Chapter 108 - The Hellish Great Journey (7)
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Moyong Jaehwa held the bow he received with a bewildered face.
"B-But, Hyungnim, how could I..."
"Do you not know how to use a bow?"
"N-No, it's that..."
I grabbed his fingers. Thick calluses were embedded on his index, middle, and thumb fingers, having burst and healed an unknown number of times. They were calluses in places where swordsmen could never develop them.
"What is the problem?"
"..."
Moyong Jaehwa looked at the injured Baek Wongak. Then he looked at the warriors of the Moyong Noble Clan who were watching him.
"Did you make a promise not to use miscellaneous skills when you left the noble clan?"
The Moyong Noble Clan was ashamed that Moyong Jaehwa, the eldest son, was engrossed in miscellaneous skills rather than the sword.
"... Yes? How did you know that..."
"What is more important right now, that promise or the lives of those people?"
"Of course..."
"Then isn't that enough?"
And that had delayed the appearance of the One Bow Against a Thousand Breaking Bow for a long time.
"..."
I thrust a quiver of arrows into the yearning Moyong Jaehwa's arms.
"If you use a sword, you cannot save them. If you use a bow, you can save them. What is there to hesitate about?"
I do not need the Breaking Bow that would appear after the destruction of the Moyong Noble Clan.
I do not need the Breaking Bow who had stopped the Demonic Cult's grand army alone after the momentum of the Orthodox-Demonic Great War tilted toward the Demonic Cult.
"Throw away what Lord Breaking Sword said. When it comes to protecting your precious people, what does it matter if it's a sword or a bow? You just need to use what you are good at."
"...!"
Moyong Jaehwa's eyes shook violently.
"Is there anything more to hesitate about?"
"... It's not that, but I have never learned the way of the bow. Using it when playing alone is all I've ever done..."
I smirked and said.
"Do not worry. I will teach you what I have learned."
The Breaking Bow, who had blocked ten thousand members of the Hellish Ghost Corps alone in Guizhou, would now fend off the Twelve Peaks and Castles.
* * *
Moyong Jaehwa felt bewildered.
How did he know that he enjoyed shooting a bow, and what did he mean by telling him to fend off the enemy with it?
In the first place, he had used a bow to shake off his worries. It was simply because when he was shooting a bow, worries and concerns about himself and the noble clan did not come to mind...
Telling him to block the enemy with that, he had no idea what to do.
"Uwaaaaagh."
His body, grabbed by Jin Sowoon, floated up, and the ground quickly distanced itself. They landed on the tree where the young master of the Gwigung Sect had been hiding earlier.
"Among those I know, there was a man who tried to fend off ten thousand enemies alone."
Jin Sowoon pulled out a single arrow.
"He stepped forward alone without fear to buy time for millions of people to evacuate."
In the distance, the members of the Twelve Peaks and Castles could be seen charging madly after seeing the signal flare shot up by the Gwigung Sect.
"Everyone thought it was nonsense. Because such a thing only happens in myths."
Moyong Jaehwa swallowed hard, engrossed in the story, completely forgetting that he was in an urgent situation.
"H-How did it end up?"
"He stopped them."
"Ha!"
"People call the sword the king of all weapons, right? After capturing that sight in my eyes that day, I thought this. The king of all weapons might be the sword, but the most terrifying weapon in the world is the bow."
The Twelve Peaks and Castles charging relentlessly down the wide official road.
Moyong Jaehwa's hands broke out in a sweat at the sight of them looking as if they would strike at any moment.
"H-Hyungnim."
Jin Sowoon leisurely drew the bowstring.
"Watch closely. This is the way of the bow he left behind."
TWANG!
Drawing a neat arc, the arrow flew toward the Twelve Peaks and Castles.
However, it was not enough to stop them. Compared to a force numbering close to five hundred, a single arrow was far too few.
"Uh?"
Moyong Jaehwa's eyes shot wide open.
The arrow Jin Sowoon shot began to split into dozens.
NEIGHH!
The charging warriors and horses of the Twelve Peaks and Castles stopped in their tracks in surprise.
"How could you use the Gwigung Sect's phantom arrows..."
"It is not the Gwigung Sect's."
"Pardon?"
"What I have learned is the method of imbuing my enlightenment into an arrow. And I merely imbued the Taiyi Sect's swordsmanship into the arrow just now."
Then, Jin Sowoon began to recite the essence of the archery technique he had just performed.
"Is it okay... for you to teach me this?"
Because he had studied martial arts more deeply than anyone since childhood, he knew. He knew how high a level of archery this was, and how long it had taken to perfect this martial art.
"I was merely keeping it; I simply passed it on to the one he wanted to give it to the most."
