Why Am I an Outsider?
The words Sun Wukong tossed out spread through the hall the way a stone sends ripples across a still lake.
"What kind of nonsense is that, Teacher Sun!"
Several voices roared at once.
Sun Wukong answered as if none of it concerned him in the slightest.
"Then forget I said it. What's with the shouting?"
His manner of speaking was a peculiar thing — that unbothered tone, as if they were the ones making a fuss over nothing. The Taoists who had raised their voices faltered. His sheer composure made them wonder, for a fleeting instant, whether they had overreacted.
And Sun Wukong was, in fact, perfectly composed.
"Hell, I figured you'd all be tearing the mountain apart hunting down the assassin. Instead you're sitting around talking about treatments and sacred grounds and debts of gratitude. Sounds pretty leisurely to me."
"This is not a matter for an outsider to speak on!"
The Wudang Taoists rose in a rustle of robes. These were elders of no small standing, and the force of their presence was orderly and sharp. A current of energy whipped through the hall, pricking skin like the edge of a blade.
Sun Wukong flicked his hand as if swatting a fly.
"...!"
The piercing aura that had been filling the chamber vanished in an instant. The elders' faces went rigid.
He swept our presence away with a single wave of his hand?
What in the...
They were elders of Wudang. They understood exactly what they had just witnessed. The ones who had been red-faced and shouting took an involuntary step back.
Sun Wukong slipped into the opening.
"So I guess it's not that urgent after all?"
"What on earth are you talking about?"
"The leader of an entire sect has been struck down, and you're still sitting here whispering among yourselves. How long is that going to go on?"
"Well..."
"Embarrassed? Heh. So face and prestige matter more than a blood debt, is that it?"
"...!"
"Common sense says you declare the assassin a Wulin Public Enemy, track him down, and dig until you find him. Doesn't it?"
No one had a ready answer. It was the correct argument, and they knew it.
Sun Wukong's gaze swept the assembled faces. Some looked ashamed.
Those ones belong to the Mugok Pavilion Master's camp.
Others flushed and seemed to be glancing sideways, taking their cues from someone else.
And those are the Samcheong's people.
Sun Wukong had sat in silence since taking his seat. Defiling the sacred ground was a grave offense, so he had simply listened to them carry on. It had been convenient. Without lifting a finger, he could see who stood with whom, what attitudes they held, what they were thinking, and how the factions had split.
Matches what Dangrang told me, more or less.
A faint smile touched Sun Wukong's lips. Unlike most Earth Deities, who kept themselves apart from worldly affairs, Dangrang had watched Wudang's internal business with a thorough, almost obsessive eye. Thanks to that, Sun Wukong had been able to confirm the sect's inner workings from his seat — and now he had verified that the web of relationships Dangrang had described was close to the truth.
Then there's nothing more I need to see.
Contrary to his reputation, Sun Wukong was not a man who simply charged in swinging. In the old days, handling everything according to his own temperament had earned him Tang Sanzang's wrath every single time. So he had learned to use his head — to slay demons and settle matters in ways that pleased his master and still got the job done, even if it gave him a headache.
The weight of what he had just said was not a simple thing. A brief hush settled over the hall, and Sun Wukong's voice cut through it.
"Let me ask you something. Are you even tracking the Sect Leader's assassin right now?"
"..."
Silence stretched. No one wanted to air the sect's internal affairs in any detail. Then, as if he had sensed something, Mugok Pavilion Master Cheonjeong answered.
"We are. I have my own martial artists searching for the culprit."
"Any progress?"
"..."
Silence again, in place of an answer. Shame sat thick on his face. Sun Wukong swallowed a dry laugh and cocked his head.
"That's rather strange, isn't it?"
"...?"
"A matter like this, and it's just the Pavilion Master running his own people after the assassin? I've heard that among Wudang's elders, there are three Taoists of the deepest reputation and the greatest influence..."
The Taoists on the left surged to their feet. The Samcheong's faction. Sun Wukong could barely keep from laughing at how simple the reaction was.
"What exactly are you implying, Teacher Sun?"
"Implying?"
He tilted his head, and their faces flushed darker.
"What meaning did you intend by those words?"
"There's no hidden meaning."
Sun Wukong looked straight at the Samcheong.
"I'll ask you outright. Why aren't you people putting any real effort into finding the assassin? You three elders who receive such grand reverence as the Samcheong?"
He stared them down and said it to their faces. The reaction in the hall split cleanly down the middle.
"What manner of insolence is this! The Samcheong stand as martial uncles to the current Sect Leader — have you no sense of seniority at all?!"
The Samcheong's Taoists flew into a rage. The Mugok Pavilion Master's people, by contrast, watched in silence. A faint, satisfied look touched their faces. Sun Wukong's conduct was outrageous beyond measure — but privately, that unrestrained temperament was a breath of fresh air.
"You've been yapping since I sat down. It's getting on my nerves."
"Wh-what did you say?"
The flushed, middle-aged Taoist faltered. It was the first time anyone had heard language that coarse within Wudang's grounds. Sun Wukong jerked his chin at the man.
"Was I talking to you?"
"You little—!"
"I've never had a father like you, so don't go calling me 'you little' this and 'you little' that. Even if you have been scattering your seed all over the place."
"Hah."
"Pfft."
Astonished laughs and poorly suppressed snorts spilled from the opposing camp. You didn't hear talk like that in Wudang, where everyone trafficked in elegant phrases. And directed at a Taoist cultivating the Dao, it was not merely cutting — it was an insult.
"Y-you—!"
