Why Should I Apologize When I’m the Host? (4)
Hyun Jong’s eyes, as he looked at Chung Myung, were utterly dazed.
The elders beside him, and the rest of the disciples, did not look much different.
“I—”
Hyun Jong, who seemed about to say something, silently covered his face with both hands.
“Chung Myung.”
“Yeah?”
Chung Myung answered with complete ease, still kneeling at the door with one hand raised.
“Just in case I’m mistaken, I have to ask...”
“Yes.”
“...You do know you’re a Taoist priest, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course!”
I’ve been living in a Taoist sect for years, okay?
“Right... yes, you know. You know... and yet...”
Hyun Jong stared up at the ceiling, looking as if he could not bear to go on.
The Chung Myung standing here was not the Chung Myung who had kicked Yang Gyeong in the face in front of all those people.
It was the Chung Myung who had escaped on the way to the Hall of Repentance, then kept trying to go back and beat Yang Gyeong some more until Baek Cheon and Un Geom finally restrained him and dragged him here.
If the two of them had only noticed a little later that Chung Myung was gone, Yang Gyeong would probably not have been able to leave Mount Hua by now and would instead be lying in the Medical Hall, looking like a porcupine from all the needles Dang Soso had stuck into him. Ah—no. He would have been receiving treatment.
“Please... please, just act like a proper Taoist priest, all right? Please...”
“No, Sect Leader! Listen to me. That bastard was disrespecting Mount Hua!”
“You’re the one disrespecting Mount Hua most of all! You! Most of all!”
“Me? Come on, no way.”
“Ughhh!”
“Hehe. There seems to have been a bit of a misunderstanding, but I was only trying to talk things through nicely. I mean, would I really go so far as to throw a punc—”
“Hold your arms up straight! Straight!”
“...Tch.”
Chung Myung pouted, then again raised both arms stiffly beside his ears.
Hyun Jong felt his heart blacken.
That top genius of the world’s younger generation...
The people flocking to Mount Hua these days weren’t here to see Hyun Jong, and they weren’t here to see Tang Gun-ak either.
Everyone who came to greet Hyun Jong stayed on the mountain instead of leaving right away, all of them searching for Chung Myung. They wanted to see with their own eyes what the famed Mount Hua Divine Dragon actually looked like.
And that sort of bastard was behaving like this...
“A person should grow wiser with age...”
“Ah. On that matter, actually, I’ve got a few things to say.”
“Huh?”
“Hehe. I don’t think that’s really going to happen. Wouldn’t it be better if everyone simply gave up and moved on? Then our hearts could find some peace, right?”
“...Chung Myung.”
“Yes?”
“Raise your arms higher.”
“...”
“Arms, arms! Higher!”
With a dejected expression, Chung Myung lifted his arms even higher. From one side came a voice clearly brimming with dissatisfaction.
“No, the kid might act like that! What did he do that was so awful you need to punish him too? Chung Myung, put them down! Your arms will hurt.”
It was true that a martial artist of Chung Myung’s level would not get arm pain from standing in punishment for a little while, but Hyun Young still seemed unhappy even so.
“The more you keep shielding him like that, the worse he gets!”
“How can you say that!”
When Hyun Young glared, Hyun Jong flinched slightly.
Was I too harsh?
Hyun Young said with fire in his eyes,
“When has Chung Myung ever gotten worse?! From the very first time I saw him until now, he’s been exactly the same all along! He hasn’t changed one bit!”
“...”
Ah... yes... that was true. Yes, he had been like this from the start.
“And from what I can see, he’s even improved a little. At least this time he only hit the guy once!”
“...What a proud achievement.”
What a fucking proud achievement.
Hyun Jong’s deepest sorrow was that, as Mount Hua’s Sect Leader, he could not bring himself to voice such profanity aloud.
“And the real problem is letting people get away with saying things like that! How can someone in Mount Hua dare put words like that into his mouth? As Chung Myung said, that wasn’t just insulting the outsider sects by calling them wild barbarians. He was mocking, belittling, and ridiculing Mount Hua—the sect that allied with them!”
