No Longer an Extra
Me?
Once the party had returned to the inn, they went to wash before setting out. The aftermath of battle had left them steeped in the raw stink of sweat and blood.
While they bathed, Ham Cheon-yeong recounted to those who had remained behind everything that had unfolded at the Soyo Martial Arts Hall.
"I never would have imagined it."
Everyone listened in astonishment. The incident itself had been a string of reversals, and the more they heard, the greater their shock grew.
"If I'd been there, I'd have killed that Pyo Seon bastard on the spot."
Kang Chu-mi fumed as if she had been standing in the hall herself.
Yu Seong had no interest in their conversation. He had glued himself to Jeong Geum-sik's side instead.
"Mister, please teach me how to talk to animals."
Having spent nearly his whole life in the mountains, Yu Seong had grown up close to wild beasts, and the idea of communing with them fascinated him.
"That's not an easy thing. It takes a great deal of study."
"I don't care if it's hard. I'm sure I can learn."
"Wanting it isn't enough. You need inner energy, the way martial artists do, or it isn't possible."
Jeong Geum-sik answered with uncharacteristic patience. Had it been an ordinary child, he would have refused coldly and driven them off. But this was Sanho-ong's grandson — a child even Jeong Geum-sik himself was not sure he could handle.
"I'll teach you once you've gained inner energy of your own."
Yu Seong was not the sort of child to throw a tantrum over it. He understood.
"Okay. Then it's a promise."
"All right, all right."
Jeong Geum-sik agreed without a second thought. Once they parted ways at Seokcheon, he did not expect to see the boy again.
Dokgo Ho-in and Kang Chu-mi were still clustered around Ham Cheon-yeong, hanging on every detail of the Soyo Martial Arts Hall.
"So Big Brother caught Pyo Seon and saved the hall master's daughter. That's our Big Brother for you."
Dokgo Ho-in's eyes shone with open admiration as he listened.
Jang Hyeon-nam had gone to bathe, and the others were each absorbed in their own affairs, which left Seo Joo-cheon alone in his room. He had used washing as an excuse to slip inside — and in his hand was a bronze mirror.
At the Soyo Martial Arts Hall he had caught his own reflection and tried to run a Character Search, only for Jeong Geum-sik to interrupt him. He had been forced to wait until they reached the inn.
If Jang Hyeon-nam had learned the Southern Splendor Immortal Art, would he have fallen to demonic qi the way Pyo Seon and Jang Hong did?
He had turned the question over and over on the ride back. Pyo Seon, Jang Hong, and her senior brother Gong Myeong had all been Orthodox martial artists. The idea that they would slip into demonic deviation simply because they had practiced the Southern Splendor Immortal Art and taken an elixir beyond their level was a setting that, no matter how he looked at it, refused to make sense.
Hypothesis after hypothesis, thought after thought — and at last he arrived at a single conclusion.
This reeks of a plot that was always meant to drag Jang Hyeon-nam into demonic qi.
Had he handed the Southern Splendor Immortal Art to Jang Hyeon-nam without ever learning of this incident, he could not even imagine what would have followed. A demon worse than Pyo Seon might well have been born.
Stories I never wrote are spawning on their own. This is a setting that could not exist unless someone deliberately intervened.
The incident sent him tracing back every discrepancy he had stumbled over since arriving here — starting with the fact that he had fallen into the world of his own novel at all.
At first I thought the world of my work had simply drifted a little from the page. But looking at it now, it could never have warped this strangely unless someone had put their hands on the manuscript itself. After I died in that accident, someone else took over my work. No wonder the historical backdrop suddenly became the Ming Dynasty. It didn't arise naturally — it was an author's intervention.
The thought that followed came at once: Hong Seok-hun might have handed his novel to another writer to revise and serialize. Hong Seok-hun was exactly the kind of man who would do it.
Seo Joo-cheon decided to run a Character Search on himself. Until now he had never felt the need to search Po Un — but if he wanted to prove his hypothesis, he had to.
If I look at my face in the bronze mirror and activate Character Search, will it actually work?
He gazed quietly down at the tense face in the bronze. Inner energy gathered in his eyes, and he triggered the search. Beneath the reflected face, a record began to flow.
Seo Joo-cheon read the record and nodded. It was exactly as he had written it. For a minor extra among extras, destined to die at the protagonist's hands, a profile this long was actually on the lengthy side.
Then, as his eyes traveled downward, he jerked his chin back in shock.
"What is this?"
A single word clung to the end of the record. Modified.
Seo Joo-cheon stared at the rewritten record and could not close his mouth.
New content has been inserted into Po Un's profile. Did it change because I synchronized with him? Or did a new author revise it and make it this way?
Chaos. Confusion. His mind was both at once. He thought for a moment, then shook his head.
Whatever it is, it doesn't matter. I'm not a character who moves according to a script — I'm a human being with free will. Whatever this is, I won't be swept along by it.
He steadied himself and drew a deep breath.
Even if this is a created world, it has no choice but to change because of me and my free will. That's probably why that free will has been affecting everyone around me. Why Sang Ryo is alive and following Jang Hyeon-nam. Why the Shaanxi Four Fiends became the Shaanxi Four Chivalrous Heroes.
Come to think of it, ending up in a fight with the Undying Demon would have been impossible for a supporting character. Driving him off, even more so. His various abilities had played their part, of course — but the fact that Seo Joo-cheon, an extra, had taken on that role while the protagonist stood to the side meant he had already been caught in a changed scenario.
None of it had existed in the original work.
And now I've become a protagonist-level character. That means I have more than enough power to change everything.
If he wanted to become a true lead, Seo Joo-cheon realized, he would have to start acting with far greater autonomy than before.
