The End Is Another Beginning (5)
"I’ll never lose to those Southern Edge bastards, no matter what!"
“…….”
"Don’t worry, Sasuk! I’ll crack that little snake’s skull and come right back!"
“Uh… right. Yeah.”
Baek Cheon could only stare at Dang Soso, blazing with fighting spirit, and feel a single, profound question take shape in his mind.
Of course, hating Southern Edge was practically a required skill for any Mount Hua disciple.
That wasn’t Mount Hua’s fault.
Ever since the moment one entered Mount Hua, it had become almost a tradition to get beaten up by Southern Edge’s disciples once every two years. It was impossible not to come away with some resentment.
But the problem was…
Soso. You haven’t even been at Mount Hua for a year yet.
Why on earth did you already have such a grudge against Southern Edge?
Wasn’t your transformation into a Mount Hua disciple happening a little too fast?
Baek Cheon looked at Dang Soso with a complicated, conflicted expression.
He still remembered the image of her from Tang Family, like a single flower in bloom. So seeing her now as she ran toward the ring only made her feel more unfamiliar, and somehow more striking, the longer he looked.
"She’ll do fine… right?"
When Baek Cheon turned and asked Yu I-seol, she slowly shook her head.
"Mount Hua sword. Soso hasn’t absorbed it yet."
"That’s true, but—"
"Winning doesn’t matter. What matters is will."
Baek Cheon nodded.
And experience, too.
What Mount Hua wanted from Dang Soso—and from the Cheong generation as a whole—was not victory and the glory of Mount Hua’s name.
It was for them to see more, learn more, and gain the momentum needed to one day become the center of Mount Hua themselves and rise to even greater heights.
Though compared to what we expected, they’re doing several times better.
Even so, aside from Yoon Jong and Jo Gul, the Cheong generation was still lacking compared to the other Baek generation disciples.
Hm?
Chung Myung?
No, that one had to be left out.
Baek Cheon watched Dang Soso with a faintly worried look.
"Southern Edge!"
"……."
Yi Song-baek coughed awkwardly as he met Dang Soso’s hostile, glaring eyes.
Did I do something wrong?
To get death glares like that from their very first meeting…
"……I’m Yi Song-baek of Southern Edge. I look forward to learning from you."
"I’m Dang Soso of Mount Hua!"
It was a spirited introduction. Yi Song-baek smiled bitterly and drew his sword.
Shrring.
"My eyes can see, but my sword has no eyes, so do be careful not to get hurt."
"What nonsense. You should be worrying about your own skull."
“…….”
Ah.
Definitely a Mount Hua person.
Chung Myung’s shadow seemed to flicker behind Dang Soso’s back. Yi Song-baek gave another small cough and straightened his posture.
Dang Soso narrowed her eyes and glared at him.
I will never lose to a Southern Edge bastard.
For some reason, just seeing Southern Edge’s white martial robes made her stomach boil.
That had never happened when she was still at the Tang Family, so if this was happening after she joined Mount Hua, then there must be something wrong with the stream running between the two sects.
Anyway!
Clang!
Dang Soso’s plum blossom sword was drawn.
She still hadn’t fully mastered Mount Hua swordsmanship. In the six months since joining, her martial level had risen, but catching up to the senior brothers and sisters who had trained with swords for more than a decade was impossible from the start.
But being lacking did not mean one should naturally retreat.
To push forward along one’s own path, however insufficient one might be—that was what Dang Soso believed Mount Hua’s teaching to be, and that was her will.
Dang Soso, who had been glaring at Yi Song-baek with cold eyes, rushed forward without the slightest hesitation.
"Here I come!"
She kicked off the hard flagstones and flew toward him like a ferocious beast.
Whoosh!
A vicious strike, almost impossible to believe it came from such a slender arm!
What she lacked was not power, but technique.
As the daughter of the Tang Family’s head, she had trained her internal energy steadily and thoroughly, until it was no exaggeration to say that she would not lose to any genius disciple from a famous orthodox sect.
And with Jaso-dan added to the mix, her internal energy could honestly be called the best in Mount Hua.
The sword carrying that power shot straight toward Yi Song-baek’s head.
Yi Song-baek took two light steps backward.
BOOM!
Dang Soso’s sword smashed into the floor where he had just stood, producing a thunderous explosion.
“…….”
Yi Song-baek’s eyes widened at the deep gouge torn into the ring. He was taken aback by the force he had not expected at all.
