Chapter 39
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 39
Chapter Title: You Are the Sword of Completion (3)
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“This boy is the Star of Heavenly Slaughter. Killing him before he comes of age would be better for the Central Plains, and for you.”
Twenty years ago.
Namgung Cheok spoke to his old friend, Jin Sang-ho.
His gaze was fixed on Jin Je-yong, who was running around with a wooden sword.
“Brother Nam, you come all this way after so long just to say that again?”
Jin Sang-ho grumbled as he watched the brightly playing Jin Je-yong. He was grinning from ear to ear.
He looked as if he could die from how cute Jin Je-yong was.
“I've told you countless times, my name isn't Gung-cheok. My surname is Namgung. The Namgung Clan. How can you still get it wrong after all your years in the martial world?”
“What does it matter? 'Brother Nam' just rolls off the tongue. Besides, didn't you introduce yourself as Nam Cheok when we first met?”
“No, that was just an alias I used when I joined the Righteous Alliance.”
Namgung Cheok shook his head. Arguing with Jin Sang-ho was a fruitless endeavor.
His martial arts were third-rate, but his tongue was that of a supreme master. Namgung Cheok had never won a battle of words against Jin Sang-ho.
“Even if you don't kill him, you must destroy his dantian.”
“That A-mun kid, the old lady next door… everyone's calling a child the Star of Heavenly Slaughter or whatnot.”
Jin Sang-ho tore his gaze from Jin Je-yong and frowned.
Jin Je-yong was five years old this year.
Jin Sang-ho couldn't understand why all these grown adults were trembling in fear just because a five-year-old showed a bit of talent.
Namgung Cheok clutched his throbbing head and said.
“I'm not saying this as the patriarch of the Namgung Clan. I'm saying this for your own good.”
“No matter what you say, Brother Nam, he is a child I brought in. He is my disciple.”
“And because of that, you’ll be the first to die by that boy’s sword.”
Namgung Cheok said with a worried expression.
The wooden sword Jin Je-yong swung made a sound that should have been impossible for a wooden sword to produce.
Namgung Cheok knew all too well that this was a stage one reached just before being able to wield sword ki.
‘Sang-ho doesn’t know. Just how absurd his talent is.’
Jin Sang-ho was a good man, but his martial arts skills were abysmal. He had survived ten years in the martial world, even through the War of Righteousness and Evil, with all his limbs intact, yet he still couldn't escape the third-rate level.
Since his own skills were lacking, so was his eye for talent.
“I have warned you.”
“Brother Nam, enough of that. Have some Yeoahong before you go.”
“Yeoahong?”
“They say the girl next door, Gyeong-ae, brewed it when she was born. I secretly…”
“You crazy bastard.”
Jin Sang-ho took out a small jar from a cabinet.
Namgung Cheok pressed his forehead, then glanced at the liquor bottle.
“So how many years has it aged?”
* * *
After passing the leadership of the Namgung Clan to his son, Namgung Jun, Namgung Cheok visited Sinnae Village once again.
It had been five years, but the Sinnae Sword School was still the same.
No, it had changed a little. There were a few more people. Jeok-sam, and was it Nam Gyeong?
Two boys, somewhere between adolescence and manhood, were learning the sword from Jin Je-yong, who had just turned ten.
“Sam, Gyeong. The sword is…”
“The sword is what?”
“Child Instructor, I think I have to go home today for my father's memorial service.”
“Senior Brother! Yesterday you said it was your grandmother's memorial service! Where are you trying to run off to!”
“Hey, family members can die one after another! It's a memorial service today, I tell you!”
Namgung Cheok sighed as he watched the two senior and junior brothers raising their voices in front of Jin Je-yong.
For someone who had lived in the solemn Namgung Clan, he had never seen such a chaotic mess.
“Brother Nam, you’re here?”
In the midst of it all, a much older Jin Sang-ho welcomed Namgung Cheok.
“It's not Brother Nam… Anyway, it’s been a while.”
Namgung Cheok grumbled under his breath as he handed over a roasted duck he had bought from a neighboring village.
Jin Sang-ho’s face lit up as he eagerly accepted the roasted duck.
“Haha, the Yeoahong has aged even more.”
“Keep this up and you’ll have to sell one of your disciples to the young lady next door.”
“A-mun ran away, so would it be Gwi-su? Or Je-yong?”
Namgung Cheok smiled at Jin Sang-ho's childish words.
Even while saying such things, he was probably helping his neighbors out. The reason Namgung Cheok had traveled all the way to this remote Sichuan was because of Jin Sang-ho’s unpretentious personality and, above all, his compassion for others.
‘The boy has righteousness, but no power.’
