49. Murong Clan (11)
Murong Clan (11)
49. Murong Clan (11)
Murong Rin had spent her life as the strong, a superior who never needed to watch anyone else's reactions. She flaunted her lust without the shame women were expected to feel. Come to think of it, Master and Jeong-hyang had little shame about sex either. Perhaps I was fated to become entangled with women like them. A Daoist talking about fate—how ridiculous.
Murong Rin slipped off her clothes. Murong Jin had folded her garments before setting them down, but Murong Rin left clothes worth several houses crumpled on the floor. A moment later she tried to circulate qi and winced. Pain during qi circulation was serious enough that I rushed over in alarm, but she stopped me with one hand.
"It's fine. It hurts a little, but I did it deliberately. Young Master Baek, have you heard of Bedchamber Arts?"
Bedchamber Arts? Why had that bizarre term come out of her mouth again? She spoke to me with complete composure, almost as though she were boasting.
"You may not believe it, but true Bedchamber Arts exist—not merely sexual techniques. It sounds absurd, does it not?"
Ah... no. I happened to know some too.
"Do you not find it strange that I never became pregnant despite sleeping with so many men? I paid a fortune to learn Bedchamber Arts. During qi circulation, I reverse my internal energy at the Hoeum Acupoint and create a tiny wound in my womb. I do it carefully, so the wound is minute, but that alone prevents conception."
Ah, I'd heard of that: the intrauterine contraceptive device, the loop, which created inflammation in the uterine lining to prevent pregnancy. It couldn't compare to the Yin-Yang Art, which transcended natural law, but like her Kegel exercises, her Bedchamber Arts were centuries ahead of their time.
She unfastened the ties of my clothes with a subtly alluring look.
"How about it? Nice, isn't it? You can release your seed inside me as much as you like. It's a dream come true for any man, right? So don't hold back today. Let's do it."
Her blatant seduction reminded me how badly I'd lost my mind last time. I had desperately avoided ejaculating inside Murong Jin, then became drunk on the situation of sleeping with Murong Rin—a flower atop a cliff—and came inside her without thought. Of course a woman willing to use her own body and future children for her dream of becoming Clan Head would not rely on something as uncertain as a Birth Control Pill.
"Fair is fair—half a shichen each. We each do what we want. I'll go first."
She took a mouthful of liquor from the bottle and passed it to my lips. As the sharp, floral fragrance spread through my mouth, she laid me down on the floor and mounted me just like that. Unlike the last time, her movements were unhurried, gentle and leisurely. It figured—even in sex she seemed to prefer being on top. A round of passion would end, then we'd rest a while sipping liquor, and resume at some random, unexpected moment. Perhaps this was what sex with a friend rather than a lover felt like.
"Hah... hah... you monstrous man..."
She sprawled on the floor and looked up at me. The mere difference in height between our gazes was childish, yet it filled me with a man's pride at overcoming her.
"I'll give you a nine. Become a perfect-ten man by the time I return from Henan. Young Master Baek's equipment and stamina are both excellent, but you mustn't rest on your laurels."
"You are asking too much, are you not?"
"That's because I am Murong Rin. I'll considerably increase my own power on this journey to Henan—not martial strength, but the power that comes from people. My becoming stronger benefits you too, does it not?"
That was true. I knew her chances of becoming clan head were desperately slim, yet part of me still believed she would realize her dream one day. No—I hoped she would. Her success would greatly benefit both me and Yeongsan Sect.
"My martial arts and age both fall short. To overcome my brothers, I must gather people to my side. I want to win their true hearts. Will you give me yours too, Young Master Baek?"
She must have finished circulating her qi, because she asked me with a direct, candid gaze. Until now she had been a troublesome friend in a superior-subordinate relationship. Now we were friends with benefits. She wanted more: someone truly loyal to her.
"I don't have a veto anyway, do I?"
"Oh my? The way you say that, someone might think I'd threatened you. Look. Right now I'm lying prostrate on the floor, begging for your heart. And besides, I did you with my mouth once last time, didn't I?"
"You're lying down, not prostrate. And you really have threatened me plenty, haven't you?"
"If it's unfair, then you try becoming stronger than me. While we're on the subject, let me ask you something. If you were to tumble off a mountain on the way back to Yeongsan Sect, stumble into a cave brimming with karmic opportunities, master some peerless martial art, and become even stronger than our Clan Head—how would you want to treat me then? Would you never look at me again because my value to you had vanished? Or would you take revenge for everything I've put you through and then leave?"
"I wouldn't abandon you. But then I'd teach you what the word friend, which you've used so carelessly, truly means, Young Miss."
At those words, she burst out laughing.
"You'll take your revenge but you won't cast me aside? That sounds just like you. All right. Name just one thing. It's a dream that can never come true anyway, so if it suits my mood I'll let you have one."
She spoke provocatively. Since we'd mingled bodies, a great deal of my fear of her had melted away.
"Well, I'd love to use your cunt as a wine cup and drink my fill of Shaoxing wine."
What was so delightful about that remark? The madwoman cackled like a lunatic.
"Puhahaha! Magnificent, Young Master Baek. Very well. I grant it now. I have no intention of standing on my hands, so you'll kneel and lap the wine pooled at my Jade Gate like a dog."
"I'd rather not."
"Why ever not?"
"Because right now, your cunt is full of my semen, isn't it?"
This time she pounded the floor, erupting in uncontrollable guffaws. She really was a mad bitch.
"I understand. Then we will save it for next time. In exchange, tell me one thing. You've seen my ugliest side since childhood, but you don't truly hate me, do you? They call me Beautiful Madness, but you're no ordinary man either. I want to know your secret. You're hiding one, are you not?"
