WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 102: When Young, I Knew Not Sorrow's Taste (7)
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Namgung Ujin knew it too.
‘I've been an idiot.’
He had stepped forward, saying he would help Moyong Ha, but in the end, all he had done was treat it as a nuisance.
‘Why did I even get involved...’
The real problem was that he had openly declared Moyong Ha wrong in front of everyone.
Then he had brought the others out drinking.
And now Yeon Sowol had actually caught a suspicious group.
It was humiliating, plain and simple.
He had disgraced himself.
He had brought shame upon his family name.
‘This is driving me crazy.’
He wanted to flee immediately. What right did he have to keep his head held high?
Still, he could not.
‘Even if I was at fault, if I let this slide, I'll only become a laughingstock. Then I really will have disgraced my family.’
He did not care if people looked down on him.
He had made a mistake, so perhaps he deserved it.
The problem was that he was the only Namgung currently in Yuezhou. If he was not careful, it would not be Namgung Ujin alone who became a joke. The very name Namgung could become one.
‘And this is the second time.’
Namgung Ujin had already picked a fight with Yeon Sowol when they first met.
He had claimed that the poem Yeon Sowol quoted might be insulting them.
That matter had been smoothed over at the time.
But now this had happened again, giving him even more grounds to press the matter. He could not simply back down.
Otherwise, the Namgung Family might be branded as a family of fools who picked fights for no reason, only to humiliate themselves.
‘Absolutely not.’
Namgung Ujin's eyes flashed. He had made his decision.
Bang!
His hand slammed down on the table.
Formidable internal power filled the strike, but he harmonized the qi precisely enough that the table did not break.
The wooden table simply rang out like a great temple bell.
Everyone was startled by the refined technique. A few even looked afraid.
Aware of their gazes, Namgung Ujin glared at Yeon Sowol.
“Young Hero Yeon. What did you mean by that?”
* * *
‘He's picking a fight?’
Yeon Sowol met Namgung Ujin's gaze with cold eyes.
Namgung Ujin had been provoking him since the day they first met.
Yeon Sowol had backed down then.
He had thought it might have been a misunderstanding.
But not now.
‘What has he done to act like this?’
There was no reason to yield.
No, if he yielded now, he would be the fool.
‘What did I mean?’
Yeon Sowol answered without holding back.
“I meant exactly what you heard.”
“...”
Namgung Ujin clenched his teeth.
‘Exactly what I heard? This bastard...’
At first, he had forced himself to act angry. Now he was genuinely annoyed.
“So you're saying you were targeting me, Namgung Ujin? That I handled things carelessly without putting any thought into it? That I nearly let the target get away? Is that what you mean?”
“Was I wrong?”
“...”
It was true, leaving Namgung Ujin speechless. Still, he unfastened the sword at his waist, drew out a long cord, and tightly bound the hilt and scabbard together around the guard.
“Last time, you mocked me with poetry. This time, you ridicule me before everyone without sparing my dignity. Come outside. I need to see whether you have the right to do that.”
Yeon Sowol snorted.
He unfastened his sword as well.
Clear Mirror, the spiritual sword given to him by the leader of the Hengshan Sect.
Like Namgung Ujin, he did not draw it. He tightly bound the hilt and scabbard together.
Moyong Ha arrived at the inn just as the two were glaring at each other and about to head outside.
One look at Namgung Ujin and Yeon Sowol's faces was enough for her to grasp roughly what had happened. She hurriedly stepped between them.
“Wait. Please wait. There is no reason for you two to fight over this. It is all this Moyong Ha's fault, so please calm yourselves first. Young Hero Namgung, may we speak for a moment?”
The last time, Moyong Ha had mediated, and Namgung Ujin's conflict with Yeon Sowol had been smoothed over.
This time was different.
“Young Lady, step aside.”
Namgung Ujin spoke coldly, but secretly sent Moyong Ha a voice transmission.
「Young Lady, I am sorry it has come to this. But it cannot be helped. My own dignity and my family's dignity are now at stake.」
Moyong Ha stared at Namgung Ujin, then took a step back.
Once he mentioned his family's dignity, she could not insist. As a member of a martial family herself, she could understand Namgung Ujin's position.
Still, one thought made her frown.
‘What if Young Hero Namgung loses?’
Namgung Ujin's martial arts were impressive enough that he was called Yuezhou's foremost rising young talent.
Yet the Yeon Sowol she had seen was not inferior to him in the slightest.
‘It'll be troublesome if he makes an even bigger fuss and twists this into something ugly...’
Among the Five Great Families, the Namgung Family ranked among the very best. If a young master from such a house set his mind to causing trouble, few things could be more tiresome.
So Moyong Ha sent him a voice transmission as well.
Unlike usual, her voice was cold and completely free of laughter.
「Young Master, even defeat must have dignity. No matter the outcome, do not tarnish the name of the Five Great Families. If you do, it will stain the Moyong name as well.」
“Ha!”
Namgung Ujin laughed aloud, as though he found it absurd, or perhaps pleasing.
‘Does Young Lady Moyong think I'll lose?’
He glanced at Moyong Ha.
