The Trace of the Sword
Standing on the podium, Joo Chae-rin scanned the students seated in the lecture hall. ‘There are a few decent ones this time.’ It seemed that almost every student known for having talent in swordsmanship had shown up. While her interest was piqued, she didn’t hold any real expectations. It had already been seven years since she started working as an academy instructor. In that time, hundreds of students had attempted her assignment, and hundreds had failed. She continued to set the task, clinging to a shred of hope, but by now, she was nearly resigned to the idea that it was impossible.
“Nice to meet you all. I’m Joo Chae-rin, the instructor in charge of Advanced Sword Skills. Since the course details were all announced during orientation, I’ll get straight to the point. You all know about the assignment, right?”
The students all nodded. Joo Chae-rin’s assignment was famous even outside the academy. There was no way the students who had signed up for this class wouldn’t know about it.
“To reiterate, whoever completes the assignment I’ve set will receive an A+ regardless of their exam results or attendance.”
This alone was unconventional. It meant that if you solved the assignment, you could get a perfect grade without ever attending class. But that wasn’t the end of it. The reward that followed was the very reason this assignment had become so famous.
“And, I will grant you any favor you desire.”
As the students stirred at the outrageous offer, one student raised their hand high.
“I have a question!”
“What is it?”
“Is it really, truly anything?”
Joo Chae-rin didn’t flinch at the question, which could be considered rude. Instead, she offered a seductive smile and replied.
“That’s right. Whatever you want, I can grant it.”
Perhaps lacking the nerve to match his own audacity, the student who asked swallowed hard. Kim Ilshin chuckled to himself. Knowing that Joo Chae-rin had never even been in a relationship, her gestures just seemed amusing to him.
“Alright! No more explanation needed, so I’ll show you the assignment now.”
Joo Chae-rin turned her head nonchalantly and pulled a jagged fragment from her pocket, tossing it onto the lecture hall floor. For a moment, the space around the fragment seemed to distort, and a massive boulder that looked to be three meters tall appeared. On one side of the boulder, deep, intricately intertwined traces were carved in every direction. Those traces were the answer to the assignment—though no one other than Kim Ilshin could tell.
Joo Chae-rin placed her hand on the boulder and said, “The goal of the assignment is to break this boulder and retrieve the contents inside. Who wants to try?”
Many students raised their hands with bravado. It looked like half the students in the room had volunteered. Joo Chae-rin pointed to one of them.
The chosen student, Namgung Min, stood up confidently and walked to the front, and the other students nodded as if to acknowledge him. A third-year student like Kim Ilshin, he was famous for his swordsmanship utilizing wind magic. Namgung Min walked with a confident gait, stood before the boulder, and drew his sword. Wind began to swirl around him.
Whoosh-!
The wind raging around him slowly wove into his sword, creating an intangible sword energy.
“Hup!”
With a shout, he raised his sword high, and the fiercely rotating sword energy soared upward before—
Kwang-!
It fell. The compressed wind exploded all at once, tearing the surroundings apart. The wind’s sword energy shredded everything it touched—the floor, the chalkboard, the desks. Seeing a strike that would easily turn a boulder into dust, the other students watched the rock with a mix of anticipation and nervousness.
“Uh…?”
However, when the widespread dust settled, the boulder remained completely unscathed. Seeing that not even a scratch had been left, let alone the rock being broken, Namgung Min’s face turned to shock. He had thought he might not succeed on the first try, but he hadn’t expected this.
“What is this…?”
Namgung Min muttered gloomily and sat down with a dejected expression. That strike had been the best he could produce. If it had no effect, breaking it was impossible.
“Is there anyone else who wants to try?”
Even though the opportunity was there, the students couldn’t easily raise their hands and only glanced at each other. Many had given up on the challenge after seeing Namgung Min’s failure. There weren’t many students in the room stronger than Namgung Min, and even they, having seen the boulder remain intact after his strike, didn’t dare to attempt it.
Joo Chae-rin was equally disappointed. She even began to doubt her mentor’s dying wish that someone would eventually succeed. ‘Is it a failure again this time?’ Just as she was about to dismiss the challenge, judging that there would be no more takers, a voice spoke up.
“I will give it a try.”
A student at the back of the room had raised their hand. When she looked to see who it was, the face was familiar. ‘His name is… Kim Ilshin, was it?’ He was a student she had seen on the enrollment list. She remembered him because his overwhelmingly disastrous grades had stood out.
“Sure, come and try.”
She permitted the challenge, but she had no expectations. She just thought he was showing off. That was how she felt, at least until then.
***
Kim Ilshin approached the boulder and examined the traces. Sharp trajectories were intricately intertwined as if dozens of blades had raced across the rock. At a glance, it looked like several people had carved it recklessly, but Kim Ilshin could notice the mysterious principles contained within. It was a Sword Trace. A master of a high realm had depicted their enlightenment.