Namgung Cheok felt a sense of regret every time he saw Jin Sang-ho.
Jin Sang-ho was one of the few truly righteous men he knew.
“So, what is it this time?”
“Aren’t you the one who came to this backwater, Brother Nam?”
“You’re the one who sent the urgent message, aren’t you? I’m busy handing things over to my son, you know.”
Namgung Cheok knew very well that the position of patriarch did not suit him.
He had only taken it on because of the War of Righteousness and Evil. Now that the war was over and the Five Great Clans had established their place in the Righteous Alliance, he thought it was time for him to step away.
“Well, it’s… sigh, I was thinking of entrusting Je-yong to you.”
Jin Sang-ho was spouting nonsense without even having a drink.
To him, Jin Je-yong was a disciple like his own son, the apple of his eye.
Namgung Cheok knew why he was trying to send such a disciple all the way to Anhui Province, where the Namgung Clan was located.
‘Is he becoming too much to handle?’
Even at a glance, Jin Je-yong’s skill level was far beyond what one would expect from a ten-year-old.
Just by the sword ki gathering on his wooden sword, it was clear that no one of his age, or even among the rising generation of martial artists, could match him.
“I don’t want to. I want to stay with Master.”
Jin Je-yong, who had approached them at some point, said while sneaking a piece of the roasted duck.
Namgung Cheok didn’t show it, but inwardly, he was utterly shocked.
‘He approached me without me sensing him? How?’
“I like my master.”
“Is that so?”
Jin Sang-ho beamed. He was the very picture of a doting fool.
“Brother Nam, why don't you spit out some useful techniques? I won’t covet your family’s martial arts.”
“What?”
He spoke as if it was something owed to him.
Namgung Cheok was dumbfounded by his shameless friend’s attitude.
“Master, didn’t you say Elder Nam’s martial arts are nothing special? All flash and no substance…”
“Shh, shh, shh! Ahem! Je-yong! A man who holds a sword must always begin and end with etiquette. Even if it’s the truth, how could you say such a harsh thing in front of the person himself?”
Jin Sang-ho spouted his nonsense in a remarkably plausible way.
Who in the world would dare speak of the Namgung Clan’s sword arts in such a manner?
Namgung Cheok ground his teeth, his hand twitching towards the sword at his waist.
‘Should I just kill these bastards?’
That was fifteen years ago.
* * *
“He must be killed. But…”
Three years later, he visited the Sinnae Sword School again, and there had been a change.
Jeok-sam and Nam Gyeong were nowhere to be seen, and in their place, a boy and girl he had never seen before were getting beaten by Jin Je-yong.
It seemed they too were Jin Je-yong’s disciples.
“I can’t bear it. What kind of sword will he show me?”
Even to Namgung Cheok’s eyes, Jin Je-yong’s disciplinary strikes contained a profound mystery that he could not decipher.
As a fellow swordsman, his competitive spirit was stirred.
“Je-yong, Brother Nam wishes to see your sword.”
“Uncle Nam?”
‘This kid doesn't think my surname is Nam, does he?’
It seemed Jin Sang-ho’s playful use of ‘Brother Nam’ and ‘Mr. Nam’ had rubbed off on his young disciple.
In the end, a name didn’t matter.
“Yes, it’s Uncle Nam. Sang-ho praised your sword so highly.”
“Master did? Hehe! I’m still a long way from the realm Master spoke of.”
The bright innocence in Jin Je-yong’s shy yet pleased expression made it hard to believe he was the Star of Heavenly Slaughter.
He had the unique naivety of a child.
Jin Je-yong picked up a wooden sword and stood before a tree.
“Uncle Nam, Uncle Nam. Please take a look at this.”
“Of course, of course. I came here to see your sword.”
Jin Je-yong swung his sword in front of the tree. In its path were leaves, branches, and the tree itself.
For a child who had long been able to imbue his sword with ki, cutting down a single tree should have been no difficult feat.
And yet, all he cut were the leaves.
“Huh?”
Namgung Cheok’s eyes widened. He was too shocked to speak.
He would have understood if the sword was so fast that it only cut the leaves, but that wasn’t it. Jin Je-yong’s wooden sword had clearly passed through the branches and the trunk.
The wooden sword passed through as if there was nothing there. Yet, only the leaves were severed.
“Master said a swordsman must distinguish between what to cut and what not to cut.”
“Th-that’s not what that means.”
“It’s not?”
Jin Je-yong asked back as if he didn’t understand.
Namgung Cheok turned to Jin Sang-ho with a look of astonishment. Jin Sang-ho, who was watching from the porch, nodded.
“How was it? Uncle Nam. Can I call myself a swordsman now?”
