Chapter 379: Stagnant Water is Bound to Rot (4)
“Heok! Heok!”
Yeon Ji-pyeong’s appearance had become so impoverished that it couldn’t even be compared to a dozen days ago.
He didn’t know when he had last washed, dirty water flowed down his whole body, and his loose hair covered his entire face. Perhaps he had continued his unreasonable training, hardened blood could be seen on the corners of his mouth revealed between his hair.
Even the martial arts uniform he was wearing was torn in places and covered in blood scabs, making it look gruesome.
Drip. Drip.
Blood flowed from the palm holding the sword. He had swung the sword not caring even if his tiger’s mouth tore.
“Huu. Huu.”
His breathing gradually subsided.
Yeon Ji-pyeong’s two eyes, who slightly bent his waist and naturally let his arms hang, were burning red.
“…”
Soon, his breathing became calm.
‘Where is this.’
Yeon Ji-pyeong, who was blankly looking at the broken rock, suddenly felt a sharp pain on his lips.
Jureureuk.
His dried lips split open, and blood flowed again over the place where blood had hardened.
Yeon Ji-pyeong thought.
‘When did I last eat.’
No, before food, he couldn’t even remember when he had last drunk water. It felt like it had been well over three days, but it was amazing that he was still standing fine.
Of course, he didn’t feel much inspiration about being fine himself.
‘Since when have I been swinging the sword.’
He didn’t know. He couldn’t remember.
He didn’t even remember at all how he had swung the sword. For the first day, he seemed to have cultivated the secret sword techniques of his family, but he had no memory of what training he did after that.
‘Is it okay to do this.’
It was training close to abuse.
Effort and training are bound to have different methods depending on where one looks. No matter how much he swung his sword recklessly like this, it would only damage his body.
Yeon Ji-pyeong himself knew that better than anyone else. His senses were more outstanding than anyone else’s, and he could instinctively grasp the direction of the effort he should put in.
But what about now?
‘I don’t know. I don’t know.’
Huuung.
His skin stung in the blowing wind.
His five senses had become extremely sensitive. His blankly open eyes looked into the microscopic holes in the cut surface of the rock, his nose smelled all kinds of scents of mother nature, he heard the sound of ants crawling in the forest far away in his ears, and his mouth felt full of the salty taste of blood and the sweet taste of air.
‘It hurts.’
As his senses became more active than ever before, his body flinched even at minor stimuli.
It was then.
‘…?’
Someone was coming. Secretly, carefully.
His blank expression was the same, but his senses were capturing someone approaching secretly.
‘There is no hostility. And…’
A subtle light rose in his transparent two eyes.
‘It’s not one person. It’s two people.’
In an instant.
Paaaaang!
Someone who was getting closer rushed towards him.
The flow of the air changed. He could tell by the change in the air touching his skin even before he heard a sound.
‘Fast.’
It was a tremendous speed. Even if he drew out explosive acceleration with all his might, he wondered if he could even follow half of this speed.
Surprisingly, an intense fighting spirit was radiating from the person rushing towards him. And the target that fighting spirit was aimed at was himself.
‘Who is it? Why suddenly? But can I react?’
For a moment, Yeon Ji-pyeong felt secretly doubtful.
‘But why am I so relaxed?’
It was not a time to be relaxed. Although there was no killing intent, it was a threatening rush just by its speed. In this current body condition, even one wrongly placed fist could put his life in danger.
And one more thing.
‘It’s fast… but it doesn’t feel that fast.’
Considering that ignorant speed and acceleration point, it was normal to be hit before even contemplating this much.
But he was thinking and thinking again. He was finding a method on how to respond to the movement of that unknown powerhouse rushing as fast as a thunderbolt.
How is this possible?
Huk!
In an instant, a terrifying light shone in Yeon Ji-pyeong’s two eyes.
It felt like he had suddenly fallen into the real world while wandering in a hazy dream. The sharp sensation as if his flesh was being cut also became dull before he knew it.
