The Repulsion of Yin and Yang
Different energies repel.
I see. So you mean to treat me as if I am not even here. It doesn't matter. Your spirit will break soon enough. The moment the ritual's power begins to work, the young master will be mine.
It galls me that you've kept him all to yourself, but I will allow it just this once. There will be a pleasure, I think, in watching the grief on your face when I take him from you. Pain that comes after happiness always cuts deeper. Ah, I can hardly wait—your face, helpless before me, as the young master is stolen away.
The next day, I explained the situation to Master.
"For that reason, I'd like to ask you to keep things ordinary."
"Good grief. Fine, fine. A woman and all her carrying-on."
Master's eyes slid toward Tomusa, standing off to one side. She made a careful point of not meeting them.
"Then what I teach you today will be homework enough to span the whole of your childhood."
Yesterday he gifted me the agony of having my limbs torn apart, and today it's an assignment for my entire childhood?
"I'm already worried what sort of ordeal is waiting, and the lesson hasn't even started."
"Hahaha! Don't worry. It's only a little abstruse—difficult, nothing more. Put in the time and the effort, and you will certainly succeed."
He broke into a great, open laugh. As if I were in any position to believe him.
"So what exactly will you be teaching me?"
"Ahem. Yesterday I told you of the harmony of yin and yang, and you profited by that principle. This time, we will use the nature of yin and yang as they stand opposed."
"Then isn't that simply breaking the harmony between them?"
"Ah-ah. Not breaking it. We only take the repulsive force the two energies bear toward each other, and make a power of it."
Black qi unfurled from Master's right hand with a low, rushing hiss.
"Is that Hand Qi?"
"It is. First time you've seen qi drawn outside the body?"
"Yes... the first time. It's incredible...."
"Anyway, watch closely."
This time, white qi bloomed from his left hand.
"Now look. When the qi of yin and the qi of yang are present like so, and you send each one toward the other—"
He turned his palms to face one another. Every time the two streams met, blue light leapt between them, crackling sharp as lightning.
"This blue energy is the power born when yin and yang repel one another. Wield it, and the same measure of inner energy will produce a far greater force."
He laid the explanation out like a man showing off a prize.
"But isn't this just the Thunder Art?"
"Ha! No, you brat. It looks similar, but the principle is on another level entirely. Those people compress their inner energy and then detonate it. This uses the repulsive force between yang qi and yin qi."
Looked exactly the same to me....
"But I can't draw qi outside my body. How am I supposed to do it?"
"Inside an acupoint, obviously. What kind of question is that?"
"...I'm sorry? To do it inside a single acupoint, I'd have to manifest two different energies at one point at the same time, wouldn't I?"
"Yep."
I was appalled. Master could not have sounded more casual.
"How am I supposed to do that?!"
He smacked me on the head for my temper.
"Hey. Gather yang qi in your right hand."
Afraid of being hit again, I did as I was told.
"Now gather yin qi in your left."
"Like this?"
"Mm. Coming along nicely. Then you'll manage."
I stared at him in pure disbelief. He only stroked his beard.
"No need for me here. I'll be going."
And with that, he vanished. I was left standing alone in the training ground.
"Master...! Master...!! Come back, please, Master!!!"
Tch. Send a voice transmission and call that teaching?
Nothing else for it. I sat down on the floor of the training ground, called up yang qi in my right hand and yin qi in my left, and slammed the two together—!
Clap.
Yeah. Figures. Nothing but the sound of my own applause, and not a thing besides. I could gather two different energies at once easily enough, so long as they sat in different parts of my body. But he wanted it done in a single place.
"I was going to!"
Honestly. Just you wait. What's he going to do if I pull it off on the first try?
All right. First, gather the yin qi. Then, if I poured yang qi in over it—
Tch. Blocked. The energy already settled there wouldn't let the other in.
"Quiet, please! You're distracting me."
For now, the closest I could hold two different energies was the distance from one hand to the other. So I started closing it. Hand and hand became chest and hand, then shoulder and hand, elbow and hand, fingertip and wrist.