Our hearts had drawn closer—hers as well. Now she was trying to share secrets and grow even closer to me.
I wavered. It wasn't affection, but after sleeping together several times, I felt strangely drawn to her.
"Yes. I have one. After entering Yeongsan Sect, I came to have a woman I love. We've already promised to marry."
"That senior sister of yours? I already know."
Her face looked disappointed.
"Actually, it's not that senior sister. It's a different senior sister."
"That's not exactly a grand secret, is it?"
"There's one more woman I love besides my senior sister."
"Good heavens. You cured your premature ejaculation and immediately began laying hands on women. You've touched two senior sisters?"
"No. One of them is my master."
It was a secret that would come to light someday, but it was the taboo of taboos, the one that always pressed down heavily upon my chest. Maybe I'd wanted to unburden my heart by confessing honestly to her alone—now the only friend I'd grown truly close to.
"Good heavens. You really are mad too, aren't you? This is a comfort. I've lived all this time feeling the loneliness of being the only mad bitch under heaven.
"Yes. That's how it should be. That's what makes you Young Master Baek. That's what makes you my friend."
There was no mocking laughter. She simply stared at me in disbelief.
"You'll have to work extremely hard. In the martial world, power is everything. If you want to shut up every last person who runs their mouth, you'll have to amass a tremendous amount of strength.
"Good. Return to your sect, train with that lovely Master and Senior Sister, and come back a perfect ten-point man. Then even if everyone condemns you, I alone will support you."
She earnestly cheered on my future—a future that had violated society's taboos. Just as she was that sort of person, I had known she would say exactly that.
"Not ten. A hundred. No, I might even become a thousand-point man."
"A fine attitude."
When I returned to Yeongsan Sect, I might pass through the pinnacle of the Fourth Stage of the Yang Blossom Art and perhaps even reach the Fifth Stage, the one said to send a person straight to paradise. Unlike my master and Jeong-hyang, who were turning into monsters alongside me, Murong Rin was an ordinary person, and I wanted my manhood to be objectively evaluated by her. And like the friend she was, not a lover, we spent the last night together after sex had ended, drinking through the hours until dawn.
I had never once set foot in the Murong Clan's training ground. But when I ascended its platform for the expedition ceremony, every gaze turned toward me: those of nearly three hundred overwhelmingly elite Murong Clan warriors, more than a hundred servants, and countless martial figures who had gathered from across the land to witness the ceremony. Without Elder Hwangseong, my legs would already have given out.
I lit a stick of incense. My mouth chanted an incomprehensible invocation in a calm yet powerful voice. Talismans burned with elaborate gestures as I cried toward heaven. Murong Rin, who knew me best; Clan Head Murong Hyeok-jung; and Murong Sang, who despised me, all stared in stunned silence.
Before long, the sword dance began. Hwangseong's martial arts were nothing to speak of. Yet his sword dance for performance alone slashed through the empty air so splendidly that he seemed a transcendent master. The sight of sixteen talismans burning in a single instant, then scattering through the air, reminded me frankly of a circus, and I had no idea what principle lay behind it, but whenever I swept the White Feather Fan, a gentle breeze arose, and I could feel that this old man Hwangseong's ritual was genuine.
"...and so I, Daoist Yeongmok, call to Heaven! May the martial achievements of these three warriors—Murong Su, Murong Jun, and Murong Rin—bring glory to the Murong Clan!"
I raised the White Feather Fan toward heaven with a thunderous cry, and a roar like rolling thunder filled the training ground. A true Daoist ritual felt like watching Peking opera. Nearly four hours steadily drained my stamina, yet my heightened spirits let me savor the experience as both performer and audience.
And then Murong Hyeok-jung appeared atop the dais, piercing through the roar. Even seeing him right before my eyes, I couldn't perceive his movement at all. It looked like nothing less than teleportation.
—You're better than I expected. Even Sang, who can't stomach the sight of you, may look upon you anew. But Rin, who was dead set on ruining the ritual, will be hearing from me later.—
He sent me a voice transmission as he drew his sword and raised it aloft. At his example, every last martial artist of the Murong Clan, including Murong Sang, drew their swords and aimed them at the heavens.
"The Murong sword shall spread across the world!"
Hundreds of warriors answered the clan head's cry with a roar of their own. Before I knew it, Murong Hyeok-jung's sword was wreathed in a blue Sword Aura as massive as a pillar, and I, assailed by its pressure from the nearest vantage, had my legs give out—utterly disgraceful.
Sword Aura.
If sword qi was a supremely sharp laser blade, then Sword Aura was a particle pulverizer. It was this world's ultimate strategic weapon, which destroyed everything it contacted. The proof of a true first-class martial artist—a status held by fewer than a thousand among tens of millions in the martial world—was manifesting right before my eyes.
Murong Sang's sword also bore a distinct Sword Aura. The captains beside the Clan Head likewise manifested it—smaller than those of the Clan Head and his son, both counted among the Top Hundred Masters, but unmistakable. Blue sword qi shone at the tips of the Murong siblings' weapons and those of countless other warriors.
A Top-Tier Sect.
People casually spoke of the Nine Great Sects and the Beggars' Sect or the Five Great Clans. Seeing their true strength from so close showed me anew how vast the world and how formidable the martial world truly were.
Could Yeongsan Sect survive in the martial world? Was the Spirit-Binding Art alone enough to raise it again? At the end of the magnificent expedition ceremony, the vague anxiety I had suppressed weighed heavily on my heart.