The Future of Wudang
The previous night.
Hyeon Un had said this to the young disciples who came to find him, looking as though they'd been wrung half to rags.
"The truth is, Seong-un is going to become my disciple. In fact, I'd say he's already half become one."
"Y-your disciple?"
It was a notion neither of them had ever imagined, and Baek Sang and Baek Seol's expressions went blank with shock.
After all, who was it that stood before them now?
White Cloud Sword Hyeon Un.
An elder of the Wudang Sect and one of the Seven Wudang Masters, a supreme expert who stood at the very peak of the current age.
If our waiter — no, if our honored waiter becomes the Elder's disciple...
The generational lines would be thrown into chaos.
Sometimes such tangles did happen in the Taoist sects. A second-generation disciple's eldest might be barely older than a first-generation disciple's youngest — or in rare cases, the second-generation disciple might even be the elder in years. And while strict sect discipline demanded that one address a first-generation disciple as one's senior martial uncle regardless of age, people were still people, and the relationship inevitably became an awkward one.
But this case went far beyond that.
If Seong-un became the Elder's disciple, he would be a first-generation disciple.
And the youngest of those first-generation disciples was none other than Oh Jeong-san — a man who had already passed his fortieth year.
"So then... he would be our senior martial uncle?"
While Baek Sang was still drowning in confusion, Baek Seol asked in her innocent, guileless voice.
Hyeon Un gazed upon Baek Seol, who had already begun calling Jin Seong-un her martial uncle, with the eyes of a man beholding the most precocious child in all the world, and nodded.
"That's right! That's exactly how it will be!"
Of course, no real progress had been made on that front.
When he had dropped the hint to Jin Seong-un, the answer that came back had been an exceedingly firm refusal.
Hyeon Un clicked his tongue in bitter disappointment.
"Until it is settled, you must not breathe a word of this to anyone. And above all, not to Seong-un himself."
"I'm sorry — what?"
Baek Seol felt something was off.
She could understand not telling outsiders. But why on earth would they have to keep it from the man himself?
Hyeon Un watched the two young disciples for a moment, and then a clever idea seemed to strike him.
"Speaking of which — have you two gotten to know Seong-un any better?"
"...We have not, Elder."
Baek Sang still wore a thoroughly bewildered expression.
Hyeon Un looked at him and said, "Then get to know him. Your roles are of tremendous importance. You must go beyond merely earning his regard — you must become truly close to him."
Baek Sang and Baek Seol pictured Jin Seong-un in their minds.
By and large, he was blunt and brusque in expression and manner. Not unfriendly, exactly, but somehow difficult to approach. It felt as though they might actually warm up to Cook Seo long before they ever managed it with Jin Seong-un himself.
When the siblings' faces clouded with uncertainty, Hyeon Un's eyebrows slowly bent into an inverted V.
"Fools! What manner of Taoist abandons a task before even attempting it!"
The sudden bellow made the siblings jump out of their skins.
Is this really worth getting this angry over?
The thought flickered briefly through both their minds — but neither dared to voice it aloud in front of him.
"Let me leave you with one last thing. It may well be that the future of Wudang rests in your hands."
"Th-the future of Wudang?"
"You have already experienced it firsthand, have you not?"
At Hyeon Un's words, the siblings' minds went to Jin Seong-un's violence — no, to his sparring and training.
It was certainly true that he was a man an Elder might covet. Baek Sang privately thought of him as an old master granted renewed youth, such was the depth of his power.
"Baek Sang. And Baek Seol."
"Yes, Elder."
"You two are the ones who will one day compete for the position of leader of Wudang. You understand this, do you not?"
"...Yes. I suppose such a day will come eventually."
The thought of having to compete with each other — of all people — for that seat left a bitter taste in both their mouths.
Oblivious to this, Hyeon Un continued.
"Naturally, you will compete against your fellow disciples as well. Have you ever tried to imagine the Wudang Sect you will one day inherit?"
Neither of them could answer.
It was still a matter far too distant and dizzying to contemplate.
Hyeon Un went on. "To put it coldly, none of the first-generation disciples, Jeong-san included, will ever be the finest under heaven. Think of the Sword Star of Mount Hua and the Sword Marquis of Kunlun. The last time I met those two, they were already standing shoulder to shoulder with me."
The Mount Hua Sword Star and the Cloud Dragon Sword Marquis.
Both barely past forty, yet already assessed to be closing fast on the ranks of the Ten Great Masters of the realm.
Coldly considered, there was not a single swordsman among Wudang's first-generation disciples who could measure up to either of them.
"But consider this. What if Seong-un became my disciple — that is to say, a first-generation disciple?"
"...!"
Jin Seong-un's martial prowess was truly extraordinary.
At barely twenty years of age, he had already overwhelmed with a single strike two men hailed as the Phoenix and the Dragon of the late-stage peak realm.
If that incomprehensible genius became a disciple of Wudang — then perhaps, just perhaps, he could stand against the Plum Blossom Sword Star or the Cloud Dragon Sword Marquis and have a real fight of it.
