Third-Rate (64) — Those Who Only Call Roll: Grade 5 (3)
"What's with all that?"
Jin Yigang asked, pointing at the chairs lined up beside the platform. He and the rest of the punitive expedition force were currently assembled at the Grand Martial Training Ground. Since Jin Yigang's unit was the Tenth Squad of the Tenth Army, he stood at the very end of the left flank.
"Seats for the court officials," Oh Gwang replied.
"Court officials show up even for enlistment day?"
"Normally they wouldn't bother, but this time there are special circumstances."
"What special circumstances?"
"The promise of becoming Alliance Chief of the Martial Alliance drew a flood of talent here."
"So this place has turned into a talent well, huh?"
"Exactly."
"What about you, old man Oh?"
"That's got nothing to do with us Grade 5s."
"What's this Grade 5 business?"
"The Empire divided the expedition force into five grades. Grade 1 are the ones who absolutely cannot die."
"Isn't not dying on a battlefield impossible?"
"For someone who never fights in person, wouldn't the odds of dying be about the same as dying in a drinking accident?"
"So they're the ones holding posts that keep them out of combat."
"Just look for the ones wearing the flashiest clothes — that's them."
"And Grade 2?"
"The ones whose bodies get escorted all the way back to their family estates, along with paperwork documenting the official cause of death."
"So kids whose parents have some real pull."
"Right."
"Grade 3?"
"The ones who hand over nothing but the body — no supporting documentation."
"Same escort treatment as Grade 2, though."
"Their standing must be similar. Then Grade 4 — their ID tags get collected, and word is sent home to their families."
"And Grade 5?"
"The ones who only get roll called."
"So we're the ones who just sit under surveillance until we drop dead."
"Quick study, aren't you?"
"One thing I'm curious about — did the Grade 5 families fall out of favor with the Emperor or something?"
"Yes."
"So they scrambled to find stand-ins and sent those instead. But……"
"You're wondering why the Empire obviously knows they sent substitutes, yet looks the other way?"
"I just want to check if my guess is right."
"That, my boy, is politics."
"If they pressured those families to send their real sons, the backlash would be severe — they might even end up breeding a resistance faction. Is that it?"
"Exactly. The stand-ins are the meeting point between the Emperor and the families who've fallen out of his good graces."
"All units, attention!"
A thunderous voice rang out at that moment. Everyone except the members of the Twin-Ten Squad snapped to attention in unison.
"Good to see you all."
A voice saturated with internal power rolled across the field. Jin Yigang lifted his head. A man in indigo martial robes had ascended the platform, and the seats flanking it on both sides were now fully occupied.
"I am Cheon Archon, Jong Cheondo, Second Banner of the Geumwi Daicheonguk."
Oh Gwang spoke up. "This isn't even the departure ceremony. Why show up for enlistment day?"
"The answer lies in that 'talent well' I mentioned earlier."
"You came all this way in person just to recruit?"
"These are the people who will become the backbone of the Martial Alliance. 'Just recruiting' doesn't cover it."
"Ah—!"
Jin Yigang nodded. By Oh Gwang's account, everyone gathered here would one day form the core of the Martial Alliance — but none of them had been assigned anywhere yet. The men seated up front had clearly come to snatch up whichever of the talents here struck their fancy and make them their own. Fail to claim them early, and someone else would take them all, which explained why so many had swarmed in for enlistment day.
"You thinking about joining the Martial Alliance, old man?"
"At my age? The Martial Alliance can wait……"
"Hey, are the army commanders Grade 1?"
"All I know is that we're Grade 5."
"We now move on to the congratulatory address."
The master of ceremonies was Sagong Pyo, the Southern Jinmusa of the Twin-Ten formation.
"He really does everything, doesn't he."
"Well, they have to put faces to names before the talent comes flocking."
"So I bet he'll start listing the perks of joining each department too?"
"Half of what that Second Banner fellow just said was already taken up by the perks of joining the Geumwi Daicheonguk. Were you not listening?"
"Wasn't interested. Wish I'd stayed home."
Jin Yigang scowled. He'd come out thinking it was some grand occasion, only to find it was a recruitment fair.
