The Black Iron Plaque Shatters
"Shall we begin again, Instructor?"
That single remark from Yun Cheon was not mockery or provocation.
It was the courteous invitation of one martial artist to another — offered in pure, honest respect.
"Kuh… KWAHAHA!"
Jeok Mu-gwang was delighted.
How long had he yearned for this, teaching cadets who stood beneath him?
For someone to come at him with genuine killing intent.
But what he had truly craved was never a cadet beneath him — it was a contest against the strong.
I only ever wanted to escape the Hidden Demon Cave… and here's a fascinating young one, delivered right to me!
Tendons coiled like serpents along the hand gripping his wooden saber.
"Heh heh heh… So this old instructor took a hit, did he? You shed the rings from your legs — but you leave those on your wrists? Why is that?"
"…I have no confidence in deflecting a supreme master's saber strike barehanded."
The iron rings still encircled Yun Cheon's forearms.
Reducing weight mattered, but without internal energy, catching a full-force blow from a peak-realm expert barehanded was simply impossible.
"Fair enough… Very well. Brace yourself. From here on, it will be nothing like before."
With that roar, the techniques of the Mad Blood Blade erupted from the tip of Jeok Mu-gwang's wooden saber.
Sweeee—!
The saber strike came hurtling toward Yun Cheon with a sound of air being torn apart.
Even without internal energy channeled through it, it was the primary weapon wielded by a supreme master's hand — a dimension apart from the fists and kicks Jeok Mu-gwang had thrown until now.
And it was not the only thing that had changed.
As expected… fast. But…!
Yun Cheon, too, had finally been freed from the restraints he himself had forged.
With the iron rings cast off, his new form no longer clung obsessively to slow, deliberate footwork.
Slowness and speed are two halves of a single pair!
Clang!
The sound of the remaining iron rings on his arm deflecting Jeok Mu-gwang's saber.
When the wooden saber and the iron rings collided at full power, sparks scattered.
True to his moniker of Mad Blood Blade, a crimson madness gleamed in Jeok Mu-gwang's eyes as saber strikes began to rain down like a storm.
Bang-bang—! Bang-bang-bang—!
Once more, the initiative in the exchange seemed to slip back to Jeok Mu-gwang.
"That's the real Mad Blood Blade!"
"I… I can't even follow it with my eyes!"
With every strike he deflected, the shock transmitted through the iron rings and deep into his bones.
It was a staggeringly heavy impact — enough to rob Yun Cheon's wrists of all feeling.
Ghh… To think striking steel with wood could feel this weighty!
Dozens of consecutive strikes crashed down in an instant.
But Yun Cheon did not yield ground easily.
The two figures wove a dizzying tapestry across the arena floor.
The entire sparring grounds sank into utter silence, the crowd swallowed whole by the breathless contest.
The cadets, having forgotten even to blink, could only stare blankly at the collision between the two.
Clang! Kak! Kak! Kak!
Without pause, the ringing of iron against wood tore at their eardrums.
And amid that ferocious exchange, Yun Cheon's brow creased — for the first time — ever so slightly.
This sensation…!
The quality of the shock traveling up his wrists was changing.
At first, the iron rings had held firm and sturdy beneath the blows.
But now they too seemed to have reached their limit.
The rings shrieked, vomiting out a foul, discordant vibration.
Grkk—.
After repeated clashes, the paradox was complete: not the wooden saber, but the steel rings had reached their breaking point first.
To do this much without internal energy — truly a supreme warrior….
That realm of unity where a weapon, an extension of the body, moves as though it were a natural limb.
By contrast, the iron rings Yun Cheon wore were strictly tools of training.
Having held back the instructor's saber this long, they had already served their purpose.
I cannot take that wooden saber with my bare body. Is this my limit…!
Though Yun Cheon had lived fastened to iron rings for the past year, devoting himself to tempering his flesh, his essence was that of a swordsman.
…And yet, drawing an actual sword or saber would only raise suspicion.
The secret manuals and instruction provided by the Hidden Demon Cave accounted for everything in the martial arts he had shown until now.
The first to notice that strange discrepancy was none other than Chief Instructor Gal Mu-heun.
…Hah, what a pity. Is the difference in primary weapons to decide this contest?
The wooden saber, though fashioned from fragile timber, was a blade that had been Jeok Mu-gwang's lifelong companion — the extension of a martial artist's soul.
The iron rings, for all their steel, were crude things slapped together at some blacksmith's forge, form without substance.
That difference was cleaving the outcome in two.
And yet something troubles me. If that is so, then young Yun Cheon cannot be a swordsman at all….
Even as weapons went, the iron rings somehow felt wrong for him.
Yun Cheon's footwork was so extraordinary, and the kicks woven so seamlessly into it so precisely timed, that the question had simply never surfaced.
