The Hidden Dragon Grotto
Grind—.
With that skin-crawling shriek of stone grinding against stone, a vast chamber was revealed. It was a space unlike either the scholars' hall or the physicians' quarters he had passed through. Every wall was finished in sleek obsidian, and along one side stood a medicine cabinet so enormous that it filled the entire face of the wall.
And at the center, dominating every gaze in the room, sat a colossal cauldron — large enough to swallow three or four grown men whole. Its surface was etched with an intricate formation array, and within it churned a dark crimson liquid, thick as molten iron.
"This is the Hidden Dragon Grotto, where the Great Method takes place."
Namgung Dan approached the cauldron as he spoke.
"Inside that vessel are every elixir, poison herb, and spirit tool we scoured from across the entire Jianghu over the past fifty years. In other words, those fifty years of Jeongcheon Hall are in there."
He rested his hand on the cauldron's railing.
Ssszzt—.
A faint wisp of steam rose where his palm touched the metal.
"This was meant to be taken by the Family Head — my cousin. Each generation, the head of the Namgung Clan has refined his body through this Great Method and been reborn as a vessel truly worthy of containing the heavens."
Which meant only one thing.
"……You never took it yourself."
"I did not."
Namgung Dan smiled bitterly.
"The Family Head had already found his own path without it, so he meant to yield it to me. But……"
He swallowed the rest of the sentence. He did not bother repeating that he had refused out of nothing more than petty pride.
"Enough. The past is the past."
Namgung Dan turned to look at Namgung Cheon, and his eyes were more serious than they had ever been.
"Now it belongs to you. This Great Method is called the Great Method of Rectifying Heaven and Sinew Transformation — the art of setting the heavens right and overturning flesh and bone."
"The Great Method of Rectifying Heaven and Sinew Transformation."
Namgung Cheon murmured the name quietly. His mind held archives on every manner of grand technique, yet this was one he had never once encountered.
"A warning before we begin. This is nothing like the simple process of swallowing an elixir and gaining inner energy."
Namgung Dan pointed at the dark crimson liquid inside the cauldron.
"It is not elixirs alone in there. Bone-melting grass that dissolves your skeleton, Blood Heart Flower that stops your blood, flesh-eating Heuksadam — every manner of lethal venom is mixed together. They are catalysts, meant to seal the elixirs' energy inside your body and magnify that power to the extreme."
"Using poison to control poison, and medicine to suppress medicine."
"Precisely. Two opposing energies will collide inside your body and forge something new. In that process, your flesh will be shattered and remade countless times over."
Namgung Dan's gaze sharpened.
"It is on an entirely different level from the Balmo Sesu you underwent as a child. Compared to this Great Method, that was little more than washing impurities out of the body."
Any great martial family customarily performed the Fur-Cutting, Marrow-Cleansing rite on their successors in their youth. Naturally, this body had undergone it as well.
The Body of a Hundred Weapons, the Balmo Sesu, and the Heavenly King Heart-Nourishing Pill.
It was thanks to those three that I was able to rise this far, this fast.
And now he was to receive this Great Method as well. Expectation flickered and flared in Namgung Cheon's eyes.
"The pain of melting bone and tearing flesh will reach you undiluted. The moment your mind gives out, you could die on the spot. Even so — will you do it?"
"Yes, of course."
With that terse answer, Namgung Cheon pulled off his shirt. He walked forward a few steps and stood before the cauldron.
"There is no strength worth having that comes without pain."
At those words, the corner of Namgung Dan's mouth curled upward.
"I like that answer very much. Good."
He watched Namgung Cheon for a moment, then turned his head toward the door.
"Bring it in."
At his word, the eldest of the scholars waiting outside entered carefully. In his hands he carried a stone casket, cold enough that a chill seemed carved from ice itself. The old scholar presented the casket before Namgung Dan and bowed deeply at the waist.
