Silk Road 7
So an temporary alliance, of all things.
Still, it was the best I had. With my limited wits, I couldn’t come up with a compromise any better than that.
Even so, for an improvised solution, I thought it wasn’t bad at all.
“What’s Lord So really up to, sending you here?”
Jin-wol asked.
Now that we had formed a temporary alliance, I supposed I had to give her at least something.
“Uh…”
I needed a moment to sort my thoughts out.
Unlike a little while ago, when my life had been threatened both directly and indirectly, my nerves had finally loosened, and my head wasn’t working all that well.
“If you tell me some cheap little lie, I’ll kill you on the spot.”
“My master expected me.”
“Ha. He knew I’d come?”
“Yes. That’s why he wanted to get here first and clear the place out before you, young lady, arrived.”
Of course, I had made that up. The Left Guardian had never said any such thing. He had only told me to come find the Blood Heart Pill.
But the Executioner before me was in no position to dismiss my words lightly.
I had to make the most of this situation and coax her along.
I had to guide the conversation. I had to seize the initiative.
“Still, I didn’t expect you to arrive this quickly.”
“Hmm…”
She seemed to consider it for a moment, then immediately waved her men back.
The five soldiers who had been acting as her attendants were still rummaging through the house as if they intended to turn every board and beam inside out.
It was a filthy sight, no different from a band of beggars in veils scraping up pig bones.
“Are those private troops under the Cult Leader’s Palace?”
“No. Borrowed from the Elder Council. The Cult Leader’s Palace doesn’t keep private soldiers of its own.”
“The Elder Council…”
The Elder Council. That was where the Left Guardian handled his affairs.
But that was all I knew. I’d failed to squeeze anything more out of him.
The five soldiers lined up before her.
Before long, one of them—a weathered old soldier in a battered set of armor—stepped forward to report.
The wait wasn’t long.
Jin-wol cut him off before he could even finish. It was the sort of tedious report that didn’t need listening to anyway. In other words, it was a waste of time.
They hadn’t found a single clue about the “middleman,” the very thing I had come here for.
“Get up. We’re heading to the Military Command Office.”
I forced myself to my feet.
Then—
Crack!
“Ah!”
…I tried to stand up.
Pop!
This was the aftermath of a life-and-death duel fought with everything on the line. There wasn’t a single part of me that still felt intact.
It had been a life-and-death struggle for me, but for her it had probably been little more than a warm-up.
Jin-wol looked at me silently.
Even she seemed to realize this wasn’t the kind of wound that invited mockery, so she didn’t come down on me for putting on airs or anything of the sort.
To put it simply, it was internal damage. The price for rushing in with a weak body and a reckless heart had come due all at once.
“Sit in a cross-legged stance and use your heart technique. Recite the principles of recovery.”
“The principles of recovery? I was never taught anything like that.”
As I’ve said over and over, that bastard Left Guardian had taught me nothing beyond a few basic internal arts and movement techniques that any demon would know by instinct.
My answer left Jin-wol visibly flustered.
“What? No, you know that level of movement and footwork, but you don’t even know Jeongma Heart Art? Tell me everything he taught you. And don’t you dare dress it up.”
At that, I began reciting everything I had learned from the Left Guardian.
“For heart techniques, there’s just True Demon Foundation Art and Moonshadow Circulation. And for movement arts—”
“Movement arts?”
“Crimson Mist Phantom Soul, Flying Heaven Demon Shadow, Asura Sky-Treading Steps, Demon Shadow Steps, Demon Dragon Ascension Walk, Windless Air Pellet Steps…”
Thud!
“Enough. Enough!”
“Ghk.”
“What, does he have a brain or not? What kind of child did he turn you into, to make his disciple end up like this?”
I felt oddly unsettled. It was the strange sensation of being scolded as if I were being insulted, yet not quite.
“Haah. If anyone heard this, they’d think you came from some escort agency instead of Red Lotus Manor. From now on, don’t go around bragging that you’re his disciple. I’m embarrassed enough for the both of us.”
“Cough.”
“Wait. Then that axe… you just swung it with brute strength? You didn’t use inner force?”
“Of course I know how to use inner force. I was just focusing on footwork. My master said my strength was already more than enough. He told me he’d teach me how to handle weapons only after I’d mastered movement techniques.”
Jin-wol, listening quietly, nodded.
She looked as though she understood perfectly well what the Left Guardian had been aiming for.
“I can’t say it makes no sense, but still, heart techniques…”
Her voice trailed off.
“Forget it. It’s not even my disciple, and I’m getting worked up for nothing. Lord So will deal with it however he likes.”
“Don’t say that. Couldn’t you teach me just a few heart techniques? I’d like to be able to handle my own internal injuries, at least.”
I played it off and tugged at her sleeve, deliberately letting my eyes glisten.
The rough weave of the dark blue martial robe scratched against my fingers.
“Tsk. Do you think internal injuries are such trivial things? If all it took was one round of regulated breathing to recover, then maybe four out of ten martial artists in their graves would’ve already crawled back out.”
