Playing Is the Best

"Here it comes."

At Namgung Cheonyeong's quiet murmur, Namgung Muyoung tipped his face to the sky.

The weather had been uncommonly fine of late—not a drop of rain, not a single cloud marring the open heavens. Across that vault of blue, a streak of pure white light flickered into view.

Namgung Cheonyeong smiled.

"Quite the remarkable spirit beast, isn't it?"

"It really is. How many times has that thing found us now? It hunts us down like a ghost."

"Trained messenger pigeons, prized falcons—nothing in the world could keep pace with that creature."

The thread of light began to descend, angling straight toward Namgung Muyoung. It plunged with the ferocity of a falling meteor.

Muyoung cocked his head. Can an owl even fly that fast?

He had never taken much interest in beasts, so the sight left him baffled. It was no match for the legendary Peng, said to cross thousands of miles in a single wingbeat—but this owl was unnaturally ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠swift, and unnaturally clever besides.

In a blink, the white speck resolved into the clear shape of an owl. Just as it reached a point directly overhead, Myodu-eung broke out of its dive, snapped its wings wide, and drifted down as gently as a falling leaf.

"Truly impressive."

"How Teacher Sun ever came to command a spirit beast this intelligent, I cannot imagine."

Namgung Cheonyeong clicked his tongue in wonder and untied the letter bound to the leg of the owl now perched on his forearm.

"Passed through Lu'an and heading north, it says. Moving in the opposite direction from us, exactly as planned."

"The martial artists in the area have definitely thinned out."

Muyoung tugged his bamboo hat lower as he spoke. The farther south they traveled, the more sharply the number of martial artists dwindled. Word of Sun Wukong swaggering his way north had drawn them all like a tide.

Namgung Cheonyeong had put his skills to work tracking the Wudang Taoists, and the effort had borne fruit. He had narrowed their likely positions to a handful of probable sites, and the pair had set out accordingly.

Their trail led south.

To pull every watching eye in the opposite direction, Sun Wukong had gone north.

Myodu-eung was a spirit beast extraordinary enough to sweep the whole of Anhui in a single day. More astonishing still was its knack for finding them no matter where they were. Thanks to that gift, the two parties could stay in close contact as they moved.

"He really is playing the decoy to perfection."

"And thrashing every martial artist who comes after him, at that."

"Good heavens. When the bait is stronger than the fish…"

"Still no word of the men in black making a move?"

"None yet. But they have vanished from this area as well, so they are clearly paying Teacher Sun their full attention."

"He is doing his part remarkably well."

"He is. Although… there is a rumor making the rounds that he demonstrated the Namgung Clan's peerless martial arts. That part is…"

"Perhaps he picked up whatever the outer-court warriors practice?"

"Hrm."

"I did ask Father for a martial art once. It is possible that is what he passed along."

Muyoung said it, but he was far from certain. What Father showed him that day was the Heaven-Soaring Unfettered Sword.

Sun Wukong would not have used that. …Surely not?

Even for Sun Wukong, that technique was the culmination of the Namgung Clan's entire martial tradition. It could only be mastered by building every art of the clan from the ground up, step by painstaking step. Learning it from a single glance was absurd.

Muyoung quietly buried the unease. Surely Father had simply gifted him one of the forms the outer-court warriors trained in.

"In any case, the rumors have only grown more credible. Every martial artist in the region is hunting Teacher Sun."

"That cannot be easy. The martial artists of Anhui, all on his trail…"

"Well…"

Namgung Cheonyeong gave a wry smile and let the thought trail off.

"The handwriting feels like he is having the time of his life."

"Having fun?"

"Yes. As if he were playing some delightful prank. Two days ago he apparently smashed the Butterfly Immortal, originally of the Wudang Sect—and from the way he tells it, the fight was so entertaining he could barely contain himself."

"The Butterfly Immortal? The famous master who surpassed the Peak Realm twenty years ago? There were even rumors he had reached the threshold of the Transcendental Realm—a peerless expert, treated with the same reverence as the Wudang elders despite being a secular disciple. And Teacher Sun brought someone like that down? That is… wait."

Muyoung's voice, which had been running on without much thought, cut off cold. The corner of Namgung Cheonyeong's mouth slowly fell.

"…Come again?"

"The Butterfly Immortal… attacked, so… I cracked his head for him. That is what it says."

