WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 122: When Young, I Knew Not Sorrow's Taste (27)
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Yuezhou was in shock.
Because of the Twenty-Four Plum Blossom Sword Art Ha Jeop had displayed.
“A first-rate martial artist defeated someone at the peak realm...”
“Bubulbu isn't some ordinary master! I know of three peak-realm masters whose heads fell by his hand. Three!”
“I heard Bubulbu was only twenty-four when he reached the peak realm.”
“He's a genius. A genius everyone in Hubei knows.”
“And he lost to a young Daoist who only just turned twenty.”
“They say immortals live in the Nine Great Sects and One Gang...”
“But didn't Bubulbu defeat rising young talents from Wudang too? Does that mean Huashan is stronger?”
“Not every rising young talent is the same.”
“So that Daoist Ha Jeop is that much of a genius. Is that what happens when a genius obtains a peerless divine art...?”
“Definitely. We've seen inhuman strength and wondrous techniques at this martial arts tournament, but the Plum Blossom Sword Art was on another level.”
“Sword qi blooming from empty air. Can a human truly achieve something like that?”
“Huashan's sword has reached the heavens...”
Wherever she went, everyone was talking about the match between Ha Jeop and Wi Sihon.
About how extraordinary the Nine Great Sects and One Gang were.
About the immense gap between them and sects outside their ranks.
People carried on heated discussions, practically spraying spit.
Even the martial officials had become so absorbed in the debate that they forgot their duties.
“The name of the Nine Great Sects and One Gang is lofty for a reason. That was truly an incredible move. The Twenty-Four Hands Plum Blossom Sword... How could anyone stand against it?”
“Hmm. It's embarrassing to admit it, but I'm not confident.”
“Come now. You won't know until you try!”
“Would it make sense for the Son of Heaven's sword to lose to the swords of the Jianghu?”
They talked here.
They talked there.
They gathered in noisy crowds.
Moyong Ha walked through the utterly chaotic streets of Yuezhou.
The same names kept reaching her ears.
Ha Jeop.
The Twenty-Four Hands Plum Blossom Sword Art.
They called it the finest under heaven.
The sword of immortals.
They said its artistry reached the heavens.
They called it divine.
A bitter smile touched her lips.
Yuezhou was loud.
She too had been thrilled by it. She too had been awed.
Still, she could not feel that way wholeheartedly.
She knew more.
Her position was different.
“Divine...”
Divine, was it?
“It is only a dispute atop a snail's horn.”
She passed through the streets with strangely sorrowful eyes.
* * *
A dispute atop a snail's horn.
It meant a conflict fought upon a snail's horn.
It was an anecdote recorded in Zhuangzi.
When Qi broke its alliance, King Hui of Wei asked how he should punish it.
Dai Jinren answered with a question instead.
“Does Your Highness know of a small creature called a snail?”
“Of course I do.”
“On the snail's left horn is a country called Touch, and on its right horn is a country called Man. The two went to war, and tens of thousands died.”
“What kind of nonsense is that?”
“Then does Your Highness know what the universe is?”
“Of course I do.”
“Do you believe the universe has an end in the four directions, above, and below?”
“No person may have seen it, but by the nature of the universe, it should have no end.”
“Then from the perspective of beings who freely roam that boundless world, would the countries on this earth not be so insignificant that they might as well exist and not exist?”
“...Hmm.”
“Among those countless countries is Wei. Within Wei is its capital. Within that capital, inside the palace, is Your Highness. When considered this way, how is Your Highness's desire to fight Qi any different from Touch and Man fighting atop a snail's horn?”
King Hui of Wei lost all desire to wage war and withdrew his army.
Moyong Ha thought to herself.
‘Dai Jinren in that tale must have known this world's true nature.’
People were foolish enough to think the world belonged to humanity.
Yet as a direct descendant of one of the Five Great Families, and through the calamity in Liaoning, she had learned of and witnessed a world that was nothing like that.
The Buddhist tradition spoke of the trichiliocosm.
According to its teachings, the world was Mount Sumeru.
Eight mountains and eight seas surrounded Mount Sumeru to form the world.
The sun and moon were bound to Mount Sumeru as they circled it, and the Six Heavens of Desire unfolded along its height.
Then where was the human world?
