Chapter 23
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 23
Chapter Title: Jang Jo-san's Treasure(?).
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A new wind began to blow through the Yeomhwa Family after the Four Demons arrived.
The shouts of a little over ten warriors echoed through the training grounds early each morning, breathing new life into the family estate.
The Four Demons trained with Mujin for about an hour from dawn, then instructed the warriors.
Steward Do, who had initially watched them with concern, no longer worried about the Four Demons.
He had held the preconceived notion that they would be rough and vicious, but having experienced them firsthand, he found they had a simple side to them, just as Mujin had said.
While they had coarse expressions and temperaments, Steward Do saw that they were merely direct in expressing their thoughts and feelings, not evil.
Moreover, seeing how well Soyeon and Dojin got along with the Four Demons put his mind at ease.
As children often do, the two had no preconceived notions about people.
They simply accepted the Four Demons for who they were and blended in well with them.
Whenever the warriors took a break from training, the two children would always go and play with the Four Demons.
Steward Do's greatest joy recently was that Dojin and Soyeon were living each day with laughter instead of worry and anxiety.
In the past, when the Cheonghwa Merchant Guild and debt collectors pressured them almost daily, his heart had ached more than once seeing the two children so intimidated every day.
But that gloomy past ended as if it were a lie the moment Mujin came to his senses.
Although Mujin hadn't told them what kind of fortunate encounter he'd had or when, Steward Do was prepared to wait as long as it took for Mujin to tell him himself.
‘Something's strange. There's definitely something here.’
For a week now, Mujin had been training only in the mornings and spending all afternoon in his room, observing the folding screen.
The sense of unease he felt from the screen clearly told him something was off, but he couldn't quite pinpoint what it was.
“Hmm...”
And so, Mujin spent a week staring at the ink wash painting on the screen, even skipping his afternoon training.
‘A vast, deep mountain range, a hawk soaring above the rugged peaks, and a waterfall cascading down below. What is it? What on earth is bothering me so much?’
He examined the hawk, each contour of the mountains, and the fiercely falling waterfall, but nothing came to mind.
‘It's just a few strokes of an ink-laden brush. Am I mistaken...? Huh?’
Just as he was gathering his thoughts to give up, Mujin's eyes shot open.
‘The lines!’
Once his eyes were opened and he began to see the source of his unease, all the secrets started to reveal themselves.
Mujin moved closer to the screen and began to focus not on the painting itself, but on the ink lines that formed it.
Pacing back and forth before the unfolded screen, Mujin watched the ink lines of the painting and moved his fingertips.
Mujin's hand began to trace unknown lines in the air. What started as random, disorderly movements gradually took shape over time, resembling the forms of a martial art.
“Swift...”
-*Swish!*
“Flowing...”
-*Swoosh!*
“Divine...”
-*Shuk!*
Finally, Mujin thrust his fingertips into the air as if dotting a final point.
“I never would have thought the principles of a martial art could be embedded in the ink lines. What a novel idea.”
With that, Mujin went out to the front yard, broke off a tree branch, and held it in his hand.
Then he began to draw on the ground, replicating the parts of the ink lines that contained the martial principles.
With every stroke of his branch on the ground, characters were completed.
[摺通打脈]
“Fold, Penetrate, Strike, Meridian...”
A smile spread across Mujin's face as he pondered the meaning of the characters written on the ground for a moment.
He returned to his room and folded the screen.
And as he folded the screen, his eyes caught the ink lines containing the martial principles overlapping one another.
The ink lines containing the principles were ingeniously arranged to overlap.
“Seven spots.”
Having confirmed this, Mujin smiled at the folded screen and moved his hands.
-*Swish! Tatatatang!*
The moment Mujin's two fingers shot through the air and struck the seven spots on the folded screen quickly and forcefully.
-*Clunk! Creeak. Clank! Clank! Clank! Thunk! Thud!*
The sound of some mechanism turning came from within the screen, and soon, a hidden compartment in the wooden frame opened, and something fell to the floor.
