Chapter 15
Chapter 15
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: Struggle
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The road to Taiyuan, the base of the Nether Luo Sect, was a long one.
A considerable long-distance journey lay ahead.
The one silver lining was that the interior of Shanxi Province was relatively like a basin, offering fairly flat terrain.
They still had to pass through gorges, but compared to truly scaling mountains, it was luxurious comfort.
The real issue, however, was still the distance.
From Hongzhou County to Taiyuan was over five hundred li—more than two hundred kilometers.
Considering that ordinary people traveled about fifty li—around twenty kilometers—per day, even a simple calculation yielded ten days.
And no matter how she thought about it, the patient's condition wouldn't hold out for ten days.
They had to hurry.
Wi Sowol considered adjusting her body technique, Star Lodge Divine Traces, to something closer to pure lightness skill, but there was no need.
She didn't need to run at all.
Right now, Wi Sowol was riding in a palanquin alongside the Weird Physician and Jang Rok.
And not just any palanquin—it was borne by two absolute peak masters.
"Incredible."
Discarding all notions of honor and dignity, the two had volunteered as palanquin bearers.
Fighting Ghost Gu Yang Ho and Nether Blade Divine Demon Mok Geon Pyeong seemed determined to show what the ultimate palanquin bearers could do, charging ahead at full throttle.
When absolute peak masters unleashed their lightness skills at maximum power, the speed was beyond imagination.
Even Wi Sowol was newly realizing that a palanquin could achieve such velocity.
"We'll arrive tomorrow."
"I see. I should circulate my qi for a bit. Best to stockpile as much internal energy as possible."
The Weird Physician entered meditation to regulate his breathing, saying he'd lecture on intestinal abscess later.
With nothing to do, Wi Sowol cracked open the window and poked her head out. The rushing wind whipped her hair fiercely.
"Little one. Pull your head in. You could snap your neck."
A warning came from the Nether Luo Sect Lord running ahead.
'I wanted to chat a bit.'
Wi Sowol used her small frame to slip out the window with cat-like grace, hopping lightly onto the palanquin's roof.
"Hey, kid! Get down!"
Gu Yang Ho's shout.
But Wi Sowol ignored the words of anyone weaker than her.
Recent record: one win, zero losses.
Gu Yang Ho's words held no meaning for Wi Sowol.
Using the subtleties of Star Lodge Divine Traces to plant herself firmly on the roof, Wi Sowol addressed the Nether Luo Sect Lord.
"Nether Luo Sect Lord."
"With respect!"
The words of the weak fell on deaf ears.
"I have a question."
"I've told the Weird Physician everything about his condition."
"That's not it."
Wi Sowol wanted to ask about goodness.
The Nether Luo Sect Lord, hurtling forward at tremendous speed while bearing the palanquin, responded in an even voice without a hint of strain.
"Are you the Weird Physician's disciple?"
Due to the haste, and the Weird Physician having no intention of introducing her, this was the first time his attention turned to Wi Sowol.
"Yes."
"Good, then. Speak."
"I've heard the Nether Luo Sect's doctrine is 'Life is Struggle'."
Life is struggle.
From birth to death.
The Nether Luo Sect viewed every process of life and death as a struggle.
"Does that mean, for your Nether Luo Sect, struggle is goodness itself?"
Just as Buddhist disciples followed precepts and Daoists adhered to merit and demerit, the Nether Luo Sect defined life through the discipline of struggle.
Wi Sowol's pure question: What on earth is goodness?
The Nether Luo Sect Lord sensed something peculiar in her words.
'Can't quite grasp it.'
Her voice sounded like a girl not even ten years old, yet his instincts as a supreme master spoke of depths beyond years.
It fit perfectly for a disciple of the Weird Physician, renowned as one of the world's strangest.
"Weird Physician's disciple. Do you believe in Daoism?"
The Nether Luo Sect Lord continued immediately.
"Only those obsessed with merit and demerit would ask such a question."
