Book 23 Chapter 2

Meeting the Master, the inevitable encounter

-Off! And…… Right!

One week ago.

Inside Ilho room on the third floor of the Silla Gak sponsored annex, which is said to boast the best facilities and hospitality in Ganghoran.

Yay!

Digging in!

The steel rod with the hastily forged name "Strike Awakening Spirit Rod" carved into its body scraped against the uneven stone floor, sparking yellow flames. The man holding it was an old man with graying hair as white as snow. The old man's gaze was fixed on the prefect lady, who sat somewhere in front of him.

Everything about her was perfect: her naturally wavy black hair, her jewelry, which was simple but not flashy, her makeup, which was light and flattering, her clothes, which were impeccable, and the way she sat, which exuded grace and dignity. But while she could fool others, she could not fool the old man, for it was he who had taught her all this. So he could see right through his pupil, no matter what he looked like. For the old man, it wasn't even a question.

"……."

Yun Bi could no longer meet his gaze and lowered his head. The countless words he had planned to use if he ever met his master again were buried in the recesses of his mind, not even a sniffle in sight. It wasn't supposed to be like this…… It was dangerous as it was.

Blah, blah, blah!

'Keeeeee! Pah-bah-bah-bah!'

With each heavy step the old man took, Yunbi's body couldn't help but tense up.

Eek!

The Master's toe came into Yan Bi's gaze, and he stopped dead in his tracks. At the same time, as if in sympathy, the hideous steel rod stopped moving.

Yun Fei calmed his fluttering heart and looked up with a wry smile. There, smiling benevolently, was Master ……, of course.

"Take it off."

Said the master with an expressionless face. Stunned, Yun Bi grabbed his collar with both hands and screamed.

"Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

The mental attack worked, and even the master of calm and indifference flinched slightly. He hadn't taught her that kind of act, but where had she learned it?

"Who says perverted inspiration?!"

When I shouted at her to cancel it immediately, she turned her back to me and fell to the floor, her eyes watering from the pus on her shirt, and she sobbed nervously, the posture of a victim of an assault who had just encountered Chihan.

"Black and white, but you forced a young lady to take her clothes off, so that alone makes you a great pervert!"

With a posture that encourages misunderstanding and speculation, Yanbi cried out. The master shouted back.

"Who said get naked, I said get dressed!"

Yeonbi asked, rolling his eyes.

"Why do I have to change, when I'm pretty sure there's no good reason to change at this moment?"

Yeonbi pointed out.

"No, there is!"

In a stern voice, the master replied.

"No, why not?"

Yanbi's voice rises slightly in question. But the master had his reasons for not giving in. In a serious voice, the master said.

"If you had a brain, you'd think about it. It's not very pretty to beat up a girl, even if it's just for show. I may not be bound by the rules of the world, but that doesn't mean I don't have some things in my heart that I'd rather keep hidden."

They weren't wrong, it's all about appearances, but an old man fondling a young girl didn't look good no matter how you looked at it. If it didn't look good, it was good, and if it didn't look good, it was criminal. That's why I hadn't done the math yet and was waiting.

"Aha! Um… so you're telling me to get dressed because you want to beat me up… in other words, you're telling me to get cleaned up and beaten up?"

Said Yanbian with a big smile on his face.

"Well, something like that. I'm glad you seem to get it now too!"

It hurts to say it twice, the Master's eyes were saying.

"Hmm, I see."

"Uh-huh, whatever. Besides, you don't have to bother with a bath. I'll let you get dressed."

Sensei's voice rises a bit when he realizes that I've entered the time buy with no intention of changing.

"Well, now that you've heard a good reason, why don't you go change, and we can continue the sequel then."

In a kind voice, the master smiled.

"As you wish, then……."

Yeonbi bowed its head in greeting. And then…

"Did you think I was going to say…? If so, boy. You'll never be able to change."

Yeonbi replied with a straight face, and his tone was different from his usual one.

After hearing his reasoning, I felt even more compelled to stick with it.

"What a girl, do you want to just change or do you want to get hit and change?"

Even though I said it out loud, it was a logical contradiction of my previous statement.

"Absolutely not."

People shouldn't just give in to blackmail, sometimes you have to make a stand. And for Yunbi, that time was now.

