Not Exclusively Mine (3)
Her instincts warned her immediately: the creature hovering before her was deadly.
Every hair on Sowol's body stood on end, a prickle of cold sweat tracing the nape of her neck. Can I really do this? She had begun formal sword training only a handful of months ago. Wondering whether she could bring down such a monstrous aberration on her own was only natural. Yet despite the tremor in her chest, she did not retreat a single inch. Instead, she took a measured step forward.
No-Mind.
She brought Lee Hyun's teachings to the forefront of her thoughts. There was no fear. No dread. Not even the competitive hunger to prove herself. Stripping away every extraneous impulse, Sowol let her awareness dissolve into absolute emptiness.
A piercing, unearthly shriek tore through the gloom.
The harrowing wail failed to slow her stride. Irritated by her insolence, crimson embers flared deep within the wraith's hollow eye sockets. It plunged forward with blinding speed, intent on tearing the life from her flesh.
Another curdling scream split the air as a bolt of pale, spectral energy shot straight at her. Shifting half a pace aside, Sowol slipped past the blast in a single fluid motion and swung her wooden sword. But the blunt timber sliced through nothing but empty air.
"Hup!"
Disappointment found no quarter in her heart. In this state, even regret was an unforgivable luxury. She had to empty herself completely, clinging to nothing at all. How had Lee Hyun moved when he cut down the Skeleton Gang? His blade had been entirely unfettered, flowing like water across stones, bound by nothing in existence. He had shown her that possessing nothing meant being capable of anything.
She yearned for that sword. She wanted to grasp that boundless dance with her own hands. But the moment that tiny ember of desire sparked within her stillness, Sowol shook her head. This, too, is idle clutter.
There was only one truth to hold: her master's guidance. The state of No-Mind.
Enraged that its prey had slipped away, the wraith fired a volley of ghostly white projectiles in rapid succession. Yet not a single strike brushed her robes. With slight, drifting adjustments of her posture, Sowol wove through the onslaught without breaking rhythm. Slower than Master's strikes.
The wraith's attacks were choked with raw malice. If she could not even evade strikes this crude, every agonizing hour of training she had endured would amount to nothing more than a waste of time. And she refused to be pathetic. Weaving past the final barrage, Sowol tightened her grip on the hilt.
What she sought was that singular sword dance. Envisioning a blade radiant as pristine moonlight, she slashed upward.
The air gave a low, resonant thrum.
It lasted only a fraction of a heartbeat, but clinging to the edge of the wooden sword was an unmistakable, gossamer haze of pure white radiance. Not a single person present could fail to recognize what it was.
"...Dear heavens."
Anne's lips parted in sheer disbelief. If her eyes were not deceiving her, that faint glow was...
"...Sword Qi...?"
Sword Qi was a threshold that even warriors who trained for decades could never cross without extraordinary genius. Yet here was Sowol—a girl who had held a sword for barely a few months—manifesting it before her very eyes. Anne was utterly struck dumb.
The gossamer shroud fluttered as though a single breath might snuff it out, but even the wraith sensed the lethal threat coiled within that light. Its ethereal form recoiled instinctively, hesitating for a fatal instant.
And that hesitation sealed its doom.
"Haaah!"
With a low, resolute shout, Sowol surged forward. Darting across the ground like a gust of wind, her golden eyes flashed with sharp focus as she brought the wooden blade down in a clean arc. In that fleeting instant, the silhouette of her strike bore an undeniable, lingering resemblance to Lee Hyun's own sword.
"Phew..."
Watching the wraith unravel into dissolving wisps under the weight of the Qi-infused blow, Sowol exhaled softly and glanced back. Anne was slumped on the ground, staring in dazed shock, while Lee Hyun stood with his arms crossed, observing the aftermath as if looking at something entirely unremarkable.
While Anne's reverent gaze offered a faint flicker of pride, the sight of Lee Hyun's impassive expression flooded Sowol with sudden humiliation. What did I just do...?
It had been nothing more than a clumsy imitation. She had recklessly tried to mimic a fragment of the sword dance Lee Hyun had demonstrated days ago. To a master who knew the perfected form, how absurd must her crude attempt have looked? He probably thought she was trying to take flight before she had even learned to crawl.
It's so embarrassing.
She had never felt such burning shame in all her life. As the treasured daughter of the Eastern Merchant Guild, gifted with noble standing and a face universally praised as lovely, pride had accompanied her every step. That very pride made this humiliation cut twice as deep. For someone of her stature to settle for cheap mimicry...
Clenching her fists, Sowol met Lee Hyun's gaze and bit down softly on her lower lip. Next time... I swear I will show you your true dance.
What in the world did that girl just pull off?
Sword Qi? I knew she was extraordinarily gifted, but to manifest Sword Qi after barely a few months of proper training? Sure, I had helped awaken her mana, but I never imagined she could externalize and shape it this quickly. Did I just strap wings to a tiger?
