The Arrival of So Biwon
After Sa Unsik left, Yoo Eunhyeon found himself with a new morning and evening routine: practicing the Mahon Cheongong that Sa Unsik had passed on to him.
“Hoo…….”
Yoo Eunhyeon let out a long, satisfied breath and rose to his feet.
Simply circulating his internal energy through a full cycle left him feeling refreshed, his body healthier than before.
For someone who worked his body every single day like Yoo Eunhyeon, nothing could have been better.
“It’s more fun than I expected.”
Yet what truly delighted him was something else entirely.
It was the act of piercing through the internal energy with his own principles and establishing it as a proper Dao.
At first he had accepted and circulated the energy only along the fixed paths Sa Unsik had taught him.
But before many days had passed, Yoo Eunhyeon realized that this internal energy method was exactly like cultivating a field.
Taking in the energy of nature and letting it flow as it should—this was work utterly familiar to him. It was no different from clearing trees from a mountainside, cutting waterways, and shaping the finest field for farming.
“Let’s think of the dantian that stores internal energy by drawing in nature’s qi as a field. And if the meridians are the pathways that energy travels through…….”
Leaving the broad framework of the method Sa Unsik had given him untouched, Yoo Eunhyeon began adjusting the directions of the energies flowing through the finer meridians.
Any other martial artist who saw it would have clicked their tongue and declared it the surest way to fall into qi deviation. Unaware of any such danger, Yoo Eunhyeon simply regulated his breathing.
As though tidying the ground around a central field, he reshaped the flows of internal energy and drew them in.
Roughly half a month passed.
The training itself had gone smoothly, yet Yoo Eunhyeon’s anxiety had been steadily mounting all the while.
“Mother should be back any day now.”
His mother, Su Hwa-seon, had still not returned.
She had clearly said half a month would be enough. Instead of coming home, she had not even sent word, so of course he was worried.
“Honestly. If you’re going to be late, you could at least say so. What’s the person waiting supposed to do…….”
Yoo Eunhyeon took out his frustration by catching and killing a caterpillar that had been munching on a peach for no good reason.
After grumbling the whole day while sorting peaches, he was on his way home when his steps suddenly halted.
“Huh?”
He stared at the tree stump near the entrance to the house and made a startled sound.
It was a stump he had passed countless times on the way back, yet something about it felt different from usual.
He could not yet see clearly, but the strange sensation was vivid and sharp.
It was possible only because Yoo Eunhyeon’s senses were keen enough for Sa Unsik himself to have praised them. Gaining internal energy had sharpened them further still.
After a moment’s hesitation, Yoo Eunhyeon carefully approached.
“Hoo…….”
Then he saw someone sitting on the stump.
The figure was an old man with a closely shaved head, a long pipe clenched between his teeth. The bare scalp alone made him look like a monk, yet even Yoo Eunhyeon, who lived deep in the mountains, had never seen a monk who smoked.
He seemed so perfectly blended into the background that he might have been part of a painting, and Yoo Eunhyeon felt oddly reluctant to speak first.
“Young benefactor. Might I trouble you with a few questions?”
Fortunately the old man turned his head and addressed him first. His voice carried a strange resonance similar to Sa Unsik’s.
“Ah, yes……. Monk……?”
At the word “benefactor,” Yoo Eunhyeon naturally called him a monk.
Even so, his doubts did not fully vanish. For a monk, the pipe was still lit, and at the waist of what looked like a Taoist robe hung a pair of blades.
Somehow this one also seems to resemble nature, just like the Lord……. Are all martial artists like this?
Thanks to Sa Unsik’s teachings, Yoo Eunhyeon at least understood that martial arts meant borrowing the power of nature. While he was thinking that might be the case, the old man smiled kindly.
“Hehe. Call me whatever feels comfortable. I am neither monk nor Taoist, yet in a way I am both.”
From the old man still flowed a leisurely energy like nature itself, much as it had from Sa Unsik.
Yet where Sa Unsik had carried the wildness and unpredictable chaos of nature, this man seemed to embody its grandeur and calm order.
“Then I’ll call you Daoist Monk.”
“Daoist Monk……. Hehe.”
Feeling strangely at ease, Yoo Eunhyeon made a joke that was unlike him. Silly as the remark was, it seemed to please the old man.
“It suits rather well. What meaning is there in a name, after all……. Yet there is meaning in refusing to deny what draws one, so I shall accept it.”
As the old man began to spout peculiar words, Yoo Eunhyeon’s face slowly contorted.
He said he’s both monk and Taoist……. Is that why even his speech is twice as complicated?
Whether he noticed Yoo Eunhyeon’s thoughts or not, the old man simply drew on his pipe and exhaled a plume of smoke. A thick herbal fragrance rose from it.
“Well then. May this old man ask a few questions now?”
“Ah, please go ahead.”
“Has anyone visited this place recently?”
“How recent do you mean by recently……?”
“Around twenty days ago, I would say.”
The only visitor in that time had been Sa Unsik. Yoo Eunhyeon hesitated a moment over whether to admit it. Without knowing why the old man was seeking Sa Unsik, he had no wish to be dragged into unnecessary trouble.
