Chapter 101: Rethinking the Premise (1)

“Ahh, I’m stuffed.”

He should have restored his body step by step with a restrained meal, but he had been too hungry—far too hungry. For the first time in his life, Yeon Jipyeong put away five servings in one sitting.

Thanks to that, his belly stuck out a bit. He didn’t dislike the feeling of fullness, though.

Coming out of the dining hall, Yeon Jipyeong suddenly turned his eyes.

“Huh?”

He blinked.

“Who’s that?”

Letting his feet wander for no real reason, he had somehow reached the area near his older brother’s quarters.

And there, beside his brother’s quarters—inside Yeonryeowon—someone was chopping firewood.

At a glance, the figure looked like someone he had never seen before. Curiosity tugging at him, Yeon Jipyeong sidled toward the front of Yeonryeowon.

THUD!

With a smooth swing of the axe, a big log split in two.

The curiosity on Yeon Jipyeong’s face turned to surprise.

“Gasp!”

THUD!

Another log split.

There was nothing flashy about the axework. It wasn’t even struck with full force—and not with two hands, but one.

With just a soft, arc-tracing swing, the wood split with a keen seam. The blunt axe edge carried a current that sharpened the cut.

What was astounding was the quality of the energy beading on the axe—and the movement of the axe itself.

Even with a minute amount imbued, a floodlike, intense momentum poured out. The form of the swing looked like nothing special, and yet it was very beautiful.

“A master!”

Incredible. At least for the current Yeon Jipyeong, it was a level he’d scarcely dare to face.

TICK!

“Huh?”

The axe whiffed. A rebounding billet sprang away and fell far off.

A complex look flickered across the woman’s face—Mookbi.

“Um....”

Yeon Jipyeong startled and stood up.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I was just staring. I was being rude, wasn’t I?”

He apologized frankly.

Mookbi didn’t know why the other person was apologizing. She was only curious why anyone would watch something as trivial as chopping wood.

“It’s fine. But...”

She had been about to ask who he was, then paused.

One way or another, she was the guest. Anyone she didn’t know was highly likely to be someone of the Yeon household.

Mookbi bowed her head.

“My name is Mookbi.”

“Ah, yes! I’m Yeon Jipyeong! Nice to meet you!”

A brief silence fell.

Yeon Jipyeong blinked; Mookbi averted her gaze at the awkwardness.

In the midst of it, Mookbi thought:

“Yeon Jipyeong? Then that person’s younger brother?”

On the way here she had heard a lot about Yeon Jipyeong. Young in age, but a peerless genius and a gentle-natured child, they had said.

Mookbi looked at him again.

With bright, shining eyes turned her way, Yeon Jipyeong’s face did indeed look as gentle as she’d heard.

Mookbi cleared her throat.

“Mm, so then I...”

“You’re a guest!”

“...Pardon?”

“Uh, aren’t you?”

Mookbi scratched her head.

She was a guest, yes. But Yeon Hojeong and Yeon Wi had told her to treat this place like her own home, and everyone as one family.

“A guest... in form? I suppose you could call it that...”

“Sorry? What do you mean?”

Mookbi thought of a way to cut off this awkward, meandering conversation.

The answer was to bring up Yeon Hojeong.

“I came here with Yeon Hojeong—that person.”

Yeon Jipyeong’s eyes flew wide.

“M-My brother is here?”

“Eh? Ah... yes. That’s right.”

“Gasp! And I didn’t even know! I thought he’d come later, but this soon?!”

Joy bloomed on Yeon Jipyeong’s face.

But only for a moment.

“Huh? But...”

“That person?”

Something about the word choice was odd. “That person, that person”...

“Kuh-heuk!”

Yeon Jipyeong dashed up and seized both of Mookbi’s hands.

It was so sudden she couldn’t avoid it. Looking down at him with a dazed expression, Mookbi saw Yeon Jipyeong speak with a serious face.

“Sister-in-law!”

Mookbi decided that trying to judge which had been the more shocking moment—when she’d sworn to annihilate Sun-Piercing Valley, or now—was a futile exercise.

