WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 84: I Was Once a Madman of Chu (6)
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“Pfft...”
“Kh! Khuhuhu...”
Two people were choking back laughter.
Jin Geol and Won Huiseung.
“...Junior Sister...”
“Uh... Uhh?”
Yu Hyeon covered his face, the tips of his ears red, while the girl cautiously peeked out again from between her raised arms.
“...”
Meanwhile, one person silently looked up at the sky.
His eyes were sad.
Two people were stifling laughter.
Two more were flustered.
As the latter two gradually turned red, Yeon Sowol finally spoke.
“To go that far...”
His voice trembled slightly.
“To go that far just to fight me. Why, exactly?”
Yeon Sowol lowered his gaze from the sky and looked at the two Hengshan Sect disciples.
Bitterness still lingered in his eyes, but they were also steady and clear.
“Both your faces have turned red. That means you're ashamed of what you said and did. Which means you deliberately provoked me into fighting you. I don't understand that. If you'd really come to find me over some careless things people said, you wouldn't be this embarrassed. There must be another reason. Isn't there?”
“...”
Yu Hyeon drew his shoulders in slightly.
‘What kind of eyes are those...?’
He had heard Yeon Sowol was an expert one year younger than himself.
Yet those eyes were straight and deep, as though they could see through to the bottom of a person.
Despite being insulted out of nowhere, he stood tall and calmly asked what had happened. There was even a kind of dignity about him.
Under that gaze, Yu Hyeon could not help feeling twice as ashamed.
Which was why...
“Y-you, you...”
“Stop, So Hye.”
When his young junior sister, her cheeks and ears blazing red, tried once more to insult Yeon Sowol, Yu Hyeon reached out and stopped her.
“B-but, Senior Brother. To properly test him, we need to provoke him...”
“Stop.”
So Hye looked at him anxiously, but Yu Hyeon did not waver.
“I'll handle this. Once Master understands the circumstances, they won't rebuke us.”
“...Yes, Senior Brother.”
His eyes were firm. Seeing that, So Hye stepped back without another word.
Then she hesitantly approached Yeon Sowol.
Without warning, she bent over so deeply that her head nearly reached her knees.
“I-I'm sorry, Young Hero Yeon! We had no choice but to try using a tactic to provoke you! I-I swear, I didn't mean any of it. I sincerely a-apologize for speaking so carelessly!”
Her small head nearly touched her knees, and the ponytail tied behind her head drooped to the ground.
Yeon Sowol let out a quiet sigh.
“I knew from the beginning you didn't mean it, so don't worry about it. Please stand.”
“...I'm sorry.”
Yet So Hye did not raise her head.
“That is enough. Please stand.”
Even after Yeon Sowol urged her again, So Hye did not lift her head. Instead, she said in a voice that sounded close to tears.
“I-I can't look at your face... I'm so embarrassed...”
Keeping her head lowered, she slowly shuffled away sideways like a crab.
“...”
Yeon Sowol watched with his lips slightly parted.
Only after crab-walking back to Yu Hyeon's side did So Hye finally lift her head.
The moment her eyes met Yeon Sowol's, her face flared red and she hid behind Yu Hyeon.
For a girl so beautiful that the word peerless was no exaggeration, she was remarkably awkward.
“Ahem. Ahem.”
After a few embarrassed coughs, Yu Hyeon bowed to Yeon Sowol.
“I, too, apologize. I tried to provoke and test you without a word of explanation. Even if I had ten mouths, I would have nothing to say in my defense.”
Only then did Yeon Sowol turn his attention back to Yu Hyeon.
“To be honest, I am not pleased. Still, you must have had a reason. I would like to hear it. Why were you trying to test me?”
“I apologize, but... I cannot tell you that yet.”
Yeon Sowol's expression hardened slightly.
“I am sorry. But I can promise you one thing. If you agree to my test, Hengshan Sect will certainly repay you, regardless of the result.”
“So I must pass this test before you'll tell me what this is about.”
“I am deeply ashamed...”
“Then let's do it. The test.”
Yeon Sowol answered without a moment's hesitation.
Their first meeting had been strange, but Yu Hyeon was still a rising young talent of Hengshan Sect. He was exactly the person Yeon Sowol had spent the entire journey wondering how to befriend.
He could not let this chance pass.
“Young Hero...!”
Yu Hyeon, the Soaring Xiang Sword Wolf, bit his lip and opened his eyes wide.
“Your agreement is all the more generous because my request was so rude in every respect. This Yu feels even more ashamed.”
