How to Wield Inner Energy
It took me a full half shi just to deal with the visitors and see them off.
Master watched the backs of the departing third-generation disciples and let out a sigh.
“I’m worn out.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? What have you done wrong? Because of you, they were only able to keep me here for half a shi instead of a full one.”
Come to think of it, given the number of people involved, half a shi really was about right.
The Taoists of Mount Hua weren’t so shameless as to badger a child and pry into things without any thought for decorum.
“My fellow disciples came all a flutter to tell me the news. They said you unleashed the Falling Blossom Sword Art in Hwa-yeon Hall?”
“I just imitated the Falling Blossom Sword Art you showed me before. It’s all thanks to you, Master.”
“You little brat. I only demonstrated it; I never properly taught it to you. If anything, the impressive part is that you remembered the sword art I showed you once and then used it to beat Ha Seo-hwa. Well done.”
Master reached out and patted the top of my head.
He did that often, but I still never seemed to get used to being treated like a child.
That was because, before my regression, I had been a twenty-eight-year-old man.
I should just accept it, though.
There had been times long ago when I’d seen Master off, then secretly soaked my pillow in tears because I missed this very hand on my head.
Complaining about this was nothing but spoiled nonsense.
And, truth be told, it didn’t even feel all that bad.
Maybe it was because my mind was grown, but my body had become that of a child.
Even when I used martial arts, I often felt as though my mind were being dragged along by the body’s instincts.
Master stopped patting my head and asked, “Still, you’re awfully late.”
“I was touring the parts of the sect I hadn’t seen yet with Senior Brother Jung Nam-jung and Senior Sister Seo Jin-ah.”
“Anything interesting?”
“I’m supposed to spar with Senior Sister Seo Hwa tomorrow too.”
Master looked surprised.
“You asked for that?”
“No. Senior Sister Seo Hwa asked me. I refused at first, but she kept insisting, so I had no choice but to agree.”
“Well, there were once plenty of rumors that Seo Hwa never knew defeat.”
Master seemed to think it over for a moment, then nodded.
“Sparring with Seo Hwa of all people must have worn you out. If you’re tired, shall we skip today’s training?”
“I still have the strength to train!”
“You really do love training, don’t you……”
Master was kinder to children than I remembered.
Even after a third-generation disciple entered the sect, the training they received from Master wasn’t all that different from the training in Hwa-yeon Hall.
Basic cultivation and physical conditioning. At most, a bit of instruction on how to circulate inner energy.
But because I had already shown I wasn’t ordinary from the very first day, my training had become something special too.
After finishing my basic cultivation practice, Master unexpectedly said, “Last, I’ll teach you the forms of the Falling Blossom Sword Art.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Watching and then imitating the Falling Blossom Sword Art was impressive. But if you learn martial arts that way, it’s easy to pick up bad habits. Once that happens, it becomes a real nuisance later on.”
“Thank you, Master.”
“First I’ll show you the Falling Blossom Sword Art. I only demonstrated it once, half a year ago, so your memory won’t be exact.”
Master drew his sword.
Beginning with an overhead strike, the blade carved a graceful arc through the air, leaving afterimages in its wake.
Unlike the Falling Blossom Sword Art I had seen before, there was no excess to it at all. It was flawless.
After quickly demonstrating the first through eighth forms, Master gave me a proud look and casually said, “Your turn now. Show me the Falling Blossom Sword Art the way you did in Hwa-yeon Hall.”
“Understood.”
I began with the first form, just as he ordered.
Of course, I didn’t infuse it with power as I swung.
The energy gathered in my dantian was far too little to be of any use.
Master, too, focused less on how to release it with inner energy and more on correcting the movement so the sword path wouldn’t wobble.
After I finished the first through eighth forms, Master let out a half-bemused, half-admiring sound.
“Hah. Seong-woon, are you sure it’s even right to call that mere eyes-on imitation?”
“What’s wrong?”
“Your sword path was immaculate, with no wasted motion whatsoever. As far as the sword forms go, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say a second-generation disciple had performed them.”
