21. Daoist (5)
Daoist (5)
21. Daoist (5)
The Yin-Yang Art was an exceedingly simple internal art. My innate talent might have been garbage, but a first-grade textbook could hardly be difficult for a middle schooler. I reached the second stage of Yang Blossom Art in an instant. While I was at it, I tried for the third stage as well, but just as Master had said, even when I circulated qi according to the formula in the book, the energy became obstructed somewhere before completing a single microcosmic orbit. When I turned past the Qi-Circulation Principles, I found an additional condition for reaching the third stage, unlike the first and second. The moment I read that I had to ejaculate inside a woman who was circulating the second stage of Yin Blossom Art while I circulated Yang Blossom Art, I hurled the book onto the floor.
Damn it. Of course. Yang Blossom Art was a bedchamber art, after all. Originally, the cultivation of bedchamber arts was not something for virgins and bachelors like us, but something for a married couple to practice together. That must have been why even Master could not reach the third stage. Master had said she needed Yang Blossom Art's help to climb to the third stage. No, how was I supposed to help with this? Still, it was a book Master treasured. I picked the book up, dusted it off, and looked at the later contents.
The third stage. Just as Master had said, it stated that one would exude a faint fragrance that attracted the opposite sex. Presumably, the condition for reaching the third stage of Yin Blossom Art was likewise to receive the semen of a man at the second stage of Yang Blossom Art. There was no way Master, a virgin, would copulate with me, and fundamentally, a master and disciple were like parent and child. Contrary to Master's expectations, Yeongsan Sect, populated only by virgins and bachelors, could not advance beyond the second stage of the Yin-Yang Art.
Beyond that, the contents were utterly preposterous. A human being exuding fragrance? Even among the small number of elites admitted to the top-tier Mount Hua Sect, not everyone reached the ultimate realm of Sword Fragrance. And this piece-of-shit internal art claimed to grant a realm at the very pinnacle of the martial world? However I looked at it, the Yin-Yang Art was garbage bedchamber art, like obscene nonsense someone had scrawled as a joke. It was not worth sacrificing the slightest shred of shame to attain. Even if this ridiculous effect was real, I had no desire to reach the third stage and become a fragrant man, so the second stage was enough.
Precisely because the ridiculous contents were perversely intriguing, I slowly turned to the next page. The fourth stage. The condition was to ejaculate nine times in succession, using at least once each the mouth, genitals, anus, hands, and breasts of a woman who had mastered the third stage of Yin Blossom Art. Was anyone who could pull that off even human? And the anus, at that? Fuck, in this era—no, homosexuals had existed in my previous era too, so anal sex must have existed, but how was anyone supposed to stomach that in a world without enemas? The stated effect was that if the woman had practiced Yin Blossom Art, the ejaculated semen would not fertilize her but would instead be absorbed like a weak elixir. The man's internal energy would not be drained, though he would not grow stronger as the woman did.
The condition for the fifth stage. Having relations with two or more women who practiced Yin Blossom Art. The effect was that the partner woman—whether she had practiced Yin Blossom Art or not—would experience a pleasure akin to ultimate bliss. The final stage, the sixth stage. The condition was to simultaneously have relations with four women who had reached the fifth stage of Yin Blossom Art. The effect was a strengthened version of the fourth stage. Even for a woman who had not practiced Yin Blossom Art, he would not get her pregnant, and for a woman who practiced Yin Blossom Art, the elixir effect of the semen would increase ever so slightly.
It was a Yin-Yang Art that felt unfair yet fair. Yang Blossom Art's effects presupposed from the start that the user would engage with multiple Yin Blossom Art practitioners, as well as women who had not practiced it. In exchange, Yin Blossom Art had the internal-energy-boosting effect that Yang Blossom Art lacked. Though, mind you, the internal energy to be gained from pounding away frantically at the sixth stage for a year was probably on the level of two roots of good-quality ginseng.
