There's a Traitor Among Us (1)
The training was brutal.
Chu Yang-hon was a master whose pride ran every bit as deep as his severity — a perfectionist down to the bone. The time I'd spent under him hadn't been a week. When the training finally ended, nearly a fortnight had gone by.
We returned to the main sect.
"Ch-Cheongsong?"
"Cheongsong's back!"
"Cheongsong! Where have you been? We've been looking everywhere!"
The disciples crowded the mountain gate to welcome me home.
"Who's that behind him?"
"A beggar from the Beggar's Sect?"
They whispered among themselves, eyeing Chu Yang-hon at my back.
"I am Chu Yang-hon. I entered the Mount Hua Sect some three hundred years past."
"What? Chu Yang-hon?"
"Don't tell me — the First Sword of Mt. Hua?"
"Come on. That man only exists in legends."
Chu Yang-hon flicked his hand.
A soft hiss of steel. His sword drew itself from its scabbard and drifted through the air like a fish gliding through still water.
"That sword art!"
"The Plum Blossom Sword Art?"
"He's performing the Plum Blossom Sword Art with Sword Control?!"
The disciples' mouths fell open as they watched Chu Yang-hon's demonstration unfold across the empty sky.
"Who is the current Sect Leader of Mount Hua?"
Tea trickled into a cup. Hwa Jeok-gyeol, the current Sect Leader of Mount Hua, received Chu Yang-hon with every courtesy the rites demanded. As she poured for him with careful hands, a look of sheer survival flickered in her eyes.
"That our Ancestral Master would truly grace the main sect with his presence… this is a blessing bestowed by the heavens themselves."
"Hahaha. I severed my ties with the mortal world long ago. It's all thanks to this fellow here."
Chu Yang-hon clapped me on the shoulder as he said it.
"Pardon? Cheongsong?"
"Indeed. The boy possesses extraordinary talent."
"Cheongsong? Well… he's no dullard, but he's hardly exceptional for a man. He has been improving of late, I'll grant you that. He only just reached the fifth star of the Plum Blossom Sword Art."
"It's the seventh star now."
"I beg your pardon?"
"I gave him a little help."
Help?
Help?
He threw me into a pit of death, force-fed me unknown elixirs, denied me sleep, and sparred with me until I couldn't stand. Die or grow stronger. The training of the past fortnight had been closer to the methods of the Demonic Cult than anything the Mount Hua Sect would claim as its own. Thanks to that, my stats had climbed without spending a single S-Point.
I could still see it. My master's sociopathic face.
"If you are to call yourself my disciple, you will not set one foot outside this cave until you have reached the third star of the Nine Solitary Swords."
"How many years do you think that will take? We don't have time. The Black Obsidian Valley is going to attack Mount Hua."
"One week. Ten days at the most."
Even he, whose eye for the martial path reached the heavens themselves, could not see my power as an Absolute.
"How can a body and an inner force of this caliber produce footwork this poor?"
"This much would have them calling me a genius in the secular world."
"No. You expect me to believe that you completed the final form of the Nine Solitary Swords? I cannot accept it."
"Thinking is what I do best. No one can be perfect at everything."
"Special training, then. We raise the intensity."
Every time I showed a shortcoming, my master cranked the training harder. In the end, I tasted the extreme of swordsmanship in a mere fortnight.
"Be that as it may — if Cheongsong is the Ancestral Master's disciple, then his generational rank would be…"
"Pay it no mind. I am a man already cut off from the mortal world. Treat the boy as you always have."
That was when Chu Yang-hon's eyes lit up at the sight of Ryu Su-gyeong.
"Ohh. The Senior Disciple is a different breed indeed. Fine timber."
"You honor me."
"What say you to a match against my disciple? It should prove entertaining."
"Pardon? I have already surpassed the first-rate and stand at the threshold of the Peak realm. However much Cheongsong may have received the Ancestral Master's teachings, he will fall short of overtaking me."
Ryu Su-gyeong's brow twitched, her pride clearly pricked.
"So you will not fight?"
"Hmph! I can fight."
I looked at Ryu Su-gyeong. This was the first time since arriving in this world that I had truly come face to face with her.
She's a total tomboy.
It felt exactly like looking at Choi Yeo-jin before I'd conquered her. The classic martial artist through and through. Just seeing her made my chest swell. I wanted to rush over and hold her tight that very instant — but if I acted on that impulse here, I'd be written off as a lunatic on the spot.
"Eldest Senior Sister. Would you honor me with a spar?"
