The Expert's Guidance (3)
A long, straight tunnel stretched into the rock wall.
It felt just like re-entering the earthen tunnels of the Underground Hall.
The difference was that the Repentance Cave had no torches mounted on the walls, leaving it shrouded in darkness.
The disciplinary monks pulled out fire starters and lit torches before venturing inside.
How long had they walked through the endless tunnel? Before long, a massive iron door loomed ahead.
Rusted a deep red from untold ages, it looked ancient.
The leader gripped the wheel-shaped handle attached to the door and turned it to the right. Each rotation grated against their eardrums with a piercing metallic screech.
Kiiik, kiiik, kiiik.
Once the handle had fully turned, the leader yanked the door open.
A narrow gap formed between the door and the rock face. One of the monks rushed to help, and together they heaved. Their breaths came in ragged gasps as they strained, but the door inched open agonizingly slowly.
Finally, after much effort, they flung it wide.
Seo Baek now understood why these sturdy, muscular Shaolin monks had struggled so with a single door.
The iron door was as thick as the length of an adult's finger!
Moreover, the hinges connecting it were embedded deep into the rock wall.
Without a technique powerful enough to shatter such a massive barrier, escape from the Repentance Cave was impossible.
Seo Baek followed the disciplinary monks through the door.
The straight tunnel now branched left and right.
"This way."
They led him down the left path.
Along the left tunnel, iron doors stood in a neat row.
These doors differed from the first one. Each had a small sliding hatch at the base.
Likely for passing food to the prisoners.
Only then did it truly sink in for Seo Baek.
'This is the real Repentance Cave.'
Behind those doors lay cells. Shaolin monks who had broken their precepts—or villains captured by the temple—would be confined here, one per solitary chamber.
Aside from the hatches, the doors had no bars, sealing the cells perfectly.
In the Central Plains martial world, there were bizarre arts that shrank the body by dislocating bones and joints.
But the hatches were too small—even a human head couldn't squeeze through. No matter how esoteric the technique, slipping out that way was impossible.
In other words, the Repentance Cave used double iron doors to ensure prisoners couldn't escape.
After passing five or six doors, the leader halted before the second-to-last one.
"This is the room for our benefactor."
He briefly explained the cave's rules.
"Disciplinary monks will bring water and meals three times a day for meditation. To prevent suicide, we use wooden bowls, not porcelain. Never speak to them—remember that."
The leader and the monks strained once more to open the door, just as before.
But as it swung open, Seo Baek was slightly startled.
Unexpectedly, the cell inside was as bright as midday.
"Enter."
As Seo Baek stepped in, the monks closed the door behind him.
Kkiiigiiik, thud.
The door sealed shut. The path to the outside world was now blocked—until it opened again for the Body Transfer Skill.
Turning from the door, Seo Baek realized why the cell was so bright and froze in surprise.
The wall opposite wasn't solid rock—it gaped open to the sky.
'No way.'
He approached the edge and peered out.
A blue sky and faint clouds drifted above, with the dense green peaks of Song Mountain below.
'They hollowed out a massive hole in the cliff face to make these cells.'
With eight cells on each side of the branching path, that made about eighteen in total.
Who knew what villains lurked among them? Even Joint Faction elder Cheon-un was likely in one.
'But in cells like this, couldn't someone escape if they really wanted to?'
The thought had barely crossed his mind when he looked down and let out a wry smile.
Below stretched a sheer cliff—not straight vertical, but slanting inward.
And it was smooth rock, barren of even a single weed, let alone trees.
Climbing down would be like hanging from the ceiling by one's bare hands!
Thick clouds shrouded the middle, obscuring where it ended or how far the ground lay below.
Perched atop Xiao Shi Peak, the exact distance was impossible to gauge, but it was surely vast.
'Even a peak expert who could walk on air couldn't descend from here.'
Unless one was a true immortal soaring through the skies, the drop was unthinkable.
The sky and earth visible, yet escape impossible... The Repentance Cave lived up to its infamous reputation as an ingenious prison.
Seo Baek slowly surveyed the cell's interior.
It was surprisingly spacious.
The floor, carved from the cliff, was uneven in places.
Lying down directly would chafe the back, but fortunately, there was a brick bed built against one wall. It was worn and filthy, but a thick quilt atop it would ward off the cold.
On the opposite side, a long trough in the floor channeled a steady stream of water like a brook, cascading over the cliff.
'The latrine.'
No waste would pile up, keeping things clean and free from disease.
Aside from the confinement, the Repentance Cave wasn't so bad.
Best of all, the open wall offered a stunning view of the sky and Song Mountain peaks.
Seo Baek sat cross-legged on the floor and began meditative breathing.
As his inner energy circulated through his meridians, a warm glow suffused his body.
'This is actually a good opportunity.'
