So, I Just Came Out? (3)
Baek Cheon’s face tightened.
Across from him stood Chung Myung.
Whenever that bastard had faced Baek Cheon before, he’d always worn that loose, half-lidded expression, practically radiating annoyance as if this were all a waste of his time.
But not now.
The body Chung Myung held his sword in, the sword gripped in a midpoint stance, gave off a heavy, crushing pressure. And the eyes fixed on Baek Cheon were cold, deeply settled.
Is he serious?
Baek Cheon steadied his ragged breathing.
He didn’t think he could win, but he didn’t want to be beaten so helplessly either.
He dug his toes into the ground as if he meant to seize it, and loosened the strength in his wrists.
Use everything I have, completely!
And at that very moment, Chung Myung moved.
Fwaaaat!
Before Baek Cheon could even flinch, he leaped into the air. There was no other way to avoid the sword energy sweeping across the ground.
And then, in the next instant—
Fwaaaaat!
Chung Myung kicked off the clashing plum blossom sword energy and shot straight toward Baek Cheon. The sword raised high toward the sky flashed blindingly in the sunlight.
Shwaaaaaak!
The blade came crashing down in a single stroke.
At the sight of that murderous force splitting toward his head, Baek Cheon panicked and raised his sword just in time to block above him.
But then, at that exact moment—
Just before sword met sword, Chung Myung bent his wrist and drew the blade inward.
What?
In that instant, Baek Cheon’s eyes branded the sight of Chung Myung’s sword slicing through the air and the hilt of the dark plum sword aimed directly at him, searing into his mind like a brand.
Fwaaaat!
The hilt shot toward his eyes with ferocious speed, and before long it seemed as though the world itself would be swallowed in black.
Baek Cheon froze.
“……”
Thud.
His face, after landing back on the ground, was slick with cold sweat.
Chung Myung’s sword hilt had stopped right in front of his eyes. If he hadn’t halted at the last moment and brought it down, his eyes would have burst open without question.
Shruuuuk.
Still dazed, Baek Cheon watched Chung Myung sheath his sword, then wiped the sweat from his face with his sleeve. After that, he gave a formal salute.
“……I’ve learned well.”
“I’ve learned well.”
With a casual nod, Chung Myung turned and swept his gaze over the other disciples who had been watching the spar. Every single Mount Hua disciple was gathered around, not one missing, all of them watching in silence.
“You saw that?”
“……”
“So? What did you get out of it?”
The Mount Hua disciples looked at Chung Myung with uncertain faces. They had watched the whole thing from beginning to end, but what exactly they were supposed to have seen in that exchange was not so easy to answer.
“Uh… that we’re still nowhere close?” Jo Gul forced out.
Chung Myung snorted.
“Well, that’s not wrong.”
He shrugged and went on.
“What I wanted to show you was a matter of method.”
“Method?”
“Yeah. Method.”
Chung Myung nodded slowly and looked back at Baek Cheon.
“I hate saying this myself, but your skill, Sasuk, is excellent. At this point, you’d be treated as a first-class swordsman anywhere in the Jianghu.”
Baek Cheon had defeated one of Wudang’s second-generation disciples and had even stepped in to help during the fight with Jang Il-so. At this point, the words “young rising star” no longer suited him.
Objectively speaking, Chung Myung’s assessment was actually rather harsh.
“But does that make you strong?”
Chung Myung asked the question, then shook his head.
“No. Not really.”
It was a hard statement to understand. Skilled, but not strong?
“This is the fundamental problem with the sword of the righteous sects, especially the Daoist sword. The sword of the Dao exists to awaken the Dao. The sword itself can’t be the end goal.”
Chung Myung drew his sword again.
“That’s why it’s honest.”
The blade that had been lifted high slowly cut downward.
“Of course, the Daoist sword does contain plenty of methods for defeating an opponent. But it isn’t like those Sapa bastards or demonic bastards, existing only for that purpose. At its core, the Daoist sword is a means of self-cultivation.”
“Ah…” Jo Gul nodded.
Come to think of it, when the two plum blossoms had bloomed against each other earlier, Baek Cheon had focused on the sword itself, while Chung Myung had used the blossoms to draw the eye before slashing downward to target the legs.
The same had happened in the final instant when the blades clashed.
Baek Cheon had tried to settle it honorably, blade against blade, while Chung Myung hadn’t bothered to meet that force head-on and instead had aimed the hilt at Baek Cheon’s eyes.
It was a method Mount Hua did not teach.
“Real combat is cruel.”
Chung Myung’s voice dropped.
“Of course, Mount Hua’s sword is excellent in its own right. But there are things the sword of Mount Hua can’t handle. No sword school in the world teaches you how to deal with someone who’s fallen and is clawing at your leg, or with someone who’s stabbing at you from behind, ready to throw away their own life just to kill you.”
“……”
“That’s the limit of a sword that exists for self-cultivation rather than for battle.”