“Ha, haha. Yes, you are a swordsman.”
What swordsman could display such a divine skill? Even Namgung Cheok himself, considered the greatest master of the Namgung Clan, was incapable of such a feat.
“Haha! Magnificent. You will become great one day.”
“I’m Master’s disciple, after all.”
Jin Je-yong smiled shyly.
Namgung Cheok sent Jin Je-yong back to his disciples and approached Jin Sang-ho.
“Je-yong is already beyond what I can contain. So, at the Namgung Clan…”
“No. That child must grow under you.”
Jin Sang-ho continued the conversation they had three years ago, but Namgung Cheok firmly refused.
“The nonsense you spoke, no, the wild fantasy of a third-rate martial artist, Je-yong is making it a reality.”
Usually, the saying that a swordsman must distinguish between what to cut and what not to cut meant that one should not draw their sword rashly.
But the young Je-yong had misunderstood this and demonstrated an unbelievable divine skill with an actual sword.
“If he goes to the Namgung Clan, he’ll be called a Sword King at best. If he does well, maybe a Sword Emperor or Sword Monarch.”
“That would be incredible…”
“But if he continues to polish his sword under you, he will surely be able to complete the sword (劍成).”
“What does that mean…”
Jin Sang-ho couldn’t understand what Namgung Cheok was saying.
Namgung Cheok, on the other hand, had a great epiphany after seeing Jin Je-yong’s sword.
He wondered if he had confined the sword to the martial arts defined by his own thoughts, by the Namgung Clan.
On that day, Namgung Cheok gained freedom from the sword, and years later, he would claim the title of Sword King among the Twenty-Two Masters Under Heaven.
And on that day, after hearing Namgung Cheok's words, Jeok-sam began to call Jin Je-yong the Sword of Completion (劍成).
* * *
“Behold. That is our clan’s Boundless Azure Sky Sword Art (蒼穹無涯劍法).”
Time flowed again to the present.
In the Jegal Clan's private training ground, members of the Namgung Clan stood to watch Jin Je-yong’s sword.
“How does he know the Namgung Clan’s family martial art?”
“I taught him.”
Namgung Cheok answered his son’s question.
The reason was simple.
‘I wanted to see the true Boundless Azure Sky Sword Art before I die.’
As Namgung Cheok thought this, Jin Je-yong drew his sword and traced a circle.
Changgung (蒼穹) meant the azure sky.
Jin Je-yong’s sword pressed down heavily on the surrounding air.
Everyone from the Namgung Clan gathered in the training ground held their breath.
Muae (無涯) meant boundless freedom.
Ultimately, the Boundless Azure Sky Sword Art was about capturing the infinity of the sky in the sword.
‘But it eventually degenerated into a technique that just spews out blue ki.’
Just a decade ago, Namgung Cheok had thought the Boundless Azure Sky Sword Art was simply a sword art created by observing the blue sky.
How could one capture the sky in a sword? He had thought it was just a metaphor.
“This is what I think of as the sky sword? Something like that.”
When Namgung Cheok first showed the Boundless Azure Sky Sword Art to Jin Je-yong, he had called it the sky sword.
At first, Je-yong had imitated Namgung Cheok’s forms, then he interpreted the true meaning of the sword art, and finally.
‘He improved it.’
Jin Je-yong had re-established the Boundless Azure Sky Sword Art, created by the founder of the Namgung Clan, with his own enlightenment.
That was when Jin Je-yong had just come of age.
“Th-that is…”
Jin Je-yong’s sword shone with a blue light. It wasn't an artificial thing like a sword aura, but a blue like the sky reflected in a clear lake.
As he swung his sword at his surroundings, the air turned blue, as if the sky itself had descended.
“Azure sky…”
Namgung Jun muttered with a strange expression, a mixture of joy and sorrow.
It was because the Boundless Azure Sky Sword of the Namgung Clan was being unfolded by the hands of a young man completely unrelated to the clan.
“Yes, that is the place you must all strive to reach in your lifetime.”
Namgung Cheok said with a bitter expression.
However, he knew that neither he nor anyone else in the Namgung Clan could reach the realm Jin Je-yong had displayed.
Jin Je-yong’s sword finally turned towards the sky.
“Elder Nam, no, Elder Namgung. Please watch! The sword of the Divine Sword’s disciple.”
Jin Je-yong called out to Namgung Cheok.
And he swung his sword straight down.
The blue sky tore open without a sound, revealing the black night sky.
“Yes, I have seen it well. The sword of the Divine Sword’s disciple, the Sword of Completion.”
Namgung Cheok smiled faintly and looked up at the sky.
Through the rift in the heavens, nameless stars shone with an unparalleled brilliance.