Chapter 3
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 3
Chapter Title: Left Envoy - Diamonds are Firm yet Beautiful
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The initiation into the Golden Body Art demanded even more deranged feats than imagined.
Like iron being smelted in scorching heat.
Every muscle tore and healed repeatedly, growing stronger.
A principle anyone who works their body grasps intuitively, even without precise knowledge.
The founder of the Heavenly Robe Sect, originally a blacksmith, wove the same truth into martial arts.
"Hmm. Smash it first, eat, and you get stronger."
A training method that would cripple an ordinary person.
But he was born with sturdy bones.
"Endure it. You mustn't move a muscle."
Golden radiance pierced through Geum-gang's body alongside a wriggling sensation.
Excruciating burning pain, as if her veins were aflame.
Innate true energy, guided by Ha Jin, surged forward, scorching every meridian.
It shattered the channels, amplified the innate energy, and forced recovery.
In other words, a forced recasting of bone and marrow.
Even Ha Jin, a transcendent expert, sweated profusely, unable to lower her guard.
"Ugh..!"
Geum-gang endured far better than Ha Jin anticipated.
The Golden Body Divine Art's initiation began with forging the Golden Body.
Shatter the imbalances, summon innate true energy, rebuild.
Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Sculpting the Golden Body grain by grain.
'Remarkable.'
Her body was already perfectly balanced.
A warrior's honed physique was deemed a "balanced body."
In building muscles and wielding them true, the form optimized itself.
For a child untouched by martial arts to near the Golden Body—it was genius incarnate.
Born with iron bones.
Amid the inferno ravaging her flesh, Geum-gang pondered her name.
Geum-gang.
'Diamond.'
Symmetrize the body, cast it unyielding?
Absurd babble to a modern mind.
But this was the jianghu.
Qi explained all.
Ha Jin's own frame could slice rock like tofu.
Her might validated the art's truth.
So, trust and obey.
When first receiving the Golden Body Art, the master bids the disciple envision indomitability.
That intent shapes the innate true energy into Golden Body.
All heirs pictured crude bulwarks.
Thick ramparts.
Single-plate armor.
Turtle shell.
But Geum-gang was modern-born.
She envisioned a geometric lattice of facets.
Her subconscious reforged her form incomparably tougher.
Two hours passed; like Ha Jin's locks, Geum-gang's hair gleamed gold.
A herald of nearing Golden Body.
Muscles and meridians symmetrized, true energy and flesh turned aureate.
Golden light bore searing agony.
Her eyes blazed molten, transmuting to golden irises.
When every hair shone sunlike, Ha Jin wiped sweat-soaked brow and withdrew her hand.
"Disciple. You have entered the Golden Body Art."
Exhaustion etched her face.
Yet she rose hastily, eager to impart more.
Geum-gang opened her eyes slow, rose—and the world reborn.
Strength surged uncontainable, like clutching a fledgling.
Legs thrummed with power to crater earth.
Senses knife-sharp.
All minutiae registered.
Vibrations beyond the ancestral hall.
Lid-flimmer.
Servant girls' faint murmurs outside.
"Yes. Geum-gang. How does it feel?"
"Strange."
"As expected. It took your master a full day; your brilliance spared me toil."
"You overpraise me, Master."
Her body felt alien.
Golden-tressed cascade.
Veins aglow with starlike yellow flicker.
Ha Jin beamed at her disciple's form.
Who knew this stray would shine so?
By fortune's whim, a lovelier Golden Body than foreseen.
Beauty as unbreakability.
Among peers, none in the Central Plains could mar her.
Geum-gang had twice known a new body.
First, frailty.
Second.
"Miss! What if you shatter everything!"
Overwhelming might.
"Oh, sorry."
'Fuck.'
Oh.
What sound escaped my lips?
Months on, Geum-gang flowed into girlish poise and speech.
Self-revulsion surged when awareness struck.
Golden Body's chief vexation: throttling power always.
'Circulating qi? Golden Body Divine Art diverges from inner or outer arts.'
Ha Jin expounded proudly.
'Standard arts hoard qi in the dantian via meditation, unleash as needed. External, internal—none differ.'
A mere speck dantian marks a warrior.
Jianghu axiom.
Yet...
'You lack dantian. Forged none, nor could. I shattered mine own. Still, peaks can't pierce me. Golden Body Art transmutes constitution. Qi-hoarding needless.'
The body ever-empowered, sans needful moment.
No qi-boost boon, yet human supremacy sans gimmicks.
Thus, Golden Body Art.
Post-initiation, Ha Jin summoned her daily.
"Geum-gang. Watch well."
Ha Jin rooted heavy, punched—cliff yawned vast crater.
Too hamfisted for profundity.
"How's that strike?"
"Poor insight mine, yet it lags in spots."
Ha Jin grinned, fisted tight.
"Aye. Too plain for form."
Stanceless, she flailed fists free.
Floundering to outsiders.
Geum-gang perceived.
Ha Jin's martial reason infused.
A sword-dance sublime.
"This one?"
"Profound beyond my tongue."
"Sharp eye. Thus fights the Golden-bodied."
From heart's whim, desire unbound, yet rule-abiding.
Ancient Hundred Schools sage.
Realm where will bends not principle.
"Golden Body keenens sense; rote forms obsolete."
Swing, smash—instinct pure.
"Then training?"
Geum-gang glanced up; Ha Jin clenched demonstrative.
"Traditional way exists."
Master-disciple sparring unending.
"Sense alone! Sharpen! Sharper!"
'Fuck!'
Ha Jin beast-rampant; Rakshasa moniker apt.
Fist, palm, kick, thigh, claw, knee, elbow, handblade.
Every limb lashed foe.
Each peril incarnate.
Golden Body's lunatic spring and bend enabled impossibles.
"Taking it grand!"
Ha Jin marveled at progress.
First-realm child, such wit.
'Body alone heaven-sent?'
Unseen by Geum-gang: she mirrored, adapted Ha Jin's dance, counterflooded.
Palm-strike, elbow-crush contra.
Blade-hand swordkeen, collar-yank sequel.
Absorbed every motion.
"Yes! Faster! Nimbler!"
'This one may crest Heavenly Robes Unfettered, grandmasters' despair!'
Sect's ancient ache.
Guo Han's fairy silk.
Her era's triumph?
Ha Jin's hope swelled uncontained.
Geum-gang tasted death.
Daily disciple-master brawls.
How barbaric the regimen.
"Whew. Refreshing as ever."
Of course—for you.
I ate blows.
"Too painful."
First hits quaked her.
"Grateful for instruction."
Morrow: grit-fueled endurance.
"Hurts daily, Mashter."
Swollen cheeks lisped.
"Mashter?"
"Master."
One month exact.
Geum-gang learned dodging.
"Uhn. Master, hurts."
Cute whimper deployed.
"Aigoo, my wee one."
Pain-play coy begat gentler morrow.
"Master, painless today?"
Dire pain? Aegyo utmost.
"Mm. Rest befits."
Lap-lounging respite.
Geum-gang leg-dangled, munching yakgwa.
Hawk bends the perch.
"Hee. Yakgwa yummy."
'Fuck... one smack incoming... tenderest spot...'
Left Envoy's lax tutelage birthed duplicitous belle.
Ha Jin knew the golden tot's schemes.
'Ugh. Cuteness slays restraint. Tomorrow, grapples galore.'
As disciple mulled mutiny, deviant huffed eager.