Well, it’s nothing much. (4)
“Ha……”
The old scholars let out hollow laughs, as if they found it absurd.
“Hahahahah! Hahahahahaha! Well, now.”
That hollow laughter soon turned into great and loud one.
“What do we need you to do for us, you ask. Listen, Sodojang.”
The old scholar who had been continuing the exchange with Chung Myung shook his head and said.
“Do you think there is anything more we could desire at this age? Sodojang, we are in a position where all we can do now is wait for the day we die. For us to…”
“At any rate, you, who follow Confucius, always put on airs, even when you’re about to drop dead.”
“….What did you say?”
Chung Myung looked straight at the old scholars and said.
“There’s no such thing as a person who dies after achieving everything they ever wished for.”
At that heavy voice… no, rather, cold would perhaps be the more fitting word to describe it, the old scholar closed his mouth. The anger that had been surging up as if it would burst at any moment was crushed down in an instant. That was because there was an indescribable weight hidden within that voice.
“You just turn your head away and die because you know it can’t be done. As if you never wished for it in the first place.”
“…”
“Isn’t that right?”
The old scholar silently gazed at Chung Myung. It was a piercing gaze, imbued with the passage of time, yet Chung Myung met it without averting his eyes.
In the end, the one who finally turned his head away first was the old scholar.
“I truly… truly cannot understand.”
“…”
“You are clearly nothing more than a young child….”
A sigh slipped from the old scholar’s lips. It felt as though he had been pierced through the lungs. After groaning quietly for a long while, he soon turned to So Jung-gyeong.
“I think I understand why Master Dongbaek brought this young man here.”
At those words, So Jung-gyeong, who had been watching, nodded silently.
“Then…”
Just as Baek Cheon felt a faint glimmer of hope at how strangely well the situation seemed to be resolving.
“You are right. There is no such thing as a person who dies having achieved everything.”
“…”
“We are no different. There are always things that must be done. We merely… turned away from them, deeming them impossible.”
The old scholar looked at Chung Myung with sunken eyes.
“Certainly, if you can fulfill our wish, then breaking principle once would be no great matter. But… the important question is whether you truly have the ability to fulfill what we desire, is it not?”
At this, Chung Myung lifted his chin slightly.
“So?”
“We shall test you. We shall see whether you truly are as remarkable as your words make you out to be. If you pass that test, we will tell you our true wish. But if you fail to pass the test we set.”
Killing intent flowed through the old scholar’s eyes. It was killing intent of a different nature from that of martial artists, the kind emitted by men who had wielded power instead of swords and walked upon the edge of a blade with their tongues as weapons.
“You will have to pay the price for that arrogance. By whatever means necessary, we will certainly hold you responsible for all of this. You, Sodojang, and the one who dragged you here. And your sect as well.”
“Good grief, these old fossils sure talk a lot. As if any of you were even born a hundred years ago.”
A hollow sound escaped from the old scholar’s mouth. It was so absurd that he did not even have the strength to be angry.
But whether he did or not, Chung Myung remained just as indifferent as ever. After all, the life he had lived had been far too violent for him to be frightened by such threats now.
“It’s a pain humoring this pathetic nonsense, but… Well, not like there’s another choice.”
Chung Myung crossed his arms and nodded.
“Go on, then. A test or whatever.”
“…”
“For those bastards who’ll only believe something once they see it with their own eyes, there’s no choice but to show them. When do we do it? Now? Or should we get some sleep and start tomorrow?”
“…Follow us.”
The old scholars, who had been silently glaring at Chung Myung, rose from the wooden platform and began walking ahead.
The moment he saw that, Baek Cheon let out a breath of relief, then immediately grabbed Chung Myung by the head and started shaking him.
“You crazy bastard! What the hell are you thinking?!”
“Ow! That hurts!”
“What are you going to do if we don’t pass the test! From the look of it, this doesn’t seem like something that’ll end with just us!”
“What are you saying something so obvious for? We just have to pass.”
“You think that’s as easy as saying it!”
