Flames
As dawn crested the mountain ridge and drove back the dark, a quiet breath slipped from Cheongwol's lips where she sat cross-legged in meditation.
Dawn dew clung to every blade of grass, drinking in the sunlight until it glittered silver, and the cool morning air wrapped the world in a thin veil of mist.
"Hah..."
She rose and worked the stiffness from a body that had kept vigil through the night — and in that moment realized she had overlooked something vital.
Too many wandering thoughts. Focus only on what must be done.
That she had never known a proper family and found it sorrowful. That she would walk alone from now on and found it lonely. The martial artist she was about to face — Ak Ji-ho — was not a man one could meet while cradling such soft, self-indulgent feelings.
He was no ordinary opponent. He was the Young Master of a clan vast enough to stand alongside the Six Great Clans.
And just as unforeseen variables had seized her ankle when she first crossed blades with Seomun Hwi, such things could strike at any moment.
Undivided focus.
With a scattered heart, she would never turn aside the tip of his spear.
She clenched and unclenched her fists several times, steeling her resolve for the match once more. If there was any mercy in the night, it was this: the long hours of circulating her qi had left her body impossibly light.
But was she the only one?
The Young Master is probably no different.
The duel had been arranged precisely because neither of them could afford to yield — so of course he would be ready. With a gaze far sharper than her usual one, Cheongwol set out for the place where the match had been appointed.
The two of them had agreed to hold the duel in private — with two exceptions. Jeonghwa and her third disciple, Seonhwa, were permitted to observe.
Jeonghwa was the sect leader, so her presence was only natural. Seonhwa's attendance, however, had come as a surprise. It was the condition Jeonghwa had set for allowing the match on Emei Sect grounds.
This child has remarkable talent, but her temper runs hot and her experience of the martial world is still thin. I would keep her at my side and let her learn through this duel. Would that be possible?
One could hardly refuse a request from the head of the Emei Sect — and the depth of Jeonghwa's regard made plain that Seonhwa was destined to lead the sect one day. Ma Taesang had nodded without a second thought.
It would be no trouble at all.
A short while later, while Ak Ji-ho loosened his body, Ak Seo-a appeared alone. Ma Taesang had fully expected Cheongwol to be at her side, and he tilted his head slightly.
"You didn't come with Young Lady Cheongwol?"
It was an ordinary question, no different from any other morning — yet Ak Seo-a bit down hard on her lip and dropped her head.
"Well..."
He was about to press further when Cheongwol herself emerged not far behind.
Perhaps it was because she was a martial artist on the brink of a duel. With every step she took toward them, Ma Taesang felt his own senses sharpen of their own accord. He was a martial artist too — when an opponent radiated an edge this keen, the nerves had no choice but to answer.
But he only huffed a quiet laugh and shook his head. Today, at least, there was no place for him to step in.
...I nearly made a fool of myself, letting competitive fire get the better of an old man who ought to age with some dignity. Still — I worry for the Young Master.
Ma Taesang turned and glanced at Jeonghwa, who stood with Seonhwa. He had not particularly welcomed her presence as a spectator, but now that the moment had arrived, he found himself almost grateful she was there.
Ak Ji-ho and Cheongwol. Both possessed martial skill far beyond their years — and youthful pride, if left unchecked, could turn a spar into a serious injury.
While these thoughts occupied him, Cheongwol's footsteps had already brought her to Ak Seo-a's side.
"Nothing of note during the night?"
"No, sir. And you, Elder? All was well?"
"What could possibly happen to me?"
After that brief morning exchange with Ma Taesang, Cheongwol turned toward Ak Seo-a.
"..."
Ak Seo-a flinched under that gaze — but Cheongwol paid it no mind and closed the distance. Then she opened her arms and drew Ak Seo-a into a firm embrace, just as she had the night before.
"Seo-a. What you said last night — I thought about it all through the dawn."
"...Young Lady Cheongwol."
"I'll start with the conclusion. I understand the heart behind those words. I had... a family that precious to me as well. But..."
Cheongwol drew a quiet breath and lifted Ak Seo-a's downturned face. The hollows under her eyes told the story — she had not slept a wink, waiting for Cheongwol to return to her room.
"If my family had done something unforgivable — I might have taken their side in front of others, but I would have told them, clearly: that was wrong."
"..."
"If you can't do that, the same thing only happens again. Look — the wound is rotting. It's festering from the inside out."
The words were for Ak Seo-a, but Cheongwol's eyes had found Ma Taesang.
"...If you can't do it, I will. Wait here."
She pinched Ak Seo-a's cheek and grinned. Then, as she passed Ma Taesang on her way toward Ak Ji-ho, she let a single line brush past him like a breeze.
"I trust you weren't asking whose fault it was because you truly didn't know."
Jeonghwa stepped forward, and even the restless wind seemed to hold its breath.
