Chapter 70

Outside, dawn was dim. The winter air was cold as ice, and frost crumbled underfoot with every step across the training ground.

Jin Mukyung, who had already been warming up, grinned at me.

“Well, have you finished preparing yourself mentally?”

Of course not. But I hid my churning stomach and nodded.

Someone once said that if you couldn’t avoid something, you should enjoy it. When I thought of this as just another part of becoming stronger, I felt a little more at ease…

Shing.

“Then let’s see that impressive skill of yours.”

Is this bastard Korean? Why is he so impatient?

I had no time to avoid him. Jin Mukyung rushed toward me in an instant, and I hurriedly swung my spear shaft at him.

Clang! Kaga-gang!

Jin Mukyung’s breath drifted between us through the weapons we had crossed.

“Your stance isn’t bad.”

It had to be. I had survived seven years in a Gate where my life had been on the line, using nothing but a spear. The experience I’d built up with the spear was on a completely different level from my fists and kicks.

I glared into his eyes and answered.

“This time, it won’t be easy.”

One word at a time. Clearly and distinctly.

“You…”

Perhaps he sensed that something about my momentum was different. Jin Mukyung’s pupils trembled.

“Can’t you keep your damn eyes open?”

“Oh.”

Swoosh. Thud!

Jin Taekyung collapsed. It was not particularly surprising. This was already his fifth knockout.

The truly surprising thing was something else.

I can’t believe he lasted two hundred exchanges against me.

Five spars over two hours.

Anyone would naturally become exhausted. But Jin Taekyung was different. He kept getting back up like a roly-poly toy, growing stronger each time. By the end, even Jin Mukyung had been forced to face him seriously.

What the hell is this guy?

When he fought unarmed, his movements had been awkward enough to resemble those of an eighty-year-old man. But the moment he picked up a spear, everything changed.

The coward who had fawned over Jin Mukyung to avoid getting hit had vanished. In his place stood a seasoned spearman.

He was like a wandering martial artist. Someone who had survived countless brushes with death.

His movements were simple to the point of seeming crude. His attacks and evasions were irregular, relying on his own instincts. There was nothing fixed about the way a wandering martial artist fought.

That was exactly what Jin Taekyung looked like to Jin Mukyung.

And that was why the question only grew larger.

How?

Even among the heirs of prestigious families who picked up a sword as soon as they learned to walk, countless people only hovered around the threshold of First Rate. Yet this man had stood before the wall of the Peak realm in just three years.

And he did it while giving off not the scent of a courtesan’s powder, but the strong scent of a seasoned wandering martial artist. The more Jin Mukyung thought about it, the more absurd it seemed.

Was something like this even possible?

It was possible.

Having a Supreme Peak master cleanse his tendons and marrow. Improving his constitution with elixirs. Then swinging a spear until he shit blood while building real combat experience.

For three years without missing a single day!

“…That’s ridiculous.”

Jin Mukyung muttered hollowly and scratched his head.

If that was the case, only one answer remained.

A genius.

That one word resolved every question with perfect clarity.

Why?

Because he was a genius. Someone blessed by heaven, just as the word implied. Someone born with talent.

Geniuses were ahead in every way. They started from a completely different place.

“Zzz… Hoo…”

“…”

But of all people, this guy was a genius?

That was impossible. It couldn’t be true!

A sudden surge of anger rose within Jin Mukyung, and he kicked his younger brother in the rear.

“Prrrblblbl.”

Jin Taekyung rolled away several times before shuddering all over.

“W-Wolhwa noona. Not there.”

“…”

“If you suddenly do this… Ah. Aah!”

Crack.

The last thread of Jin Mukyung’s patience snapped.

Beep!

System

• Sleep Mode has been forcibly terminated!

So it can be forcibly terminated?

My joy at discovering a new function lasted only a moment. Why had Sleep Mode been forcibly terminated?

Because someone had woken me up, obviously.

“In the sacred training hall, you say what? ‘Not there’? ‘Not there’?”

