Confrontation
The form Yeobhwa unleashed with Hidden Jin was the Wood Collapse Fist.
It was the technique he trusted most.
Among all the stances of the Five Elements Fist, it alone seemed worth attempting with Hidden Jin. Even if the Hidden Jin itself failed to emerge, that was fine. So long as he delivered even a glancing blow that shook his opponent’s center, the exchange would break even.
At this range, even a retreating step would not let the other man fully escape. Yeobhwa took a half-step and poured every scrap of momentum he could into his fist. The power he felt was less than a quarter of what a proper execution of the form could produce—yet it was more than enough to hurl a man backward.
The thrusting fist streaked toward Cheonhwa’s chest—
and Cheonhwa moved in a way Yeobhwa never expected. He threw his entire upper body backward as though simply lying down. Iron Plate Bridge. Yeobhwa’s fist sliced empty air like a wasted arrow.
The cost of forcing Hidden Jin and failing was steep. His center of gravity lurched; his stance collapsed. For Cheonhwa it was the perfect opening. The five-move concession had already ended; he was about to right his own posture and counter when Inwol’s words suddenly rose in his mind.
He told me to treat this bout as instructional sparring—to take the position of a teacher.
Instructional sparring did not end merely by knocking someone down. The other party had to walk away having learned something; only then could it be called teaching.
What can I teach Senior Brother Yeobhwa?
Cheonhwa considered. In what was he superior to Yeobhwa?
Achievement in Balanced Heaven Qi Accumulation Art, Nine Palaces Footwork, and Five Elements Fist.
Of those, what could he teach right now?
Five Elements Fist.
The decision flashed through him and he acted at once. Using only the strength of his legs and waist, he snapped his torso upright as if springing. Then he advanced on a diagonal half-step, closing the distance until their shoulders nearly brushed. Through that point of contact he read Yeobhwa’s movement: the older disciple still had not fully recovered his balance.
Cheonhwa stepped between Yeobhwa’s feet and, with the diagonal shift of Earth Horizontal Fist, drove his whole body forward. The last of Yeobhwa’s wavering center vanished; he toppled straight backward.
After rolling once across the ground, Yeobhwa sat up wearing a blank, bewildered expression—the face of a man who had no idea what had just happened to him.
“That just now…”
“An applied form of Earth Horizontal Fist. Earth Horizontal Neutralizing Jin.”
“Earth Horizontal Neutralizing Jin…”
Yeobhwa repeated the name under his breath, committing the final technique that had felled him to memory. It was a form that required the ability to wield Jin itself, the same prerequisite as Hidden Jin. Even if he could not use it today, it could become the motive that drove him to train harder.
“Will you continue?”
“No. This is far enough.”
Once Hidden Jin had failed, prolonging the bout would not overturn the result. Yeobhwa conceded. Inwol, who had been acting as referee, approached.
“Well done, both of you. I’d like to hear each of your impressions of the match. Yeobhwa first.”
“I felt how high the wall still is. At the same time, it was a valuable hour that showed me the Five Elements Fist I know is not the end of the art.”
Yeobhwa spoke with open pleasure, clearly valuing the experience more than the loss itself.
“Now you, Cheonhwa. How did it feel once you were facing him?”
“His linking of forms is still lacking. He needs to solidify the fundamentals further.”
At the blunt assessment Yeobhwa’s face fell.
“Anything else worth noting?”
“Thanks to his natural frame, the force behind his fists is exceptional. I’m actually looking forward to seeing what it will be like once he completes the second stage.”
The praise that followed brightened Yeobhwa’s expression again. Cheonhwa and Inwol both thought the same thing privately: wearing every emotion on one’s face was a problem in its own right.
“Everything that needed saying has already been said, so I have nothing further to add. Training ends here for today. Cheonhwa, stay a moment—I have something to discuss.”
When Inwol dismissed them, Yeobhwa obeyed the instructor’s order and left the training ground first. Alone with Cheonhwa, Inwol stated his purpose.
“How did instructional sparring feel?”
“Difficult. Especially the part where you have to think about teaching rather than simply fighting.”
“Of course instructional sparring is harder than a regular bout. Still, if you mean to become Chief Disciple, you’ll need to grow accustomed to it.”
Chief Disciple—the title given to the disciple who stood highest within a generation. It was not awarded merely for early entry. Only those whose ability shone brightest among their peers could be chosen. That Inwol had mentioned it at all meant he regarded Cheonhwa as material worthy of the position.
“Instructor Inwol, do you want me to become Chief Disciple?”
“Given the path you’ve walked and the influence you’ve already shown, I believe it’s entirely possible.”
Cheonhwa thought the evaluation overstated. Strength alone did not make a Chief Disciple; the post also demanded reputation and the trust of others. For someone as unsociable as himself, looking after others would be no easy task.
“I’m only saying the possibility exists. You needn’t bury yourself in the idea.”
Seeing Cheonhwa’s troubled face, Inwol added the gentle qualifier. Still, Cheonhwa could not shake the complicated feeling. Suddenly the phantom of the founding master he had seen in the cave rose before his mind’s eye.
When you told me to prove myself… was this what you meant?
Naturally, the founding master of memory offered no answer.
Even after he began receiving individual training alongside Yeobhwa, Cheonhwa’s daily routine scarcely changed. He practiced external arts during the morning session. Whenever free moments appeared he swung the wooden sword, working to internalize the sword forms. While awake he maintained the children’s breathing method and poured himself into the third stage of Balanced Heaven Qi Accumulation Art. The only addition was the occasional instructional bout with Yeobhwa.
