The Heavenly Demon Teaches (2)
The Heavenly Demon���s words rang clear.
“Good. If the Heavenly Demon Divine Art is a hammer, how should one swing it?”
“Uh… strongly?”
“Exactly. You must swing it with power. But simply swinging hard won’t solve everything, will it? Just as there is swordsmanship and spearmanship in this world, there must be teachings that explain precisely how a hammer should be wielded.”
Hwaryeong explained that in martial arts, this guidance was known as principle.
“Principle teaches you how to deploy your martial arts for the best possible result. Without deep study of that principle, you cannot truly master any technique.”
“I understand up to that point.”
Yi Sun, who had been quietly listening, finally voiced the question that had been bothering him.
“Then… how exactly do you come to understand this principle?”
He didn’t know much about martial arts before, but now he grasped how vital principle was. The problem was that he still had no idea how to actually learn it. To him, principle remained an abstract, elusive concept.
“The method for understanding principle is already widely known. You, Dang So-il, should already be familiar with it.”
“Me?”
“Yes. You must know about martial arts verses, correct?”
At the suggestion that one could learn principle through martial verses, Yi Sun couldn’t agree. It wasn’t that he didn’t know the verses of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art. In today’s world, those verses were simply something you could look up on the internet in seconds.
Back when he first started playing the Heavenly Demon class in Apis, full of enthusiasm, he had done exactly what the protagonists in wuxia novels did. He searched for the verses of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art, memorized them, and hoped that enlightenment would follow, allowing him to wield true martial power.
Reality had been cruel.
No matter how many times he recited the sacred verses, enlightenment never came. Instead, players who simply copied the system-assisted skills progressed far faster. After getting beaten up by other users for days, Yi Sun eventually gave up and did what everyone else did: he watched strategy videos on MyTube and learned how to play the Heavenly Demon class properly.
Since then, he had never once looked at the martial verses again. Even now, as a recognized pro-level Heavenly Demon user in the league, those verses had never once helped him.
“You look like you don’t believe me.”
“Because no matter how much I memorized them, nothing ever changed.”
“Haha. Don’t you think it’s strange to expect results when you memorize them without even understanding their meaning? Just as you cannot study by staring at an English book without first learning the alphabet, there are prerequisites to learning the verses. And that is precisely what I will teach you today.”
From now on, I will teach you how to study martial arts.
I have been thinking about teaching the children about martial arts for some time now.
Ever since I met Harin and began instructing her, the contemplation has continued. It has not been a short period of reflection.
After all, the reason I seriously raised my rank in Apis was to gain the authority needed to teach.
While pondering how to earn that authority, I also considered how best to teach martial arts to people.
How could someone like me, who had never taught beginners, possibly instruct those who knew nothing?
Those who usually came seeking my guidance were already at least at the Peak Realm. Anyone below a certain level wouldn’t even dare approach me.
I never explicitly blocked them, yet at some point everyone simply accepted this as fact.
Thanks to that, while I had helped many who were stuck in their pursuit of enlightenment, I had never taught anyone from the very beginning.
The one who helped resolve this dilemma was Harin.
She understood modern people far better than I did and answered all my questions with sincerity.
“You don’t even know this?”
“Then let me ask you instead. How would I know something like that?!”
My conversations with Harin were a continuous series of shocks.
I had assumed everyone could at least form their own interpretations of martial verses like Harin did. But she told me that such people were rare. In fact, she said most people had never even read the verses of the arts they practiced.
From my perspective, it was incomprehensible—how could someone wield martial arts without even knowing the verses of their own technique? Yet that was simply how modern martial artists were.
Modern people knew far less than they didn’t know. When it came to martial arts, they were practically illiterate. They needed to start from the basics that even children in the Divine Cult would have learned.
That was why I decided to teach others despite not yet having accumulated enough authority. If Harin’s words were true, authority could come later. Correcting common sense was far more urgent.
To be honest, even up until the moment today’s lecture began, I had doubted Harin’s claims. They were simply too far removed from my own common sense. No matter how little modern people knew about martial arts, could it really be that bad?
But seeing the endless stream of confused questions from the viewers, I realized she had been right. If I had skipped the fundamentals, the questions flooding in now would have doubled.
“See? I was right, wasn’t I?”
“Yes. You were correct.”
Harin sidled up to me with a pleased smile, as if asking to be praised. I firmly pressed down on her head, then walked over to Dang So-il.
The expression on his face suggested his head was about to explode. It looked like he hadn’t fully understood my words yet.
Well. It didn’t matter. I would simply keep rolling him until he did understand.
“How long do you plan to sit there clutching your head?”
“Just a moment. Too much information came in at once. I’m trying to organize it.”
“You fool. Sitting at a desk worrying is what scholars do. A martial artist must move their body to sort things out.”
