Knight-Errant
Without using light-footwork, Cheongwol made his way toward Chengdu in Sichuan at an even, unhurried pace—not too fast, not too slow.
The weight he had taken upon himself to avenge the Im family’s grievance.
The parting from those who were not bound to him by blood, yet had by now become no different from family.
And the tender ache of longing carried to him by the jade pendant his mother had left behind.
All those tangled feelings mixed together in his chest, leaving his mind in disarray.
But perhaps he had lingered too long in thought.
Before he knew it, the sun was tilting low, and Cheongwol was still stranded at the mountain’s edge.
I really don’t want to sleep outdoors...
He was just wondering whether he ought to use light-footwork now and race until he reached a village when several burly men appeared not far ahead.
"Though she is a woman, she has a sword at her side, so she must be a martial artist. There’s also the written notice from the main residence, and the sun’s already going down, so why don’t we just let her pass?"
"...Still, she’s a guest who went to the trouble of coming all this way. We ought to at least greet her properly."
The men exchanged a few muttered words while glancing at Cheongwol, then strode toward him.
"Halt. This is the territory of the Green Forest. Please state your identity and business, young lady."
A neatly dressed man who had identified himself as a Green Forest bandit stepped before Cheongwol and cautiously held out a hand.
"...?"
For a moment, Cheongwol could only stand there in blank confusion at their behavior, but then, as if something had suddenly come to him, his face brightened.
"Ah! Heroes of the Green Forest! That’s right, isn’t it?"
At Cheongwol’s completely unexpected reaction, the bandits looked at one another in silence.
"Yes, that’s... right, but..."
They had met a lone woman in the mountains, and yet she was reacting with such open delight.
In truth, Cheongwol was only glad to meet people he had heard about in stories from Unhak, but the bandits—battle-hardened from years of mountain robbery—immediately sensed that something was going very wrong.
To survive as bandits in an Orthodox region, especially in Sichuan, where the people were infamous for their viciousness, one had to be exceptionally skilled at choosing one’s targets.
And yet here was a lovely, youthful woman wandering a mountain path all alone until dusk, smiling happily at the sight of bandits.
We’re in trouble.
If we were going to get in trouble, we really should’ve gotten into the right kind of trouble.
As the huge man who seemed to be their chief grimaced, his already fearsome face twisted even more savagely.
They had already received a notice from the main residence warning them to be careful, since several promising Orthodox young experts had been roaming the area lately, and now they’d gone and caused this mess by acting rashly.
What was more, the woman showed not the slightest hostility toward them.
It was the kind of calm that only appeared when one simply didn’t consider them worth noticing at all.
...Even with our eyes open, we failed to judge her martial skill. We’re no different from blind men.
With a heavy sense of responsibility, the chief let out a low groan, and the faces of the bandits around him darkened as well.
But Cheongwol, knowing none of this, could no longer hide his excitement as he slipped a hand into his robes to fetch the toll fee.
"Just a moment. I actually prepared for this kind of situation in advance."
She prepared in advance for this kind of situation?
Prepared what, exactly?
Sensing a warning from his instincts more vivid than ever before, the chief bandit began to sweat buckets.
The martial artists of the Sichuan Tang Clan wore green garments and concealed poison and hidden weapons in their wide sleeves.
By contrast, the woman before him wore plain martial clothing, and even her sleeves weren’t particularly wide.
And yet, why?
Why did it feel as though, if he allowed that woman to take her hand out of her robes, the result would be something irreversible?
With a dry swallow, as though his throat were burning, the chief finally steeled himself.
"C-chief!"
"Fall back. If someone must bear the responsibility, then I alone am enough."
Were bandits, even bandits, capable of honor?
The chief sent his underlings back and approached Cheongwol with a rigid expression, then pleaded earnestly.
"Young heroine! Please, if someone must be blamed for failing to recognize a master, let it be me alone!"
"Huh? What are you..."
But before the chief could even kneel, someone shouted in a ringing voice and came running swiftly toward them.
"How dare bandits try to harass an innocent woman in Orthodox territory!"
Wondering what on earth that was supposed to mean, the chief turned his head and found a small dragon plunging down from the sky with the sunset at its back.
Its momentum was so ferocious that he could do nothing but squeeze his eyes shut.
-KWAANG!
A moment later, a thunderous roar shook the entire mountain.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
She had never intended to kill the bandits, but it was only after pushing off a tree and launching herself fiercely into the air that Ak Seo-ah realized the problem.
I put too much force into it. What do I do?
But once a surge of power had already been unleashed, there was no way to draw it back now.
If she did, the bandits might survive—but the backlash from forcing her inner energy would surely send her blood and qi into chaos.
And if she collapsed, who would rescue that woman from the bandits’ harassment?
The bandits’ lives and the woman’s life.
Which should come first was obvious.
