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Sizzle.
The pork belly, boiled once until the inner meat was tender and thoroughly cooked, sat upon a well-scrubbed wooden Blade Demon. Above the Blade Demon, four kitchen knives spun in circles.
"...Haaht!"
Sagong Hee extended her hands toward the four blades with a spirited shout. The four knives, animated by the Taiji Wisdom Sword's Sword Control Art, flashed as they each took their positions and began to move.
Two blades gripped both ends of the pork belly slab, while a third neatly sliced away the bristled skin. The last blade, moving with the precision of direct carving, cut the pork into uniform lengths with exquisite control.
"Heh, heheh, heheheh...!"
Sagong Hee could not stop laughing as she cut the meat.
Though they were only kitchen knives, she wielded all four perfectly, slicing the pork with not a hair's breadth of error—and the juices dripping from the meat looked absolutely mouthwatering.
"Si-a! Come quickly!"
"Yeah, yeah. You're trying to make me taste-test your Heavenly Demon cooking, aren't you?"
Grumbling, Lee Si-a wrapped a piece of the boiled pork in a lightly blanched bok choy leaf and lifted it. With an elegant gesture, she savored the flavor of Sagong Hee's boiled pork.
"...Not bad. It's not dripping blood everywhere like last time."
"Hehe, of course. I mastered boiling last night. So now..."
Sagong Hee gulped and poured oil onto a wide iron griddle. Lee Si-a watched from the side and shook her head, but Jin Sa-wol, who should have been stopping Sagong Hee, simply watched her in silent encouragement.
"The boiled meat is still full of moisture and juices, and you're going to oil-grill that?"
"Heh heh, just wait and see."
Sagong Hee produced a cotton cloth with a triumphant expression. It was a spotless, clean cotton wrapping cloth, and she used it to pat the moisture off the boiled pork.
The blades paired up in twos, moving as though gripping chopsticks. Jin Sa-wol spread white powder across a wide wicker tray, and Sagong Hee lifted the boiled meat with her swords and dredged it in the powder.
"Hoo..."
With a tense face, Sagong Hee stretched her hands toward the broad iron griddle. The oil was slowly beginning to boil over, and she took a deep breath and projected her qi.
"Begin!"
The four blades flew as though dancing and began placing the powder-dredged boiled meat onto the griddle. Lee Si-a shook her head at the sight.
"Why on earth are you grilling something that's already boiled?"
"If I try to grill it directly, I burn it."
"Then can't you just practice more? We have meat overflowing."
Lee Si-a pointed at the enormous wild boar laid beside the main gate. She had butchered it perfectly, separating bone and flesh, and all the lean meat had been used for Sagong Hee's cooking practice.
Sizzle.
The heated oil began flash-frying the powder-dusted boiled pork. Sagong Hee moved the four blades rapidly and began flipping the meat at blinding speed.
"Haaht!"
Flip, flip, flip. Sweat beading on her forehead, Sagong Hee flipped the meat countless times with her swords, and the moment she judged the timing right, she began skewering and retrieving every piece with her blades.
Swish!
The grilled meat landed neatly on a white platter. Sagong Hee lifted the corner of her mouth at the sizzling surface.
"Si-a, would you check it for me?"
"...Out of four sides, three are grilled and one side is still raw—six pieces like that."
"Ugh, a failure..."
Sagong Hee was crushed. Aside from the broadly cut surfaces—the exposed cross-sections of the meat—there were quite a few spots where patches of powder remained untouched.
"Like I keep telling you, don't cut it after boiling. Grill it first."
"But I'm not confident. About whether it's truly boiled through."
"Then you can just grill it all the way through."
"I don't have the confidence to grill without boiling first! Si-a, just taste it, please!"
Lee Si-a very quietly chewed and swallowed the bok-choy-wrapped meat. Even while eating, her elegant gestures made Sagong Hee feel a twinge of envy.
"...It's decent. No one's going to scold you for grilling this."
"Yes! A success!"
Sagong Hee threw her arms around Lee Si-a and bounced up and down. Lee Si-a pushed her aside and nibbled at a piece of meat grilled evenly on all four sides.
"Si-a, let me pour you a cup of red wine."
"Sister, when you come to the Demonic Cult later, I'll treat you really well."
Lee Si-a beamed as she accepted the drink Jin Sa-wol poured for her. For Lee Si-a, who loved liquor, the absence of a nag telling her to "abstain from drinking" and the ability to drink legally were cause for celebration.
"Meat calls for liquor."
"Si-a, aren't you full? You must have eaten a lot of the failed pieces earlier."
"Me? Heavenly Demons don't get fat. Because of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art, there's no reason for me to gain weight no matter how much I eat. What was it again—the Heavenly Demon Divine Art burns away any weight gain."
Sagong Hee, who had been scanning Lee Si-a up and down, unknowingly clenched her teeth behind her lips. Whatever else there was to say, Lee Si-a's toned figure was something she deeply envied.
"Do you want more? Sa-wol, sister. Isn't there that liquor that my lord left unfinished last time?"
"What? F-for real?! That bastard was sipping it behind my back without me?!"