****

KWAANG!

It carried an eighty-cattie heavy weapon and even the White Tiger’s steel-like offensive might.

Jade Wave True Qi harmonized the body’s hardness and softness, and the muscles being tempered even this very moment produced explosive output and a rugged endurance.

Even so, he was pushed back.

JJEONG!

Yeon Hojeong’s body ricocheted backward.

The sword Yeon Wi held was a common longsword. Yet the sword-force pouring from that longsword was overwhelming like a tidal wave. A blade scarcely a tenth the weight of Hojeong’s axe was producing the heft of a thousand catties.

BANG!

Driven back, Yeon Hojeong sprang in again.

From the instant he set White Tiger Lording Step, he adopted a complete battle posture. One step to advance, two steps to kill—without hesitation he unfolded his martial arts.

FARRARARAT!

It looked as if formless flames were burning around the sweeping axe.

Even while handling a tremendous heavy weapon he was fast, and the strike made the most of a heavy weapon’s strengths. Its destructive power was one any absolute master would balk at meeting head-on.

Yeon Wi’s sword drew a straight line.

JJJEEEOOONG!

His upper-arm and shoulder muscles twitched.

Yeon Wi couldn’t help admiring his son’s monstrous strength.

Where does such power come from?

Among the seven great clan lords—no, among the six great clan lords now—his martial arts would vie for the very top. And this time he wasn’t suppressing his skill as before. If not his full power, he was at least employing his art in earnest.

A blow strong enough to make such a transcendent master’s muscles tighten unconsciously—this was force that would tell anywhere under heaven.

CHIRING!

Where axe and blade met, Yeon Wi’s sword traced a suddenly soft motion.

“...!”

Yeon Hojeong’s expression flipped.

Like a snake, the blade slid down the axe edge, flowed along to the haft, and went for the wrist. The movement was so natural and smooth he lost it from his sight for an instant.

WHAP!

He released both hands from the haft and whipped the butt-end with a kick.

JJJEOJEOJEOJEOENG!

At point-blank range, the axe was fired. In the blink of an eye Yeon Wi’s sword hammered the axe edge with twelve linked-sequence cuts, shaving down its power.

THU-U-UMP!

Yeon Wi’s eyes widened.

Without lifting his head, he realized that his son had already shifted into the air above him.

Fast!

The fiery energy pouring down toward his crown was tremendous.

White metal energy flipped to red fire. The time it took to shift from White Tiger Qi to Vermilion Bird Qi was lightning-fast.

Nor was that all.

“Haaap!”

It was a rarely heard kiap. He fixed red wings to his two legs, packed a white storm into his right fist, and hammered it down.

Four Spirit Arts—he implemented two attributes at once.

KWO-AAANG!

Where the fist punched into the training ground floor, the destructive force of that strike spidered fine cracks across the entire ground.

A mighty fist-art—power beyond imagining. He had implemented White Tiger’s Beast-King Nine Thunder Stances in a fist form.

FWAAASH!

Evading with Heaven Net Divine Step, Yeon Wi closed in with Bow-Body Springing Shadow.

“...!”

The speed was immense. It was as fast as Blood Wing Sweeps the Heavens.

It wasn’t because Yeon Wi had learned a footwork as fast as Blood Wing Sweeps the Heavens. This was purely the realm of martial arts. When his inner power, body, and insight combined, even simple steps could produce such speed.

FLASH!

Avoiding Yeon Wi, Yeon Hojeong snatched up the axe that had fallen to his left and set his stance.

With a sudden change of line, Yeon Wi had already reached a point one jang in front of Yeon Hojeong.

Their weapons drew out godlike speed.

JJJEOJEOJEOJEOENG! CHICHICHICHING!

Within a single breath their weapons collided eighteen times.

Needless to say, Yeon Wi’s sword-speed was extraordinary—but Yeon Hojeong’s axe-speed, too, exceeded the human limit. Among martial artists who handled heavy weapons, few could display fast-work on this level.

He’s strong.

