Chapter 52 - Act 8. Daemudo’s Main Mountain (3)

“Heard the rumors. That you have the talent to break my record.”

U Yuhee scrutinized him from behind the mask. Yise quietly waited for the Winged Dragon Hall Master to continue. No matter how often it happened, he could never quite grow used to being examined so openly.

“Definitely unusual.”

U Yuhee tilted her head, then added,

“Raise it quickly. Your realm.”

“Yes. I will devote myself to cultivation.”

“Your role is very important.”

“Thank you for thinking so highly of me, but I am still insignificant.”

“For now, yes.”

U Yuhee slowly circled him. Perhaps it was a habit; she kept going around and around even as she spoke. The rather disrespectful thought occurred to him that she was a little like... a puppy wagging its tail.

“If you rise quickly, everyone will change.”

“What do you mean by change?”

“They’re all too complacent. No hunger.”

The meaning of the words drifting out from behind the mask was a little difficult for Yise to grasp.

“If Senior Hae Il ascends, Daemudo will collapse.”

Yise remained silent. He already knew that Hae Il’s goal was to ascend to the heavenly realm. Despite the disparity in strength between the Jeong Empire and Daemudo, Hae Il alone possessed the overwhelming power to enforce peace. If he left for the heavenly realm one day, would anyone be able to fill the void he left behind?

“Even so... surely the Azure Dragon Hall Master would not leave trouble behind? He cares deeply for Daemudo.”

“The only way is to wipe out all our external enemies before ascending. But he doesn’t want blood on his hands.”

Yise understood U Yuhee’s concern. Wasn’t that precisely why Hall Master Hae Il had asked him to become a sword? Setting aside whether those expectations were more than he deserved, devoting himself to cultivation was only natural, whatever the reason.

“I understand. Inadequate as I am, I will try.”

“Good. To mark our meeting, I’ll tell you a secret.”

“A secret?”

“A secret realm will open soon. Only Qi Refining Cultivators can enter. We’ve already agreed with the Jeong Empire that neither side will interfere with entry or departure. Reach late-stage Qi Refining, and you can go in too. Make that your goal.”

A faint gleam lit Yise’s eyes. A secret realm. The news Park Gangseo had shared settled in his mind as fact. A land of opportunity was opening—dangerous to venture into, but worth the risk.

“When you say soon, may I ask how soon?”

“Two years at the earliest. Fifteen at the latest.”

‘... Isn’t that an awfully large gap between earliest and latest?’

A Cultivator’s sense of time was difficult to get used to.

As U Yuhee stopped circling as though her business were finished, Yise ventured a question.

“Hall Master. Might I ask what became of the attack on Hall Master Hae Il?”

“We agreed to forget it happened.”

“Then you were able to reach an agreement. What a relief.”

“We cut off the ringleader’s head and agreed not to pursue the matter further. A peaceful resolution.”

Yise caught his breath. Could that really be called a peaceful resolution?

“... Did he willingly offer his head? A great Core Formation Cultivator?”

“No. Senior Hae Il cut it off on the spot.”

He could not keep up with this conversation. How had that not started a war? It was more than his common sense could accommodate.

“Is it all right for him to kill so freely? He seemed concerned about heavenly tribulation.”

“He told you about that too?”

A hint of interest entered U Yuhee’s voice.

“Interesting. Don’t worry. He didn’t kill him.”

“...?”

Yise questioned her again.

“Didn’t you say he cut off his head?”

“Yes. Cut his head off.”

“But he didn’t die?”

“Ah.”

Something like a chuckle escaped from behind the mask.

“At Core Formation, you won’t die from losing your head as long as your golden core remains. You’ll lose some spirituality, though, so your cultivation will suffer.”

“... What?”

Yise’s mind went blank for a moment. Just how did the world of great Cultivators work? He could not imagine people who survived decapitation strolling down the street.

Of course, the person who could answer his questions had already raised a hand in farewell and leaped onto a rooftop without a backward glance.

“...”

The white robes vanished from sight in a single bound. Yise stood there for a long time, simply staring up into empty air.

* * *

Putting aside his interest in the libraries, Yise went straight to the crafts street in the research district. Among the rows of workshops, pill-refining furnaces, and laboratories, none specialized in immortal cuisine. It was simply lumped into “miscellaneous crafts” and relegated to a communal workshop. Without private storage or workspace, the place was hardly suited to making immortal cuisine.

‘This is a problem.’

He could rent a private space, but the monthly cost in spirit stones was substantial. Apparently even a small garden plot or a single stall in a beast shed required monthly payments. In the end, it seemed he would have to wait until the new year, when he could begin taking missions in earnest, before properly making immortal cuisine again.

‘I’ll just cultivate.’

The answer was simple. The exchange gathering was his only remaining engagement, so concentrating on cultivation until then was the right choice. Without lingering, Yise turned toward the residential district.

The moment he turned onto the side path leading to his quarters in Clear Repose Hall One, Yise spotted a familiar Cultivator suspended in midair by a binding spell, flailing helplessly.

‘... What’s he doing up there?’

His business partner and fellow entrant, Bu Chun, was surrounded by a group of Cultivators who were bullying him.

