WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Chen
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◈ The Martial Genius who Remembers Everything ◈
Chapter 136: The Black Flame Dragon Proving Himself (6)
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The instructors initially evaluated the Martial Arts Academy students' abilities, but a handful of instructors could not possibly assess hundreds of students.
In the end, students were first judged by whether they belonged to the Nine Sects One Gang and the Five Great Clans or the One Hundred Eight Peaks.
There were further considerations as well. What rank did their sect hold among the One Hundred Eight Peaks? If they belonged to one of the Five Great Clans, were they from the main line or a collateral branch?
That was how their abilities were estimated.
Viewed in that light, matching me against Ilgak of the Shaolin Sect ignored every convention that had existed until now.
A disciple of the Shaolin Sect, the foremost authority in the martial world, against a disciple of the Taeul Sect, which was barely clinging to the edge of the One Hundred Eight Peaks.
By any standard, we should never have been matched.
“This is taking quite a while.”
It seemed we were not the only ones thinking so.
Several instructors and trainers objected to the situation. The Academy Director and Vice Director had even stepped down from the platform to hold an emergency meeting.
“It looks like they’re done.”
“Of course they’ll make adjustments to this absurd situation. Ah, I’m not saying that to look down on you, Young Master Jin.”
“It’s fine.”
Contrary to Seong Moran’s hopes, Buk Wonpyeong’s deeply furrowed brow suggested the discussion had not gone well.
He surveyed the training ground for a moment, then sent me a sound transmission when our eyes met.
-Their stated reason is that they rated your ability highly because you received a perfect score on the written examination... but it seems the Elders' Council had a hand in this.
-The Orthodox Society again?
-I don’t think so. It seems the White Path Society wants to see your abilities as well.
-I see.
-If you want, I’ll stop this even if I must use my authority.
-It’s all right. You may become my martial uncle someday. Wouldn’t you be disappointed if I started relying on you already?
Buk Wonpyeong looked quite surprised, then nodded.
-This might be a better opportunity. Even if you lose to the Shaolin Sect, no one will point fingers at you.
The moment he finished speaking, an instructor shouted in a booming voice.
“The sparring match will proceed! The Academy students whose names have been called, step onto the training ground!”
Ilgak walked onto the training ground.
He remained composed, as though the cold stares and mocking looks around him meant nothing.
“This is clearly a scheme to bring down Eldest Senior Brother.”
Eunho gritted his teeth.
“I’d rather Eldest Senior Brother simply forfeit.”
“Me too...”
“...”
“I heard Ilgak is the strongest person in the Shaolin Sect after Little Buddha.”
Geumpyo said nothing, but Dongryong could not hide his worried expression.
“Is that so?”
Even at my calm reply, Eunho’s tightly clenched fists reddened with anger.
“Why do we have to be treated like this every time? Don’t you feel wronged, Eldest Senior Brother?”
“People want us to stay where we are. Every attempt we make to move forward will inevitably offend them.”
“...”
“Just because it’s filthy and unfair, should we remain there?”
“Eldest Senior Brother... Even if you don’t move forward, you’re still our Eldest Senior Brother.”
I nodded.
In my previous life, I had not been able to protect them.
I had been too busy watching Gye Cheolyeong’s mood and trying to save myself.
Even so, they had never once shown resentment toward me or poured it onto me.
They had been that way even when I had not been their Eldest Senior Brother.
“I know. But if I don’t move forward, won’t you be the ones left to face the wind and rain?”
Geumpyo, whose lips had been trembling silently beside us, suddenly shouted.
“Why are you trying to carry every burden alone, Senior Brother? We aren’t children!”
“I know.”
This was my burden alone.
My atonement for the previous life that only I remembered.
“But if I protect you first, won’t you be able to protect even more junior brothers and disciples afterward?”
“...!”
“...!”
“...!”
Because we had always been together since childhood, I could recognize their emotional shifts right away.
When Geumpyo didn’t want to cry, his nostrils flared. Eunho deeply furrowed his brow.
And Dongryong silently shed tears.
“Don’t worry. I won’t fall in a place like this. Dongryong, stop crying too. If you cry like that, won’t it make this Eldest Senior Brother seem incredibly weak?”
“...Hic.”
I removed the Black Dragon Sword and Flying Dragon Claw, then handed them to Eunho.
The Geum-Eun-Dong brothers looked back and forth between the Black Dragon Sword and my face with bewildered expressions.
“Besides, when it comes to tricks, who could possibly keep up with this Eldest Senior Brother?”
“...?”
“...?”
“...Ah!”
Only Eunho seemed to understand, raising his eyebrows. I gave the quick-witted boy a slight smile before turning and stepping onto the training ground.