"I'm heading out. What about you, fortune-teller?"
"I'll stick around and watch a bit longer."
"Suit yourself."
Jin Yigang promptly started backing away.
"You're not leaving, Whale?"
As he slipped out of the rear ranks, he asked the hunchbacked old man. That sharp-eyed hunchback had once introduced himself to Jin Yigang as Gon, so Jin Yigang had taken to calling him Whale.
"Was just about to head out myself. But tell me — do you really have no interest in the Martial Alliance?"
The old man asked. His original name was Ji Gon, but since it was a name that had once rung with notoriety, he simply went by Gon.
"What would a man who's not even a martial artist do with it?"
"You're not a martial artist?"
"Nope. No plans to become one, either."
"Then how do you plan to make a living?"
"I'll worry about that if I come back alive."
"I see."
"What about you, Whale?"
"Same as you."
"I can't speak for anyone else, but you strike me as the type who'll make it back."
"They say a person's life never goes the way they want it to."
"That's true enough."
Jin Yigang nodded.
The walk from the Grand Martial Training Ground to the barracks was a long one. There was a small hill, a stream, and even an abandoned plaza along the way.
"What was this place, that it's so vast?"
"Three hundred years ago, it was the stronghold of the Blood Demon Cult, a colossal sect."
"Are the Blood Demon Cult and the Blood Sect the same thing?"
"You know of the Blood Sect?"
"Thought they were destroyed a thousand years ago. So they must have carried on the line somehow?"
"Right. They survived and carried the bloodline forward, eventually growing into the massive force known as the Blood Demon Cult. If not for Seonggil Sahan, they might still be standing today."
"They were destroyed by Seonggil Sahan?"
"They were. Back before he became Khan, Seonggil Sahan went through a period of being hunted, and he came to the Blood Demon Cult seeking aid. The cult refused him. Years later, after defeating his rivals and taking the throne of Khan, he marched an army here and crushed them. That was the end of the Blood Demon Cult. Afterward, this place became the base of the Zamiwon, a secret organization of the Yuan dynasty, and countless assassins were born here."
"And when Yuan fell, it passed to the Ming Empire, then."
"The Embroidered Guard and the Dongcheon fought over it, and the Embroidered Guard won."
"That's a relief."
"How do you figure?"
"Every building here must hold traces of the lives that were lived in it. So it was never truly abandoned."
"……Huh. I suppose so."
"You think they're still around?"
"Who?"
"The Zamiwon assassins. Yuan fell less than fifty years ago, and they say martial arts have to be trained from childhood — so wouldn't some of them still be alive?"
"They'll be alive."
By then, the two had arrived at the barracks. Emptied of everyone, it felt desolate. Jin Yigang tossed kindling into the hearth.
"Get the fire going, will you?"
"Can't you manage the True Samadhi Fire?"
Ji Gon asked.
"Never had any formal martial training."
"No one lacking real martial training, however well they fight, could knock Padun unconscious."
"I said I never had formal training. I never said I don't know any."
"Then what?"
"Do you know the Thousand Martial Figures at Jecheon Uiseongak?"
"I spent half a year there, so I'd say I know them quite well."
Ji Gon's eyes turned distant, as if recalling that time. He'd been in the flush of his youth, brimming with dreams. He'd gone there chasing a foolish fantasy — to unlock its secrets and become the greatest under heaven. Six months later, he'd given up. It had certainly been mysterious, but he'd concluded there were no secrets to be found, and even if there were, they were beyond his reach.
"There were a thousand and fourteen figures in total, and I broke every one. Each time, I swung my hands and feet a thousand and fourteen times without pause."
"You used your hand or foot only once per figure?"
"And you must not stop even once."
"That's actually possible?"
"There are forty-eight thousand four hundred arm movements, and combined with the legs, a hundred sixty-eight thousand four hundred in all. Master every one of them, and it becomes possible."
"……"
"You going to light the fire or what?"
"Fine, fine."
Ji Gon lit the fire with the True Samadhi Fire, and flames rose at once.
"Sounds like something that'd be awfully useful to have learned…… Could you teach me how it's done?"
