What the Hell Is Going On? (1)
I had a dream.
No, Chung Myung couldn’t tell whether it was a dream, a memory, or nothing more than the flicker of his life flashing before his eyes. He didn’t know if he was dead, dying, or not dead at all.
All he could see was the past.
Fragments from his earliest childhood.
The first time he had entered Mount Hua.
The sight of himself training alongside his martial brothers and sisters.
And, above all, the image of him roaming outside because he could never quite adapt to the mountain’s rigid, suffocating rules.
"You are a Daoist before you are a warrior. Do you not understand that power without the Dao is nothing more than violence?"
That same old lecture.
He had been sick of it.
And so, though he was a disciple of Mount Hua, he had never fully followed Mount Hua’s teachings. His natural talent had been absurdly gifted, enough to earn him the title of Plum Blossom Sword Saint—an honor he’d never considered particularly fitting—but he had still been Mount Hua’s oddity.
Why hadn’t he understood?
Even if the teachings hadn’t suited him, even if all of it had felt stale and outdated, everything he was had come from Mount Hua. He had loved Mount Hua that deeply.
It was a realization that came far too late, followed by regret that came even later.
If only he had valued those teachings a little more. If only he had grown just a little stronger. Maybe then he could have changed that grotesque ending. If only…
"Do you regret it?"
Chung Myung quietly accepted the faint voice echoing through the darkness.
It was his martial brother’s voice.
The Sect Leader martial brother. His father, his brother, his family, and the one he had long tried to follow.
The one he had wanted to walk behind, but had never managed to truly follow, until in the end he had no choice but to turn away from him.
Yes. I regret it.
I regret it, Martial Brother.
"There is nothing to regret."
His martial brother’s voice carried a gentle warmth.
"At the end of the day, it was still Mount Hua, wasn’t it?"
…Martial Brother.
"Still."
It almost sounded like he was smiling.
Endlessly warm, endlessly kind.
"Even so, it was Mount Hua."
Thunk!
Still Mou—
Thunk?
Huh? Thunk?
"Kyaaaah!"
An awful bolt of pain exploded through his head.
It hurt. It hurt so badly tears sprang to his eyes.
No, what kind of pain was this? Even when his limbs had been torn away, it hadn’t hurt this insanely.
"Heavenly Demon?"
Had that bastard not died?
Chung Myung instinctively raised both hands to shield his head. If that bastard was still alive, then he’d have to rip his throat out again—
"Heaveeeeenly Demooooon?"
But what came back was not the Heavenly Demon’s deep, overwhelming voice, but a voice anyone would find irritating, twisted, and obnoxious.
"Hm?"
When he opened his eyes, an unfamiliar face came into view.
A beggar?
A beggar. A Beggars’ Sect beggar, no less. Judging by the knot tied at his waist, he was only a newly minted first-knot beggar. To put it kindly, he was a low-ranking beginner in the Beggars’ Sect; to put it harshly, he was the lowest of the low among beggars.
The beggar, with his face crumpled in permanent bad temper, was glaring at Chung Myung and snorting through his nose.
What the hell is a beggar doing here?
The situation made no sense.
Chung Myung tilted his head and stared blankly at the beggar. Seeing that reaction, the beggar’s expression darkened with irritation. He looked thoroughly mean-spirited.
"Heavenly Demon, my ass! You little brat, what the hell are you mumbling in your sleep? You beggar bastard! Everyone else has gone out begging, and you’re sprawled here sleeping like some big-shot? I already told you I’d beat the hell out of you if I caught you slacking again, didn’t I? You think my words are a joke, beggar brat?"
The beggar spun the mendicant staff in his hand.
Wait a second.
So he’s… threatening me?
"Pfft."
A laugh slipped out before he could stop it.
He didn’t understand the situation, but this wasn’t something that needed special interpretation. Not in the least.
Who was Chung Myung?
Among the countless swordsmen in the world, he stood in the top three. The people of the realm praised his sword as the essence of Mount Hua’s martial arts, and hailed him with the exalted title of Plum Blossom Sword Saint.
