Chapter 316: Chapter 316
Truthfully, the replacement of Instructors and Training Masters at this point held little meaning for me.
My grades wouldn’t plummet just because the evaluation shifted from relative to absolute standards.
Besides, where I wanted to go was the White Wolf Pavilion.
Not the Azure Dragon Pavilion or the Red Dragon Pavilion that everyone coveted—so as long as I wasn’t undervalued enough to be shunted off to a branch, there was no real problem.
“What’s so funny?”
A voice dripping with frost.
Not wanting to create trouble, I lightly bowed my head.
“My apologies.”
But the Instructor bore into me with a piercing stare and asked again.
“I asked what’s so funny.”
Whatever they did at this point no longer mattered, so I’d intended to let it go.
But…….
“I asked what’s so funny. Are you going to answer or not?!”
When someone pulled something this brazen, how was I supposed to keep a straight face?
I raised the head I’d slightly lowered.
“I don’t know what the reason is, but I found it amusing that you’re working so hard to devalue this entire class.”
“What?”
“The previous class received a lot of attention because of Yong So-ah, that’s true. But I can’t accept that our class is somehow below the level of yours.”
It was true that our class drew less attention than the last.
The previous class had been packed with people who’d already made names for themselves before entering the Academy.
But this class also had Il-gak and plenty of others who would make their names in the coming Great Righteous-Demonic War. To call us below standard—
When I answered confidently, the Instructor’s face contorted.
“You don’t know the reason?”
Then his head cocked to one side.
“You really don’t?”
“I don’t.”
He’d been asking the same annoying question over and over…….
“It’s because of you.”
Hm? What kind of bullshit was that?
“You seized the Representative position through underhanded means, and the entire Academy’s level has suffered for it.”
Such outlandish bullshit that I was struck speechless.
But did the Instructor mistake my silence for being cowed?
He continued with a smug grin.
“Because the Academy’s Representative is so far below standard, the quality of instruction has plummeted, which will ultimately deal a serious blow to the entire Murim Alliance.”
As if all the blame rested on me.
As if I were someone who’d stolen what was theirs.
“Never in the history of the Murim Academy has there been a class this worthless.”
He glanced at me once.
“Watching you all scramble helplessly against a single disciple from a third-rate sect is so infuriating I can’t sleep at night.”
Then he cast a contemptuous look at the students from the Nine Sects and One Gang and the Five Great Clans.
His gaze returned to me.
I could feel his will to crush me before I grew any further.
“Then again, you are an exceptionally underhanded wretch. I hear you pinned the charge of Witchcraft on the Lantern Sect this time and destroyed them?”
He used the word “pinned” when the Execution Pavilion itself had already mobilized.
No matter what I said, he clearly had no intention of listening.
Taeul Sect being beaten down was nothing new.
Well, we were a weak sect. That much I could accept.
“Seriously, what have you been going on about?”
“……Hm?”
This level of mindless slander and mockery had crossed the line. And for someone who crossed the line—
“Oh, are you perhaps from Qingcheng Sect, where they practice Witchcraft?”
“What?”
A mindless counterattack was the best solution.
***
“You…… crazy bastard!”
“Am I wrong?”
“How dare you spout such nonsen……!”
“Why are you getting so worked up? Oh, is it true you practiced Witchcraft? That you’re from Qingcheng? Do your eyeballs happen to turn black?”
“……!”
Seeing him get excessively agitated when I pressed, he must be from Qingcheng after all.
If he’d been from another sect, he wouldn’t have reacted this strongly.
“Is the word ‘no’ that hard to say? Then again, people always give themselves away when they lie.”
“……Do you even realize what you’re saying right now?”
“Did I say anything wrong?”
“You are falsely accusing me right now……! Do you think this will just blow over?”
I let out a deliberate belly laugh.
“You were also falsely inciting people, Instructor. And yet my words are a crime?”
“When did I……!”
“The worst class in history. Are you sure about that?”
I turned my head and scanned the students’ faces.
Most of them did not look pleased.
No matter how much they disliked me, none of them wanted to be dragged down along with me. A perfectly natural reaction.
The momentum naturally shifted to my side.
I kept my eyes deliberately fixed on the students as I spoke.
“You just denied everything these people have worked for over the past year, Instructor. And yet you’re telling me I’m committing a grave crime with my falsehoods?”
“That’s……”
“Does my being the Representative alone prove this class is the worst? Oh, and for the record—I won my martial duel against Il-gak.”
Instantly, every gaze swiveled to Il-gak.
Il-gak’s smooth, shaved head somehow flushed crimson.
The Instructor ground his teeth.
“That’s only because you hid the fact that you secretly received training from the Academy Head.”
