There's Always Someone Crazier
Crash—
A sound like shattering glass rang out across the dueling arena.
Yesterday's preliminaries had ended without incident, and the main rounds—fought as one-on-one duels—had begun. Of course, main rounds was a generous term; the participants were still swarming thick as flies, so we had to fight match after match each day until the numbers thinned out. The result was that I was already stepping into my fourth duel on the very first day of the bracket stage.
"Th-this can't be happening..."
"What do you mean, can't be? Save the waterworks and just go home nice and quiet, wash your feet, and get some sleep."
I had just shattered, barehanded, the sword of a warrior whose name I couldn't even remember. As martial artists invariably do, he had cherished that blade like a lover, and now that it lay in scraps of scrap iron, he stood there hollow-eyed, his soul visibly gone from his face.
There's no denying it—this really is the most effective way to break a man's spirit.
I was genuinely admiring of the method, so dependable when it came to snapping a warrior's pride in two.
Truth be told, I knew his grief all too well.
But...
"Then do to them what you did to me—shatter their weapon. Nothing cracks a warrior's heart quite like that."
"Isn't that going a bit far, though?"
"You'd know, wouldn't you? You're the one who showed me."
Since I had already resolved to play the villain at this tournament, I decided I might as well commit fully—so, on Paeng Jun's advice, I made up my mind to reduce every opponent's weapon to debris. And so I snapped a spearman's spear in two...
"My... my spear..."
...shattered a swordsman's blade to pieces...
"Uwaaaah! My... my father's keepsake... You vicious fiend! Was there truly no other way?!"
...and as for the fist artist...
"Aaargh! My hand... my hand!!!"
As one practitioner of the fist to another, I did feel a twinge of guilt, but I swallowed my tears and broke the bones of his hand all the same. Naturally, out of consideration for his swift recovery, I made sure it was at least a clean break...
"That venomous wretch... would you look at that—he's gone and broken a fist master's fist. To think a man like that is the next-generation pillar meant to lead the Orthodox sects."
"Count it a blessing, I say. If a creature that vicious had come from one of the Demonic Cult's great houses... Ugh... chills crawl right up my spine, they do."
The spectators who had come to watch the main rounds cursed me with a single voice.
Everything was unfolding precisely as I had intended, but...
"Baekhwa... I'm so hurt today. Everyone keeps calling me a damned wretch..."
"Do not worry, my lord. I am always on your side."
At the sight of me sitting there with a wounded pout, nestled in Jegal Baekhwa's arms, Dang Giyeong clicked his tongue and spoke.
"You were savoring these duels more than anyone alive. Why the sudden change of heart? You shattered their spirits wearing the merriest face this world has ever seen..."
"Dushik. Will you shut that mouth of yours yourself... or shall I shut it for you, by hand?"
"Keeping my mouth shut has been my one true talent since long before now—the finest in all Sichuan!"
Ptooey—
"Then again, at this rate I suppose I'm due to be the one drawing all the attention."
The truth was that a villain only counted once he was famous—either someone would come hunting you, or your infamy would spread so far that no one dared touch you. A villain nobody noticed got written off as a common troublemaker, which was exactly why I had deliberately cranked my madness up even higher...
"My lord, the truth is that there is a madman in another bracket..."
"A madman...?"
"Most of the attention has already drifted to his side..."
"No... how does that even make sense?"
That anyone could draw more aggro than the Dang Clan's young patriarch systematically crushing warriors' hearts was beyond anything my common sense could accept. So I asked Baekhwa, my voice dripping with disbelief...
"You're telling me someone's raising more hell than me? Whose head did they lop off, then?"
"Nothing so dramatic... The Sword Saint's disciple has made his appearance."
"The Sword Saint's disciple...?"
"And strangely enough, he never touches a sword. They say he's been flattening every opponent in one blow with nothing but body slams..."
"Fuck."
Faced with a relentless barrage of statements my brain could not keep pace with, I gave up on thinking altogether.
And so the next day arrived...
"Kehehehe... Blood. I need blood. I'm running short on blood, I tell you!"
"Let's all just calm down for a moment... Aaargh! I yield! I surrender!!!"
"Surrender? I don't know the meaning of such weak words!"
"Referee! Someone, save me!"
"Enough! Release your grip! Just how long do you intend to keep hold of his head and shake it?!"
I had resolved to go one step further and was carrying on like a genuine lunatic, but...
"Wow... young master, they say the Sword Saint's disciple turned his opponent into a human windmill?"
"Th..."
"In his last match of the day, he must have sprinted straight over mid-meal, because he hammered the poor man's skull with the spoon he was still holding until he wrung a surrender out of him."
".........."
There was simply no outdoing the Sword Saint's disciple's lunacy.
The moment I meet him, I'll kill him at least half to death... Whatever it takes, I'll break him...
Sitting in the guesthouse, I ground my teeth, grit by grit, at the thought of that madman.
Meanwhile, elsewhere, the sound of grinding teeth echoed as well...
"Those damned bastards... I'll be sure to break at least one arm and one leg of theirs..."
"Quite the filthy mouth for a Daoist, don't you think?"