‘This looks familiar.’

The scene brought back unmistakable memories of his childhood.

It was astonishing that people could reach adulthood and walk the path of Cultivation yet still behave like children. Most were at early-stage Qi Refining. The apparent ringleader was at the fifth star. The sight practically begged the question: At your level, shouldn’t you be cultivating instead of wasting time on this?

Yise approached without changing his pace or concealing his presence.

“What are you doing?”

At the unexpected interruption, everyone turned to him.

“Senior!”

Bu Chun brightened in recognition. At the same time, a flicker of hesitation crossed the other Cultivators’ faces as they checked Yise’s realm. But they did not back down. The man in the center bowed politely.

“Senior. I don’t believe we’ve met. Were you recruited from outside?”

“I didn’t ask for introductions. I asked what you’re doing. He entered with me.”

The Cultivators exchanged brief glances. Only then did they release Bu Chun. He barely managed to keep his legs from crumpling and hurried to Yise’s side. The man in the center greeted him once more.

“So you’re the top disciple of this year’s training compound cohort. I am Ju Guyeon, the eldest brother of the pureblood Cultivators who have just become formal disciples.”

Pureblood. Yise turned the word over in his mind. Here before him was the source of the discomfort Park Gangseo had shown when mentioning the exchange gathering.

“It was merely an argument between members of the same cohort. Our junior became agitated and lunged at us, so we restrained him briefly.”

Ju Guyeon smoothly attempted to gloss over the incident. Ignoring him, Yise turned to Bu Chun.

“What did they say to make someone at your low realm go charging at his seniors?”

“These people... They said training compound graduates stink whenever we walk past, because we grew up somewhere full of impure energy.”

“That’s not much. And?”

Dumbfounded by his indifference, Bu Chun answered in a voice close to tears.

“But we’re all from the same cohort, even if we grew up in different places. That’s going too far...”

Yise sighed lightly.

“Is that all? It’s hardly anything terrible. Why get so worked up? Don’t you know a Cultivator needs an unshakable inner center?”

“How is that not terrible...?”

“It’s not as though they said, ‘These vermin from outside crawled in here without knowing their place, so we’ll hack off their limbs and feed them to Demons,’ is it?”

“...”

For a moment, time seemed to stop. Bu Chun stared up at Yise with his mouth half open, while Ju Guyeon and his companions stiffened in unison. It sounded almost as though Yise were threatening to hack off their limbs and feed them to Demons then and there.

“How can a Daoist have such a foul mouth?”

“What are you talking about? That’s the bare minimum for bullying.”

“...”

Having been told that a bastard with no mother or father would grow into a Demon if he suckled another woman’s breast, Yise considered this degree of spite no more than the mild teasing anyone might endure. All the talk of pureblood bullying had worried him a little, but these boys were so tame—so genuinely boyish—that he needn’t have bothered.

“As expected of an outsider raised breathing impure energy. Clearly, you have never acquired proper refinement.”

A faint crease formed on Ju Guyeon’s brow. As his tone and manner grew increasingly insolent, Yise struggled to stop his hand from straying toward his hand axe.

“They’re tame, all right... but I suppose they have their own way of getting under your skin.”

Perhaps dressing their bullying up so elegantly made it grate in a different way. Surely this degree of insubordination warranted taking a hand from each of them... No. No, it didn’t.

“Anyway.”

Yise turned his gaze back to Ju Guyeon’s group.

“Talk it out, and don’t use force on your fellow entrants again. I enjoy using force too, and I’m good at it.”

The words were casually tossed out, but their weight was anything but light. Ju Guyeon stared at him for a moment. He seemed to sense instinctively that beneath Yise’s easy manner lay an intimidating presence forged in real combat, something his realm alone could not explain. Yet Ju Guyeon was not one to back down easily either.

“Enjoy it while you can, Senior. No matter how skilled you are in the Demon-Exorcizing Arts, a training compound graduate without the support of blood relatives has clear limits. We may have fallen behind because we weren’t allowed outside the main mountain until now, but soon enough you’ll be calling me Senior.”

“Speak up. Your realm’s so low I can’t hear you.”

“Grr!”

“But how did you practice the Demon-Exorcizing Arts without leaving the main mountain?”

“We trained in live combat against Demons brought to the main mountain and practiced the Spirit-Exorcizing Cultivation Art. What else could we do?”

Pampered greenhouse flowers, then.

Yise kept that remark to himself.

“... Mark my words! We pureblood brothers will rule the cohort of the three hundred and thirteenth year since the sect’s founding!”

“What on earth are these people talking about? Do disciples at the main mountain have a brotherhood system? And what’s this about the three hundred and thirteenth year?”

“We swore brotherhood among ourselves.”

He hadn’t expected an answer, but Ju Guyeon supplied one immediately. The fellow was surprisingly helpful in the most pointless ways.

“The three hundred and thirteenth year since the founding means this year. Do training compound graduates not even know Daemudo’s history?”

That politely needling tone scraped at his nerves once again.

‘Should I just beat the lot of them?’

Yise seriously considered it. The exchange gathering would be a fine opportunity, but somehow he doubted he could hold out until then.