Without a word, Namgung Dan opened it. Emerging amid the frigid air came a red orb radiating heat so fierce it was the very opposite of the casket's cold — a crimson pearl pulsing like a living heart.
As he gazed upon it, Namgung Dan spoke quietly.
"The inner core of the Thousand-Year Fire Carp. It is the fire that will bring this cauldron to a boil — the final key that will bind the energy of fifty years' worth of gathered ingredients into one, and set it exploding."
Namgung Cheon felt the overwhelming heat pouring from the core.
Namgung Dan regarded it a moment longer, then gave a quiet order toward the door.
"Seal the gates. From this moment until the Great Method ends, no one enters or leaves."
"Yes, my lord."
The old scholar answered from beyond the door and pushed it shut.
Grrooong—.
Just before the stone door closed, Namgung Cheon looked out at the corridor beyond. Dozens of scholars and physicians knelt there in full prostration, all of them looking back at him. In their eyes burned a desperate, earnest hope — the decades, the centuries of Jeongcheon Hall's labor, all of their knowledge and effort gathered into this single Great Method, and every one of them praying for its success. The longing reached him plainly, achingly.
Boom!
The stone door sealed shut, and the Hidden Dragon Grotto sank into perfect silence.
Namgung Cheon closed his eyes briefly. The faces he had seen beyond the door remained vivid in his mind. Right now, he carried the hopes of all of Jeongcheon Hall on his shoulders.
Heavy.
But he did not dislike it. The heavier the weight he carried, the higher he would be able to soar.
Namgung Dan approached him.
"Is your heart ready?"
In answer, Namgung Cheon gave a silent nod — then slowly lowered his body into the cauldron. At that resolute figure, Namgung Dan let out a short laugh.
SPLASH!
Without hesitation, he flung the inner core of the Thousand-Year Fire Carp into the center of the cauldron.
The instant it hit—
RUUUMBLE! WHOOSH!
The cold, dormant herbs erupted into a boil as if a volcano had detonated beneath the vessel. Crimson energy coiled around the entire cauldron.
"Kuhhh……!"
A suppressed groan tore from Namgung Cheon's throat. The searing pain of scorching flesh and the bone-scraping chill of killing cold assailed him in the same breath. The energies of elixirs and lethal venom burrowed through his meridians at will, shredding his body from within.
This was a hell where an ordinary man would either scream and claw his way out, or thrash desperately just to hold on to consciousness.
But—
Merely enduring will not absorb this energy completely.
Namgung Cheon forcibly seized his fading consciousness. He bit through the flesh inside his mouth, drew blood, and fixed his eyes with iron resolve.
Bearing the pain? Withstanding it?
Anyone can do that much.
What he wanted was not simply to survive—
Namgung Cheon's eyes transformed.
I will absorb all of it — without leaving a single wisp of energy behind.
His lips parted. Instead of a scream, something eerie began to flow out: the verses of a mental cultivation method.
"Heaven bestows, and I am its equal; all things and I are one……"
As he recited the verses, a blue aura began to gather with each of his breaths.
Haahp!
The pain deepened further.
And in that very moment—
Pain?
One martial art rose naturally to his mind. The secret art he had used when circulating his inner energy through the Great Cycle some time ago — the Pain-Exchanging Origin Return Art.
The Origin Return Art is, by its nature, a method that turns self-inflicted suffering into inner energy.
A smile curved Namgung Cheon's lips.
And……
He looked down at the crimson liquid boiling around his body. Was he not, at this very moment, steeped in an agony beyond all measure — his flesh dissolving, his body breaking apart?
Then the answer was simple.
Then I will make even this pain my own.
In the crimson steam, Namgung Cheon's eyes blazed like fire.
Deep in the night, the study of the Family Head Hall was veiled in the scent of ink and the faint fragrance of tea. Jegal Hwa, seeing that her husband's teacup sat empty as he reviewed his reports, quietly poured fresh tea.