Done. I had narrowed the gap at which I could gather two opposing energies at once, and what remained wasn't even a handspan. At this rate, when I unleashed a palm technique, I might even strike with both attributes in a single blow.
Ah—I'd been so fixed on closing the distance that I'd forgotten what actually mattered.
"Hmph! Just watch. I'll succeed before the day is out."
Now, let the two energies flow so they mingled naturally at the center of the palm. Not too much of either one. Neither side running slower than the other.
Hm. I had managed to manifest both energies at a single point. And all they did was fall into harmony. Nothing happened at all. No matter how I turned it over, this was the best I could do.
"I'm not making any more progress, so what do you want from me?! Should I just break this harmony?!"
Why had he gone quiet?
Don't tell me. If I break this—!
"...But how do I break it?"
Tch. I hadn't wanted to resort to this.
"If you won't tell me, I'll tell Grandmother."
The words were barely out of my mouth before Master appeared at my side.
"Tch. Underhanded brat. Invoking the name of the Zhejiang White Tiger."
He clicked his tongue and went on, slow and drawling.
"Hey. Suppose you wanted to break a bead. How would you do it?"
"Throw it on the ground."
"And can you throw that thing you've gathered in your hand onto the ground?"
"I can't."
He'd come to help, and all he offered was nonsense.
"Then how do you break a bead that just sits there?"
"Strike it hard with something solid, and it would break."
"Right. Then that ought to break if you strike it hard, too. I've said my piece, so don't come looking for me."
Another string of incomprehensible remarks, and he vanished again.
Strike it hard and break it?
He had to mean I should break it with inner energy. So I would gather that energy at the Quze point, the hollow at the crook of the elbow. A great deal of it. As much as I could hold. And then, all at once, drive it toward my hand!
"Ngh—!"
Inner energy stockpiled at the Quze point slammed into the store held in my palm. The weave of yin and yang shattered. Power burst through my hand all at once, numbing, vast, and wild.
Only then did I understand why Master had been so intent on teaching me this. What surged through me was a force my present inner energy should never have reached—several times stronger than the amount I had gathered only a moment ago.
"This is granite, though?"
Figuring I had nothing to lose, I brought my fist down on the floor. The boom was enormous. The training ground shattered to pieces beneath me.
"Young Master!"
Startled by the noise, Tomusa and Myoryeong came running.
"Are you all right? You aren't hurt anywhere, are you?!"
"Yeah, I'm fine. But look at this! I did this!!"
I pointed at the shattered floor.
"The shards could cut you. Let's get you clear of them first."
Tomusa swept me up into her arms as if I weighed nothing.
"But... is this going to be all right?"
"The servants will have a bit of a time of it, but it's fine. Even so, don't do it again."
"Yeah. Okay."
I was fretting, and Tomusa was the one soothing me. I'd have to tell Mom later that I was sorry for breaking the training-ground floor.
"Master, then today's lesson is over, right?!"
"Tomusa, Master says I can rest now. Let's play together. It's been a while."
"All right. Let's play."
The moment I showed her I was fine, the worry smoothed clean off Tomusa's face.
"Young Master, you weren't going to leave me out, were you?"
"Of course not. Myoryeong, you play with us too."
"I was really hurt, thinking I was the only one being left behind."
"Huh? Did I do that? Well, we can all play together from now on."
From the roof, Lee Hyeon's master watched the boy and his bodyguard, and spoke.
"That rascal. This time I truly thought he wouldn't manage it, and he goes and succeeds in a single day. So the ones who've overcome Severed Meridian Syndrome really are a different breed, aren't they?"
"The truth is, I'd meant to leave this as nothing but homework and teach him other things. Born lucky in his learning. Then I can show him all sorts of things in the time we have left."
"Whose grandson is he, after all. Talent like that shouldn't even be possible.... Bah. Thank heaven I took the kid as my disciple. Hand him over to those other women and I'd have been sick with envy."
"Well then. Shall I teach him as much as I can, before the time runs out...."