Said differently, it meant the Wudang Sect that Baek Sang or Baek Seol would one day inherit might still be able to claim supremacy over all the realm.
Moreover, that he was not of their generational line worked in their favor. They would never have to compete head-to-head against such a monstrous talent.
Only then did the siblings understand.
Understood that the future of the Wudang Sect truly rested upon their shoulders.
"Do you understand now?"
"...We will do our very best."
"M-me too!"
Hyeon Un smiled with satisfaction.
"Good. Remember this well. Not a word of this may be spoken until he formally becomes a disciple. If the Mount Hua Sect, the Kunlun Sect, the Martial Alliance, or the Beggar's Sect catches wind of it, we will have a very sore headache on our hands."
The Mount Hua and Kunlun Sects both had deep roots in the old Quanzhen lineage. The Beggar's Sect was a pack of gossips, and the Martial Alliance was an organization with an insatiable hunger for talent.
Hyeon Un was intensely wary that someone might steal Jin Seong-un away from him.
Baek Sang and Baek Seol, of course, knew nothing of these circumstances. They merely nodded, their faces growing grave, as though some great secret burden had been entrusted to them by the Elder himself.
And so it was that Jin Seong-un's misunderstanding of the Wudang Sect only continued to deepen.
Are all Wudang Taoists like this?
Gift-addicted Hyeon Un. Worry-addicted Oh Jeong-san. Work-addicted Baek Sang and Baek Seol.
That was how Jin Seong-un saw the Taoists of Wudang — less a righteous sect and more a dangerous collective of addicts of one stripe or another.
Baek Sang was scrubbing the tables and floors with the ferocity of a man who fancied himself the last orthodox fighter standing at the end of the Great Righteous-Demonic War, treating cleaning like a campaign of total war. The sheer vigor was impressive, admittedly — the problem was that the customers were finding it more than a little unnerving.
Tak-tak-tak-tak-tak-tak-!
Jin Seong-un's head turned toward the kitchen.
That savage chopping again. No need to look — it could only be young Baek Seol, hacking away at the ingredients as though she'd just met a mortal enemy in a duel of life and death.
Just then Seo Yugyeom came out, dusting off his hands, and spoke to Jin Seong-un, who stood there staring blankly. "There's nothing left to teach her. Her knife work is flawless and she understands the ingredients better than most. And since she's a Taoist who apparently lives on vegetables alone, her palate is actually incredibly sharp — almost absurdly so."
A refined palate was, after all, the single greatest talent a cook could possess.
For the past hour now, every dish that left the kitchen had been made entirely by Baek Seol's hands. Her tremendous focus and willpower, plus the stamina to pour inner energy into the work, let her handle a formidable volume of orders all on her own.
"...Same on this end, I'd say."
Jin Seong-un nodded and glanced over at Seomun Ak and Baek Sang. Seomun Ak found Baek Sang's sudden transformation deeply strange, but some quiet, competitive fire had evidently caught in him as well, because he was now burning with equal zeal, absorbed in the work.
It was an unusually busy evening.
A merchant friend of Noh Sang-won's had just become a grandfather, and half the market had come swarming in to drink to the news.
And yet Jin Seong-un and Seo Yugyeom found themselves with nothing to do.
"...It's happened faster than I expected."
Jin Seong-un let out a low sigh.
His face wore such a contemplative look that a curious Seo Yugyeom asked, "What is it?"
"The master of the first inn I ever worked at, when I was young, once told me this: that the ultimate goal every merchant should strive for is 'a business that runs fine without you.'"
"Oho."
Seo Yugyeom's eyes gleamed.
Wasn't that exactly like the Salmak Master?
Without ever lifting a finger himself, the assassins he had trained so rigorously — and the Vice Master — resolved nearly everything. The Salmak Master, in the truest sense of the word, made money sitting still.
In the boisterous hum of the inn, Seo Yugyeom broke into a sly grin, sidled closer to Jin Seong-un, and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial murmur. "Hey. There's something I've been dying to ask you for a while now."
Jin Seong-un looked at him.
Seo Yugyeom lowered his voice even further. "A guy with your kind of strength — why in the world are you running an inn? Watching you, it's not like you're greedy for money. And honestly, with your skills, you could get money or fame far more easily."
Seo Yugyeom's question was one that many people had quietly wondered about.
With martial arts of Jin Seong-un's caliber, any sect in the land would have welcomed him. He could have been an instructor for a clan, a warrior in one of the Five Great Noble Families, or a swordsman of the Martial Alliance. If he could simply prove his identity, he might even have sought the great honor of serving as an imperial guard in the palace itself.
Seo Yugyeom was convinced Jin Seong-un was hiding something. There had to be a reason he had to run an inn.
Jin Seong-un gazed at his inn for a long moment.
Drunken patrons laughing and shouting; the two young waiters sprinting themselves breathless. The smell of liquor and food thick in the air, and the ceaseless percussion of knife on cutting board ringing from the kitchen.
