Why Are Women So Strange? (1)
A few days later, a notice stamped with the Cult Leader’s seal was posted on the bulletin board standing tall at the very center of the main school grounds.
Combat Tournament for Those Below the Age of Majority
Target: All probationary disciples and disciples within the cult who have not yet undergone their coming-of-age ceremony.
Rules: All methods permitted except killing.
Reward: Those who place in the top ten will receive the supreme reward.
The final survivor will be granted the opportunity to become the Cult Leader’s disciple.
The area around the bulletin board was swarmed in an instant.
“A tournament for minors? Aren’t those just kids?”
“Still, if you make it into the top ten, they’re giving out a supreme reward.”
“Look at the reward for the final winner, too. It says they’ll be given a chance to become the Cult Leader’s disciple.”
Not only the disciples, but everyone, showed interest.
Some cheered at the chance to compete at their age; others were thinking of sending their children, and still others, their own disciples.
Something like this was a rare chance to catch the Cult Leader’s eye.
Besides, until now the combat tournament had always been held only after coming of age, so the idea of extending the opportunity to children younger than that was enough to make anyone’s eyes go wild.
And before long, the news reached me as well.
“Wang Saryeong, are you going to take part too?”
Jin Sohee asked me.
Well. I’d faced the Blood Demon in person, and that had made one thing clear: he was monstrously strong.
Still, the road I had to walk and the road the Blood Demon offered were bound to be different.
In that situation, did I really need to work for the right to become his disciple?
“I’m not really aiming for the disciple slot.”
“What?”
Jin Sohee’s eyes widened in surprise.
“If you become the Cult Leader’s disciple, you’d basically have to inherit his martial art.
But the martial arts I’ve learned are completely different in flavor.
Of course, if I became the Cult Leader’s disciple, I’d probably become an exceptional master, but to do that I’d have to throw away everything I’ve built so far.”
And the black magic was different too. It was black magic powered by Death Energy. I’d already tried a few times, but blood energy alone wouldn’t activate it.
What black magic needed was only death energy. Even the Blood Demon himself couldn’t cultivate death energy, so if I wanted to walk my own path, following the line of the Third Blood Demon was the right way to go.
Jin Sohee stared at me for a moment, dumbfounded.
In the Blood Cult, the position of the Cult Leader’s disciple was effectively one rank below an elder.
I guess it was surprising that I wouldn’t care about a place like that.
“…That’s just like you. You don’t care about a position everyone else would kill to get.
Still, you’ll have to participate. There’s no way they’d just sit back and let someone like you sit this out.”
“I know. I may not want to become a disciple, but I’m definitely taking the reward.”
If the top ten were all promised a supreme reward, then finishing second might get me something even better.
“You’re taking part too, right?”
“If you’re participating.”
“Then we’re competitors.”
I turned and lifted a hand in farewell.
“Train hard. You’ll need to be at my level before I can push you into first place.”
With that, I started back toward my room, but Jin Sohee kept following me.
“Why are you following me?”
“Teach me, too.”
“What?”
To sum up Jin Sohee’s request: among our peers, I was the strongest, so she wanted me to teach her how to get stronger.
It was weird enough that I’d be making a competitor stronger in the first place, but fundamentally, my method wasn’t something I could use on Jin Sohee.
“Then at least spar with me.”
I barely managed to shake off her request for a match and returned to my room.
Only to find someone I didn’t know standing inside.
“Who are you?”
“My, you sure look sharp.”
She smiled brightly, acting innocent enough, but the quick-wheeling eyes beneath that sunny expression told me she was anything but harmless.
She wore red martial robes and looked old enough to have recently gone through her coming-of-age ceremony, yet the heavy blood aura clashing with her youthful face made her stand out.
She wasn’t someone I remembered from among the disciples, nor from the instructors.
I closed the door and stepped slowly into the room. A chill brushed the back of my neck.
The intruder was perched on the edge of my bed, swinging her legs carelessly.
And yet, despite that completely unguarded posture, she was ready to respond in an instant.
And then...
She feels wrong.
The smell of blood coming off her body had something strangely familiar about it.
Yes—she gave off the same sort of feeling as the energy the Blood Demon had shoved into me.
“It’s rude to barge into someone else’s room like this, don’t you think?”
At my question, she puckered her lips and stood up.
“Rude? That’s just something the weak have to worry about.”
That sounded like the sort of line only someone high and mighty would say, but she didn’t look old enough to have any such rank.
“Then what brings you here?”
“I heard there was a disciple my master had taken an interest in, so I came to take a look.”
Master. With that one word, the puzzle pieces in my head began clicking into place.
Someone in the Blood Cult young enough to look like that, yet possessing such a dense blood aura and the audacity to behave like a tyrant within the cult.