When he stepped out of the room, Jang Hyeon-nam and the others had already finished preparing to leave and were waiting for him. More time had passed in that guest room than he had thought.
The whole party was seated at the table. As Seo Joo-cheon approached, Jang Hyeon-nam rose.
"Sit over here, Hyung-nim. Before we leave, I'd like to tell everyone that we've become sworn brothers. Is that all right?"
Lost in his own thoughts, Seo Joo-cheon had completely forgotten that he and Jang Hyeon-nam had sworn brotherhood.
"Of course."
"For now we'll announce it here, and when we return to the clan, we'll hold a proper ceremony."
Seo Joo-cheon smiled.
"Little brother, that kind of ceremony doesn't mean much to us. Not to two people who've crossed the line between life and death together."
Jang Hyeon-nam's face filled with emotion. He surged to his feet and cupped his fists in a martial salute.
"That's our Hyung-nim. This younger brother is always learning from you."
"You flatter me. I'm more worried that association with me will set tongues wagging about you."
The Jang Clan was a merchant-martial house, but a prestigious clan all the same. If an heir of such a family had sworn brotherhood with a mere Unorthodox martial artist, gossip was inevitable.
"Hahaha, Hyung-nim. My father has sworn brotherhood with any number of Unorthodox and Black Path martial artists. And not a single person has used that against him."
Seo Joo-cheon smiled again.
"That's because every one of those sworn brothers was a renowned master, isn't it? Who would dare gossip about famous veterans of the Jianghu? But this older brother is Unorthodox, and a nobody at the bottom of the ladder. That's what worries me."
Jang Hyeon-nam's expression turned grave.
"What are you saying? You're the one who faced the Undying Demon and drove him off without flinching! Who would dare call you lowly?"
"I'm grateful you think of me that way."
Jang Hyeon-nam had grown too heated. Seo Joo-cheon answered evenly, easing him back down.
"Everyone here can bear witness that we are sworn brothers."
The others all nodded.
"Congratulations to you both on becoming sworn brothers."
Sanho-ong Hak Yu spoke with genuine delight.
"Congratulations."
Yu Seong was as happy as if it were his own affair — the two people he liked best had become brothers.
"I offer my congratulations as well."
Jeong Geum-sik added his own.
Ham Cheon-yeong, Dokgo Ho-in, and Kang Chu-mi rose and turned to Seo Joo-cheon.
"Big Brother, congratulations on gaining a new brother."
"Thank you. Come to think of it, little brother Hyeon-nam is the youngest among us, so he's become a brother to these siblings I think of as my own flesh and blood as well."
"Of course. Your younger siblings are my siblings too. From now on I'll honor you all as older brothers and older sister."
A smile spread across Kang Chu-mi's face.
"Even if we can't travel together, I'll think of you as a little brother too."
"Thank you, Noonim. I'm truly glad to have such a beautiful and virtuous woman as my older sister."
Dokgo Ho-in threw his head back and laughed.
"Hahahaha! Our little brother already knows how to please the Fourth!"
"It's the truth. The truth. I'm speaking the truth."
"By becoming sworn brothers with Hyung-nim, I've gained two extra older brothers and an older sister on top of it. This younger brother is truly happy."
There was nothing but sincerity in Jang Hyeon-nam's voice.
"Honestly, from the first moment I met you, Hyung-nim, you somehow didn't feel like a stranger. I kept being drawn to you — this strange sense of closeness. I'd never felt anything like it in my life. I've always been shy around new people; I don't warm up to strangers easily."
Seo Joo-cheon could explain his own affection easily enough — Jang Hyeon-nam was a character he had created. But that Jang Hyeon-nam had felt the same thing toward him… it felt like fate.
"We felt strangely attached to you too, little brother. That's why our Big Brother doted on you so much. We were almost jealous."
Kang Chu-mi added, and Ham Cheon-yeong and Dokgo Ho-in both nodded. Watching their Big Brother fuss over Jang Hyeon-nam had, more than once, stirred something uncomfortably like envy.
"Even if we can't stay together, my older brothers and older sister will always have a place in my heart."
Jeong Geum-sik welcomed the sworn brotherhood with genuine pleasure.
Getting along with a descendant of the Jang Clan is a good thing. It'll be a source of strength on the path we have to walk.
His reasons for liking it were not quite the same as everyone else's — but he liked it all the same.
Before they left the inn, they looked over the wounds taken in the fight against the Undying Demon. Jang Hyeon-nam's injuries had improved a great deal, and Sang Ryo's had healed enough that they were no longer a concern.
On horseback, bound for Seokcheon, Seo Joo-cheon sank so deep into thought he nearly fell from the saddle. Even then, the thoughts would not stop.
Becoming a protagonist-level character means from now on I have to actively investigate events and drive them forward myself.
When you wrote a novel, a passive protagonist made every incident and episode timid and frustrating. It was one of the patterns readers hated most. Only when the lead took charge of the story could anyone feel that satisfying rush of watching him win.
If Po Un was now a protagonist-caliber figure, Seo Joo-cheon realized, he would have to act far more aggressively than he had until now.
Even if another author is tampering with my work, they won't touch the main framework — just the small details. The Invincible Secular Disciple is already a completed novel, after all.
If he himself were revising someone else's book, he would leave the skeleton standing and only trim the branches to suit his own taste.
Still, I should stay a little tense. If another author inserts new episodes, the story will run in directions I don't know.
When he had known his own work completely, there had been no fear. He could roughly predict how events would unfold. Now even a small change could transform characters and incidents into something entirely different, and that kept him on edge.
Hak Yu, by contrast, shed tension with every mile that brought them closer to Seokcheon.
I've been on constant alert in case the Slaughter King's men attacked again. I can finally relax a little.
He gazed quietly at Yu Seong, who slept soundly at his side.