Searching the Clouds for One’s Heart
Over the past three months, I had taken dozens of Clear Harmony Pills, the Hyeondo Sect’s own elixirs, and I could feel myself inching ever closer to the bottleneck between middle and late Qi Refining.
The invisible barrier that had been stifling me, like a hard shell sealing off the release of spiritual energy, had suddenly vanished.
At least on the surface, it looked as though the overwhelming force Elder Nam had hurled at me had been so fierce that it had shattered the unseen wall that had been hindering my growth.
Considering that what he had truly wanted was for me to be crushed into mental and physical exhaustion and suffer a long illness of the heart, it was a ridiculous turn of events.
And if I thought about how the very reason I had taken the role of examination supervisor was to earn the contribution points needed to buy a Gather-Essence Pill for breaking through that bottleneck, then this was an unexpected stroke of fate for me.
Of course, that did not mean I thought well of him. No matter the outcome, he had tried to harm me, and my feelings toward him could hardly be favorable.
But it seemed I was not the only one who had built up fury over his conduct.
Grit.
“You’ll regret this...”
Nam So-ryong stared in the direction his father had disappeared and swore vengeance. In the end, it had been this brat, not me, whose spirit had been badly damaged by Elder Nam’s pressure. Bloodied tears streamed down his face as he clenched his lips so hard they almost seemed to tremble.
Then, after glaring at me once, he turned on his heel and simply left. If he abandoned his post in the middle of the trial, he would not be able to receive a proper accounting of his contributions, but it seemed he did not care about such things at all.
As for me, it was the same. Now that I no longer needed the Gather-Essence Pill to break through the bottleneck, I did not need the contribution points at the moment.
So I, too, looked in the direction Elder Nam had gone for a moment, then left as well.
And even though I returned to my eastern residence far earlier than scheduled, Yang Jeon was standing in front of it as though he had been waiting for me, and he addressed me with a grave expression.
“I figured you’d be back not long after. You’re not the type to quietly endure Elder Nam’s unfair orders. Want a drink?”
I had no idea when he had prepared it, but seeing him offer me a gourd of alcohol, I accepted it readily.
I thought it wouldn’t be so bad to celebrate this unexpected gain with a drink for once.
But when I removed the wooden stopper sealing the gourd and began drinking straight from it, gulping it down greedily, he seemed surprised and continued speaking.
“I had no idea you were fond of liquor. If I’d known you liked it this much, I would’ve brought some sooner.”
I answered with a small smile.
“I’m not especially fond of it. Only now and then... very rarely, I need something to fill this hollowed-out place in my chest.”
Truthfully, I did not miss my past life as Heavenly Demon Ak Bi. It was not that I disliked the man I had been when I had forced the world to its knees, but rather that there were other things I missed more.
A-cheong... no, Jeong So-sang... I still missed her, the woman I had loved, the woman who had made me into the greatest person under heaven, one who answered to no one’s command.
And for some reason, I missed life in the Neung family as well. It seemed to be because it was a precious memory of “living with family,” something my past self had never experienced.
When, as a child, I had asked my father to give me an entire little pavilion in the rear garden, saying I needed it for martial training, he had simply laughed heartily and allowed it.
As a result, the Neung family had to build a new pavilion for guests, but my father, soft to the point of being practically mushy, had gladly borne even that for a single request of mine.
Later, when I asked him to find me a proper sword for practice, my eldest brother, who had been having one forged for himself, had laughed and handed it over to me instead...
Those had seemed like trivial things at the time, but looking back now, they had grown into memories so large that I could feel a hollow ache in one corner of my heart.
Perhaps because of that lingering warmth, I found myself raising the drink again, only for Yang Jeon to suddenly snatch the gourd from my hand and start gulping from it himself.
Given that it was a fairly strong liquor, enough to set your mouth burning the instant it touched your tongue, it was rather amusing to watch.
Still, even that was less interesting than what he said next.
“Khh... ahhh... So you heard about Junior Martial Sister Cheong-eum. Didn’t I tell you? Elder Nam especially favors female dao companions.”
Junior Martial Sister Cheong-eum... It was her. The one who had stood up for us in Dark Dust Market, the one I had kissed. It seemed that the whereabouts of the woman I had sought in vain on several occasions were tied to an utterly unexpected person: Elder Nam.
“So Elder Nam took her as a direct disciple?”
“What, you didn’t know? Junior Martial Sister Cheong-eum became Elder Nam’s dao companion.”
At those words, I snatched the gourd back from his hand.
Then I shoved the liquor into my mouth with a roughness that was unlike me.
Some of it missed my throat and ran down the back of my neck, but I did not care.
If I was going to extinguish the fire that had suddenly flared up in my belly, I needed to pour in as much liquor as I could.
But perhaps he had grown regretful that I was drinking up what remained, because Yang Jeon reached to seize the gourd from me again.
I used my free hand to form a Golden Crow Hand and lightly blocked his attempt.
Whoosh! Tap. Tap.
With his hand blocked so effortlessly, he seemed to give up on the gourd and spoke again.
“Junior Martial Sister Cheong-eum is only one of Elder Nam’s many dao companions. There’s no rule saying she can’t have another dao companion besides him, either, so if your heart is still in it, it’s not too late.”
At that, I straightened the gourd I had tipped too far and asked him back with a bitter smile, “So you knew the heart I didn’t even know I had?”
By then the alcohol had risen enough to redden his cheeks, and he answered again.
