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◈ The Heaven-Slaying Sword ◈

Chapter 13: Chapter Two - First Foray into the Jianghu, and the Demoness (7)

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On the top floor of Gyeonghwa Pavilion, after Mok Ri-won had left.

Hwa Seo was still staring out the window in a daze.

Below lay the largest avenue in Suyang County, and at its end stood the Illyun Society estate.

"I'll be back."

His voice still lingered in her ears.

So did the sight of him grinning as though trying to look cool.

Squeeze.

Lost in thought, Hwa Seo recalled those things and clenched her fist.

"Idiot..."

How could anyone be that foolish?

Someone who was surely not long for this world.

She tried to turn away from him by dwelling on such thoughts, but she could not.

In the end, his words had been right.

“A good person does not kneel. In fact, it is the opposite. Evil people should be the ones kneeling and begging for their lives.”

His words made those who heard them want to rely on him.

"A hero does not lose to villains. That is a line spoken by the Sword Hero in the first chapter of Tales of Martial Heroes."

His unquestioning goodness was so pure and beautiful that Hwa Seo twisted her expression this way and that.

"...Hyang."

"Yes."

"What was Pyo San's realm like?"

"When we fled, he was in the middle stage of the Peak Realm."

"It has been five years. Where do you think he stands now?"

"...Pyo San was someone the clan head particularly cherished. He reached the Peak Realm at twenty-seven, and it took only three years for his attainment to mature. In the worst case, he may have reached the very end of the Peak Realm by now."

So Hyang lowered her head even further.

Hwa Seo let out a breath and muttered.

"...He has no chance of winning."

She was speaking of Mok Ri-won.

Hwa Seo knew.

He certainly possessed talent.

She did not know who had taught him, but he must have received every kind of miraculous medicine and profound method from a renowned martial artist of the previous generation. He must have undergone training beyond anything ordinary people could imagine.

That was how he had achieved such martial skill at his age.

'But...'

That was also the problem.

He was too young.

Reaching the upper end of the First-Rate Realm at that age was worthy of admiration, but how many people in this vast martial world had already reached that level?

The very opponent he intended to face was a martial artist who had reached the end of the Peak Realm.

"...Idiot."

He was an utter idiot.

He had charged into a deathtrap in pursuit of some romantic ideal. The retainers who still tried to remain at Hwa Seo's side were idiots too.

And so was she.

Hwa Seo rose to her feet.

"Miss...?"

"Let us go. Yes, that idiot did say one thing that was right."

So Hyang raised her head and looked at Hwa Seo.

Hwa Seo gazed through the distant window toward the Illyun Society's halls.

"Those of us who have committed no crime have no reason to run in the first place."

A remarkably relieved smile spread across her face.

Hwa Seo turned her gaze to So Hyang and the other retainers.

"If our lives are going to rot away anyway, let us resist at least once before the end."

She extended her hand.

Smiling, So Hyang took it.

* * *

Pyo San looked at Mok Ri-won.

'Sword qi.'

Before him stood a young man glaring at him as dark, ink-colored sword qi streamed from his blade. He might have become a new star of the proud orthodox martial world.

No, having learned to release sword qi at such a young age, he certainly would have.

'What a pity.'

Had he not met Pyo San, that future would have been his.

Rattle.

Pyo San drew the throwing knives fastened at his waist.

Three were nestled between the fingers of each hand, six in total.

"Please bear me no resentment."

The young man's words had been entirely right.

What Pyo San was doing sullied the name of the orthodox martial world, which his seniors had raised so high.

Yet it was something he had to do.

He was a man who placed loyalty above the greater cause.

"I will remember you."

Pyo San's arms flicked.

The throwing knives scattered like a mirage.

All of them shot toward Mok Ri-won at once.

Clang!

Mok Ri-won swung his sword and knocked them away.

He prepared to rush Pyo San.

Then, at that very moment...

Sssaaa.

A chilling sensation ran over Mok Ri-won's entire body.

'Killing intent!'

Sensing something wrong, Mok Ri-won twisted around and looked behind him.