He took in every sight, every smell, every vibration of Seongun Inn for a while — then answered, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Mm. Well... it's just the work I've always done, isn't it?"
"That's it? That's the whole answer?"
Seo Yugyeom's face visibly deflated. He'd been braced for something grander.
"Then why not take the old man Hyeon Un's offer? It couldn't hurt."
Seo Yugyeom deliberately avoided the word disciple. The room was plenty loud, but Seomun Ak was a martial artist too, and if he set his mind to it he could listen in.
Sure enough, Baek Sang's footsteps and Baek Seol's chopping stuttered — for just a heartbeat.
Seo Yugyeom smirked inwardly. Those two. Suddenly acting all different overnight — clearly the old man got to them with something.
Jin Seong-un chewed on the question for a moment, then shook his head. "I like the inn, all the same."
"You really are a strange one."
Seo Yugyeom shrugged.
Truthfully, Jin Seong-un's decision suited Seo Yugyeom fine. Seongun Inn was the first home he had ever chosen for himself.
"But you know there's another reason too, don't you? You know I know."
Seo Yugyeom grinned wide.
Jin Seong-un coughed awkwardly into his fist and promptly vanished somewhere.
Watching him go, Seo Yugyeom burst out laughing all over again, thoroughly entertained. Apparently, the first friend he'd ever made in his life was a terrible liar.
Hubei Province. The city of Enshi.
The meaning of its name — "bestowing grace" — had long since faded to nothing.
Hubei was a province where the Martial Alliance Headquarters, the Wudang Sect, and the Zhuge Clan all held ground, its orthodox factions riding high on a tide of white. And the single patch of black Dao carved out of all that territory was this very place, Enshi.
Crack-!
A wine cup shattered in a man's hand.
The general steward who had served the liquor calmly gathered up the broken shards, plainly long accustomed to such occurrences.
The man glared at the steward with savage eyes. "Why is the White Cloud Sword there?"
Even for the Southern Black Lotus Lord — sovereign of Hubei's black Dao — Hyeon Un was hardly an opponent to take lightly.
And that was only the beginning.
The steward's face went pale with fear.
In the short time since he'd taken the post, three stewards before him had already died in this very office of the Lord.
Damn it all. All of this because he couldn't even keep one son in line!
The steward swallowed the curse inwardly.
He had been an ordinary commander once — until the men above him had died in an unbroken line, leaving the "acting general steward" post dumped squarely on his shoulders.
He spoke with the utmost caution. "It appears to have been Oh Jeong-san who summoned him, my lord. The White Cloud Sword's only disciple. So the trouble is not merely the White Cloud Sword — but the second-generation disciples of Wudang, the second son of the Seomun Clan, the second son of the Seok Manor, and the Tang Clan of Sichuan's..."
CRASH-!
The Southern Black Lotus Lord could no longer contain his fury and drove his fist into the table. The steward's knees nearly buckled.
"What did you say? The Seomun Clan, the Seok Manor, and the Tang Clan as well?"
The Lord's gaze sank low — the gaze of a man deciding whom to kill.
The steward could only pray that the chosen target would be anyone but himself.
The Southern Black Lotus Lord ground the words out between his teeth. "It's clear now. The white-faction bastards intend to use Yichang as their base and squeeze our Southern Black Lotus. Before long, the Martial Alliance will move as well."
Yichang was the border that divided Enshi from the orthodox-held territories of Hubei.
It had been the very region he had sent his son to scout — and now the white-faction dogs were filling it, one by one. It felt as though a blade of the orthodox world were already pressed against his throat.
"Of late, men believed to be beggars of the Beggar's Sect have been prowling the area. The White Cloud Sword is said to be on close terms with a Beggar's Sect elder — might this be their doing?"
The steward let the words trail off deliberately. A needle-sharp killing intent was pressing down on his entire body.
The Southern Black Lotus Lord exhaled a long, slow breath. If the Beggar's Sect had entered the field as well, he could not afford to move rashly.
"One thing at least is certain. At the center of every single one of these events stands a single inn. Is that not so?"
"...Yes, my lord. It is."
That was, in truth, the point that most bewildered the steward.
The death of the Prosperity Society Leader. The death of the Black Serpent Corps Leader. Even the involvement of the Wudang Sect, and the late-stage peak masters of the Seomun Clan, the Seok Manor, and the Tang Clan.
All of it connected to one inn.
Being a steward who received reports only through written documents and judged from paper alone, the whole affair struck him as stranger still. That very strangeness bred an uncertainty that paralyzed him — as a steward, he could not bring himself to pass judgment of any kind.
"Then let us do this."
The Southern Black Lotus Lord spoke at last, after long deliberation.
The steward nodded, wearing the expression of a man prepared to listen with every fiber of his being.
The Lord continued. "If there is something beneath your floorboards and you cannot tell what it is — what do you do? You pick up a poker, or whatever's at hand, and start poking at it. That is all."
"B-but the Beggar's Sect—"
"We simply make certain we do not step in ourselves. And as it happens, I know a raving madman, blind with obsession, who has a particular connection to that inn."