It was said to lie within the Iron Encircling Mountains, the outermost of the eight mountains around Mount Sumeru, and within the Salt Sea, the outermost of the eight seas.
Within that Salt Sea were the Four Continents. That was where people lived, the Human Path among the Six Realms.
In other words, within the vast world of Mount Sumeru, the human world occupied only the smallest part.
A realm centered on a single Mount Sumeru was called a Sumeru-world.
A thousand Sumeru-worlds made a lesser chiliocosm.
A thousand lesser chiliocosms made a middling chiliocosm.
A thousand middling chiliocosms finally made a great chiliocosm.
That was why it was called the trichiliocosm, three sets of one thousand.
One thousand times one thousand times one thousand.
One billion Sumeru-worlds.
How, then, could the world belong to humanity?
“It is all fighting atop a snail's horn.”
No matter how great a peak-realm master was.
No matter how sharp Huashan's sword that defeated such a master might be.
In the truly vast world, it was no more than dust.
And within that vast world, divine and countless strange things happened without end.
The calamity that had engulfed Liaoning was one of them.
Moyong Ha knew the terror of fiendish demons and Strange Ghosts better than anyone.
Wicked demons.
Strange ghosts.
Humans could be wicked.
Humans could be strange.
Yet once the words demon and ghost followed, it became an entirely different matter.
Things beyond human understanding.
Things human ability could not withstand.
Incomprehensible, irresistible forces. Twisted laws that could only be escaped by walking the proper path, lest one unknowingly leave the Human Path.
“There is no need to speak of the trichiliocosm. Even beneath this sky, fiendish demons and Strange Ghosts beyond human understanding and ability run rampant.”
Moyong Ha trembled slightly.
Why were humans so insignificant?
Why were humans so weak?
Before demons and ghosts, their fates were toys.
“Unless one can tear through heaven and earth to pass beyond them, unless one can look beyond a single Mount Sumeru without being bound to it, we humans are all prey from birth.”
To overcome that fate, surpass human limits, rise above the games of demons and ghosts, and reach immortal workings, people cultivated martial arts.
They wished to become immortals and roam the world as though setting off on a distant outing.
The Nine Great Sects and One Gang and the Five Great Families were, in the end, no more than people struggling to overcome the fate of prey.
Even the Son of Heaven, who ruled the world, struggled to carve out a narrow path for humanity amid the tangled paths of demons and ghosts.
It was arduous and distant.
Yet struggling was what humans did.
Moyong Ha, too, was a rightful heir of those who struggled without giving up.
And for that very reason, she now harbored a suspicion.
The shadow over Yuezhou might be more than the work of a mere Demonic Path faction.
It might not be evil wrought by humans at all, but the work of fiendish demons or Strange Ghosts that had never been human to begin with.
The testimonies she had gathered lent weight to that suspicion.
“How has the harvest remained abundant for so long? It is all thanks to the provincial governor.”
“Once, crops all across Yuezhou began turning yellow. No one knew why. But when we sprinkled the water the provincial governor distributed, the dying crops became green and healthy again. He is a person sent down by heaven. Heaven truly sent him to us.”
“Was it three years ago? There was a terrible epidemic. The provincial governor gathered the sick, washed them with clean water, and changed their clothes. Within a week, they had all recovered. Everyone marveled that they had never seen an epidemic in which no one died.”
“He is highly educated, so perhaps he is different in every way. There was once a strange illness in the households of high officials. Children's faces turned black, and old people coughed blood. It was an illness no one had ever seen before. I heard the provincial governor cured that too. He must have been deeply skilled in medicine as well.”
“Once, fishermen kept dying whenever they went out to catch fish. Boats capsizing and people drowning in tranquil Dongting Lake. It was truly strange. Yet after the provincial governor performed rites at Dongting Lake, it stopped happening.”
Crops dying for no known reason.
Epidemics.
Strange illnesses.
Unexplained disappearances and deaths.
Rites...
Strange incidents that seemed to defy the laws of the world.
All of it felt familiar to Moyong Ha.
It reminded her of the calamity she had experienced in Liaoning.
“Now, I'll know once I confirm it.”
And if this truly involved fiendish demons and Strange Ghosts...
‘Then I must bear it alone. I can't place any more burden on Sowol.’
A true demon could not be faced by those who had never encountered one.
