WeTried Translations

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Editor: Abstract

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 44: First Class (3)

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First Class (3)

"Eight? Did she say eight?"

"That's insane! How is that even possible?"

"Even Special Master Dan Baek-yeon herself couldn't do it that fast, right?"

The whole lecture hall stirred with the noise of cadets crying out in shock.

Special Master Dan Baek-yeon had shared a groundbreaking method of release, developed through her own research, for undoing a paralysis point. Even she needed to count to at least ten to release it. Mumu, without a shred of internal energy, had forced it open in eight, using raw muscle alone.

'How?'

The one hit hardest was Hong Hye-ryeong, successor of the Four Immortal Masters.

As the top scorer of the entrance examination, she'd naturally expected to claim first place in the practical exercise too. But thanks to Mumu, her achievement had been completely buried.

'...Eight.'

She herself had needed to count to twenty to release the point.

The gap was too wide to even compare.

'Me, falling behind...'

Living with the confidence that no one her age could ever catch up to her, this came as quite the shock.

Meanwhile,

'Pfft.'

Mo Il-hwa, who still hadn't released her own paralysis point, was having the time of her life watching Hong Hye-ryeong sit there shaken, unable to focus on her inner reflection.

The attention-seeker had lost her spotlight. Mo Il-hwa could only imagine how that felt.

'Way to go, Mumu!'

She found him utterly adorable.

Dan Baek-yeon, who had been surprised by the result at first, now wore a troubled expression. The cadets watched her mood carefully.

'Her pride's wounded, isn't it?'

'Probably.'

'She's supposedly one of the Six Stars of Heaven, and some random cadet, no, a kid without even any internal energy, released it faster than her.'

'Hey, the release method was never about how much internal energy you have anyway.'

'Still...'

Unlike this murmuring among the cadets,

'How did he do that? Is it even generally possible to release a sealed point through raw muscle alone, without inner reflection? And if it is possible, how did he approach it? Did he perform some kind of self-administered muscle-and-bone manipulation to push the energy out of the point?'

Dan Baek-yeon was already circling the deeper question. Her own record being surpassed didn't even register to her.

Her personal creed was that if any method, however unconventional, proved more effective than what was already known, it deserved to be refined and adopted.

Just then Mumu spoke to her.

"Sabu-nim. Do I not get any bonus points?"

"Ah..."

Dan Baek-yeon looked at Mumu. His eyes were full of expectation. It struck her as odd.

He'd released the point faster than she herself had. He could easily have looked smug, even arrogant about it. Instead his eyes were round and his gaze was purely innocent.

'Give me bonus points too.'

That was all he seemed to care about. It was strikingly different from every other cadet she'd seen.

'...Cute.'

Watching Mumu closely, Dan Baek-yeon finally spoke.

"Interesting."

"Are you giving me bonus points?"

"Very well. I gave cadet Hong Hye-ryeong one bonus point for releasing hers fastest. But you did it even faster than I could, so giving you the same single point wouldn't be fair. I'll award you two."

Buzz, buzz!

The instant the words left her mouth, the whole room stirred.

In one moment, it was no longer Hong Hye-ryeong but Mumu closing in on first place, right from the very first class.

Hong Hye-ryeong bit down hard on her lip. The one bonus point she'd earned suddenly meant nothing at all.

Just then, one cadet raised a hand.

"Sabu-nim, shouldn't this be judged separately though?"

"Separately?"

"Yes. The exercise was specifically about releasing the paralysis point using the method you taught us, Sabu-nim. But that guy there, I mean, cadet Mumu, used a completely different method, didn't he?"

Some of the other cadets nodded along with the objection. Giving points for a method entirely different from the assigned exercise seemed excessive to them.

Dan Baek-yeon answered calmly, without missing a beat.

"I called my method groundbreaking. But cadet Mumu here, using this very method I've mastered, released it faster than I ever could, even without any internal energy at all."

"W-well, that's..."

"Which means cadet Mumu's approach is more efficient, or more groundbreaking, than my own method. That's why I awarded the bonus points."

Her explanation was clean and airtight.