“Oh? Is a martial artist supposed to publicly disclose every art they’ve learned? Is that what they teach at Qingcheng Sect?”
“……”
“Then please share every art you’ve learned, Instructor. And your final trump card for killing an enemy, while you’re at it.”
“……”
He couldn’t say a word.
A murim proverb always said to keep at least thirty percent of your true skill hidden.
The crazier ones said to hide seventy.
And this man had the nerve to peddle that nonsense.
I shrugged once.
“Everything you said was nothing but bullshit.”
“……!”
Both the Instructor’s and the students’ eyes doubled in size.
Even for me, that had crossed the line. I knew it.
But I crossed it on purpose.
This was the only way to truly piss him off.
“Most likely, you replaced the Instructors and Training Masters for some other reason entirely, then pinned the blame on the students. That’s why you keep spouting such bullshit.”
GRIND.
Yikes, those teeth were going to shatter at this rate.
If he thought that would make me stop, he was sorely mistaken.
“And that other reason is probably……”
I turned my head again to look at the students.
Particularly those from the Nine Sects and One Gang and the Five Great Clans.
“Because you’re scared your idiot juniors can’t follow in your footsteps. Because you’re terrified that if the grades get mixed up, people outside the Nine Sects and Five Great Clans might take the key positions.”
“……!”
Not just the Instructor but the students’ faces flushed crimson.
Here and there, some stared at me with open hostility.
But so what?
You lot were going to hate me anyway.
If you were going to keep dumping sewage on my path, you should’ve been prepared for some to splash back onto yours.
“Must be nice, being from the Nine Sects and the Five Great Clans. Even with mediocre grades at the Academy, your seniors come down and pull you up like this.”
I looked at them and curled my lips into a bright smile.
“Truly a fair and just Murim Alliance.”
Just as the Nine Sects and Five Great Clans members directed hostility at others, there were those who directed hostility right back at them.
The One Hundred Eight Peaks students and those with no affiliation.
Whatever the truth, the current situation certainly looked that way.
The fear-filled gazes that had been aimed at the Instructor were gradually shifting to contempt.
Sensing the changed atmosphere, the Instructor squared his expression and spoke.
“……As expected, that tongue of yours is as devious as they come.”
He tried to spin my words as lies, but it was already too late.
I’d already given the students something to think about.
From now on, no matter what the Instructor said, the students would believe whatever they wanted to believe.
Case in point—discontent was already erupting among them.
“Those Nine Sects bastards, honestly……”
“They really want to go this far?”
“Then why even hold a Regular Exam? They should just divide everything among themselves.”
This wasn’t simply the result of what I’d said.
All I’d done was lightly prod the inferiority and doubt that had been deeply rooted in people’s minds all along.
Sprouting leaves and bearing fruit—that was their own doing.
Just like right now.
“From what I’ve heard, there’s never been a case where all Academy Instructors were replaced at once.”
“So even after becoming Murim Alliance members, we’ll still face the same discrimination?”
“They said going to the Academy wouldn’t change anything……”
Rage born of long-endured discrimination spread like contagion.
The Nine Sects and Five Great Clans members who’d been glaring at me were now locked in staring contests with the other students glaring back at them.
Those who’d been watching me with a “what is this madman doing” expression now directed their hostile gazes at the Instructor instead.
Sensing the shift, the Instructor loaded his voice with inner arts and bellowed.
“Enough! ENOUGH!!!”
Several students flinched and clapped their hands over their ears.
Those who’d been glaring at each other turned back to the Instructor.
He stared at me with a now-calm face.
“If my words make no sense…… can you prove otherwise?”
Prove?
Prove what?
“Can you demonstrate it? That your skill truly merits the top rank.”
Ah, so he was going for a head-on approach.
“Every top scorer in the Academy’s history possessed at least Deputy Hall Master-level skill. I…… also possess Deputy Hall Master-level skill within the Murim Alliance, so prove yourself.”
What a joke.
I already knew from Mantongbu records that he was at full Hall Master level.
But what did that matter?
If he wanted to throw himself into the cesspit—
SHING.
I immediately drew the Red Radiance Sword and raised my killing intent.
A crimson line appeared along the blade as bone-chilling killing intent scattered in all directions.
“Urgh……”
“Wh-what the……”
“What in the……”
Even the students in the front rows grimaced, struggling to endure it.
I aimed the tip of the Red Radiance Sword at the Instructor.
“Let me prove it, then. Do I just need to cut off one of your arms?”
When I took three bold strides forward, he retreated a step, extending his hand.
He rolled his eyes up and down for a moment.
“……No matter how heated things got, as an Instructor I cannot draw a student’s blood.”
What was he talking about?
Had he actually entertained the absurd notion of drawing my blood?
“Then how shall I prove it?”