Namgung Cheonyeong could not quite bring himself to finish the rest. The corner of his eye twitched.

"The Butterfly Immortal is… a revered elder of the righteous path, is he not?"

"…He is also a gifted physician, famous for treating the poor free of charge. They call him an immortal for a reason."

"A man of justice. The villains who have died by his hand number more than you could count on both hands."

"So you are telling me Teacher Sun…"

The two of them fell silent.

A revered elder of the righteous path. A respected master of the old generation.

"And he cracked that man's skull?"

Namgung Muyoung squeezed his eyes shut. Father… my worst fear just came true.

The world tilted in front of him.

Sun Wukong felt deeply wronged.

"So you are the Heaven-Blind Strange Buddha who slaughtered the Wudang envoys and fled with the secret manuals!"

A white-haired old man blocked the road. A snow-white beard spilled to his waist. His face was a landscape of deep wrinkles—old enough that no one would have blinked to see him laid in a coffin. But the presence rolling off him was nothing like an old man's. His back was ramrod straight, his legs were planted in the earth like twin pillars, and his shoulders were broad as a gate. A clear, piercing light shone from his eyes and bored straight through Sun Wukong.

"I may have left the Wudang Sect, but I am still a Taoist who once called that mountain home. And so I shall execute you here."

The Butterfly Immortal thrust his bamboo staff straight out.

Sun Wukong scratched his cheek.

"Look, I wasn't the one who attacked those Wudang Taoists."

"Wretched, deceitful creature. That does not wash the blood from your hands. Heaven is watching!"

The rumors, it seemed, had gotten wildly out of hand. In the telling, Sun Wukong had become a villain who butchered the entire Wudang envoy and robbed them of their manuals.

He scratched his cheek again. Did I go a little too hard?

He had been swinging his staff with genuine relish the whole way here. Smashing through the martial artists who swarmed him like moths to a flame had burned away every scrap of fatigue piled up in his skull. Maybe he had gotten a little too drunk on the fun.

"Heaven-Blind Strange Buddha, though? That's what they're calling me?"

The Butterfly Immortal's beard quivered with rage.

"They say you spare the martial artists who come charging at you. Fighting with your eyes closed—are you putting on some cheap imitation of a Buddha?"

"Ah. So that's how it went."

Sun Wukong stroked his chin, tasting the epithet they had hung on him. Heaven-Blind Strange Buddha. He wasn't actually blind—he just kept his eyes shut. And he was a Buddha, so the name wasn't exactly wrong.

All in all, he found it rather satisfying.

Beside him, Namgung Seowol muttered, blunt as a stone.

"Sounds like a villain's nickname."

"Right now I am playing the villain."

"So you are a bad guy?"

"I'm playing the bad guy."

"A bad guy?"

"…Yeah."

Sun Wukong's face went slack, and he gave up on answering. The Butterfly Immortal listened to the little comedy with a deepening scowl.

"Surrender quietly and allow yourself to be escorted to the Wudang Sect, and I shall spare your life."

"If you surrender quietly, old-timer, I won't hit you too hard."

"…"

"Beating up a kid and a wrinkled old man at the same time would really help me get into the villain role, you know."

The Butterfly Immortal snorted and came on at once.

His figure seemed to vanish—and then he was simply ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠there, right in front of Sun Wukong. The bamboo staff carved a line from left to right.

Sun Wukong's steel staff whirled up to meet it.

A shriek of impact split the air. It was a staff of mere wood, and yet it crashed against steel with a roar like colliding bells. Sun Wukong felt the rebound climb his wrist and smiled, faint and bright.

"Not bad at all."

An expert on the level of a Namgung Clan elder? No—higher than that. A gleam kindled in Sun Wukong's eyes. The difference between this man and every small fry he had met so far was unmistakable. A delighted smile touched his mouth.

"I was just starting to get bored. Nice of you to bring me something new."

"What are you prattling about!"

A bluish aura gathered at the tip of the bamboo staff. Sword gang.

Sun Wukong clicked his tongue in brief admiration at the man's control of inner energy, and swept his steel staff around.

Steel met bamboo wreathed in sword gang, and the two weapons locked. From the outside they looked frozen. Inside, a vicious war of energy was tearing back and forth.

The Butterfly Immortal's eyes flew wide.