"..."

"Any objections?"

"None."

The cadet who'd raised the complaint had to sit back down having gained nothing for it. Her logic left no room for rebuttal.

The cadets who'd been unhappy now looked at Mumu with envy instead.

Dan Baek-yeon then issued a warning to the class.

"You won't have time for this. Any cadet still paralyzed past a count of a hundred will be judged as not having listened properly in class, and points will be deducted."

The instant she said it, everyone's attention snapped away from Mumu entirely.

With the lecture hall quiet again, Dan Baek-yeon sank back into thought.

* * *

The first class ended.

Once it was over, the cadets' faces all wore satisfaction in general. Across every martial academy and clan in the whole Central Plains, none offered education at this level except Changcheon Martial Academy. That was exactly why everyone fought tooth and nail to get in.

Mo Il-hwa and Jin-hyeok were waiting outside the lecture hall, since Dan Baek-yeon had asked Mumu to stay behind briefly.

"Why do you think she asked him to stay?"

Jin-hyeok only answered Mo Il-hwa's question with a noncommittal "who knows." It was because of Mumu and Hong Hye-ryeong. The two of them climbing ahead with bonus points from the very first class had stirred up a strange mix of jealousy and competitive drive in him.

'I've been too complacent.'

He'd thought two or three years was plenty of time. He hadn't even placed in the top twelve of the entrance examination. But with this kind of relaxed attitude, he felt certain he'd fall behind in the competition.

'I need to try harder.'

Since it had come to this, he resolved to throw himself into training, even if it meant cutting into his sleep.

Watching Jin-hyeok like this, Mo Il-hwa's expression turned strange.

'He's always so serious.'

Having spent a few days around him, she'd gotten a read on his personality. Watching him made her wonder if his older brother Yu Jin-sung was similarly serious. Being brothers, they might well resemble each other.

Just then, having finished the introductory class on weaponry and moving toward the lecture hall for the advanced course on internal energy theory, Hae Ryang came into view.

"Hae Ryang!"

"So-jeo. Did your first class go well?"

"Eh, so-so. How about yours?"

"Not bad either. The Sabu-nim teaching the weaponry introduction was so easygoing and entertaining that the lecture wrapped up in under half a cup of tea's time, and we practically just played around after."

"Oh, really? This next class is going to be a total breeze then."

The corners of Mo Il-hwa's mouth curled up.

"What about the advanced course on internal energy theory? I've been looking forward to that one most of all. Who's the Special Master Grade instructor for that?"

"Special Master Dan Baek-yeon."

"Hup! T-the Northern Seas Ice Palace's own!"

A gleam of light shot out from between Hae Ryang's narrowed eyes. He looked thoroughly satisfied.

Watching him, Mo Il-hwa smirked and threw a bucket of cold water on him.

"It's going to be fun. She fills the entire class time to the very last minute."

"...Even on the first day?"

"Yep. And her voice is so soft and even that I had a hard time not falling asleep."

At her words, Hae Ryang gave a hollow laugh and scratched his head, unsure whether to feel pleased or not.

Just then, Mumu stepped out of the lecture hall.

"Young Master Mumu!"

"Hae Ryang!"

"You must have worked yourself hard through the first class."

Hae Ryang's flattery instincts had kicked in. Even while treating Mo Il-hwa as the real power here, he was convinced that Mumu would eventually be the one to make the greatest name for himself.

Watching him, Mo Il-hwa shook her head, then turned to Mumu.

"Why'd she ask you to stay behind for a bit?"

"She said she wanted to check my physical condition."

"Your physical condition?"

"Yeah."

"Hm... is this about the exercise?"

Her guess was dead on. Dan Baek-yeon had spent the whole rest of class quietly mulling it over, and in the end had decided she wanted to examine Mumu's body.

"So that's all it was?"

"I don't know. She said she wants to study my body sometime later, when she has the time."

"She said WHAT?"

Mo Il-hwa's voice jumped in surprise, then she caught the looks from around them and dropped her volume, a little embarrassed, before speaking again.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"She just said that. Said my body seems really different from an ordinary person's."

