Escaping the Repentance Cave (2)
Seo Baek fell silent, his lips pressed shut.
The man's words had been so utterly unexpected that his once crystal-clear mind wavered for a moment.
But thanks to his profound mastery of inner arts, he quickly regained his composure.
"I am grateful for saving my life. But please, mock me no further."
Seo Baek assumed the man was toying with him again and spoke accordingly.
"Hah. Every fool I meet is a stubborn blockhead. Just listen first."
As Seo Baek remained quiet, the man continued.
"'Have the Murim Alliance's experts use Body Transfer Skill on this one's inner energy core to stop the revenant outbreak.' Is that what the letter says?"
"Precisely."
"Your life's been a twisted mess, hasn't it? Your master raised you diligently just to lop off your head and devour you. Heh heh heh."
"If you insult my master and Shika Manor, no matter your debt of life to me, I will speak with you no more."
Seo Baek's voice turned icy, unlike before.
"That bastard's clan fights on even as death looms."
"……."
"Fine, then. What's a way to halt the revenant outbreak without defying your master's words?"
The man turned the question back on him, but Seo Baek had no ready answer.
It was only natural. If he'd known, he wouldn't be trapped in Repentance Cave, nor would his heart feel so profoundly empty.
"I do not know."
"Shall I tell you why you don't know?"
"Please do."
"Because you've been fixated on Body Transfer Skill."
The man's voice dripped with mockery once more.
"Not just you—everyone's obsessed with those three words and missed the real point. Murim Alliance? Shaolin? Bunch of idiots they've gathered. Heh heh heh."
To mock Shaolin and the Murim Alliance was to scorn the entire Central Plains martial world.
Yet the man didn't seem to be bluffing.
"Stop circling and tell me plainly."
"Simple. Don't use Body Transfer Skill."
"Then how can we stop the revenant outbreak…?"
"No, there is a way. Join the Murim Alliance yourself."
"……!"
In that instant, Seo Baek felt as if a blinding light pierced the darkness before his eyes—an illusion of sudden clarity.
Like wandering endless night and spotting a single ray of dawn.
"Once you're part of the Murim Alliance, stop the outbreak yourself."
The man's tone had shed its laughter, turning deadly serious.
"Body Transfer Skill is inherently risky and rarely succeeds perfectly. Much of the inner energy core dissipates, or the recipient suffers grave injury. But if you're with the Murim Alliance, there's no need to take that gamble."
Of course. Becoming the Alliance's vanguard to halt the outbreak wouldn't defy his master's will, would it?
Seo Baek usually wore an impassive expression unbefitting a boy his age.
But this time, his mouth parted slightly in stunned blankness—a face Wang Yi Sam would have teased him about endlessly.
The man's words had struck true to the heart!
Seo Baek bowed toward the wall once more.
"Thank you for enlightening this foolish disciple."
"At least you know proper manners."
Seo Baek resolved himself.
He would join the Murim Alliance in Shika Manor's name and end the revenant outbreak with his own hands.
"The Murim Alliance won't hand heavy responsibility to a boy not even in his twenties. How old are you, anyway?"
"It matters not."
Seo Baek cut him off firmly.
"It is my inner art. I will use it for the world's sake."
"……."
The man said nothing, but a smile tugged at his lips as he thought,
'Impressive courage for one so young.'
People usually followed others' wills. Why? They shunned responsibility.
Only one with unshakeable self-belief could decide as the boy had.
His path ahead would be anything but smooth.
'Standing alone against the world is lonely indeed.'
The man smiled, seeing echoes of his own past self. There was a faint bitterness in that smile.
Seo Baek moved to the cell's edge, gazing out at the vast expanse, and took a deep breath.
The energy from the sky and Song Mountain's peaks seemed to flood into him, clearing his chest with crisp freshness.
With resolve hardened, it was time for action.
Seo Baek voiced what had piqued his curiosity.
"You can read others' thoughts."
"Indeed."
The man answered readily.
"If true, that is an extraordinary ability."
"Extraordinary? Bullshit—this is no gift, it's heaven's curse."
Heaven's Curse. Punishment from the heavens.
The man's constant barbs weren't mere crotchetiness.
Seo Baek sensed a man burdened by a storied past.
A thought suddenly struck him.
Jin Ha-gun of Wudang, parting words:
—There'll be a villain in Repentance Cave. Don't listen to a word that bastard says.
Jin Ha-gun had warned there was no good in consorting with villains.