Whack! Whack! Whack!

I curled up like a shrimp and spoke in a dying voice.

“Please, spare me…”

“No!”

Thwack-thwack-thwack!

I had no idea how many times I was hit. My consciousness had cut out twice in the middle of it.

My last memory was of squeezing out my remaining strength to leave a dying message on the training hall floor before collapsing.

When I opened my eyes, it was already night.

What did I do for it to be night already?

I felt like a time traveler. Ever since I had met Jin Mukyung, entire days had been flying by.

I muttered as pain swept through my entire body.

“Jin Mukyung is really strong.”

Excluding Jin Mukyung, I had faced two Peak masters so far.

The Head Elder and Jopil.

The Head Elder doesn’t count.

In his case, I had to admit that heaven itself had helped me. If not for the sacrifices of the Jin Family of Taiyuan’s martial artists and Lee Cheonbaek’s surprise attack, he was a master I could never have defeated, even if I had died and come back to life.

Then what if I compare Jopil and Jin Mukyung?

I did not have to think for long.

I had experienced fighting both of them, so the choice was easy.

Jin Mukyung is stronger.

Jopil was unquestionably a monster. Even now, I got goose bumps whenever I remembered the savage heat pouring from his Flame Divine Palm.

But how should I put it? He was strong like a Peak master, and he used the deadly Flame Divine Palm, but that was all.

More precisely, it was a difference in how they used their martial arts.

Jin Mukyung was different from Jopil. Even during our spar, he had used at least ten different martial arts to completely shut down my attacks.

To a martial artist, martial arts were another weapon. Jin Mukyung knew how to draw out the right weapon at exactly the right moment.

Compared to him, what did I have?

I could exclude the Jin Family’s Cultivation Technique, which I had possessed from the beginning. As for martial arts I had learned in Murim, I had only the Jin Family’s Spear Technique and the Jin Family’s Manoeuvre Technique.

Of course, both were unquestionably First Rate martial arts.

But put another way, they were only useful up to the First Rate level.

The limits of martial arts. Jin Wikyung could not possibly have failed to notice what I had felt.

That was why he had sent me to Jin Mukyung. Ugh.

My brow furrowed automatically from the pain. I had only raised my upper body a little, but every joint in my body throbbed, and my skin ached.

It seemed even Sleep Mode had its limits when it came to rest.

Well, I did get beaten half to death.

To complete the Quest by earning Jin Mukyung’s recognition, I would have to endure days like today—or even worse ones.

Maybe I would simply get beaten senseless and fail the Quest anyway.

It really is one mountain after another.

And that made me happy.

As an F-rank Hunter, I had not even been given the right to climb a mountain. But everything had changed.

There was a mountain I had to climb, and I had been given the right to climb it.

And I could do it faster than anyone else!

This isn’t the time for this.

I rose from my place, forgetting the pain. Every minute and second I wasted felt unbearable.

Jin Mukyung was in the underground training hall.

I descended the stairs leading underground, keeping my footsteps as quiet as possible, and saw him.

“Hah!”

With a short shout, his sword moved.

Whoosh! Shh-shh-shhk!

The wind split along the blade.

Jin Mukyung’s movements were as unrestrained as he thrust and slashed through the empty air at the speed of a ray of light.

About fifteen minutes passed.

Jin Mukyung lowered his sword and let out a long breath.

“Hoo.”

He wiped the sweat from his brow with his sleeve, then turned his head toward me.

It seemed he had noticed my presence some time ago.

“Tell me.”

The words came out of nowhere.

Confused, I reflexively asked:

“Tell you what?”

“About the martial art I just performed.”

“Uh, well, first of all, it was really fast…”

“For the record, if you say some pointless bullshit like ‘It was fast’ or ‘It was strong,’ I’ll kill you.”

What a ghost.

I racked my brain for an answer that would keep me alive.

What had Jin Mukyung’s martial art been like?

As I thought about it carefully, a vague impression began to surface.

“Rough?”

