The Binding Knot
Everyone had expected the same result. For a blade of grass that had only just put down roots, the wind and rain had simply been too fierce to withstand.
But then the boy's and the girl's stances crossed, and the moment that fragile, wavering wooden sword carved a single, unbroken line through the air—
Thud.
The one left standing was not who anyone expected.
Every onlooker stared at the arena with momentarily blank expressions.
...What just happened?
Why is that child still standing?
Their question was one and the same. Why on earth was that girl the one standing?
It wasn't only the lay spectators. Even the academy directors who fancied themselves men of some discernment murmured among themselves, unable to make sense of what they'd just witnessed.
No — not everyone, in truth.
"...!"
Kwa-dang!
Baek Gun-ak forgot all propriety and shot up from his seat.
"Don't tell me... jo-mun?"
Impossible. Even at the height of his powers, he had only ever known that such a thing existed — a martial principle of the old jianghu so obscure that the martial artists of this era would not even recognize its name.
Jo-mun, put simply, was a vital point. But not a physical one like the solar plexus or the temple. It was the knot of qi, the seam in one's martial art — the inevitable junction of internal and external energy that formed the instant a practitioner forced out qi to execute a technique.
Naturally, that knot was never fixed in place. It shifted with every movement, with every circulation of internal energy. But if one could target it — if one could sever that knot at precisely the right moment, in precisely the right way — then no matter how profound the opponent's art, it could be shattered and torn down in a single instant.
That is not something luck can accomplish. If even I could never do it... how could that child have?
And if it was such a fatal weakness, why did so few people know of it? The answer was inefficiency. To even perceive it required special methods or secret eye techniques found only in the deepest vaults of the great sects' arts. And since the jo-mun's location changed every time the opponent moved, anyone skilled enough to track it would be far better off simply striking the vitals laid bare before his eyes. What was more, as a martial artist's level rose, that gap shrank — or vanished altogether.
Just then, Geum Tae-bang muttered obliviously from the next seat over.
"I say. Isn't that... jo-mun? Even back in the palace, I only saw it two or three times at most..."
"..."
"My, my. A rare spectacle indeed. So Master Jin knows how to teach, and not just how to thrash people. The moment I laid eyes on him I knew he was no ordinary fellow, I tell you..."
A chill ran down his spine.
"Ah—ahem! Kehem! Kehem!"
Under Baek Gun-ak's razor-sharp glare, Geum Tae-bang coughed drily several times and shut his mouth.
Soon the referee hurried up onto the arena, and shouted in a voice thick with flustered disbelief.
"Th-the winner! Jeong So-so of the Cheongun Academy!"
A moment of dead silence spread across the arena.
WAAAAAAAH!
Then a roar of cheers erupted from the stands, loud enough to sweep them all away.
"One hit and — bam! Down he went! I don't know what in the world happened, but that was incredible!"
"A disciple of a brand-new academy just felled a disciple of White Horse!"
The spectators buzzed with excitement. Upsets had always been the kind of spectacle that kept a crowd on the edge of their seats, hadn't they? Come what may, the star of this tournament was now that girl!
But at that very moment—
A man scrambled up onto the arena, his face stricken.
"So-so!"
The desperate cry cut clean through the commotion engulfing the stage. The onlookers sucked in their breath.
Jeong So-so, who had been staggering her way down from the arena—
Srrk.
—was crumpling to the ground, strength gone.
Having shouted it himself, Jin Cheong-un was startled to learn he was capable of making a sound like that. He sprinted to the edge of the arena and knelt beside Jeong So-so, who had collapsed in a heap.
"Haah. Haah. Haah."
Her breathing was abnormally ragged — unnaturally so. His expression turned grave.
"What's wrong? Are you all right?"
"N-no!"
"What?"
"Koff! I-I got beat on the entire match, of course I'm not all right! If you hadn't stopped me, I could've hit him a few more times...! Heuk! Hah!"
The brief numbness drained from his face and he barked, "You have got to be kidding me!"
"Hehe. I'm f-fine. I think I just relaxed all at once. My breathing... hah. It's killing me."
"Breathe deep. Slowly."
Jin Cheong-un pushed his internal energy into her at once, and his jaw clenched all on its own.
If she were merely exhausted, her qi would not be wavering like this.
He flooded his Geoncheon qi through her in an instant, combing every last thread of her qi and blood. No internal injuries, no external wounds. No sorcery, no strange arts. That left poison — but had he not personally vetted every scrap of food and every drop of water she'd touched since leaving Jin Manor?
