Mount Hua Never Disappears (1)
The world fell silent. An icy stillness settled over Mount Hua.
No one could speak, and no one could even think to move.
Those who knew martial arts were speechless because they understood just how extraordinary the sight before them was. Even those who knew nothing of martial arts could tell that something unbelievable had just happened right in front of them.
Sama Seung stared at Chung Myung, his eyes trembling.
With nothing but basic swordsmanship…
He had subdued Yun Baek?
And not even once giving him a chance to strike back?
The string of attacks had flowed like running water, natural and seamless. Yun Baek, swept up in that sword, had not even managed to attempt a counterattack.
Could I do that?
Sama Seung could not immediately answer the question that rose in his head.
Subduing Yun Baek in an instant was something Sama Seung could do easily enough. But overwhelming an opponent with only basic swordsmanship, without ever leaving room for a counter, was an entirely different matter.
Even if someone twice as strong as Sama Seung appeared before him, he could not say with certainty that they could reproduce the same divine display Chung Myung had just shown.
This was a matter of how perfectly one had mastered the fundamentals, and how timely one could unleash the sword.
Roughly put, it was like a massive root.
Not a splendid branch or a thick trunk. A root invisible beneath the earth, yet so vast that it held everything up. That root had spread too far, too deep.
W-what kind of monster is that kid?
There was another meaning to a root that vast.
It meant the boy would grow into a tree. A tree so enormous it would cover all of Mount Hua and more!
Then a voice, colder and sharper than ice, pierced Sama Seung’s ears.
“Next.”
Sama Seung’s eyes quivered as he looked at Chung Myung.
Chung Myung stood there with his sword leveled, gazing at them with eyes sunk deep and calm as still water.
We have to stop him.
The outcome of this match no longer mattered. If Chung Myung truly grew into what Sama Seung feared, then one day Jongnam might be buried in that boy’s shadow.
Yes.
Just as it had been when the old Plum Blossom Sword Saint still lived.
“E-elder….”
“Ah….”
Only then did Sama Seung regain his wits. He swept his gaze over the disciples gathered around him and gritted his teeth.
Who should he send?
That was when it happened.
Jong Seo-han growled and glared at Chung Myung.
“Elder, I’ll go! I’ll go out there, beat that bastard down, and teach those Mount Hua fools their place.”
“…….”
The more one knew, the more one saw. To Jong Seo-han, Chung Myung’s strength did not seem visible at all.
What should be done?
After a brief hesitation, Sama Seung bit down hard on his lip.
“Seo-han.”
“Yes, Elder!”
“Don’t win easily. Wear that bastard down.”
“……Pardon?”
“Do as you’re told!”
Jong Seo-han stared at him in confusion, then nodded.
“I’ll do as you command.”
“……Go.”
“Yes!”
Clutching his wooden sword, Jong Seo-han dashed toward the dueling ground.
At that, Jin Geum-ryong, who had kept silent until now, finally spoke.
“Elder.”
“…….”
“It’s a little hard for me to say this, but….”
Sama Seung’s gaze turned to Jin Geum-ryong. Seeing his expression, Jin Geum-ryong flinched and unconsciously stepped back.
It was cold.
So cold it seemed to radiate frost.
Sama Seung soon looked away and fixed his eyes on the dueling ground.
Jong Seo-han took a deep breath.
I won’t let my guard down. I won’t look down on him. I won’t overestimate myself.
If he could only bring out all of his own ability, there was no way he could lose to some kid like that. If he became careless and gave the enemy the initiative, like Yun Baek had, then absurd things like this could happen.
“I’ll praise you for taking down Yun Baek. But I….”
The rest of the sentence never made it past his lips.
His mouth closed on its own, cutting off his voice and stopping his thoughts dead in place.
Silence.
Before him stood Chung Myung, in a high guard, and it felt as though the air around him was slowly sinking.
……What is this?
He had not known it when he was watching from below.
