Life [2]
Early that morning—
"Got everything?"
I asked Seol-ah.
In truth, there was little worth packing. Once you stood at the Peak Realm, internal energy could take the place of whatever chemical fuel the body needed to move, and a rise of that same energy could scour away waste and dust alike. Seol-ah was no different. If hunger found us on the road, we could always take some wild animal, and anything else, I could see to myself. Practically speaking, all we needed was money and a spare change of clothes.
"Yes! We're setting off now, right?"
Seol-ah, her bundle already packed, asked it bright with excitement.
Was a journey really so wonderful as all that?
"Yeah. Let's go."
I stole the bundle from her hands and said it with a wide smile. The truth was, I was glad too. With Seol-ah beside me, what wouldn't be fun? In all seriousness, I felt as if I could walk onto a battlefield and still break into a smile at the sight of her face.
"Ah—why are you carrying the bundle? I'll take it! Give it here!"
Seol-ah flailed her short arms, but it was useless. The difference in our heights ran to nearly a full foot; raise my arm, and she had no hope of reaching.
"I'm carrying it. Where do you think you're going, when you aren't even well?"
"Hmph... You're the one who'll be exhausting yourself, running lightness arts all day! At least let me carry that!"
"So it's fine so long as I'm not the one holding it?"
"What?"
Her puzzled echo had not even finished before the bundle in my hand drifted up into the sky.
"Wh—what...?"
"Reach the Peak Realm, and even this becomes possible. So we're settled now, right?"
"...Isn't that even harder?"
"Mm... more or less the same. This does take a little more effort, but if I'm holding the bundle, I can't hold you tight. So this is the better bargain."
I meant it. Strap the bundle on, carry it however I liked—so long as it was on me, holding Seol-ah would be a nuisance.
"W-well... then there's no helping it."
She said so with her cheeks faintly flushed.
"Oh—then what is that technique called?"
"Uh... I'm not sure. I only just tried it for the first time."
"Really? Then may I name it?"
"Yeah. Will you?"
"How about Heogongseopmul? It means seizing an object out of empty space."
"Oh. I like it."
Grasping from the Void — to gather the empty air, and seize what floats within it.
Our Seol-ah had a gift for names as well. Heogongseopmul. A thoroughly handsome name. I ruffled her hair without mercy.
"Hehe."
"You've named the new technique, so shall we head out?"
"Yes!"
The answer came full of spirit. Chuckling, I swept her up into my arms. I had thought it before: she was genuinely light. A little over eighty pounds, if I had to guess.
"It's been quite a while since we did this."
"It has. For a year we all but lived in that hut."
We had only stepped outside to buy things like bedding and pillows, or to eat somewhere else, and even that had grown rarer once half a year was behind us. Still, holding Seol-ah and setting off on a long journey after so long felt good in its own right.
I let out a short laugh, kicked off the ground to run, and then a thought stopped me.
If I can float an object in the air, couldn't I fly through empty space as well?
If I didn't know, I ought to try. I stamped upon the air and leapt upward.
Boom—!
A crack of riven air, and my body shot skyward.
This... this is pretty good.
A touch slower than running on the ground, of course. But run along the earth, and terrain made a true straight line impossible. Factor that in, and this was a technique well worth having.
Bang, bang—!
Every step upon the air drove a wind that stabbed at the eyes; I answered it by laying a sheath of condensed qi evenly over Seol-ah and myself. She had been staring blankly for a long while. At last she forced her gaping mouth shut and spoke.
"...How in the world are you stepping on empty air? Even the clan head never showed a technique like this..."
"This one's pretty easy."
You stand at the Peak Realm, and you still can't do this? An eminently reasonable suspicion rose in me: perhaps they kept it a clan secret and only used it where no one could see. It was that easy.
"You just gather the natural qi in the air into one place, then shove it away with the rebound of your condensed qi. Heogongseopmul works on a similar principle."
"...That is not easy at all. Ordinary people can't manipulate natural qi..."
"Ah."
So that was the problem.
"But even in a world with no internal energy, I could feel natural qi and handle it to some degree. Why can't the people here?"
People who went so far as to draw natural qi into their own bodies and refine it—why couldn't they command this? That, I still could not understand.
"What is there you couldn't do, when a single year of martial arts brought you this far? It's simply one more thing among the rest."
"Hmm. You think so?"
