Chapter 54
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 54
Chapter Title: Sparring Selection
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After finishing my meditative breathing, I cracked my eyes open slightly, and Jeong-seon was staring intently at me from the side.
I shot him a sideways glance, breaking out in a cold sweat.
Come to think of it, his fetish was definitely...
A big, strong, dependable man.
How many of those had I already fulfilled?
"Why won't you look over here?"
"...Still in the middle of meditative breathing..."
"Yeah?"
Of course, it was a lie.
No way you could chat this casually during meditative breathing.
And that was common knowledge to any martial artist.
Jeong-seon saw right through my lie but didn't call me out on it.
Peeking through my half-closed lids, I could see him peering into the sliver of space under my eyelids.
"Done with your meditative breathing?"
"..Yeah.."
Scary.
It felt like I was a deer standing before a tiger.
In terms of size and strength, I was closer to the tiger—but some problems couldn't be solved with brute force alone.
And right now, that problem was Jeong-seon.
"Read this."
Jeong-seon held the Sun Heart Method manual.
I'd already memorized most of it and had no need for it anymore, but Cheol-woong insisted that rereading it each time would uncover hidden meanings, refusing to take it back—so I'd been carrying it around ever since.
Seemed like Jeong-seon had read it too.
Jeong-seon, who hadn't shown any interest in me before.
"You knew it was an extreme yang inner art and still learned it?"
"Yeah."
"Then you know why people avoid it?"
"Hard to build up inner energy?"
Jeong-seon nodded at my answer.
"There are only two ways to cultivate extreme yang inner energy. Devour yin qi, or absorb yang qi."
"Ugh..."
A groan slipped from my lips before I knew it.
Absorb yang qi?
Just hearing the words made my skin crawl.
Come to think of it, ordinary men had stronger yang qi, while women had stronger yin qi.
Jeong-seon was the opposite—his yin qi was overwhelmingly strong.
He had some yang qi, sure, but it was negligible by comparison.
"That's why North Sea Ice Palace folks can master extreme yin arts despite the conditions. They live in that brutal frozen hell."
Right. Seol-yeong had trained in extreme yin arts that way too, only to end up afflicted with Nine Yin Meridian Blockage.
Having lived his life as a martial artist in this wuxia world, Jeong-seon was packed with all sorts of knowledge.
"So, I think I can help you out."
"...With what?"
"Meditative breathing. You were gobbling up my yin qi pretty eagerly just now, weren't you?"
"..."
Busted.
Well, maybe it was inevitable.
Just like how I'd started vaguely sensing other people's inner energy after picking up martial arts and leveling my heart method...
Jeong-seon seemed able to get a rough read on mine, even if not precisely.
Yeah, it had definitely helped.
The Sun Heart Method's level—which had been stuck—had actually gone up.
But giving this the green light felt like crossing some irreversible point of no return. It left a bad taste in my mouth.
"Without my help, it'll take you forever to build up your inner energy."
"..."
That was true too.
The higher the Sun Heart Method leveled, the tougher the next breakthrough became.
Without Jeong-seon's help, there was no way I'd reach great completion in time.
I accepted his offer with a face like I'd bitten into something scorching hot.
"...Do anything weird during meditative breathing, and you could end up with qi deviation."
"Huh? I know that."
"No, just... making sure."
Jeong-seon gave me a puzzled look, like why state the obvious?
Yeah, it was obvious. But I had to warn him one more time.
I'm anxious, okay?
This time, we weren't meeting at the little clearing in front of the dorms.
All four of us gathered at the massive clearing where the entrance exam had been held.
And the other cadets were there too.
Even some I'd never seen before.
Cheol-woong beckoned us over, and though it felt awkward with all those eyes on us, we had no choice but to line up beside him.
"Five of you will compete in this friendly match."
From what he explained, the five would go out one by one in sequence, racking up consecutive wins until they'd beaten all five opponents.
If luck was on our side, protagonist Poong-woon would carry most of it.
"And four of those are the new cadets right here beside me."
Cheol-woong pointed us out with a finger, drawing a flood of stares.
Now I got what they meant by "stinging gazes."
Sudden murmurs erupted among the cadets, growing louder.
Loud enough to make out from here, and all saying pretty much the same thing.
"Poong-woon from Heavenly Martial Academy and the North Sea Ice Palace young lord aside... who the hell are those other two?"
"Junior cadets, no less..."
"And that big lug supposedly hasn't even trained a full month."
"A month? Who do they think they're insulting?"
Mostly negative buzz about me and Jeong-seon.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but it wasn't a month—barely ten days.