Yu Hyeon looked at Yeon Sowol with emotion in his eyes, then seemed to steel himself and lowered his voice.
“This test is not a simple spar.”
“If it is not a simple spar?”
“That is still difficult to explain. But if you lower your guard by thinking this is only a spar, you may suffer greatly. Please concentrate as though this were a real battle.”
Yeon Sowol found the entire situation baffling.
It had already been strange enough that Yu Hyeon had suddenly insisted on sparring. Now he was saying it was not simply a spar.
‘Whether it is simple or not, a spar is still a spar, isn't it? But he wouldn't say all that just because he wants me to take it seriously...’
As Yeon Sowol's thoughts grew tangled, Yu Hyeon stepped back a suitable distance.
Then...
Srrrriing!
He untied the cord binding the sword's hilt to its sheath and revealed the blue blade of a real sword.
It was a slender blade, a foot longer than an ordinary sword. The light lingering on it felt cold and ominous.
“S-Senior Brother! If you draw that!”
“It is fine. For a little while. I have drawn it before.”
So Hye started, but Yu Hyeon remained calm.
Yeon Sowol furrowed his brow.
“Surely you do not mean to spar with real swords?”
Yu Hyeon nodded firmly.
“Yes. I know it is an unreasonable and rude request. But since, contrary to our original plan, you will not be fighting while angered, I believe we need real swords to properly judge you.”
What exactly was he trying to judge?
Though frustrated, Yeon Sowol went along with it for now.
“Very well.”
Sring.
Yeon Sowol drew an ordinary sword. After the Demon-Severing Sword had been shattered, he had bought it from a decent smithy.
It was not a bad sword, but beside the vivid blue sword in Yu Hyeon's hand, it looked pitifully shabby.
Yu Hyeon spoke.
“Then we will begin. Ten exchanges. You need only withstand ten exchanges.”
His eyes grew serious as he spoke.
In an instant, a heavy tension pressed down on the area. Even the smiles vanished from Jin Geol and Won Huiseung's faces as they watched.
* * *
The vivid blue sword Yu Hyeon had drawn.
It was a Demon Sword that Hengshan Sect had kept sealed for a long time.
A sword said to bewitch the person who held it, as well as the person standing before it.
A sword that let people kill easily and made them endlessly crave blood and flesh.
A sword that intoxicated people so that the more blood they saw, the more they gradually lost their reason and became murderous fiends.
When Yu Hyeon was young, he had once asked his master.
‘Master. Why do we keep the Demon Sword sealed? Wouldn't it be easy to melt it down or break it?’
His master had replied.
‘Yu Hyeon. A Demon Sword is a sword inhabited by a demon or ghost. What do you think will happen if we destroy the sword?’
‘Uh... Will the demon or ghost be set free?’
‘Exactly. That is why we cannot destroy it.’
‘But do demons and ghosts really exist?’
‘They do. Once you become skilled enough to hold that sword, you will understand.’
Time passed, and Yu Hyeon became a rising young talent representing Hengshan Sect.
Now he held that sword.
The vivid blue and chilling Demon Sword, a foot longer than an ordinary blade.
Wooooong!
The Demon Sword cried out.
It was not the clear ring of a sword, but a cry that sounded strangely eerie and mournful.
Yu Hyeon knew for certain now.
He knew the wicked presence dwelling within that sword.
It was a presence that needed to be suppressed within its sheath, yet now they needed that very presence.
He recalled the conversation he had shared with his master that morning.
‘Yu Hyeon. What we need now is not simply a strong expert. We need someone with an unshakable heart and pure qi, someone who will never be beguiled by wicked energy.’
As the master spoke, the chilling Demon Sword had been held out to him.
‘If he can endure thirty exchanges without you drawing it from its sheath, he passes. We can work with him. Yet if his qi remains completely unmoved even after those thirty exchanges, you must invite him as a guest of the main sect. He will certainly be someone worth building ties with.’
The Demon Sword's power weakened if it was not drawn from its sheath.
That was why his master had instructed him to provoke his opponent into an emotional state. The Demon Sword's influence would be stronger that way, making it a proper test.
But Yu Hyeon had drawn the sword completely.
It was an extreme measure because Yeon Sowol had not become angry. In return, he reduced the thirty exchanges his master had mentioned to ten.
Yu Hyeon took a deep breath. Even ten exchanges would drain a great deal of mental strength if he wielded the drawn Demon Sword.
“Then, I will begin.”
“Yes.”
Wooooong!
Flutter!
Yu Hyeon drew up his true qi. His robes swelled, and it seemed as though heat haze blazed around him.