Only someone like her, who had experienced demons, could hope to survive while facing one.
Was she afraid?
Did she have regrets?
Was she trembling?
Was she excited?
Whatever the case, the day Moyong Ha would act had finally come.
* * *
It was a dark night.
The government office was quiet.
The Yuezhou provincial governor, whose temper had reportedly been poor of late, had left work early and returned to his residence.
With no superior left whose reactions they needed to mind, the subordinates had all left work as well.
The martial officials who were supposed to guard the government office at night had left to control the uproar in Yuezhou. Only a minimal force remained, standing guard over the dark compound.
Whoosh!
Tap!
None among them had the skill to notice Moyong Ha flying in like a bird.
Without stopping even once, she crossed seven walls in one burst and headed straight for the deepest part of the Yuezhou government office.
Tap!
The instant she crossed the wall at its innermost reaches,
Whoooooosh!
Fog suddenly poured in from every direction.
Water splashed softly, though it was impossible to tell where the sound came from.
The front felt like the back.
The right felt like the left.
A bizarre confusion of the senses came over her.
Moyong Ha did not panic.
Instead, her eyes lit up as if she had been waiting for this.
‘Yes. There should be a formation array here.’
Long ago, Zhuge Liang had piled stones to create a formation array called the Eight Formation Diagram.
The story of Lu Xun rashly entering it, failing to find the Gate of Life, nearly starving to death, and barely escaping was well known.
Even if it did not compare to that, a place like the Yuezhou government office would naturally possess a formation array capable of blocking even a decent master's sight and hearing.
Moyong Ha thought to herself.
‘If this formation array only confuses me, makes me lose my way, or hides certain buildings from sight...’
That would be normal.
A formation array laid by a human skilled in arcane formation methods could easily deceive even the senses of a late first-rate master.
But...
‘If this formation array goes beyond confusing me and warps the laws of this world itself...’
Then it had left the Human Path.
It would be fair to say fiendish demons and Strange Ghosts had touched it.
Just as they had in the calamity that occurred in Liaoning.
“Please...”
Moyong Ha wished for one thing.
That she would find traces of fiendish demons and Strange Ghosts here.
It would surely become dangerous, but...
‘If I only find them, I can at least send the information to the main house in Liaoning...’
It would come down to one outcome or the other.
Either way, that was why she had left Liaoning and traveled so far across the world.
“...”
Suppressing the feeling that her heart was being squeezed,
Step. Step.
Moyong Ha slowly moved forward.
She sharpened her qi sense and examined her surroundings. The deep fog was thicker and damper than darkness itself, and she could sense nothing through it.
Splash. Splash.
Then she heard water.
Her slow steps came to a stop before a shallow stream.
This was certainly within the government office. Why was a stream flowing here?
‘An illusion? Confused senses? Or...’
Moyong Ha slowly drew her sword.
Riiiiing!
Her sword began to hum.
Martial arts had been created by humans to surpass their own limits and their fate as prey.
Heat haze rose from her entire body.
Her clothes fluttered and billowed.
True qi churned.
Bright blue sword qi formed along the blade.
The Moyong Family's understanding was condensed within that faint light.
The workings that moved the world.
Something humans could never command by nature.
If this was a human formation array that bent the qi of nature, it would surely tremble before this sword qi.
The Moyong Family's sword art specialized in stirring, riding, and cutting through the surrounding energy like a bird beating its wings.
Moyong Ha took her sword in a reverse grip. Then she slowly thrust it into the stream flowing before her.
If the stream was only an illusion created by the formation array, it would waver before the sword qi and reveal its true nature, if only for a moment. The sword would simply pierce the dirt below.
‘But if it isn't...’
Splash.
Moyong Ha's sword touched the water's surface.
Sliiide.
It entered, slipping deeper and deeper.
The stream looked shallow, yet the blade sank endlessly below.
Had she taken even one step onto it, her entire body would have sunk beneath the surface.
“...”
Moyong Ha slowly pulled up the sword that had been submerged deep within the shallow stream.
Her face had gone rigid.
This was not human power that created illusions and confusion.
It warped the laws themselves.
“What do I do now?”
Moyong Ha twisted her lips with an expression that could have been laughter or tears.
“I think I found it, Sowol.”
Footnotes:
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