"Are you saying that is me?"
"He believed early on that he had lost his family because of his own indecisiveness, and he hoped it would be a solution for someone who had the exact same worries as him in the future. I am not applicable to that, and you are the rightful successor."
"... What is its name?"
"It does not have one. He also just wished for it to be named by the user."
"... Heaven-Shattering, I will name it the Heaven-Shattering Divine Bow."
A strange smile played on Jin Sowoon's face.
"How arrogant."
"No. It is an incredible martial art befitting such a name."
"Then there is no need to hesitate any longer, right?"
"Yes. A quarter-hour... Could you buy me just a quarter-hour of time?"
In the first place, it was impossible for him to absorb all the core principles of the Heaven-Shattering Divine Bow in this short moment.
He picked out only the most important parts and combined them with the Heaven and Earth Breaking Flash Sword.
Somehow, the complex theories he heard merely as an essence began to produce the most exhilarating and refreshing answers when woven together with the Heaven and Earth Breaking Flash Sword.
It was as if it had met its separated other half.
The Twelve Peaks and Castles, who had been surprised by Jin Sowoon's phantom arrows, began to poke their heads out one by one again.
Jin Sowoon shot his bow, and this time, the group waiting below shot their arrows as well.
When the real arrows hidden within the phantom arrows pierced the bodies of the Twelve Peaks and Castles' warriors, they hid their heads once more.
After a few times of repeatedly hiding from and poking out against the arrows, they moved busily inside, and soon began to protect their fronts with shields one by one.
TWANG!
SWISH SWISH SWISH!
The arrows hidden within Jin Sowoon's phantom arrows rained down on the heads of the Twelve Peaks and Castles, but they were all blocked by the shields.
Moreover, for every two arrows, they threw a flying sword to knock down Jin Sowoon's arrows. The imperfect phantom arrows had been neutralized.
Before they knew it, the distance was closing in to nearly eighty zhang.
"Are you not ready yet?"
"Ah! I-I'm sorry. The Heaven and Earth Breaking Flash Sword fit so perfectly that I tried substituting the Flash Cloud-Dividing Sword and..."
"You punk! Snap out of it. Captain Baek's life depends on you."
"Yes!"
Moyong Jaehwa answered like that and nocked an arrow on the bowstring.
Even though he was standing on a tree, there was not the slightest sway.
The moment he opened his eyes after closing them briefly.
THWANG.
Along with a deep resonance different from Jin Sowoon's, a single arrow flew forward.
In a straight line, not an arc.
Not as dozens of shots, but as just one.
The moment the Twelve Peaks and Castles, who were sneering at the flying arrow, slyly moved their shields aside and tried to deflect the arrow with their swords.
CRASH.
It pierced the right shoulder of the warrior who tried to deflect it with a sword and pushed him back two zhang.
Horse-Piercing Arrow.
An arrow that pierced through a horse and even passed through the armored body of the warrior riding it.
Astonished by the arrow's power, the warriors of the Twelve Peaks and Castles tangled with one another and began to retreat behind the rocks.
Before he knew it, not a single one of them could be seen in Moyong Jaehwa's line of sight, and the path ahead was completely clear.
"You saved Captain Baek."
The people who had been charging to slaughter Moyong Jaehwa's group at any moment did not even make the sound of breathing.
That sudden silence felt incredibly thrilling to Moyong Jaehwa.
* * *
This standard Murim exam was nothing short of chaotic.
Not a single thing could be predicted.
In the southeast sector, countless examinees failed to pass the First Gate due to bandits and Japanese pirates joining forces, and in the northwest sector, people presumed to be of the evil path clashed with examinees, unintentionally producing a massive number of dropouts.
In the northeast sector, the Mantong Bureau was conducting an investigation into nearly five hundred deaths and the unidentified individuals presumed to be the culprits.
Just like the previous times, results were unpredictable, and there were many cases where unexpected individuals dropped out or rose to prominence.
In particular, Daoist Myeonghyeon, who had been closely watching the movements of the Twelve Peaks and Castles, summoned the Orthodox Council members of the Elder's Hall when the Twelve Peaks and Castles stopped at Mount Song and moved no further.
"We shouldn't have placed our hopes on them in the first place. Wasn't their original goal to recruit the Taiyi Sect?"
"Anyway, looking at the results, isn't it a good thing that the two of them ended up at odds?"
"That is not the problem. Word has it that there are those among the Twelve Peaks and Castles who were robbed of their Admission Tokens."
The Orthodox Council members numbered sixteen in total. They accounted for more than half of the thirty members in the Elder's Hall. Considering that each of them was a figure who could effortlessly shake the world with a single hand, perhaps aware that their gathering itself should hold a commensurate weight, they did not stop reproaching each other.
