The Heavenly Martial Body
There was an inn here — an utterly ordinary one. The kind of establishment so unremarkable that no one passing by would ever expect a shred of anything special from it. And yet, to the young man who had been standing in front of it for a long while now, this inn meant something altogether different.
"Finally."
He was barely past twenty, perhaps. His temperament was dry by nature, so his reaction was hardly explosive — but even so, the young man was unmistakably moved.
He had been an orphan from birth. He had never once laid eyes on the people who might have been called his parents. He didn't resent them, and he didn't miss them either. No — it would be more accurate to say he had never spared them a single thought at all.
"Took about ten years, didn't it."
Every person needed a livelihood. For Jin Seongun — a man with neither parents nor connections — the trade he had chosen was that of an inn waiter. Greeting guests, carrying food, sweeping floors: simple, honest work.
In truth, he had once dreamed of becoming a martial artist. For those born with nothing, there was no surer path to turning one's life around than the blade. But Jin Seongun's talent for the martial arts was, to put it plainly, catastrophic. He couldn't even master the Samjae Sword Technique — the sort of manual any street vendor's child could pick up for a few coins.
Fortunately, Jin Seongun was not foolish enough to chase the impossible. He buried the dream of the martial world in one corner of his heart and simply lived, faithfully, as a waiter. He earned money like a dog and spent it like a minister, setting aside every coin beyond the bare cost of food and lodging. Perhaps Heaven took pity on him, because he managed to find work under an innkeeper of good character — one who recognized his diligence and competence, and who even padded his wages when business was brisk.
The fruit of all that was standing before him now. This inn — an establishment others might dismiss as nothing much.
Jin Seongun lifted the signboard in his hands. It was a plain, unmarked board, not yet carved with a single character. He stared at it for a long moment.
"A name, then."
He glanced up at the sky, and found himself pondering the inn's name with far more gravity than he had ever given his own — Seongun, the star-clouded. With those cold, impassive eyes and his stony expression, he might well have been mistaken for a martial artist on the eve of a duel to the death.
"So it's an inn, is it?"
At the voice that drifted over, he turned — and found two men standing there who looked, at a glance, like unorthodox sect martial artists. For the first time, a smile touched Jin Seongun's lips.
First principle of a waiter's life: when you see a martial artist, meet him with a smile. Even if he happens to be one of the unorthodox riffraff who prey on the livelihoods of common folk.
"We'll be opening for business soon. Do stop by, great heroes."
The unorthodox men nodded along, looking rather pleased with themselves. Simple-minded as those types tended to be, being addressed as great heroes never failed to lift their spirits. And once they were gone, Jin Seongun's face went dry and expressionless again. It had been a calculated smile from the start — of course it faded.
"Seongun Inn."
Yes. That name, in the end, was the right one.
He walked into the kitchen and drew out a small, rough-hewn knife. This was a world where waiters who could read were rare — and yet Jin Seongun set to carving the letters into the signboard without a moment's hesitation. He had taught himself to read in the scraps of time between waiting tables, and for his own name and the word inn — the trade he'd bled a decade into — he needed no reference at all.
He rubbed ink into the freshly carved characters, then cast a calm eye over the inn's interior. Every preparation that could be made, had been made. The tables and chairs, bought cheap from a bankrupt inn, were well maintained; the cleaning went without saying.
Only one thing remained.
"All I need now is a cook."
He had already put up a notice advertising for one. Jin Seongun was a waiter, not a cook — he could manage simple fare, but an inn, in name at least, ought to serve food worth paying for. He sat down at a table, thinking that it would be nice if a skilled cook happened along, and just then—
"Is the owner in?"
Jin Seongun shot to his feet. A middle-aged man stood at the entrance, peering around the interior. He looked a touch past forty, with a respectable bearing and thick, capable hands — the air of a fine cook hung about him somehow.
"Yes! Welcome, come in."
As Jin Seongun stepped forward, the man tilted his head a few times.
"Is the owner not around?"
He seemed to have taken the young Jin Seongun for a waiter — which, admittedly, was not wrong.
"I am the owner."
"Ah — thought you were the waiter, I did."
"I'm a waiter and the owner. Call me waiter or owner, whichever suits. Waiter-owner works too."
"……?"
Is this fellow mad? The expression on his face was perfectly serious, so apparently it was no joke. The man studied Jin Seongun for a moment, then gave a slow nod.
"Right then — waiter-owner. Did you happen to buy this inn whole?"
"I did."
The man's eyes narrowed. He looked around the interior again, with a wariness that seemed strangely pronounced.
A faintly unpleasant feeling crept over Jin Seongun.
"Is something the matter?"
"Hmm……"
The man let out a long murmur, and seeing it, Jin Seongun grew certain: something was wrong with this place. It was an inn he'd bought with every coin he'd earned in a lifetime of labor. The price had been quite reasonable for the location and size, so he'd considered it a good bargain.
"They didn't say anything odd to you when you made the deal, did they?"