Six throwing knives, cloaked in dark blue qi, had changed course in midair and were flying toward him.

Thunk.

The knives embedded themselves in Mok Ri-won's body.

Silence descended.

Mok Ri-won came to an abrupt stop and looked down at the knives protruding from his body.

Then he gritted his teeth and grabbed them.

"Hup!"

With a shout, he pulled all six knives from his body.

His face was tightly contorted as he glared at Pyo San.

Pyo San could not help but admire his spirit.

"You have the bearing of a hero!"

To rise again with a body covered in wounds against an opponent he could not defeat, that was the very image a hero ought to possess.

That was why Pyo San found this meeting so cruelly ironic.

'If things had been different, I might have even taught him a thing or two.'

It was a cruel and bitter fate.

He had met this young man at a moment when Pyo San could not be in the right, at a moment when he had to make it seem as though nothing had happened here. He could only feel regret.

Still, he could not let Mok Ri-won live.

'No one can learn of what happened today.'

Everyone except Hwa Seo, whom he had to take back with him, would prove their silence with death.

Pyo San snapped his fingers and released his internal energy.

The throwing knives scattered across the ground floated into the air, then flew swiftly back into his grasp.

Sssaaa.

Dark blue waves of qi rose from Pyo San's entire body.

"Here I come again."

Mok Ri-won exhaled and adjusted his grip on his sword.

His expression was twisted viciously, and his breathing came rough and uneven.

Pyo San knew the weakness young masters like him shared.

'Their lack of experience.'

Powerful martial arts, vast inner power.

And the finest masters.

Nine out of ten promising disciples from famous orthodox sects had grown up in such conditions, and that was the flaw they shared.

A flower that bloomed splendidly in a greenhouse knew nothing of how harsh the world could be.

Pyo San threw the knives again.

Then he leaped high and widened the distance from Mok Ri-won as the young man rushed toward him.

Thunk!

This time, three knives struck.

One embedded itself in Mok Ri-won's right shoulder, another in his forearm, and the last in his left thigh.

But it was not over.

Pyo San's martial art was a concealed-weapon technique that showed its true power once its user reached the Peak Realm and could release qi.

Shadow-Flitting Flying Knives.

It was a flying-knife art in which inner power was imbued into missed knives, sending them back at the opponent like shadows.

The knives that should have fallen to the ground became wreathed in dark blue qi.

Then they shot toward Mok Ri-won again.

Thunk!

It was one-sided.

This time, three knives lodged squarely in his back.

Mok Ri-won pulled them out again. Pyo San avoided Mok Ri-won, who charged like a wild colt, and gathered the knives back into his hands.

It would likely end in the next exchange, or the one after.

With that thought, Pyo San steadied his breath and threw the knives once more.

Then...

Clang!

His prediction missed with almost laughable precision.

* * *

When Mok Ri-won was fifteen, he had a question.

"Master, when will you teach me how to apply what I have learned?"

"Mm?"

"Is that not so? Every hero in Tales of Martial Heroes makes full use of their martial arts, but you have taught me nothing except the basic forms and physical conditioning."

He believed his lessons were progressing too slowly.

No, Mok Seon-o was teaching him too little.

At the time, Mok Ri-won had been hungry for knowledge.

He was also at the hot-blooded age when he had begun to tire of repeating what he already knew.

Why did his master still teach him nothing but the basics?

Mok Seon-o's answer to fifteen-year-old Mok Ri-won's question was a gentle smile.

"It is because you do not need to learn it."

"What?"

That day, Mok Seon-o placed a hand on Mok Ri-won's head and gently stroked it as he added only this.

"You will understand it even without learning it. That is why I am telling you that you need not worry about it."

It was an incomprehensible answer.

It was also an answer that made him feel stifled.

In truth, it had remained a question in his mind even after he entered the martial world at eighteen.

Only at this moment did Mok Ri-won finally understand what Mok Seon-o had meant.

* * *

Mok Ri-won knocked away all six incoming throwing knives with three sword forms.

Then he spread his qi senses.

'They are coming back.'