And if you wanted to get technical, the so-called three greatest swordsmen in the world weren’t much of a trio at all—two of the other three had never been worthy of standing against him. Hadn’t even the Heavenly Demon acknowledged, in his final moment, that Chung Myung’s sword was the strongest under heaven?
Even if the Beggars’ Sect’s leader came himself, he wouldn’t be able to keep his head held high before Chung Myung.
And yet—threatened?
Threaten—ed?
"Huh? Huhhh? You just laughed?"
The beggar stared at him in utter disbelief.
"Hey, beggar."
"Hey, beggar?"
"Looks like you don’t understand the situation yet, but put that thing down first."
"Ha. Hahahahaha. Hahahahahahaha."
The beggar actually started laughing, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Watching that, Chung Myung’s eyes narrowed too.
For some first-knot beggar to act like that in front of him?
And then, without warning, the beggar swung his staff at Chung Myung’s head.
Hah.
Unbelievable.
Who did this bastard think he was, doing something like that to me? It looked like today he’d have to teach this beggar a proper lesson.
First, block that slow-as-molasses stick!
Chung Myung leisurely lifted his right arm. All he had to do was seize the staff and make the difference in skill painfully obvious—
…Huh?
Huh?
Slow?
Why was his arm this slow?
The staff was flying at him, but Chung Myung’s hand still hadn’t reached it.
No, the moment he’d decided to move, he should already have had that staff in his grip. What, had he been hurt more badly than he thought?
Then he’d just have to put in his best effort….
Eh? What the hell?
Chung Myung’s eyes went wide.
In the center of his vision, he saw the staff hurtling toward his head. And at the very edge of that vision, a tiny hand appeared. A tiny hand moving toward the staff at a snail’s pace.
So small, and also…
Short?
Huh?
It shouldn’t be short. If it was short, then it couldn’t stop the—
The staff the beggar swung slipped past Chung Myung’s arm and landed squarely on his crown.
Kuuuuuuuuung!
Thunder roared inside his head.
Thud.
Struck as if the world itself had collapsed, Chung Myung’s body toppled neatly backward.
Twitch. Twitch.
Sprawled out on the ground, his body began to convulse.
All the useless thoughts about how the hell the situation had gone this badly, and how he was supposed to deal with it, vanished cleanly from his mind. All that remained was pain, as though heaven and earth were being torn apart inside his skull.
"Kyaaaaaaah!"
Clutching his head, Chung Myung rolled on the ground.
Even when the Heavenly Demon had ripped his arm off, it hadn’t hurt this much!
"You little bastard!"
The beggar who had struck Chung Myung’s head now spat into his palm and began beating the living daylights out of him in earnest.
"Situation check? You want a situation cheeeck? Fine! I’ll make damn sure you understand the situation today! If you’re going to go crazy, then at least do it politely, you punk! What, did you swallow the heat? You know what fixes heatstroke? A good beating!"
The staff rained down on Chung Myung’s body with merciless precision.
"Ow! Agh! Stop, you crazy beggar! Quit it right now—agh!"
"Die! Die!"
"Ow, it hurts! Dammit!"
Under the relentless barrage, Chung Myung’s shouts began to change little by little.
Whack! Whack! Whack!
"You bastard beggar! I’ll kill you! I swear I’ll take your life—"
"Then take it! Please, just take it already, idiot!"
"Ow! Why won’t it block? Owww!"
Smack! Whack! Smack!
"You… enough already… no, agh! Ow!"
The beating showed no mercy.
"…Help…."
Whack! Whack! Whack!
"S-save meeeeee!"
As if foreshadowing that the new life ahead of him would be anything but smooth, Chung Myung was beaten like a dog on a summer’s day before the first chapter of his new existence had even properly begun.
"…Ah. My pride hurts."
Chung Myung yanked the cloth he’d stuffed up his nose back out.
"O-ow, ow…."
Dull pain throbbed in his nose. The moment he saw the filthy cloth, now stained red, his face filled with utter emptiness.