The journey from Sichuan to Shaolin had been endless hardship. He couldn't recall the last time he'd cleared his mind for proper meditation.
Brooding over imprisonment was pointless; better to meditate and empty his thoughts.
His body refreshed from the breathing exercise, but his mind remained unsettled.
Doubts he couldn't resolve lingered, circling endlessly.
He had unleashed the Shika Heart Method for over half a shichen—no, several times that—while battling the revenant horde.
Yet neither then nor now had there been any sign of qi deviation.
If anything, the fresh air made his body feel lighter than usual.
'Should I tell the Abbot about this?'
The thought struck him suddenly.
What if qi deviation hit out of nowhere? The Body Transfer Skill would become impossible...
'Why didn't I think of that sooner?'
Self-reproach was useless now. The water was spilled.
Above all, one thought refused to fade: his master's words in the scroll.
Seo Baek's mission wasn't just to deliver the scroll to Shaolin.
He himself was the true mission—going to Shaolin.
To transfer the Shika Heart Method via the Body Transfer Skill to the temple's and Murim Alliance's experts.
He intended to obey his master's command gladly.
'If it's the only way to stop the revenant outbreak.'
Yet a corner of his heart remained heavy.
When Hanzhong's checkpoints fell and the horde surged toward Shika Manor, his master, master's wife, and senior brothers fought to the death.
A desperate battle solely to let him escape.
Seo Baek bore their sacrifices on his back all the way to Shaolin.
But upon arrival, everything had flipped.
Now he wasn't the hero to end the outbreak—he was merely the material to make others the heroes.
Realizing this filled him with profound emptiness.
'I want to end the revenant outbreak myself.'
Not mere bravado or heroics.
Alone, it was impossible. But he had comrades met on the road to Shaolin—ones with martial prowess and unique abilities. Together, he believed they could achieve anything...
All for naught.
Suddenly, lines from Li Bai's poem came to mind, and he murmured them softly.
From Li Bai's Bring in the Wine:
"Heaven gave me talents; they must have a use."
Yet a lifetime of cultivated arts and inner methods now had no place.
As Seo Baek wallowed in deep futility—
"A thousand gold spent will return someday."
A reciting voice echoed from somewhere.
The exact next line after what Seo Baek had spoken.
Meaning—he had heard him!
'Who?'
Seo Baek first thought it a hallucination.
His muddled mind conjuring his master's wife's voice...
But no. It was unmistakably a man's voice.
'Transmission?'
Not that either. Someone had clearly recited the poem aloud in a clear voice.
Proof: the man's words bounced off Song Mountain's peaks, returning as echoes.
Before Seo Baek could grasp it—
"Life feels futile, does it?"
Without thinking, Seo Baek replied.
"Yes. Utterly futile."
"Because you came to stop the revenant outbreak, only to be sidelined while others step up?"
"......"
"Or because you've realized you're just fodder in Shaolin's grand scheme? Heh heh heh."
The man's laughter was peculiarly sinister.
Suddenly, Seo Baek sensed something off about the exchange.
No—this wasn't conversation.
He hadn't voiced those thoughts, yet the man spoke as if peering into his mind.
'How?'
"Mind-reading."
Once more, the man answered his thought.
"You're lying."
"It's true. I mastered mind-reading."
"Mind-reading observes subtle facial twitches, movements, or unusual habits to divine thoughts. You can't see my face now, so it's not that."
"Finally pulling yourself together, eh?"
Clap, clap, clap.
The man applauded.
Not in admiration, but mockery—it felt like jeering.
"Didn't you know? Life is inherently futile."
The man launched into a tirade.
"Life has no purpose. You're born, eat, shit, fight, die. If you don't die, you bed women; they bear children, who eat, shit, fight—and that's life."
"So humans are born without reason?"
"Exactly. None."
His answer was firm.
"Were you born to be Shaolin's lab rat? Did you brave the revenant hordes to become Body Transfer Skill fodder?"
"......"
"Birth has no purpose or reason. People hate facing their own meaninglessness, so they fabricate excuses."
"......"
"Cat got your tongue? Ah, shouldn't have teased a guy already drowning in self-pity. Heh heh heh."
Was it the grating laugh, or the piercing truths?
Seo Baek began to chuckle slowly.
"Haha..."
Once started, the laughter wouldn't stop—it poured out uncontrollably.
"Hahaha, hahaha, hahaha..."
He was startled.
His face hadn't twitched into a smile. His heart remained sunk in futility and gloom.
Yet from deep within, laughter erupted beyond his control.
"Hahahahahahaha!"
Seo Baek knew it had come.
The precursor to qi deviation.
He had unleashed the Shika Heart Method far beyond the half-shichen limit.
The backlash had waited until now, alone in the Repentance Cave.
Then—
"That's not qi deviation."
The man spoke gravely.
"If you don't want to die, do exactly as I say from now on."