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◈ The Martial Genius who Remembers Everything ◈

Chapter 103: The Grand Journey Through Hellish Chaos (2)

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When Jwa Daegi of the Sojeong Unit had been in Beijing.

That was when he had followed the young master to Beijing as a servant of the Nanjing Yuk Family Estate. He said he had once seen high officials and nobles hunting.

First, the hunters captured wild deer.

Deer raised on farms were familiar with people and simply stood still, so hunting them was no fun.

They then starved the captured deer until the hunting competition began. If the animals had too much strength, they would be harder to hunt.

I had thought they went through an absurd amount of trouble.

Once weakened, the deer would lose their senses over just a few grains of food.

Then they would release the deer and begin the hunting competition.

Usually, the stags or lead deer were caught first.

Not because they stood at the front of the other deer.

Lead deer generally had magnificent antlers, making them easy to spot. They also weighed more than the others and could not run as quickly.

Jwa Daegi had said this while mocking the Martial Alliance's elite warriors for dressing in splendid finery before heading into the Orthodox-Demonic War, but it offered little comfort to the Sojeong Unit, who wore rags.

The reason I suddenly recalled that story was simple. This time, we were the stags in the deer hunt.

Those who cleared Gate III usually formed huge groups with people they knew and began the Great Journey together.

Unlike the previous gates, where even examinees from the Nine Sects One Gang, the Five Great Clans, and the One Hundred Eight Peaks fought fiercely, the Great Journey only required them to reach the Martial Arts Academy. There was no reason for those whose admission was already guaranteed not to cooperate.

Namgung Seonhwa and Seong Moran had approached several people who cleared Gate III to negotiate.

"What? What did you say you wanted to do?"

"Cooperate?"

"Pahaha! Young Lady Namgung, I never imagined you'd become this amusing since I last saw you."

"I'm not joking..."

"Hahahaha. I'll be sure to call on you after the examination is over. Hahahaha!"

No one accepted.

People who would normally exhaust every possible means just to speak with them now fled as though Namgung Seonhwa and Seong Moran had caught the plague. Namgung Seonhwa and Seong Moran could barely process it.

The number of warriors at their disposal had already fallen to around twenty percent of what it had been.

Leaving aside exchanges between sects, no one would want to take on a burden in the middle of an important examination.

At least the Moyong Clan had joined us.

"But we're preparing an ambush ourselves?"

"An ambush works best when no one expects it."

Namgung Seonhwa let out a quiet sigh.

After leaving Nanyue, we ran at full speed and passed Puyang in three days.

People who had been startled by our initial pace hurried after us, but we kept running even through the night. Unable to keep up, they had all fallen behind within a day.

There were a few ambushers waiting along the way after hearing the news, but with the Moyong Clan warriors reinforcing us, our offensive power had grown even stronger. Our march never slowed.

The Moyong Clan warriors, unused to marching through the night, occasionally collapsed one after another. With no other choice, the first people to use the steel carriages were the Moyong Clan warriors.

"Is this the place?"

"Yes."

"...Just as Young Master Jin said, it's an ideal place for an ambush."

Mount Jindan lay beside a river between Huaxian and Fengqiu County.

The mountain was not particularly high, and reservoirs for farming had long been built throughout the area, so an official road ran through it.

It was the fastest route through Zhengzhou toward Hubei Province. Not only us, but the other examinees would also have to use it.

"But the mountain is too low. Anyone who knows a decent martial art could climb those walls."

That was why no mountain stronghold had been established there, despite the terrain being ideal for an ambush.

"You don't need to worry about that. The Wudang Sect once captured enemies here who were far more terrifying than Wudang Sect disciples could ever be."

No matter how talented Wudang Sect disciples were, they could not compare to the Blood Demon Ghost Sword Unit.

#

"Your poor judgment affected the disciples' examination as well, so you will resolve this yourself. ...If you fail, you will spend the rest of your life cleaning the Scripture Pavilion."

The warning from the main sect, relayed by the head of the Wudang Sect's Zhengzhou Daoist Temple, was exceptionally severe.

'Damn it...'

Hyeonsu gritted his teeth.

His own defeat, and Hyeonjin's, was one thing. After losing to Jin Sowoon, he had been too shaken to think straight, and it was true that he had forced bad advice on Hyeonjin.

But how were Hyeonhyang's defeat against Eunho and Hyeonmyeong's defeat against Geumpyo his fault?

Yet those damned junior martial brothers pinned the cause of this whole incident on him. If he made one wrong move, Hyeonsu might spend the rest of his life in the Scripture Pavilion.

"We'll take back the Academy Admission Tokens the Taeul Sect stole from us, from the Taeul Sect itself."

Taegun, whose admission was guaranteed after obtaining a Gate III Token, departed for Hubei Province with the other Wudang Sect disciples.

Hyeonsu and his junior martial brothers remained behind, waiting for the Taeul Sect to leave Nanyue.

"We'll finish this before they reach Qingfeng County, then join the procession heading for Hubei Province."

"...Yes."

"...Understood."

The replies were far from enthusiastic. Whenever he spoke, they still looked at him with suspicion.

"If you're so dissatisfied, then make the plan yourselves!"

"...We didn't say anything."

Even if they recovered the Gate Tokens from the Taeul Sect, the four of them might not be able to complete the Great Journey and reach the Martial Arts Academy.

They had to catch them before Qingfeng County.