Speaking of which, there were seniors here too, huh?
I'd barely seen any in the dorms or during the exam, so I'd assumed otherwise.
Curious, I quietly asked Jeong-seon, and he explained nicely.
"Academies like ours that don't get sponsorships have to scrape by on commissions..."
Said most seniors capable of pulling their weight were out handling requests to fund things.
That had to sting.
Unselected cadets were voicing doubts about me and Jeong-seon,
and some were even venting about how instructor Cheol-woong had picked the entrants so one-sidedly.
As the murmurs swelled, I sidled up to instructor Cheol-woong and murmured,
"How about I bow out this time?"
"Good idea. Spar for the slot, then."
My suggestion ignored.
And Cheol-woong made the pitch to the others.
"Spar?"
"We can take 'em, long as it's not Poong-woon."
"Let's do it!"
The other cadets jumped at it, naturally.
All wearing the smug grins of overconfident warriors.
Cheol-woong sidled up to me in the meantime.
"Throw it on purpose, and you're expelled."
"...Understood..."
He'd sniffed out my scheme and slammed the door shut.
The matchup system went like this:
Pick any of our four you wanted, spar, and steal their slot.
I worried me and Jeong-seon would be stuck sparring all day, but nope.
"Then I'll take on that guy."
A man with a long, striking scar across his face stepped forward from the cadets, and the crowd who'd been eyeing me went quiet.
Judging by the vibe, he was a pretty big deal around the academy.
"Remember him? Number 2."
"Number 2..."
Jeong-seon's reminder jogged my memory.
He'd taken the entrance exam alongside Poong-woon.
Yeah, kinda rang a bell now.
No veto power for me, so the spar was on. Soon, it was just me and him in the center of the vast clearing.
"Win this, and I'll confess to that errand boy at the inn."
"...Pardon?"
"Beat you, and I'll earn instructor Cheol-woong's nod too."
"..."
Something told me I wouldn't lose.
In-mu Academy ranked dead last among the academies.
Now that I'd grown, I could tell.
Except for Poong-woon—a Mount Hua Sect disciple and Heavenly Martial Academy alum—most cadets here were all about the same level.
This guy was no exception.
None of the crushing pressure I'd felt training under Poong-woon.
Ever since the Sun Heart Method leveled up, my inner energy had stabilized nicely.
Total amount was still low, but I figured I could pull off what Jeong-seon did—channeling inner energy into the legs for quick dashes.
And sure enough, I managed a clumsy imitation of Jeong-seon's speedy sprints.
The start signal dropped, and I shot toward him with Swift skill and inner energy boosting my speed.
He swung his sword in a wide horizontal arc, like swatting a baseball to match my pace—but I didn't let up.
I dove in even closer, slipping past the blade.
Had I chickened out and slowed, I'd have eaten exactly the strike he planned.
"What the—!"
A technique someone small and scrawny like Jeong-seon couldn't pull off.
Leveraging my bulk and momentum for a full-body crash.
A body tackle.
The kind you see all the time in wrestling or American football, now crashing the wuxia scene.
I kept my speed, slamming my shoulder into his solar plexus.
"Guhk."
With a choking gasp, he toppled over unconscious.
A pretty lame defeat for Number 2.
"...What the hell was that?"
"Some kinda martial art...?"
"Never seen it before..."
They seemed more shocked by the unfamiliar move than the outcome.
I'd originally planned to charge like Jeong-seon and smack him with my sword, but he reacted well—so I improvised.
I'd won, but Poong-woon's face was a weird mix.
"That... what... Never mind, good work."
"Seong-han! You copied my move!"
Jeong-seon was thrilled I'd mimicked him, and Cheol-woong was grinning.
A silent one, just the corners of his mouth twitching up—but for that guy, that counted as a full-on beam.
"I-I'm not challenging."
"Guy's using some freaky martial art..."
No more challenges came my way after that spar.
Interest shifted to Jeong-seon instead.
But he'd grown a ton these past few days too.
His sheer inner energy volume had landed him Number 7.
While teaching Seol-yeong—who couldn't use hers due to Nine Yin Meridian Blockage—he'd focused purely on the martial arts themselves.
He'd yelled at her like crazy on day one, but sheer obsession with earning praise from instructor Cheol-woong had him drilling her relentlessly.
He'd ended up learning right alongside her, just like Cheol-woong intended.
"Jeong-seon wins."
Jeong-seon took down the woman tagged Number 3.
Once me and him showed our stuff, the cadets stopped challenging us.
Instead, they scrapped among themselves for the fifth friendly match slot.