Who the Hell Is Calling This a Duel? You’re Dead Now. (4)
“You little bastard! What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”
Seeing Baek Cheon sprint toward him at a crazed speed, Chung Myung looked up at the sky with a dazed expression.
Hah.
Oh, what a miserable fate I’ve got.
Without the slightest hesitation, Baek Cheon lunged at Chung Myung and swung his sword.
No, this bastard had drawn a real sword too?
Were all the second-generation bastards cursed over real swords or something? Why did they whip them out every chance they got and make such a scene?
Even as the thought flashed through his mind, Baek Cheon’s sword came whipping toward him with murderous force. The blade, packed with qi, flashed a bright blue as it aimed for Chung Myung’s shoulder.
Even with his eyes practically rolled back, the fact that he was aiming somewhere other than a vital point was a pass.
Still.
“If you wrap it in sword energy, you’ll still die anyway, you lunatic!”
Chung Myung kicked the incoming blade.
Kaang!
His foot and the sword wrapped in sword energy collided, and absurdly enough, the clang of metal rang out. Unable to absorb the force carried in the strike, Baek Cheon was sent tumbling backward.
“Huh?”
Baek Cheon scrambled upright, staring between Chung Myung and his sword in utter disbelief. It had happened so fast that he still couldn’t understand how he’d been knocked back in the first place.
“Tsk.”
Chung Myung clicked his tongue and quickly checked on Yu I-seol’s condition. With such a thunderous blast exploding beside someone lost in a trance, surely she must have—
“She’s fine?”
Normally, that sort of explosion would have been enough to drag anyone out of it, but Yu I-seol was still deep in that trance.
She was dull.
So dull.
But this time, that dullness had worked in her favor. It wasn’t common for someone to swing a sword and fall into a state of selfless absorption like this.
In Buddhism, it was even specifically called tuqiao, shedding the shell, for the moment when one forgot the self, cast off the outer husk, and entered a new realm. For a martial artist, it was an immensely important instant.
If this collision had jolted her out of that state, she would have regretted it for the rest of her life.
“You bastard! What do you think you’re doing! Don’t you know how important mua is to a martial artist?!”
You know that and you still came at me swinging a sword?
Chung Myung blinked at Baek Cheon in open disbelief.
So that was why he was pissed.
“How dare you disturb someone who’s reached a state of enlightenment! There are things a person can do and things a person can’t, no matter how much common sense they lack! You shameless wretch!”
Baek Cheon’s eyes were full of killing intent as he glared at Chung Myung.
“It’s true I’ve never looked at you kindly, but I never thought you were such a damned bastard that you’d interfere with a sword enlightenment! I should have straightened out your rotten character long ago!”
Chung Myung let out a long sigh.
No, asshole. I wasn’t disturbing her—I was helping her.
Still, how would you know that? It’s all my fault, I guess. My fault for being so amazing.
He understood, but that didn’t mean his reply would come out nice.
“You know all that, and you still drew your sword and attacked me?”
“What did you say?”
“And what if that precious disciple had gotten hurt because of you?”
“If you hadn’t counterattacked—”
“You wanted me to die?”
“……”
Chung Myung’s flat answer left Baek Cheon flustered and tongue-tied.
Are all the second-generation disciples just a bunch of lunatics?
The world was usually made up of mostly normal people, with only a few crazies scattered among them. But these second-generation bastards seemed to have reversed that ratio completely.
At least among the second-generation disciples Chung Myung had talked to so far, there wasn’t a single normal one.
If Yoon Jong had heard that, he would have been horrified and said it was rich coming from the pot calling the kettle black, but what did it matter? He wasn’t here.
“You think I’d ever kill you?”
“You were trying to kill me just now.”
“……That was because it was an emergency.”
“You also had sword energy in it.”
“……Th-that was—”
As he listened to Chung Myung, Baek Cheon’s face, which had been twitching this way and that, suddenly went blank.
Wait a minute.