“I don’t really…….”
Thinking that playing dumb was best in such cases, he was about to shake his head.
At that instant he met the old man’s eyes directly.
Yoo Eunhyeon had no choice but to swallow the rest of the sentence. Somehow the old man’s gaze seemed to know everything already, yet still asked.
He did not want to get involved in a dispute, but nothing was certain, and he had no desire to force a lie either. In the end he nodded.
“He did visit.”
As if he had already known, the old man’s expression did not change in the slightest even after the nod.
“Might I ask that person’s name?”
“He said it was Sa Unsik.”
“Hmm…… How long did he stay here?”
“He arrived about twenty days ago and stayed roughly five days, I think?”
Having started talking, Yoo Eunhyeon no longer felt any urge to hide things. He simply answered the questions as they came.
“Do you know that person’s identity?”
“He seemed like a martial artist? Where was it…… He said he came from a place called Mount Dae in Qinghai, I believe?”
Yoo Eunhyeon muttered as though dredging up a hazy memory. The fact that he, who barely knew the place names of the Central Plains, still remembered Sa Unsik’s words was itself proof of how powerful that encounter had been.
The old man continued to regard him with clear, transparent eyes, as if trying to see straight through any falsehood.
Yoo Eunhyeon, who had told no lies, wore a confident expression. The old man asked again.
“Can you tell me what that person did while he stayed here?”
“He just watched me farm and asked this and that, so I answered. That was all.”
Of course he completely omitted any mention of martial arts or marriage. He would not lie, but unfavorable truths could still be left unspoken.
“You mean he simply came to watch young benefactor farming?”
“He said he was just traveling, looking for places with fine scenery.”
“Is that truly all?”
When the old man pressed a little too hard, Yoo Eunhyeon also slightly furrowed his brow. He had been answering as if drawn along by the man’s words, yet listening now, there was no reason at all to be interrogated like this.
“But Daoist Monk, are you acquainted with that Lord?”
The old man fell silent for a moment.
At Yoo Eunhyeon’s counter-question he seemed to realize he had gone too far. He exhaled a stream of smoke and lightly bowed his head.
“……I have been most rude. Having learned the trail of the man I was recently pursuing, it seems I grew too impatient.”
Faced with such humility from someone who looked far older than himself, Yoo Eunhyeon also became flustered and bowed in return.
“Not at all. Visitors rarely come here……. If you wish to hear more, please come inside. You’re a guest—allow me to offer you some tea.”
“Hehe. Would you do that for me? Well then……. This old man is called So Biwon.”
“I am Yoo Eunhyeon.”
As he returned the introduction, Yoo Eunhyeon suddenly glanced at the hill and started. Their conversation had seemed brief, yet the sun was already setting.
At how swiftly time had passed he somehow recalled the old tale of the woodcutter whose axe handle rotted while he watched the immortals play, and immediately shook his head.
Nonsense. First ghosts, and now immortals?
“Young benefactor. Why is that?”
“It’s nothing. Come, let’s go in.”
At So Biwon’s question Yoo Eunhyeon shook his head as if clearing away idle thoughts. Thus, half a month after seeing Sa Unsik off, he found himself hosting another guest.
Yoo Eunhyeon invited So Biwon into the house and served him tea. Then he continued the conversation they had left unfinished outside.
“Daoist Monk, did you come all this way chasing after the Lord?”
Since So Biwon had grilled him thoroughly about Sa Unsik the moment he arrived, it was easy enough to guess he had come seeking the man’s trail.
“You could say that.”
“If that’s the case, he’s been gone quite a while. Wouldn’t it be better to hurry after him instead of lingering here?”
To Yoo Eunhyeon, who had no idea how swiftly martial artists—especially masters like Sa Unsik—could travel, half a month made the question only natural.
So Biwon, however, merely smiled with unhurried ease.
“Hehe. It is true this old man has been pursuing him, yet I did not chase him in order to meet him. On the contrary, meeting him would be troublesome. In truth I came only because I alone am able to follow his trail……. Should we actually meet, it would be no different from one of us losing his life, so I have little desire for a reunion.”
“Eh? Then the two of you are enemies?”
“Hehe. No. That is not so. It is merely a matter of our respective positions. In a way one might even say we walk toward the same path. It may sound contradictory, but there is no need for young benefactor to force an understanding. Those who are not of the martial world find such relationships difficult to grasp.”
Not enemies, yet if they met they would have to fight—and yet they might also be companions on the same road.
Yoo Eunhyeon could not fully comprehend So Biwon’s words, but for the moment he simply nodded.
If one started fretting over every incomprehensible thing in life, the world would become far too tiring to live in.
“That could be. But I don’t really know anything more.”
Having no wish to involve himself further in matters he could not understand, Yoo Eunhyeon decided to play dumb.
“…….”
So Biwon merely gazed at him in silence. Yoo Eunhyeon flinched under that look.
It was a face that seemed to see not the surface but the depths within. A strong feeling arose that he must not lie.
As if peering straight into those depths, So Biwon spoke in a calm voice.
“I am merely interested in what purpose that man headed where for, and what actions he took. Might you tell me?”