"Heh, heh, heh, you're making a bunch of falcons today, Onya! If your wish is to die today, can't you be a master and grant your student's wish? Don't worry, if that's your wish, I'll grant it!"

A cold voice rang out from the Master's calm mouth.

Whaaaaaat!

At that moment, the sword cavity on the spirit rod blazed with a dazzlingly bright white light, and the light gradually faded away.

"What is that?

The bright white light was extinguished, and in its place, black and white beads swirled in staggered spirals around the faintly glowing spirit rod, dancing with each other. One bead was a white pearl of light, while the other was a black pearl that absorbed the light around it. A sword circle? A chill ran down Yunbi's spine as she stared at the pair of beads, small but somehow instinctively dangerous.

'That's dangerous! You'll die if you stop it! You can't stop that…….'

I saw the unspoken warning and felt an instinctive sense of foreboding. I'd never seen anything like it before.

"What do you think, have you changed your mind?"

Without relenting, the master said.

"Ahaha, I'm suddenly feeling a little stuffy in my clothes, let's go change."

It didn't take half an angle for his resolve to crumble. But it was also foolish to step into something so dangerous, especially when it was a master.

"Do you have a change of clothes?"

In a blunt voice, the master said, "I don't have any clothes, and I don't want to get in trouble if I offer to go get them. Of course, even if he did, he had no intention of doing so.

"I brought it just in case. It's not a big deal, I just need to make a few changes to the inside, not the outside. It doesn't take up any space, and you're not going to send it away if I tell you I'm going to get it anyway, are you?"

Yeonbi said, pouting.

"Well, that's good, because I don't think I'll ever need to use it."

"What's that again, sabu?"

Before I knew it, a long white sash was fluttering arrogantly in the wind. I couldn't imagine what it was for.

"Oh, you mean this? It's easy to use, you just hold it up to your eye and twirl it around."

Like this," he said, and mimed bringing it to his eyes.

"And then what?"

Unable to contain his curiosity, the disciple asked.

"If you had refused to change, I would have no choice but to blindfold you with the eyes of your body and beat you with the eyes of your mind. But now that you've changed your mind, I have no further use for you."

Master said in a soothing tone. Somehow, the wistfulness in his tone stuck in my ears.

"Are you sure it's the Heart Eye Heart Sword?"

The master said, "It's not a big deal," as if it were.

"Don't make a big deal about the sword. It's just a heartbreaker."

There was something eerie about being modest and saying things that weren't meant to be said.

"I'll just go change."

Yeonbi said quickly. That seemed like a good idea.

"Oh, and don't forget to stretch your muscles."

"He doesn't care about anything. I'm afraid he's not going to do it."

The Yeonbi grumbled and reluctantly retreated to the cabin's attached room, and for the first time in a very long time, I was myself.

"Once again, it's been a long time, disciple."

I have to say hello again.

"It's been a while, and it's not a pleasure."

Ryu-yeon replied with a grunt. She felt very uncomfortable with her lack of initiative. She looked around for an opening, but Master Liu hadn't seen it coming, so she didn't give him a chance to dig in.

"By the way, Master, what was that just now, I've never seen that technique before?"

"Hmm, I've never shown it to you before, so of course you've never seen it before."

In a gruff voice, the master replied.

"That's not true! You said you've taught him everything, even if you can't get him to implement it right now, you've taught him everything in theory. Were you lying to him then?"

Voila!

"You bastard, who are you to tell me that this is a falsehood? This is not the Rainbow Gate Martial Art, so you must not have learned it! It's up to this master to teach or not to teach anything other than the Wen Sect's visions."

Master Touro said. I should have written mind and read arbitrary.

"Don't be silly, and who did you learn that weird technique from?"

"Whoever learns, learns to learn. Who dares to teach an old man?"

"That or that."

Bi Ryuyeon stuttered, her mouth hanging open.

"That's not the same thing, dude!"

Voila!

Once again, the inevitable honeybee has flown.

"Yeah, it was someone else's, his name was Taekwondo or something, and it was his martial art."

"What happened to him?"

Curious, she asked.

"Dead."

The master had only one word for me.

"To whom?"

It was more of a confirmation than a question.

"To me."

It's no big deal, Master Turo said.

'After all…….'

Ryuyeon confirmed her suspicions.

"But why?"

"I'm damned."

It was like I was asking for the obvious.

"Oh, sure……."