"You, Cheongsong? Truly? Even in a spar, I do not hold back."
"That's fine. I can handle that much."
"Hmph. You've been getting cozy with the junior sisters lately and it's gone to your head. Unlike the other women, I do not go easy on a man simply because he is a man. Only those I acknowledge earn my trust."
We stepped out in front of the building and drew live steel. Ryu Su-gyeong was already on the verge of major completion in the Plum Blossom Sword Art. I was at the seventh star — what people commonly called minor completion. My master had done everything he could for me. From here, I had to advance on my own.
"Look over there!"
"Cheongsooooong♥"
"Cheongsong and Eldest Senior Sister are going to spar!"
The moment I stepped outside, disciples poured in from every direction to watch.
"Come at me first. I'll give you three exchanges."
"You'll regret that."
A blossom of sword-light burst from my blade, petals of qi so beautiful they could have been real flowers. The extreme of the Illusion Sword — the Plum Blossom Sword Art, said to kill an opponent before they could even recognize the blade.
Clang!
"Hmph. Is that all?"
Ryu Su-gyeong caught my sword and smiled, light and dismissive.
"I was only feeling you out."
My blade seemed to split into many, a cascading illusion that scrambled her senses. Clang! Clang! Clang! She parried several times and gave ground.
"Tsk!"
She looked stung that she'd been forced to take a step back at all.
"Next time, there may be blood."
"Come!"
A roaring gale of sword-wind tore forward.
"This is—!"
Bam! Clang! Ryu Su-gyeong's blade failed to knock mine fully aside. My sword carved through her guard and into her robes. She was far too skilled for the edge to touch her skin — but the cloth split.
A rip. A heavy sway.
"Holy—!"
"No way! Eldest Senior Sister was hiding those?!"
"I always wondered why she bathed alone every day…"
"Eldest Senior Sister! You're gorgeous♥"
My sword had passed across her chest, slicing through the compression bandages and the collar of her robes, and her voluptuous figure spilled into the open air.
"You bastard!"
The three exchanges she had conceded were gone. Her sword came for me in earnest, fierce and unrestrained. Every time she swept her arms, those watermelon breasts heaved with the motion.
"What are those things, a honey trap? I can't concentrate on the spar!"
"You— you bastard!"
My body, which had been moving at full speed, stopped dead in a single instant and knocked her sword aside. A clatter of steel — her blade seemed to fly from her grip. She kicked it. The sword spun toward me, punched through my collar, and buried itself in a pillar behind my back.
She closed the distance and glared. Our faces were a centimeter apart, eyes locked.
Something soft and enormous pressed against my chest. Those massive breasts were flush against me.
"Yes. I lost. You're Eldest Senior Sister, no question."
They squished again, even softer.
"So, uh. When were you planning to take those off me? I've got an erection."
"What? You—!"
She flushed scarlet and jerked backward.
"Oh my god. Cheongsong almost went even with Eldest Senior Sister!"
"That kind of growth in such a short time? A few more years and Eldest Senior Sister might actually lose."
"Don't tell me the next Sect Leader is going to be Cheongsong."
I'd lost — but the change in me hit the crowd like a thunderclap.
"What sword art was that?"
Hwa Jeok-gyeol, Sect Leader of Mount Hua, put the question to me directly.
"The Nine Solitary Swords. A sword art created by Ancestral Master Chu Yang-hon. I've reached about the third star."
"Remarkable. To press a master of the ninth-star Plum Blossom Sword Art with a mere three stars…"
Ryu Su-gyeong bristled at that.
"Pressed? If I hadn't given him those exchanges, the match would have been decided in a single stroke. I held back out of consideration, that's all…"
"Before the spar, you said quite clearly that you do not go easy on a man you have not acknowledged. Surely you weren't holding back? Or is it that… you have feelings for Cheongsong as well?"
"I— I do not! I was simply caught off guard by an unfamiliar sword art."
"Hmm. Very well. Let us go inside. Ancestral Master, please take your rest for now. There is much to discuss regarding the future of the sect."
And just like that, the matter was settled. In the days that followed, I lived with the title of disciple to Mount Hua's Greatest Swordsman of All Time hanging over my head.
A few more days passed. Word reached my ears that rumors about me had already spread as far as the Wulin Alliance. The next generation's Greatest Sword Under Heaven, they were calling me.
I trained and I fucked, building my strength with everything I had.
"Your virility is truly something to behold."
Master Chu Yang-hon said it to my face.
"If you poured even half the passion you spend on women into your training, you would have been a master long ago."