Cheonhwa knew every detail of Yeobhwa’s progress as thoroughly as his own—because Yeobhwa stuck to his side and cheerfully reported every scrap of it, whether Cheonhwa wanted to hear or not. Once Yeobhwa began the external-body training methods, his foundation arts advanced at a steep climb. In a mere seven days he rose from four-star to five-star achievement, a leap so sharp that even Yeobhwa himself was startled by his own growth.
Upon reaching five-star in the second stage, the Thirty-Six Swords Under Heaven was naturally added to his individual curriculum. Yeobhwa, however, did not look especially pleased. Because every feeling showed plainly on his face, his reluctance was transparent.
He seems to feel an aversion to swordsmanship itself—or perhaps to the sword as a weapon.
There was almost certainly some personal reason, and it might even be connected to his interest in fist arts.
“If learning the sword forms is hard, you can take it more slowly.”
“……It’s fine. Whether sooner or later, I must learn them if I want to pass the promotion examination.”
Yeobhwa answered Cheonhwa’s tactful suggestion with a bitter smile and a shake of the head. His complexion was poor, yet he continued the sword practice in silence. Cheonhwa respected that resolve and did not press further. Everyone carried at least one past locked inside their chest. All Cheonhwa could do was stand beside him and help him grasp the foundations of swordsmanship as quickly as possible.
Then, around the time Yeobhwa had barely managed to learn those foundations, Inwol remarked out of nowhere:
“We’re going to increase the number of disciples receiving external-body training like Junior Brother Yeobhwa.”
“It’s only been half a month since Senior Brother Yeobhwa started the methods.”
“Results appeared within that half-month, so the roster is expanding.”
Inwol looked thoroughly pleased that the number of students under his care was growing.
“No time to stand about. I’ll go prepare the training equipment the new disciples will use. If they arrive while I’m gone, tell them to wait a moment.”
Leaving the message, Inwol hurried off toward the storeroom. Not long afterward the disciples seeking external training began to appear. Among them were faces Cheonhwa knew well—a carefree-looking youth and a girl who carried a languid air. Myeonghwa and Yeonhwa.
“Why are the two of you here?”
Cheonhwa asked on reflex. Both had long since completed the second stage and entered the third; there was no real need for them to learn external-body methods. They answered his question in turn.
“I figured I’d see something interesting if I came.”
“I heard that if I come here I can spar with you every day.”
Each had come for their own interest. Learning the external methods was essentially a bonus. Cheonhwa found their answers absurd, yet the thought did not last long. A subtle sense of wrongness radiated from both of them. The change was minor, but Cheonhwa reacted with the sensitivity of a wild animal—a habit and an intuition born of a harsh childhood, when noticing even the smallest shift had been the difference between survival and death.
Their auras have changed.
Through his qi sense the true qi of the two felt subtly different from before. Myeonghwa carried the impression of a gentle breeze; Yeonhwa felt like cold snow. Only one circumstance produced such a shift.
“Have the two of you perhaps learned new internal arts?”
“Wow, you actually noticed.”
“Yes.”
Myeonghwa and Yeonhwa both confirmed it. Disciples who reached the third stage of Balanced Heaven Qi Accumulation Art were given the chance to study a higher-level mind method. Most seized the opportunity at once; as a foundational art, Balanced Heaven had clear limits when used as a primary method. Before learning, each candidate underwent various examinations to determine which art suited them. The checks existed because the characteristics of the different mind methods diverged so sharply. Learning an incompatible pair could twist the qi and blood and plunge a cultivator into deviation.
“I learned Blue Heaven Qi Art, and Junior Sister Yeonhwa learned Dark Heaven True Qi.”
“Junior Sister Yeonhwa’s true qi felt cold. Did she learn ice arts?”
“Mm. The examination said this one matched me best. It actually feels comfortable.”
A faint smile touched Yeonhwa’s lips; she clearly liked the new method. Dark Heaven True Qi possessed an extreme Yin nature, so the number of people who could learn it was limited. A single misstep could freeze the meridians solid under the Yin Cold Qi—yet if one could master it, the art granted abilities of an entirely different order from ordinary true qi.
“Sorry to keep you waiting. Finding the cart took longer than I expected.”
While the three conversed, Inwol returned from the storeroom with the training equipment. As Cheonhwa counted the pieces he sensed something odd.
“Instructor Inwol, there seems to be one set too many.”
“No, the count is correct. Myeonghwa, Yeonhwa, and Jeokhwa.”
Inwol pointed with his fingers as he named them in order. Cheonhwa automatically turned his gaze toward the last person mentioned. In a corner of the training ground stood a girl who had been deliberately erasing her presence. A face he had seen before—unmistakably the same girl who had faced Junior Sister Yeonhwa in the promotion-examination bout.
“Why is Junior Sister Jeokhwa acting like that?”
“The explanation’s a bit long.”
Myeonghwa kindly filled him in.
“Junior Sister Yeonhwa looks sharp, but outside of anything related to martial arts she’s pretty clueless. Junior Sister Jeokhwa is the one in charge of looking after her.”
Hearing only that much about the relationship already gave Cheonhwa a bad feeling.
“They had a huge fight recently over a difference of opinion, and then they ran into each other here for individual training.”
“So it’s an awkward situation to look each other in the face.”
“It is, but I don’t think it’ll last long.”
Myeonghwa jerked his chin toward Yeonhwa. She was currently absorbed in the training equipment, turning a sandbag this way and that in an attempt to hang it, yet making little progress on her own. After watching her struggle for some time, Jeokhwa finally could not bear it and stepped forward to fill the bag for her.
“See? Junior Sister Jeokhwa can’t stand watching that kind of helpless floundering. She keeps interfering, and before she knows it she ends up treated as Yeonhwa’s personal caretaker.”
“……”
Cheonhwa found himself speechless before the vicious cycle that good intentions had created.