I couldn't think of anything else to say; the ending was written in ink.

'That must have hurt a lot…….'

It didn't seem like anyone else's story, and I felt a sense of camaraderie.

"So how did you get it, he said you rummaged around?"

"Of course I learned it from the top. Haven't you ever heard that books are a treasure trove of wisdom?"

It was a bit of a sneer, but she had more questions than that.

"So, where did you get the money for that?"

Apparently, the source is suspect.

"Where do you think you got it?"

Sensei said with a wickedly meaningful smirk. Of course he would not divulge such precious secrets. There was only one conclusion, then. I couldn't stop myself from sighing.

"Haha, what do you mean…… I have a pretty good idea."

I held a moment of silence for the man whose name I forgot. So, I decided to do something about this monster, so I wrote ……. But there was one thing that bothered me.

"Wait a minute. Didn't you just say that a rising martial artist shouldn't just have a kung fu class, that words and scribbles on a piece of paper can't express the reasoning behind each move? The kung fu class is this part of learning, and the other eight parts are the teacher's teachings."

"I did, and I don't change my mind about that."

"I thought you just said you learned on the job!"

"Yeah, but who said you learned to fly?"

"Well, then……."

"You don't have to be an advanced martial artist, but you can learn the lower levels of martial arts just by looking at them. You know what they say, the higher you go, the more natural it is."

In other words, he could tell by looking at the book that it was below his level. That left Bi Ryuyeon speechless. He needed to stall for time…… and his plan to catch the master off-guard by exploiting his logical weakness of inconsistency in his teaching and keep him distracted on offense had failed.

"Okay, disciple, I think we're running out of topics to talk about, so why don't we start again?"

As she wondered if there was anything else she could think of to talk about, the master interrupted her thoughts. When she looked up, she saw that the spirit rod was once again pointing skyward!

"Oh, come on, can't we just go with the flow?"

After her plan to be sneaky failed, Bi Ryuyeon protested cutely. Needless to say, her cuteness didn't work.

"Didn't this master teach you that if you keep doing what you're not doing, your life will be shortened?" The answer, of course, is……."

Bi Ryuyeon urgently raised her gong.

"It's a 'no'!"

Boom!

With a terrifying crash, the Strike Awakening Spirit Rod fell like a thunderbolt.

But!

The steel alchemical rod, made rapidly flammable by the master's hand-forged alchemy, failed to fulfill its original purpose of harpooning the target. The reason for the target's failure to destroy was not the target's unauthorized evasion; it was the silk balls that Bi Ryuyeon suddenly threw out at the speed of light. The moment it entered the orbit of the steel club, the master's hand instantly stopped. It was an incredible speed, and yet it had no difficulty stopping, which could only be described as the skill of a divine beating. That was the art of volitional movement, whereby the body moves spontaneously when the will arises.

"It can't be!"

His mind's eye pinpoints the being enveloped within the furoshiki. Your nose twitches in reflex.

"I see… you recognize me."

The resurrected Bi Ryuyeon wiped her forehead and said. But it was too soon to breathe a sigh of relief. The iron club was still perched on the top of her skull, a finger's length away. It was only after his mind's eye had penetrated and examined the furoshiki that he asked.

"That's…… booze!"

The master spoke with conviction, not doubt. If there had been doubt, the club would not have stopped. Yun Fei nodded confidently.

"Yeah, that's not regular alcohol either."

The Master wrinkled his nose for a moment, then fell silent for a moment of contemplation.

"That soft, subtle scent wafting through the air is definitely out of the ordinary, and I'm guessing it's some kind of fancy, expensive liquor."

Apparently, the master could smell the alcohol, if he smelled it at all, and even trace amounts of it in the air, breaking through the rigid seal of the double-triple. From now on, it was all about Yeonbi. I swallowed hard and peeled back the silk robe of Yeonbi.

The silk robe gently peeled away like a woman's garment, revealing the dew of the moon in all its glory. The scent of liquor wafting through the air became even richer. A look of ecstasy briefly appeared on the master's face as he smelled it.

"You guessed it right, you're the kind of person who carries a liquor bug in your stomach all year round. It's a rare liquor called 'Dew of the Moon', and there's nothing better here in Kanghorando. Unfortunately, the liquor warehouse that stores this rare liquor was raided and completely destroyed."

"What does that mean?"