With every step I took, a commotion rose through the crowd.
The murmurs grew louder until the place began to resemble a marketplace.
“...W-What? Wasn’t that guy’s main weapon a sword?”
“The Taeul Sword Emperor’s true teachings are sword arts, after all.”
“Then... does he think he doesn’t need a sword against the Shaolin Sect?”
“He’s insane.”
A faint crack appeared in Ilgak’s composure, which had been as unshaken as a carved Buddha statue.
“Why didn’t you bring a sword?”
“Isn’t fist fighting your specialty too, Monk Ilgak?”
“...Did you deliberately leave your sword behind?”
Ilgak’s face had turned as fierce as one of the Four Heavenly Kings inside the Heavenly King Gate.
“It wouldn’t look good for the top student to use his full strength against an ordinary Academy student.”
“...How arrogant...”
-Do you think I’ll meekly take this lying down?
“...!”
-I’m not a fool. Did you think I wouldn’t see through your shallow little scheme?
“Academy student Jin Sowoon. Sound transmission before a sparring match is prohibited.”
At the referee’s warning, I nodded.
“I hope this will be a good sparring match.”
Ilgak’s face twisted at my smiling fist-and-palm salute.
#
‘Just how strong am I now?’
Compared to my previous life, my strength in this life had improved beyond comparison.
Back then, I had desperately tried to conserve even less than half a gapja of internal energy. Now, I could use the Mad Heaven Divine Palm twice without collapsing from exhaustion.
Comparing someone who had started as a low-ranking third-rate martial artist with the top entrant of the Martial Arts Academy was absurd.
Still, judging my level within the martial world was more complicated.
Whenever I faced people from the Nine Sects One Gang and the Five Great Clans in this life, I had responded based on the Shattering Form Jegal Cheongi had created in the past. I had also relied on all kinds of tricks and memories from my past life, so I could not accurately judge my true level.
I had recently encountered one of the Alliance Leader’s Hall shadow warriors who did not know the Shattering Form, but he had never been someone I could measure myself against in the first place.
In that sense, Ilgak was a genuine opponent who could properly reveal my current level.
The Shaolin Sect was the only sect among the Nine Sects One Gang and the Five Great Clans for which no Shattering Form had been created.
No, it was a sect that had never needed one in the first place.
The Shaolin Sect’s martial arts, founded on cultivating both mind and body, did not concern themselves with the efficiency of individual moves. Every practitioner could produce countless variations according to their personal enlightenment, so there had been no need for the Shattering Form, which sought the most efficient way to counter techniques.
“Begin!”
At the referee’s shout, Ilgak assumed an opening stance.
It was Dragon King Fist, one of the Shaolin Sect’s Seventy-Two Supreme Arts.
His two fists looked ready to strike at any moment, like dragon serpents waiting for the moment to ascend.
‘Dragon King Fist from the start. He must be furious.’
When I assumed the opening stance of the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist, the commotion grew even louder.
“Is he really planning to face him with fist arts?”
“His arrogance is excessive.”
“He’ll be embarrassed anyway. Maybe he just wants to lose without looking too bad.”
Ilgak moved first, breaking through the noise of the crowd.
He used the Immovable Body Art as though gliding over ice, followed by a chain of attacks from the Dragon King Fist.
Papatat!
The fierce barrage of punches flowed like water. Each strike was as sharp as a dragon’s tooth, making it feel as though I were being cut by swords.
After launching ten attacks in a single move, Ilgak had no intention of retreating. He unleashed Dragon King Fist again and again, disrupting my vision with attacks that surged at me from the front and rose from below.
“Was this all your arrogance amounted to?”
His tone was polite, but his voice carried unmistakable anger.
Having blocked three moves and a total of twenty-five attacks, I used the Taeul Eighty Thousand Divine Steps to create an afterimage moving beside Ilgak, then tried to retreat.
“...Hmph!”
Ilgak moved sideways toward the afterimage. Then, perhaps because he heard the footsteps of my true body, he swiftly twisted his ankle and used the Bagua Four-Form Steps, appearing directly in front of me.
The Dragon King Fist, capable of unleashing ten strikes in a single move, tore through the space where I had been. I barely avoided it and got behind him.
But then...
Bang.
Ilgak stamped so powerfully that the training ground floor cracked beneath his foot, and in an instant, he had moved behind me.
“Even riding a cloud, Sun Wukong could not escape the Buddha’s palm.”
Papapapapapapapapap!
Ilgak unleashed Dragon King Fist.
I answered with the changing principles of the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist.
Dozens of fist images filled the air, colliding with punches as sharp as dragon teeth.
Kwagagagagang!
