The Day She First Smiled
Her feet tangled.
The tip of her sword wavered.
It wasn’t even a proper form.
And yet Ha Seo-hwa swung her sword.
Yoo Sung-woon met her head-on, not once trying to avoid the attack.
No matter how exhausted he was, the inner energy he had built up every single day had not betrayed him.
He was swinging from sheer momentum rather than strength, but there was still considerable force behind it.
The instant their two bodies collided, the impact exploded between them.
They were both driven back from the center, but Ha Seo-hwa was flung farther away. The difference was visible at a glance.
Even so, she did not hesitate to rush back in.
They sprinted through the forest, kicked off tree trunks, and at times crossed each other’s legs as they clashed head-on.
What collided between them was more than the desire to win.
She poured into her wooden sword the feeling that she was facing a formidable enemy with the fear she carried inside her.
Ha Seo-hwa wasn’t a fool.
She knew that if she simply swung wildly with power behind each strike, all she would do was drain her stamina—and it would do nothing against Yoo Sung-woon.
But Yoo Sung-woon’s weakness was his body.
Even if he had gained seven years’ worth of inner energy from the spirit pill, he had still only been learning martial arts for half a year.
His bones and sinews were good, and he compensated skillfully for what he lacked with inner energy, but not to the point of overtaking the effort Ha Seo-hwa had poured in all this time.
After being battered again and again by brutal, power-laden attacks, Yoo Sung-woon finally staggered.
“Ahhhhhh—!”
Ha Seo-hwa didn’t let the opening slip by.
With a roar-like battle cry, she unleashed Falling Blossom Sword Art.
The amount of power packed into her wooden sword was nothing to scoff at.
Ha Seo-hwa didn’t realize it, but for that one moment, when she seized the momentum, she overwhelmed Yoo Sung-woon.
After exchanging several moves, Yoo Sung-woon deliberately closed the distance.
He wanted to suppress her sword forms and drag her into a hilt fight.
Ha Seo-hwa was exhausted.
And after being struck so many times, her body was far from normal.
He intended to keep pressing the injuries he had already inflicted and crush her with force, but Ha Seo-hwa clenched her teeth and held out through sheer stubbornness.
There wasn’t a place on her body that hadn’t been struck—her arms, her legs, her waist, her thighs.
Her muscles screamed, but she wrung out every last bit of strength in her and shoved Yoo Sung-woon away.
“Prepare yourself, Yoo Sung-woon!”
With those words, Ha Seo-hwa unleashed Seven-Star Steps and charged.
She went on the offensive with a martial art Yoo Sung-woon had never seen before.
Moon Maiden’s Harmonizing Sword, fourth form.
Clouds Part, Moonlight Falls!
It was a newly learned form, and the strongest attack she could produce in her current state.
Sword strikes poured down on him like moonlight breaking through the clouds.
Above, below, left, right—there was nowhere the blade did not seek.
Before the attack could land, Yoo Sung-woon righted his sword.
Then he settled into the initiating stance as his body led him.
White Flow Plum Blossom Sword Art, first form.
Seeking Plum Blossoms at the Winter Solstice.
The sword art created by Mount Hua Sect Leader Baek Gun-won unfolded in Yoo Sung-woon’s hands.
The moment their wooden swords crossed, dull thuds rang out in rapid succession.
The wooden sword that should have been pounding Yoo Sung-woon’s body dozens of times over was, contrary to expectations, blocked, guided, and deflected.
Ha Seo-hwa forgot even to breathe at the sight of her all-out Clouds Part, Moonlight Falls being completely dismantled.
It was a sword art she had never seen before.
It resembled the swords of Mount Hua, yet she had never seen such a martial art used in the sect.
And yet it was more refined and graceful than any sword technique she had ever witnessed.
The tip of the sword seemed to dance like a plum blossom in the air.
The arm that extended the blade resembled the branch of a plum tree.
...Beautiful.
Could a sword art created to harm someone be this beautiful?
She admired it without meaning to, but even so, the sword kept moving without pause.
At the last exchange, Yoo Sung-woon flooded his wooden sword with twice the usual amount of inner energy.
Crack!
Ha Seo-hwa’s body could not withstand the sudden force. She was lifted lightly from the ground and sent flying backward.
She had taken the blow, but the situation was not bad.
Because her posture hadn’t collapsed, she could use the trees to counterattack in turn.
