WeTried Translations
Translator: Hydrogen B
Editor: Hydrogen B
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 740: Story of the Past, a regressor's Retrospective - 8
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The Swordmistress first went straight to the bank and withdrew tens of millions of alke. Then she went to the Patronage Merchant Guild and threw all that money at them.
A week later, Virgo Palace had been perfectly restored to its former state.
If there wasn't enough money, she only had to spend more. The Swordmistress was one of the Twelve Zodiac Seats, renowned as a chivalrous hero, and someone who had carried out imperial orders with "considerable" diligence. She had barely spent any of the money she received, and when she unleashed the funds she had amassed, Virgo Palace was swept up in a flood of wealth.
A flood of water made everything a mess, but a flood of money did the exact opposite. Everywhere people who had tasted that money passed, Virgo Palace became more dazzling and splendid.
Precious spiritual medicines. Training equipment. Housekeepers with verified identities and abilities. Energy arts manuals. Magical tools.
The Swordmistress spared no expense, investing an excessive sum to raise a single disciple.
Shei remembered the time she had become a Holy Maiden. Back then, she too had received the Sanctum's full support. With Skywarbler in hand, she drank spiritual medicine like water and wielded immense power. It was enough power and authority to make her feel omnipotent, but it had burdened her just as heavily.
The Swordmistress's support was different.
It was limitless, but had nothing to do with world peace or justice. It was solely for Shei.
A burden? The Swordmistress wanted nothing from Shei. She demanded nothing.
She only taught her.
“Heaven-Reversing Boundary is an energy art that reaches the root and reverses the Heavenly Form.”
Amid the sound of Virgo Palace being repaired, the Swordmistress explained the principles of Heaven-Reversing Boundary to Shei.
“Birds build nests, and moles dig burrows. Cats land softly, and dogs love humans. That is the Heavenly Form. The fundamental instinct inscribed in them before they are even born. They come into the world already capable of doing it, even without being taught or learning.”
This was an initiation that explained where energy arts began, where they had already arrived, and where they should go. It meant the Swordmistress intended to entrust Shei with the meaning of this energy art.
It was proof that she truly meant to take Shei as her disciple.
“But humans' Heavenly Form is insufficient. No, they possess strength disproportionate to their Heavenly Form. Martial arts, swordsmanship, staff arts, blade arts, sorcery, even sincerity and trust. Humans do not wield these things through a Heavenly Form. They simply learn and master them, creating martial traditions. Compared to a Heavenly Form, they are insignificant and crude skills.”
Shei focused. She didn't fully understand what that meant, but she tried as hard as she could. If she couldn't understand, she intended to memorize every word.
She had probably failed. The formulas of Heaven-Reversing Boundary that the Swordmistress had explained over several hours couldn't possibly have been so brief.
“But even a Heavenly Form could not have been granted from the beginning. It must have absorbed countless attempts and failures, innumerable deaths and inheritances, before finally reaching that form. If the world truly is as harsh as the Darwinists howl, if it was gained by discarding those who fell behind among hundreds of millions born together, if that is how the Heavenly Form was inscribed... then it too is training earned through endless tempering.”
Still, Shei didn't need to understand it. That wasn't a condition for learning Heaven-Reversing Boundary.
She needed to hear it, swallow it, dissolve it, and store it between her bones and tissues. Heaven-Reversing Boundary was that kind of energy art.
“Then why should endless tempering be unable to change the Heavenly Form?”
Hundreds of millions of pains. Deaths. Elimination.
At their end lay a transformed Heavenly Form.
As Shei desperately tried to understand, she suddenly felt that Heaven-Reversing Boundary suited her.
For someone like her, who died, died again, came back to life, and went to die once more, she was perhaps the best suited to fulfill its meaning.
A week passed as the Swordmistress explained Heaven-Reversing Boundary's principles, recited its formulas, fed Shei spiritual medicine, and integrated qi into her body. Shei felt as though time was passing too quickly. Every day was full, yet time slipped through her fingers as easily as grains of sand.
When a vague sense of regret made her restless, the Swordmistress, having finished teaching her energy arts, raised Shei to her feet and spoke kindly.
“My disciple.”
“Yes, Master.”
“Take it.”
“Pardon?”
The Swordmistress's fist flew at her the instant she finished speaking. Shei only realized what had happened after she hit the ground.