"Master, this is my training. I found the secret of the Nine Solitary Swords in the middle of having sex."
"Hrm. It is true that you grow stronger the more you share intimacy with women… but it remains a most peculiar method of cultivation."
"Would you like to learn the bedroom arts as well, Master? There's a technique called the Plum Blossom Extreme Joy Art in the martial manuals."
"That will be quite enough. At my age, I am not about to take up the bedroom arts."
And so I was enjoying my sex life at the Mount Hua Sect when, one day—
"Cheongsong."
Ryu Su-gyeong came looking for me. She was wearing a short skirt, which was unlike her. A red China-style dress, a sword slung across her shoulder. She opened her mouth with uncharacteristic care.
"We've received word that monsters have been appearing in the vicinity of Greater Mount Hua."
"Already? The rumor that the Black Obsidian Valley's monsters had crossed the Great Wall only started the other day."
"It did. But the small fry have already pushed through northern Shaanxi and infiltrated the south. A considerable number of our Plum Blossom Swordswomen are committed to the hunt as we speak."
"Right. So what does that have to do with me?"
"You proved your strength in that last affair. Assist me in exterminating the monsters."
"Yes."
We assembled a party and started up the Taihang range. With us came Ha Bo-yeon, the disciple I'd sparred with before; Ryu Su-gyeong, our Eldest Senior Sister; and Hwa Mu-rin, the Sect Leader's daughter.
Ha Bo-yeon was skilled enough with the sword to be named a future Plum Blossom Swordswoman, and though Hwa Mu-rin seemed a little lacking thanks to her almost nonexistent knowledge of sex, she had inherited the Sect Leader's blood and her martial ability was outstanding. Ha Bo-yeon in particular had grown at a frightening pace over the last few months and had the masters wrapped around her finger.
"We're entering the area where the monsters have been sighted. The objective is to sweep from that peak to the one opposite and kill every monster we find."
The ranks of the Plum Blossom Swordswomen — Mount Hua's main fighting force — had been badly thinned after they'd gone to aid the Zhongnan Sect, which the Black Obsidian Valley had wiped out. Ordinarily the Plum Blossom Swordswomen would have handled this themselves, but these days they and the mid-tier masters were serving as unit captains, leading junior disciples beneath them.
"Can we finish it all today?"
"If we fight even once in a day, that's a success. Monsters are a slippery breed — they'll run the moment they see us. Let's move."
I followed Ryu Su-gyeong's back up the mountain. The trail climbed often, and every time it did, the underwear beneath her short skirt flashed into view, swaying with each step.
Something brushed against my lower body. I twitched.
Ha Bo-yeon grinned at me, sly and knowing.
"Shh."
She caught my wrist and guided my hand up under her own skirt. Squelch. There was nothing underneath that knee-length hem. I groped along her crotch and found a clit the size of a small bean, rolling it under my fingers.
"Mmh♥"
I eased a finger into her entrance, nice and slow.
A tap on my other side. Hwa Mu-rin had smacked me with her hand. She leaned in close to my ear, whispering like she was passing a secret.
"I wanna play Rice-Barley too."
In front of me, Ryu Su-gyeong's ears gave a great twitch. Those large pointed ears had flushed a faint, telltale red. I climbed the slope with one hand in Hwa Mu-rin's pussy and the other in Ha Bo-yeon's, working them both at once.
Squish. Squish. Squish.
"Nnh♡"
Hwa Mu-rin couldn't hold the sound in. Ryu Su-gyeong's ears flicked again. She had every reason to look back — and she didn't. She kept her eyes locked forward and pressed on.
"The summit is just ahead."
Ryu Su-gyeong said it like she was talking to herself.
"Already?"
I glanced around with a lazy, easy smile. From the high peak, the mountains fell away in every direction, the whole landscape laid out at a glance.
"I'm a little thirsty. I'll go get some water — I think there's a stream over that way."
Ha Bo-yeon spoke up, and I raised my hand with her.
"Very well. We don't know when a fight might break out, so be careful."
"Yes."
The instant I was out of Ryu Su-gyeong's line of sight, I started undoing my trousers. I'd been fingering those two pussies the whole way up without getting off, and my cock had been leaking pre-cum in a steady, helpless drip — hard enough now to cut glass, standing at a furious, almost painful attention.
"Time for a drink, then?"
Ha Bo-yeon smiled, filthy and delighted, and buried her face in my groin. My cock, slick and shining with clear pre-cum, pushed between her lips and slid into her mouth.