"You dodged?"
“……Were you expecting me to stand there and take that?”
Yi Song-baek let out a dry laugh.
Mount Hua’s disciples certainly had a unique side to them.
If I’d seen that in the past, I would have looked down on it.
But now he understood.
It was better to pursue real substance, no matter what appearance one wore on the outside, than to obsess over manners and pride while remaining hollow within. That was the true bearing of a martial artist.
Yi Song-baek briefly shifted his gaze and looked far off toward Chung Myung.
Watch closely, Taoist Chung Myung.
Whether my last two years were wrong or not.
Whether I truly walked the path you spoke of!
This was a duel. But it was not merely a duel.
For Yi Song-baek, this was a place to prove his efforts to Chung Myung.
"Hoo."
Yi Song-baek raised his sword and pointed it toward the center.
Middle stance.
The basic posture underlying every sword technique.
His breathing lowered. The air around him began to sink, heavier and heavier.
Lower. Lower still.
A concise sword and a stable center of gravity allowed one to respond to any situation.
It was something everyone knew, yet few could truly uphold. People of the world called that orthodoxy.
Clang!
Yi Song-baek’s sword slowly received the terrifyingly forceful strike Dang Soso hurled at him.
Never too strong. Never too weak.
A sword that held the middle path.
Dang Soso’s face hardened the moment their blades met.
What is this?
At a glance, it was nothing special. It wasn’t flashy, and there was no particular trick to be seen.
And yet this sword was somehow different from any she had seen before.
Dang Soso kicked off the ground and widened the distance between herself and Yi Song-baek.
His solemn eyes followed her.
“……That guy.”
A low murmur slipped from Baek Cheon’s lips.
Was it Yi Song-baek?
When he had seen him at the Hwajong Jihoe, he had not seemed particularly special. No, even now, outwardly, there was nothing striking about him.
He did not have the sharp edge Jin Geum-ryong carried, nor the fierce, overwhelming energy of the other Southern Edge disciples.
On the surface, he was as plain as water mixed into water, or wine mixed into wine. Just another sword user you could find anywhere.
And yet, he was different.
"What’s different?"
"The basics."
Baek Cheon started and turned his head.
Chung Myung, who had somehow already returned to his seat, pulled dried meat from his bundle and answered with a detached air.
"The basics."
"……What do you mean?"
"Exactly what I said. Just the basics."
With a faint smile, Chung Myung looked at Yi Song-baek.
"What do you think swordsmanship is?"
"……The way to use a sword."
"Right. The way to use a sword. The way to use a sword built from forms. But those forms never really stray beyond three things."
Chung Myung held up three fingers.
"Thrust. Slash. Block."
He snorted.
"In the end, every form is just a combination of those three. That’s what a sword is to begin with. There’s nothing all that complicated about it."
Baek Cheon frowned.
"Aren’t you simplifying it too much?"
"Those simple things pile up and become complicated. In other words…"
Chung Myung paused just long enough to draw out the moment, then went on.
"If you can execute thrusting, slashing, and blocking perfectly, then the sword itself becomes perfect too."
"But that’s…"
"Yeah. Almost impossible. Perfection is a concept that can’t really exist. Obsessing over a perfect sword is the work of a madman. But."
Chung Myung said this with a meaningful look.
"There was once a sword sect that tried to do what even Shaolin and those snooty Mount Wudang bastards wouldn’t dare to attempt. Around me, the world is divided into thirty-six directions. A madman who believed that if he could perfectly thrust, slash, and block in those thirty-six directions, then he’d become an invincible swordsman no one in the world could fear."
"Thirty-six directions…"
"That’s right. That was…"
Without taking his eyes off Yi Song-baek, Chung Myung said softly,
"Southern Edge’s Southern Edge’s Thirty-Six Sword Technique."
He sank.
His mind was not agitated in the slightest.
He could even feel the brush of the air against his fingertips with vivid clarity.
Yi Song-baek realized he was more focused than he had been in months.
The middle path.
To maintain the line without becoming excessive and without falling short was several times harder than simply leaning to one side.
Southern Edge’s sword was a sword that held that middle path.
It was not strong, not flashy, not fast.
And yet Southern Edge’s sword was more complete than any other.
If I had known this from the start…
I wouldn’t have wasted so much time.
But that was fine. The path he had to walk was only just beginning.
He would not be seduced by flashiness or power. What he had to uphold was the middle path, and the soul of Southern Edge.