I wasn’t trying to hide anything in particular. I had also performed a perfect Falling Blossom Sword Art in Hwa-yeon Hall. Showing clumsy edges would only make things seem stranger.
For a brief moment Master was lost in admiration, but then he returned to his teacher’s manner.
“Seong-woon. And yet your expression isn’t bright.”
“Yes. I realized there was something wrong with the way I was doing it.”
“Good. A bad habit has crept in.”
“...I think so too.”
“What do you think the problem is? Try to remember.”
I nodded.
I had decided to reveal my talent, so there was no reason to show any clumsy side now.
But the reason Master hadn’t praised me wasn’t because he had missed something.
“I’m swinging the wooden sword too much like an adult, aren’t I?”
Master nodded.
“Yes. A child’s movements and an adult’s movements are different. You weren’t learning from a manual; you were copying my movements, so it can’t be helped.”
It was a sharp criticism.
I hadn’t exactly been imitating Master’s Falling Blossom Sword Art, but I had lived the life of an adult until now.
The gap between a child’s body and a mature mind was immense.
I’d been trying to narrow that gap for the past half year, but it wasn’t easy to strip away habits that had already settled into the body.
That was even more true because my mental image of martial arts was already at the level of transcendence—that is, the realm from my previous life.
That was also why I was so focused on practicing basic cultivation right now.
“There were parts that bothered me while watching your Falling Blossom Sword Art. I’ll point them out one by one and correct them so they fit together properly.”
“Understood.”
“First, let’s straighten out your balance. Take your stance.”
Even while I adjusted my posture, I couldn’t hide my confusion.
Wasn’t Master supposed to be clumsy with martial arts?
When I first woke after my regression, the swordsmanship I saw from Master had been rough for a master at the peak stage.
Hadn’t he made a mistake while demonstrating the Falling Blossom Sword Art to his disciple?
“I’m very glad I had you show me the Falling Blossom Sword Art. Otherwise, something serious could have happened later.”
But now I could see that he understood martial arts more skillfully than many other masters at the peak stage.
To be fair, until now I had only learned basic cultivation from him. And because Master sometimes showed clumsy moments during training, I hadn’t noticed it.
It wouldn’t be easy to spot my problems at a glance, either, but his eye for detail was extraordinary, sharp enough to catch things before they fully formed.
I usually remembered Master as gentle, so I never would have guessed he had this side to him.
“As for how to circulate inner energy while using the Falling Blossom Sword Art, I’ll have to fetch the manual tomorrow and show you.”
In other words, he had already decided to pass the art on to me.
A master could adjust a disciple’s progress at will. Even so, formally teaching the Falling Blossom Sword Art after only half a year was an exceptionally bold step.
“I’m still supposed to be at the stage of basic cultivation, though. Is that all right?”
“You’ve already taken in the strain of the Falling Blossom Sword Art. More importantly, you can perform it skillfully. In that case, it’s better for you to learn it properly now so it doesn’t cause trouble later. Learning it half-heartedly will only become a huge poison in the future.”
Master looked a little troubled.
“The reason I haven’t taught it to the third-generation disciples is because of qi deviation. If you circulate your inner energy incorrectly while using martial arts, it can’t be helped.”
“Because they don’t know the acupoints.”
“Exactly. Even just the governing and conception vessels alone……”
“There are dozens of them, and if you count the whole body, there are hundreds.”
Master’s eyes widened at my interruption.
“You know a lot about this? I haven’t gone into the details of acupoints yet.”
“I was the child of a physician, after all. I’ve read books, so I know my acupoints well. Not all of them, though.”
A martial artist is not a physician.
No one expects you to memorize every acupoint.
But because knowing them makes training easier, Mount Hua also tried to make its disciples memorize them.
Normally I should have learned the acupoints as well, but Mount Hua had misunderstood my identity.
There was an easier path available, so there was no reason to take the hard one.
