Sword Sovereign vs. Mugwang, The Birth of the Thunder Emperor, and the End of the Spar (1)
Mujikja had his eyes closed. He stood at the center of a vast lake. This was the mental world he had conjured, a space that reflected what he was feeling right now.
Ripples ceaselessly spread across the lake.
Waiting.
Maintaining a mind as clear and still as a bright mirror over still water, he waited for the real strike to come.
Numerous ripples arose around him, but they were all too far for his sword to reach, so he ignored them. Creating chaos to scatter his focus—that had to be Elder Namgung Cheon's intent.
Kwarrrruk.
Finally, a massive ripple erupted behind him. No, this wasn't a ripple. Waves that had no business surging on a lake churned violently.
The waves crashed toward Mujikja. Rather than resisting forcefully, he threw himself into the flow.
Feeling the current with his entire body, Mujikja finally swung his sword.
Taeguk Hyegeom.
As far as he knew, there was only one martial art in the Central Plains capable of controlling a flow this immense.
Trollong.
Mujikja's sword softly enveloped Namgung Cheon's fist, gently redirecting it upward. The thunderous energy shot toward the heavens.
With that alone, Mujikja escaped the crisis.
"Second strike."
But the leisure was fleeting. A second attack came hurtling in right away, this one laden with even more thunder qi.
"Infinite Buddha."
Mujikja murmured a quiet incantation and surrendered to the flow just as before.
I realized I'd been under a ridiculous delusion.
Dive into that?
Just getting close would tear my body to shreds.
Could you even call that a human fight?
Come to think of it, was the Hwagyeong really human?
No. If that's human, then everyone else in the world is just bugs.
Deflecting a bolt of lightning and hurling it back to the sky?
Could I do that?
I knew what martial art Grandpa Baldhead was unleashing from his hand. Taeguk Hyegeom. I'd experienced it dozens of times—no, hundreds—and even wielded it myself.
But could what I'd done compare to this?
The basics were reading the flow. One day, when I'd asked Grandpa Baldhead about it, he'd answered like this:
—"I'm only telling you this because you begged, Young Master, so no slacking off. Listen up.
You want to know more about Hyegeom? The name sounds grand, but it's really nothing special when you break it down."
—"The name's nothing special either. What even is Hyegeom? Cloud Sword sounds a hundred times better."
—"Should I just leave? You begged me to teach you while I was eating, and now you want me to go?"
—"There goes your true nature again. No wonder they kicked you out of Wudang. Fine, the name's okay."
—"Sigh... What did I do wrong in a past life...? Just listen this time."
—"I said I got it."
—"Shut that mouth!"
—"......"
—"Good. Where was I?"
—"......"
—"You can answer that."
—"You said 'Hyegeom's nothing special.'"
—"Thanks. Now shut it again.
So, when wielding Hyegeom, you only need to know one thing. The flow. That's it."
Yes, the flow. A concept I vaguely grasped in my head.
After that, to read that "flow" even in my sleep, I'd endured my head getting smashed by Daegalbak endlessly.
Maybe that's why I could at least see Elder Namgung Cheon's flow. Well, just barely see it...
It moved this way, that way, here, there—no pattern, just chaos, a total mess.
Like a typhoon raging over an endless ocean. Get caught once, and it's over.
Finding the flow in that seemed impossible.
Yet Grandpa Baldhead blocked the second strike.
Kwakwakwakwa!
The third.
Kwarrrrrruk!
The fourth.
Rurrrr, kwabang!
This wasn't about seeing or not seeing.
"How...?"
It wasn't luck or half-assed blocking. Grandpa Baldhead was precisely reading the flow.
"Is... is that even possible?"
By now, Monk Grandpa should be explaining, but when I glanced up cautiously, he was completely absorbed in the match.
I decided against waking him. This wasn't his expertise anyway. He'd probably just say he didn't know.
If it were Monk Grandpa in that spot, he'd try smashing through with brute force.
So in the end, I have to figure it out myself...
Hm?
Then I spotted something familiar yet unfamiliar.
Compared to the massive flow Elder Namgung Cheon was showing, it was minuscule.
But it was undeniably the starting point.
—"Grandpa Baldhead, what if you can't read the enemy's flow? You use that weird sword style sometimes. I couldn't even imitate it."
—"Imitate that and you ain't human. And it's not for imitating anyway. When that happens, just make a new flow."
—"Then what?"
—"Change it. Into a flow you can read."
—"How?"
—"......Well."
The existing Taeguk Hyegeom was a sword art that matched the enemy's flow.
Mujikja had studied it his whole life, but if he hadn't met that boy Namgung Daeso, he'd have been trapped in that framework forever.
"Seventh strike!"
From the fifth strike onward, reading Elder Namgung Cheon's flow became utterly impossible.
Now he was no different from a bolt from the heavens.