Wi Sowol thought he meant to dismiss it when he fell silent, but no.
He was merely organizing his thoughts.
"The struggle we speak of isn't merely clashing swords or fists with others."
"Then?"
"It's struggle against everything except myself."
Sensing she hadn't fully grasped it, the Nether Luo Sect Lord elaborated further.
Wi Sowol took it as courtesy due to her being the Weird Physician's disciple, but it almost felt like he was speaking to himself amid this dire reality.
"We are all born different. And we must be. Because we are different, we love, hate, despise, and revere one another. Struggle is the intersection with that difference, the process that guides me toward a better self."
Why call martial arts "study"?
If it were merely for killing people or winning fights, it could just be called martial technique or martial skill.
Yet it bears the name of study.
Because martial arts are the study of cultivating oneself through martial means.
"There is no good or evil in it. Only myself and what is not myself. So I live by the cultivation I've built. Even if that leads to killing others, it's merely a process. Likewise, if I'm killed by someone, it's just the outcome of struggle, unrelated to good or evil."
To Wi Sowol, it sounded utterly irresponsible.
Basically, just live however you want—why complicate it with talk of good and evil?
"Your sect's doctrine is 'Life is Struggle'. Then what is the endpoint?"
Confucianism speaks of the gentleman, Daoism of the immortal, Buddhism of the Buddha.
So what answer do those who define all teachings as "other" and seek their path from within themselves offer?
"Transcend Self to Heaven."
It could only be oneself, after all.
"Completely surpassing my limits to ascend to the heavens. Our sect cultivates martial arts for that purpose, struggling against the world beyond ourselves."
"That's why we get called unorthodox, but it's a minor thing."
Gu Yang Ho's interjection went unheard by Wi Sowol.
The voice of the weak couldn't even vibrate her eardrums—this too must be growth through the struggle they described.
"Then what about after death?"
Doesn't one weigh good karma against bad then?
No matter how much one claims to have lived diligently by their own standards, will heaven's judgment heed it?
"I don't care for Confucius's teachings. But he did say something decent."
Not yet knowing life, how can one know death?
"Or have you died before, young one?"
"...Who knows."
Wi Sowol trailed off as the perfect retort jabbed her side.
"I'll head down now."
"Wise choice. Meditate like the Weird Physician. We'll arrive without a wink of sleep."
"Thanks for the talk. Hope your son pulls through."
With that, Wi Sowol slipped smoothly back through the open window.
Outside the palanquin, now absent one speaker, the conversation wasn't over.
This time, it proceeded quietly, audible only to the two involved.
The Nether Luo Sect Lord sent back a smirk via transmission in response to Gu Yang Ho's question.
[Who knows. It's the Weird Physician.]
As far as the Nether Luo Sect Lord knew, this was the first time the Weird Physician had formally taken a disciple.
He'd had a few disciple-like figures, but they weren't official entrants and didn't dare claim the title themselves.
Yet Wi Sowol boldly called herself his disciple—an unprecedented event.
Wi Sowol had worn her bird-beak mask throughout, but the viewing hole she'd made to see outside connected inner and outer.
Dark Void Observation—an eye technique that compensated for dim light and visual distortion, allowing one to see more.
True to mastery of it, the Nether Luo Sect Lord had peered through that tiny hole and seen beyond.
'That child has value, even without the Weird Physician.'
The Nether Luo Sect Lord loved his son.
Enough to cast aside face and pride, shoulder a palanquin, and offer arms as vital as a warrior's life.
§
Taiyuan, Nether Luo Sect.
Towering grander than the provincial offices in Shanxi's capital, the complex symbolized who ruled this Taiyuan.
The place that wouldn't stir even for the Provincial Administration Commissioner's visit was now abuzz welcoming a guest.
"Inside!"
"Is the alcohol distillation done?"
"Have you forgotten what kind of doctor the Weird Physician is? He doesn't take flat fees—he charges by proportion! Money, get the money!"