Don't tell me… he's been taking Jeok Mu-gwang's Mad Blood Blade head-on using nothing but iron rings and kicks this whole time?!
What impossible talent was this!
Truly a genius — a talent bestowed by the heavens themselves.
A talent without equal beneath the sky!
While Gal Mu-heun marveled, Yu Ha too sensed the shift.
Yun Cheon's gone strangely passive on offense… Did he pick up an injury somewhere?
But that didn't fit either — Yun Cheon's movements themselves remained flawless.
If not his body, then….
Only then did Yu Ha's eyes catch it as well: Yun Cheon was actively deploying his footwork while avoiding direct collisions with the wooden saber at every turn.
Don't tell me — the iron rings!
Not long after Gal Mu-heun and Yu Ha registered the anomaly, Jeok Mu-gwang finally seized upon Yun Cheon's weakness.
An opening!
The moment Jeok Mu-gwang sensed Yun Cheon trying to withdraw a single step from the exchange, his wooden saber flew at Yun Cheon's throat.
An inescapable strike!
Left with no choice, Yun Cheon raised his arm and deflected the blow with his iron ring.
CRACK—!
Only then did a handful of sharp-eared drill instructors and observers sense that something was wrong.
The sound is different!
The next instant, Yun Cheon's iron rings visibly loosened and slid down his forearm.
Damn it — the rings are coming off!
Jeok Mu-gwang charged in without missing a beat, unleashing his ultimate technique — the Mad Blood Slash!
Got you, brat!
In that instant, Yun Cheon retreated hard and launched his body into the air.
Both hands and both feet suspended in empty space — a desperate, cornered crisis with nowhere left to run.
Yun Cheon's new form seemed about to be swallowed whole by Jeok Mu-gwang's ultimate strike.
There's nowhere to dodge! Then…!
Yun Cheon spun his backward-flung body through a full revolution.
Then, flipping into a handstand, he planted both palms against the ground and rebounded.
Hmph. This ends it. He can't block my saber strike from such an unstable stance.
Even the one executing the technique believed it, at that very moment.
Sweeee—!
Suddenly, something came hurtling from around Yun Cheon's wrist.
Jeok Mu-gwang instinctively slowed his strike and ducked his head, evading the incoming projectile.
KUUUNG—!
"Wh… what was that?"
"What did that guy just throw?"
"A hidden weapon?"
Embedded in the wall of the spectator stands was none other than —
the iron ring that had been dangling loose from Yun Cheon's wrist.
"…That's no hidden weapon! It's his iron ring!"
Senior Drill Instructor Ya Jin shot to his feet, overcome by a shudder of awe.
"He reproduced my Soul-Severing Dagger with an iron ring!"
Yun Cheon's elaborate handstand mid-retreat had been an improvisation — a way to turn his dangling iron ring into a thrown weapon!
Drip—.
In that moment, a single crimson drop fell onto the arena floor.
A single bead of blood, trailing down Jeok Mu-gwang's cheek.
At the sight of it, the entire sparring grounds held its breath.
"The Instructor is bleeding…!"
"A cadet… wounded a supreme-realm master?"
No one shuddered harder than Yu Ha.
…Beyond monster — a genius! No other word can contain it…!
What Yun Cheon had shown was no mere sneak attack.
It was a stroke bordering on the miraculous, overturning a hopeless crisis in a single move.
Within that one stroke were fused not only his mystical footwork, but even the subtle secrets of Ya Jin's hidden-weapon arts.
If the boy had thrown not a bulky iron ring but a razor-edged dagger….
At the sight, even Chief Instructor Gal Mu-heun could not conceal the gleam of greed in his eyes.
And he's a cadet we simply scooped up off the ground? So we hauled a treasure back from the Central Plains. I always thought the method wasteful….
The observer seats had already descended into pandemonium.
"I'll take that one! With a single gem like him, the rest are all unnecessary!"
"Bah! Who said you could claim him? Our Black Shadow Unit staked our claim first!"
"Enough! Observers, mind your decorum!"
It reached the point where Gal Mu-heun himself had to step in and restrain them.
"The duel is not yet over. Refrain from causing a disturbance. That boy is, for now, still a cadet of the Hidden Demon Cave."
While the hall raged with excitement, Jeok Mu-gwang quietly wiped the blood trailing down his cheek.
The agreed duration of the duel was drawing to a close.
"……You are the first cadet ever to wound an instructor. And yet, I feel no shame. That is simply how great your skill has proven to be."
Jeok Mu-gwang had acknowledged Yun Cheon with his whole heart.
And yet the two of them made a starkly different sight.
A streak of blood ran down Jeok Mu-gwang's cheek — but Yun Cheon's robes hung from him like rags, his body riddled with countless small wounds.