In the game, the way to complete the assignment was to draw the correct trajectory in the order the traces were carved. Since he could succeed with A-grade talent just by reading the walkthrough thoroughly, he thought it would be easy for himself, who possessed S-grade talent.
‘I didn’t think it would turn out like this.’
But now, Kim Ilshin could see beyond that. The trajectories of the sword traces engraved in his mind were dismantled one by one and floated in the air. As they transformed into three-dimensional images according to the order they were carved, he could see the movements at the end.
Sring-
Only then did Kim Ilshin draw his sword. A clear, ringing sound that didn’t suit a low-quality iron sword echoed, and a wave of mana gathered at its tip. Kim Ilshin’s overwhelming talent didn’t stop at just realizing the movements. He accepted everything contained within the sword traces—the sword’s formula, the principles, and even the intent of the one who left them behind.
Swoosh.
Smoothly and slowly, he moved his sword. The wave of mana wrapped around the blade began to encroach upon the surroundings, and Kim Ilshin fell into a trance. He closed his eyes and focused on the scene that emerged.
The person who carved the sword traces was an old man who had long since passed the twilight of his life. The grip of a swordsman, trained for a long time to hold a sword, crushed even the rock, and it did not change even as it weathered and decayed. Holding the sword was the swordsman’s life itself, so that, at least, remained until the end of his life. In that sense, the weak grip of an old man who couldn’t even snap a slender blade of grass meant his end was near.
However, his swordsmanship reached the heavens, and he hoped to leave his enlightenment to future generations. At the final moment, he raised his sword. All swordsmanship has its roots in self-protection. It was created as a means for the weak to preserve their own lives. Thus, the old man did not set his heart on destructive swordsmanship, and what he pondered endlessly was the pinnacle of parrying.
‘……I see it.’
When he opened his eyes, there were several trajectories rushing toward him. They had no substance, but he knew they were not mere illusions.
Step.
Kim Ilshin took a step without hesitation. He let the strong trajectories flow by like calm ripples, and the trajectories that intertwined softly became a raging wave that he broke through. That process was the path of the sword, and Kim Ilshin walked without wavering.
Thud.
Finally reaching the end of the path, Kim Ilshin’s sword touched the boulder. Then, the boulder, which hadn’t allowed even a small scratch from any attack, crumbled on its own as if to say it had finally completed its mission.
‘Let’s call it Cheonryu (River Flow).’
Named the Cheonryu Sword because it contained the continuous flow of water. Kim Ilshin named it so.
“……Huh.”
“Whoa…….”
Amidst the silence that engulfed everyone, save for the occasional small exclamation, Joo Chae-rin muttered softly.
“No way. Really…?”
Joo Chae-rin’s eyes, looking at the remains of the crumbled boulder, shook violently. The student at the very bottom of the rankings—whom she hadn’t expected anything from, whom she had only thought was acting out—had finally liberated her from her lifelong task.
Joo Chae-rin, who still couldn’t quite grasp the reality of the situation, stared blankly at the spot where the boulder had been. The image of the boulder standing tall lingered in her eyes.
“Instructor. There’s something here.”
It was Kim Ilshin’s voice that woke her. When she turned her head, she saw a small box in his hand. He had discovered it under the debris of the boulder.
“O-oh? G-give that here…!”
Joo Chae-rin hurriedly approached him and took the box. The small box, which felt the weight of time, was something she had desperately longed for over the past several years.
‘Finally…….’
Joo Chae-rin barely suppressed the tears threatening to burst forth from her moved heart and said, “Class is over for today! Everyone else, take a break or prepare for your next class, and Ilshin, come with me.”
Saying that, Joo Chae-rin grabbed Kim Ilshin’s wrist and quickly headed out of the lecture hall. In her other hand, she was clutching the box as if it were precious.
As the two left, the students who had finally regained their senses began to open their mouths one by one. Among them were the two most active ones: Namgung Min and his twin brother, Namgung Hyeok.
“……Man, he actually did it.”
“Right? But honestly, I still don’t know how he did it.”
“You too? Man, me too.”
While discussing the process of Kim Ilshin breaking the boulder, they questioned his past actions. “Is that really the Kim Ilshin I know? Why has a guy like that been living like that until now?”
“I don’t know, we’re in different classes. Maybe he’s one of those ‘hiding his power’ types.”
“No, he hid his power way too much.”
The topic of their conversation soon boiled down to one question: “What should we ask for? She said she’d grant anything.”
“……I don’t know.”
“Do you think she’d tell us if we asked?”
“……Probably not, right?”
“I guess so. Should we try asking her to tell us if we win a sparring match?”
“I feel like I’d get wiped out in one second.”
“You jerk.”
The two continued to share such idle talk until the next class began.
***
His body was almost lifted off the ground by the forceful grip pulling his wrist. The speed was so fast that they were already near Joo Chae-rin’s private office. Leaving the route to Joo Chae-rin, Kim Ilshin thought about the reward. He had already decided what to ask for. Since there was no chance of being refused, he would soon be able to obtain a new sword along with an opportunity for proper practical experience.