Good Kid, Bad Kid
Cold sweat soaked the back of my shirt, but the kids were already clamoring.
"Nangin-nim! Hurry up and start!"
And then there was Sagong Hyeon, watching me with rapt attention.
Haa...
The Tang Clan had tried to kill me with a staged accident. At the Jeomchang Sect, it looked like I was going to die of pure humiliation instead. Nothing for it — this wasn't something I could put off, and people didn't actually die of embarrassment.
Probably.
Since I couldn't escape it anyway, I might as well enjoy myself. When Ho Cheon-an committed to something, he gave it everything he had. Sagong Hyeon had come here precisely because he'd been looking into why the children had started behaving so well. So why not rope him into the performance too?
"Master, since things have come to this, would you care to join in the fun?"
"Hohoho? I'm not quite sure what you mean, fellow Daoist."
I sent him a sound transmission the children couldn't hear.
"Hohoho. Ah, now I understand."
"Amitabha."
"All right! Let's begin today's prayers!"
"Yaaay!"
"Hey now! Line up in order!"
The first child took his place in front of me. Normally we would press our palms together together, but today called for a different approach.
"Hahp."
"Whoa, candy!"
"That looks so good!"
Just making candy appear had clearly lost its novelty. Then again, entertaining the kids wasn't the point today, so it hardly mattered. When the child reached out for the sweet, I shook my head and dropped it into a bowl instead.
The sudden change in routine left the children baffled.
"Last night, Lord Hou Yi appeared in my dreams. He was furious — said some of you had been telling lies."
The kids swallowed hard.
"So today, Lord Hou Yi himself will listen to your prayers and judge whether you're telling the truth!"
Uneasy eyes all around. Sure, some of them had genuinely been good after the promise of extra candy for good behavior — and the happiness that came with eating it. But plenty of others had just talked a big game about being good kids.
I shot Sagong Hyeon a quick glance.
Message received.
I flipped the bowl over as I spoke.
"You went to bed early and got up early again today, and trained hard too, right?"
"Yes, Nangin-nim!"
"You didn't cause any trouble or do anything bad, did you?"
"...Uh... n-no."
"Hmm! Excellent! If you were lying, Lord Hou Yi would have taken the candy away!"
I lifted the bowl.
Naturally, the candy was gone.
"Hoho... you little rascal! How dare you lie in front of Lord Hou Yi!"
"Ugh...! I'm sorry!"
"Then confess your sins to Lord Hou Yi this instant!"
Watching him tear up in pure terror softened my heart a little — but this was what discipline looked like.
"During scripture class today I was goofing off and broke an inkstone! And I hid the broken pieces in my locker and pretended I didn't know anything!"
"What else!"
"I tickled my friends' feet while they were sleeping!"
"Ahh! So you were the culprit yesterday!"
"The day before too! It was you, wasn't it?!"
Apparently he was a repeat offender — the victimized kids erupted into a noisy uproar. Ignoring the chaos in the cheap seats, I addressed the boy.
"Hohoho... what are you waiting for? Offer Lord Hou Yi a prayer of forgiveness at once!"
"Hiiing... Lord Hou Yi. Sniff. I'm sorry."
The situation had clearly terrified him — tears and snot were pouring down his face. I glanced at Sagong Hyeon. He gave a faint nod. Time to wrap this up.
"Very well!"
Right after flipping the bowl, I pressed my palms together in an exaggerated gesture.
"Open the bowl."
Wiping his nose and eyes on his sleeve, the boy carefully turned it over. Inside sat a piece of candy that absolutely should not have been there.
"Ah...!"
"Lord Hou Yi loves honest children! Because you found the courage to apologize to him, he has specially granted you this candy!"
"Hwaaaah...! Thank you, Lord Hou Yi!!"
Clutching the candy tight, Cheonghae exited stage left in a flood of tears and snot.
"Next!"
The children who'd been crowding in front of me shuffled back uneasily.
"Hohoho..."
Sagong Hyeon watched Ho Cheon-an coax the frightened children forward one by one to offer their prayers.
More precisely, he watched those hands.
It was a truly remarkable skill.
"Hohoho... whether it's divine power or not, it's certainly miraculous."