"...Senior Brother, they're moving too fast."

But the Taeul Sect group began running at full speed the instant they left Nanyue.

"Start a fight! They'll have no choice but to stop eventually."

He sent several swift warriors to provoke a battle, but the bastards simply ignored them and kept running at full speed.

There was also something Hyeonsu had overlooked. The other side had just over one hundred people, while they had nearly four hundred.

Naturally, their procession stretched much farther, which meant they risked an ambush before catching the Taeul Sect.

"Damn it, reorganize the formation. Send out a vanguard and make sure we don't lose them."

They were human. Even if they ran at full speed, they would eventually have to stop. As long as the vanguard did not stop them, they could hunt them down whenever they wanted.

"Senior Brother, they aren't resting."

"It's almost the hour of the dog."

"What are they thinking?"

The march that began in the morning continued even after the sun set and the moon rose. The enemy was in the same condition, but the Wudang Sect members were growing increasingly exhausted after missing even a single meal.

"Stop for now and make simple preparations. They're human, so they'll sleep eventually. Send more men ahead and don't miss that moment."

Hyeonsu's prediction was wrong again.

They kept moving without sleep.

"Those crazy bastards... Fine. Let's see who wins."

By then, Hyeonsu was driven to the edge.

He gave them enough time to use qi-regulating breathing for about two hours instead of sleeping, then continued the pursuit.

In terms of internal energy, the Wudang Sect members could not compare to the Taeul Sect group.

If they intended to fight in rotating waves, it was Wudang who would certainly win.

Just as expected, word finally came that the enemy had stopped.

"Some of them were seen entering a valley in Mount Jindan."

"Really?"

They would split their force in half, with one half pretending to keep moving while the other half ambushed them to slow the pursuit.

It was a basic tactic, and an excellent method for a smaller force to handle a larger one, but they had chosen the wrong opponent.

"They think little of Wudang."

The vanguard reported that a road ran through the center of the mountain valley. It was certainly favorable terrain for an ambush, but not enough to trouble martial artists.

"How far ahead is the vanguard?"

"Half a day's travel."

"They're already that far ahead?"

It was difficult to believe. They had only been running together for three days, yet the distance between them had grown so great.

"Senior Brother Hyeonsu, we need time to recover before we fight."

"What?"

When he turned, Taemyeong looked terrible.

"We haven't slept at all for three days. We haven't eaten properly either."

Only then did Hyeonsu realize there was a difference in internal energy between himself and his junior martial brothers.

"We'll finish personal preparations in two hours, then depart again."

"Haa... Understood."

Those eyes, full of dissatisfaction, would have been unimaginable in the past.

But it would end today.

Once he recovered the Gate Tokens and showed them the cost of humiliating Wudang, neither his junior martial brothers nor Wudang itself would make too great an issue of this matter.

After all, he had passed Wudang's internal evaluation, said to be more difficult than the Martial Arts Academy examination.

When it was time to depart again, everyone still looked exhausted.

A brief nap and a meal of dry rations could not restore their strength like proper rest.

"Endure a little longer. They must be exhausted too."

By the time the sun sinking behind the western mountains had set and the moon rose, the Wudang Sect reached Mount Jindan.

"Thirty people are stationed on each side of the valley."

"Is there a path up the valley walls?"

"Not from this direction."

"They chose this place because the road is blocked?"

"That seems to be the case."

"How high are the valley walls?"

"The highest points are around fifty feet, and the lowest are around thirty."

This was it.

This was where the difference between a prestigious great sect and a weak sect showed.

The difference in how they thought.

Their petty assumption that it was high enough simply because they could not climb it.

For Wudang Sect disciples, fifty feet was an easily manageable height.

"Jin Sowoon... Where is that bastard? Don't tell me he went ahead?"

"No. He's in the valley with his junior martial brothers."

Hyeonsu nodded, then looked at his junior martial brothers.

"Our schedule was disrupted, but we can still proceed as planned. Let's go."

The terrain would cause some losses. But considering their tenfold numerical advantage and the gap in martial arts, they could make up for those losses easily enough.

From the entrance of the valley, they activated Grass-Skimming Flight.

Nearly four hundred people moved, yet the only sound was dry leaves brushing against one another.

After they had entered deep into the valley.

Thud.

A man-sized boulder fell into the center of the valley with a tremor that shook the ground.

"It's them!"

At Hyeonsu's shout, dozens of rocks the size of human heads fell from both sides.

Several people were struck by the crashing rocks and knocked unconscious, but as instructed, the others kicked off the ground and raced up the valley walls.

"Jin Sowoon! Where are you?"

The instant Hyeonsu kicked off a massive boulder, he burst forth with internal energy and soared into the air.

He stepped once on a protrusion in the valley wall and quickly climbed to the top.

But Jin Sowoon was nowhere to be seen.

Instead, he heard a strange sound.

Shhhhhhh.

'The sound of water?'

He had expected to see the Taeul Sect group lifting and throwing rocks from above the valley, but not the sound of water filling his ears.

Why would he hear water, the sort of sound that belonged beside a river or stream, in such a dry valley?

Dismissing it as impossible, Hyeonsu steadied himself and prepared to swing his sword.

Then he saw it.

The Taeul Sect members stopped throwing rocks and clung to large trees.

Splash.

And from above the valley, a massive surge of water bore down on him.

"What the...?!"

Footnotes:

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