If I land on the trunk and rush in immediately…
But Yoo Sung-woon had already seen through her plan.
He kicked off the ground with all his strength and rushed at her faster than she was flying backward.
An upward slash that began low.
He shoved aside the wooden sword she had raised in defense.
Then, with no hesitation, he swung his right foot and kicked her unguarded solar plexus.
Ha Seo-hwa slammed into the very tree she had intended to use as a landing point.
Even after her body hit the ground, he did not stop.
The moment she jerked her head up, a shadow fell over her vision.
She twisted reflexively to the side, and the wooden sword whistled past through empty air.
She rolled backward, quickly righted herself, and kicked off the ground again.
Yoo Sung-woon also swung his wooden sword horizontally toward her as she charged in.
Rattle-crack.
The instant their blades crossed and exchanged blows, a strange sound unlike any before rang out fiercely.
Something between them shot into the air, flew past the branches, struck them again and again—
And finally plunged into the ground.
Half of Ha Seo-hwa’s wooden sword.
Ha Seo-hwa, drenched in sweat, looked down at her right hand gripping the hilt.
The blade had broken.
And yet the hilt of the wooden sword clung to her hand as if it had rooted there and would not come loose.
Only then did the strength leave her legs, which had been holding out by sheer will.
Yoo Sung-woon approached as her knees gave out and she sank weakly to the ground.
“So senior sister lost.”
“...Yes. I lost.”
“Do you feel miserable?”
Ha Seo-hwa answered inwardly.
Of course.
It was humiliating.
Not only had she fled in such a disgraceful state during the spar, she had also been struck, rolled around on the ground, and even cried.
Out of all the disciples in the world, she was probably the only senior sister who had been beaten so shamefully by a junior disciple who had only just entered the sect.
And yet, for some reason, she didn’t feel unpleasant.
She had a lot she wanted to say, but the words faded before they could reach her lips.
“It doesn’t feel bad.”
Ha Seo-hwa slowly shook her head.
“Even though I lost so miserably, it feels like the boulder pressing on my chest has disappeared.”
It was a feeling she had never experienced before, so she couldn’t put it into words, but Yoo Sung-woon understood what she meant.
If she no longer felt as though she were suffocating the way she used to, then that alone was a blessing.
He couldn’t say for certain whether Ha Seo-hwa had fully resolved her inner demons.
That was likely something she would continue to struggle against in the days ahead.
In truth, that was the way of everyone.
Yoo Sung-woon himself was by no means free of it.
Everyone had something they feared.
Ha Seo-hwa spoke.
“What you said—I thought about it when I went back. That martial artists can be cruel, but martial arts themselves can’t be cruel. I came up with my own answer to that too.”
Yoo Sung-woon nodded.
“I’m listening.”
“Every time I saw the martial arts used by Master or Grandmaster Sister, I thought they were frightening. No, not just them. Even the martial arts used by the disciples…”
Though they were part of the black path, it was by a martial artist’s hand that she had lost her parents.
The wounds inflicted at such a young age lasted a lifetime.
She couldn’t expect the hurt to heal and the scars to vanish in just two years.
“But that doesn’t mean I think people are frightening. Master and Grandmaster Sister always worry about me.”
“That’s enough, then.”
“Really?”
“People can be cruel, frightening, or beautiful. Like I said before, martial arts change depending on who uses them.”
If she could simply learn to see the martial artist and the martial art as separate things, that would be enough.
Ha Seo-hwa had taken her first step toward that way of seeing.
“If you’ve realized that much, I’d say you’ve grown quite a bit.”
Ha Seo-hwa asked, “I still don’t understand the part about beautiful.”
“To me, people who get back up even when they’re struggling look that way. Think about yourself just now, senior sister. Even after rolling on the ground, you kept getting up and trying to fight back.”
“And you call that beautiful?”
“At the very least, I’ve never thought of senior sister as cruel.”
“...”
“And honestly, you look a lot better now than you did when you were being all spineless and giving up after losing a single exchange.”
Yoo Sung-woon went on.
“Wouldn’t your parents have been like that too? My own parents resisted the black path too, even throwing their bodies in the way to protect me.”
What Yoo Sung-woon recalled was not parents whose faces or names he remembered, but his comrades.
But the feeling was much the same as Ha Seo-hwa’s.
“Even after being stabbed by swords, they kept getting back up and trying to hold those bastards in place... I could feel that they would never let them through to me.”