“……Inner arts! Let’s settle it with an inner arts contest!”
“Hmm……”
I paused to think about why these things kept happening.
I hadn’t exactly been hiding my abilities.
So why did people keep crossing the line?
But then, on reflection—
“Ah.”
I’d never clearly demonstrated my strength either.
Maybe that was why these incidents kept recurring.
Right, that was it.
“What? Scared?”
Did my moment of thought look like hesitation?
From his perspective, this must have felt like an absolutely favorable fight.
In a martial duel, senses and improvisation could offset a gap in level, but inner arts were a testament to the years one had lived.
No student should be able to match a veteran in an inner arts contest.
No ‘ordinary’ student, anyway.
I suppressed the corners of my mouth that kept trying to climb and nodded.
“Let’s do it. Do I just need to shatter your qi center?”
“……No, an inner arts contest isn’t about……”
What was more definitive than mocking your opponent while they coughed blood as a cripple?
This was starting to appeal to me.
“Let’s do it.”
I sheathed the Red Radiance Sword and extended both hands.
“……”
After a brief hesitation, the Instructor steadied his expression and clasped my hands.
His face brimmed with confidence.
“Go ahead—flail to your heart’s content!”
The moment our hands interlocked—
WHOOOOSH—
A massive current of energy, vast as the Yangtze, surged through his palms and into me.
Quite heavy and solid—he must have never lost to anyone on inner arts alone.
“Heh, how’s that? There’s always a higher heav……”
I drew upon the Taeul True Scripture in earnest.
And in that instant.
“……!”
The triumphant smile on the Instructor’s face turned rigid.
“Hck……!”
His chatter stopped dead as he clamped his mouth shut and strained with every fiber of his being.
His inner arts, which had pushed all the way to my Cleft Gate, began to recede—slowly but inexorably.
“……!”
He frantically tried to channel more Internal Qi, but it was futile.
He should have compared something worth comparing.
No matter how vast the Yangtze, it could never surpass the ocean.
Internal Qi that entered through Cleft Gate, Crooked Pond, and Central Treasury surged past his Middle Qi Center in one breath, then drove through Great Tower, Yang Gate, Heavenly Pivot, and Sea of Qi one after another until it bored into his qi center.
His Yangtze-like energy was swept away by a current as vast as the ocean, losing all vitality and being completely suppressed.
And then, going further—
SWOOOSH—
I turned the energy hostile and raked through his acupoints.
“Ghrk…… ghrk……”
He gulped down air as if he couldn’t get enough, but the thirst on his face wouldn’t ease.
It didn’t take long for his flushed red face to turn an ugly dark color.
And finally.
‘Qi center!’
I wrapped his qi center in energy and gradually increased the pressure.
In the midst of suffocating agony, the terror that his qi center might shatter must have been rising.
Sure enough, horror filled his expression.
“You said something about insults earlier, didn’t you?”
Just a bit more pressure and I could destroy his qi center.
I continued calmly.
“The real insult was dealt by you, Instructor. Not just to me, but to every student in my class.”
He might or might not have been conscious—his eyes had already rolled back.
Foam frothed at the corners of his mouth like a rabid dog. Truly a pitiful sight.
But I couldn’t stop here.
“The insult we suffered. I’ll repay it in full.”
If I didn’t show them, they’d keep crossing it. That line.
I poured more Internal Qi in and tightened the grip on his qi center. His body began to tremble violently.
On the very brink of passing out.
Then, one desperate word escaped his lips.
“……S-stop……”
“What was that? I can’t quite hear you.”
I slightly eased the pressure on his qi center.
The Instructor let out a ragged, scalding breath.
“……P-please, stop……”
“Asking me to stop isn’t an apology.”
The Instructor’s eyes bulged.
Pain must have sharpened his mind.
After a moment’s hesitation, he barely managed—
“I…… beg your forgiveness.”
This bastard still hadn’t learned his lesson.
I tightened the pressure on his qi center again.
“GAHK……!”
The Instructor finally began spewing bloody froth.
I angled my body to avoid the splatter and deliberately raised my voice so everyone could hear.
“Sorry, I couldn’t quite catch that.”
“……F-forgive me. I…… I was wrong.”
His eyes glistened, on the verge of tears, as he pleaded desperately.
I released the pressure on his qi center and withdrew all my Internal Qi.
“AARGH!”
I’d been a bit rough on the way out, and the Instructor collapsed on the spot, vomiting blood and losing consciousness.
RETCH!
I stepped back to avoid the blood.
“Tsk. So much for today’s class.”
As I returned to my seat, gathered my things, and walked out of the lecture hall—
“……”
“……”
Not even the sound of breathing could be heard inside.
What a way to start the new term.