Nosebleed.
Not the kind caused by blood flowing backward from internal injuries, either, but a nosebleed from getting the hell beaten out of him.
Was that even a thing?
And it wasn’t just the nosebleed. There wasn’t a single unharmed spot on his body.
His bruised, swollen eyes were bad enough, but it felt as if not a single joint or bone was unscathed. Had he ever, in his entire life, been beaten so thoroughly that his whole body felt loose and broken like this?
He had caused all sorts of trouble in Mount Hua, a sect proud of its strict discipline, and never once been beaten like this. And now his very first such experience had come courtesy of some street beggar.
"Damn beggar bastard…."
The hand that wielded the mendicant staff had the scent of a professional. The way he beat someone without leaving a single corner of the body untouched was practically art.
If the staff had been aimed at anyone other than himself, he would have applauded.
"You Beggars’ Sect bastards. I’ll wipe you out."
Right now, though, all he could do was seethe.
Unable to bear the heat and irritation boiling inside him, Chung Myung flopped onto the ground and thrashed around. But all that did was make his body hurt more.
"No, more importantly…."
Chung Myung hurriedly sprang up and went to the stream. Then he leaned forward and peered into the water.
A child’s face he had never seen before stared back at him. When Chung Myung twisted his expression, the child in the water twisted his expression too; when Chung Myung exhaled, the child in the water exhaled as well.
"…What the hell is going on here?"
Why was there a child’s face in the water?
No, fine, the face itself was acceptable. He could understand his face changing. Besides, younger was supposed to be better, wasn’t it? He’d become absurdly young—too young to the point of looking like a baby-faced brat—but still, young was better than old.
And no matter how he thought about it, this face was handsomer than Chung Myung’s old one. So he didn’t particularly mind that part.
The part he did mind was that his body had gotten younger too.
Short.
His arms and legs were shorter than they used to be. Not because he’d always had a short build, but because this was the body of a child who had not yet grown.
Besides, the poor thing had apparently grown up without enough to eat, because all that was left were skin and bones. Even now he felt weak and hungry enough that lifting a hand was difficult.
Ah. Right. That was because he’d been beaten.
Anyway!
"So…."
To sum it up:
"I’m alive."
Though calling it I might not be entirely right. No matter how he looked at it, this wasn’t the Plum Blossom Sword Saint Chung Myung’s body. The old man, nearly eighty years old, had become a child.
It wasn’t that the Plum Blossom Sword Saint Chung Myung had survived. Rather, the Plum Blossom Sword Saint Chung Myung had entered the body of a beggar child, and retained all his memories while doing so.
"What a bloody absurdity."
Was this what Buddhism called reincarnation?
If he’d known this would happen, he should’ve joined Shaolin instead of Mount Hua.
Brushing aside the suddenly deepening stir of piety—and deliberately ignoring it—Chung Myung raised a hand and scratched his head hard.
"Ow!"
The force of the motion sent pain flaring through his whole body. The more he thought about it, the angrier he got.
"No point ranting about how impossible this is. It won’t change a damn thing."
This wasn’t a dream, and it wasn’t an illusion.
He had even suspected the Heavenly Demon of using some kind of sorcery, but if that bastard could create illusions this vivid, he would have already ruled the world.
He didn’t know what the hell had happened, but in the end he had to accept that all of this was real.
And if that was the case, then what Chung Myung needed to do next was painfully obvious.
"…First I need to figure out exactly what the hell is going on."
He shot to his feet and started running back toward the beggar’s den he’d escaped from earlier. Well, he tried to run.
"Grrrgh…."
He didn’t even make it a few steps before collapsing back down.
"You really beat the crap out of me, you beggar bastard."
Chung Myung’s eyes began to burn.
"Whatever the situation is, I’m definitely going to screw the Beggars’ Sect over."
Just because he’d died and come back to life didn’t mean his awful personality had gone anywhere.
Before long, he forced himself upright again and set off toward the beggar den, staggering as he went.