She was not smiling.
Namgung Ujin smiled despite himself as he replied.
「Young Lady, I too am a legitimate scion of a distinguished family.」
He walked lightly out of the inn, and Yeon Sowol followed behind him.
“Oh, a fight?”
Hwangbo Hwi, who had not shown his face even once until now, appeared in the open space before the inn, his ornaments jingling. He must have heard something somewhere.
He licked his lips eagerly.
“That Yeon Sowol fellow looked strong. Maybe today we'll properly witness the Namgung Family's Great Expansion Sword Technique.”
One of Hwangbo Hwi's friends asked,
“Great Expansion Sword Technique? When it comes to the Namgung Family, isn't it the Vault of Heaven, Boundless Sword Technique and the Emperor's Sword Form?”
“Honestly. Those are for the family head and young family head. The fourth young master uses the Great Expansion Sword Technique.”
“Hm. I didn't know that.”
“Don't underestimate it. The Great Expansion Sword is peerless under heaven too. Have you ever seen the Namgung Family left out when people name the greatest sword under heaven? It is the sword cultivated by a legitimate scion of the Namgung Family, known as the greatest sword family under heaven. The Great Expansion Sword Technique is supreme even among supreme-grade sword arts.”
“It's that good? Then we're in for quite a show.”
Not only Yuezhou's young martial artists, but even older martial artists passing nearby stopped to watch with interest.
“Anyway, that Yeon Sowol fellow got himself into trouble.”
“Why? You think Yeon Sowol will lose after all?”
“I don't know about that. But the Namgung sword is huge. It is hard to withstand all that sword force. I know because I've fought it myself.”
Hwangbo Hwi sounded as though he was having the time of his life.
“Once he takes a single Namgung sword strike, he'll panic and blink about three times.”
It was ridiculous, really.
Hwangbo Hwi declared,
“Even if Yeon Sowol wins, there is no way he will come through it unscathed.”
* * *
Great Expansion Sword Technique.
Great meant vast.
Expansion meant broad.
It took greatness and breadth as its very name.
It was arrogant, fitting the great Namgung Family, which was often considered foremost among the Five Great Families.
In truth, all the Namgung Family's sword arts were like that.
The Vault of Heaven, Boundless Sword Technique meant a sword art as endless as the blue sky.
The Emperor's Sword Form was, as its name said, the sword of an emperor.
Just as their names suggested, the Namgung sword was known for being heavy and fierce.
Yet heavy and fierce only explained half of it.
To be great, broad, and like the heavens meant to have no weak points.
To be an emperor meant to dominate.
Clang!
Claaang!
Namgung Ujin proved the Great Expansion by parrying every one of Yeon Sowol's successive attacks without moving from where he stood.
‘None of this is working?’
When Yeon Sowol used Willow Leaf Steps, his body swayed like a willow leaf fluttering in the wind.
Each step contained countless changes, making it impossible to predict where he would go. Yeon Sowol liked using Willow Leaf Steps and qi sense to exploit his opponent's blind spots.
But it was not working this time.
‘Faster!’
Whoosh!
He harmonized his qi and even controlled the wind at will, twisting this way and bending that way as he drove in his sword.
Yet Namgung Ujin parried every attack with a sword more than a foot and a half longer than Yeon Sowol's.
It was an exquisite sword art that cut off attacks with only the smallest movements.
He had not even moved a single step from his spot. It felt as though Yeon Sowol faced a massive mountain.
In the end, Yeon Sowol was the first to retreat.
He frowned.
This was the first time he had been blocked so thoroughly.
Namgung Ujin held his long sword in both hands and let it hang toward the ground.
“Your sword is sharp, and your Movement Art is exquisite. But if that is all you have, you are no match for me.”
He tilted his chin.
“You may still withdraw the insult you have given me.”
It was a kind of truce offer. He was saying he would stop here.
Namgung Ujin was sincere.
He knew from the start that he had little justification for picking a fight. He did not particularly want to humiliate Yeon Sowol more than necessary.
Yeon Sowol remained silent.
After a moment, he spoke.
It was a mutter to himself, completely unrelated to what Namgung Ujin had just said.
“Ah. I get it now. So that's what it was? Wow. I didn't expect that.”
Namgung Ujin frowned.
“Did you not hear me?”
Yeon Sowol waved a hand.
“Hold on. I think I'm starting to understand what kind of sword art the Great Expansion Sword Technique is.”
Namgung Ujin let out a hollow laugh.
“You understand the sword intent of the Great Expansion Sword after seeing it once?”
The sword intent of the Great Expansion Sword Technique was not especially secret. Once martial arts were revealed, people could generally analyze their basic principles.
That did not mean it was common knowledge.
There were not many masters under heaven capable of recognizing a sword art's sword intent. Among them, even fewer possessed the deep knowledge needed to analyze the Namgung Family's Great Expansion Sword.
And a martial artist at the late first-rate realm had figured it out after exchanging only a few blows?
“Young Hero Yeon. There is no need to invent things that do not exist because you are ashamed of your own shortcomings...”