Yoo Sung-woon asked, “I don’t think I could ever call that sacrifice cruel. That’s just my opinion.”
Among Yoo Sung-woon’s comrades, there had been none stronger than him.
There had even been wandering second-class martial artists who were neither Peak nor First-class.
And yet, the fact that comrades were holding the line behind you was immensely reassuring.
Ha Seo-hwa nodded as if she understood.
“So what matters is protecting something.”
“That’s not the only answer, of course. Who can decide why someone takes up a sword? In the end, the intent behind a martial art changes with the nature of the person using it…”
“I want my sword to be like yours.”
“If you want that, then go ahead. You don’t need my permission for it.”
“Then teach me.”
Ha Seo-hwa asked, “Why do you take up a sword?”
“I train, naturally, to protect things. If I want to protect what’s mine, then of course I have to become stronger, don’t I?”
“What are you trying to protect?”
“My sect.”
The answer came so quickly, so unexpectedly, that even Yoo Sung-woon found it absurd once it left his mouth.
Mount Hua Sect was a great sect, home to one of the Hundred Great Experts and even one of the Ten Great Martial Artists.
It was ridiculous for children who were only third-class to be talking about protecting the sect.
But there was no reason to hesitate over it.
Yoo Sung-woon continued shamelessly, “Mount Hua Sect reached out to us when we were at our most desperate. I want to protect this place.”
“What about the common people?”
“I’ll think about it.”
He paused briefly.
“I’m in a similar situation to you, senior sister, but not exactly the same.”
Ha Seo-hwa had heard from Jin Young-mae about Yoo Sung-woon’s circumstances.
Although they had arisen from misunderstanding and misinterpretation, the broad outline was similar.
“We’re disciples, not masters. It’s only natural that there’s a lot we don’t know. That means we have to keep learning and keep understanding.”
In the end, a sect was a place people came to in order to learn something.
“...That’s true. I learned a lot from you too.”
“What did you learn from me, exactly...?”
“Courage.”
Ha Seo-hwa looked up at Yoo Sung-woon and said, “Thank you for teaching me courage.”
Yoo Sung-woon, who had been looking down at her, suddenly went still.
A flustered expression appeared on his face.
“...So senior sister could make a face like that too.”
At his muttered words, Ha Seo-hwa unconsciously touched her own face.
The corner of her lips, brushed by her fingertips, was indeed curved upward.
“How about living in the world a little more brightly? It suits you better like this.”
Come to think of it, it had been a very long time since she had smiled.
Back when she lived with her parents, she used to smile often, or so it seemed.
But after entering Mount Hua Sect, she had forgotten how.
Still, once she realized she had smiled, a soft snort escaped her, and then, strangely enough, a foolish laugh burst out of her mouth.
“Ahahaha!”
It was the first laugh in a long time.
She had never laughed like this after losing her parents.
It was a smile she had never shown even to Hyeon So-eun or Jin Young-mae.
This was laughter even beyond that.
Ha Seo-hwa laughed for so long it seemed the forest itself might shake, then used her index finger to brush away the tear at the corner of one eye.
Seeing Yoo Sung-woon looking startled by her sudden laughter, Ha Seo-hwa held out her hand.
“Hey, lend me your hand.”
“My hand?”
“Yeah, your hand.”
Yoo Sung-woon extended his right hand with some reluctance.
Ha Seo-hwa took it and kneaded it between both hands.
“It’s soft. Kind of squishy.”
“Well, I’ve only been training for half a year. I haven’t practiced long enough for it to harden. But that’s going to change from here on out.”
Ha Seo-hwa quietly let go, then turned her gaze to the ground.
Silence settled between them.
Perhaps because of that, the restless noises in her heart sounded even louder.
Clenching the place on her robe where a plum blossom had been embroidered, just over her chest, Ha Seo-hwa made a silent vow.
Let’s become stronger.
So that even when I face fear, I won’t lose my courage.
So I won’t disappoint the person who gave me courage.
So that if I ever see someone who is like me, I can reach out to them the way he did.
* * *
The next day.
Ha Seo-hwa showed her face at Hwa-yeon Hall.
She had deliberately avoided training time and come during the sparring session instead, but today she did not apply for a match.
The third-generation disciples looked at her with puzzled expressions.
My guess was this.
She’d been beaten so badly by me yesterday that her body probably wasn’t in any condition to train.