Somehow, Seo Baek felt that villain was the man beyond the wall.
He had already ignored Jin Ha-gun's advice.
But it didn't matter.
The man had aided him twice: freeing him from pursuit blood acupuncture, and revealing a way to honor his master's command without Body Transfer Skill.
Villain or not, he was Seo Baek's lifesaver.
Moreover, mind-reading was invaluable. If they needed to infiltrate somewhere to stop the outbreak again, such an ability would be essential.
"Help me."
"Out of nowhere, what nonsense?"
"You already know my thoughts without me saying."
"Saved a drowning pup, and now it demands my bundle."
"You saved me—you must see it through."
"You mean escape Repentance Cave and rejoin your comrades?"
"Yes."
Seo Baek planned to flee Repentance Cave first.
Waiting in his cell for a Murim Alliance visitor didn't suit his temperament.
Better to escape spectacularly and appear before the Alliance on his terms. To join them, he needed to prove his worth upfront.
Sensing the man's skepticism, he asked,
"This is Shaolin's Repentance Cave. Countless villains rotted to skeletons here. How do you plan to leave?"
"I have a way."
"By slipping your arm through the meal slot when the porridge idiot feeds you? No chance. They use a shovel with a bowl."
"Not that crude."
"Even killing the porridge monks changes nothing. You saw coming in—these iron doors open only from outside."
"Then make the discipline monks open it themselves."
"Have them open it personally? Even idiots aren't that stupid…."
The man fell silent then.
He had read Seo Baek's escape plan in his thoughts.
"Hm. That just might work."
"It requires two, not one. What say you? Escape Repentance Cave together?"
"My bones were itching anyway."
The man grinned and replied.
* * *
Bang! Bang! Bang!
A clamor echoed through Repentance Cave—the sound of someone pounding an iron door.
Not tapping, but slamming with full force.
Something urgent was afoot.
Discipline monks rarely entered beyond meal times. But the unrelenting racket forced them inside.
The noise came from the last cell in the left tunnel.
Realizing this, the monks' faces grew troubled.
That cell held an infamously wicked man of the jianghu.
"Ignore it?"
"Let's at least hear what it is."
The leader approached and called,
"What is it?"
"Get to the next cell quick!"
the man bellowed.
The monks exchanged glances. Suspicious.
Not his own cell, but the next? Clearly, villains conspiring some scheme.
"The boy you put in the next cell jumped off the cliff!"
"……!"
Doubting him at first, the monks snapped alert.
The leader knelt, head low, and peered through the meal slot.
Kreeeak.
He checked the bunk, even the latrine trench.
No sign of the boy.
Only one way out of Repentance Cave.
Leaping from the cliff!
"The boy's gone."
"Impossible…."
The monks swallowed hard.
Some prisoners, in despair, had jumped—rare, but it happened.
But the boy, confined mere half a day? Despair that quickly, leading to such an extreme end?
Unbelievable.
One monk ventured,
"Hiding on the ceiling?"
Repentance Cave was carved into sheer rock—no handholds.
But who were these prisoners? Masters of deception, perhaps fooling eyes with tricks.
The slot was at the door's base, flush with the floor—impossible to scan every corner.
Ceiling corners were blind spots.
The leader decided to investigate.
"I'll go in. Guard here."
"Yes."
He unlocked the door and leaped inside.
Craining his neck, he scanned both ceilings.
Nothing. No boy.
For the first time, the leader panicked badly.
The Shaolin Abbot had said the boy wasn't a criminal but a guest—confine him briefly, treat him well.
Now he'd jumped to his death….
Not only had they failed their duty, but they had no face left before the Abbot.
As the leader stood dazed, the other two entered.
"Where's the boy?"
"Gone…."
They too were stunned.
A mere youth, abandoning hope so soon.
The leader recovered first.
"No time. Report to the Abbot now. I'll search for any sign below."
"Yes."
The pair dashed out.
Alone, the leader edged to the brink and peered down.
Ever shrouded in thick clouds, the abyss below was invisible.
Rare cloudless days yielded no view of the ground either.
The peak's height meant the fallen boy couldn't survive….
"Amitabha. Why such a foolish choice?"
He murmured in dismay.
Tatataht.
Sudden footsteps rang from the cliff.
He thought his panic conjured hallucinations. No footfalls on such heights.
But glancing that way, he recoiled in shock.
A shadow raced across the cliff face like the wind.
The shadow was Seo Baek.