And that wasn't all. That final strike she used to finish off the wraith was unpolished and rough around the edges, but it was unmistakably the Moonlight Sword Style.
"...Now I understand why Master Lee accepted Lady Sowol as his disciple," Anne murmured from the ground, her voice pulling me out of my internal bewilderment.
Though screaming on the inside, I kept my expression carefully blank and gave a slow, measured nod. Just then, Sowol began walking toward me, having cleared away the remnants of the monster. How should I handle this? Shower her with praise, or...
"...It is finished, Master."
"Unrefined."
"...Yes."
Sowol's shoulders flinched, her golden eyes clouding with anxious self-reproach. Even if I hadn't formally taught her the style yet, since what she had unleashed was the Moonlight Sword, reprimanding her clumsy execution was the right move. A crow-tit trying to match the stride of a stork only ends up tearing its own legs apart. History is littered with swordsmen who ruined their foundations by mimicking advanced techniques before mastering the basics. Rebuking her for leaping straight into the Moonlight Sword was entirely justified.
"Do not attempt it again until you are ready."
"...Understood."
Sowol's head drooped, her shoulders sagging dejectedly. Right. That's enough scolding for now.
"Even so, you did well."
Reaching into my coat, I pulled out a Praise Sticker and pressed it firmly onto her forehead.
Caught completely off guard, Sowol's eyes went wide as she stared up at me.
"Manifesting Sword Qi and grasping the rudiments of the Moonlight Sword are feats far beyond your current stage. You did remarkably well to pull them off."
"Master, I..."
"Just as it is a master's duty to correct a disciple when she strays, it is equally a master's obligation to celebrate her growth."
I reached out and patted her head. Leaning softly into my palm, the gloomy cloud hanging over her evaporated, replaced by a shy, radiant smile.
"Did you copy the Moonlight Sword from what you saw back then?"
"Yes."
"Starting next time, I'll teach it to you properly. Dedicate yourself to mastering it."
"I will!"
Sowol looked overjoyed. And frankly, so was I. Her rapid progress meant I could raise her into a powerhouse that much faster.
"At any rate... the fact that a wraith and ghouls appeared out here confirms that cultists are operating in the vicinity."
"What do you mean by that, Master Lee?" Anne asked, rising to her feet. The lingering hostility and envy she had previously harbored toward Sowol were completely gone from her eyes. No doubt a consequence of witnessing Sowol's absurd display of martial talent just now. A welcome change of pace.
"Exactly what I said. Wraiths and ghouls don't naturally spawn in terrain like this."
"Then their presence means... someone deliberately released and controlled them here?"
"Precisely. And nobody possesses the specialized craft to manipulate spiritual undead like that except the cultists."
During the religious war event in the middle of the game's main storyline, players learned that the cult possessed specialized artifacts capable of sealing and commanding spectral monsters. They frequently leveraged those tools to unleash restless spirits upon battlefields.
"The range of that control isn't very wide, which means..."
Drawing my sword in a single blur, I hurled it into the distant darkness with all my strength.
"Aaaargh!"
A shrill cry of agony echoed from the gloom. Leading Sowol and Anne at a sprint, we arrived to find a man pinned to the earth, screaming as my blade jutted clean through his thigh.
"If we interrogate this rat, we'll get a clear picture of how deeply the cult has infected the estate."
Shattered crystal shards littered the soil beside him—the broken remains of the artifact used to tether the wraith. Remembering its mechanics from the game, I grabbed the writhing man by his collar and hauled him up.
"Why don't you start by telling me about your backer and your hideout?"
The interrogation didn't take long. Breaking a couple of fingers has a miraculous way of loosening tongues.
Armed with his confession, we rallied the estate guards Anne had summoned and made our way to a small, disused storehouse situated on the outskirts of the territory. Remembering the man's claim that an abandoned warehouse had been converted into an altar, I shoved open the heavy wooden doors. The scene inside left no room for doubt.
"...This is horrific," Anne murmured under her breath.
I nodded grimly. We had found the right place.
"Master, look. There are people collapsed over there."
Presumably the missing estate residents. Bound securely with rough ropes, they stared blankly into the empty air, their eyes hollow and vacant.
"What happened to them?"
"Their vitality was harvested to sustain the wraith," I replied, sifting through several parchment ledgers on a nearby table. "And once they died from exhaustion, the plan was likely to turn their corpses into zombies."
After skimming the documents, I gave Anne a nod.
"Comb the entire perimeter! Search every inch to make sure no other rats are lurking in the shadows!"
"Yes, sir!"
While the soldiers bustled about securing the area, my eyes scanned the clutter atop the main altar desk. Sure enough, it was there. Resting in the corner was a dark, ornate seal, and I reached out to claim it.
◈ A clandestine token granting access to the secret stronghold of the evil cult.
"Master, what is that?" Sowol asked, stepping up to my side.
What was it, she asked?
"Something I'm going to trade for the next step in your growth."