Baek Cheon slowly nodded.
He had felt that clearly enough while facing Jang Il-so. He’d even felt helpless before the malice of a man who charged in with every means at his disposal, willing to inflict even a single wound if it meant dying with the enemy.
“You can’t deal with Maninbang or Saperyeon like that.”
And in the future, when they had to fight the Demonic Sect, it would be the same.
In the past, Mount Hua had used the sword it had trained in, honestly and directly. That had even held true in the early days of war with the Demonic Sect.
But as the war dragged on and battle piled upon battle, their swordsmanship had begun to change little by little. To survive. To bring the enemy down. It had become more practical, and more brutal.
If many of the people who had lived through that war had survived, Mount Hua’s sword might have undergone a dramatic transformation. But whether by fate or misfortune, the sword of that era was never passed down to the next generation.
“So…?”
Yoon Jong spoke with a tense expression.
“You’re saying we have to learn that now?”
At those words, Chung Myung’s face tightened slightly.
They’re afraid.
That had been the meaning behind Yu I-seol’s words.
To speak plainly, this was not so much Mount Hua’s sword as Chung Myung’s sword. The sword Chung Myung had forged through countless real battles. And it was a wicked sword technique, one for which there was no guarantee that passing it down to the next generation would not blur Mount Hua’s very essence.
That was why he had hesitated for so long.
He had already taken the shortcomings he felt in the Plum Blossom Sword Art and corrected them as best he could, then passed those corrections on, but that had still remained close to theory. He had not taught them a sword steeped in murderous intent solely for killing an opponent.
In the first place, because Mount Hua’s sword was what it was, the sect leaders of the past had ensured that their disciples would not lose the proper path. They knew that even a trace of killing intent on the tip of the sword could shake the sect’s very spirit.
But now, what Chung Myung was trying to do was the opposite.
The very Chung Myung who had worked so hard to restore Mount Hua’s spirit was now doing something that might, in the end, cloud that spirit once again.
Chung Myung bit his lip slightly and said nothing. Only after a long while did he nod slowly.
“Yeah. You have to learn it.”
But there was no other way.
If all of them could reach the ultimate within three years, then there would be no need to teach them such swordsmanship at all. If the situation weren’t so desperately urgent, he could have led everyone gradually onto the right path over decades.
But things were already too different.
The flames of war came faster than expected, and there was no way to avoid that war completely.
Then there was only one thing Chung Myung had to do.
Don’t repeat the same mistake.
What’s wrong can always be corrected. A waning spirit can be revived.
As long as there are people.
As long as there are people who will carry on that will, Mount Hua can one day return to where it should have been all along. The Dao is, after all, something like water.
What Chung Myung had to pass down to Mount Hua was not some lofty Dao even he did not fully understand.
It was to make sure those who held that will would not disappear. To make sure his martial brothers and sisters survived, even if it was only by one more person.
“Practical swordsmanship, huh…”
Baek Cheon said with a strange smile.
“Sounds fun.”
Chung Myung’s face turned sour.
“Don’t treat it lightly. There’s a reason practical swordsmanship is called practical swordsmanship—it can’t be learned just by swinging a sword alone. You’ll probably end up saying it’d be better to go to a battlefield and get stabbed to death.”
“Then it’ll be even more fun.”
Baek Cheon raised his sword.
“No need to overexplain it. I’ve already made more than enough preparations. If anything, I’d say it’s better to spend this time swinging the sword once more, don’t you think?”
Chung Myung stared at Baek Cheon without a word.
Baek Cheon had just experienced a brutal defeat. The moment that sword hilt had shot toward his eyes, he must have felt terror close enough to death. Chung Myung had made sure of that.
And yet there wasn’t the slightest hesitation left in those eyes now.
“……”
A faint curl appeared at the corner of Chung Myung’s mouth.
Maybe I was worrying for nothing.
It struck him all over again.
They were not Chung Myung.
Even if Chung Myung had learned demon-like swordsmanship in the midst of extreme hardship, there was no reason these people had to become the same.
They were far more Daoist than Chung Myung was. Far more righteous, far more likely to walk the proper path.
His worry that he might decide Mount Hua’s future wrongly was nothing more than arrogance.
The ones who would decide Mount Hua’s future were all of them.
“So how do we do it?”
“……Well, simple.”
At Baek Cheon’s question, Chung Myung gave a snort of laughter.
“For today, you just have to die about a hundred times.”
“……”
“Then you’ll end up swinging your sword like mad just to stay alive.”
Grind.
Chung Myung dragged his sword across the ground and glared at Baek Cheon with a face like a demon.
“Talking with your mouth is easy. Want to see whether you can back it up with your body?”
“Bring it on, you bastard.”
“Just don’t piss yourself!”
Chung Myung charged in, exuding savage killing intent.
A half-smile, hard to tell whether it was amusement or something else, settled at the corner of his mouth.