“Exactly!”
As soon as Chung Myung eagerly agreed, Hyun Jong suddenly glared at him with fierce, blazing eyes.
“...Well, I mean... uh... yes.”
Chung Myung drooped his head again. Seeing that, the Mount Hua Five Swords let out quiet exclamations.
My word, he subdued Chung Myung with nothing but a look.
That’s our Sect Leader for you!
Wow... that actually works?
What was so impressive about a sect leader pressing down on one person with a glare? Nothing at all—unless that person happened to be Chung Myung, in which case it became an event that could split the heavens.
“You should be a little quiet.”
Just then, the silent Hyun Sang let out a sigh and stepped in to restrain Hyun Young. Hyun Young bristled at once.
“No, am I wrong or something?”
“Just be quiet! Hm? Quiet!”
Hyun Young stuck out his lips in annoyance.
Watching the elder and the third-generation disciple both pouting at once, Hyun Jong felt as though his heart had burned away to ash and scattered into the wind.
Unam, watching the two elders bickering, smiled faintly before speaking.
“Sect Leader.”
“Mm?”
“I do not often side with Elder Hyun Young, but on this occasion, his words are not entirely wrong. In my view as well, Chung Myung did not truly do anything wrong.”
“...Even though he ran out of Mount Hua again just so he could beat him some more?”
“That was less wrongdoing than... a matter of character. Cough.”
No, well, let’s set that aside for now.
“He was right to act decisively.”
Unam spoke again in a solemn voice.
“This was not merely a reaction born of dislike for the outer palaces. Even if they had felt poorly toward the outsiders, they could not have spoken that way here if they truly respected Mount Hua.”
“That’s right!”
The moment Chung Myung chimed in enthusiastically, Hyun Jong suddenly shot him a scorching glare.
“...Right, yes, fine. Uh. Yes.”
Chung Myung immediately hunched again, looking dejected. Watching it all, the Mount Hua Five Swords let out soft gasps.
Good heavens, he’s completely pinned Chung Myung with just his eyes.
He really is the Sect Leader!
“At any rate, this incident created an opportunity to clearly convey Mount Hua’s position to the North Sea Ice Palace and the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace, who had traveled all this way to Mount Hua. If Chung Myung had only moved a little more slowly, they might have concluded that Mount Hua was no different from the sects of the Central Plains that had once excluded them.”
“Mm, I think so too.”
There still remained a great wall between the Central Plains and the outer lands. Mount Hua had broken through that wall and forged a relationship, but relationships could always change with time and circumstance.
Relationships had to be tended continuously.
If they became complacent simply because they had already made a good impression, no one could know how the feelings of the North Sea Ice Palace and the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace might change.
“It was a little forceful, perhaps, but to the disciples of the Ice Palace and Beast Palace, Chung Myung’s actions must have been a clear signal. A signal that Mount Hua, unlike the other Central Plains factions, could truly stand on their side.”
“...There’s no clearer signal than that.”
“Maybe too clear, if you ask me?”
“...Signals should have some moderation.”
Still, it was undeniable that Chung Myung’s actions had at least resulted in strengthening the Heavenly Alliance’s unity.
“Sect Leader.”
“Continue.”
At Hyun Jong’s words, Unam nodded.
“The senior members of the North Sea Ice Palace and the Palace Lord of the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace seem to trust Mount Hua completely, but the will of those at the top does not necessarily align with the will of the entire sect, does it?”
“True.”
Hyun Jong nodded.
From the standpoint of Mount Hua’s Sect Leader, it might have been an unpleasant thing to hear, but there was not the slightest sign of discomfort on Hyun Jong’s face.
“Perhaps the disciples of the Ice Palace and the Beast Palace still carry unease about Mount Hua. Given the years they have spent living in mutual exclusion, distrust will not be so easily dispelled.”
“So what you’re saying is that it needed to be shown, not merely spoken?”
“Yes. I believe it was appropriate.”
