Do You Know the Saber?

The next morning.

Five young martial artists of the family who had reached the Transcendence Realm — Paeng Cheong-ui among them — gathered early and sat around the tea table in the pavilion. The guests in the annex seemed sunk in deep sleep, with no intention of coming out.

"Everyone here?"

Paeng Cheong-ui had barely opened his mouth when Paeng Cheongrok, the second son, seated beside him, cut in.

"So. That woman you brought back yesterday — who is she? Start there."

"The 13th Seat of the Rounds."

The smiles vanished at once from the branch-family kin, including the second son, who had been buzzing at the chance to tease the eldest for finally opening his eyes to women. Paeng Cheongrok stood blank for a beat, then bellowed loud enough to lift the pavilion off its posts.

"Hero Lupin!?"

"...They'll hear that all the way at the annex."

"What do you expect? Voices in this family have always been loud. So how did you bring her? She didn't look anything like Hero Lupin."

"You still can't see past a veil."

Paeng Cheongrok clicked his tongue.

"Oh, simply magnificent, elder brother. Late Transcendence Realm, and already so very full of yourself~"

"Which is why I told you to stop chasing skirts and throw yourself into training."

"Did I chase them? The flowers took a liking, and they came after the bee."

From inside his martial robes Paeng Cheongrok produced a hand mirror he had hidden there, turned his sleek face this way and that, and flashed a row of white teeth. For a man of the Paeng his build was only moderately large, his lines refined enough that he had even made the shortlist for Jade Qilin. Everyone else in the room, himself excluded, was thick-featured and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠burly.

"Anyway. Hero Lupin has let it be known she may represent our family in the Ascending Martial Emperor Tournament. By the rules, her opponents are the five of us. She means to spar this very afternoon, so prepare yourselves properly."

Everyone groaned. What kind of schedule was this? And yet merely making Lupin one of the family would secure two Great Restoration Pills a year from the stores kept by the imperial house. To most people of Cheonghwa, half-mad with the hunger to grow stronger, it was a thing to be envied past enduring.

Even so, there was a question buried in Paeng Cheong-ui's words, and Paeng Cheongrok asked it for the rest of them.

"But to make her family, Hero Lupin has to win anyway, doesn't she? What do we gain by preparing so hard?"

"Whether Hero Lupin becomes an adopted daughter of the Paeng, or marries into the Paeng. That would be the difference."

At the word marry, the branch kin swallowed hard. It was not simply that they felt the pull of Lupin's body. The 13th Seat of the Rounds — a restriction-free seat, yes, but if Lupin sealed a marriage pact with a man of Cheonghwa, that seat would naturally become Cheonghwa's. And what sort of treatment awaited the husband of a Round? A man of the branch blood might take that place instead of the legitimate eldest, Paeng Cheong-ui.

Paeng Cheongrok sidled up and whispered.

"Why are you egging them on? What are you going to do if someone actually steals the Young Patriarch's seat?"

"Steal it?"

Paeng Cheong-ui snorted.

"Already fretting that your elder brothers will take it from you. You've still got a long way to go."

"No, I mean —"

"She's a Round. There's even a wild rumor she ground Ekaterina under her heel. You think the likes of us can beat someone like that easily?"

Arms folded, Paeng Cheong-ui shook his head.

"Once she represents our family and takes the adopted daughter's place, who will be the other of the two taught the Primal Thunder Saber? My achievement is the fastest among us, so I won't be cut. But."

He was aiming the words straight at Paeng Cheongrok.

You half-assed your training. Time to step down from a seat above your station.

Paeng Cheongrok flared and nearly seized his shoulder, then caught himself.

"Ha... haha. Well. If that's what you say, elder brother, then I'd better prepare properly and meet this spar head-on, hm?"

His clenched hand creaked, joints grinding.

"And anyway, Hero Lupin can't use formalized aura, right? We'll be fighting under the tournament rules as they stand. If it's saber against saber, I figure I can handle it."

Paeng Cheong-ui smiled, bright and easy. He had been thinking much the same.

Before she transmigrated, Lupin had been the sort of person who took a fair amount of stress from food. Her stomach had been trouble from birth. Eat rich and it hurt. Eat cold and it hurt. Drink too much milk and it hurt. Eat spicy and it hurt. There was so much she wanted, and the moment she actually ate freely her insides turned over — how could she not have been stressed?

She did not worry about that anymore. Whatever she ate, the day after she opened a treasure chest it became properly seasoned cooking. Underripe fruit sweetened until the sugar seemed to bloom; a bland broth deepened until the flavor welled up from the bottom of the chest.

Yegor's wild cooking tasting of MSG? Because she had opened a treasure chest the day before. From the moment Lupin woke, every dish was as good as a delicacy of the heavens: black-bean noodles folded from sweet soybean paste, dumplings stuffed with every ingredient imaginable, savory crisp Beijing duck, dishes of tofu, stir-fries of fresh vegetables. Her stomach was strong, her digestion swift, her capacity generous. She ate and ate, and it kept going down. And so, once again, bowls and plates rose beside her like a tower.

The cook who had served the Paeng for twenty years stared at Paeng Cheong-ui in open shock. The family he waited on ate impressively, but never like this.