He said, feeding more wood into the hearth. To Ji Gon, though, the True Samadhi Fire was beside the point. The thought had struck him that Jin Yigang might actually have unlocked the secret of the Thousand Martial Figures.
"If you truly mastered every movement of the Thousand Martial Figures, you'd be able to see exactly where and how an opponent will throw each fist."
"Fists, I can't say. But I can see the gaps."
"Gaps?"
"The weakest point that appears in the flow of a movement."
"The seam!"
Ji Gon cried out despite himself. The faint fissures that open in the flow of energy whenever a martial art is performed — that is what martial artists call the seam. The instant one appears is so subtle that even masters rarely claim to have caught it with any confidence.
And yet this fellow, who looked for all the world like nothing more than third-rate trash, was talking about seams. No — seeing that he called them gaps, he clearly didn't even know the proper term.
"You call that a seam?"
"Yes."
"Seam or gap, I don't know which — but the reason that brute Padun got walloped by you is that his gaps are wide enough to drive a cart through."
As the fire blazed up, he added charcoal. Before long, a cozy warmth filled the barracks.
"Who gave you that?"
Ji Gon asked, pointing at the Blood Yellow Demon Umbrella.
"Some old gentleman. It keeps off the rain, and it makes a fine shield against arrows."
"Do you have any idea what it actually is?"
"Do I need to?"
"Not necessarily. But sometimes you have to know the story behind a thing before you can see its essence."
"So you do know what this is, Whale."
Jin Yigang brought the umbrella out.
"I both do and don't."
"It has a name, I take it?"
"The Blood Yellow Demon Umbrella — one of the Three Great Treasures of the Blood Sect."
"What's it for?"
"That, I don't know. Though you seem to be putting it to fine use already."
"You mean the way I clubbed Padun with it?"
"Exactly."
"The man who gave it to me must know what it is too, then?"
"You'd think so. Now — who gave it to you?"
"An old gentleman who uses half a blade as a weapon."
"So it was Nang Baek, the Blood Venerable."
"You even know Nang, huh?"
"So they've come out into the world too. Where are they now?"
"We parted ways in front of the Invincible Fist King Land."
"If you parted at its very threshold……"
"I didn't go in."
"Why not……"
"Nothing in it for me."
"You're a strange one."
"That's just my personality. I'm bored — care for a cup of tea?"
"You have tea?"
"I have everything except what I don't have."
Jin Yigang grinned, set the water kettle he'd brought from the mess hall on the hearth, and drew tea leaves from a box. It was White Hawk Silver Needles, dusted with fine white down.
"Give the kettle a burst of that True Samadhi Fire, will you?"
At Jin Yigang's request, Ji Gon cupped the kettle in both hands and drew his inner fire upward. Soon steam curled from the spout.
Jin Yigang pinched the leaves into the cup a little at a time and closed the lid.
"White Hawk Silver Needles from Fujian. They say emperors have drunk it since ancient times — the tea of eternal life."
"Looking to live forever, are you?"
"Yeah. I really do want to live long. There's so much I still want to do."
"Well, from where I'm sitting, you look like you've got another hundred easy years in you."
"I'd love that. Here."
Jin Yigang held out the cup.
Ji Gon lifted the lid.
"Oh—!"
A gasp escaped him. The leaves stood upright in the golden water, white down bristling, impossibly beautiful.
"If you sip slowly, little by little, the leaves will dance."
"Really?"
Ji Gon took a mouthful, then looked down at the cup.
"Hahahaha!"
Laughter burst out of him. It was true. Inside the cup, the leaves were drifting this way and that, each one dancing its own dance — one gliding left, another gliding right, another leaping clean off the surface. It was as though the leaves had come alive. And the taste was extraordinary. Most teas left nothing behind but a faint bitterness. This was different — like the lingering sweetness on your tongue after eating a fragrant, honeyed fruit.
"Good, right?"
"It's wonderful."
Bang!
Just then, the door burst open, and five martial artists with murder in their eyes strode in. They spotted Jin Yigang and Ji Gon.
"Answer up. Which bunk belongs to Number 997?"