“So that was why you were preparing for the civil service examination. You were trying to merge Nature Learning and martial arts.”
“...”
Namgung Ujin's eyes wavered.
“You added the insight of spirit, cultivated through Nature Learning, to a martial artist's qi sense. Linking those two could not have been easy, but you did it with uncanny skill. That must be your secret art... Anyway, since you can do that, you can see from above as though looking down from the heavens. Like seeing the future. You already know what I will do, so you can block me that easily.”
Yeon Sowol's eyes, which had been lost in thought, sharpened as they settled on Namgung Ujin.
“Am I wrong?”
“...”
His tone was irritating.
But Namgung Ujin could not get angry.
A chill had run down his spine.
‘What is that...?’
When people saw something incomprehensible, they felt a chill.
Yeon Sowol took up his stance again, forming Sword Fingers with his left hand and gripping Clear Mirror in his right.
“Anyway, if that is how it works, I should change how I deal with it too.”
Creak.
Namgung Ujin ground his teeth.
He was trying to shake off the momentary intimidation. Instead, he growled even more fiercely.
“You will abandon your specialty and face the sword of the great Namgung Family with a makeshift method?”
Hummmmm!
He had not even drawn his sword.
Dark blue sword qi gathered over Namgung Ujin's scabbard.
“You spoke as though you knew everything. But do you even know that great and broad carry another meaning?”
Namgung Ujin sneered.
“The martial arts of the great Namgung Family resemble the heavens. Like the vast and broad sky, we embrace every kind of qi. Did you know that?”
The first-rate realm was the realm where essence was dissolved into qi.
At that point, most martial arts dissolved essence into specific types of qi according to their cultivation method. Cultivation in the orthodox Daoist tradition usually produced pure qi, like the qi of the Five Elements. The martial arts of unorthodox schools could focus on turbid qi, like explosive qi. Some leaned toward the qi of fire, others toward the qi of lightning.
But the Namgung Family did not discriminate between types of qi. Vast and broad, it embraced them all, so it dissolved essence into qi faster than anyone else. The harmonies those energies created were likewise greater than anyone else's.
“The Namgung sword is great and broad.”
Hummm!
The increasingly dense sword qi rippled along the scabbard like the sea.
It was an aura comparable to the dense starlit sword qi Won Huiseung had only revealed at the very end.
“It lays all things beneath it.”
The essence of martial arts that pursued greatness and breadth rather than purity.
The crowd stirred.
“What sword qi...”
“At that point, isn't it practically gang qi?”
“They said the Namgung sword was heavy and fierce... It truly lives up to its name.”
“You should not take that head-on.”
Namgung Ujin kicked off the ground.
Confidence had returned to his face.
Not confidence in himself, exactly.
It was something that could be called pride in the Namgung Family's martial arts.
“Try running away.”
The Namgung Family's lightness art was not so much light as swift, not so much flexible as exquisite.
It seemed to approach simply, yet steadily restricted and pressured the opponent's movements.
Those who faced the Namgung Family's sword could not escape its fierce strikes even when they tried. Like prey caught in a spiderweb, they were gradually driven back until they finally collapsed.
But Yeon Sowol had no intention of evading.
He only adjusted his stance where he stood.
“Makeshift? No. This is proof.”
Speaking words Namgung Ujin could not understand, he met the Namgung sword head-on.
Namgung Ujin gripped his long sword with both hands and swung down from overhead as though splitting Yeon Sowol in two.
Yeon Sowol formed Sword Fingers with his left hand, held his sword with his right, and lightly raised it from below.
“Sowol...!”
The sight was so precarious that Moyong Ha let out a shrill cry.
Claaang!
A violent martial force wave swept out, sending one person flying backward.
Screeech!
A long furrow carved itself into the ground beneath the feet that had dug in with all their strength.
Hum. Hum. Hum.
The one desperately gripping a visibly trembling sword in both hands was...
“...What?”
Namgung Ujin.
Yeon Sowol had not taken a single step back.
“H-How...”
Namgung Ujin even stammered in his confusion.
Yet Yeon Sowol sounded as though it was only natural.
“Just as I thought. You said it resembled the heavens...”
He muttered as though something had been proven.
Then Hwangbo Hwi, watching the fight, thrust his head forward and shouted,
“Namgung, what was that? Why did your sword get pushed back so easily? Is his sword force really that incredible? What, is it gang qi?”
It was quite rude, but everyone was inwardly thinking the same thing. They swallowed hard and waited for Namgung Ujin's answer.
Namgung Ujin answered with a confused expression.
“I don't know. I don't understand... The martial force I sent out scattered as though it had fallen into the sea... Then something came back like a massive wave...”
“What are you talking about?”
“Will you shut up?”
Namgung Ujin clenched his teeth and glared at Yeon Sowol.
After hesitating, he finally asked,
“...What sword technique was that?”
Yeon Sowol answered, looking a little troubled.
“Well. It was not so much a sword technique as an insight I gained recently...”
The Great Expansion Sword Technique resembled the heavens.
“This one is the universe.”
Yeon Sowol took up his stance again.
“...?”
Namgung Ujin blinked five times.
Footnotes:
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