"Today's duel shall determine a victor — but killing techniques are forbidden. Each of you may expend the full measure of your inner force and martial learning, yet you will refrain from any act that endangers the other's life."
The words were few, but their weight drew the breath of both combatants — and every onlooker — taut as a bowstring.
"I am Ak Ji-ho, Young Master of the Shandong Ak Clan. I humbly request your instruction."
"Cheongwol. I am lacking, but I will give everything I have."
The brief formalities complete, the two stood unmoving in their places. As their inner force began to rise, the air grew heavy and a taut tension settled over the ground.
"Do you understand why those two remain still?"
At Jeonghwa's question, Seonhwa rolled her eyes in brief hesitation, then carefully nodded.
"Because neither has reason to move first. The Young Master wields a spear, so he need not close the distance to strike. Young Lady Cheongwol uses her fists, so she is waiting for an opening. But they cannot stand like that forever — so for now, they are drawing up their inner force."
A faint dissatisfaction crossed Jeonghwa's face. The answer had not fully pleased her.
"Half right, half wrong. Did you learn nothing from your own match against the Young Master?"
"That is..."
As Seonhwa faltered, Jeonghwa raised a hand and pointed to Ak Ji-ho's spear.
"Look beneath the Young Master's spearhead."
"Pardon?"
Seonhwa lifted her gaze — and there it was. Unlike the spear he had used against her, a long red tassel now hung below the blade, trailing far enough that it ought to snag with every thrust and sweep.
Why attach such a thing? The question had barely formed when Jeonghwa, as if reading her thoughts, smiled and continued.
"A spear is, by nature, a weapon that expands and defends one's domain as widely as possible. For a spearman, controlling distance is everything. And yet the spear arts of the Shandong Ak Clan — famed for the spear above all — do the exact opposite."
Before the words had fully left her lips, Ak Ji-ho settled into stance and leveled his spear-tip at Cheongwol.
"He drives into the opponent's guard, pours out his forms, then immediately forces them back and reclaims the range. In a word — it is a spear art that has conquered distance itself, the spear's greatest strength and its greatest weakness."
Whether she widened the gap or closed it, her sword had never been able to reach him. Seonhwa, who had felt that truth in her bones during her own duel with the Young Master, finally understood.
"...So the one hunting for openings isn't Young Lady Cheongwol. It's the Young Master."
"Now you begin to see."
—Whssht!
In the same instant as Seonhwa's realization, the tip of Ak Ji-ho's spear bloomed into a red flower and came flying toward Cheongwol.
The secret spear art of the Shandong Ak Clan — its name revealed to the world once more after long silence.
In the brief instant the spear-tip drove toward her, Cheongwol realized the red tassel hanging beneath the blade was no mere ornament — it was a blade as sharp as any edge.
But the recognition came a fraction too late.
The red tassel scattered like flower petals, painting the thrust's trajectory in a bewitching haze.
—Fssht!
She twisted her body and barely slipped the spear itself — yet several strands of the red tassel she could not fully escape grazed her sleeve and skin, leaving thin cuts behind.
"Ngh...!"
She had thought a spear required only wariness of thrusts and cuts. She had never imagined that a long tassel could whip through the surrounding space and make every path of attack nearly impossible to predict. It was no simple feat — a spear art of such refinement that inner force had to be threaded not only through the shaft, but into every single strand of the tassel.
Cheongwol unfurled her footwork and fell back at once, but Ak Ji-ho had no intention of surrendering the momentum he had seized. His arms swept without pause.
From the left. From above. From the right again — then straight for her chest.
At times the spear seemed to drive in a clean line, only to coil through empty air as the red tassel burst like afterimages and clouded her vision — then slipped in from an unexpected angle, as if to catch her off guard.
As the red petals Ak Ji-ho conjured scattered in every direction, Cheongwol felt for a moment as though she stood alone, trapped inside flames spreading from all sides.
"The Young Master seems to hold the advantage."
Seonhwa's voice carried a note of admiration as she watched — but Jeonghwa shook her head.
"She has taken wounds, yes — yet even against that troublesome spear art, she is avoiding every fatal blow. Her footwork is not merely refined. It borders on the miraculous. So that is why she never named her school."
The martial world teemed with strange hermits and recluses, numerous as grains of sand — and with them, countless martial arts that had never been recorded. Among them were sects that passed their lineage through a single disciple alone, unwilling to see their name known. To Jeonghwa's eye, Cheongwol seemed to belong to that breed.
Well — she must have had something to rely on, to challenge the Young Master of the Shandong Ak Clan to a duel.
Watching Cheongwol turn aside her opponent's ferocious secret techniques with only the lightest of wounds, Jeonghwa's eyes slowly narrowed.
And yet... why does her face feel so familiar? I am certain I have seen it somewhere before...