Jin Mukyung’s eyebrow twitched.

Was that the right answer?

“Did you just speak informally to me?”

“…It seemed rough.”

“Even a little kid could say that. Be more specific.”

The image in my head gradually became clearer.

I remembered the sword blades pouring toward an imaginary enemy and the movements that accompanied them. Fast, unrestrained motions. And an aura that seemed to press down from every direction.

It was like…

“A waterfall?”

“…”

“Huh?”

What? Was that the right answer?

After remaining silent for a while, Jin Mukyung suddenly swung his scabbard.

Smack!

“Ow! Why did you hit me?”

“Just because.”

He stared at me with a strange look in his eyes.

“How did someone like you ever come out?”

Was that an insult or a compliment?

I had no idea what he truly meant, but I had to hear the answer to his question if only to soothe my wounded pride. Rubbing my throbbing forehead, I asked:

“So, was that the correct answer?”

“There are thousands of martial arts manuals in Heaven’s Gate Temple. They were arrangements left behind by the departed Seniors who hoped to cultivate the younger generation of the orthodox Murim.”

“And?”

“The Falling Flow Sword you just saw is one of them. I found it buried deep in the archives.”

Falling flow. In other words, water falling down.

A waterfall.

I had only said the first thing that came to mind, but it had actually been the right answer.

“Oh, ooh.”

Am I really a genius?

If I could recognize martial arts like this after only two months of learning them, I was afraid of how strong I might become in the future. Even I found myself frightening.

“Surely you’re not having the embarrassing thought that you’re a genius or something after managing only that much?”

“…”

He really is a ghost.

Still, I seemed to have at least a little talent.

Unable to let go of the thought, I cautiously asked:

“Can everyone normally do this much?”

Jin Mukyung flinched.

“O-Of course. Anyone with eyes should be able to guess this much.”

“Come on.”

“‘Come on’? Do you want me to pluck out one of your eyes?”

“…That might be a bit much.”

Why is this bastard being especially stone-faced today? Did something unpleasant happen?

Even after I backed down, Jin Mukyung could not contain his anger. He snorted irritably.

“It’s basic. Basic. Everyone can do it.”

“I get it. Why do you keep getting angry? You’re scaring me.”

“Are you rebelling against me? Is it because you’re going through the storm-and-stress stage of adolescence? Do you want to get beaten with the Twelve Gale Fists?”

I did not know what the Twelve Gale Fists were, but getting hit by them sounded painful.

I shook my head fiercely, but Jin Mukyung’s anger showed no sign of fading.

“Do you know martial arts? Huh?”

“N-No, sir.”

“How long have you been learning martial arts?”

The answer slipped out reflexively.

“Two months. Two months.”

“Right, a bastard who’s only been at it for two months… What? Two months?”

Jin Mukyung glared at me with bloodshot eyes.

“Not three years, but two months?”

This was an emergency.

The social instincts I had gained through seven years of working life shone at that moment. I hurriedly opened my mouth, making sure to emphasize one particular part.

“Three years! Plus two months!”

Jin Mukyung’s fist had been trembling as though he had suffered a stroke, but it steadied again. For some reason, even his voice seemed slightly gentler.

“You little bastard. You startled me.”

You startled me even more, you son of a bitch.

Does he have anger-management issues?

If Jin Mukyung asked Jin Wikyung, my lie would be exposed immediately. But at least I would not have the misfortune of experiencing the Twelve Gale Fists right now.

In any case, Jin Mukyung’s anger subsided in the meantime.

“I’ll say this only once. Listen carefully.”

“I’ll engrave it on my heart.”

I bowed deeply, and he declared in a domineering tone:

“I teach, and you obey.”

“…”

Is this a dog-training school or what?

“There will be no objections. Why? Because I’m stronger than you.”

It was true, so I had no desire to argue.

Money, power, and force. Their forms might differ, but the world always revolved around the strong.

I wanted to stand at its center.

“What will you do?”

My answer had been decided a long time ago.