Moonlit Ambush
The night streets of Luoyang lay bathed in the faint glow of a waning moon. The steady rhythm of sturdy leather boots echoed softly along the path before slowing to a halt. "Haa..."
Summer was still some days away, and the night air carried a sharp chill. The moon itself hung thin and pale, making it difficult even for those with keen night vision to move without a lantern. It was hardly ideal weather for a stroll. Yet for Cho Yak, who had long since stepped beyond the bounds of ordinary humanity more than a decade ago, the cold and the darkness were simply facts of the night—nothing more. What troubled her was that she had been wandering the streets around Hwaweolru for quite some time without her mood improving in the slightest. The walk had been pointless.
Truthfully, it was thanks to her sworn sister's excessive concern for others that she had survived in Lanzhou. Even so, watching from the sidelines often left her feeling stifled. When her sister had seen her off, she had surely assumed Cho Yak was going out to cool her head after being mocked by her own disciple. The thought only made the anger flare up again.
The disciple's insolence was infuriating, but such behavior was hardly rare among those who practiced martial arts. If she returned to Tianshan, there would be mountains of similar fools. She could endure it—or, if she could not, she could simply beat the habit out of them. What truly enraged her was that this person, who was clearly no block of stone and wore his emotions openly, kept swallowing his feelings and weighing every action against responsibility and principle. It was a maddeningly novel kind of irritation.
If there was something to refute, one refuted it. If someone spoke words that could harm others, one made them an enemy. Yet his constant refrain of "I cannot burden others because I lack confidence in my own actions" was so harmless that it defied rebuttal. Watching it unfold was suffocating, like being trapped in a cage with Xiang Yu under the summer sun.
Cho Yak was still trying to draw the cool night air into her burning chest when she suddenly stopped breathing. The surroundings had grown unnaturally quiet. At this hour, silence was expected, but even a master should have been able to hear distant footsteps, voices from within houses, or the sounds of nocturnal birds and insects. This stillness was excessive.
She slowly reached back and grasped the hilt of the greatsword slung across her back. Only after drawing the blade and planting its tip against the ground did she finally hear footsteps—large, rhythmic ones. Six figures appeared on the rooftops to the left and right, and two more blocked the path behind her. As she stared into the empty space ahead, a tall, foreign-looking youth emerged a beat later.
"Ah, it has been a long time. Have you been well?"
It was Guiseon.
* * *
"Have you been well, you say."
"Was that such a difficult question to answer?"
"No. I was merely considering your intentions in asking it."
"Oh?" Guiseon looked impressed. "You actually thought about that? I expected you to charge straight in. You have grown quite a bit."
Cho Yak calmly studied his face. The straight nose, sharp eyes, and thin lips curved in a faint smile were exactly as she remembered. It was the same face that had slaughtered her family and tortured her that day. Good—her thirst for revenge had not aged in the slightest.
"Are these all the men you brought?"
"Hardly."
The moment he finished speaking, a thunderous roar shook the ground beneath her feet. She turned to see smoke rising from the direction of Hwaweolru.
"I sent some there in advance as well."
Cho Yak pulled her gaze back to Guiseon. "So you were working with the authorities?"
He shook his head. "You should speak accurately. We are not allies—I command them."
"...You filthy insect."
"Suddenly?" Guiseon tilted his head, genuinely puzzled, and spread his hands. Cho Yak rested her sword on her shoulder.
"You must have spun another pretty lie. A parasite who cannot do anything himself."
"A parasite? Your self-loathing runs deep."
Guiseon's amused remark made Cho Yak's brow furrow further.
"Let us parasites get along. I hold no particular grudge against you. In this vast land, there are only two of our kind. Why hate each other? If anything, I should be grateful—you gave me the idea for the Relying on Death to Ascend to Immortality Qigong."
Cho Yak snorted. Guiseon frowned. "What is so funny?"
"You calling me kin. Was it your people's tradition to tie one another under the sun and burn them halfway to death?"
"Is that worth laughing about? Well, the experiments were a bit rough, but you nearly died once, so let us call it even. We may live for hundreds of years—why hold onto petty grudges?"
Was he sincere, or was he provoking her? She had never been skilled at reading expressions, and his face revealed nothing. But it did not matter. Keeping her eyes fixed on him, she shifted her attention to measuring the distance beneath her feet.
Just then, Guiseon spoke again. "By the way, what is so interesting about the ground that you keep staring at it?"