But the aura emanating from Chung Myung, now that he faced him directly, was something Jong Seo-han had never experienced before in his life. He had never felt anything like this from Jin Geum-ryong, or even from his own master.
Without meaning to, he swallowed hard. The muscles all over his body drew tight.
Just by looking at Chung Myung standing there, his body was warning him of danger on its own.
Chung Myung’s half-lidded eyes settled on Jong Seo-han.
Before he knew it, Jong Seo-han had raised his wooden sword and taken a stance. All the stray thoughts crowding his mind vanished. It was as if only the two of them existed in the world now: him and Chung Myung.
Then.
Whoosh.
Chung Myung took a slow step forward.
It had clearly looked slow to the eye, yet Chung Myung’s body arrived directly in front of Jong Seo-han in an instant.
He drove the ball of his foot into the ground.
He drew the force rebounding upward into his waist, twisted through his hips, and drove it up through his upper body. Then, carrying that power through without wasting a trace, he brought the sword down with absolute resolve.
Bang!
It was nothing more than a plain downward strike.
Power, speed, accuracy. Nothing but the fundamentals.
Yet the strength unleashed by that one strike, carried out with such perfect fidelity to the basics, exceeded mere fundamental technique.
Jong Seo-han’s legs buckled.
Chung Myung advanced another step, his sword still following through. Jong Seo-han, already off balance and unable to steady himself, let out a strangled cry and twisted his body at the last instant.
No, no!
And that was the end.
In Jong Seo-han’s eyes, he saw the wooden sword falling toward his own head.
Ah….
Shock and fear filled Jong Seo-han’s eyes.
That’s impossible….
Crash!
Jong Seo-han sprayed blood and was hurled to the ground.
One strike.
Just one strike.
Jong Seo-han, the second-strongest among the second-generation disciples, had been sent crashing down in a spray of blood from a single blow. Everyone’s eyes widened at the impossible sight.
And under those stunned gazes, Chung Myung barked out again, cold as ever.
“Next.”
Chung Myung looked quietly toward Jongnam.
By now, Jongnam seemed to understand how the situation was unfolding. Their faces had gone stiff, as though they had seen a ghost, and that alone proved it.
Too soon.
It was too early to be shocked. What he had to show them was not over yet.
He had no intention of being satisfied with merely handing them defeat.
Given what Jongnam had done to Mount Hua, simple defeat would be far too light a punishment.
Today, Chung Myung would carve a scar into Jongnam that could never be erased.
As long as Mount Hua remained in the world, and as long as Jongnam remained in the world, that scar would never disappear. It would not vanish with time, and not even history itself would be able to wash it away.
You did something you should never have done.
Mount Hua had sacrificed everything to save the world. Even when Chung Myung tried to stop them, his martial brothers had thrown their lives away like straw on the summit of the Hundred Thousand Great Mountains to stop the Heavenly Demon.
And the price for that was this?
It sank.
The anger he had forced down for so long began burning in Chung Myung’s chest as a cold flame.
In the world we protected, you were there too, Jongnam.
And yet Jongnam had not only repaid that kindness by stealing the Plum Blossom Sword Art and looking down on Mount Hua, but was now scheming to trample Mount Hua forever.
We really did hold back this long.
Chung Myung found himself praising himself for once. He had come this far while swallowing the surge of rage that rose in him several times a day. He no longer needed to endure the anger he had kept caged for so long.
“Next!”
When Chung Myung shouted again, sharp as a blade, the Jongnam disciples flinched and looked at him. Then, hesitantly, they entered the dueling ground and carried Jong Seo-han away.
One of them remained behind, standing stiffly before Chung Myung with a sword in hand.
He had shown them enough of Liuhe. Then it was time to move on to the next.
Chung Myung calmly took up the starting posture.
At once, a sound like someone drawing in a sharp breath came from behind him.
“I, Nakhwageom!”
Taking the opening stance of Nakhwageom, Chung Myung lifted his sword and pointed it at the Jongnam disciple.