“Oh, damn it. You were born to worry, weren’t you.”
Chung Myung clicked his tongue as he looked at Baek Cheon.
“There’s nothing to worry about. They’ll give us a test that’s reasonable enough to pass.”
“How can you be so sure of that?”
“Isn’t it obvious? If we just turn around and leave, those people gain absolutely nothing.”
“…Huh?”
Baek Cheon flinched slightly and looked at Chung Myung.
“They gain nothing?”
“Yeah.”
Chung Myung continued as though it were nothing worth mentioning.
“But if we pass the test?”
“Well…….”
“They’ll get something out of it, at least. Since we’ll be granting one request of theirs. In this situation, what would you do, Sasuk?”
“Uh…”
“Of course you’d let us pass, wouldn’t you? Even if you didn’t intend to make it easy for us, you wouldn’t force some utterly unreasonable nonsense, would you? Right? It’s only natural. Who would want to take a loss? If a pumpkin rolls onto your doorstep, you pick it up first and think afterward.”
Baek Cheon stared blankly at Chung Myung, then turned his head and met the eyes of Hwasan’s disciples.
“So, uh… am I the strange one? Somehow it sounds like it makes sense.”
“Well, is this the first time?”
“At this point, I don’t even know whether this is sophistry or not.”
“If those old gentlemen heard it, they’d probably go, ‘That sounds plausible?’ too.”
“…Right?”
Baek Cheon let out a groan and scratched roughly at his head.
It was clearly nonsense, but it was nonsense he somehow could not refute.
“That’s not what matters right now.”
Tang Soso, who was following behind the old scholars, looked back at So Jung-gyeong and said.
“Elder. Do you perhaps have any idea what the test they’re talking about might be?”
“Hmm. It’s not that I don’t have a hunch, but…”
So Jung-gyeong deliberately put on a troubled expression.
“But I think telling you that beforehand would compromise the fairness of the test. Fairness aside, there’s no need to hand those ill-tempered old men an excuse to nitpick.”
“Hmm, now that I hear it, that’s true.“
Perhaps thinking it made sense, Tang Soso nodded without another word.
Fortunately, they did not have to wonder for very long. The two old scholars walking ahead soon came to a stop. It was not very far from the thatched hut.
“Here?”
The disciples of Hwasan all furrowed their brows at once.
What stood before their eyes was a vast pavilion, and its shape was almost…
“A martial arts sect [무림 문파 – they specify ‘murim’]?”
“It does look like one, doesn’t it?”
“Indeed. So this is their main base?”
“That’s not it!”
At those words, Jo Geol shouted sharply.
“What do you mean, a martial arts sect? It’s an academy [서원(書院)]! An academy!”
“Hm? An academy, you say? Doesn’t this look like a sect no matter how you look at it?”
The great main gate, the long walls stretching to either side, and beyond those walls, the sight of several tiled roofs rising irregularly… no matter how he looked at it, it seemed familiar.
“Well, of course they’d be similar.”
“Why?”
Jo Geol spoke as if it were obvious.
“Because the purpose is the same. In the first place, a sect is just a place that gathers together all the buildings needed to teach its disciples, isn’t it? An academy is also a place equipped with everything students need to study, so naturally the forms would end up similar.”
“Ah……”
Yoon Jong nodded in understanding.
“So, ten thousand streams still return to one source. Once you reach the end, everything connects.”
“I’m not sure that saying is quite meant to be used here… but the meaning should be right.”
“I see. An academy, then…”
Baek Cheon, who had been nodding as though he understood, suddenly stopped.
“But why an academy?“
“Who knows. They said it was a test, so maybe they really intend to make us sit the civil service examination.”
“…Then we definitely won’t pass, right?”
“Do you even need to ask?”
Just as the tense conversation among the disciples of Hwasan seemed about to drag on a little longer, the old scholars looked back at them with sharp gazes.
“This way.”
The disciples of Hwasan nodded and, with tense expressions, headed into the academy.
