The Master and His Disciples (2)
Having stepped out of his room, the master gazed up at a sky of flawless clarity.
The sunlight was warm, and the mountain breeze that drifted through was refreshingly cool.
It was, without question, a splendid day.
"If I do not ascend on a day such as this, when else would I ascend?"
Sitting down in a cross-legged position on the bare ground, he summoned his disciple.
"Jo-ya."
At the master's call, a youth with strikingly handsome features appeared, his shoulders flaring wide in annoyance.
"What is it now?"
His eyes and his tone, however, carried a distinctly insolent, crooked edge.
"This master of yours has decided it is finally time for his Feathering and Ascension."
Ugh, here we go............
Jiang Zhou let out a long sigh, sank down where he stood, and faced his master.
"Master, I am begging you — please ascend today. It is your disciple's most earnest wish."
At that reply, the faint smile on the master's face warped slightly.
"Why do I hear you telling me to hurry up and die?"
Jiang Zhou's expression twisted into something even uglier than his master's.
"It has already been half a year since you first announced your ascension, Master. Do you not remember how I bowed to the ground back then, praying for your ascension?"
It had been the same routine every single day for the past six months.
On the first day, he had truly believed his master meant it — had bowed all the way to the floor and mourned their impending parting. But after that farce repeated itself over and over, his irritation had long since boiled over into pure fury.
The master looked at Jiang Zhou with a sorrowful face.
"I cannot fathom how my once-brilliant, dignified disciple has degenerated into such a good-for-nothing."
"Oh, come on — have you never considered that it's *your* fault I turned out this way? Being sold off as a slave would've been a far kinder fate than serving you."
"And yet was it not thanks to this master that you mastered the supreme martial arts of the world?"
Hmph.
Jiang Zhou blew a loud, undisguised raspberry at him.
The period when he and his master had gotten along had lasted all of a few months.
The training had been so brutal, so punishing, that more than once he'd felt like throwing himself off the sheer cliffs above.
"When I was a boy, I believed every word you said. Not anymore. What kind of supreme master of the world hides away in a dump like this?"
At Jiang Zhou's skepticism, his master erupted into a full-throated tirade.
"You wretch......! Have I not told you there are reasons I live in hiding? If I help with one great task, every petty problem in the land comes looking for this master — that is why I must remain hidden. Even now, the moment I showed my face in the jianghu, all the great masters would come swarming, crying, 'Ah, Elder Brother! Where have you been all this time?'"
Jiang Zhou stared at his master, whose face had gone red with enthusiasm.
'*Impressive. Truly impressive.*'
He did not doubt that his master was, in fact, a formidable master.
Two years ago, the man had emerged into the jianghu and fought a bloody battle against Buk Yeomra and his entire band of underlings.
But cutting down Buk Yeomra and his men did not necessarily make one the greatest under heaven.
Buk Yeomra himself had claimed his own martial arts were pathetically weak.
And his master was a chronic braggart at the best of times, so Jiang Zhou had never been able to gauge how much of it to believe.
The moment Jiang Zhou's fire dimmed a little, the master swelled with even greater pride.
He spread both arms wide to encompass the mountains and fields.
"Do you know how the great masters of this world revere this master of yours? You wretch! If I so much as announced today that I would take on disciples, these mountains and fields would overflow with the greatest warriors alive."
Ugh...........
Jiang Zhou stepped back with a deep sigh.
"Fine, fine. Then hurry up and ascend already."
*
With a self-satisfied smile, the master closed his eyes.
'I could see it clearly — the signs of ascension...... How strange this is. Mukcheon, have you lingering attachments to this life still? If attachments remain, this would be no ascension but a Rejuvenation Return...... Truly, a dilemma.'
He had cast off his attachment to life long ago.
Taking in a disciple and passing down his martial arts had been for the sole purpose of ascending.
And yet some attachment apparently still clung to him, for he could not shed his body no matter how he tried.
'Cast off the stray thoughts......... cast them off......'
As he released his mind from the world, the universe receded into the distance in an instant.
The sounds of all creation faded away, and his spirit-soul thrashed and struggled to tear free of its flesh.