And then he shot forward with breathtaking speed.
Different!
Jo Gul clenched his fist tightly.
Chung Myung’s movement was completely different now. It was nothing like the measured, concise motions he had shown while demonstrating Liuhe. This was a movement fierce and sharp, like the wind rushing through a gorge.
Just changing the sword style made him seem like a different person. How could one man wield such entirely different swords with such perfection?
It was like a flower blooming on an ancient tree that had grown out of a cliff, only to be swept away by a violent wind.
Swish!
The speed was beyond anything seen when he had used Liuhe.
A terrifying quick sword flew toward the Jongnam disciple.
“Ghk!”
Clang!
Just as he thought he had somehow blocked it, the sword was withdrawn faster than the thrust itself had come, only to stab in again at twice that speed.
What—!
Clang!
The sword was blocked right before his throat, only to be pulled back again.
The way to handle a quick sword was to wait for the instant it was drawn back after the thrust. That was the orthodox method. But even knowing that, the Jongnam disciple did not dare try to counterattack.
The moment he tried to exploit the opening as the sword withdrew, the withdrawn blade surged forward again.
“Ngh!”
Faster.
Clang!
Even faster!
Whoosh!
The sword, not fully deflected, grazed his shoulder. It was only a graze, but the pain was so vivid it felt like flesh was tearing and bone was shattering.
“Aaaaargh!”
At last, unable to find any way to respond and having lost all reason, the Jongnam disciple screamed and began slashing wildly.
No, he tried to.
Thud!
Before he could even put strength into the hand gripping his sword, Chung Myung’s blade slammed into his Adam’s apple.
“Grrrhk!”
The Jongnam disciple collapsed where he stood.
Thump.
Chung Myung glanced at the Jongnam disciple lying on the ground and snapped coldly.
“Next.”
Yoon Jong let out a breath that sounded almost windless.
T-that’s Nakhwageom.
It was different.
It was so different from the Nakhwageom Yoon Jong or Jo Gul used.
If Liuhe was a sword style faithful to the fundamentals of swordsmanship, then Nakhwageom was a style centered on quickness, the very heart of Mount Hua’s sword doctrines.
Chung Myung was telling them with his sword now.
This is Nakhwageom. This is Mount Hua’s sword.
“……With only Nakhwageom….”
It was the sword style they had learned.
But to be honest, Yoon Jong had never once thought of Nakhwageom as martial arts as outstanding as Jongnam’s sword.
No matter how much the sword style wasn’t everything, if one judged it coldly, Mount Hua’s martial arts could not compare to Jongnam’s.
That had been Yoon Jong’s thought until now. No, the thought of all three third-generation disciples.
But Chung Myung was telling them, not with a hundred words but with a single real battle, that Mount Hua’s martial arts were in no way inferior to Jongnam’s. That was surely why Chung Myung had deliberately fought them using only Liuhe and Nakhwageom.
“……What have I been looking at all this time?”
Someone who had not properly mastered what he already had had envied what belonged to others. It was shameful. Beyond shameful.
“Martial Uncle. Nakhwageom is….”
“Yes.”
Yoon Jong understood what Jo Gul was trying to say.
He nodded heavily and said firmly,
“Don’t look away. That is Mount Hua’s sword. The sword of Mount Hua that we must learn and pass on.”
Yoon Jong realized one thing.
From this moment on, the disciples of Mount Hua would never be the same as before. Having seen such an impossible sight, they could never return to what they were.
Chung Myung’s back, sword in hand, filled his eyes.
That loudmouth who always ran his mouth was now guiding them without a word, all with the back of his shoulders alone.
Show us more.
Show them what Mount Hua’s sword truly was.
Show them how strong Mount Hua’s sword could be.
The world grew quieter and quieter.
In Yoon Jong’s gaze, Chung Myung’s figure swelled larger and larger, as though only Chung Myung stood alone in the entire world.