What in the world is this?
Tendons stood out along the jaw he'd clenched without meaning to. And at that very moment, something snagged on his qi-sense.
Why is her lung energy alone so vigorous?
There it was — the reason for the ragged breathing. Illness did not strike only when one's qi ran hollow; it struck just as surely when it burned too hot. It was a condition commonly known as qi excess.
In a word: her body hadn't been harmed. It had been improved — too much.
"Hah."
Every ounce of tension drained from Jin Cheong-un's shoulders with a wasted breath. Ha. All that panic for nothing. Her breathing regulation had simply slipped for a moment. An hour or two of proper rest and it would resolve itself.
Chiiik—
Just to be certain, he scattered the energy with his Geoncheon qi before withdrawing his hand.
"How do you feel now?"
"Well, I... huh? My breathing?"
"Good grief. You two are such a handful. Such a handful."
Jin Cheong-un let out a long sigh and rose to his feet, then spoke in a voice pitched somewhere between scolding and not.
"If something's wrong with your body, you stop the match and say so. Why keep fighting like an idiot?"
"...You knew?"
"I assumed you just couldn't focus... honestly. You siblings really are alike, even in the strangest ways."
Jin Cheong-un shook his head vigorously.
"That'll do for today."
"What?"
"We're withdrawing from the finals."
"No, I can still fight!"
"Fight in that state? You've done more than enough. So—"
"No."
Jin Cheong-un blinked and looked down at her.
"Master, I want to keep going. Please let me see it through to the end."
"Why?"
"Because in all my life... I have never once had anything come of trying hard."
Jeong So-so gripped her wooden sword — fractured here and there along its length — in a white-knuckled fist. Quietly, she turned to look back over the arena.
"But this is the first time in my life I feel like I've achieved something with my own two hands. I want to win — truly, with everything I have. Not just for the academy's sake. I want it for myself. Please let me do this."
Then, having spoken with bottomless earnestness, she abruptly thrust her fist into the air and cried out, radiant:
"You're the one who said it! With utmost sincerity, nothing is impossible!"
"..."
Speechless, Jin Cheong-un stared at her for a long moment. He had treated this match as nothing more than business to be settled with the association — but for this child, it had evidently been something else entirely.
"It seems I've been underestimating you."
With a thin smile, he nodded.
"Fine. Good."
"...Yes!"
"But if we're doing this, you are prepared for what comes with it?"
"Of course I... huh?"
Prepared? Prepared for what?
"You're talking that big a game, so I take it you're confident you'll win. Surely you don't intend to defy your master's wishes and then lose. Hmm. Hmm!"
"Master? Excuse me — Master?"
Despite his disciple's plaintive calls, Jin Cheong-un allowed himself a wry smirk. But as he turned away, the air around him cooled several degrees.
But... why would that symptom appear so suddenly?
It was usually one of two things. A different species of internal energy being injected into her — or her having consumed some herb or medicinal tonic. But she had never once been struck by such a technique, never once eaten anything amiss...
Jin Cheong-un's footsteps froze mid-stride.
The water So-ryong brought back.
He immediately circulated his Geoncheon qi and turned his perception inward. Whatever it was had long since dissolved — no trace remained to be found. And yet he could feel it. A minute, thread-thin increase in the energy of his lungs.
"..."
Saaaah.
In an instant, Jin Cheong-un's eyes sank into cold, still water. He turned his head, slowly.
"M-Master?"
Jeong So-so flinched at the sight of his profile. It was the same listless, half-interested expression as always — and yet the moment she caught the bottomlessly frigid glint beneath those half-lowered lids, she almost didn't recognize the man as her master at all.
"If you're all right now, go rest with So-ryong."
"Wh-where are you going, Master?"
His gaze slid toward the VIP seats — toward Baek Gun-ak seated there. As it happened, Baek Gun-ak was glancing their way at that very moment, and their eyes met in midair.
"I'm going to go have a short word with the Vice President."
I don't know what that panicked look means. So I'll go ask him. Why something strange was mixed into the water the participants drank — and who he trusted, and what he trusted them with, to cross that line.
But at that very moment—
"Junior! Juniorrr!"
From far off, someone was waving both arms at them in a frenzy. It was Hwang Jong-baek.
"Senior? Oh my, you were worried about me. I'm perfectly fine now."