"Now, now, calm down for a moment. If our Orthodox Council does not unite as one, how will we be able to achieve our great task in the future?"
Daoist Myeonghyeon, the current head of the Orthodox Council, spoke solemnly, but more than a few people clicked their tongues at his opinion.
This was because his election promise to place the Mantong Bureau under the Orthodox Council had been delayed day after day, raising fundamental questions about his qualifications that had been there from the start.
"United as one my foot, the Orthodox Council's name is about to fall to the ground. What will you do if a member of the Orthodox Council fails to enter the Murim Academy as the top student?"
"Then it cannot be helped."
"Ha...! No, is that supposed to make sense right now!"
Daoist Myeonghyeon could not hide his lament as his plan to pressure Zhuge Somyeong into placing his disciple in the Mantong Bureau went awry, but he thought an opportunity had come again thanks to Jin Sowoon, who had ruined the operation in the first place, continuing to run wild.
"... Council Head. Are you saying that without knowing that the Taiyi Sect entering the Murim Academy could have a huge impact on the order of the Murim Alliance in the future?"
Contrary to the serious question, Daoist Myeonghyeon leisurely stroked his beard.
"Haha, what an alarming thing to say. Isn't the purpose of establishing the Murim Academy to select and foster talents fairly so they can work for the peace of Murim? What is so bad about them growing their skills and entering?"
"Ahem. Hmm."
Who wouldn't know that? But the founding purpose was just a purpose, and the way the actual world operated was different, wasn't it?
"Perhaps what Elder Cheon wishes to say is his concern about Jin Sowoon of the Taiyi Sect entering as the top student."
"That's right! That is exactly what I want to say."
The Murim Academy held responsibilities and rights strictly based on grades.
Considering that the foundational tone of that class's academy students would change depending on who entered as the top student, the students' freedom was good, but removing the possibility of causing confusion in advance was more important than anything for the future of the Murim Alliance.
"I wondered if those folks of the Twelve Peaks and Castles would do something slightly useful, but it was just as expected. We will have to make a move after all."
"What are you saying, Council Head? Are you speaking without knowing what will happen if we privately interfere in the standard Murim exam?"
"Of course we shouldn't privately interfere. But Elder Kang, do you wish to see a disciple of the Taiyi Sect enter as the top student?"
"... Ahem."
"Furthermore, did you know this? Jin Sowoon of the Taiyi Sect, who is currently predicted to be the top student, is the one to whom the Chief Strategist had handed over an Admission Token in the past."
"Huh? How could such a person be taking the standard Murim exam?"
"Why he is taking the standard exam or where the Admission Token went is not what's important. The problem is that that man from the Taiyi Sect is someone Zhuge Somyeong is keeping an eye on."
"..."
"What do you think will happen if Jin Sowoon of the Taiyi Sect ends up going to the Mantong Bureau or even the Simhyeon Pavilion?"
"Haha."
"It will be the first time since Chief Strategist Zhuge took control of the Mantong Bureau that an academy graduate enters the Mantong Bureau. And a disciple of the Taiyi Sect, at that."
The Mantong Bureau was the institution that operated the Murim Alliance.
To have the Mantong Bureau in one's hands meant being able to freely move the Murim Alliance. Moreover, entering as an academy graduate? It was unimaginable what sort of things he would do with immense authority at such a young age.
"The Taiyi Sect is a sect that, until recently, had been evaluated as one that should be excluded from the 108 Peaks. If a disciple of a sect that has suffered such contempt enters the Mantong Bureau and gains power, would the peace of the Murim Alliance truly continue?
They will recklessly disrupt the order of the Murim Alliance in the name of reform and progress."
The elderly elders closed their eyes and let out sighs one after another, as if the mere thought was terrifying.
Now that attention was already focused on Jin Sowoon and the Taiyi Sect, there was no one picking a fight with Daoist Myeonghyeon, asking what had happened to the Mantong Bureau matter.
Because for them, someone they deemed insignificant sharing authority with them would be far more fearsome than the Mantong Bureau currently falling into the hands of the Council of Elders.
"You are right. When a clumsy person swings a sword, innocent people are bound to shed blood."
The elders who had been looking coldly at Daoist Myeonghyeon soon began to nod one by one as well.
It was truly easy.
Daoist Myeonghyeon was feeling grateful toward Jin Sowoon, whom he had previously gnashed his teeth at.
"We wish to hear the Council Head's esteemed opinion."
"We wish to hear the Council Head's esteemed opinion."
Their voices were each filled with politeness and anxiety.
Having soothed the people's anxiety with a brief silence, Daoist Myeonghyeon wet his lips and began to speak.