Word of the Weird Physician's arrival had reached the Nether Luo Sect hours ago.
They bustled to prepare so he could focus solely on treating the Young Sect Master upon arrival.
They had no choice but to rush—the time granted was too short.
The messenger pigeon reported the Sect Lord and Great Protector were escorting him as palanquin bearers.
They'd arrive soon after the pigeon's message.
"How's the Young Sect Master?"
"In meditation. Extreme pain has worsened his complexion, but he's holding his posture firmly."
"As expected... We must prepare for the Weird Physician to treat him immediately. We have to save the Young Sect Master. Inform him too—the Weird Physician is coming."
Their efforts bore fruit.
"They're here!"
The bird-beak mask, which he'd started wearing last year and now symbolized him among those who knew, appeared in the Nether Luo Sect grounds.
Two of them, even.
"Sect Lord, Weird Physician, this way."
The chief steward, managing the sect's affairs, skipped even brief greetings and hurried them to a secluded spot.
Where Young Sect Master Mok Ja Un was enduring pain through meditation—and soon, the operating theater.
Instead of a garden, true to a martial sect, they'd cleared stones and flowers, paving it with blue stone for a training ground. There, Wi Sowol saw this patient, the Nether Luo Sect's Young Sect Master.
'Never seen him before.'
The clash with Gu Yang Ho had naturally been a collision with the Nether Luo Sect itself.
And in her past life, Wi Sowol had never laid eyes on this youth.
Above all, the successor she remembered to the Nether Luo Sect Lord was not his son, but a disciple.
'Did he die?'
As Wi Sowol pondered the youth's fate, people moved.
An operating table was prepared, and Mok Ja Un lay upon it.
He even positioned himself there on his own.
Without a groan.
Astonishing mental fortitude.
"We're in a hurry. Let's start immediately."
"Yes."
"I should have lectured on the way in the palanquin but didn't. I'll lecture during the surgery."
Like with the tetanus patient, the Weird Physician applied alcohol to Mok Ja Un's abdomen.
"Why the alcohol?"
Gu Yang Ho, watching intently from the side, asked.
He glared, determined not to miss a single action.
"Because we have to cut open the belly."
Laparotomy.
This surgery differed from the tetanus one.
What needed removal was inside, not out.
In a place only visible after opening the belly.
"Uh, is this really okay?"
"I'm Ma Yu Seung. If I can't save him, no one can."
More than his moniker, he prided himself on his name.
"Now get out. You're in the way. Only me and my disciple stay. Even you, Nether Luo Sect Lord, must leave."
"How do you know what you're—!"
"Enough."
The Nether Luo Sect Lord stopped Gu Yang Ho's protest.
"From now on, it's the Weird Physician's and Ja Un's struggle. Our role is to wait."
One word halted Gu Yang Ho, and he obediently followed the order.
"Weird Physician. I leave it to you."
Every moment counted.
The Nether Luo Sect Lord didn't hesitate.
As he and Gu Yang Ho departed, the Weird Physician immediately unleashed Dazed Haze Hand on Mok Ja Un, anesthetizing him.
Finally free of pain, a faint peace settled on Mok Ja Un's face.
At the same time, the blade fell on his body.
Slash—
Slicing through firm muscle, opening the abdomen.
"Intestinal abscess is literally pus in the intestines. Other doctors blame damp-heat and stagnation, saying to relieve it—but that only buys time before the end. To treat intestinal abscess, you must open the belly and excise the abscess, or..."
As he incised Mok Ja Un's abdomen with his hands, the Weird Physician began his lecture.
His words abruptly stopped.
"Worst case."
Having removed his bird-beak mask during prep, Wi Sowol clearly saw the Weird Physician's face twist.
"Master?"
"The abscess has ruptured. The poison has spread through the abdomen. If it's entered the bloodstream... it's too late."
The Weird Physician muttered bitterly.
"This one's beyond saving."