-ryeong's chests, and relief washed over them. Geum Wang, too, seemed reassured; with a cheerful face, it burrowed into Heo Cho-ryeong's arms.
As the two swam to within a dozen jang of the boat, Hwang Nodae spotted them and rowed over at a desperate pace. "Young Master! You are safe!"
He studied Ouyang Qiangang's complexion as the young man climbed aboard—and suddenly sucked in a sharp breath. "Young Master... your appearance...!"
He could not even finish the sentence, and astonishment was written plainly across his eyes. It had been barely two days since they'd parted. Yet Ouyang Qiangang now stood before him, every trace of sickness gone, transformed into a healthy, strikingly handsome youth of peerless beauty. Anyone not shocked would have been the strange one.
Ouyang Qiangang smiled calmly. "We had good fortune, Hwang Nodae. There was a fortuitous encounter on the island."
He gave Hwang Nodae a brief account: that they had discovered the Ten-Thousand-Year Cold Jade and a spirit elixir; that they had been attacked by an unidentified masked figure; that they had fallen into the cavern beneath Sand Rock Peak and made their way out. As for the golden monkey perched on his shoulder, he introduced it simply as a friend he had made underground.
The legacy of the Ghost Water Divine Secret, and the sword scar on that wall—not yet. A secret that vast only invites needless suspicion and danger. The Cold Jade and the elixir are more than enough for now.
Having escaped Dayangsan Island, the group avoided the fishing village and moored at a quiet cove a dozen li away. Carrying a spirit elixir, a secret manual, and a spirit beast, they decided drawing human eyes would bring nothing good. Then they returned at once to Bamboo Forest Manor.
When Heo Il-bi opened the door of his study and saw the transformed Ouyang Qiangang stepping in alongside his daughter, he nearly dropped the teacup in his hand. Eyes gone wide as saucers, he shot to his feet. "Gang-ah... what in the world happened to you?"
Seated across from him, Ouyang Qiangang repeated the same account he had given Hwang Nodae. Heo Il-bi wore the expression of a man who wanted to press for more, but sensing that Ouyang Qiangang was keeping something back, he chose not to dig further. He resolved to trust this extraordinary martial nephew of his and wait.
His gaze drifted, almost without his noticing, to his daughter—whose eyes had not left Ouyang Qiangang. Heo Il-bi caught it: the look in her eyes as she watched him held no pity or concern, but a complicated, deep emotion—the kind one directs at a man. It worried him, but true to his years as a seasoned veteran of the murim who had weathered every sort of storm, he decided to pretend he hadn't noticed.
Ouyang Qiangang drew a jade case from his robe and lifted the lid. Seeing the jade wreathed in an aura of cold, Heo Il-bi let out a long breath. "Is this truly the Ten-Thousand-Year Cold Jade?"
"It is, Uncle."
"Put it away. I fear what others might see."
"Yes."
Watching Ouyang Qiangang tuck the jade case back into his robe, Heo Il-bi asked, "What are your plans from here?"
Ouyang Qiangang answered in an even tone. "Starting tomorrow, I intend to begin crafting the storage vessels for the Pure Yin Qi Condenser. At the same time, I will run production of the Yang Dragon Pills in parallel."
"That's too much, Gang-ah." Heo Il-bi's face clouded with worry. "It's been barely a day since you came back from that brutal ordeal on Dayangsan Island. You may have gained a fortuitous encounter, but your body still suffers from the Nine Yin Severed Meridians. Juggling alchemy and the crafting of the apparatus—two grueling tasks at once—will strain you far too heavily."
Ouyang Qiangang shook his head. "I'll be fine, Uncle. No one knows my own body better than I do."
Sensing it would be difficult to break his resolve, Heo Il-bi swallowed a sigh and nodded. "If that's how it must be, I won't stop you any further. But you must promise this old uncle you will never push yourself beyond your limits."
"I promise. And there is something else I must tell you."
"What is it?"
Ouyang Qiangang's expression hardened. "The masked man who tried to kill Sister and me on Sand Rock Peak of Dayangsan Island."
Fury kindled in Heo Il-bi's eyes, and his brows rose. "Do you know who he was?"
"He wore a mask, so his identity was impossible to determine. Most likely, he doesn't know who we are either."
"Hmm..."
"He was a formidable master. If he ever traces our movements, needless turmoil could fall on you and Sister. If possible, it would be best for Sister to refrain from going out for the time being."
He added, "As for me, I won't be leaving the estate anyway for a while, given the pill production and the equipment work."
Heo Il-bi nodded with a grave face. "Understood. The masked man most likely came after the divine weapon of Sand Rock Peak. If so, the odds that he will keep hunting you are not high."
"Why do you think so?"
"Because the divine weapon affair has already been concluded."
"I'm sorry?"
Ouyang Qiangang pressed on, puzzled. "Greed for things beyond this world—a divine weapon, a secret manual, a spirit elixir—does not die down so easily, from what I understand. How can it already be over? Has the divine weapon found its owner?"
Heo Il-bi nodded as he replied, "Now that I think of it, you two spent those two days all but imprisoned underground—you wouldn't know how it all ended." He gave a wry smile and went on. "Heh heh. The whole affair ended as nothing more than a futile farce. That's the murim for you—always has been. One worthless rumor, and hundreds bleed for it."
Ouyang Qiangang's eyes sharpened as the meaning landed at once. "Then you're saying the divine weapon that erupted in the Seven-Colored Treasure Light was a fake?"
"How did you—"
"Something about the scene struck me as off."
"Hmm... well, yes, you're right." Heo Il-bi nodded and continued. "The one who finally took hold of the jade case said to contain the treasure on Sand Rock Peak was Namgung Pung of the Namgung Clan—the Divine Sword of the Eight Directions."
It was a fact Ouyang Qiangang already knew, but he listened in silence. "The enraged warriors pursued him fiercely, and fearing a bloodbath was about to break out, Namgung Pung unveiled the jade case before the assembled crowd under the protection of the Namgung Clan and the Mount Wudang Sect."
"If the divine weapon was a fake... then what was inside the case?"
Clicking his tongue, Heo Il-bi answered. "Inside, in place of a divine weapon, was nothing but an ingeniously built mechanical device—one that, when triggered, would amplify the light of a rare luminous stone tens of thousands of times over and shoot it into the sky. Someone had played a very malicious prank."
Most of the disappointed warriors had slunk away in hollow defeat, each returning to his own sect, and so the uproar over Dayangsan Island came to a laughably anticlimactic end. That said, he recounted, the relatives and comrades of the martial artists who had died on Sand Rock Peak were sharpening their blades of vengeance, hunting like men possessed for the culprit behind the whole affair.
Ouyang Qiangang quietly closed his eyes. So my guess was right. The divine weapon never existed in the first place. The entire thing was an elaborate play staged by someone for a specific purpose. And that purpose... was to kill those men at the summit, one by one.
When the conversation was over, Ouyang Qiangang and Heo Cho-ryeong left Heo Il-bi's study. At the door, Ouyang Qiangang turned to Geum Wang. "Geum Wang, will you stay with Sister from now on?"
Geum Wang, nestled in Heo Cho-ryeong's arms, nodded vigorously at him and waved its hands in a sweeping gesture that clearly said, go away already. An unmistakable declaration: I don't like men. The creature made a show of snuggling deeper into Heo Cho-ryeong's embrace and, rubbing its cheek against hers, drifted off with her.
Ouyang Qiangang couldn't help laughing at the sight, despite himself.