The dazed master realized what the Yeonbi was trying to tell him.

"As expected, Master, you're quick on the uptake. That's right, this is the last of the 'moon dew' in my hand."

"What are you going to do?"

The master asked, his brow furrowing slightly, already eager to drink it.

"It's going to happen!"

Wham!

Quickly pulling the secret weapon from the small of his back, Yun Che tapped the sharp end of it against the jade bottle.

"Mu, what are you doing!"

As the life of the precious liquor was threatened, the panicked master stretched out his hand and exclaimed.

"Stay away from me!"

Bi Ryuyeon shouted, stepping back quickly.

Master's movements paused for a moment.

"If you come any closer, there is no life in this bottle."

Bi Ryuyeon said in a very serious voice.

"Are you serious?"

"I mean it."

In a serious voice, Bi Ryuyeon replied. She couldn't let go of her last lifeline so easily.

"Now, put your hands down, there's no point in trying to stabilize the shape of the tassel with empty promises."

A master would have enough power to apply a void element to lock the liquor in the broken bottle in its original form. He shouldn't let his guard down. Reading his actions, the master lowered his hand, savoring the taste.

"……."

A heavy silence fell between the two men. Neither spoke, except to glare at each other, but the standoff didn't last long. Sincerity must have been conveyed somehow. The first to back down was surprisingly the Master.

"Okay, I'll let Nobu make a concession this time. What do you want him to do?"

"Why don't you put that nasty stick down first?"

Bi Ryuyeon suggested, but she never let go of the trick in her hand. She knew better than anyone that the situation could turn around faster than the speed of light if she let her guard down.

"Well, wouldn't it be a bit of a waste if I made it and never used it?"

Sensei said, his mouth watering with regret.

"Not at all."

Bi Ryuyeon replied. It was right to destroy them for the sake of peace between the great powers.

"Okay, I threw it away. Now what?"

The master took every opportunity to rescue the bottle from the kidnapper, but he was not successful. He could beat the criminal, but he couldn't guarantee the safety of the bottle. In the past, he would have been helpless in any condition… but he had to admit that his student had definitely grown stronger in the three years he hadn't seen him.

"Go over there and sit where you were sitting."

"I sat down."

Not wanting to end up drinking through his nose, he did as he was told and returned to his seat.

"Okay, now what?"

"You can do it like this."

With that, he let the cup he had picked up fly. It flew through the air at a slow, lazy pace, landing precisely on the table in front of you and stopping.

Poof!

She approached without a sound, uncorked the bottle, and poured herself a drink.

"……."

I walked right up to him, but he said nothing, just stared at the golden liquor rising in his glass.

When his glass was full, he raised it and downed it in one gulp. It was the most delicious liquor he'd had in a long time.

The feeling was indescribable. The heavenly droplet-like liquid slid down his throat, leaving an intense trail that filled his mouth. With his eyes closed, he savored the taste and scent.

Boom!

Setting down the last drop of wine on the table, the master spoke in a low voice.

"You thought to appear before Yonkedou Nobu?"

Sitting at an angle and not even making eye contact, Nosabu asked, not as a compliment, of course.

"It was you, not anyone else, who taught me to hit if you can't avoid it."

"Did you?"

The labor department asked her how she could possibly remember such a thing. She looked at him like he couldn't be bothered. Seeing such a nonchalant face somehow made her angry. She didn't seem to realize that she was being reflected that way by others.

"I did, ahhhh."

Suddenly, Nosabu straightened up from his slanting posture and looked her in the face. Bi Ryuyeon was dumbfounded, and had to barely suppress the urge to ask, "Why are you smiling so genuinely? She might need to reevaluate the credibility of the proverbial "spit in the face of a smile".

"Come to think of it, it's been a while, hasn't it, you damn apprentice?"

I don't see what's so good about it, and there's nothing good about it," the master said, smiling. It had been three years since Bi Ryuyeon had left Amishan without a word. After all, the saying 'spit on a smiling face' should probably be changed to 'a punch in the face! But shortening a life with a punch that won't hit is the Sochi of foolishness. Alas, I had to stifle the urge that welled up like a spring, but even if I could stop an outgoing fist, I couldn't stop a moving mouth.

"I don't like it, not one bit!"

Bi Ryuyeon's stomach twisted slightly at the smile that somehow appeared on her face, and she replied bluntly once more.