"At this rate, won't her belly burst?"

"Have more food ready. Yesterday she ate even more than that."

"Pardon? She ate that much yesterday as well?"

This month's provisions were going to be a problem. The cook clicked his tongue and ducked ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠back into the kitchen.

Lupin's meal went on for a full two hours. In that time Paeng Cheongrok and the branch kin who would face her arrived one by one and lined up beside Paeng Cheong-ui. Not one of them praised her looks, so her Charm Growth Value spent yet another day with nothing to do but smirk. Even so, a shared mood settled over the room. The rising generation of the Paeng were all men, and that was a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠true blessing.

Whether a daughter born to the Paeng or a bride come to marry in, a woman was not to hesitate before food. Eat like a single stroke of lightning. That was the teaching handed down through the generations of the house.

"...There's no denying she's charming."

"Her efficiency at table is remarkable. It all seems to be banking itself in the body."

And once a face was passable, the place the eyes eventually went was obvious. However completely the martial arts had stolen their minds, they were men in the end. Had there been even one sister among them it might have been different; as it was, every last one of them was hopeless with women. Paeng Cheongrok, who valued a face more than a body, pretended not to look. Paeng Cheong-ui had never expected from the start that he might take Lupin to wife, and only smiled.

Then, at last, Lupin set down the empty soup bowl and let loose a belch worthy of a dragon.

"Haa. I'm full."

She leaned back in her chair and murmured, pleased.

"A few tanghulu for dessert and that'll be just right..."

To Klein, who had filled herself on a single bowl of fine noodles and was only now drinking a cup of tea, it was a genuine shock. She had overdone it yesterday, yes — but wasn't this far too much, piled on top of yesterday?

"You still have room in there...?"

"Must be a black hole in my stomach. I eat and eat and I'm still hungry."

Klein did not know the words black hole, but she understood them well enough as some monster that gorged without end, like a dragon. Otherwise the tower of bowls stacked beside Lupin made no sense at all.

A little later the cook brought out the tanghulu he had prepared, set ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in a steel bowl over ice. Lupin lit up and popped a candied grape straight into her mouth. It shattered with a bright crunch, and cold juice burst in a flood. Drown a sweetness shocking enough to fill the whole mouth with one cup of cool green tea, and the finish was perfect.

Mm. This is it. A person has to eat at least this much to live.

"Haaa. I'm happy."

Only then did the empty bowls, stacked neat as bricks, leave the round table. A clean cloth wiped it down in brisk strokes, and eight glasses of a drink cold as ice soon took their places — the sour plum cordial that carried the people of Beijing through the summer. Lupin, of course, emptied hers before the Paeng had even sat.

"Khh — this is refreshing too."

Tang. The bright sound of the glass striking the table rang through the chests of the five men seated there.

The three of the branch were brimming with resolve, already tasting the family art of the Primal Thunder Saber and a charming wife besides. Paeng Cheongrok, unwilling to lose to her, knocked back his own sour plum drink in answer — and crumpled his face when it proved far too cold. Paeng Cheong-ui was all smiles, thinking of what he might learn in a spar with Lupin.

Everyone concerned had gathered, and Paeng Cheong-ui was just about to explain the choices that would follow the spar when Lupin shot her hand into the air.

"Might I ask about the Primal Thunder Saber? I asked Klein this morning, and she said the lot of you would know it best."

Paeng Cheongrok went rigid. Depending on the result of the spar, there was a strong chance the master of the Primal Thunder Saber would be Lupin, and not him. Paeng Cheong-ui glanced at that younger brother and grinned.

"As Young Patriarch, I shall explain. What is it you wish to know?"

"Is the Primal Thunder Saber the sort of thing where lightning just goes flash-flash along the path of the blade?"

"It is. White lightning appears along the blade's path, limned in black."

"Really?"

When Lupin had opened her eyes, she had acquired the foundation of the Primal Thunder Saber.

It showed, intact, in the Growth Values window — and astonishingly, the thing was a saber art that called down lightning. The moment she woke that morning she had drawn a joyful slash, and black-and-white lightning had cracked along the blade's path as if it had leapt straight out of a comic.

"Then is this the Primal Thunder Saber?"

Lupin bolted out into the manor yard before the hall where everyone had gathered. She could almost recreate a character she loved, and she was more excited than she had ever been. The color wasn't the yellow she had hoped for, but so what? Black and white had a style of their own. No — perhaps black and white was finer than yellow. Primal lightning rising through a world packed with every color was that fierce. For now it was only a shabby little spark. Rank it up enough, and someday she would call down lightning that fell in splendor.

Lupin dropped her stance, shut her eyes, and worked her footwork as if she had simply changed places. An instant later, the lightning followed.

Boom!

Every person of the Paeng slammed the table and rose. Those who had been inside sprinted to the edge of the veranda and drank in, with their own eyes, the primal lightning as it faded. Lupin came running back to the front of the hall and bared her gums like a child starved for praise.

"Well? This is the Primal Thunder Saber, right?"

Paeng Cheong-ui's lower lip trembled. Then he dropped to his knees with a thud.

"Hero Lupin. No — my lady."

"Yes?"

And then, out of nowhere, he seized both of her hands and bellowed from the pit of his lungs.