Dang Soso watched him with a slightly stiff expression.
What is that guy?
There was a heaviness in him she had not seen in Baek Cheon, and not even in Chung Myung.
Of course, Chung Myung was a man who didn’t possess anything like “heaviness” in the first place, but the pressure radiating from that sword was still greater than Baek Cheon’s, and that unsettled her.
What are you doing, Dang Soso!
She clenched her teeth.
She had already known the other side might be stronger than she was.
So why had she stepped onto this stage?
Dang Soso raised her sword and pointed it at Yi Song-baek.
Words were unnecessary.
I will paint my own plum blossoms.
No matter who stood before her, if she could draw her plum blossoms to perfection, then there was nothing to fear.
The two swordsmen faced each other with cool, unblinking eyes.
As if infected by the taut tension, the crowd held its breath and watched their standoff.
It was Dang Soso who moved first again.
"Taahat!"
With a short shout, she charged at Yi Song-baek at blinding speed.
WHOOSH!
Her sword split the air. Then it rained down on him in endless succession.
Bloom!
The plum blossoms she had to bring forth were different in texture from those produced by Mount Hua’s other disciples.
If Mount Hua’s plum blossoms were spring flowers in full, brilliant bloom, then hers were, quite literally, flower rain.
A disciple of Mount Hua, but also a daughter of the Tang Family.
The talent that had failed to bloom within the Tang Family now became Mount Hua’s sword, scattering rain made of flowers across the world: Myriad Heaven Flower Rain.
Plum Blossom Scattering All Over.
Though it was Mount Hua’s sword, the plum blossoms that were uniquely Dang Soso’s swept outward like a storm of petals and covered Yi Song-baek’s entire body.
And the eyes of Yi Song-baek, watching that sight, sank lower.
It felt as if flowers were falling from the sky.
Beautiful.
Beautiful beyond compare, and yet a sword that was endlessly sharp.
Blocking everything seemed impossible.
But Yi Song-baek did not rush. He swung his sword.
Clang! Clang! CLANG!
His feet planted firmly on the ground, his shoulders loosened just enough to send power through perfectly. His elbows whipped the blade like a lash, and his wrists flexed to absorb the shock.
He slashed. He thrust. And he blocked.
No matter how much Mount Hua’s plum blossoms might cover the world, the world around me is still only thirty-six directions.
If I can perfectly unleash my sword in those thirty-six directions, then even a rain of plum blossoms filling the mountains will never reach my body.
Southern Edge’s sword is the sword of orthodoxy. And the foundation of the martial sword lies in blocking the opponent’s attacks. The sword most faithful to that foundation in this world is Southern Edge’s Southern Edge’s Thirty-Six Sword Technique.
The dreamlike downpour of blossoms lost its force before the wall of sword light surrounding Yi Song-baek. Drifting and scattering, they at last struck the barrier of his sword wall and fell away.
"Ghk!"
Dang Soso gritted her teeth. But she could not give up here. She tried to extend her sword again.
And then, at that instant—
Fwaaaang!
With a sound like air splitting apart, Yi Song-baek’s sword broke through the sword wall and surged forward, plunging straight toward Dang Soso’s head.
"Ah…."
Swish.
Yi Song-baek’s sword stopped precisely at her shoulder.
Dang Soso bit her lower lip hard.
"…I lost."
"It was a fine match."
Yi Song-baek withdrew his sword and gave a respectful martial salute.
"A sword both sharp and keen. If its depth had been a little greater, I would have been the one to lose."
"……I’ll acknowledge the winner’s grace, but it’d be better if you didn’t get too smug. I’ll be the one winning next time."
"Of course. I look forward to it."
Seeing the openly smiling face of Yi Song-baek, Dang Soso let out a low sigh.
Still a long way to go.
She had fought and lost as a swordswoman, so there was no regret. This defeat would only make her stronger.
"If you get too cocky, you’ll end up getting burned badly. My senior brothers are a lot stronger than I am."
"I know."
Yi Song-baek paused briefly, then turned his head to look in one direction.
"I know that better than anyone. Better than anyone."
The place his gaze, mixed with admiration and fighting spirit, had landed was Chung Myung.
"He’s my goal, after all."
There was nothing but sincerity in Yi Song-baek’s eyes.
And when Chung Myung received that look, he muttered softly,
"The end is another beginning."
Right there.
In the ashes, a new seed of Southern Edge was growing.
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