‘No!’
Yeon Ji-pyeong instinctively swung his sword.
Crack!
It was an extremely neat sound. Sharp iron broke, creating a fierce resonance.
Yeon Ji-pyeong looked down at his own sword with blank eyes.
The blade of the three-foot longsword was cut neatly in half, becoming a sword slightly longer than two feet.
‘For the sword to be cut off.’
It wasn’t broken, it was cut neatly.
What was even more surprising was that the opponent had not parried it with a sharp strike at all. Of course, the sharpness was amazing, but the reason a perfectly fine longsword turned into a half-sword was because of a slanting strike realized with explosive speed and power.
Yeon Ji-pyeong raised his head.
In front of him was Yeon Ho-jeong, stopped exactly in the motion of striking down diagonally holding the Black Dragon Axe.
“Amazing.”
Yeon Ho-jeong, who relaxed his posture, smiled with a satisfied face.
“I felt your qi was terrifyingly and sharply honed. It was an extreme increase in senses that I hadn’t seen in you until now. Just in case, I poured in the internal energy of one strike, and you properly reacted to this strike.”
“…Brother?”
“You did well. To be able to condense true qi to that extent, even though the time was short, it must have been a very severe ascetic practice.”
“Yes?”
Yeon Ji-pyeong couldn’t understand at all what his brother was saying.
At that time, Gang-ryang, who was standing behind Yeon Ho-jeong, spoke with his arms crossed.
“It truly leaves me dumbfounded. Should I consider this a difference in talent, or a difference in concentration.”
Yeon Ho-jeong took over Gang-ryang’s words.
“It’s not talent. It’s concentration. However, it was too dangerous of an attempt. If I had come even half a shichen later, Ji-pyeong’s life would have been in danger.”
“To pour such ignorant axe strikes on such a younger brother, you are truly harsh too, Brother.”
“Harsh, you say. Whose younger brother is he, I have that much faith in him.”
Yeon Ho-jeong smiled and touched Yeon Ji-pyeong’s shoulder.
“You rascal, no matter what, don’t do this kind of dangerous training in the future.”
“Yes? What dangerous training?”
Gang-ryang clicked his tongue.
“You don’t even know what kind of training you did.”
Yeon Ji-pyeong looked at Gang-ryang with a bewildered face.
Gang-ryang shook his head and said.
“I don’t know what kind of shock you received or how much, but forgetting time, you swung it until you couldn’t move while solely putting your mind, body, and qi into the flow of the sword.”
“…?!”
“In other words, it’s also called a state of selflessness, but that ascetic practice you went through is hard to express simply with the words state of selflessness. I don’t know if you hypnotized yourself or what, but beyond becoming one with the sword, you completely bound yourself to the sword.”
“…!!”
“Sword and self becoming one body. Since you permeated into the sword, naturally your true qi also changed, becoming magnificent and sharp like your sword technique. That’s why you could instantly react to Brother’s attack.”
Yeon Ji-pyeong looked at Yeon Ho-jeong with trembling eyes.
Yeon Ho-jeong nodded his head.
“Experiencing this doesn’t mean your martial arts will increase right away. However, the difference between a person who has walked that path once and a person who hasn’t is immense. It will certainly be a great help to your future growth.”
“Ah!”
“You’ve worked hard. But it would be good to forbid this kind of training in the future. I can’t help but admire your effort of concentrating to that extent in a short time, but only when immersion can be freely controlled is minimal safety guaranteed. Immersion forgetting oneself can give a big gift, but it is bound to be accompanied by just as much danger.”
Yeon Ji-pyeong was flustered. Because it was a martial principle he had never heard of before.
Yeon Ho-jeong said.
“Did I tell you before? If not, I will tell you on this occasion. A martial artist who has learned internal energy means a person who knows how to handle qi. Qi is fundamentally based in the mind, so if your mind is unstable, your qi is unstable, and if your mind is stable, your qi is stable.”