Hyun Jong’s unusual gaze shifted to Chung Myung.
Of course, Hyun Jong himself had defended Chung Myung at the time for much the same reason. But...
Did he really act after thinking it through?
He already knew that Chung Myung was not some foolish brute whose body moved before his head did. The Chung Myung he knew was someone whose body did move before his head, but was also clever... no... that didn’t mean much.
“And there is one more thing. Most importantly, it served as a warning to the other sects.”
“Mm?”
Unam spoke firmly.
“People know the Heavenly Alliance is newly formed, but they do not truly know what kind of place it is.”
“Indeed.”
“If Mount Hua and the two outer palaces had yielded in this matter, there would certainly have been those who looked down on the Heavenly Alliance.”
“...”
“We already know, don’t we? Goodwill does not necessarily return as goodwill. To reclaim what was given in the form of goodwill, one needs corresponding strength and resolve.”
“...You are right.”
They had experienced that bitter lesson too many times. How meaningless the goodwill of the powerless could be.
The Mount Hua disciples, reminded of their own past, hardened their expressions.
“We must show them plainly. That the Heavenly Alliance is not some easy target, and that it does not tolerate rudeness.”
“That’s right! If you stay quiet, you just become a mat!”
The people who had been listening so earnestly all frowned in unison and turned to stare at Chung Myung.
Under that perfectly synchronized glare, Chung Myung gave an awkward look and said,
“...Did all of you secretly rehearse that behind my back today?”
“...In all of that, you really don’t think there’s even a tiny chance you might be in the wrong, do you?”
Hyun Jong let out a sigh.
There was not a single thing wrong in Hyun Young’s words. This brat really had not changed at all. Not even a little.
Then Chung Myung said,
“That’s just how the world works.”
“Hmm?”
“Once people start looking down on you, problems keep piling up. Human beings, when they see someone easy to push around, always test the waters. They go, ‘They’ll probably just put up with this, right?’”
“...”
“So you’ve got to grab them properly at the start. Then the half-assed ones won’t dare mouth off. So first thing, on the first meeting—grab them by the collar!”
“...That’s enough.”
“Yep.”
Hyun Jong sighed once more, then thought to himself.
He wasn’t wrong.
The problem was that he said the right thing in a way that made people want to scream, and did the right thing in a way that made the back of everyone’s necks ache.
Hyun Jong clicked his tongue bitterly and looked around at the other disciples. Then he closed his eyes for a moment and opened them again. As if he had gathered his thoughts, his gaze became clear.
“Whether it is a person or a sect, it is natural for conduct to change according to position. But Mount Hua’s position has changed too much in too short a time, and too often, so you must be confused as well.”
“...”
“But that is when you must steady your hearts most of all. When you do not know what to do, remember only this.”
Everyone’s attention fixed on Hyun Jong.
“You do not need to force yourself to do something merely for the sake of what is changing.”
It was a somewhat unexpected thing to say.
Seeing the disciples’ unwavering gazes as they waited for the next words, Hyun Jong smiled gently.
“You are already doing well enough. The proper course of action you should take is already woven into the teachings you have received. Where your hearts naturally go is where Mount Hua must also go, so trust yourselves and do not waver.”
“Yes, Sect Leader!”
“We will keep that in mind.”
Hyun Jong nodded.
There would be countless more incidents like this in the future. As Mount Hua’s influence grew and the work before them multiplied, they would be forced to make more and more choices.
They could not always make the best choice every time. But if they knew clearly where they were supposed to go and kept walking, then however crooked and winding the road might be, would they not eventually reach where they were meant to arrive?
“Change inevitably brings uncertainty with it.”
Hyun Jong’s voice settled the disciples’ hearts into calm.
“Let us move forward with resolve. Trust what we have done until now.”
“Yes, Sect Leader!”
At that forceful reply, Hyun Jong smiled quietly.
“At last, tomorrow will be the inauguration ceremony. Let us make sure all preparations are perfect.”
“Yes!”
At long last, the day when the Heavenly Alliance would be officially founded drew near.
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