"N-not that! Quickly! Come here, quickly!"
"...?"
"You man! Your disciple! Your disciple has collapsed!"
"Ah — yes. That's exactly why I was just—"
Thud.
Jin Cheong-un's breath stopped in his throat. The water So-so had drunk — the water some hand had almost certainly tampered with. The one who had carried it back was So-ryong. If that child had drunk it. If, while he was so carefully filtering the turbid qi of his Severed Meridian Syndrome, a tonic meant to whip the qi into a frenzy had entered his body—
BOOM!
Without so much as a backward glance, Jin Cheong-un kicked off the ground and tore across it.
THUD!
Jin Cheong-un arrived at the Cheongun Academy's assigned spot in the blink of an eye, and his eyes went wide.
"Master!"
"Cho-sam? What are you doing here?"
Not only Hwang Jong-baek's people — the place was crawling with Black Tiger gang members. What in the world were they doing here?
"No. The story can wait."
"W-we're here, sir!"
Jeong So-ryong lay atop a thickly layered pile of traveling cloths. Had the Black Tiger men spread them out because the ground was cold?
"So-ryong."
"Master... koff, koff!"
Jin Cheong-un's face hardened.
Tssssss!
A heat-haze of energy was rising off the boy's body. The prodrome of the Severed Meridian Syndrome. The attack had not yet begun, but the stagnant qi pooled inside him was seeping out, smoldering, as though it would rupture at any moment.
Cho-sam hurried to explain. "He collapsed all of a sudden while chasing after you when you ran out, Master. For now we carried him here with Director Hwang's disciples and..."
"Thank you."
Jin Cheong-un lifted Jeong So-ryong's body into his arms at once.
Not here.
It was different from before. He needed somewhere with no one around — immediately.
"Junior! Is the boy all right!"
"So-ryong!"
Hwang Jong-baek and Jeong So-so came rushing up behind him. Jin Cheong-un's words spilled out half-tumbled.
"Senior, there's no time to explain. I will repay this debt — but I must ask one favor of you."
"A f-favor?"
"Stand guard for me."
"...!"
"I'm taking him to the guest hall. While I focus, watch the perimeter."
Hwang Jong-baek stammered, flustered. "I-I've never done anything like that. Guardianship is something you entrust only to people you'd trust with your life..."
"I'm asking you."
"...!"
He froze in place, unable to manage even an answer.
And then—
"Master, I'm sorry..."
"So-ryong."
Coughing over and over, Jeong So-ryong wore the expression of a boy convinced it was all his own fault.
"I didn't hide being sick this time. It really was sudden..."
"I know, you little rascal."
"I'm sorry..."
In that instant, that uncannily grown-up child broke into a sob.
"I'm sorry for being sick. I'm always nothing but a burden to you, Master... and So-so's match is still left to fight... koff, koff!"
Everyone's faces crumpled, and no one could find a word to say. Even Hwang Jong-baek and the Black Tiger men felt their eyes sting, biting down hard on their lips to hold it in.
And at that moment, Jin Cheong-un grinned and swept a hand over Jeong So-ryong's hair.
"A little squirt like you, worrying about your elders? Who do you think you are?"
"Huh?"
"This master of yours isn't soft enough for a little sickness from you to spell disaster. So sleep deep. From now on, put your faith in this master and no one else."
Jeong So-ryong gave a faint smile. Then his eyelids slid shut, as gently as if he were drifting into sleep.
"Master! So-ryong's—!"
"He's fine. He fell asleep from exhaustion."
Jin Cheong-un let out a long breath, and quietly looked back and forth between his two disciples.
Blood will tell, they said — but how on earth could the two of them be this alike? The way they were such a handful. The way they seized a man's heart and wrung it out. The way they worried over everyone else when they were still at an age when they themselves should have come first.
The way they took after their eldest senior brother, too.
Why is it that only my retirement keeps turning out like this?
With a hollow face, Jin Cheong-un smiled wryly. Then he drew one deep breath, lowered his head, and said:
"Let's go, Senior Hwang."
"Hm?"
"Master! What are you going to do?"
"I've dragged this out for the sake of caution... but I can't stand the waiting any longer."
Jin Cheong-un's eyes flashed.
"Since it's come to this, I'll use this chance to settle this Severed Meridian Syndrome business — once and for all."
Every gaze in the place turned toward Jin Cheong-un.
And they saw it — his eyes, burning with an intensity none of them had ever witnessed in him before.