Ilgak must have underestimated the power of the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist. He ignored the afterimages, took the attack with his entire body, and stepped back three paces.
He looked down at the arm that had blocked the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist head-on.
Seeing his reddened skin, he furrowed his brow as though he could not believe it.
“Heavier than you expected, isn’t it?”
“...”
The positions of Ilgak’s two fists changed from side by side to one above and one below. It was Tiger Fighting Fist, another of the Seventy-Two Supreme Arts.
Thud!
Ilgak used the Bagua Four-Form Steps, his body shooting forward like an arrow. In an instant, he was before me, swinging both fists like a tiger.
Papat!
I used the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist to block Tiger Fighting Fist, but every collision sent a numbing vibration through my bones.
‘At this rate, my bones won’t hold.’
Ilgak had mastered Thousand-Pound Armor, an external art, so he had no hesitation about clashing head-on. I did.
Besides, there was no reason to contest strength against strength in the first place.
I diverted one of his punches and twisted my body to the side at the same time, using Lotus.
Crack.
“...!”
No matter how well he had mastered Thousand-Pound Armor, the joints connecting his bones were still human.
Unless he wanted his bones broken, he had no choice but to put his weight onto the arm I had seized.
Ilgak’s body rose into the air and flipped halfway over.
At the same time, I used all my strength to slam him into the training ground.
Crash!
Ilgak struck the ground with his entire body, then sprang back up like a pig bladder filled with air.
He stared wide-eyed like a rabbit, unaware of the dirt on his face.
“...Flower-Grafting?”
Ilgak looked unable to believe it.
Then again, martial arts like Flower-Grafting and Four Ounces Move a Thousand Pounds had originally been looked down on even in the Wudang Sect and the Shaolin Sect.
How shocking must it have been to see the Flowing Cloud Divine Art redirect force far more effectively than the Shaolin Sect’s methods?
“Did the Taeul Sect have martial arts like that?”
“This is not a place restricted to only certain martial arts, is it?”
“That... is true.”
Ilgak composed himself, and different energies gathered in each of his hands.
Dragon King Fist filled his right hand, while Bamboo Leaf Hand filled his left.
He was likely wary of the Lotus technique from the Flowing Cloud Divine Art.
Like him, I gathered Lotus in my left hand and the energy of the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist in my right.
Gulp.
At the sound of someone swallowing, Ilgak glided toward me.
This time, rather than dodging or evading, I used the Taeul Eighty Thousand Divine Steps.
Dragon King Fist came first.
Thud, thud, thud, thud!
I redirected each of his punches with Lotus. Just as I tried to use his force to subdue him...
Bamboo Leaf Hand, which he had prepared in his left hand, stabbed sharply toward me.
Papatat!
I moved my feet desperately to avoid Bamboo Leaf Hand as it flew at me with terrifying sharpness. The ground his hand passed over was gouged deep.
Crash, crash, crunch!
Though human hands and marble collided, dust flew into the air and chunks of marble shattered away.
The moment he withdrew Bamboo Leaf Hand and tried to pull back...
I used the Taeul Eighty Thousand Divine Steps to take his flank and unleashed the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist in full.
Countless fist images and strikes embroidered the air before swallowing his body.
I had already controlled all four sides. There was nowhere for him to escape.
Because he could endure it with Thousand-Pound Armor, I poured in every bit of internal energy I had.
Even the hardest rock would crack under a stronger hammer.
Kwagagagagagak!
Ilgak met the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist with Dragon King Fist and Tiger Fighting Fist, but he seemed to reach his limit and withdrew both fists.
He likely intended to take the attack with his body, then seek an opening. But if he could endure Three Gapja of internal energy, I would be better off forfeiting first.
Just as Ilgak was about to be swallowed by dozens of fist images and strikes...
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Golden light flashed, accompanied by a tremendous explosion.
The unexpected impact launched me into the air. I spun several times before finally dispersing the force and landing on the ground.
I raised my head, fearing what I would see.
“Is that Vajra Demon-Subduing Fist?”
“No way... He’s only about twenty. Already?”
“Why not? They say Ilgak’s talent is no less than Ilmyeong’s!”
I knew he had mastered the Dharma Muscle-Tendon Classic.
“...”
But publicly, it was said that one did not begin training in the Dharma Muscle-Tendon Classic until after thirty...
Surely monks wouldn’t lie?
As the dust settled, golden light surrounded Ilgak’s fists.
With a single punch, he had blocked all the dozens of strikes from the Myriad Blossoms Invincible Fist.
It was undoubtedly Vajra Demon-Subduing Fist.
I could not hide my disappointment.
‘They say there isn’t a single person in this world you can trust.’
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