A Provocative Invitation
There would be no more feeling each other out.
Hoseo-a opened his mouth.
"Looks like the greenhorn's lost his damn mind. Fine. That proposal of yours — I'm not turning it down. You said any main weapon was fine, right? You stick to those precious fists of yours. Me —"
Hoseo-a strode forward. In his hand rose a sword whose blade alone was wrapped thick in leather. It had the shape of a sword, but the heavy breadth of the blade called a sabre more readily to mind.
"I'll take you with this."
"A sword that runs closer to a sabre. Almost like its owner."
Hoseo-a smiled with satisfaction and rapped the sword against his palm. The blade struck flesh with a dull, heavy report.
"You ought to be grateful I haven't stripped the leather sheath. Or… maybe you should resent it instead? With this still on —"
Hoseo-a chuckled low in his throat.
"— even a graze turns it into an iron club that shatters bone."
"Hoseo-a, wait!"
The pack behind him shouted.
"All of you stay put. You pathetic bastards."
At Hoseo-a's words the group at his back flinched. He glared them down.
"Disciples of the great Cheonsubaekryeonsa, shrinking from some flashy shell that only looks the part — you ought to be ashamed."
"…!"
The ones who had flinched under the pressure when I stripped my martial robes wilted further under Hoseo-a's rebuke. He spoke on toward them.
"My uncle used to say it. Trash like that is always third-rate with no real skill. A true martial artist is oe-yu-nae-gang — soft without, steel within! Back in the savage days of the jianghu, when internal energy methods were still poorly studied, men wrecked their bodies to the limit. Who trains that brutally anymore?"
His little speech drew admiring murmurs from the lot of them.
"S-see? That's Hoseo-a for you! He's right!"
"…"
I said nothing.
…
Mumyeong said nothing either.
Sensing my steady stare, Hoseo-a turned his head and looked at me. Our eyes met.
"All of you watch closely."
Hoseo-a lifted the thick sword and dragged his massive frame forward.
"Trash like this — in a single blow!"
And without the slightest warning —
— Whoosh.
He swung. He had no intention of stopping the blade. The resolve to break every scrap of flesh and bone it met was written plain across him.
If I'd had the Chiljong-heukjusa-gap, I wouldn't even need this.
I clicked my tongue short. My dantian stirred. I ran the sequence through my head at speed. The sword came flying into view.
The flow of energy Goa used to run through my body — it was like this, wasn't it.
I set the edge of my hand in the path of the oncoming blade. Focusing on that knife-hand, I drew a scorching current up from my dantian and mirrored, stroke for stroke, the way Goa had once worked in tandem with the Chiljong-heukjusa-gap.
— Pa-pat!
In an instant a pale black haze — the grey fog that comes just before lightning — rippled along the edge of my left hand, twisted like thread, and wove itself tight as cloth. Completing it took less than a single breath —
— CLAAANG!
The sword stopped dead against my left knife-hand in a spray of sparks.
— Ziiing…
Watching the tip of the trembling blade, I spoke.
"Not bad for a first try."
"What the hell is this."
Hoseo-a could not seem to accept what had just happened in front of his eyes.
"You blocked my sword with your bare hand?"
I shoved the sabre-like blade aside.
"Do you even know how to hold a sword, Hoseo-a? Doesn't seem like it."
The moment he recognized the echo of his own earlier question — Do you even know how to hold a sword? — Hoseo-a's earlobes flushed crimson.
"You son of a bitch! I went easy on you —!"
Bloodshot veins stood out in his eyes.
"I'll kill you!"
Hoseo-a's aura changed. The sword in his grip wrapped itself in silver internal force. Behind him his companions screamed.
"Hoseo-a, don't!"
Hoseo-a kicked off the ground. From his hand bloomed a genuine Zhongnan Sect form of a different order entirely from anything so far.
Youn-un Geombeop — Zhongnan Sect orthodox sword forms
Hoseo-a roared.
"A lowborn mongrel like you — no one will care if I kill you!"
With the soft, billowing silver mist unique to Zhongnan arts, Hoseo-a's killing stroke snaked toward my throat like a serpent. Watching it come, I murmured to myself.
"So. You've used internal force."
— Crack.
I rolled my wrists loose.
"From here on —"
— Pa-ba-bat.
My footwork began to quicken.
"— every move I make"
— Gulp…!
"is thrashing to stay alive. Got that?"
With those words my body surged forward like a wavering shadow, the principles of Baekryeon-pal-ya-jong woven through it, slipping every strand of the Flowing Cloud Sword Art and closing the distance one step at a time.
"How the hell is this thrashing?! You monster of a bas— Ghk!"
— KWAANG!!!
A fist buried itself in his gut. That was only the beginning. A merciless barrage hammered into Hoseo-a's body. I swept his legs out from under him like a broom. His knees burst purple and he crumpled. I chopped down on his right collarbone as if with an axe. The bone crushed; his right arm dropped useless. I seized him by the collar. He flailed, fumbling the sword into his left hand, swinging it clumsily, thrashing to keep me off. Over that defense I started raining fists without discrimination.
— Kwang! Kwang! Kwang! Kwang! Kwang!
"Gh… ghk!"
The blade was far too thin to serve as a shield for his face. No — it failed even at that. The sword settled across Hoseo-a's features.
— Kwang! Kwang! Kwang!
His face turned to pulp.
— Kwang! Kwang!
The blade began to buckle.
— Crr… ack!
Whatever poor iron the sword had been forged from started to split. Hoseo-a's eyes rolled back.