“Isn’t that a bit forced?”
“Forced? Nonsense. That’s exactly how I learned.”
When I learned my martial arts, that is. If I didn’t understand, I was beaten until I was on the verge of death, forced to learn through pain. Among those who trained with me, several lost their lives during that harsh training.
Compared to that, this was hardly forced at all.
When I half-forcibly positioned both Dang So-il and Harin in front of me, Harin’s face filled with horror.
“I’m included too?!”
“Of course you are.”
You already knew this would happen, didn’t you? Before Dang So-il arrived, I had already rolled you lightly. Did you really think I would let you off?
You must have rested plenty while I was lecturing Dang So-il and the viewers. Now prepare yourself to roll obediently.
As Harin grumbled and began stretching, Dang So-il awkwardly started warming up beside her. I watched them while biting on my long pipe, then glanced at the chat window.
It wasn’t just Dang So-il whose head was splitting. Many viewers who wanted to learn about martial arts were deep in thought. Of course, most of them still seemed completely uninterested in anything related to “martial arts.”
I never expected everyone to accept what I said. Even in the Murim there were plenty of people who didn’t care about martial arts. In the modern world, there were surely even more.
“Are you both ready now?”
“Yes!”
“Yes.”
After hearing their answers, I tucked the long pipe into my robe.
“Then let us begin.”
Hwaryeong declared that she would spar against both NyangNyang and Yi Sun at the same time, pointing out their shortcomings as they fought.
If an ordinary person had said such a thing, one might have asked how they could possibly handle two near-professional players. But Hwaryeong was someone for whom such worries were unnecessary.
After all, she had previously achieved an overwhelming victory against nine opponents who were equal to or stronger than Yi Sun.
Knowing that record, neither NyangNyang nor Yi Sun hesitated for even a second before charging at her.
Hwaryeong easily received their first rush and immediately began pressing them back. As Yi Sun desperately blocked her onslaught, he felt as if he were suffocating.
There was no time to think. The slightest lapse in concentration would allow Hwaryeong’s fist to reach him. He was completely occupied with simply following her movements.
His thoughts stopped. A state of no-self came over him.
Though it was Yi Sun’s body that moved, it no longer felt like his own. Every single motion was dictated by Hwaryeong’s precise movements. At that moment, he was no different from a puppet in a marionette show.
Dodge.
Block.
Counter.
His body moved without pause until suddenly, he began to observe himself from within.
At some point, his body had begun to follow principle.
“Ugh?!”
Perhaps because a stray thought had intruded, Yi Sun’s movements froze for an instant. Hwaryeong’s fist struck his side, sending him flying far into the distance.
He tumbled across the ground several times before finally regaining his stance. He stared at Hwaryeong with dazed eyes.
What… was that just now?
“What are you doing? The spar is not over. Stand up.”
Yi Sun rose to his feet and checked the chat window.
What? Only one minute had passed?
Thinking it was impossible, he checked the time and realized the chat was telling the truth. He had just exchanged what felt like an endlessly long series of blows, yet only a single minute had gone by?
Yi Sun recalled the state NyangNyang had been in when he first arrived here today—completely ragged, barely holding onto his sanity. NyangNyang had said he had been rolling around for a whole hour.
That meant he had repeated the kind of exchange Yi Sun had just experienced for an entire hour.
No wonder he had been in that state. It would have been strange if he hadn’t.
I’m going to end up like that soon too.
“Tsk.”
The sound of a tongue clicking pulled Yi Sun out of his thoughts. Hwaryeong was looking at him with clear displeasure.
“If you’re not coming, then I will go to you.”
The spar continued without end.
During the first ten minutes, both NyangNyang and Yi Sun rolled across the ground more than ten times. By the thirty-minute mark, their concentration and stamina had begun to drop sharply, causing them to roll even more frequently.
After roughly an hour, neither of them was in their right mind anymore. Their bodies still moved, but their brains had stopped functioning long ago. They were like zombies straight out of a movie.
And when that state had continued for two full hours—
Yi Sun was dying.
When he tried to stand, his arms gave out and his face slammed into the dirt. He thought it would be better to just faint.
Two hours. Just two hours.
When he played normal ranked games in Apis, time flew by in the blink of an eye. Why did it feel so unbearably long today?
“Dang So-il. Stand up. It is still too early for you to collapse.”
“...”
“Very well. I shall help you up.”
The moment Hwaryeong spoke, Yi Sun felt something cold press against his back. He didn’t know what it was, but his brain was screaming that if he stayed still, it would pierce him.
He frantically rolled to the side, only to realize there was nothing behind him.
Again?! Damn killing intent!
I can’t even lie down because of that!
Who was the guy that said Decai and Yi Sun were exaggerating when they talked about killing intent?! It’s real! Killing intent!