The Demon Sword let out an eerie cry.
* * *
‘An unpleasant sword.’
That was what Yeon Sowol thought.
He did not know that Yu Hyeon held a Demon Sword.
But his sensitive qi sense told him there was something wrong with it.
‘It feels like something might burst out of it...’
That strange sensation worsened the moment Yu Hyeon poured true qi into the sword.
Then, as their swords met for the first time...
「Grrrk, grrk, grrrrrk.」
A sound like grinding teeth rang directly behind Yeon Sowol, right against his ear.
...!
Goosebumps rose across Yeon Sowol's skin. He already had bad memories of that sound. A demonic practitioner of the Demonic Cult had used sound arts with that same grinding noise.
Yeon Sowol clenched his teeth.
Still, he did not turn toward the sound.
He could hear it, but it was only a sound. His qi sense told him there was nothing there.
Clang!
He met Yu Hyeon's second exchange like that. The moment Yeon Sowol's sword collided with the Demon Sword...
...!!
Yeon Sowol felt his sense of balance lurch out of place.
He corrected the warped sensation with his sensitive qi sense so quickly it did not show, but inwardly, he was deeply startled.
That was not all.
A metallic, bloody scent filled his nose, as if dried blood had clogged it completely.
‘What is this?’
Yeon Sowol felt wicked energy.
‘Why is there... energy like this?’
It was murky and filled with malice, impossible to believe it came from a rising young talent of an eminent orthodox school like Hengshan Sect.
It even crawled out from the sword like a living thing and slipped into Yeon Sowol's ear...
‘Fuck!’
What is this? There really is something...!
Panicked, Yeon Sowol pushed his martial arts to a deeper stage of maturity. True Flame blazed fiercely, and sword qi flared brightly from the tip of his sword.
With the world flattened before his eyes, he swung his sword.
He severed the irritating thread drifting before him.
Craaaack!
The instant Yeon Sowol's sword collided with the Demon Sword, cracks spread across its surface like a spiderweb.
Then it shattered.
Fragments scattered and fell in pieces, like glass flower petals fluttering through the air.
“...Huh?”
Only then did Yu Hyeon raise the hilt that was all that remained of the Demon Sword.
“Huh?”
Seeing that, Yeon Sowol realized what he had done.
‘Damn. I got startled and used the power of the Heaven-Killing Star without thinking...’
The chill he felt as something seemed to enter his ear.
It was no different from the sensation of ghosts invading his body when he had first fallen into this world.
So he had instinctively drawn on the Heaven-Killing Star's power, and the expensive-looking sword had been completely destroyed.
“Uh. Why is it... This... It mustn't break. Huh? Then the demon or ghost... the demon or ghost...”
Flustered, Yu Hyeon began gathering the fragments scattered across the ground.
Then horror appeared on his face.
“What? It’s gone? I can’t feel even a trace of the demon or ghost's energy. This is... As if it has vanished completely...? How? You destroyed the demon or ghost along with the sword?”
Cold sweat ran down Yeon Sowol's back.
‘So it really was a precious sword?’
Pretending to be calm and acting as though he knew nothing, he clasped his hands behind his back and asked.
“Hm? Did something disappear?”
Yu Hyeon seemed to come back to his senses and suddenly looked up at Yeon Sowol.
At first, his face was blank. Slowly, shock filled it.
“No. Now that I think about it... In only three exchanges. You destroyed the Demon Sword in only three exchanges...”
“Hm? A Demon Sword?”
When Yeon Sowol asked, Yu Hyeon swallowed hard and asked in return.
“You did not feel it?”
In truth, no person could fail to feel it.
The beguilement and wicked interference of a Demon Sword drawn from its sheath.
But Yeon Sowol needed to conceal that he had used the Heaven-Killing Star's power, so he pretended to know nothing.
“What do you mean?”
Yu Hyeon's mouth fell open.
“G-good heavens... You were completely unaffected? That dense demonic aura... It had no effect on you at all, Young Hero Yeon?”
So Hye, who had been watching beside them with wide eyes, gasped and joined in.
“My goodness... Just how powerful must your qi be...! Well, you did shatter a sword our sect sealed and guarded for over a hundred years in only three exchanges...!”
“R-right. Of course. Just how pure and bright must your qi be!”
Yu Hyeon and So Hye looked at each other and nodded, then gazed up at Yeon Sowol with shining eyes.
‘...Is that a good thing?’
For now, Yeon Sowol gave them an awkward smile.
Footnotes:
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