Cho Yak did not answer. The instant Guiseon opened his mouth to speak once more, she kicked off with her back foot. Figures from all sides leapt toward her, but before they could reach their positions, she took one powerful step and brought her sword crashing down toward Guiseon.
The blade falling from the upper right was heavy, yet not merely heavy—it was not heavy at all. Charging forward and then flowing with weight was to bind the sword to technique; that made technique the master, not the sword. Instead, she saw with the sword, heard with the sword, and drew with the sword. Would one call it a good master to issue endless commands to the blade? That which governs itself without governance is the Dao. Wuwei ziran—non-action and naturalness—was the true destination of the sword path.
But would that alone suffice? Cho Yak knew herself well. She was confident in her ability to endure and hold firm, but she had no talent for scheming or reading others' hearts. How could she compete with Guiseon in cunning? The fact that he had sought her out during her walk and surrounded her with subordinates already proved he had seized the initiative. Offering him distance despite knowing his intent was her own calculation—that doing so would make things easier for her.
At a glance, she appeared to be a fish already caught in the net. To break free, there was only one answer. Even a fish in a net could leap. If she could jump beyond the reach of Guiseon's imagination—higher than even she herself believed possible—then the net spread in every direction would become meaningless.
Rather than clumsily guessing at Guiseon's thoughts, she chose to focus on what she knew best: herself. Once she decided, her mind grew calm. In the center of that emptied space, the technique she had witnessed at the end of today's sparring session suddenly surfaced. It was a skill she had seen for the first time today, yet she had not merely observed it with her eyes—she had read it while crossing blades. Even someone as ordinary as she believed she could replicate it.
After all, it was not particularly difficult. It was simply the principle of listening and drawing with the sword, combined with the mindset of complete immersion in oneself. To cleanly pour her heart into an immature technique, she first needed to fill it completely—and that, too, was not hard. Among the seven emotions, hatred and anger were the cheapest. Her heart was already overflowing with them, ready to spill over.
First her ears went deaf. Then her eyes turned white. Finally, she forgot even that she held a sword and simply let the blade exist as it was. And then, a crimson tide poured forth.
* * *
When she regained consciousness, Guiseon had shrunk considerably in the distance. Only after struggling to her feet did Cho Yak realize her hand no longer held the sword. Looking around, she saw it embedded in the middle of the road like a gravestone. From beyond it came Guiseon's voice.
"Impressive."
Cho Yak tried to speak, coughed several times, and finally spat out a mouthful of blood before she could answer.
"What is?"
"You have grown a great deal. You hated it so much, yet it seems you had the resolve to devour a few hearts if it meant revenge."
Guiseon wiped beneath his eye with his right hand. Blood smeared across his fingers, but the wound was already closing. Cho Yak's expression twisted.
"I did no such thing."
"There is no need to lie to me. Especially not in this situation."
"Then what about you? What is that?"
Cho Yak asked, staring at the ground beneath Guiseon's feet. The solid pavement looked as though a firebomb had exploded across it, torn open in every direction. She had been right to fear Guiseon—but not because of his martial prowess. His demonic eye, his cunning, and his subordinates were what made him dangerous. His own strength had never been remarkable. The last time they fought, Guiseon had fled after being overwhelmed by an uncontrolled Cho Yak. So where had this power come from?
Guiseon answered as if it were obvious. "Hm? It is simple. I ate. Did you not already know?"
"You ate?"
"Yes. I consumed just over a thousand hearts here in Luoyang alone. If you ate that many, you could become just as strong. You are better at fighting than I am—you might even surpass me. Do you regret not eating them back then?"
Instead of replying, Cho Yak forced herself upright. Guiseon clicked his tongue.
"You are making this harder than it needs to be. I have no intention of killing you."
"What are you plotting?"
"Nothing much. I am simply going to use you as bait."
"Bait?"
"Yes. I heard that the so-called Sword Immortal is close to you. The Sword Immortal and those people are rather troublesome for me. I thought I would dig a trap using you as bait, just in case."
"The Sword Immortal? Why would a master of the Wudang Sect—"
Cho Yak's expression crumpled. She lifted her head to meet Guiseon's gaze, and her face slowly relaxed. Then her eyes closed, and she collapsed. Guiseon squinted with one eye and muttered.
"As expected, eye tricks do not work well on martial artists. Ah, I will carry her myself, so leave her be. If anyone comes after us, do your best to stop them."