“A martial arts manual?”
Mujin bent down, picked up the manual, and looked inside the open compartment of the screen.
“...”
Having spotted something else inside, Mujin carefully reached in and pulled it out.
It was a porcelain bottle, the size of his index finger.
He opened the stoppered bottle and let a single drop fall to the floor.
-*Tssssssss!*
With a hissing sound, the floor began to melt, and a foul stench rose up.
“Corpse Melting Powder...”
Seeing the deadly poison, said to be able to dissolve even corpses, Mujin realized that if he had tried to force the screen open, the device was set to dissolve the manual.
Closing the lid on the Corpse Melting Powder and setting it aside, Mujin turned his attention back to the manual.
His curiosity was piqued by the manual hidden in such an interesting way.
“Heart-Severing Sword Style? Refined Spirit Arts?”
The first half of the book was a sword style called the Heart-Severing Sword Style, which focused on the principles of speed, swiftness, and divinity. The latter half was an internal art called the Refined Spirit Arts.
Flipping quickly through the book, he found a message from Jang Jo-san, the one who had left the manual in the screen, on the very last page.
-If by chance someone has found this manual, you must be a gracious person who appreciates my work. I believe that if you are someone who recognizes the value of my art, then I can entrust you with this martial art, which contains the essence of my life's study. To the one who solved this mechanism and found this manual with your excellent eye and study: I trust in your artistic sense, your brilliant mind, and your martial talent. I hope you will achieve greatness and walk the path of a master.-
After reading Jang Jo-san's message to the end, Mujin raised one corner of his mouth.
“What a load of crap. From someone who was barely one of the top ten masters in Hubei. Tsk, tsk. Anyone would think he'd left behind some legendary technique. How pathetic.”
Now that he had solved the mystery, only to find it was merely Jang Jo-san's manual, Mujin suddenly regretted the week of afternoon training he had missed.
He had thought some great secret was hidden within, but if he had known beforehand that it was just Jang Jo-san's manual, he wouldn't have obsessed over solving the screen's puzzle like this.
“I thought some amazing treasure or a map to one would come out. Tch.”
The manual, which he had skimmed through, was nothing special in Mujin's eyes.
Even if one mastered it, it was a sword style that would, at best, place them among the top ten masters of Hubei.
Unless it was a divine art that could make one an unrivaled master under the heavens, guide them quickly to the peak realm, or multiply their internal energy severalfold, it was of no interest to Mujin.
Just as Mujin was about to shove the manual carelessly onto an old bookshelf, his hand suddenly stopped.
“Ah!”
Though it was a trivial martial art, useless to him, there were people in the family right now who would be more than grateful for it.
“There are those guys.”
Mujin hurried out of his room and shouted.
“Masok! Masok!”
At Mujin's call, Masok, who had been hauling water, set down his buckets and ran over.
“Young Master! Did you call?”
“Go get Steward Do and Elder Jo right now.”
“Yes!”
Without another word, Masok ran off to fetch the two men.
A short while later, Steward Do and Elder Jo rushed into Mujin's quarters.
"You called for us?"
“Ah, it's nothing much. I just found this.”
As he finished speaking, he tossed the manual, and Elder Jo snatched it out of the air.
“Heart-Severing Sword Style. Refined Spirit Arts? Is this a manual?”
Mujin nodded in response to Elder Jo's question.
As Mujin nodded, Elder Jo barely suppressed the urge to open the manual and spoke.
“W-Why are you giving this to me...? May I read it?”
“I don't mind. It's Jang Jo-san's manual, not my secret art.”
!!!
At the words "Jang Jo-san's manual," both Steward Do's and Elder Jo's eyes widened.
“Wh-Where did you find this manual?”
As far as Steward Do knew, the Yeomhwa Family had no connection to Jang Jo-san.
So why would such a manual turn up at the Yeomhwa estate?
Just as Mujin was about to answer, Steward Do clapped his hands.
-*Clap!*
“The screen! It came from the screen!”