The Swordmistress beat Shei every day. Each strike carried exactly as much pain and shock as Shei could endure. Shei couldn't faint or collapse. She could only take the blows or desperately try to block them.
Time slowed again.
The moment she let her guard down, even briefly, a fist flew at her face. Her body, remembering the pain, reflexively avoided it.
The attacks seemed to set her nerves ablaze. Fists that did nothing but hurt her flashed menacingly before her eyes. Shei couldn't relax for even a moment. While fetching water, while cleaning, while training in energy arts, the Swordmistress would throw a fist without warning.
The Swordmistress was literally tempering Shei.
Three years passed that way.
“Master...”
“Yes.”
“...I'm sorry.”
Shei had failed to learn Heaven-Reversing Boundary.
The reason was always the same. Shei lacked talent. Heaven-Reversing Boundary was the ultimate form of Heaven and Water Qi Arts. Only when qi was ingrained into the body could one move quickly and reflexively.
Shei was a slow learner who had not even mastered Heaven and Earth Qi Arts. Even strengthening her body through Water Qi Art was difficult for her. She could react, but her body wouldn't move as she wished, so she couldn't even imitate Heaven-Reversing Boundary's basics.
The Swordmistress's first disciple had spent three years without even gaining a proper grasp of Water Qi Art. Thinking that this inadequate disciple was herself, Shei felt crushed by frustration.
It was an emotion she had never experienced as a Holy Maiden. Back then, she had been disappointed in the world and felt only an obligatory sense of guilt toward those who believed in her. Now, she couldn't bear it because she resented herself.
Seeing Shei completely dejected, the Swordmistress gave a gentle smile and stroked her head.
“You are walking the path.”
The Swordmistress controlled even her emotions through Heaven-Reversing Boundary, so her face rarely showed them. Yet the corners of her lips curled slightly, softening. Shei felt the frustration that had settled heavily in her heart melt away.
“That is enough. If you keep walking, someday you will arrive. At a place I have not seen or reached.”
“I can't even follow in your footsteps, Master.”
“I didn't teach you because I wanted you to become like me. I taught you because you have your own will. You have gained the meaning of Heaven-Reversing Boundary, so you will someday arrive somewhere.”
“Can someone who still doesn't even have a feel for it really arrive anywhere?”
“I don't know. That's what makes it more exciting.”
Shei understood now. The Swordmistress's expressionlessness came only from governing herself through Heaven-Reversing Boundary, while her heart was filled with endless consideration and love. The reason she had never taken a disciple was simply because the feelings involved were too weighty for her to begin easily.
It was truly fortunate that Shei possessed the bare minimum of talent needed to learn Heaven-Reversing Boundary.
Though whether that was fortunate for the Swordmistress, Shei didn't know...
A question suddenly occurred to Shei, and she asked it.
“Could you teach a Holy Maiden too?”
“Something like health energy arts, perhaps.”
“Not that. Heaven-Reversing Boundary.”
“Holy Maidens don't need it. They have precognition.”
The essence of Heaven-Reversing Boundary was an energy art that inscribed reactions and movements into the Heavenly Form, allowing one to counterattack the instant an opponent's attack was perceived. Holy Maidens, who each possessed the power of precognition, had no particular need for it.
“What if a Holy Maiden asked you to teach her?”
“I couldn't.”
“Even if it were a Holy Maiden's request?”
“Precisely because she's a Holy Maiden.”
The Swordmistress answered as if it were obvious.
“You can't hit a Holy Maiden.”
* * *
Shei resolved even more firmly not to act as a Holy Maiden, but that didn't mean turning away from the world. To prevent its destruction, she needed to stop the calamities leading it toward ruin.
One of them was Jiseon.
The moment Shei heard that Jiseon was invading, she decided to act. She first went to the Swordmistress and reported it.
“Master. Something has come up.”
“I'll go too.”
“Pardon? But...”
“My disciple's debts of gratitude and grudges are mine as well.”
The Swordmistress left Virgo Palace behind and followed Shei out. Shei desperately held back the sting rising in her nose.
For some reason, Jiseon's offensive was far larger than in the previous cycle. Jiseon gathered the scattered followers of the Earth Mother and marched all the way to the Sanctum. The vassal states didn't dare stop that massive religious force. Even the Empire, which called itself the Sanctum's guardian, declared that it would not intervene in this incident.
- Politics and religion must be kept separate.
