Regret, Ruin, Awakening (6)
"It's fine, Senior Sister. ...But if you're really sorry, why don't you bestow some guidance on this pitiful junior? My master bailed halfway through, so I never got the advanced Quanzhen training."
Geniuses from prestigious families like Soso had been drilled in rhetoric since childhood, so even when politely refusing, they'd handle things in a way that avoided owing anyone favors. But naive folks clueless about the ways of the world often missed the subtext entirely.
From our chat, Wang Miyang seemed like a decent person who owned up to her mistakes and apologized—but her people skills didn't look top-tier.
So rather than beating around the bush with false modesty, it was better to state my wants clearly. Besides, true or not, Wang Miyang and I were both Quanzhen disciples for now. A junior blocked by a wall after his master vanished, humbly seeking guidance from a sect senior? Perfectly reasonable. She wasn't teaching an outsider, so no reason to refuse.
"You're the first junior I met in the murim... I could teach you if you want to learn... but, um..."
Wang Miyang hemmed and hawed, tilting her head slightly and sneaking peeks at me. She didn't seem reluctant to teach—just hung up on something.
"...Aren't you embarrassed to be Quanzhen?"
Aha—so that's what was bugging her.
I, Sima Mancheon—the genius who deceives even the heavens, proudly inscribed on the Immovable Bright King's nameplate—was the guardian of the murim whom Jesus would acknowledge, Buddha would tremble before, and Socrates would poison himself over.
A true guardian must be impartial. No discriminating against descendants over past sins, no petty bullying.
Besides, to me, sects were like chocolate wrappers or crab shells. Not important. What mattered was the filling—the martial arts. Quanzhen techniques were worth learning, worth passing down through generations.
To have access to such gems and feel shame over face? That was disgraceful for a murim warrior.
I bowed low to my childlike master, prostrating myself fully.
"The martial arts of Quanzhen are the finest under heaven. This unworthy junior begs for your guidance. Please accept me as your disciple."
Wang Miyang gazed down at the tall man kowtowing shamelessly to a little girl, without a trace of embarrassment.
'The martial arts of Quanzhen are the finest under heaven... How long has it been since I heard those words from someone else?'
She lifted her gaze to the night sky, staring at the Big Dipper that guided the lost.
The Ilwol Singyo—a demonic cult of runaway murim traitors who'd betrayed their clans and sects. Her first murim excursion: hunting down her senior sister who'd fled with sect secrets, dragging her eternally youthful body into the fray despite her age. A journey that could end in death.
Was this the arrangement of the founding ancestor Wang Chongyang, who decreed the sect's lineage must never break? She'd taken in a young junior who mixed techniques and spouted nonsense but never shamed the core teachings.
Chatting near the outhouse wasn't ideal, so Wang Miyang and I moved to a nearby clearing. A massive moon and twinkling stars made it perfect for nighttime training.
His master's name being undisclosed nagged at her a bit... but he was her first disciple ever, and with his solid foundations, Mancheon was the perfect candidate to inherit Quanzhen's advanced arts.
She decided to teach him the secret techniques.
"The technique I'm about to show you is very different from the basic Quanzhen stuff you've learned."
"You mean...?"
Wang Miyang slowly raised her hand, pointing to the brightest cluster among the stars—the Big Dipper.
"As you know, the Big Dipper is Quanzhen's symbol."
In the murim, the Big Dipper wasn't just some ladle-shaped constellation. It symbolized gang qi, the mark of peak masters who'd shattered mortal limits. The character for gang (罡) literally evoked the Big Dipper.
Facing a gang qi user meant death for ordinary murim folk. A master unleashing it—despite the massive qi drain—signaled deadly intent.
The Big Dipper: stars of death. Fighting a Quanzhen warrior who claimed it? Suicide.
But honestly? I'd never felt that vibe learning Quanzhen arts. The Quanzhen Orthodox Inner Cultivation Method gathered pure qi, but built inner energy slower than other sects—disadvantageous in equal-level fights. Empty Brightness Fist was elite defense, deflecting brutal force rather than killing outright.
The Celestial North Dipper Formation came closest, ganging up like a dogpile—but for group tactics, Shaolin's 108 Arhats Formation, encircling and pounding with 108 monks, topped the murim charts.
Wait... is that why Shaolin's the strongest orthodox power?
A massive revelation.
As I pondered, wearing a dubious look at Quanzhen arts being "gang-level,"
"Your foundations are solid—no risk of qi deviation. Better to show than tell."
Exasperated with explanations, Wang Miyang extended her doll-like porcelain hand toward a massive boulder for a live demo.
"Watch closely. This is one of the absolute arts that once shook the Central Plains."
It obliterated my doubts in an instant—a mystical, overwhelming spectacle.
Qi surged from her fingertips like lightning. More precisely: a bolt from the heavens, cleaving empty air. The qi-stream from her palm spiderwebbed outward, shattering space like fractured glass. It pulverized everything in its path.
Crushes foes like frost underfoot, shattering them to icy shards.
Kraka-ka-ka-BOOM!!
The merciless blast crushed and demolished all before it. The Big Dipper twinkled amid the swirling stone dust in the dead of night.
Wang Miyang beamed with pride at her stunned young disciple, introducing the sect's secret art.
"The palm art that treads frost lightly and shatters like ice fragments—Treading Frost Shattering Ice Palm."
Eh...? That's a true secret art...?
Then what were the ones I thought were secret all this time...?
I glanced down at the so-called Beggar Clan secret in my right hand—my trusty staff.
I'd suspected as much... but tonight confirmed it.
Hey, Staffy—you're expelled from the martial arts party effective immediately.
...But as a founding member, outright banishment felt harsh. Demotion from soul partner to workhorse it was.
Anyway, not the point now.
I met her calm, twinkling golden eyes—sizing up if Quanzhen arts suited me, or if I measured up. With confident swagger, I closed the distance step by thudding step toward my new partner technique.
Daring to gauge the vessel of Sima Mancheon, heaven's own deceiver...? Sure, she's my senior and master, but time for a little lesson.
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Tweeeeng...Treading Frost Shattering Ice Palm...This is way too hard...
I'd figured a technique that epic would be tough—but it was brutal beyond expectations.
Core principle: vibration-based shockwaves making space "crack" visually. Immense power demanded vast qi and pinpoint control—a finicky advanced art.
Wang Miyang tilted her head at Mancheon flailing to shatter a pebble hovering over her open palm with emitted qi.
His dantian qi was pure enough despite admixtures, and he didn't seem dim. Weird.
...Does he have some bad habit he doesn't notice?
No disciple experience left her puzzled on handling this. Observing closely, she opted to test his body directly.
"Enough. I get your level."
"...Pardon?"
"Need to pinpoint the issue. Assume stance."
Caught off-guard by the sudden spar, such personal coaching from a master was rare, so I raised my staff, priming Dog-Beating Stick Technique.
‧ ‧ ‧
Bottom line from our midnight session: failed to master Treading Frost Shattering Ice Palm on the first try.
...And under the guise of "fixing bad habits," Wang Miyang confiscated my Staffy.