Yeon Wi could finally feel how many steps beyond his pre-monastic self his son’s realm had leapt.

He’s grown unbelievably strong!

Inner powers of unknown origin were working together with Yeon Hojeong.

But that wasn’t the point. It was clear he hadn’t grown by learning other arts first; he had grown already, and then learned to supplement.

In other words, his son’s insight was already complete enough to contain multiple martial arts without lack. No—perhaps even beyond that.

The subtlety of the lines felt through the weapons, the lofty martial principle felt in his adaptive responses—he couldn’t even imagine where the limit lay.

How on earth?!

Even for the peerless genius Yeon Jipyeong, one would doubt this was possible. He had broken through ten, twenty years of another man’s time in mere months.

If Yeon Wi was astonished at his son’s tremendous growth, Yeon Hojeong, too, was freshly surprised at his father’s steel-forged martial art.

He’s stronger than Ming Cheon!

Though now a public enemy of the martial world, the Ming Clan of the Nine Provinces had been a peerless martial household that upheld the renown of “the greatest clan under heaven” for a hundred years.

And stronger than the lord of such a clan. He had learned a counterfeit Four Spirit Arts, so his overall balance should have been skewed, but even considering that, his father’s martial art surpassed Ming Cheon’s.

Amazing. There’s so much here I don’t have...!

His father’s sword-force, unfolding in true earnest.

Hard to compare to himself in the Dark Emperor days—but within it was the realization of an ideal orthodox martial artist, stacking without omission the many parts even he had been missing.

Perfect. Complete.

He had felt it before as well, but his father’s martial art was a full and finished martial Way with nothing to add or subtract—the summa of orthodox sword. Even after decades, Yeon Hojeong would find it hard to realize; it was the synthesis of white-path martial arts.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

At some point, Yeon Hojeong drove Yeon Wi back.

White Tiger Lording Step grew stronger the more momentum it rode. With a powerful linked advance and the Beast-King Nine Thunder Stances, the beast’s fangs grew larger and sharper, and became all the more ferocious.

With the exquisite sword-principle of Iron Sword Great Derivation, Yeon Wi received and parried Yeon Hojeong’s martial art.

Good. At this level...

More than the techniques implemented, the pressure of the surging will-force was greater still. There was the killing intent of a warrior who sweeps away foes with overwhelming momentum—the majesty of a general.

At this level, he should be able to take this sword.

In that instant, Yeon Wi’s eyes flashed.

JJJEEEOONG!

With a fearsome strong-cut, the axe lost its line.

With a single stroke, White Tiger Lording Step lost its momentum, and the Beast-King Nine Thunder Stances had their fangs shorn off. It was an enormous sword-force.

And it didn’t end there. At ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) Yeon Wi’s sword tip, a mighty true energy gathered in an instant.

Right then—

FWOOOOSH!

Yeon Wi saw a giant hand dye his field of view in darkness.

The writhing, advancing change of form looked like a dragon. And it was fast. An attack that could be blocked—but not avoided.

Surprise rose on Yeon Wi’s face.

Reverse Dragon Palm!!

In less than half a breath, the palm-force he shot out carried tremendous power. It was an ultra-high-speed attack that leveraged powerful cardiopulmonary capacity.

There was no time to show the sword of his newfound insight. Yeon Wi swiftly shifted his internal power and blocked the palm-art.

KWA-ANG!

Yeon Hojeong was driven back more than ten steps.

Yeon Wi, by contrast, stood like a post on the same spot.

“Hoo.”

Shaking out his hand, Yeon Hojeong reset his stance.

“As expected, that won’t do.”

Yeon Wi’s eyes wavered.

“Don’t tell me—you knew?”

“Sir?”

“I’m asking if you were reading my next attack.”

Yeon Hojeong tilted his head.

“No. Only that, uncharacteristically for your martial art, I saw a slight opening—and, thinking it a clear weak point, I attacked it.”

“...!”

“Why, is something wrong?”

“No.”

Sllrrng. Tak!

Yeon Wi sheathed his sword.

“We’ll end the friendly match here.”