So rather than pulling her force back, Ak Seo-ah instead drove her inner energy even higher, wrapping it around her entire body.
The sight was like that of a dragon with its jaws open, dropping from the heavens.
The secret spear technique of the Shandong Ak Family.
It was the instant Azure Dragon Sky-Subduing Spear was unleashed.
But just before the spearhead reached the bandits, a heavy, utterly unexpected shock traveled up the shaft and into her hand.
"Ugh...!"
Ak Seo-ah nearly lost her balance for a moment, but she twisted her body sharply in midair and barely managed to avoid crashing to the ground.
Which of those bandits, exactly, possessed martial skill profound enough to deflect her spear with such ease?
As the dust stirred by the impact slowly settled, the face of Ak Seo-ah, already taut with tension, gradually came into view.
"What in the world do you think you’re doing, attacking without warning?"
"...?"
Yet in a reversal that made all her tension feel absurd, the person standing in her way was not a bandit at all, but the very woman she had thought was being harassed only moments before.
Ak Seo-ah stared at her in bewilderment, then looked down at the bandits collapsed beside them, only to find that they too were shaking their heads with similarly stunned expressions.
"You almost got people seriously hurt."
The woman frowned slightly and brushed the dust from her shoulder.
Then she pointed at the bandits and began lecturing Ak Seo-ah as though scolding a child.
"The heroes of the Green Forest were breaking the mountain path open and even escorting you, and you go and do something like this over a few measly coins?"
At the woman’s rebuke, Ak Seo-ah hunched her shoulders before she realized it and stammered in a shrinking voice.
"I-I swear it wasn’t because I was stingy with money..."
The bandits, listening quietly at her side, only grew more frightened, thinking Cheongwol was mocking them.
But Cheongwol, unaware of that, only continued speaking.
"Then why did you do it?"
"That is..."
She had only meant to help a woman in distress, and yet why was she being treated like a villain?
Unable to suppress the surge of indignation rising in her chest, Ak Seo-ah lifted her spear and slammed its butt into the ground hard enough for everyone to hear.
As all eyes turned to her, she drew a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and declared proudly,
"I am the eldest daughter of the Shandong Ak Family, Ak Seo-ah! I admire the knight-errants who uphold righteousness and chivalry, and though I am still lacking, I follow that ideal with all my heart!"
At Ak Seo-ah’s bold, unrestrained proclamation, the chief bandit and the others could only clearly understand one thing.
From this day onward, their bandit life in Sichuan was over.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
"You really are just going to leave? My senior brother said to at least give it to you if possible..."
Cheongwol looked reluctant and reached into his robes again, but the chief bandit hurriedly waved both hands.
"No, no. The fact that you saved our lives is already more than enough grace for us. Isn’t that right?"
At the chief’s question, the bandits standing behind him nodded enthusiastically.
"Yes! That’s right!"
"Absolutely!"
Seemingly pleased by their booming response, the chief looked at Cheongwol with an awkward smile.
"Then... if you’ll allow it, we’ll take our leave now."
Cheongwol tilted his head, looking slightly puzzled.
"Why are you asking me for permission?"
Apparently taking that as, I’m not interested in you anymore, so stop bothering me and get lost, the bandits took off without even looking back.
"...Do you have urgent business somewhere?"
Watching their backs until they became tiny dots in the distance, Cheongwol turned to Ak Seo-ah.
Her hair had been tied high in a neat attempt at composure, but her bangs were tousled and unruly.
She claimed to admire knight-errants, yet her eyes and the curve of her mouth looked as if she might cause trouble at any moment.
And the graceful contours that revealed her as a woman naturally drew Cheongwol’s gaze.
What am I even doing right now?
With a face growing hot from embarrassment, Cheongwol averted his eyes, only for Ak Seo-ah to hurry up to him with sparkling eyes.
"O-oh... a knight-errant! You’re a knight-errant too!"
"...What?"
"There’s no need to be shy! This one saw it clearly with her own eyes!"
Ak Seo-ah seized Cheongwol’s hand with both of hers, excitement shining all over her face.
"Even though you’re strong, you still didn’t bully the bandits into taking your toll! Not flaunting one’s strength recklessly—that is the very foundation of a knight-errant!"
It seemed she had mistaken something badly, but before Cheongwol could even object, Ak Seo-ah rushed on in a heated voice.
"And on top of that, you threw yourself into danger to save the bandits’ lives, then let them go without asking for anything in return! If that isn’t a knight-errant, then what is?"
"..."
"Seeing you like this makes me feel terribly ashamed for having thought of taking the lives of bandits so lightly, even if they are bandits."
Back when he had listened to his grandfather speak of the knight-errants of the Central Plains, had he looked at them with eyes this bright as well?
At the sight of Ak Seo-ah, who reminded him of his younger self, Cheongwol could only give a helpless grin.
"...Anyone who calls himself a knight-errant is no true knight-errant."