The Way of the Foolish Sword
My real name was originally Seo Hyeon-woo.
Hyeon for virtuous. Woo for friend.
It was a fine name — but my master decided it didn't suit me, and the one he gave me instead was Seo-woo.
Woo for foolish.
Why "foolish," of all things? At first I tried to put a generous spin on it. There was the old saying about the foolish old man who moved the mountains, wasn't there?
A fool changes the world. Keep swinging the sword, steadily and without rest, and eventually you'd throw Sword Qi, launch Sword Gang, maybe even take to the sky?
It took me years to understand the truth. I simply had no talent. So the idea was that if I stubbornly drilled one thing and one thing only, at least I wouldn't get myself cut down?
Looking back, Master had been right.
The truth is, most people go through life assuming that even if they never land the lead role in the drama of their own existence, they can at least manage a supporting part. I was no different.
I'd fallen into the Murim, but I didn't despair. Being dropped into a world like this usually meant you'd been chosen for something. I clung to the conviction that I had to possess something the people of this martial world did not.
That hope was crushed without mercy.
One night Guan Jinho — my master — got thoroughly, spectacularly drunk and started running his mouth.
"…Ah—no! My disciple! Seo-woo! Or is it? Hmm? Heh heh heh…"
However much he'd put away, he was completely soused.
"Hey! You still doing that breathing method I told you, still swinging that sword till your hands split open?"
I was, as a matter of fact. There wasn't much else to do. When I wasn't working as a hired escort, every waking hour went to training.
When I said as much, he flew into a rage.
"Hey! You—haah! Talent… hmm? You've got none. A brat who's barely past twenty, and this much turbid energy clogging you up?! Swing for a hundred days, a thousand days — you think you're going to become a master?"
I had nothing to say. I'd thought he looked kindly on my silent diligence. Apparently not.
No wonder he'd started pushing me toward bookkeeping a while back. Martial strength isn't everything on an escort run. Someone has to keep the accounts and manage the household, don't they? The chief steward's raising a successor — that sort of thing.
Whenever he got bored, he'd raise hell about me putting the sword down…
I never did. So he taught me every martial art the Murim had to offer. Every last one of them third-rate techniques — but what was I supposed to do about that?
The idea of an ordinary modern man learning some supreme art had been absurd from the start.
Three Calamities Fist and Kick Arts.
Three Calamities Staff Arts.
Three Calamities Sword Method.
Three Calamities Saber Method.
Three Calamities Spear Arts.
Three Calamities Hidden Weapons.
Three Calamities Archery.
Master taught me all of them.
The only one I showed any real progress in was the Three Calamities Sword Method — the same scrap of technique every third-rate thug in the streets picked up.
So I swung the sword with stubborn, foolish persistence.
My hands split open, and I kept swinging even before the wounds had closed. The days stacked up. Five years of that, and I could finally execute the single sword form Master had taught me.
After that, he stopped telling me to quit training. He brought me all sorts of things he called spiritual medicines instead, though he grumbled endlessly that my inner power refused to accumulate. Even so, I managed to form a dantian the size of a grain of millet.
That internal cultivation method didn't even have a name. It was just a breathing technique. It felt so unfair I went ahead and named it myself.
Behold: the Purple Cloud Divine Art!!!
Seven years in.
Inside the escort agency, no one could take my sword.
That was only true of sparring matches without Sword Qi, though. Against a second-rate swordsman fighting with a live blade and Sword Qi raised, I couldn't receive the strike at all — because my sword couldn't take it and snapped.
I stopped sparring that day.
Ten years in.
No escort in the agency could take my sword. Whether they raised Sword Qi or not, my blade path was already at their throat before they managed it.
That was when Master started demanding I unfold the form slowly.
At first I could sustain it for about ten minutes.
Then thirty.
Eventually I could swing that single form for over an hour at a stretch.
I could probably go longer than that now.
Slower. And slower still.
The slower my sword became, the clearer the blade path stood out before my eyes.
Today, once again, I swing the sword like a fool.
Until I can cut the moon.
I decided to call this Three Calamities Sword Method the Foolish Sword.
A new member joining the Eclipse was welcome news by any measure. And when that member happened to be a woman, certain things were unmistakably different.