Chung Myung was right. He had put killing intent into it, and he had used sword energy too. Then how was this bastard standing there so completely uninjured?
Had he actually blocked the blow from Baek Cheon, who had put all his strength into it, without so much as a scratch?
“Stay away from my sago!”
Baek Cheon’s face hardened. Then he said in a firm voice,
“I won’t ask what you were doing anymore. But right now, put your sword down and step back. If you don’t, then today you’ll face me not as your martial uncle, but as a martial artist.”
Nice.
Chung Myung brightened.
“Oh, really?”
“……”
Wow, that was exactly what he’d wanted.
“This bastard, even now—”
Baek Cheon ground his teeth.
A person needed perspective. If he put himself in Baek Cheon’s shoes, it was easy to understand why he was angry. From his point of view, something that should never have happened was happening right in front of him.
So, ordinarily, stepping back here would have been the right thing to do.
The problem was one thing.
Chung Myung smacked his lips and casually turned his head.
If I tweak this just a little more, I think something huge is going to come out of it.
Yu I-seol was now in a once-in-a-lifetime moment of realization. It was abrupt, yes, but enlightenment often came out of nowhere in the first place.
Some people spent their entire lives facing a wall in meditation and never gained even a single flash of insight, while others stumbled into enlightenment while eating a meal. It wasn’t something you could do through effort, nor something you could force by wanting it badly enough.
It was simply up to heaven.
And the greatest miracle Yu I-seol had received wasn’t that she had entered a state of selflessness. It was that Chung Myung had happened to be beside her when she did.
In general, a person who fell into that state forgot themselves and became wholly absorbed in the sword. In that state, they might move beyond the sword they already knew and unleash something new, or glimpse a higher realm.
That was why no one was supposed to interfere with someone in that state. If the sword that emerged from that transcendent place went awry and they failed to respond properly, disaster could follow.
But who was Chung Myung?
He was a grand master who understood every sword of Mount Hua and had once stepped into a realm no one else could reach. Though he couldn’t fully manifest it in this body yet, in all of Mount Hua’s history, it would be hard to find anyone whose understanding of Mount Hua’s swordsmanship surpassed Chung Myung’s.
That meant he was exactly the one who could intervene in Yu I-seol’s trance and lead her sword toward a higher realm—
So why the hell did that bastard have to show up?!
It was awkward to guide her properly while someone else was watching. One wrong move, and the matter could balloon beyond all control.
Chung Myung looked at Yu I-seol and clicked his tongue.
What can I do? It’s your luck, I guess.
Mount Hua still desperately needed one more master to help lead them forward, but Chung Myung had no lingering attachment to a ship that had already sailed. Still…
Beating the hell out of the bastard who made me miss that ship is a different matter.
Chung Myung moved a couple of steps away from Yu I-seol and glared at Baek Cheon.
“Is this far enough?”
“More.”
“Tch.”
Chung Myung moved two more steps away from Yu I-seol.
“Satisfied now?”
“……Are you trying to play games with me? Back off properly. I have no intention whatsoever of letting you harm my sago.”
“Who’s harming anyone? It’s you who’s causing harm over here.”
“Over here?”
At Chung Myung’s insolent reply, Baek Cheon’s face twisted with anger, and Chung Myung just looked up at the sky, speechless.
Do these guys have some kind of grudge against polite speech or what?
Yu I-seol was like that, and now Baek Cheon got irritated the moment the words got even a little short. What a fine batch of talent they were—born to be scooped up the instant the Crown Prince returned and made his disciples, honestly.
“Yes, martial uncle. Right now, I think the problem is you.”
Baek Cheon shot him a cold stare.
“I’ve tried my best to understand your insolence.”
Oh, really?
After making a huge fuss and dragging the matter out on every possible pretext, now he wanted to act like a gentleman—ah, was that the sort of thing he meant? In any case, why had something like that gotten into a Daoist temple?
“But even my patience has limits. And there are always people in this world who simply cannot be reasoned with.”
