The Hundred-Year Root and the Red Wolf's Shadow
I pulled out the fleeceflower root I had secretly kept hidden inside my robes.
According to Nam Cheon, it was a Hundred-Year Fleeceflower Root.
It was a rare medicinal treasure, precious enough to be treated as a spiritual elixir anywhere. I could probably gain at least five years' worth of internal energy from it.
Ordinarily, I'd decoct it into a tonic or prepare it properly.
But for now, I decided to wash it well and chew it raw from the root up.
Crunch!
A bitterness so intense it numbed my tongue surged through my mouth, and the energy of the Hundred-Year Fleeceflower Root began to flood into me.
I immediately circulated the Vajrayaksha Divine Art and began absorbing it.
The energy coursed through every corner of my body's finer meridians before sinking into my dantian.
The absorption rate was beyond satisfactory.
Every bit of energy that entered me became mine at once.
At this rate, I may not be gaining five years' worth, but ten.
The energy I absorbed began transforming my body in accordance with the formulas of the Vajrayaksha Divine Art.
It was reshaping my flesh into something better suited for the art of the Vajrayaksha.
Crack.
Creeak. Crack.
With the sound of bone and sinew shifting, my skeleton hardened and my muscles grew denser, tougher.
A considerable amount of pain came with it, but I didn't show it.
Because I knew this process was necessary.
How much time passed like that?
"Hoo."
I let out a light breath.
The energy of the Hundred-Year Fleeceflower Root had been completely absorbed.
And my physical condition was now better than ever.
At this point, couldn't I start sword training in earnest?
Since I had absorbed such fine energy, I decided to continue my training.
I unfolded the manual for Overlord's Footwork that I had obtained from Nam Cheon's hideout.
I had already gone through it all night and memorized the formulas, but...
I still hadn't fully made the finer details part of my body.
I circulated the Vajrayaksha Divine Art while practicing Overlord's Footwork at the same time.
It truly was the footwork of a thief famous enough to leave his name behind.
Even though I wasn't exactly small, the steps I took while using it were astonishingly light.
My movements became soft and nimble, and naturally, I made almost no sound.
And if I forced energy into the Yongcheon point in the soles of my feet as though making it burst outward, I could achieve explosive acceleration in an instant.
A speed so sudden even I found it startling.
If I ever need to ambush someone or pursue them, this will be incredibly useful.
The only problem was that my proficiency was still too low to rely on it in actual combat.
But that was no real problem. I simply had to keep practicing from here on out.
As that thought crossed my mind, a faintly absurd one followed, and I let out a crooked smile.
Aren't I learning this a little too quickly?
It seemed I had talent as a thief after all.
If I had formally studied under the Thief King, I might even have ended up being called a divine thief.
In any case, that only benefited me.
The more cards I had to play, the better.
Shing!
In the middle of practicing Overlord's Footwork, I stopped and drew my sword this time.
I had more or less finished building the foundation of my body. Now it was time to begin true sword training.
True to the name Northern Heavenly Sword Sect, the Jin Family was famed for its swordsmanship.
There was once a time when, if one listed the finest sword sects in the Central Plains, ours ranked among the top five.
Though that was before I was even born.
Still, the fact that we had once stood alongside places like the Wudang Sect, the Mount Hua Sect, the Jongnam Sect, and the Namgung Family was extraordinary in itself.
Which meant the hidden enemy must have spent a very long time weakening us.
I had no intention of playing into their schemes any longer.
I intended to shatter their plans with the sword of the North.
"Hoo."
I calmed my breathing and focused my mind.
Then I moved into the forms of the Gale Continuous Sword.
Gale Slash.
The most fundamental form of the martial art, and the core technique at its heart.
Its essence lay in unleashing a slash swift enough to live up to the word gale.
Slash!
In an instant, the wooden target I had set up before me was cut cleanly in half.
The cut was so smooth that even its cross-section looked sharp.
I stared for a moment, surprised by the power of the slash I had just produced.
This much?
It was true that this was the first time I'd used it since returning to the past, so I had been unusually focused.
Even taking that into account, though, it was stronger than I'd expected.
Stronger than the me of this age should ever have been capable of imagining.
It seems several factors have worked in my favor.
The experience and insights accumulated in my first life.
And the body I had refined through the Vajrayaksha Divine Art.
Along with the internal energy I'd gained from the Hundred-Year Fleeceflower Root.
All of it had come together to produce this kind of force.
Once I understood that, I began to dance with the sword like a madman.
Until every last drop of internal energy I had gained from the root was spent.
By the time I had swung the sword for a long while, a pleasant sense of exhaustion settled over me.
"Huff... huff... haa..."
After swinging for what felt like ages, I sprawled out flat on my back.
Sweat poured down me like rain, soaking my clothes through.
And yet the power of the Vajrayaksha Divine Art kept my body moving.
Now this feels like real training.
The true strength of the Vajrayaksha Divine Art was that it grew stronger the more one pushed oneself to the limit.
In other words, the more I repeated this kind of brutal training, the more I would grow.
At this rate, I'll surpass my original realm within a few years.
And if that happened, I might be able to aim even higher.
The realm my grandfather—whose face I had never even seen—was said to have reached.
The realm of Heavenly Martial Realm.
Reaching that realm was my first objective.
If I possessed power like that, those bastards in the shadows wouldn't be able to handle me so lightly.