Watching him jump to his own conclusions, Mujin nodded.
“I noticed some tricks in the painting, so I looked into it and found this hidden inside.”
Steward Do approached Mujin, who spoke with an indifferent expression.
“M-May I check the screen?”
“It's inside.”
It seemed Steward Do was more interested in the screen that had hidden the manual and its mechanism than the manual itself.
Steward Do took the screen out to the main hall where the light was good and examined it.
He inspected the space where the manual had been hidden, letting out gasps of admiration.
“So you're saying it was hidden in here along with the Corpse Melting Powder?”
“That's right. If someone had tried to force it open...”
“This pendulum weight would have broken the porcelain bottle of Corpse Melting Powder, and the manual would have dissolved.”
“Exactly. But since when were you so interested in mechanisms?”
“I've always been interested in mechanisms, but more than that... it's a work by Master Jang Jo-san...”
“I don't need that screen anymore, so if you like it so much, take it. I heard you could get 80 gold taels for it. You could sell it and help with the family finances.”
“Th-The family's finances are perfectly fine!”
As he said this, Steward Do was already tucking the screen under his arm.
“...”
Watching the steward, Mujin raised the corner of his mouth.
“I-It's a high-level martial art! This is definitely Master Jang Jo-san's personal technique!”
Mujin nodded at the excitedly shouting Elder Jo.
“Of course it's real. Who would install such an elaborate mechanism for a fake? Still, it's just Jang Jo-san's martial art.”
At Mujin's last comment, the two old men looked at him with incomprehension.
How could he be so nonchalant after obtaining the personal technique of a master who was once listed among the top ten in Hubei?
But it didn't take long for the two of them to realize why.
How could Jang Jo-san's martial art possibly catch the eye of a man who hadn't even deigned to inherit the Flame Emperor's techniques?
“It might be of some help to you two, though.”
At Mujin's words, the two old men looked at him instantly.
“Make a copy for yourselves to learn, and give the copy to the Four Demons. They'll probably refuse to learn it... but tell them to at least learn the sword forms. They'll need it to teach the warriors.”
!!!
“Y-You mean, Master Jang Jo-san's martial art...”
“You're saying to teach it to the warriors?”
“Yes. What's the use of a manual that no one learns? Weren't you worried that we didn't have any martial arts to teach the warriors? As you two learn it, systematically divide the forms. Into introductory, standard, and advanced sections. Make it easy for the men to learn.”
“B-But to just give away such a high-level martial art to the warriors...”
“That's right. This is the sword style of one of Hubei's top ten masters, no less.”
“What's the big deal about being one of Hubei's top ten masters? It's just a regional level. Enough, just do as I say. They're the ones who stuck with this failing family even when they weren't getting paid properly. What's there to be stingy about? We got it for free anyway.”
At Mujin's words, Elder Jo's eyes grew hot.
Though Mujin always spoke callously and harshly, he could feel that he cared for those who had protected the family all this time.
“Y-Young Master...”
“You're just getting more sentimental with age. Why are you tearing up again? More importantly, how is the warrior recruitment going? It's been a while, why is there no news?”
“W-Well...”
Steward Do trailed off at Mujin's question.
“What is it?”
“There are... no applicants.”
“None?”
“Yes.”
“They don't have to be initiated in martial arts, right? We can train them, so I said to just pick anyone who looks sturdy enough.”
“It's not that. There is literally no one applying.”
At the steward's words, Mujin tilted his head.
“Did you put up the notices properly?”
“Yes.”
“And you wrote clearly that we'd teach martial arts?”
“Yes...”
“And still no one's coming?”
“That is correct.”
“...”
Mujin fell silent for a moment, gathering his thoughts.
“I mean, does it make sense that there aren't any young guys in Seochang who dream of the martial world? Aren't there guys like that everywhere?”
“All such young men are seeking out the Sangro Martial Academy.”
“Haa. This damn household.”
Mujin sighed and shook his head.
It seemed nothing ever went as planned when it came to the family's affairs.