The middle-aged man's face went scarlet. He trembled, unable to get a word out. His head was full of things he wanted to say, but none of them would leave his mouth.
"You really have a death wish!"
He snapped his sleeves as if he meant to strike that very instant. Sun Wukong clicked his tongue and cocked his head.
"Hold on. Has your speech been getting shorter this whole time?"
Listening to this is starting to piss me off.
He muttered the last of it under his breath, then spoke in a voice gone suddenly cold.
The drop in his tone was instantaneous. He had changed nothing but the pitch of his voice, and the entire atmosphere of the hall shifted. But the middle-aged man was already too far gone to master himself.
"Get outside this instant. I'll teach you some manners you—"
His face went paper-white.
The people around him looked puzzled. Nothing had happened — and yet the man's face had drained of all color, and his body had begun to shake. A few faces, however, went hard as stone. The Samcheong, Mugok Pavilion Master Cheonjeong, the Butterfly Immortal beside him, and several of the elders.
The Pavilion Master's eyes twitched as he stared at Sun Wukong.
He's concentrating his energy solely on that one man!
Without affecting anyone else in the slightest. Every elder in this hall was a master in his own right, sensitive to the flow of energy — the slightest current, and they would sense it and react. And yet most of them had no idea what was happening right now.
Cheonjeong himself could not read Sun Wukong's energy. He could only guess at the situation. He flicked a glance to the side.
Nokcheong's expression had barely changed; he remained as unreadable as ever. But Hocheong, whose temper ran hotter, looked not merely stiff but quietly furious. Yangcheong, who had been watching in silence, had gone rigid as well. They, too, had felt the measure of Sun Wukong's power.
The Pavilion Master's mind raced.
So the Butterfly Immortal was right. He really is a master who surpasses the Sect Leader.
With a face that looked younger than Cheonjeong's own?
If that's true, then he's exactly the man I need right now.
The Samcheong's influence was immense — decades of connections across the martial world, and their grip inside Wudang itself. Even the Sect Leader's heir, even the Mugok Pavilion Master, found them a heavy burden.
And for some reason, he clearly harbors hostility toward the Samcheong.
The enemy of my enemy is my ally.
A man the Butterfly Immortal has vouched for. A benefactor of Wudang. Someone the Namgung Clan holds in the highest regard.
At the very least, he is no villain.
I need this man.
A look of resolve settled on the Pavilion Master's face.
While Cheonjeong steeled himself, the middle-aged Taoist's deathly pale face began to turn a sickly, mottled blue. Only then did the other Taoists grasp the seriousness of the situation and start to stir.
Sun Wukong gave a short laugh and snapped his fingers.
Ttak.
"Hah—!"
The man who had been ready to explode staggered and crumpled to the floor.
"What in the..."
A manipulation of energy so fine they had not even been able to perceive it. They understood, with sudden and painful clarity, that Sun Wukong's martial prowess was no ordinary thing.
His lowered gaze swept across the Taoists. The same men who had been glaring and shouting moments ago now could not meet his eyes fast enough. Sun Wukong clicked his tongue.
"What good is cultivating the Dao if I have to put the fear of death in you just to get some quiet? You're worse than a pack of stray dogs."
"...!"
"The grown-ups are trying to have a conversation. Don't interrupt. Understood?"
He looked the Samcheong dead in the eye.
"Hey. You three Samcheong elders."
"...!"
The surrounding Taoists nearly choked. To address the Samcheong of Wudang with that kind of insolence!
"The assassin. Do you even intend to catch him?"
He spoke as if he were addressing street thugs. Until now they had sat in silence, letting their subordinate Taoists speak for them. They could sit still no longer.
Hocheong, the youngest of the three, glared.
"Do you think we have been idle?"
"Oh, so you have been working?"
"...That is a remarkably insolent attitude."
"That's just how I was raised. Bear with me. Anyway — the illustrious Samcheong elders are tracking the assassin, so you must have found something. What did you turn up?"
The answer, naturally, was thin. Silence. Sun Wukong snorted.
"Ah. Because I'm an outsider, you can't tell me. Is that it?"
"That is only natural. We have no reason to share such things with you."
"Because I have nothing to do with Wudang. That's the reason."
"The assassin is clearly an enemy from outside the Wudang Sect."
Hocheong's words were almost blatant. The implication underneath was that Sun Wukong himself could be tied to the assassin if they so chose.
The corner of Sun Wukong's mouth lifted.
"Sure. I suppose that's possible. Hard to discuss the details with an outsider."
For a moment, the Taoists' faces went blank. Wasn't it obvious? He was not a man of Wudang. He was not even a Taoist of the same lineage. A man whose origins and background were unclear — and the only thing vouching for him was the word of the Namgung Clan's martial artists.
But Sun Wukong's sheer confidence made the Butterfly Immortal react as if he had been struck.
"Teacher Sun — have you, by any chance... studied the Dao?"
He had seen it clearly. The Taiji unfolding from Sun Wukong's person, and at its furthest reach, the Wuji. A sliver of insight into the Dao that he himself had once taught.
If that was the case...
Sun Wukong gave a short laugh and rose to his feet. Every eye in the hall followed him. His arms extended forward.
Dancing...?
His sleeves traced elegant lines through the air, fluttering with the grace of a single, unbroken dance. The Taoists who had been watching with dubious expressions felt horror slowly overtake their faces.
What was unfolding in his hands...
The Supreme Ultimate unfolded in his empty hands — and had a sword rested in those palms, it would have been none other than the Taiji Sword of Wisdom.
"The Taiji Sword of Wisdom..."
Someone murmured it, barely above a breath.
A terrible silence descended upon the hall.