"He left that because he said he'd drink it with you later... is it alright?"
"Yes. I can just ask Martial Uncle Hyeon-ta."
"As expected of you, Sister!!"
Lee Si-a shrieked and threw herself into Sagong Hee's arms. She nuzzled her face into Sagong Hee's chest and acted so spoiled that it was clear the two women had grown quite close.
"There, there. Drink plenty, eat plenty."
Sagong Hee simply smiled and patted Lee Si-a.
"Si-a, I think you're the most beautiful out of all of us when you're eating."
"Hmph, a Heavenly Demon is beautiful at every moment, of course. Hee hee."
Anyway.
Sagong Hee had perfectly mastered both grilling and boiling.
* * *
Meanwhile, elsewhere.
"Damn it, how much longer do I have to wear this roasting thing on my head!"
A young man of fairly advanced years hurled the gat he had been wearing to the ground. His smooth, balding scalp gleamed.
"It stings my eyes. Put it back on."
"Look here, Brother Dang. Haven't you been getting frostier toward me lately?"
"I was always frosty to begin with. Why would two people who've already seen everything there is to see bother with formalities?"
The man called Brother Dang, Bandit Demon, nudged Blade Demon with his foot. He spread his fan and fanned himself several times, but the humid air and the heat meant he could barely feel any relief.
"I want to go home soon. Sigh. Look here, old man. Can't you fix this heat with illusions or something?"
"Hunt the heat! On sweltering days, shaved ice is the best! Shaved ice? Grinding ice down? Guahahaha! Ice crystals are forming! Ice crystals, ice crystals are the best! Ju Ji doesn't know anything! Guahahaha!"
"Old man's gone mad again."
Bandit Demon turned his head with an expression of resignation.
"Brother Sam-gu, don't you have any interesting stories?"
"Brother Dang, I've told you already. I'm much younger than you, remember?"
"With that face?"
At Bandit Demon's words, the heavily bearded middle-aged—no, young man Sam-gu snarled with an indignant look.
"Let's go out to the marketplace and ask. Who looks younger."
"Didn't we already ask a hundred people, and ninety-three of them said I look younger?"
"Those were Easterners from far-off lands, so they don't count! If we're going to do it, we do it in the Central Plains, don't you agree?"
"Ugh, what's with all the noise...?"
The black-haired woman stirred and rubbed her eyes as she sat up. A single lock of hair at the tip of her bangs, no thicker than a finger, was dyed white.
"Rin, tell me. Do I look older, or does Brother Dang look older?"
"If he looks younger than you, and you look older than him, isn't that the end of it?"
Sam-gu's mouth fell open and froze. The woman called 'Rin' giggled and closed his jaw with her hand.
"Don't worry. There are probably at least two women in the world who like you."
"Who?"
"Your mother and your wife."
"My mother has passed away. And I don't have a wife."
At Sam-gu's words, a solemn silence fell over the party. Rin—Lee Chil-rin—clutched Sam-gu's hand and patted it, her eyes welling with tears.
"Poor Sam-gu. You don't have any family at all?"
"That isn't quite the case. ...It is a little awkward to call it family, but I do have a master."
"Oh-ho. The one you mentioned last time? The man who had you learn the Gwangcheon Asura Sword?"
"That's right, Brother Do. I don't know why, of all the martial arts out there, he chose to teach me the Gwangcheon Asura Sword..."
Sam-gu's eyes gleamed with blue light as he stroked the scabbard at his waist with his hand.
"But thanks to it, I've even managed to become a Peak-level expert."
"I suppose. At Brother Sam's age, Peak level is the baseline."
"It feels a bit strange hearing that from people who probably reached Peak in their teens."
Bandit Demon shrugged. His genius had made him a Peak-level expert in his teens, and it had been the driving force that elevated him to the Ten Demons of the Demonic Cult. The other two possessed talents that were not very different.
"Even if you reach Peak in your teens and then stay stuck at Peak for a dozen-some years after that, does anything really change? More importantly—you there, Miss Heavenly Demon."
"I'm not Heavenly Demon! I'm Rin!"
"Setting that aside—hurry up and cry already. So we can go home, you know?"
"I said I'm not her! How many times do I have to say it! Heavenly Demon is some other bitch! I'm only taking you there because I know where she lives!!"
"Brother Dang, don't torment her too much."
"......Huaaagh!!"
Illusion Demon, who had been quietly scratching his stomach, screamed and bolted upright. Lee Chil-rin clung to Sam-gu with a start.
"What now?"
"The heavenly secrets are twisting! Something that must never happen is about to occur!!"
At Illusion Demon's grave warning, the four swallowed hard and tensed.
"Heavens, stop it!!"
* * *
"Can't I try it once too?"
"You, Si-a? Hmm..."
"Couldn't we just do it outside the kitchen? Even just one piece...?"
"...You're right! You said not to do it inside the kitchen! Here's this beautifully sliced boiled pork—if I just heat it right here, that's it, isn't it?"
"Wait, you have to remove the moisture—"
Craaackle-pop-pop-pop.
* * *
"I feel like something absolutely horrific just happened."