After passing through the fairly large main gate and going inside, a broad square opened out before them. Several pavilions surrounded the large square, which almost resembled a training ground.
“Oh..”
Old but well-maintained pavilions. And perhaps the fact that, despite its size, there were surprisingly few people to be seen made it feel even more that way.
But if there was one decisive difference.
“The sound of reading……”
“Right.”
The disciples of Hwasan glanced around with slightly bewildered expressions. From here and there, clear, ringing voices reading aloud could be heard.
“…Wow.”
“This is almost like music, isn’t it?”
Each individual chant was not all that loud, but when dozens, hundreds of those small voices gathered together, its grandeur was beyond description.
“No, rather than music.. I think it would be more accurate to call it an incantation. Chung Myung is practically on the verge of ascending to immortality?”
“….Why is he being exorcised by this kind of sound? I really don’t understand.”
“Ugghh…….”
“If anyone has any liquor left, make him drink some. It’d be better than him ascending.”
“….Yes, Sasuk.”
As the disciples of Hwasan were holding up Chung Myung, who was on the verge of collapse, the old scholar walking ahead opened his mouth.
“I do not know how much you have heard from Master Dongbaek, but in the past, people of Gangho such as yourselves called this place Yurim.”
“….We heard.”
The old scholar’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“Certainly… personally, I do not find it agreeable, but there clearly exist voices saying that even a scholar must cultivate the strength to protect his own body.“
“Hmm…”
“However, in the present day, it has become something that can no longer be expressed simply by saying ‘such voices exist’.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Intention becomes a voice, a voice becomes writing, and writing ultimately gathers people together. The existence of a voice means, in the end, that an entire school of thought is formed around it.”
“…”
“You will understand when you see it. I will warn you in advance, be careful.”
Just as Baek Cheon was about to say something more.
“Honored guests have arrived. So, disciples, receive our visitors.”
When the old scholar called out in a booming voice, a sudden silence settled over the academy that had been filled with the sound of reading.
And then.
“Those footsteps…”
Bang. Bang.
The tightly shut doors of the pavilions flew open wide, and from within them, people dressed in white shenyi [심의(深衣) – white confucian robe with black details, look on wikipedia], poured out like a tide.
“Eek….”
“Whoa.”
White garments with sleeves and collars dyed black, and large ceremonial caps worn upon their heads.
“…What is this? There are hundreds of Nokrim Kings.”
People dressed similarly to Im Sobyeong poured out in endless swarms like ants and instantly lined up in formation, almost encircling them.
Baek Cheon swallowed dryly.
‘This pressure……’
At the sight of hundreds of people dressed in garments that looked nothing short of uncomfortable, all straightening their posture at once and staring at them, Baek Cheon felt a pressure unlike anything he had ever experienced before.
It was not his first time being surrounded by this many people. Rather, while living as a disciple of Hwasan, he had experienced such things countless times.
But what he felt here now was clearly different from what he had felt back then. The pressure they had experienced until now had come from the opponent’s numbers and strength, whereas the pressure he felt here seemed to come from formality and propriety itself.
“Sasuk, these people….”
“Yes. I felt it too.”
No, perhaps it was not only that.
He could feel it. From those people, in whom not even the slightest hostility could be found, a faint energy was flowing outward.
‘Are these the martial arts of Confucian scholars?’
Its nature was unlike any martial art Baek Cheon had ever encountered before. It was not clear and cool like the Taoist schools, nor heavy and solemn like the Buddhist schools. And it was certainly not free-spirited like the secular martial arts.
If he had to put it into words… yes, it was like a still lake.
An aura that carried the depth of gazing down upon a lake whose bottom could not be seen. It was the moment he instinctively realized that, regardless of their attainments, the level of martial arts these people had cultivated was by no means shallow.
And before that unfamiliar thrill had even fully settled.
One person slowly walked out from among the Confucian scholars. Towards the disciples of Hwasan, who stood with their backs to the main gate, without the slightest hesitation.
Special Spinoff Chapter 40 >>>
Side Story “Leaving Home” Part II >>>
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