He was seventy-seven years old. He had entered the Wudang Sect at six and cultivated for seventy years since. He had touched the extreme of the Peak Realm; he had not gone further, but the Transcendental Realm and beyond were heights only the chosen among martial artists could ever reach. Even so, the Butterfly Immortal was a formidable master of a great clan, his inner power deep and superb.

This man…!

The corner of his eye twitched. He was being pushed back. In a contest of inner energy, he was being overwhelmed completely. And the man in front of him still had his eyes closed, a faint smile playing on his lips.

In that instant, the Butterfly Immortal understood the epithet he had found so distasteful. It is like the smile of a Buddha.

He had trained in the Taoist arts, but in his heart he had always wished to become a man like the Buddha. Over the long years he had studied the Buddhist dharma as deeply ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠as the Tao. Countless images of the Buddha were familiar to his eyes. That was why the smile before him felt more like a Buddha than any statue he had ever seen.

No. This is a trick!

How could a villain who had butchered Wudang Taoists be a Buddha?

The Butterfly Immortal clenched his teeth and tore himself free. In that same breath his bamboo staff split down the middle, and a shaft of pure white light surged upward.

A sword, whiter than cloud. The sword gang layered over its edge shed a radiant gleam. The light was fast. It took Sun Wukong's neck.

"Got him…!"

He only thought he had.

The steel staff danced. It flicked the incoming blades of sword gang aside as if they were nothing at all—so lightly that the Butterfly Immortal almost doubted they had been sword gang in the first place.

Sun Wukong laughed, the sound bright with genuine pleasure.

To the Butterfly Immortal, this was a duel to the death. To Sun Wukong, it was nothing more than a game.

Only then did the Butterfly Immortal understand. This creature will bring a great storm down upon the martial world. A great demon.

A demon that beguiled men by wearing the face of a Buddha.

His expression turned grim and resolute. I never cultivated far enough to ascend and become an immortal. But to stand against calamity and guard the mortal world—is that not also the fate of a Taoist who walks the path?

A violent tremor rolled through the Butterfly Immortal's dantian. It heaved and coiled as if he meant to pour out every last drop of his strength—not only his inner energy, but something deeper still, the innate qi itself, dragged up and spent without reserve.

His eyes settled, calm and cold.

Mutual destruction. He would stop this man with his own death. Even if he could not kill him, he would at least take an arm. Then the younger generation would have a fighting chance.

That was when Sun Wukong understood what the old man was about to do. His face went hard as stone.

Reading that expression, the Butterfly Immortal smiled inwardly in triumph.

"Even a demon like you fears death!"

Sun Wukong's face did not change. It was terrifying in its stillness, his gaze sunk to a deep, level calm. Instead, his hands moved.

His steel staff drove into the earth. Both arms swept out and began to draw a vast circle.

The Butterfly Immortal, charging into that circle, felt his body lock. The dantian he had whipped into a frenzy began, slowly, to wind down.

This is…

His pupils shook.

The great circle his opponent's arms were carving was complete. It did not oppose. It did not end. It simply continued, without cease. Yin and yang, all things interlocking—not standing against each other, but traveling together.

Inside that circle, Sun Wukong's energy and the Butterfly Immortal's energy gathered into one and flowed as naturally as water. As if they had always been a single thing.

The Butterfly Immortal's body stopped dead. His face went paper-white.

"How can a demon wield the Taiji…"

The Taiji Sun Wukong had formed turned and moved without rest. Every current of energy was drawn in, blended into one, and in the end nothing remained—as if Sun Wukong had simply swallowed it all.

The Butterfly Immortal understood what he was looking at. How could he not? It was the ideal every cultivating Taoist longed for. The state that is the origin of all things.

Wuji.

The shape of Wuji rose before his eyes, vivid and complete. The Butterfly Immortal trembled from head to foot, and then simply folded. The strength went out of his hand; his sword rang against the ground. He could not even think of standing again. His face was ashen, the look of a man whose soul had left his body.

Sun Wukong clicked his tongue, almost pitying.

"Tsk, tsk. Trying to throw your life away for nothing?"

The Butterfly Immortal lifted his dazed eyes. A face blocked out the sun. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠In that shadow, no expression could be read.

"Listen here, you snub-nosed Taoist."

Sun Wukong's voice settled quietly into his ear.

The voice rang as if the air itself were a bell. It spread the way a ripple spreads across still water—unhurried, unobstructed. It brushed past the ear like wind, and yet every word was perfectly clear.