"…Thank you."
As the exchange wore on, Jeok Mu-gwang had achieved unity of essence, energy, and spirit — while Yun Cheon, by comparison, had fallen short in every respect.
Even setting aside internal energy, the body of a supreme martial artist was itself a perfected weapon, forged and refined over decades.
A boy who had built his body at breakneck speed for a single year, still unfinished in his growth, could not hope to bear its weight.
In the end, his limits had surfaced, and defeat weighed heavy upon him.
And even so, Jeok Mu-gwang had acknowledged Yun Cheon with genuine sincerity.
"You are no mere cadet — you are a martial artist in your own right. I look forward to the day you have fully matured."
Drenched in sweat and blood, Yun Cheon nodded, eyes gleaming.
Jeok Mu-gwang drew out the greatest technique of the Mad Blood Blade Art to settle the contest once and for all.
Blood Rules the World.
A colossal saber-aura came crashing down, as if to devour Yun Cheon whole.
And Yun Cheon met it head-on.
Right now, I have no sword. The best move left to me is this!
Rather than evade, he fused the arts he had wielded all along — the Heaven and Earth Moving Art, the Limitless Step, and the Blood Wind Leg — into a single whole.
With the Heaven and Earth Moving Art, I can borrow the energy of nature itself, if only for a breath — even without internal power!
Squeezing out the last of his strength, he set his body spinning.
A whirlwind of kicks — Ma Chung's Blood Wind Leg, reinterpreted through his own understanding and driven to its absolute limit.
It was the birth of an entirely new martial art.
"That technique—!"
Drill Instructor Ma Chung, seeing it, froze solid where he stood as if struck by lightning.
It resembles Blood Wind Leg — but it is NOT Blood Wind Leg! What in the world is that art?!
The tip of the spinning Yun Cheon's foot crashed head-on into Jeok Mu-gwang's wooden saber.
A staggering shock transmitted up through his toes!
Yet in the final instant, Yun Cheon drove his other leg out as well.
KWAANG—!
Perhaps the accumulated shocks of clashing against the iron rings had finally taken their toll — the wooden saber burst apart at its center.
"The… the Drill Instructor's saber — it broke?"
"No way — from that one strike of Yun Cheon's?"
The contest was decided.
"…That was a fine spectacle."
With Jeok Mu-gwang's words, Yun Cheon's body was flung from the arena.
But Jeok Mu-gwang remained standing upon the stage.
"Hah… hah…."
Gasping for breath, Yun Cheon, sprawled outside the ring, pushed himself up and stared straight ahead.
To anyone watching, it was an unmistakable defeat.
Yet the cadets did not proclaim Jeok Mu-gwang's victory.
Instead, they raised a thunderous cheer for Yun Cheon, who had achieved the unbelievable against a supreme-realm master.
"Ahh… incredible, Yun Cheon!"
"What a magnificent contest — against an Instructor, no less!"
At that very moment—
"…Silence, all of you."
Jeok Mu-gwang quietly raised his hand.
"Cadet Yun Cheon. That final kick of yours — what is it called? It seems different from Ma Chung's Blood Wind Leg…."
"It is called Whirlwind Leg."
"A fine name."
Jeok Mu-gwang nodded.
Then he uttered words that stunned every soul present.
"I lost."
With those words — the black iron plaque hanging unharmed upon Jeok Mu-gwang's chest.
Across its surface, cracks began to spiderweb outward.
And the very next moment—
SHAAANG—!
With a clean, ringing crack, the black iron plaque shattered and rained down onto the arena floor.
Yun Cheon staggered to his feet and picked up one of the fallen fragments.
A faint smile touched his bloodied lips as he spoke.
"This duel with you, Instructor… was a lesson beyond price. I will gratefully accept the black iron plaque."
Jeok Mu-gwang stared blankly, his gaze shifting between his own chest and Yun Cheon.
Then, unable to contain it any longer, a deranged grin burst across his face.
"Kuh… KWAHAHA! That's right — the black iron plaque is yours! Someone like you has more than earned the right to claim it!"
Every soul in the sparring grounds bore witness to the birth of a new legend.
"The… the black iron plaque—!"
"What happens in a case like this?"
The cadets milled about in confusion, eyes darting between Yun Cheon sprawled outside the ring and the shattered plaque.
And at that very moment—
Clap. Clap. Clap.
From atop the dais, where he had watched everything without so much as a twitch, the Pavilion Lord of the Mad Path — Gal Mu-heun — slowly emerged, applauding.
Cloud Dragon Reborn
Author | Chu Sang (Autumn Frost)
Publisher | Samyang C&C Co., Ltd.
Managing Editor | Editorial Department
Published by | Samyang C&C Co., Ltd. — Dreambooks
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