"Shut it!"
"A pity only I ever get to see this side of you. Truly."
A man in white Daoist robes and a man draped in robes embroidered with plum blossoms were crossing blades in a mountain tract where no travelers passed.
"Jinmu... angry, are we? Your sword line is quivering like a cicada."
"Myeongwol, I am begging you—shut that mouth and just meet my blade, won't you?"
If the preliminaries had existed to strain out the rabble, then the early main rounds existed to strain the dregs once more, and so the two of them were dueling in the dead of night to keep their instincts for real combat from rusting...
Kaaang—
When their meeting blades rang out, Myeongwol soon lowered his own and spoke.
"Let's leave it here for today... From tomorrow on you'll be facing ones who actually bring force to bear. No sense bleeding off strength for nothing, no?"
"Haah..."
Thud—
Hearing that, Jinmu flung his own sword down onto the ground...
"Tsk..."
Myeongwol clicked his tongue at the spectacle of his friend showing so little care for a blade.
"If not for that temper of yours, you would have glimpsed a far higher realm long ago. Twenty years of cultivating the Dao, and this is what I get to watch."
"Hoo... hoo..."
Of course, he knew perfectly well why his old friend was raging so...
"Would a man who dreams of becoming an immortal sulk just because the crowd isn't looking at him? The last one standing will be the one to devour all that attention anyway."
Knowing full well that Jinmu's ragged breathing came of fury rather than exhaustion, he spoke in a chiding tone.
"In any case, I'm heading back for some sleep. Do as you please."
And with those parting words, Myeongwol was gone...
"UWAAAAAAAH!"
In the dark of the mountain, only a single roar of anguish echoed on.
And so dawned the morning of the fourth day of the Dragon-Phoenix Tournament...
The other great clans' entrants and I were gathered around the tournament bracket.
"My name is..."
Over three days, Shaolin had winnowed the field to sixty-four and posted the matchups for all to see. In our group, apart from Dang Mulin and Namgung Han, caught by the age restriction, and the Jegal siblings, who had never entered at all, every last one of us ten had a name inscribed on the bracket.
"Here it is. Though, if it's come to this..."
My name sat at the very top of the sheet, and the name of that accursed Sword Saint's disciple at the very bottom...
"Haemu... please, please climb all the way to the finals..."
I murmured that name over and over, molars grinding.
"Tsk... This draw favors the Nine Sects, no question about it."
Beside me, with my fury still at full boil, Yang Do-wi clicked his tongue and muttered. Moyong Sahye nodded along in agreement.
"You're so right. If I'd seen it without knowing, I'd have just chalked it up to bad luck. But now that I know, it's downright shameless."
Looked at closely, the bracket was drawn so brazenly that curses all but wrote themselves. The entrants of the great clans were thrown against one another from the opening rounds, while the Nine Sects' men drew nameless minor sects and petty clans. And the most laughable part of all: as though they had solemnly resolved to crown Jinmu this time, his road—should he keep winning—ran through a minor sect, then a Five Great Clan, then the Sword Saint's heir, delivering him to me only at the very end, in the final...
"They're writing him a saga. Absolutely rotten bastards..."
"They really are. They're pushing him so nakedly it's hard to even play dumb."
"My guess? He'll finally deign to draw out his gangi in the semifinals or the final."
I was still gaping at the Nine Sects' little theater—staged as though from a script in which he climbs the ladder one careful rung at a time, attains enlightenment mid-tournament, and reaches the Transcendent Realm—when...
"What is there to fret over so, A-woo? You'll win regardless."
To Namgung Han's breezy reply, delivered as though none of it were her concern, I snorted a laugh and answered.
"True enough. As if I'd ever lose to a clown like that."
Not that I was entirely free of doubt, mind you.
Doubt that I would lose, that is...
Then I read the name of my first opponent...
"Paeng... San?"
"Hic!"
The owner of a face that looked as though it had weathered every storm the world could throw at it met my eyes and promptly began to hiccup. As the bristle-bearded fellow goggled at me, round-eyed, I broke into my sunniest smile and said...
"Well, well... San, been a while since we've crossed fists, hasn't it? Last time, if I recall, you swore you'd kill me..."
"D-did I ever say such a thing? I can't quite remember..."
"Gonna be fun right from the opening match. Won't it?"
"Haha... fun indeed..."
His expression hovered somewhere between weeping and laughing, impossible to classify either way. Even now, I was busily sketching out, in the theater of my mind, one recipe after another for how best to cook him.
"A-woo... just what thoughts run through that head of yours, to twist your face into such a wicked smile?"
Granted, at that sight the people around me did begin drifting away one by one.
Their loss. I simply went on giggling, one hand sloppily smothering the snickers that kept leaking out.
A short while later...
Paeng San and I stood upon the dueling platform.
"Are both of you ready?"
At the question of the bald monk who had ascended to serve as referee, the two of us nodded.
"Then begin!"
"WAAAAAAAAH!!!!!"
His knife-hand cleaved the air to announce the start, and in the same breath the crowd's cheers surged...
"I SURRENDER!"
With both hands raised high above his head, Paeng San screamed himself hoarse.