"It is different. Very different."

Mo Il-hwa glanced back and forth between Mumu and Hae Ryang. At that, Hae Ryang covered himself and muttered.

"Why me..."

Next to Mumu, he practically had no muscle to speak of, scrawny by comparison. Getting compared like that left him a little gloomy, but Mo Il-hwa ignored it and spoke to Mumu.

"Hey. Mumu. Big sister's telling you straight. No matter how famous someone is, even if they're an academy Sabu-nim, if they say they want to study your body, examine it, whatever, you shut that down flat."

"Huh?"

"What do you mean, huh? This is for your own good. My Sabu-nim, Female Knight Mae Cho-hyun, told me that from the moment you become a martial artist, your whole body basically holds your clan's secrets. So never let just anyone go poking around your body."

At her words, Jin-hyeok nodded. It made sense. Simply examining someone's insides could reveal the flow of life energy through their meridians, which could expose the secrets of whatever speciality martial arts they'd trained in.

"So-jeo is right. It could end up practically handing over your ki circulation method to someone."

"I never trained in internal energy though."

"...Uh."

Hae Ryang was left speechless at that. Come to think of it, Mumu hadn't trained in any Martial Arts at all. There wasn't really anything to gain from examining his body in the first place.

"...That's what he says, So-jeo."

"Hey! I said no is no! A man's gotta know how to protect his own body. Whatever the reason, if anyone asks to poke around your body, you refuse."

"She said if I let her study me, she'd give me a sponsorship stipend and something called a star mark too."

'!?'

At that, Hae Ryang couldn't hide his shock.

"S-she's giving you a star mark too?"

"What's wrong?"

Hae Ryang answered Mo Il-hwa and Jin-hyeok, both puzzled.

"Ah, I suppose you two wouldn't know."

"What is it, spit it out."

"I mentioned before that Changcheon Martial Academy has a few things it's especially proud of, right?"

"Right."

"One of them is the Changcheon Martial Archive."

"The Changcheon Martial Archive?"

"Yes."

They'd heard about the Changcheon Martial Archive at the entrance ceremony. Open to any cadet of Changcheon Martial Academy, it offered a variety of martial arts texts, along with benefits like herbs and weapon issues meant to help cadets advance their martial arts.

"So what about it?"

"This is where it gets important."

Hae Ryang glanced around, made sure no one else was near, and continued.

"This Changcheon Martial Archive is known to open in four stages, right?"

"Right."

The first stage opened to every cadet upon entry. The second stage opened to all second-year cadets, plus top scorers of the entrance examination and top quarterly scorers among first-years. The third stage opened to all third-year cadets and top-scoring second-years. The final, fourth stage opened only to top-scoring third-years. That was what they'd heard at the entrance ceremony.

"Yes, but that's not all of it. I've heard there are three more hidden stages beyond that, in a secret archive."

"Seriously?"

"Shh. Just listen quietly. Not many cadets even know about this."

According to Hae Ryang, there were conditions for entering the three hidden stages of the archive. It came down to receiving a star mark from members of the examination board, that is, from the Six Stars of Heaven who served as Special Master Grade instructors, or from the Academy Director or Vice-Director.

"And Mumu got one?"

"Yes."

Mumu asked, puzzled.

"Is that a good thing?"

"Of course it is. No one knows exactly what benefits lie in the secret archive, but I've heard that anyone who goes in and comes back out makes tremendous progress in their martial arts."

'Tremendous progress?'

Even Jin-hyeok, who hadn't shown much interest at first, was now listening closely. He'd had no idea the Changcheon Martial Archive held a secret like this.

'Did my brother know about this too?'

The thought crossed his mind. Just then, Mo Il-hwa asked.

"So if Mumu gets a star mark, he can get in there?"

"Probably. Though from what I understand, you need at least two star marks to enter even the first secret chamber."

"So he needs star marks from two different people?"

"That's right. And getting even one star mark is, as they say, like plucking a star from the sky. For a first-year cadet, the only chance to interact with a Special Master Grade instructor at all is a single class."