The Sanctum was left with no choice but to stop Jiseon using only its own strength.
Since this had happened in the previous cycle too, Shei hadn't thought much of it, but the Swordmistress had a different opinion.
“The Emperor is trying to tame the Sanctum.”
“Pardon? Tame it?”
“The Empire calls itself the Sanctum's guardian. Yet now, its guardian is refusing to protect it.”
The Empire was the most prosperous nation on the continent. Having developed and flourished for over a thousand years, it was truly the continent's undisputed hegemon.
Historians, however, judged that the Empire owed all of that prosperity to the Sanctum.
After joining hands with the Sanctum in the days of the Victorious King, the Empire gained hold of “fate” and rose without hindrance. Even when several crises came, the Holy Maidens who could see the future warned it in time, allowing the Empire to take the most accurate and suitable measures to protect the nation.
More people survived, more wealth accumulated, and more influence was gained. People produced more people, money earned more money, and fame grew because it was already famous.
Other nations belatedly made the religion of the Celestial God their state faith and believed in the Sanctum, but the gap had already widened. With the Sanctum's holy ground within its territory, the Empire continued to prosper. Several holy wars occurred, yet the Empire overcame every attempt and became the Sanctum's guardian.
The Empire was the Sanctum, and the Sanctum was the Empire. Government and religion had become one, leading the continent's order...
“But the current Emperor dislikes being interfered with. Yes. The Emperor won't abandon the Sanctum, but will try to tame it.”
Shei recalled the previous cycle. Something similar had happened then. When she had directly visited the Twelve Zodiac Seats to request instruction, the Empire had expressed its deep regret that she had infringed on the Twelve Zodiac Seats' autonomy.
People around her had made a great fuss at the time, but Shei was used to that level of interference and dismissed it as nothing. Thinking about it now, she understood why they had been so upset.
“If it is a conflict between religions, the Empire has grounds not to interfere. It would be a good opportunity for the Emperor.”
Her master thought more deeply than Shei had expected. Feeling a strange sense of regret, Shei headed for the Sanctum.
Jiseon revealed the truth about the Great Master, misled the followers of the Earth Mother, and brought them together. Having declared the Church of the Earth Mother's revival, Jiseon marched straight toward the Sanctum.
The vassal states let them pass, saying it was a religious matter. The Empire had given them justification, but they likely had an even greater reason. They didn't want to fight Jiseon while Jizan was in Jiseon's hands.
There was also something Shei had failed to realize until now.
The wounds left behind in Jiseon's wake were larger than she had thought.
The Sanctum's authority began with its flawlessness and dignity. Yet the story of the Great Master, sacrificed in the tale of the Victorious King and the Conquering King that everyone knew, was moving and tragic enough to touch many hearts. Those feelings immediately turned into doubts directed at the Sanctum.
Perhaps the Sanctum had used precognition to monopolize wealth and power.
That was only a minority opinion, of course. Most people grew angry and called it blasphemy. The Sanctum had served humanity for a long time and wisely overcome the calamities that descended upon the world. Those achievements would not disappear, and the faith rooted deep in people's hearts remained firm.
Even so, a crack had formed.
Just before Jiseon reached the Sanctum, amid a little passive observation, anticipation, and curiosity, Shei barely arrived first. As she stepped into Rakion and was about to head for the confessional, a hazy cluster of light appeared before her.
The Holy Maiden of Heaven, Maiél.
In the previous cycle, she had remained asleep and never awakened. This time, she recognized Shei first.
[Shei. You've finally come.]
“Uh... How do you know me...?”
[I saw you in my precognition. It was a very faint and distant vision, but there, only you, Shei, were grasping fate in your hands. After seeing you arrive here someday, I kept waiting. You came much later than the vision showed, though.]
“Ah, I had something to do.”
[I wasn't blaming you. That too must have been fate. Gaining the Master of Virgo Palace as a fortuitous encounter was your fate, Shei. Being delayed a little to obtain it was...]
The Swordmistress pointed at Maiél, who had appeared without any sign of her approach, and asked:
“Someone you know?”
“Ah, yes, um...”
“A Holy Maiden is someone you know...?”
“Yes. She is the Holy Maiden of Heaven, Maiél.”
The Swordmistress's expression had never changed, but this time was different.
For the first time in that cycle, Shei saw the Swordmistress's shocked expression.
Footnotes:
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