“Every time I came to find you, didn’t you keep bringing up Junior Martial Sister Cheong-eum?”
Did I? Honestly, I wasn’t sure.
I suppose I might have said I had come back without meeting her, or asked after her here and there, but I had not even properly understood my own feelings toward her until now, so that could not be helped.
“She was nothing more than a breeze that passed by. How can I call something mine when it was gone before I even had time to reach out?”
It had clearly begun as no more than the lust stirred up by Heaven-Defying Lust Madness Classic. But after I had kissed her, my feelings for her must have deepened without my noticing as time went by.
The image of her back then—her flustered, innocent, almost girlish expression, and the flying magical instrument, the wooden horse, that she had gifted me as though revealing her own heart—had burned itself into my soul like a fire seal.
But now it was all a memory I had to swallow down with a single mouthful of drink.
So I drank once more, then offered Yang Jeon the gourd again, though there was barely any liquor left.
“Now I see you really are my friend. From now on, even if you come to me spouting nonsense, I won’t turn you away.”
When I finished speaking and grinned at him, he promptly took the gourd from me, brought it to his lips, and emptied it in one go before speaking again.
“Right. The wind only brushed your sleeve for a moment; it didn’t shake your heart.”
He smiled back at me like that, then soon left, saying he had work to do.
And that left me alone.
For a moment, I considered taking out the wooden puppet and talking things over with Seop Myeong-gyeol, but soon I realized what I actually needed to do. When it came to settling a tangled heart, training was always best. For the time being, I decided it was right to devote myself entirely to improving my cultivation.
Which meant the person I needed to talk to now was not Seop Myeong-gyeol, who knew countless cultivation methods, but someone who could help me obtain an elixir right away.
“You’ve been drinking?”
Jeong Sa-sook wore a hair ornament that shimmered in the deep vermilion glow of sunset. Her appearance felt a little unfamiliar, so I pointed it out.
“I have. Junior Martial Sister, you’re especially radiant today. You haven’t forgotten the promise you made me, have you?”
She had clearly promised me that next time, she would help me without fail.
But at my words, her face flushed red, and she gave an answer I had never expected.
“How rude! Just because I made you a promise, do you think you can come here as you please and demand that I keep it?”
Right... this was what cultivators were really like. Weren’t they the sort of people who treated promises with others as nothing more than a passing exchange of words, caring only about achieving their own goals?
And just as I was about to turn away, having recalled the true nature of cultivators without a trace of lingering attachment, her absurd words continued.
“At the very least, you should’ve given me some warning! I’m not saying I won’t sing the song I promised you. But if you barge in like this and demand that I sing it, wouldn’t that fluster me as well?”
Her words brought back the memory of that night we had spent together.
I’ll sing it for you next time. If I’m going to sing, I need to think it through in advance.
That was the other promise she had made after asking me to sing again the song I had performed while lost in old memories. She had promised that she would sing for me as well.
In truth, the reason I had come to see her was to ask her to join me in going to Peach Blossom Grotto so we could hunt spirit beasts that might be useful as elixir materials, but the moment she saw me, the first thing she remembered was her promise to sing.
Fortunately, it turned out we had simply been thinking of different things.
Just as I slowly turned back around, she met my eyes, hesitated for a moment, then drew a long breath and began to sing.
“I ask the clouds: can the wandering moonlight, too, return to the heavens?
Though I drift after you, I can never quite reach you.
If only there were a single night in which I could remain.
The light that once shone on you in a silent night.
Could it find your path again?
Searching the Clouds for One’s Heart
Can the Lost Moon Return to Heaven
Though I Follow You, I Cannot Reach
I Wish for Only One Night’s Rest
In the Quiet Night, I Once Shone Upon You
Can I Find the Road Home Again?”
To my surprise, she was singing a song remarkably similar to the one I had sung before. More than that, it was a song that seemed to pour out exactly the feelings I had been unable to put at ease.
For a moment, I was speechless, just staring at her, and when she finally finished the song she had been pouring her heart into, she suddenly erupted in anger.
“Now that I’ve kept my promise, are you satisfied?”
Of course, I immediately shook my head at her words.
Then I took a step toward her and said, “There is still something you must do with me.”
She could say nothing in response, only staring at my lips. It seemed she had already forgotten the most important promise she had made to me.
So I took two more steps forward and held out my hand.
“Didn’t you say you would help me? No matter what it was.”
Because she had sung a song that reflected my troubled heart so faithfully, I could tell as well. She had feelings of affection for me...
Just as I had waited and looked for someone, she had also been waiting and looking for me.
Truthfully, in all the years I had lived, the only true object of my love had been A-cheong. But that did not mean I knew nothing of women. Thanks to that, I now knew how to reach out my hand to someone who liked me.
“You’re telling me to take your hand now?”
When she asked that, I only smiled in answer. She averted her gaze a little, then slipped her hand into mine.
At that moment, I took the flying magical instrument, the wooden horse, from my storage and enlarged its form.
“Since I’m planning to spend quite a long time in Peach Blossom Grotto, you’d best steel yourself.”
The instant I finished speaking, I used our joined hands to help her onto the wooden horse. Then I swung myself up behind her at once.
“I don’t know whether the lost moonlight can return to the heavens, but even if I have to wipe out every last spirit beast in Peach Blossom Grotto, I intend to return only after I have reached late Qi Refining.”
At my words, she muttered something under her breath.