“I, I know that.”
“The problem is that the opposite is also possible. Qi freely changes its form and nature according to intent, but if you slightly neglect to control qi, your mind will be dragged around by qi that bounces around as it pleases later.”
“…!!”
“The demonic arts commonly spoken of in the world are exactly that kind of martial arts. It’s said that if you learn a demonic art, the harmony of mind and body is broken, becoming stained with madness or killing people like eating meals? Although they say there aren’t many martial arts with such instability these days, such phenomena actually occur in reality.”
Yeon Ho-jeong pointed at Yeon Ji-pyeong’s chest with his index finger.
“The root is the mind, and qi is merely the warhorse you ride. Internal energy you cannot control is not yours. If you make a slight mistake, even though you learned an orthodox art, you can become a slave to true qi and lose yourself.”
“…!”
“And that is exactly the early symptom of qi deviation. Uncontrolled qi bouncing around as it pleases and hurting its master. Just a moment ago, if I hadn’t stopped that training of yours, your life would have been in danger due to qi deviation.”
While giving a lesson to his younger brother, Yeon Ho-jeong also realized.
Why his own martial arts hadn’t grown as fast as before, why he couldn’t enter the next stage even though it was accompanied by clear goals and effort.
‘I also almost fell into qi deviation.’
His effort was clear. However, he was obsessed with the realm he had achieved as the Dark Emperor.
He couldn’t help it. It was an obvious path and a path he had already experienced, so as long as he followed it properly, he would be able to achieve the realm of the Dark Emperor within a few years. He was confident like that.
‘I was wrong.’
That’s right. He was wrong.
Yeon Ho-jeong was no longer the Dark Emperor. He was the eldest son of the Yeon Clan and the Number One Rising Star Under Heaven, the Tiger General of Green Mountain, and he was the Grand Commander of the Righteous Justice Army, the strongest mobile unit of the Murim Alliance, and the Commander of the Evil-Annihilating Army.
There, there was no longer a place for the Dark Emperor.
Although he could utilize the experience of the Dark Emperor, the path to advance as the Dark Emperor was closed. He was paving a new path, and that path was completely different from the existing path he had grown into the Dark Emperor with.
If the mind leads the qi, what leads that mind is clear reason and self-reflection. And what makes reason and self-reflection bloom is also qi, and qi is fundamentally based in the mind.
A revolving enlightenment. Before he knew it, Yeon Ho-jeong had stepped off that infinite staircase and gone astray.
‘I will wander no more.’
Unlike his time as the Dark Emperor when he grew based on the Great Heaven Qi, he is currently growing by forming the Yeon Clan’s Divine Elixir.
He knew the difference in his head, but he didn’t feel the difference in his heart.
He would no longer show such an ugly appearance.
Cheolkeong.
Yeon Ho-jeong, who hung the Black and White Twin Dragon Axes on his waist and picked up the Crazy Dragon Axe he had put down to one side, turned his body.
“Before leaving for the mission, I dropped by to see your condition. If you were okay, I wondered what it would be like for you to join us too just this once.”
Yeon Ho-jeong did not look back at Yeon Ji-pyeong anymore. He just trudged towards the entrance of this forest.
Yeon Ho-jeong asked. Without stopping his steps.
“Will you join us?”
Yeon Ji-pyeong’s eyes shone.
Pureureureureuk!
Far away at the entrance of the forest, warhorses difficult to count and hundred-battle veterans mounted on them were looking this way with cold eyes.
‘That is the place.’
Right there, in the world where those people live, his brother lives. And Gang-ryang was chosen for the path heading to that world.
Then what about himself?
“I will go.”
Seureureung!
Yeon Ji-pyeong, who sheathed his half-sword, staggered and followed behind Yeon Ho-jeong.
“I will no longer wait while only worrying.”
Before being chosen, his mind was already prepared.
Yeon Ho-jeong nodded his head.
“Take care of your own life.”