Ah.........
At last, the Feathering and Ascension would truly begin.
Jiang Zhou, who had been quietly watching, put on an expression of unusual tension.
"Big Brother! I'm back! Master! I'm baaack......!"
And then, right at that moment, an unnecessary interruption barged in.
The master's spirit-soul, halfway out of its body, was dragged right back where it belonged.
"Is Sam-ryong back?"
"What's this about 'Sam-ryong'? How many times have I told you, my name isn't Sam-ryong, it's Yang Jeong!"
Along with the disciple's clear voice came a reply from that damnable distraction itself.
The master opened his eyes and glared long and hard at the offending interruption.
Whereupon an impossibly handsome youth beamed a bright smile and bent deeply at the waist.
"I've returned, Master."
"Why am I your master?"
The utterly gorgeous youth just grinned and grinned.
"What do you mean by that, Master? I received two years of your teachings, which makes me your disciple in all but name."
The shameless flattery gradually smoothed the creases from the master's face as well.
"That was only because you pestered me so relentlessly that I let you taste a few things, nothing more. And what...... is that in your hands?"
At the master's question, the youth hoisted up four or five live chickens and a sizable slab of meat.
"I brought meat, Master."
Ahem...........
The master cleared his throat and rose to his feet with a distinctly sheepish air.
"Then....... I suppose I must postpone the ascension by a few days."
Standing, he darted a cautious glance at Jiang Zhou, then promptly fled into his room.
Hehehe...........
"Big Brother, I brought meat. I've been to all sorts of places, but I've never once met anyone with your kind of cooking skill."
The youth flashed an easy, careless smile.
Grrrk..........
But Jiang Zhou ground his teeth, his eyes gone murderous.
"Do you have any idea...... what you just did? I could have sent the old man off today. You ruined it."
Hehe.
His laughter cut off, the young man quietly lowered the chickens and pork to the ground.
Whooooosh...................
And then he whirled around and bolted on his Lightness Skill.
In the blink of an eye the youth had vanished from sight, and only then did a whirlwind rise in pursuit.
Whooooosh................
Hard on his heels, Jiang Zhou set his own Lightness Skill in motion.
*
Of all the martial arts, Yang Jeong's Lightness Skill stood out as exceptional.
Judged on Lightness Skill alone, he could be counted among the top five in all the jianghu.
And yet he hated it.
His family was an escort agency, so there was rarely any need to travel long distances on foot.
Even for short journeys he rode horses or carts; there was simply no call for Lightness Skill in his life.
He had not been a master of it from the start, either.
About two years ago, riding out into the jianghu on horseback, he had run headlong into a band of bandits.
The bandits wanted his horse. Yang Jeong refused.
Bloodshed followed, as it was bound to, and he'd taken a blade and come within an inch of death.
He had barely escaped the bandits alive, but he had bled so heavily that his life hung by a thread.
It was Jiang Zhou, returning home by chance, who had saved him.
Whooooosh...............
Tearing along on his whirlwind, Yang Jeong stole a glance backward.
A dozen paces behind him, Jiang Zhou was closing in, a whirlwind of his own raging at his feet.
But the distance refused to close.
Kukukuk...
'No matter how monstrous Big Brother's martial arts are, Lightness Skill is another matter entirely.'
Wearing a smug grin, he swept his hand along the rocks lining the path.
Rattle-rattle.......
The stones littering the boulders crumbled loose, and a few landed in his palm.
Yang Jeong flung them at Jiang Zhou.
Fweep... fweep... fweep...!
The stones shot through the air one after another, piercing the wind.
In an instant, the Jiang Zhou chasing him became three.
"You're dead."
Having dodged every last flying stone, Jiang Zhou's eyes ignited with twin flames.
Yang Jeong jolted in fright and began scaling the mountain.
Whooooosh..........
Climbing the slope, Yang Jeong shot his Lightness Skill upward.
Fweep...
Dropping back toward the ground, he kicked off a mid-sized boulder with all his strength and launched himself skyward once more.
The instant he did, the boulder shuddered — and began to roll downhill.
Rumble-rumble... KOOOOM...!