While inspecting the state of the abandoned house, a sudden ominous chill washed over me. It felt as though the heavens had been enraged by some near-taboo and brought judgment crashing down.
"This is the place where Gaga spent his childhood!"
Dokgo Yeon examined the place where I had grown up with childlike joy. As if visiting the birthplace of a celebrity she had long admired, she inspected every nook and cranny of the house.
"Yeah. I also came to check on this place."
I inspected one side of the stone wall surrounding the house. Lifting the thatch covering it revealed traces of having been dug up relatively recently.
So Sam-gu had come by. I could not understand at all why he was traveling with the Flying Heaven Three Demons, but I was certain it would greatly aid them in finding the Heavenly Horse's Tear.
The Gwangcheon Asura Sword, the Sword Emperor's martial art, would bring tremendous development to the Flying Heaven Three Demons as well. The Three Demons were not the sort to flourish in these peaceful times—they were people who developed exponentially during brutal, blood-spattered eras of killing calamities.
In the future, the sword art that would be developed and refined through countless duels spanning from the Great Righteous-Demonic War to the Bloody Era of Calamity was one that had almost completely lost its original form.
I had arranged the Qimen Formation around this place so that only someone who had learned the Gwangcheon Asura Sword could release it. And sure enough, some of the Heavenly Rejuvenation Pills I had left inside were gone.
"He really did take them."
"Gaga, it was the person who lived here with you, wasn't it?"
"...Yes. A 'man' named Sam-gu."
I deliberately stressed Sam-gu's gender. Dokgo Yeon took my hand and gazed at me for a long moment.
"It doesn't seem like you're lying... but what is this uneasy feeling?"
"Why would I lie? Sam-gu was my first..."
What should I call him? I thought back to the farewell we exchanged at our last parting. A little embarrassing, but that term was definitely not wrong.
"My first male disciple."
"Gaga taught him personally?"
"Yes. I taught him martial arts myself."
I had raised an ordinary herb-gatherer into a first-rate expert. The process had been arduous and difficult, but seeing that he now seemed to have reached a perfect Peak level, I felt an unexpected happiness.
"What sword art was it? Behind the garden here, I found traces of a sword technique I've never seen before piled everywhere."
"The Gwangcheon Asura Sword."
"That's a name I've never heard before."
"Of course you haven't."
Because it's a martial art that doesn't exist in this era. A sword for self-preservation, refined through calamity after calamity until it lost its original form and retained only strength and dominance.
If you touch it, you die.
A sword art refined by binding countless sword techniques into one, for the sole purpose of protecting one's own body.
It was a martial art I had taught him expecting he might leave Anhui and live elsewhere, and its original form lay in the Namgung Clan's Sky Palace Unhindered Sword Art.
The current Exploding Dragon, Namgung Pae. It was his unique personal martial art, which he would later create as the Sword Emperor.
"That's strange. As far as I know, the Namgung Clan has no sword art called the Gwangcheon Asura Sword."
"......?"
"Is... is that wrong? From what I can see, the origin of every sword trace here... it looks like the Sky Palace Unhindered Sword Art."
"......."
To think she could deduce the original form from nothing but the traces of sword marks Sam-gu had left behind. I swallowed hard at Dokgo Yeon's genius.
"Hehe, I'd like to meet him sometime later."
"Later? No, it seems it'll be now."
I drew the sword from my waist. Pushing sword qi into an ordinary iron blade, I lowered my voice and addressed the surroundings.
"Who goes there?"
Rustle, rustle, rustle.
Centered on us, Black Cloaked Warriors began to encircle us one by one.
Their number was no fewer than fifty. What's more, every single one was a first-rate expert. And one among them appeared to be a Peak-level master.
"You need not know who we are. Hand over the Heavenly Rejuvenation Pills quietly and disappear."
"Tch. I more or less expected this."
The old man at the pharmacy had not been caught. But here, there were clear signs that people other than Sam-gu had come and gone.
In other words, someone had seen him packing up the Heavenly Rejuvenation Pills.
"If I give you one, will you tell me where you came from?"
"Spare me the jokes. Kill them."
The Black Cloaked Warriors came flying in. With a sigh, I stepped closer to Dokgo Yeon.
"Yeon-a, for now—"
Slice.
Before I could even finish speaking, Dokgo Yeon swung her sword through the air. Having instantly cut down the vanguard Black Cloaked Warrior, she withdrew her blade with an expressionless face.
"Shall I kill them, Gaga?"
The Black Cloaked Warrior collapsed to the ground. Blood dripped from the body, but he was not dead.
She had literally left him just barely alive. I patted Dokgo Yeon on the shoulder, then shook my head.
"I'll do the killing. You just protect yourself."
"Gaga, still, in my own way..."
"Alright, alright. Don't kill anyone. Feel free to swing your sword to your heart's content. But..."
I pointed at the 'woman' who appeared to be the leader of the Black Cloaked Warriors.
The only Peak-level master here.
"I'll take that bitch."
"Then I'll subdue all the rest."
The moment Dokgo Yeon nodded, she and I kicked off the ground and swung our swords.