“Still, if we apply the acupoints to the Falling Blossom Sword Art, I think I can figure out how to circulate inner energy for the third form.”
Intentionally sounding smug, I saw Master visibly falter.
“Seong-woon, do you even know what you’re saying?”
“Yes. To unleash the third form with real force, I’d need to draw the energy gathered in my dantian up through Hwan-gol, Jungjeong, and Jeonjung points, then……”
I lifted my right arm, the one holding the wooden sword, to head height and then used my left hand to indicate the acupoints.
“I’d send it through the arm holding the sword and stimulate Sorak and Sadok points. Am I right?”
Master’s eyelids twitched faintly.
If you could read the circulation of inner energy just by watching the form, then you didn’t need the manual at all.
Seeing the flicker of surprise in Master’s eyes, I added quickly, “You were surprised, weren’t you? Actually, before I came here, the chief of the Library showed me the manual for the Falling Blossom Sword Art.”
“I-I see. You saw the manual, so the acupoints……”
“But I forgot the middle part, so I just made up Sorak onward. Was I right?”
My answer left Master speechless for a moment, but he cleared his throat, gathered himself, and spoke.
“You left one out. It’s not enough to stop at Sadok; you have to circulate the energy all the way to Hoejong if you want the proper force.”
“I thought one was missing. So it was Hoejong.”
That made sense, since I had deliberately left one out.
Master looked as though he wanted to ask how on earth I had guessed the acupoints at random, but he soon shook his head.
“Setting aside how you matched the acupoints in the first place—wait. Did you say you met the chief of the Library? Senior Elder Oh?”
“Yes. I saw the manual for the Falling Blossom Sword Art in the Library too. Elder said I could stop by the Library after training from tomorrow on.”
“Oh……”
“I won’t stay too late, so would it be all right if I went in and out of the Library?”
Master gave a small nod.
“If the elder has allowed it and you want to go, then there’s no reason to stop you. If anything, you’ve been given a good opportunity, so I’d rather encourage it. Just don’t stay too late.”
“Yes. I’ll make sure it’s before midnight.”
Master looked at me with a complicated expression.
“You’ve only just entered the sect, and already you’re making such a racket. Should I call you admirable, or should I worry?”
“You raised an extraordinary disciple, didn’t you?”
“Indeed. Thanks to you, I could finally show some face in front of my fellow senior disciples after so long. My quarters are quite far from the main Taoist halls, so I hardly ever get visitors.”
The disciples built their lodgings all over Mount Hua.
Ordinary disciples set their quarters near the sect’s main Taoist halls, but Master’s place was so far away it was practically on the very edge of the mountain.
Just a little way past his quarters, there was even a forest.
I had noticed it from the first day because it was the perfect place to practice something in secret.
“Training ends here for today. You may move around freely, but don’t be late for dinner.”
“Understood.”
“I’m going to rest now. It’s been a while since I was surrounded by people, and it’s drained me.”
Master waved me off and went inside his room.
I bowed in farewell and immediately set off.
My destination was the forest beside the quarters.
The trees grew so densely there that the inside was hard to see from outside.
But if you went a little farther in, the spaces between the trees slowly began to widen, until there was enough room to move around comfortably.
I had come here often in my previous life.
Back then it had been a place I ran to because I hated training, but now the fact that I was entering it for the sake of training was rather ironic.
There was no better place to practice without worrying about other people’s eyes.
Once I had gone deep enough that no one from outside could see me, I sat beneath the nearest plum tree and settled into a cross-legged posture.
I usually practiced sword forms, palm techniques, or footwork, but today was different.
I’ve built up a decent foundation over the past half year with Plum Blossom Qi Gong.
At last, my body was suitable for properly accepting real martial arts.
Normally that process would take a year, but that only applied to beginners who knew nothing at all about martial arts.
I already knew full well how to handle the energy absorbed through an inner cultivation manual. And because I had thrown myself into training, I’d managed to shorten the time dramatically.
There was only one thing left to do now.
Right here, right now, I will enter the Violet Mist Divine Art.