Come to think of it, I should start preparing for them soon.
If I was right, they wouldn't welcome my growth into that sort of realm.
They would interfere, again and again.
They might even come directly for my life.
I can't rely on Sagong Cheon alone as my guard. I need to raise my own strength—and at the same time, make it impossible for them to touch me carelessly.
But how?
It was a very difficult problem.
They rarely showed themselves openly in the Central Plains, but once they made a move, they made it ruthlessly.
At the very least, I needed one or two means of blocking their tricks.
And I already knew the answer.
Ties.
I simply had to make sure I wasn't standing alone.
Of course, I didn't mean marriage.
I meant increasing the number of people connected to me, until I became difficult to target.
After all, wasn't it common sense that a nameless nobody was easier to strike than a famous figure whose name was known far and wide?
Especially if I forged ties with powerful people capable of shaking the martial world of the Central Plains, it would become far harder to make a move against me.
And as it happened, I knew someone nearby with whom such a bond could be forged.
The Blue-Eyed Sword Demon, Moyong Hyeon-rak.
He could become a formidable ally.
At the same time, elsewhere.
Sagong Cheon had left Jin Muyeol, who was training alone, and was reporting to Yi Tae-gyeom, Head of the Elders' Council.
"Hm."
With a cup of steaming tea set before him, Yi Tae-gyeom read the report with a displeased expression.
"So you're saying that thief really said such a thing?"
"Yes. I heard it clearly. He said someone offered him a great sum of money to put the Young Lord in trouble..."
"The same thing written in the letter, then. So it wasn't his own little performance after all?"
Yi Tae-gyeom tilted his head.
He had believed this whole theft incident to be a fabrication staged by Jin Muyeol to expand his influence.
And to be fair, if it had been staged, quite a lot about it would have made sense.
But according to Sagong Cheon's report, there really did seem to have been someone who made such an offer.
"Foolish idiots. To do something like this and leave evidence behind."
Yi Tae-gyeom muttered irritably.
Sagong Cheon, standing before him, asked carefully,
"Um... Head of the Elders' Council. This truly wasn't something you ordered?"
After all, Yi Tae-gyeom was one of the people most seriously suspected of being behind the incident.
At Sagong Cheon's question, Yi Tae-gyeom's face shifted into something strange.
Instead of answering at once, he crooked a finger at him.
"Come here."
"Yes? Of course, I—"
Smack!
Yi Tae-gyeom struck Sagong Cheon hard across the face.
Crash!
With a loud noise, Sagong Cheon's body rolled across the floor.
Yi Tae-gyeom spoke in a cold voice.
"Get up."
"...!"
Without letting out even a groan, Sagong Cheon rose immediately and stood at rigid attention.
Yi Tae-gyeom lifted a finger and jabbed him in the chest.
"Sagong Cheon. Do you still not understand your place?"
"..."
"You're a dog I keep. If I tell you to bark, you bark. If I tell you to bite, you bite. That's all you are. So why would you dare harbor questions like that?"
"...My apologies."
"Even if it had been my doing, you should never ask me such a question. That is not your place. Remember that from now on as well—unless you'd like another slap across the face."
With that, Yi Tae-gyeom gave a derisive snort.
Sagong Cheon only lowered his head.
Inside, a storm of ugly emotions rose against Yi Tae-gyeom, but he suppressed every last one of them.
Perhaps his temper had eased a little, because Yi Tae-gyeom went on,
"Well, to clear up your doubts, this wasn't something I ordered. Most likely one of the idiots under me acted on his own. Wang Jin, perhaps... though I can't say for certain."
He clicked his tongue.
His manner made it clear he found the whole business deeply distasteful.
"Even if I questioned them now, they'd all deny it and wriggle free. The only fortunate part is that the thief wasn't captured. Though even if he had been, we'd have killed him to shut his mouth."
"..."
Sagong Cheon kept his lips tightly sealed.
In truth, he knew very well that Nam Cheon had been captured once by Jin Muyeol.
And that Jin Muyeol had let him go to save his life.
The contrast with the Young Lord is too stark.
The Jin Muyeol Sagong Cheon had seen was a true great hero—someone who had done his best to save even the life of a man who had tried to harm him, simply because he couldn't bear to see him die.
But the Head of the Elders' Council before him was a petty, narrow-hearted man who regarded others' lives as cheap.
It was enough to make Sagong Cheon sick that he served under such a man.
But I have to endure it. For my daughter, I...
That was when it happened.
Yi Tae-gyeom, chin resting on his hand, had fallen into thought over something that seemed to occur to him.
After mulling it over for a moment, the corners of his mouth curled upward.
"Good. Yes, that will do."
"Pardon?"
"The Young Lord. We simply get rid of him before he grows any further. Of course, we can't leave traces, so we can't act directly."
"...!"
Sagong Cheon's face went pale.
What Yi Tae-gyeom was saying was no different from declaring that Jin Muyeol should be killed.
Oblivious to Sagong Cheon's reaction, Yi Tae-gyeom smiled in satisfaction and continued,
"I wonder if there are any suitable fellows nearby. Men of the unorthodox path would do. So would black market scum. Let's see... Ah! Those men would be perfect."
With clear delight in his eyes, Yi Tae-gyeom gave an order to the guard at his side.
"Send word to the Red Wolf Gang. Tell them I have a job for them."