How could a mere human like Mujikja read or predict the sky's lightning? Even a god couldn't.
A change came to Mujikja's sword starting with the sixth strike.
It resembled Hyegeom, but wasn't. Mujikja named this sword art after his own Dao title: Mujik Sword Method.
A bit childish, but so what? It was one-of-a-kind in the world.
The Mujik Sword Method had no fixed forms like other techniques, so he couldn't pass it on.
It wasn't just yielding to the flow—it created a new one.
A free sword art without rigid frames.
Mujikja swung toward the massive lightning descending from the sky.
From his pine pattern antique sword, which was almost embarrassing to call a sword, a faint ripple appeared.
It started small, like a ripple on the lake, but grew.
And it wasn't just one. Each vibration of the sword birthed small ripples.
Several arose at once, existing ripples met to form new ones, those met others to create more.
Finally, ripples filled the entire lake, clashing against the lightning.
The inner energy ripples tore against the massive bolt, but new ones endlessly filled the gaps.
Menmibujeol. Yuneungjeogang. The pinnacle of Wudang arts, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Taeguk.
Elder Namgung Cheon, who had pressed relentlessly from the first to sixth strikes, finally halted his assault.
"That's a martial art I've never seen."
He was genuinely shocked.
"How'd you block my attack?"
Mujikja answered plainly.
"Blocked it well."
Watching that, Namgung Daeso chuckled inwardly.
Kikikikiki. By now, Elder Grandpa's gotta be boiling inside, right? Yeah! I know that feeling all too well.
"Heh heh, 'blocked it well'..."
Unlike his calm exterior, Mujikja was quite fatigued. That last clash had consumed a massive amount of inner energy, as it looked.
Namgung Cheon, who'd poured in nearly the same, was still full of vigor.
"Do all Daoists talk in such vague circles?"
"You gonna pretend otherwise? I only learned today that Mugwang uses thunder qi."
"Anyone who's seen it before is dead. But hey..."
Namgung Cheon eyed Mujikja sharply.
Mujikja met his gaze steadily.
But he knew.
Damn, he caught on.
"Eyes can lie, but breathing can't. It's rougher than before. That last one—it was incomplete, wasn't it?"
"Heh heh, same goes for you."
Mujikja spotted the faint tremor in Namgung Cheon's muscles.
No matter the Hwagyeong or divine power, unleashing nature's might—especially the strongest, thunder qi—wouldn't leave the body unscathed.
Only Namgung Cheon could manage this much; anyone else would've been roasted alive by now.
"Even those brutish muscles have limits, eh?"
At that moment, Namgung Cheon let out a roar.
"Grararararargh!!!"
Now, of all times, he started loosening up.
"Honestly, I thought you were like the others. Cocky fools relying on their paltry skills. But Sword Sovereign..."
The muscle tremors gradually subsided.
"No empty title! Worthy of the Three Sovereigns. Mugwang acknowledges you personally."
Mujikja stuck out his tongue at Namgung Cheon's brutish recovery, matching his muscles, while recovering swiftly himself.
But Mujikja frowned slightly. One word in Namgung Cheon's speech needed correcting.
"Mind if I give you a new title?"
Both were deliberately dragging it out. Or rather, they wanted to.
A clash with a worthy foe. The desire to throw everything into chasing an unknown end.
For them, today might be a day that never came again in their lives.
Namgung Cheon to Mujikja.
Mujikja to Namgung Cheon.
A rival like no other.
"Sure. You've earned it. What is it?"
"Thunder Emperor."
"Thunder Emperor... Perfect! Love it! To celebrate the new title, I've got an incomplete technique of my own. Mind if I show it?"
"Of course. I'd have been disappointed if you didn't."
"Hahahahaha!!! You're growing on me!"
Namgung Cheon suddenly called out.
"Second Young Master!"
Namgung Jung just nodded without a word.
Namgung Cheon's face crumpled. (This was his smile, mind you.)
Implicit permission for proxy fights be damned—he'd do as he pleased.
Namgung Cheon straightened his stance.
Unlike before, not a trace of thunder qi leaked out. In this unfamiliar stillness, Mujikja tensed more than ever.
He's planning to unleash it all at once.
A reckless method no one but Namgung Cheon would attempt.
Mujikja began too. His pine pattern antique sword trembled.
The ripples from before arose again.
His other hand trembled similarly.
From two sources, ripples several times stronger than before surged.
"Fourteenth strike!"
With Namgung Cheon's short shout, he vanished.
Jiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii―
―jikiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii―
A massive bolt of lightning erupted at the spot he seemed to pass.
At its end stood Mujikja.
Trollong.
Trollong.
Mujikja swung sword and palm together.
'Menmibujeol Double Layer, Menmanjeol.'
Kwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwakwabang!
The match was decided.