"Yes. Wouldn't it be? I can't think of anything else. Forget reaching the Peak Realm in a year—even someone who reaches it before fifty is rare across all of history. Anyway, so... how about calling this Heogongdambo?"
"Oh, I like it. It means treading the void. Straightforward. Good."
"Hehe."
Treading the Void — to set one's foot upon empty air, and walk where there is no ground.
Watching Seol-ah go soft and silly under my hand, I sank into thought.
I still can't feel, not truly, just how tremendous the Peak Realm is supposed to be...
That the growth would make anyone look twice went without saying. There was, in fact, far more I could do through internal energy now. Perhaps it was only that I had climbed too easily. They called it a realm a genius could not reach though he devoted his whole life to the martial path... and I had gained the insight from a single kiss.
When Seol-ah heard me say as much, her answer was this.
"Honestly, I couldn't quite believe it either. But living with you, I came to a sort of conclusion."
"Which is?"
"Just accept that it's so. Whether you were an immortal in some past life, or a martial god who lost his memory—something of that sort."
Fair enough. I ought to think of it the same way. And if it still refused to feel real, well, I could always challenge some ascetic, or another martial artist of the Peak Realm, to a match.
Come to think of it, I'd like to turn the Lee Clan upside down at least once...
Now and then, when I slipped from the arms of a sleeping Seol-ah, she would groan and fret. For no other reason than the affairs of her own house, the Lee Clan. It had hurt every time. I ought to overturn that place as well, and make them press their foreheads to the floor before her.
I was turning that idle thought over when Seol-ah spoke.
"But is your internal energy all right?"
"Hm? Internal energy?"
"Yes. Doesn't Heogongdambo consume an enormous amount?"
"I'm replenishing it even now, so it doesn't matter. Even measured in absolute terms, I don't think it'll run dry."
At the words that I was still replenishing it, Seol-ah's pupils widened for an instant—and then she recovered her calm. She looked positively detached.
"Aren't you going to sleep?"
"No. I mean to savor every moment of being held by you all day."
She said it playfully, then seemed to embarrass herself; her cheeks colored. I laughed under my breath and tucked her hair behind her ear.
"...Couldn't you at least pretend to be embarrassed?"
Her tone was a little curt. Her cheeks were still faintly flushed. I poked a finger into one puffed cheek and answered.
"I feel the same way. Why should I be embarrassed?"
"Ugh... I can't win against you."
At my teasing reply, Seol-ah hid her scarlet face in both hands. Her reactions were always so cute that I kept wanting to tease her.
"Though stepping on the air myself is starting to feel like a bother..."
"Then shall we rest a little before we go on?"
"No, well... I can just lie down."
"...What?"
I closed my eyes and thought for about fifteen seconds, then, still holding Seol-ah, simply lay back in the air.
"Ha... and what principle is this supposed to be?"
Looking back at the two of us gliding forward as we lay there, Seol-ah let out an incredulous laugh.
"Walking is just pushing your feet against the ground and using the reaction—the ground shoving your body back with equal force, right? So instead of stepping on the air, I'm releasing internal energy evenly and pushing the natural qi away."
"Yes, well... I suppose that could... work. Yes."
She looked reluctantly convinced.
"I might even be able to sleep like this. If I carve the release of internal energy into my unconscious, it ought to work, don't you think?"
"Is that really the unconscious? If you can control it, it isn't unconscious, is it?"
"Good point. There were a few times I fell asleep while swinging a sword, and after it happened enough, I found I kept swinging even in my sleep. After that, I could."
"...Is there anything you can't do?"
Seol-ah blinked, looking utterly dumbfounded.
Cute. I ought to tease her a little more. I smiled faintly and spoke.
"Live without you?"
"...Nnnngh...!"
Her face gone beet-red, Seol-ah tapped at my chest with her small fists. The reaction was excellent, as always. This was what I lived for. I wore a thoroughly wicked grin.
"Stop teasing me like that...!"
"I'm ten parts serious out of ten. Why would I live if you weren't here?"
It was true that I felt that way. I was only saying it in a teasing voice.
"..."
Seol-ah clutched my collar and buried her face hard against my chest.
Why was she this cute? I eased her a little out of my arms, pressed one kiss to her lips, and drew her back in. It was night now. One kiss before sleep was only right.
"Sleep well."
"...G-good night..."
Her voice shrank, trembling.
Adorable. I closed my eyes with the corner of my mouth drawn as high as it would go.
All of it was two weeks before we arrived in Songwon.