He could feel it.

The strange twisting of the flow of qi, and the killing intent flying toward him.

The targeted parts of his body prickled painfully.

'Three at my back. One behind each knee, and one at the nape of my neck.'

His heart, lungs, stomach, joints, and spine.

Every one of them was a killing move that would cause instant death or a fatal wound if it struck.

Mok Ri-won steadied his breath and twisted his body.

Clang!

Once more, he knocked them all away.

'That is the end of it.'

Judging from the previous two exchanges, the knives could only change their paths once.

It was only natural.

Knives that moved freely through the air were the realm of the Sword-Controlling Art, something only those who had reached the Transcendent Realm could use.

His opponent was unquestionably in the Peak Realm.

The principle behind that martial art was likely to send the knives flying again toward calculated positions through the internal energy imbued within them.

Mok Ri-won's eyes gleamed coldly.

'Now!'

He released the internal energy from his dantian and spread it throughout his body.

The power of the Star-Linking Divine Technique, which had reached the third level, darkened his ink-colored sword qi.

For the first time in a long while, Mok Ri-won's internal energy, which had only ever known brutality, found a place to run wild and let out a cry of joy.

Boom!

A thunderous sound erupted as his foot struck the ground.

Pyo San drew in a sharp breath at Mok Ri-won's sudden charge, far faster than before.

For the first time, he drew the short saber hanging at his waist.

Clang!

Their blades met.

Internal energy struggled against internal energy.

As dark blue and ink-colored waves of qi swelled, trying to devour each other, Pyo San felt deep shock.

'How?'

How had Mok Ri-won predicted the path of the Shadow-Flitting Flying Knives?

How had he grasped its weakness after only two exchanges?

Shadow-Flitting Flying Knives was a martial art founded upon secrecy.

That meant one could not precisely tell where its knives were aiming from the qi alone.

Screech!

The blades ground against each other, scattering sparks.

Pyo San gritted his teeth and glared at Mok Ri-won.

There was something Pyo San did not know.

"Do not resist!"

The young master who spouted such lofty words.

The star he had been born beneath.

Clang!

The Heavenly Slaughter Star.

It was a star of killing calamity bestowed by Heaven.

A star that made its bearer suited to the act of killing simply by bearing it.

It came with certain traits.

Traits Mok Seon-o and Ma Il-seok knew, but Pyo San did not.

Mok Ri-won could read killing intent.

Its direction, its purpose, even the density of malice and emotions contained within it.

One born for killing calamity could perceive the ill will directed at them in every moment they drew breath.

But was that all?

Could a star of killing calamity have made this land tremble in fear through that alone?

No.

Clang!

Clang!

The blades collided and parted.

They slid past one another, crushed down, and flowed away once more.

Amid it all, Pyo San realized something unbelievable.

'He is growing...!'

With every exchange, the opponent before him was growing.

No, he was adapting to Pyo San's blade.

Pyo San could not understand how such a thing was possible, but it too was only natural.

Clang!

As mentioned before, all Mok Ri-won had learned so far were the basic forms and physical conditioning.

That had been carefully planned by Mok Seon-o and Ma Il-seok.

When the two men who had become Mok Ri-won's masters sent him out into the martial world, they worried about only one thing.

"Restrain your urge to kill."

They needed to control his murderous urges, his tendency to go mad at the sight of blood.

There was only one reason.

No matter how beautifully one dressed it up, the essence of martial arts was to harm one's opponent.

That was to say, to kill.

And the Heavenly Slaughter Star was a star made for killing calamity.

Just as the Third Heavenly Demon Li Mu-baek had been, just as the Sword Ghost Seo Woo-jin had been, just as the Demon Sword Oh Chun had been.

Mok Ri-won was the same.

As long as martial arts remained a skill for killing, he was a martial genius without equal in this world.

As long as martial arts remained a skill for killing, he could apply its forms in endlessly varied ways at the level of instinct.

Having learned only the basics of martial arts had never been any obstacle to him.

Slice.

Pyo San's right wrist was severed.

Footnotes:

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