And the reason she still showed up at sparring time without resting was probably to see whether her view of martial arts had really changed.
Ha Seo-hwa gave the instructors a respectful salute before walking straight toward me.
There was confusion in the way she looked at me, perhaps because she was sitting apart from the two people who were usually at her side.
“Alone today?”
“The other senior brothers took Jung Nam-jung senior brother and Seo Jin-ah senior sister with them.”
The two of them were known for being well-connected, so they were popular with the other third-generation disciples.
It wasn’t as though they could always stay with me.
Ha Seo-hwa nodded as if she understood, then sat down naturally beside me.
It was fine for her to be with us as long as she wasn’t wandering around somewhere far off and making a fuss.
Seo Jin-ah was talking with some of the other third-generation disciples.
When she noticed Ha Seo-hwa a little late, she waved from afar.
Ha Seo-hwa responded with a small nod.
What happened?
Seo Jin-ah was usually the type to come over and talk.
The fact that she was greeting from a distance, and that Ha Seo-hwa responded as if offering thanks, felt odd.
Before long, the answer to my confusion came from Seo Jin-ah, who was sitting a little farther away.
“Actually, Seo-hwa came looking for me late last night.”
At Seo Jin-ah’s words, Jung Nam-jung and the nearby third-generation disciples looked surprised.
I was surprised too.
She didn’t tell her I’d beaten her with a wooden sword, did she?
But what came out of Seo Jin-ah’s mouth was something I never would have expected.
“She asked me if I could get her some camellia oil with a nice scent.”
Ha Seo-hwa had always flatly refused whenever Seo Jin-ah tried to persuade her to take care of her hands.
Her reason had been that once she trained, they’d roughen again anyway, and if her hands got too smooth, the wooden sword would slip.
“So I made up my mind and gave her some that I’d scented with dried petals. It was something I was saving for myself too.”
Jung Nam-jung asked, “What flower was it?”
“You’re asking me because you don’t know?”
Ha Seo-hwa answered in disbelief.
“This is Mount Hua.”
Of course there was only one kind of petal to use.
The third-generation disciples who had been listening in nearby all turned to look at Ha Seo-hwa.
But when she turned her head, I realized she had been looking at me instead, because our eyes met at once.
“...You heard that?”
“I could hear that just fine.”
“Don’t listen.”
“I already heard everything.”
The tips of Ha Seo-hwa’s ears were red.
I had known her for a very long time, but it was only in this life that I truly came to understand how deeply I knew her.
Her smiling face, her crying face, her embarrassed face—everything about it felt new.
The third-generation disciples watching her let out a string of impressed clicks of the tongue.
“Why does she look... happy?”
“No way. Her? Senior sister Seo-hwa?”
Naturally, that impression lasted only a moment. The disciples immediately started mocking one another, saying that was ridiculous.
Honestly, if someone had told me the same thing just a few days ago, I would have reacted the same way, so I couldn’t blame them.
In the middle of everyone’s attention, Ha Seo-hwa seemed to have no thoughts whatsoever.
She didn’t seem pleased by watching the sparring, but she didn’t seem unhappy either.
More precisely, she seemed to feel nothing at all.
She kept yawning as she watched the matches, so apparently she was terribly bored.
Seeing her forcing herself to stay awake was almost laughable, so I asked, “Senior sister, if watching the sparring is boring, why did you come here?”
“I came because I wanted to.”
After that simple answer, Ha Seo-hwa suddenly looked down at her own hand.
Then she lifted the back of her hand near her mouth and inhaled the scent.
“It smells nice.”
“It’s plum blossom scent, of course.”
The disciples of Mount Hua often thought of plum blossom fragrance as the smell of home.
There was always the scent of plum blossoms on Mount Hua.
If you went to the training grounds of the second-generation disciples, you’d find people drawing plum blossoms through the air in endless rows.
Only Peak experts could release the scent of sword aura.
And yet those Peak experts were blooming plum blossoms all day long, so much of the fragrance had soaked into the training grounds that the place practically reeked of it.
“Last time you refused. What changed?”
“Senior sister Jin-ah said that if I kept taking care of them, my hands might get soft again.”
Ha Seo-hwa lifted her right hand high into the sky as though shielding her eyes from the sun.
Looking at the sky through the gaps between her fingers, she went on, “If they get soft, I’ll tell you first.”
At her pointless remark, a snort escaped me before I knew it.
“Do as you please.”