— Shhhh…
Urine ran down between his legs.
— Crack!
My palm — broad as a bear's paw — smashed into Hoseo-a's thick cheek. Fire sparked in his rolling eyes and a flicker of life returned. Still gripping that cheek, I glanced left and right. Of course there was no one. But after training with Sura, it had been so long since I had spoken with my true self laid bare that I looked again anyway. I stared down at Hoseo-a. I muttered low.
"Put some strength in those eyes, you bastard."
Hoseo-a's pupils blew wide.
"I haven't even started yet. And you're already going soft in the eyes, getting comfortable."
"Ah. Aah. Aaaah…"
— Tremble-tremble…
Hoseo-a began to shake. I put my face right in front of his and spoke.
"I'm going to live quiet. From now on, you're Slave Number One. When I call, you come flying. Understood?"
It was still a faint echo of something — something I had once tried copying after someone else.
"…!"
I patted his cheek.
"And you. If you're going to learn your sect's arts, learn something worth learning. What's a fourth-rate form doing here? Fourth-rate. Sure, as a basic foundation of swordsmanship I can pick it up this way and that and put it to use, but still."
— Kiiing.
I let the faint red light in both eyes die out. Already the complete formulas of the Flowing Cloud Sword Art were circulating through my mind, perfectly absorbed.
"H-help Hoseo-a!"
"At this rate he'll die!"
The three who had only watched until now charged in.
"Ah. Right."
Still holding the collar of the unconscious Hoseo-a in one hand, I wiped the blood spattered at the corner of my mouth and spoke toward the pack.
"You want to be slaves too? Then while I'm at it, why don't I check if you've got anything useful on you — and take a few more slaves for free."
A short while later.
I stepped out alone and quietly shut the door of the private training chamber. Inside, only blood-soaked sounds and the scattered coughs of people in agony leaked out; no footsteps came walking after me.
"Young master? Have you finished with the training chamber?"
The servant assigned to my chamber came trotting over the moment he saw me emerge. I straightened my upper robes as I answered.
"Don't worry about the cleaning. While I'm out on the regular trial I've got slaves… no, friends who'll handle it separately."
"…Sir? The cleaning?"
"Yes. In any case, please do not enter my training chamber."
I made a point of stressing it. The servant watched my back and muttered to himself.
"Ah, yes… well, anyway. Supply delays of unknown cause have left us short on every cleaning material as it is, so this works out. Whatever."
I headed for the assembly point Lee Jasuo had mentioned in advance — the place posted beforehand for the regular trial. Far off, the sun was going down. Torches were being lit. Already waiting there were the four people who would go on the regular trial with me. I narrowed my eyes. Through their martial robes I could roughly place their sects.
Jeomchang Sect, Sichuan Tang Family, Kunlun Sect, and lastly… hmm, Mount Hua Sect, is it.
Mumyeong spoke.
Mount Hua Sect…?
Mount Hua held no small meaning for me. The first martial art I had ever copied — after unintentionally gaining the copying ability through the Heavenly Demon Jade — had been Mount Hua's Plum Blossom Spinning Dagger.
As I approached them I realized something had changed from what I first heard.
"I'm certain when I heard it from Lee Jasuo, the departure roster had one more man than —"
"Excuse me — would you happen to be Young Master Moyong Bi?"
I looked to the side. Beside me stood a handsome young beggar with a boyish face, a bamboo hat pressed down over his brow.
"…Who are you?"
"Ah, this is my first time at Cheonsubaekryeonsa, so I was worried I wouldn't find you — but by the Jade Emperor's grace I've been fortunate enough to meet a person of quality like this."
The beggar smiled at me. Outwardly he was a beggar of the common sort. In one hand he held a large gourd; in the other, a staff. His clothes were shabby, but his face alone looked as if it belonged among precious things. From one angle he seemed older; from another, younger — an age impossible to pin down. Not even the grime streaking his face could fully bury the innate grace he carried.
"…"
It was oddly unpleasant. I didn't know why, but it was oddly unpleasant. I couldn't name the reason. He wore a warm, open smile — a smile endlessly kind toward me — and yet a strange sense of déjà vu wrapped my whole body. The soles of my feet itched. I looked toward the party in the distance. Then back at the beggar in front of me. Of course the regular-trial group wasn't about to leave without me. Even so, the words came out of me in a hurry before I could stop them.
"What business did you have? As you can see —"
I pointed toward the party far off.
"— I have an appointment over there and need to go quickly."
The beggar nodded.
"Aigoo. My apologies. This lowly beggar has no sense, detaining a busy young master like this."
But nothing in his manner looked hurried at all. Whatever else I might not know, I knew this particular current of conversation well — this vague feeling of wading through towering clouds. It was the atmosphere you got talking to masters of speech craft, people several levels above you. Even if I couldn't win, I at least knew how to handle it. I took a long stride straight toward him and spoke.
"From the look of it you're not even affiliated with Cheonsubaekryeonsa, so if you have no further business I'll be on my w—"
— Clack.
A staff barred my path.
"As for me, no, I'm not with Cheonsubaekryeonsa — but I dig up information in the jianghu, and on the side I handle all sorts of messy, unspeakable little side jobs of a confidential nature, and ahem. Hey. Where do you think you're going."
The beggar shoved me with the staff as if annoyed.
"…Strength?"
It wasn't that I had truly tried to force past him. But through that slender staff I felt a power that would not be refused. The man picked at food scraps caught in his white teeth with a little fingernail and said,
"The Beggars' Sect has questions for you. Where do you keep trying to go? No manners."