"Nothing of the sort."
"Well, now. Well, now……"
A flicker of pity crossed the man's eyes as he looked at Jin Seongun.
"Name's Noh Sangwon — I run the Sangwon Fabric Shop just next door."
"Ah, so you're my neighbor. I'm Jin Seongun."
He bowed his head politely. He was a little disappointed the man wasn't a cook, but good relations with neighboring merchants were the foundation of any business.
"Don't stand out there — come in, have some tea—"
"Ah — no, no I won't!"
Noh Sangwon flapped his hands and stumbled back a full step, with a force of will that seemed to declare he would not set a single foot inside that inn. And at that, the ominous feeling in Jin Seongun's gut only deepened. He would have to hear the reason, whatever it took.
"Understood, for now. You take care, now."
Whatever it was he understood, Noh Sangwon nodded and hurried off. Jin Seongun didn't grab him then and there. Working all those years as a waiter had taught him a small piece of wisdom: humanity's primal urges were stronger than most people credited, and appetite sat near the very top of the list. All the more so for a solidly built fellow like Noh Sangwon.
.
.
.
Jin Seongun waited, unhurried, until the sun went down and the dinner hour arrived. When stomachs were at their growling peak, he boiled up a single bowl of noodles and headed straight for the fabric shop next door. Business there looked slow; Noh Sangwon was fanning himself and glaring at a go board.
"Sir."
"Hwak—!"
Noh Sangwon nearly toppled backward off his chair in fright. Jin Seongun steadied him and set the bowl of noodles down on the go board.
"No need for such a fright."
"Ahem. No, of course not. And this would be…?"
Noh Sangwon eyed the noodles with open suspicion. Jin Seongun answered with the same thin smile he'd given the unorthodox men.
"You looked hungry, so I boiled some up."
"Hmm."
Noh Sangwon's guard eased a little. Yes — this was the proper courtesy. When he was young, this was simply how things were done: you moved into a new place, you brought rice cakes or noodles around to the neighbors. But people these days didn't bother. Being greeted at all was about as much as one could hope for.
"Ahem — as it happens, I am rather peckish. Much obliged, I'll dig in."
Noh Sangwon raised his chopsticks. And in that very instant, Jin Seongun's voice followed.
"By the way — does that inn have some kind of secret?"
"……"
Noh Sangwon's hand froze midair. So there was an agenda after all. I suppose I should put the chopsticks down. That, at least, was what his brain decided. But the situation was not in his favor. It was just past the meal hour. A rich broth, a tidy arrangement of garnish, an aroma pricking at his nose — his stomach was howling.
While Noh Sangwon wrestled with himself, Jin Seongun continued, in the flattest of tones, with words that were anything but flat.
"I never knew my parents' faces."
"……"
Noh Sangwon flinched. Unbothered, Jin Seongun kept talking, reciting his life story end to end. It was a wretched tale by anyone's measure.
Noh Sangwon had lost his own parents young, too — and the world was a hard place for a child to survive alone. No one understood that better than he did, which was why Jin Seongun didn't feel like a stranger to him at all.
"Whew."
Noh Sangwon let out a long sigh. Looking at the young man's face, exasperation and pity welled up in him at once. As long as he walked this earth wearing the skin of a human being, he couldn't turn away any longer. At last, he spoke with the air of a man who had made up his mind.
"Don't you go startling now — just listen. That inn there. There's something in it."
"And just what is this 'something'?"
"A ghost."
"……"
Jin Seongun stared at him flatly. So people still believe in ghosts these days. Apparently reading the thought on his face, Noh Sangwon pressed on in an even graver voice.
"This is nothing to laugh off. I've run a shop on this spot for twenty years. How many times do you suppose the owner of that inn changed in that time?"
"Hard to say. Owners don't usually change often — once or twice?"
Noh Sangwon snorted with laughter, then spread out all ten fingers.
"…Ten? It changed ten times?"
Now that's a story worth taking seriously. But Noh Sangwon shook his head.
"No."
Jin Seongun's expression stiffened somewhat as well. Noh Sangwon pressed on, in the tone of a man who felt Jin Seongun was finally grasping the problem.
"Fifty. Fifty, I say — and I stopped counting after that. Not one of them lasted out a fortnight. You must be from out of town, or you'd have heard…"
Noh Sangwon clicked his tongue. Really — swindling a young man like this. The nerve.
"Not a one of them made it past fifteen days. Tormented by nightmares every night until they were worn to husks, they fled with hands and feet raised in surrender. Some even called in spirit-mediums and Taoist exorcists. And what do you suppose happened then?"
"……"
"They took one little look inside and fled, white as sheets. Ah, and here's another one for you. Once, a martial artist bought the place. You know the type — inner energy and whatnot, strong qi, the whole lot."
"Well, yes…"
Jin Seongun nodded, and Noh Sangwon lowered his voice even further.