“Even so, I won’t be able to move properly like this. Really.”
I dropped the teasing and said it in a lower voice.
“Hmph. I never said I wouldn’t teach you.”
“Then please, make me sit properly.”
Inside, I nearly shouted for joy. The suffering had been worth it, after all.
Yes. I’d learned a heart technique.
-
The Jeongma Heart Art that the Executioner taught me was an advanced method of the internal art I had already been using, Moonshadow Circulation.
An advanced heart technique was one whose efficacy and level soared dramatically the more it was refined.
The principle of advancement applied not only to heart techniques but to martial arts as well, in which case they were called advanced martial arts.
Having gained my first true experience of such advancement, an incomparable rush of euphoria came surging over me.
I had never actually drunk alcohol, but it felt like I had taken a swig of something strong.
What stood out most was that the essence of the heart technique hadn’t changed all that much.
It hadn’t opened up some hidden point either. It was a small alteration, nothing more.
She had simply tweaked the route by which blood and qi circulated through the Eight Extraordinary Meridians.
And yet that tiny shift made me feel so refreshed. It was as if the clouds clogging my dantian had finally blown away.
Of course, as she had said, the internal injury wasn’t fully healed.
It only had the effect of briefly setting my qi in motion and easing the pain.
But that was enough.
There was no problem at all continuing on to the place called the Military Command Office with the Executioner.
-
“Speaking of which, you said you learned Asura Sky-Treading Steps?”
Asura Sky-Treading Steps. It was one of the movement arts I had rattled off as something I’d learned, but in truth, it was...
Just a pathetic imitation. The kind of thing I’d be ashamed to show anyone.
“In theory…”
I managed a response at last, after stealing a glance at her expression.
“Little mouse lady, there’s no point in putting on airs. Don’t use Asura Sky-Treading Steps. Better yet, don’t even think about learning it.”
“Is there some problem with it?”
Jin-wol stopped speaking. She cut herself off mid-thought, as though there were an unpleasant backstory she didn’t want to reveal.
And before long, I could tell my instincts had been right.
“What did you hear when you first learned about it?”
“What do you mean?”
“What did Lord Left Guardian say when he taught it to you?”
“I can’t remember exactly, but… I think he said it was the Red Lotus Manor’s secret martial art.”
“Of course. I expected nothing else from you, and you still didn’t disappoint. Wrong. It’s not the secret martial art of Red Lotus Manor. It belonged to the Blood Demon five hundred years ago.”
I was genuinely surprised.
But even as I was surprised, I could accept it. The Left Guardian was a descendant of the Blood Heavenly Demonic Cult, which had been absorbed into the cult.
That his martial arts carried the bloodline of the Blood Cult was entirely plausible.
Jin-wol went on.
“And it’s not just because it belonged to the Blood Demon. Sure, there are plenty of martial arts that originated in the Blood Cult. Asura Sky-Treading Steps itself is an advanced art derived from Crimson Mist Phantom Soul and Windless Air Pellet Steps. Among those, Windless Air Pellet Steps is fairly well known, but most people don’t realize it came from the Blood Cult.”
“Then there’s a problem with Asura Sky-Treading Steps itself?”
“Girl, listen all the way to the end. The problem with Asura Sky-Treading Steps is that it consumes Innate Qi. It literally chips away at your lifespan.”
Innate Qi.
Something fundamentally different from the internal power, or qi, accumulated in the dantian through training.
It was the source of life one was born with, in other words, one’s innate vitality.
I didn’t know how things worked in righteous sects or demonic schools, but within the cult, the use of Innate Qi wasn’t especially taboo.
So if Asura Sky-Treading Steps had been a destructive enough martial art to use as a desperate last strike in a mutual kill, I wouldn’t have hesitated to learn it even if it shortened my life.
But Asura Sky-Treading Steps was a movement technique. No matter how one sliced it, a footwork method alone couldn’t kill a person.
What kind of absurd movement art could be worth paying for with one’s lifespan?
I understood why she was warning me away from using it.
But that extreme inefficiency stirred my curiosity all the more.
There’s no harm in learning it.
Whether she realized what I was thinking or not, she spoke again.
“And that’s not all. No matter how tolerant the cult may be toward Blood Demon arts, that one is an exception.”
“Is it forbidden to use Asura Sky-Treading Steps?”
“Obviously. Have you never read the official histories?”
“Actually… my background is a little embarrassing, so I’m not exactly well versed in history.”
“During the Blood-Calamity Era, there was a major event called the Blood Sea Catastrophe. Our side had ten thousand troops, and the Blood Heavenly Demonic Cult had just one thousand. No one thought they’d lose. But who do you think won?”
“Don’t tell me the Blood Heavenly Demonic Cult?”
At her words, I made a vow.
“All ten thousand of our troops died. Not a single one survived. And back then, the Blood Demon…”
I had no choice but to make one.
“Using a perfected Asura Sky-Treading Steps, he spread a sea of blood across the heavens.”
I would learn that movement technique, no matter what it took.