I looked straight into her eyes and asked, “Are you the Cult Leader’s daughter?”
“Puhahahaha!!!”
At my answer, she burst into laughter, clutching her stomach. She laughed until tears and snot were streaming down her face. Right there in my room, like a pig stinking up the place.
“Well, you were close, but wrong. I’m the youngest of Master’s three disciples—Baek Yeon.”
My deduction had been completely off the mark. Still, if she was the Blood Demon’s disciple, then of course he’d have more than one; a man at the head of an entire faction would naturally keep several disciples.
“So then, what brings the Third Disciple of the Cult Leader all the way to a disciple’s room?”
“Like I said, I came to look around.”
She’d broken into someone else’s room without asking and was acting as if she owned the place, all for the sake of “looking around.”
“Then if you’ve finished looking, I’d appreciate it if you’d leave.”
“I haven’t finished looking yet.”
The moment she finished speaking, Baek Yeon’s figure blurred.
Whoosh!
She closed the distance without a sound, her fingers curling like a hooked claw as she shot for my neck.
It was Blood Ghost Claw, one of the Blood Cult’s signature techniques.
I leaned back immediately and avoided the attack. At the same time, I circulated the Death Blood Demon Art.
“Wow. I thought that was a perfect ambush, but you dodged it?
This is the real thing, isn’t it? Now I see why Master took an interest in you.”
Baek Yeon didn’t stop. She charged again, this time shooting condensed blood energy from her fingertips like blades.
I wrapped the power of the Death Blood Demon Art around my arm and knocked the blades aside.
I had the urge to end this cleanly with black magic.
She didn’t seem nearly as formidable as the Blood Demon or the elders or the chief instructor I’d seen before, so if I used black magic too, I could finish this with ease.
But the woman in front of me was the Cult Leader’s disciple. If I revealed black magic here, it would be only a matter of time before it reached the Cult Leader’s ears.
I have to fight her with martial arts alone.
Baek Yeon’s movements were as fluid as a dance, yet ferociously aggressive, and I parried her attacks with the Blood Demon Art of the Three Evils.
Clang! Boom!
Dozens of exchanges erupted in the narrow room. On the surface, our momentum looked evenly matched.
She was reproducing the Blood Demon’s martial art exactly, and I was reproducing the martial art of the Third Blood Demon exactly.
Realizing our levels were roughly equal, Baek Yeon’s eyes flashed with madness.
“Ahahaha! This is amazing! I never thought there’d be anyone among the probationary disciples who could go toe to toe with me.”
As she drew her energy even higher, her hair began to redden.
“Can you block this too?”
Her eyes were fully crazed now. This was different.
Could I really stop that with martial arts alone?
Should I use black magic before my life was actually in danger?
At that moment, as if responding to Baek Yeon’s aura, the blood energy within my body reacted. It burned hot, screaming to be unleashed.
As I guided that blood energy, it blended harmoniously with the Death Blood Demon Art.
But...
They’re not mixing.
Normally, the blood energy would have sunk into the death energy. But the blood energy the Blood Demon had directly infused into me refused to assimilate.
If I’d had the time, I would have sat down in meditation and regulated my breathing to calm the blood energy, but a demon woman was right in front of me.
“Take this!”
There was no time to leisurely settle my energy. I wrapped both powers around my arm and smashed her attack away.
BOOM!!!
Dust exploded throughout the room.
“I’m screwed...”
I’d only deflected her attack as before, yet now she was unconscious and slammed into the wall.
And she was the Third Disciple of the Blood Demon, no less.
It was bad enough that I’d fought a disciple of the Blood Demon at all, but to actually beat her...
This was not a small problem.
“How am I supposed to clean this up...?”
I pressed a hand to my forehead.
Would it be better to just take her life outright and turn her into a ghoul? Or maybe I should test the method for making jiangshi.
I shook my head. She was the Blood Demon’s Third Disciple. If someone told him she’d come to see me, I wouldn’t just make an enemy of the entire Blood Cult—I’d have to face that monstrous Blood Demon himself.
“For now, I should wake her up.”
If she came to her senses right away, there wouldn’t be any problem.
“Third Disciple-nim, Third Disciple-nim!”
She didn’t budge. No matter how much I shook her, she showed no sign of waking.
“Haa, no choice.”
I supported Baek Yeon and carried her to the bed.
For now, I’d lay her down and wait until she woke up.
“If I cast a concealment spell, no one should come in for at least a few hours.”
While I was laying Baek Yeon on the bed, the door opened.
The worst possible situation had just happened.
To make sure I’d be able to silence whoever it was, I turned—and saw Jin Sohee standing there in the doorway.
And she was wearing a pitiful expression, as if the world itself had been taken from her.
What’s wrong with her now?
Honestly, I had no idea why today had to be like this.