Some time passed in that manner.
Tak.
Namgung Mugang set down his brush, rose from his seat, and walked to the window. There he stood, gazing silently at the eastern sky — the direction of Jeongcheon Hall.
He watched the heavens without a word for a long while. Jegal Hwa, who understood what that deep silence meant, rose from her seat and came to stand beside him.
"……That boy will succeed."
Only then did Namgung Mugang speak, slowly.
"He must."
His voice was even and calm.
"But what comes after is the problem."
"After……?"
Namgung Mugang turned to face his wife.
"If the Great Method succeeds, great growth will surely follow. But……"
He lifted his teacup. His face reflected in the tea was still as a mountain lake.
Tok.
He tapped the rim lightly with a fingertip. At once, small ripples spread across the placid surface of the tea. The ripples struck the walls of the cup, scattered, returned — soon weaving themselves into waves more complex and irregular than before.
"Even a tiny ripple in a teacup cannot be predicted like this."
Namgung Mugang spoke quietly.
"The waves that boy will raise will spill far beyond this small cup — they will shake the Namgung Clan, and the entire realm with it."
Namgung Cheon's recent deeds passed through his mind. His conduct at the River-Along Martial Assembly, the eradication of the Ghost Mask Pact. A single small stone called Namgung Cheon had already been cast into the vast lake called the Jianghu.
And every ripple so far had been only the beginning. Once the boy gained true wings through the Great Method of Rectifying Heaven and Sinew Transformation, he would no longer be a stone at all.
How far, then, would that influence reach?
"Whether he dances atop those waves, or is swept away by them."
"……"
"We will simply have to watch, and see."
Jegal Hwa read the deep concern settled in her husband's eyes. Rather than simply hoping for and celebrating his son's success, he was calculating the aftershocks that success would bring — that cold clarity was the very essence of the head of the Namgung Clan, the Sword Emperor, Namgung Mugang.
"That boy knows how to make waves."
Jegal Hwa said calmly.
"He is not so foolish as to be swallowed by waves of his own raising, so do not worry too much."
"Foolish, no. If anything, he is too clever for his own good."
Namgung Mugang set down his teacup.
"He sees farther and deeper than anyone imagines. But because his vision stretches so wide, there will be times he fails to see the small stone at his own feet. And a single small stone can trigger a landslide."
There was weight in his words. Namgung Cheon's conduct in the Jianghu had been wondrous, yes — but also perilously close to the edge. If he ever did fall, someday……
At that moment—
"Then watch over him from behind, so that he does not fall."
"……"
"If the waves he raises grow too fierce, bend the wind for him. If an unforeseen reef appears, break it before he reaches it. Is that not enough?"
"……And that is the Family Head's role, you mean?"
Jegal Hwa shook her head.
"No. A father's role."
At that single sentence, something shifted in Namgung Mugang's eyes. Instead of answering, he silently watched the last ripple in the teacup fade to stillness.
After a long silence—
"The road that boy will walk is harder than the road I have walked."
"……"
"He has already seen too much, and he insists on carrying too much of it alone."
Jegal Hwa quietly rested her hand on her husband's shoulder.
"No. He will be fine."
Her gaze turned toward the eastern sky.
"Because he is a Namgung… no, because he is your son."
The Heavenly Demon of Namgung
Author | Baek Ri-haeng
Publisher | Samyang C&C Co., Ltd.
Editorial Supervisor | Editorial Department
Published by | Samyang C&C Co., Ltd. — Dreambooks
Address | 7F, Gwangseong Building, 28 Bongeunsa-ro 114-gil, Gangnam-gu, Seoul
ISBN | 979-11-7306-734-1
Blog | blog.naver.com/dreambookss
Twitter (X) | @dreambookss
Submissions | [email protected]
The contents of this book may not be used, in any form or by any means, without the written permission of Samyang C&C Co., Ltd. — Dreambooks.