A clean tavern in an apocalyptic world?
For one thing, ever since Mao Mei arrived, the word cleaning had been restored to the land of the living. Yes — we cleaned now. Of course, she did most of the actual cleaning, while my primary contribution was making the messes.
You'd think that would earn me a lecture or two, but she never once complained or snapped. She simply and silently put right whatever I'd scattered.
Now and then she'd ask if there was anything I felt like eating. That was about it.
All her scolding, instead, was aimed not at me but at Boss Kim of the Eclipse.
The man didn't wash much. He smelled exactly like the bachelor he was.
I, on the other hand, finished training and came home only after bathing at our precious water source.
Mao Mei did her best to scrub herself with water she'd carefully rationed from cooking, but she was still a young woman, and it clearly wasn't enough. Ignoring my warnings, she'd gone out to bathe at night again and nearly been set upon by a pack of lowlife thugs.
Apparently she'd kept her wits about her and avoided the worst of it.
I heard the story later. What she'd told them was this:
"…I'm the Captain's woman. You ready for what comes after? Think about it. Go ahead and try something if you want. You'd better kill me, though. Because if I don't make it back — do you really think you'll survive?"
And with that, she'd walked away unharmed…
It was a little late to protest. I couldn't exactly announce that I had no interest in a skinny little kid like her.
That was the terrifying thing about relationships. Once people decided one existed, the truth stopped mattering.
And yet she never actually approached me as a woman. She went around with her hood pulled up and that hideous scar painted on — makeup or stage paint, I was never sure which.
At any rate, Mao Mei's cooking leaned heavily Chinese, and it was good. It tasted like the food I'd eaten in the Central Plains.
Once those stray thoughts ran their course, today's sword form was complete.
I considered trying it at speed again.
Steam was rising off my body in thin curls. I would have liked to run through my so-called Purple Cloud Divine Art as well, but a place like this was too dangerous for that.
Qi circulation belonged at home.
I found a spot where the water had pooled deep and heaved a massive container into it.
Splash.
The shelter's people took turns hauling drinking water every day. We drew what we needed from the same source, but it was never quite enough for three people to wash with.
The container I'd dunked had come from a ruined store; I had no idea exactly how many liters it held. It looked like the kind used for agricultural water — a size and weight no ordinary person could lift.
It hadn't been designed for a person to carry in the first place.
Even I could get it off the ground. The problem was what came after: keeping it balanced. Harder than it sounded, with all that water sloshing back and forth.
After a few failures, I managed to haul it up cleanly. An average shower ran about eighty liters a person, so this ought to last us a good three days.
I walked into the shelter with the enormous container balanced on my head and an easy stride. People nearly jumped out of their skins.
"H-holy—! Look at the Captain!"
"Whoa. That's actually incredible. But why's he walking around like that?"
"Ha? You idiot. That's training. Obviously training."
It was bathwater, not training.
Thud.
I set the massive container down inside the tavern.
Boss Kim's jaw fell open.
"W-wait — how did you even carry that? A-are you planning to go swimming or something?"
"Swimming? Please. There's a water tank on the roof, right?"
"Uh? Well, yeah, there is."
"Then clean it and fix it up. Let's at least live like people who take showers."
"Heh heh heh. One of these isn't going to fill the whole thing, you know."
Then I'd just go back for another.
Mao Mei didn't say anything particular. She only glanced once at the container.
A few hours of scrubbing and patching the old tank later, the repairs were done.
We agreed I'd haul water up about once a day. Tap water at least came treated; this didn't. Filling the tank to the brim wouldn't do us any favors.
When I finished and stepped into the room, a rich, savory smell filled the air.
Wherever she'd found it all — kaoliang liquor, Chinese-style dumplings, even Japanese ramen — everything was laid out and waiting.
I'd sworn off drinking, but I figured I could allow myself a little tonight.
"…This is good."
"D-damn it! They've got guns! G-go get the boss, now!"
"Shit… We can't even arm ourselves thanks to those Hound bastards… And of course they're nowhere in sight when it actually matters…"
Several men had forced their way toward the shelter. One of them was carrying a K2 rifle. Drifting survivors, by the look of them.