"Ah... right."

Realistically, first-year cadets had exactly one chance to earn a star mark. Which meant it was fair to say that, practically speaking, no first-year ever actually made it into the secret archive. Taking that into account,

"Well then, it's good for later, I guess. Not exactly useful right now, is it?"

"You could look at it that way. But the important thing is that when you have the chance to receive one, you should absolutely take it."

"Why?"

"This is the real crux of it. It's a rumor that's circulated among cadets who graduated with top honors."

"Then why are you stalling? Just say it."

"They say the final hidden chamber of the archive holds a secret manual of peerless martial arts."

"A secret manual of peerless martial arts? What is that?"

"It really is just a rumor, so I can't say for certain."

"Fine, I get it, just tell me already."

"There's a rumor that a damaged copy of the supreme martial manual, the True Heavenly Martial Scripture, is kept there."

'!!!!'

At those words, Jin-hyeok and Mo Il-hwa's eyes both went wide.

Was there anyone in the world who trained in Martial Arts and hadn't heard of the True Heavenly Martial Scripture? It was said to be the supreme manual recording the very endpoint of Martial Arts. There was even a story that the Southern Blade Imperial Uncle, who originally hadn't matched the might of the other Four Immortal Masters, reached the same realm as them just from seeing a portion of this Scripture, badly damaged as it was.

"Is that really true?"

"You know Sword of Heaven Ryu Hyun, right?"

Of course he knew. Aside from his own older brother Yu Jin-sung, Ryu Hyun was the master swordsman Jin-hyeok admired most. He'd graduated top of his class in the second generation of Changcheon Martial Academy, and among all graduates, he was known as the rising supreme master closest in might to the Four Immortal Masters.

"I've heard that Sword of Heaven is the only one who ever entered the final chamber of the archive and came back out."

Jin-hyeok's eyes trembled at the words. If it was really true, there was no way he could keep his interest from being drawn in.

'The True Heavenly Martial Scripture...'

Anyone who heard of it couldn't help but covet it.

...Or so one would think, but Mumu showed no sign of interest in the story at all, completely unmoved. He listened as if it were some tale from another world entirely.

Just then Mo Il-hwa spoke.

"This is insane... W-wait a second, so Mumu's earned one of the star marks needed to get into that amazing archive?"

"That's about the size of it. Though of course, the very last chamber of the secret archive needs eight star marks total to unlock."

Since the academy's founding, only a single graduate across all its generations had ever managed that final chamber. Given how brutally difficult a condition that was, Mumu had, by sheer luck, gotten his chance at one single star mark.

Mo Il-hwa grabbed the shoulder of Mumu, who was standing there blankly, and said.

"Mumu. Forget what I said earlier. You have to get that star mark! You can't let this chance slip away."

Hae Ryang inwardly clicked his tongue at how quickly her attitude had flipped. Though honestly, it was understandable enough.

Despite Mo Il-hwa's fussing, Mumu still didn't seem particularly interested.

"Is it really that good?"

"Hey! Didn't you just hear all that? A legendary martial arts manual, passed down only in legend. Legend! If people knew about this, everyone would be dying to get into that archive."

"Really?"

"Does this kid only care about muscle training? This thing's worth more than money could even measure."

Mumu still wasn't particularly interested in martial arts or anything of the sort. Honestly, the sponsorship stipend had caught his ear far more than the star mark had.

"Ugh."

Frustrated by his reaction, Mo Il-hwa changed her approach.

"Just think of it as a legendary manual that could make all the muscle you've built so far several times faster, easier, and more perfect."

"Oh!!!"

That was the first time Mumu's reaction had turned intense. It really did seem like his brain was made of muscle. Put it that way, and suddenly he reacted just like everyone else.

'It's that good?'

Now Mumu finally understood their reaction. If it was something valuable enough that everyone was fussing and clamoring over it like this, it wouldn't hurt to try and get his hands on it. It had to be worth a fortune.

Just then, something occurred to Mumu.

'Huh? So if I just ask the Vice-Director for one star mark, I can get into the first secret chamber?'

Footnotes:

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