The formulas, conditions, and effects of Yang Blossom Art actually took up very little space. The appendix that followed might have been the true value of the book: diagrams depicting countless sexual positions, even explaining in detail exactly when to circulate Yang Blossom Art to satisfy a woman. I had no interest in Yang Blossom Art itself, but the variety of positions piqued my curiosity, so I ended up reading it for entertainment.
As always, I closed the book and went out to the training ground to loosen my stiff body, where I ran into Jeong-hyang. She smiled prettily, her eyes crinkling. In an instant, my whole body burned hot and my heart pounded as though it would burst. I already knew she was beautiful. She was my senior sister, someone like family. I had at least that much self-control around the opposite sex. But all reason vanished in an instant. The gentle senior sister before me suddenly appeared as a sensual woman, and my goodwill—the desire to help her and get along—warped into the base urge to strip her naked, pin her beneath me, and violate her.
Damn it! Every martial art in this goddamn sect was pathetic garbage. I knew the dangers of a heretical internal art, yet the words "virility enhancement" had still lured me in. Only now did I realize that I was a fucking idiot worthy of Yeongsan Sect's name.
"Are you training your external arts again?"
Jeong-hyang smiled kindly. What was I supposed to do? My heart—no, my libido—felt ready to explode. She could be a little airheaded, was defenseless against physical contact, and was innocent, gentle, and endlessly accommodating. If I approached her the right way, wouldn't she accept my lust? Dear God. I was no longer in my right mind. Unable to keep looking at her, I made a vague excuse and fled, only to run straight into Son Yeong, who was practicing Snow-White Sword.
Droplets of sweat trickled down her lovely cheeks. Had a sweating woman ever looked this erotic before? If I stripped her now, would her body be slick with sweat beneath her clothes? Son Yeong. The woman I had spent the most time with. We had even sat side by side on the baggage cart, sleeping shoulder to shoulder. Now that I had passed Snow-White Sword on to a woman who loved martial arts more than anyone, would she accept my filthy lust? Her swordsmanship might have been insignificant, but her body, honed through years of diligent training, would be incredibly taut and flexible. If I violated her in positions I had never even imagined, would she end up despising me? Well, even if she did, wouldn't she accept it if I taught her the clan's internal art next time?
Ah... No! Fuck. I had gone mad right now. The Heart Demon I had only ever heard about had come. Son Yeong had said that after practicing Yin Blossom Art, a strange tickling sensation arose and her whole body grew hot. But my Heart Demon right now was not on that level. To begin with, male sexual desire was beyond comparison with female sexual desire, and because every woman, including Master, was a virgin with no sexual experience, no one had ever experienced lust that exploded to the degree mine had.
I was thirsty. My chest burned as though on fire. I desperately needed cold water to calm myself. When I headed toward the kitchen, I inevitably ran into Lee Eun-ha and her enormous breasts and buttocks. Big. Truly big. Before, I had made an effort to avert my eyes, but now I could not tear them away from her chest. Jeong-hyang had the most beautiful face, and Son Yeong surely possessed a splendid body that was both soft and toned, but wasn't Lee Eun-ha still the most fuckable-looking woman of them all?
She was practical and the only woman who understood the value of the silver I spent. On top of that, she had recently told me she was more comfortable with us acting as master and servant. If I ordered her—no, if I sweet-talked her in the Joseon language she must have missed—wouldn't she willingly accept my lust? We didn't even need to have sex. Just sandwiching my cock between those huge tits and having her suck it seemed enough to satisfy me.
Damn it. Yeongsan Sect had far too many alluring women, each like a trap set to shake my resolve. Without even managing to drink water, I fled blindly toward the main gate, only to come face-to-face with Cho-ryeong. Damn it. No! She had practiced Yin Blossom Art too. But Cho-ryeong had already entered my sight.
Cute. She was so, so cute. As always, truly adorable. Ah... Thank goodness. I was so fucking glad I wasn't some scumbag lolicon.
"Junior Brother! Junior Brother!"