With no tell whatsoever — just flipping a bowl — candy appeared and vanished at will. Since Sagong Hyeon was the one feeding him sound transmissions about which children deserved a scolding and which didn't, Ho Cheon-an's technique was all the more astonishing.
Empty hands, a press of the palms, and candy materialized — baffling no matter how many times he saw it. But the real marvel came after. Ho Cheon-an would place the candy in the bowl, listen to the sound transmission, and only then decide whether to leave it or make it disappear.
He wasn't setting up the trick in advance. He was deciding on the spot, the moment he heard the report — and yet no matter how hard Sagong Hyeon looked, he couldn't spot the difference between the two techniques.
For good children, the candy stayed put and was simply handed over. When a lying child opened the bowl, it was empty. There was nothing suspicious about the motion — just turning over a rice bowl — and yet with that alone he manipulated the candy's presence so flawlessly it drew gasps of admiration.
Then a child appeared who refused to ask forgiveness even after the candy vanished. Ho Cheon-an shot him a look, and Master Cheongheo gave a slight shake of the head as he sent a sound transmission.
Last night, Yun-seong had pelted a rabbit that had wandered into the grounds with rocks. Even without throwing stones he could have easily driven the animal off — hurling rocks that could seriously injure or kill it was unmistakably wrong.
"My, so you truly did nothing wrong at all."
"Ugh..."
"Haa. Then I suppose there's no choice."
Pretending to cover the bowl, Ho Cheon-an flung it high into the air. The sudden outburst made everyone jump and crane their necks skyward. He caught the falling bowl, absorbed the impact with natural ease, and flipped it over again.
"Open it."
Sagong Hyeon was genuinely stunned.
Inside the bowl sat a rock.
When did he—?
Shock and wonder. Sagong Hyeon nearly broke into applause before catching himself.
Of course he was surprised — but the one truly floored was the boy named Yun-seong.
"H-hic! Hic!"
"I have no idea why a rock came out. But Lord Hou Yi knows the reason. And so do you."
Looking thoroughly bewitched, Yun-seong took the rock with a case of the hiccups. Sagong Hyeon could only laugh at the sight.
And so the performance billed as a prayer ceremony came to an end. The good children sucked on their candy with bright faces; the bad ones did the same with wilted spirits. Yun-seong stared down at his pebble with a quivering lip.
"You little..."
Hyeok Gi-rin crouched in front of the boy.
"Why don't you tell your senior disciple what happened?"
"Ugh... I just..."
Tears streaming, Yun-seong poured out the story of the previous night.
"Didn't it occur to you that throwing rocks at a rabbit might badly hurt it — or kill it?"
"Sniff, sniff. I only meant to chase it away!"
"But you know it was wrong, don't you?"
Yun-seong said nothing. Hyeok Gi-rin wordlessly stroked his hair. After a few gentle pats, he spoke in a voice smaller than a mosquito's.
"...I'm sorry."
"Good. Well done."
Hyeok Gi-rin drew a piece of candy from her robes and pressed it into Yun-seong's hand. The moment he saw it, he burst into full-blown tears and stuffed it into his mouth.
Sagong Hyeon watched her with a warm smile. Truly, Hyeok Gi-rin — a child who possessed every virtue a great senior disciple ought to have.
He looked over the gathered children and sank into deep thought. The ones who'd done wrong were reflecting; the ones who'd done right were bouncing with the joy of being recognized. All of it from a handful of candies and Ho Cheon-an's sleight of hand. To guide children so easily onto the right path...
"Hmm..."
Sagong Hyeon gazed at Ho Cheon-an and thought,
I ought to have a word with him.
"Oh..."
This did not look good.
After another day of grueling dragon marches and splits, I'd clutched my screaming inner thighs, prepped the magic show, and stepped out in front of the Guest Hall only to find...
"Ah, the fellow Daoist has arrived..."
"So, is this performance of his about to begin?"
"Hoho, didn't they call it a prayer meeting?"
"Bah, what does it matter either way."
Immortal sages and weathered Daoist masters. Every last one of them wore robes, their snow-white hair neatly arranged, long beards flowing — the kind of faces that would send ordinary people prostrating themselves in the secular world crying, "Good heavens, an immortal!" And a whole crowd of them had gathered.