"That one strutted in full of bluster at first. Where in the world is there a ghost? he says. And even if there were, could it withstand a single stroke of my blade? he says."
"……"
"And then — gone. Ashamed of himself, I reckon, because he ran off in the dead of night. According to those who saw him go, he'd spent a good long while bowing to the inn. Bowing, mind you!"
"Bowing?"
"Word is, it was no ordinary ghost. That ghost had been a martial artist too! And by the runaway's own account, no common fighter either, but — "
Noh Sangwon glanced around, then beckoned Jin Seongun closer. What on earth is he about to say? Jin Seongun leaned his head in, uneasily, and Noh Sangwon whispered into his ear.
"A Martial God."
"Mm."
Jin Seongun decided the story had well and truly wandered off into the weeds. Truthfully, he had been tense at first — but the moment he heard the words Martial God, all the tension drained out of him. Through all the ages, many had been called Martial God. Every one of them the foremost fighter of his era — beings close to demigods, who shattered mountains and clove seas.
"What kind of Martial God, and for what possible regret, clings to a shabby inn like that after death?"
"My point exactly!"
Jin Seongun had meant it as a jab, but Noh Sangwon flapped about and agreed all the more emphatically.
"It must be some truly monstrous grudge!"
"……"
Jin Seongun clicked his tongue quietly. Apparently there was nothing to worry about after all.
He did not believe in ghosts. More precisely, he believed in nothing supernatural — gods, spirits, any of it. If such beings truly existed, wouldn't it all be unbearably unfair? What conceivable grudge could Heaven hold against him, to have dealt him this life?
"In any case — thank you for telling me."
Jin Seongun left the fabric shop, and Noh Sangwon clicked his tongue at his retreating back. Ah well. People never learn until it happens to them. With that thought, he picked up his chopsticks — he'd fussed and fretted so long that his stomach had glued itself to his spine. He raised the noodles to his mouth.
"Ptui!"
He spat them straight back out, his face a portrait of pure horror.
"There it is! The ghost's already gotten into your hands, hasn't it!"
Jin Seongun, already walking away, turned his head and gave a faint smirk.
"That's my cooking at its best. There's a reason I've only ever worked as a waiter."
A cook was treated better than a waiter, so of course he had tried his hand at the kitchen — and he could not recall a single kind word about his food. No; he had never once escaped a scathing review. Noodles, properly speaking, were the sort of dish that stayed at least edible even if you boiled them in plain water. Jin Seongun possessed a talent of quite another order — the talent to make a man spit them out on the spot.
"Once, I even made a beggar throw up."
he murmured, somewhere between memory and reverie. It was also why he awaited a cook so desperately.
He was more pure-hearted than he looks.
Jin Seongun pictured Noh Sangwon's plump, round face. The man had judged him pitiable and endearing, and so had told him the secret — and anyone who believed in something as nonsensical as a ghost was probably no bad sort. He'd have to treat him to food now and then once he hired a proper cook.
He was wiping down a table when his head snapped around. There was a small door leading to the back yard.
"Did I imagine that?"
It had sounded like a person's voice. He glared at the door for a moment, then picked up his broom. Ghosts didn't cross his mind at all. A beggar might have slipped back there looking for a place to sleep — that was all, and he meant to check.
Jin Seongun had been blessed with steady nerves from birth. He'd always known, vaguely, that he was different from other people: the range of his emotions was strangely narrow, and he could count on one hand the times he had feared or grieved for anything. Working as a waiter, he had endured who knew how many outrages at the hands of martial artists — and not once, even with a blade pressed to his face, had he felt fear. One unorthodox swordsman had been so struck by it that he'd tried to take Jin Seongun as a pupil, only to give up upon discovering his catastrophic lack of talent.
Anyway.
Broom gripped tight, Jin Seongun flung the back door wide open.
"……"
Dusk had already settled deep. Untended grass grown to the height of a man swayed with an ugly, restless hiss.
"Anyone there? If you've come begging, I'll treat you to a bowl of noodles."
No answer came. The clearing was small, but the riotous overgrowth choked his view. He parted the grass here and there with his broom, scanning the ground — and the moment he pushed aside the densest thicket of all, Jin Seongun's footsteps stopped dead.
His face, ordinarily so slow to change, hardened a degree.
"So this was here."
A small storage shed, hidden beneath the grass. He certainly hadn't seen it when the deal was made.
He stared at it for a long moment. He would have to look inside, he supposed. A beggar hunting a place to sleep could well be hiding in there.
Jin Seongun took hold of the door handle. He hesitated — just for a heartbeat.
And what if it's not just a beggar, but one who's learned the martial arts?
He already believed someone was inside. He had no evidence for it. He simply felt something in there — some presence beyond explaining. His brief deliberation was still unfolding when—
The voice rang out, vivid and unmistakable: Behold — the Heavenly Martial Body!
Jin Seongun's eyes flew wide open. And in the same instant, the door handle moved of its own accord — as though it were dragging his hand — and the door swung inward.