“Wow……”
As Chung Myung let out an admiring sound, Baek Cheon frowned.
“What are you trying to say?”
“No, no. I just think it’s amazing.”
“Amazing?”
“You wouldn’t get it even if I told you.”
How could the exact same lines his martial brothers had said a hundred years ago still come out after a century?
—There’s no point talking to that guy.
—I’d rather recite the Dao De Jing to a cow or a chicken than try to lecture my martial brother on the Dao.
—If he could fight, maybe he’d have a point, but he can’t even do that.
Human beings really were all much the same.
Unless Chung Myung was the one who hadn’t changed at all in a hundred years.
Still grinning with amusement, Chung Myung heard Baek Cheon say sharply,
“Draw your sword. Today I’ll teach you what discipline is.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“You brat!”
“No, no. I mean… geez, you’ve got such a short fuse.”
As Chung Myung lightly mocked him, Baek Cheon narrowed his eyes.
“What exactly are you trying to say?”
“Nothing. I’m just worried, that’s all. You’re still a martial uncle, after all. Wouldn’t it damage your dignity if it got out that you got into a brawl with your martial nephew?”
Baek Cheon snorted.
“And you think I’d care about dignity in a situation like this? If you think your martial uncles or the elders will shield you, you’re mistaken. Maybe later, but not right now. At this moment, even they can’t protect you. You can take your punishment afterward.”
“That’s a pretty manly thing to say. It’s been a while since I heard that.”
Chung Myung nodded with an “Hmm.”
“But I’ve got a better way. Want to hear it?”
“……What are you scheming?”
“Nothing. I’m saying we make a vow right here. That neither of us will tell a soul about the fight that happened here.”
“What?”
Chung Myung grinned.
“I’m saying even if I get beaten up, I won’t go tattling to the seniors. You can’t exactly run crying to the elders just because you lost a fight, can you? Isn’t that right?”
Baek Cheon looked at him with a strange expression.
What is this bastard thinking?
After checking his expression, Chung Myung went serious and said,
“Looks like you’re trying to wriggle out of this situation, but do you really think I’d let you off now? You—”
“No, that’s not it.”
Unable to bear it anymore, Chung Myung let out a frustrated sigh.
“Forget martial uncle, martial nephew, sects, all that crap. Let’s just keep it clean between us. No lingering grudges. Isn’t that better for both of us?”
“……”
“If we make the promise, no matter what kind of shape I end up in, I won’t go tell the people above. If I do speak, then I’ll do whatever you tell me to do. And of course, the same goes for you. What do you think?”
A subtle smile touched Baek Cheon’s lips.
“You do have some manly spirit after all. Fine. If that’s what you want, I’ll swear it. I won’t tell anyone what happened here.”
From Baek Cheon’s perspective, there was no reason not to accept that offer.
The most annoying part of beating Chung Myung senseless was precisely the Un generation and the elders. If Chung Myung, who was protected by them, ran off and tattled that Baek Cheon had hit him, the aftermath would obviously be a pain in the ass.
And now Chung Myung was volunteering to erase that annoying part himself. Baek Cheon had no reason to refuse.
Still… he couldn’t shake the feeling that something about it sat wrong.
“Then it’s sworn.”
“It is. You’ll do the same.”
“Yes. I swear too.”
“Then that settles the matter.”
Baek Cheon raised his sword slightly and pointed it at Chung Myung.
“And I’ll acknowledge that you have some manly spirit. In this friendly match, I’m not your martial uncle, and you’re not my martial nephew. With this, I’ll settle all the ill feelings I’ve had toward you. You too—”
“Friendly match?”
At that instant, Chung Myung’s crooked voice cut Baek Cheon off.
Baek Cheon stared at him in confusion.
Huh?
And then he saw it.
Chung Myung was smiling with a face completely different from before—one that was downright wicked.
“Who said this was a friendly match? You’re dead now, you bastard.”
Chung Myung snorted and started walking toward Baek Cheon.