What... is going on here?
I stood frozen, eyes darting every which way, and spotted the children equally paralyzed beside me. Kids who'd come out grinding their teeth with resolve to be good today were now sitting in perfect ranks, military discipline locked in place. That alone told me how serious this was.
Hyeok Gi-rin, who'd come out chatting with Heukmyo, went wide-eyed too. Clearly she had no idea what was happening either.
I looked at Sagong Hyeon — the prime suspect behind this whole situation.
"Hoho, just do exactly as you did yesterday."
Master, you engineered this entire scene and now you're telling me to do it the same as yesterday? Are you messing with me right now?
A pack of Jeomchang Sect elders — obviously the sect's core leadership — had swarmed in and were staring exclusively at me. And I was supposed to put on the "Lord Hou Yi's divine power descends" show? Even if there was technically nothing wrong with it?
"Hoho. Our fellow Daoist seems rather startled."
"Hmm, I can't even remember the last time I saw a performance like this."
"Just ignore us and start the show!"
"Ah — er... my apologies. I'll begin at once."
The masters each tossed out a line and I answered on pure reflex. I still had no real grasp of the situation, but the fact remained: these venerable masters had personally walked all the way here to watch my magic show. Now that they'd shown up, I could hardly dig in my heels and refuse to perform...
Half out of my mind, I started the show.
"Nangin-nim! Nangin-nim! Today I trained hard at swordsmanship and ate all my bitter bellflower roots!"
"Mm. Well done!"
No sound transmission from Sagong Hyeon — confirmed good kid. Honestly my hands were shaking under all those stares, but I still managed to produce the candy without a hitch.
"Waaah!"
The first child out of the gate was so thrilled at being recognized as a good kid — almost as much as at the candy itself — that he didn't even pop it in his mouth. He bolted straight to Heukmyo, showed off his prize, and glued himself to her side.
"Our So-gyeong is such a good boy!"
"Heehee!"
The children's attitudes were so transparent I barely needed Sagong Hyeon's tips to tell good kids from bad. The ones who'd finished a model day carried their shoulders high and proud; the others were glancing around, reading the room.
"Mm! I commend the courage it took to ask forgiveness!"
"Thank you..."
Even with candy in hand, some of them still looked deflated.
I barely registered the kids' reactions. My attention was locked on the masters huddled among themselves, whispering about my magic. The cheap bastards had even raised a qi barrier — watching my every move, murmuring among themselves, observing the children.
Cold sweat poured down my back!
"Gi-rin, see the children to bed. We need a word with our fellow Daoist."
"Wait... Master..."
"Hoho, it's just a conversation. We're not going to eat him."
Outranked and outgunned, Hyeok Gi-rin led the children away with a pale face. And then the masters closed in around me.
"Um... Masters?"
"Hohohoho... Well now. I doubt that single trick is the full extent of your talents. Care to show us a bit more?"
"Er... shall I?"
I lightly performed a shell game with cups — a yabawi.
"My word... did you catch that?"
"No? I didn't see a thing."
"His internal energy is unmistakably First-rate, so how is this possible?"
"Can you do it once more?"
Eleven masters averaging the Transformation Realm, internal energy drawn up, all staring me down! Even knowing they meant me no harm, terrifying was still terrifying.
Somebody save me.
Screaming on the inside, my hands quickly ran through the yabawi one more time.
"Nngh..."
"Not easy at all."
"Excellent. Now then, could you show us some of your other techniques?"
And so I ended up demonstrating several golpae tile tricks as well. Half the masters had their competitive instincts fired up; the other half simply enjoyed it as a performance. Under that split gaze I performed for quite a while.
"Hmm... yes, I've seen enough."
"Yes... I somehow ended up dazzling your eyes with these meager skills. I apologize."
"They're hardly meager skills — but you did deceive the eye, that's true. Hoho."
Only then did the master who'd been taking the lead among them introduce himself.
"I am Yeong-yul. The hour grows late, so I'll be direct. The way you handled those children... it left quite an impression. Which brings me to this: would you be willing to teach your techniques here at Jeomchang? We'll compensate you handsomely."
A proposal I had never seen coming.
Jeomchang wanted to... purchase my gambling techniques — no, my magic techniques?