When the boulder itself came rolling down after him, Jiang Zhou finally halted his Lightness Skill.
Haaa..........
"That...... damnable brat......"
The escape was so tenaciously shameless that a sigh escaped him before he could stop it.
There was a reason the boy fled with such desperate cunning.
He had spent two years here taking beatings, and by now all it took was a shift in Jiang Zhou's expression for him to start backing away in wary retreat.
"I'm not chasing you anymore, so come down!"
At Jiang Zhou's shout, Yang Jeong stopped his Lightness Skill as well.
"You mean it, Big Brother? You really won't hit me?"
He looked down with eyes still full of suspicion.
"This brat makes a living out of getting fooled, does he? I said I won't hit you."
"I can't trust that, Big Brother. Do you have any idea how many times I've taken a beating after believing your word?"
"Then live up there for all I care."
When Jiang Zhou turned his Lightness Skill and started down the mountain, Yang Jeong eyed him carefully for a while before beginning his own descent.
*
Swish... swish...
Jiang Zhou kneaded the flour into dough, slapping it again and again with his palm.
Slap...! Slap...!
Over and over, he struck the dough with the flat of his hand.
While Jiang Zhou worked the dough, Yang Jeong watched from behind a tree.
"Why do you keep smacking the dough around like that, Big Brother?"
He wasn't asking out of ignorance.
He was asking because even when he copied the exact same method, the result never tasted the same.
"Because the noodles have to be pulled thin and springy."
At Jiang Zhou's indifferent answer, he pressed further.
"No matter how hard I try to copy you at home, it never comes out right."
"That's because you're only smacking it. Use your inner force — your inner force."
"I've used inner force. Didn't help."
Jiang Zhou turned his head and shot him a murderous glare.
"I've been waiting on my master for thirteen years now — thirteen. And you think you can imitate the technique in a matter of days?"
He had entered these mountains at the age of nine, and twelve years had already passed — making him all of twenty-one.
What he had honed in all that time was his martial arts, his cooking, and his prickly temper.
Setting the dough aside, Jiang Zhou rubbed the rice clean and put it in the pot.
Tunk...! Tunk...!
Then he began rubbing and pounding the pork with his bare hands.
Yang Jeong asked again.
"Big Brother, why do you beat the meat?"
"It improves the texture."
"I've tried exactly that, and it never works for me."
At that, Jiang Zhou finally reached for the kitchen knife lying beside him.
Fwoosh........
But Yang Jeong was already gone.
*
Whooooosh......
Fleeing for his life, Yang Jeong ducked behind a tree.
When no pursuit followed, he let out a long sigh of relief.
Phew........
"Nearly died back there."
Stepping out from behind the tree, Yang Jeong made his way toward the cottage.
As he walked, a round boulder wider than a man's arm-span caught his eye.
Ungh......
The sight of it pulled a groan straight from his lips.
It brought back the hellish days of his past.
When he had first begun training here, he had been made to push that boulder all the way to the summit of the back mountain.
He had pushed it to the mountainside over the course of nearly two months — and then, by a careless slip of the hand, he had lost his grip.
He'd sat in a daze for the better part of half a day before turning around and pushing the boulder back up the mountain again.
When, after six months, he finally set the boulder on the summit, he threw both arms to the sky and sang his triumph.
He was still savoring the feeling of owning the whole world when his master came up the mountain and kicked the boulder off with one foot.
The rock rolled all the way down and buried itself in the forest below.
"Do it again."
The master's voice in that moment had not belonged to this world.
Was there another demon as vicious as that anywhere under heaven?
The fury and indignation had been so unbearable that he had collapsed face-down on the ground and sobbed until he had nothing left.
It had taken another two months to push the boulder to the summit again; the third time, less than one.
And when he finally muscled it to the top in just two days, his master had nodded.
"So you do have some patience in you after all."
*
Reminiscing, Yang Jeong shuddered violently.
Ughhh.............
"I truly never want to climb this mountain again."
It wasn't even a tall mountain, yet he loathed it so much that his skin crawled at the mere memory.
The despair and agony of those days were beyond anything words could capture.