Types like these wandered in search of survivor shelters — and if a place looked soft enough to chew through, they flipped into raiders on the spot. If it didn't, they asked for help instead.
The men on guard duty were wound tight. This shelter had no firearms.
"S-sister-in-law! Please, go get the b-boss—"
The man who'd spotted Mao Mei blurted the request in a panic.
"Ah—? R-right away."
The Eclipse was responsible for feeding the shelter's watchmen as a matter of course. Mao Mei sprinted for the tavern.
The moment Seo-woo heard what she had to say, he was already running.
She couldn't believe her eyes. Was that a human being's speed?
If the world hadn't ended, he could have walked into the Olympics and rewritten the record books.
"It's dangerous — stay at the Eclipse!!"
Seo-woo shouted back at her as she tried to keep up. Mao Mei only nodded and quietly chased after him anyway.
By the time she arrived, the intruders and Seo-woo were already face to face.
"…We'd just like a little food, if you can spare it. Please help us."
The man with the rifle addressed Seo-woo with careful courtesy and sharp eyes. He kept scanning Seo-woo and the rest of the group, taking stock of their weapons.
It didn't take them long to realize the shelter had no guns.
"Hahaha. Running a pretty lean watch, aren't you? Mind if we stay a few days?"
"We'll share some food. You're not coming inside."
"That so? And if we decide we're going in anyway?"
Click.
Survivors became raiders. They would either take over this place or strip it of supplies on their way out. For all anyone knew, they were already thinking about killing everyone here.
Mao Mei watched them with her heart hammering.
In that instant—
Seo-woo's hand moved, just slightly.
There was no sound at all.
And then—
Thud.
The man with the rifle dropped straight to his knees. A small wound marked his forehead. A single chopstick remained in Seo-woo's hand.
"Huh? Hey? Why'd you go down like that? Hey?"
The rest of the group checked their armed companion and realized he was dead.
"Y-you son of a—!!"
One of them grabbed for a gun. He collapsed before his finger ever found the trigger.
There was no chopstick left in Seo-woo's hand.
Mao Mei saw it.
The chopstick vanishing from his fingers…
And she thought: no matter what it cost her, she was going to learn that technique from this man.
Creak.
The door opened.
Who at this hour? Boss Kim? Were there still intruders left? I'd killed two of the ones who'd shown up with guns this morning — with chopsticks — but maybe some had stuck around?
"Who is it? Boss? Something wrong?"
"……"
No.
The presence was smaller. Finer.
I took a chopstick in hand. The skill wouldn't have meant much in the Murim, but in this world, sending a person off with a single chopstick was easy work.
Whoosh—
Thip.
I flicked it high as a warning, aimed well above head level.
"…I-I'm sorry. I th-thought you were asleep…"
Mao Mei?
Good thing I'd thrown it as a warning on the off chance. I genuinely hadn't expected her at this hour.
"What is it?"
"……I have a favor to ask."
Looking closer, her hair was still damp, as if she'd just washed it, and she hadn't painted on the scar.
She'd even put on a little makeup.
It had only been about two weeks since she'd come here, but proper meals had put some weight on her, and a lot of that childlike look had already faded.
With the fuller cheeks and the makeup, she was objectively — and subjectively — a beauty. But the feeling was closer to noticing a wildflower by the roadside than anything resembling romantic interest.
"What kind of favor?"
"…P-please teach me martial arts."
Martial arts?
In movies and comics, women became masters too — firing Sword Qi, soaring through the sky — but that only happened when they'd built inner power carefully from childhood.
And martial arts favored men to begin with.
A woman's frame had hard limits when it came to learning this kind of thing. Besides which, every art I knew was the brutish, body-breaking variety.
"No. Knowing a little makes you more dangerous, not less. Looking completely helpless is safer."
"……I w-want to stay with you."
She quietly lowered her head.
The usual cynical mask was gone. Her face was simply flushed.
I slowly set my hand against her forehead.
I watched her squeeze her eyes shut tight.
Flick.
"Ow—! Ow!"
Mao Mei, on the receiving end of my forehead flick, even teared up a little.
"Go to bed. It's late."