Cho-ryeong secretly beckoned to me with a tiny hand like a curled fern frond. Her innocent appearance melted the Heart Demon away in an instant. When I approached, she glanced furtively around and pressed a few red berries into my hand. Wild strawberries. Since our sect stood in the mountains, they apparently grew within its grounds. Even so, Yeongsan Sect had been starving until recently and had already foraged nearly everything edible, so wild strawberries should have been almost impossible to find. Yet Cho-ryeong was giving me the few she had barely managed to gather. Tears nearly came to my eyes. The Heart Demon had left me absurdly sentimental.
I accepted the wild strawberries and put one in my own mouth and one into Cho-ryeong's small mouth, and she smiled with boundless brightness.
"Hehehe. It's good, right?"
"Thank you, Senior Sister. And I have a favor to ask."
"A favor? Of me?"
"Yes. Please just stay by my side for a moment."
She tilted her head. Keeping her in sight, I sat on the ground and began Qi Circulation and Breath Regulation with the clan's internal art to suppress the remnants of the Heart Demon. One microcosmic orbit, two, three. As my internal energy surged through my meridians and circulated around my body, my mind gradually settled. Calm returned to my overheated body.
"Junior Brother! Are you alright?"
"Yes. I'm alright. Thank you, Senior Sister."
"Ah! This is what's called guarding, right? Protecting someone while they do Qi Circulation and Breath Regulation."
"Exactly. Senior Sister Cho."
"But why did you need guarding when there's nobody here?"
"There was. Thank you for protecting me."
Cho-ryeong tilted her head again, but soon broke into a bright smile.
"Hehe. Just say the word anytime."
After dodging the four trap cards in Yeongsan Sect, I had finally found the sole healing card. Cho-ryeong's existence had allowed me to preserve my human dignity. Perhaps because I had overcome the Heart Demon once, the same phenomenon did not recur when I encountered the other senior sisters afterward. I had lived in the martial world throughout this life, yet I had never imagined a bedchamber art capable of shaking the mind truly existed.
This was the martial world where you beat things to pieces, not a fantasy world, after all.
But once I came to my senses and thought about it, though I had never seen one directly myself, this world was likewise a bizarre world where fantasy monsters like jiangshi existed. I couldn't let my guard down. Just as it had always been, my common sense crumbled in an instant before reality.
"That's astonishing. To reach the second stage in just one day. It's a state that took Yeong and me a whole month to barely achieve."
In the middle of the night, Master came to my quarters. She looked slightly aggrieved as she marveled at my achievement. It was a little unexpected to discover that Master had a competitive streak too.
"I thought I was going to die. An unbelievably powerful Heart Demon came over me. I barely managed to suppress it, and I nearly caused a serious incident."
"A Heart Demon?"
"It seems that with Yang Blossom Art—or rather, for men—an overwhelmingly powerful sexual urge wells up. At worst, I nearly made an irreversible mistake with my senior sisters."
"Oh dear! If you were having such a difficult time, you should have come and found me, your Master!"
"No, Master would be even worse. If I had done something improper to a senior sister, I could kneel and apologize, then take her to the Baek Clan Estate and support her for life, just as you once told me to. But the thought of doing something improper to you is horrifying."
"You remembered. Truly, my disciple is a man of responsibility."
Why did she look so proud as she said that?
"Still, if anything like this happens again, please come to me. Through the bedchamber art, I learned a way that won't require you to take responsibility, and I need the training anyway."
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"For the Yin Blossom Art to rise to the third stage, no progress can be made whatsoever through circulating qi alone. The semen of a man who has practiced Yang Blossom Art is required."
"Huhhh?"
"Disciple. You must really be fond of the word 'huh?' I've heard it quite a few times already."
"Ah... No! It's because you, Master, make a 'huh?' come out of my mouth on its own countless times!"
"Is that so? Even aside from the restriction you are under now, you've been suffering because you have not ejaculated once since entering Yeongsan Sect, haven't you? That suffering ends now. Your master will take care of it."
Master approached me, thrusting out her chest. In the gentle eyes of my small-framed master, a hint of madness seemed to shimmer.