Episode 9: What I think of as magic.
The next day, Ian came to see me with a puzzled look on his face.
“How did I come back yesterday?”
“You came back carrying me. “I don’t remember how I got back.”
Then Ian’s cheeks turned red.
“Don’t lie. I wasn’t that drunk. It was very heavy, right? “I’m sorry, master.”
“It would be a lie if I said it was light. It wasn’t heavy enough to make me feel sorry. “Look at these forearms!”
“Wow, your thin forearms have gotten even thinner already.”
“Look straight at the lumpy muscles!”
After exchanging jokes like that, Ian bowed his head.
“Thank you, master.”
“Let’s drink again next time.”
“Yes, master.”
As she was about to turn away, she asked again.
“If I have made a mistake with my words, please forgive me with a generous heart. “To be honest, I don’t remember what I said.”
“Don’t worry, I didn’t make a mistake. Oh, if you make a mistake next time, use your right of pardon.”
“The right to pardon? what is that?”
“It is my right to be forgiven even if I make mistakes or mistakes.”
“Did you give it to me? “You didn’t receive it?”
I held out my hand to her.
“handshake.”
Ian held my hand with his large hand.
“Okay, I’ve issued it now.”
“Isn’t it possible to get at least ten sheets of what you’ve already given me? “I will follow you around for the rest of my life, so wouldn’t one copy be enough?”
“no! It’s just one piece. So use it sparingly!”
“yes! young master!”
Her brightly smiling eyes disappeared into the flesh.
‘If there is someone in my life who can be forgiven, where will I be and where will you be? You have to issue me fifty copies of the pardon…’
* * *
That night, I was sitting alone and practicing to release energy.
While detecting three locations at the same time, a person was detected by the energy flying to the left.
These days, I’ve been immersed in the fun of finding out what kind of person the other person is through energy. When I find someone while sending out energy, I start by scanning the person from head to toe. How tall are you, what weapons do you use, and what is your martial arts level?
This time too, just when I was trying to look at the other person.
The opponent sneakily dodged to the side.
Thinking it might be a coincidence, I sent my energy towards him. But the other person moved to the other side again and avoided my energy.
‘Surely you don’t know and avoid it?’
This thread-thin and secret aura was something the other person could never detect.
But the other person started avoiding me as if he could sense my energy.
Who on earth is this?
I was curious about the other person. I continued to vent and left the room.
Practice releasing energy while moving. Of course, you had to expend mental energy several times more than if you were to exert it while standing still, but in actual combat, you would be more likely to expel energy while moving.
I felt the other person step back. I chased after him as he ran away, seemingly on the verge of being caught.
The place we arrived at was a pavilion of civil war.
The moment I saw who was standing there, I unconsciously breathed a sigh of relief.
“father!”
The person who brought me here with my energy was my father.
“That’s right. “I was nervous because I thought someone else had sensed my energy.”
“What a great energy. “You might even notice the dog snoozing under the fence over there.”
“Don’t dogs naturally have good senses? But what is going on in my residence?”
“It was a passing road.”
Even though he said that, he was definitely looking for me.
“Seeing that we meet by chance like this, we must be destined to be in a relationship.”
“That’s the end of the story.”
“yes!”
I closed my mouth and quietly gazed at the night sky my father was looking at.
After a while I asked.
“When are you going to decide on a successor?”
“In a hundred years. “You guys still have a long way to go.”
“Let’s do it in 100 days. “I think I’m all there.”
“If that were the case, Hyeolcheondoma wouldn’t have come looking for you.”
“How did you know?”
It was just the two of us meeting, but my father knew. In other words, it means that you are watching me. After all, he knew that I had suffered from acid poisoning.
“Immediately after meeting you, Hyeolcheondoma came to me.”
“What did you say?”
“I was hoping to punish you.”
“yes?”
I was surprised by the unexpected words. Could it be that Hyeolcheondoma went to his father that way and asked him to punish him?
“It was unexpected. “He’s not the kind of person who would come to me and make such a request when his student is dead.”
“Why on earth did you do that?”
Although I pretended not to know, I guessed what Hyeolcheondoma was thinking. This is to test my relationship with my father. I wonder if my father will really punish me, and if he does, what kind of punishment he will punish me. I’m trying to find out if my father thinks of me as his successor.
“So I plan to punish you.”
“There is no justification for punishing me. “That disciple deserves to die.”
“All you have to do is create a cause.”
I pulled out my sword and drew a long line on the floor.
Then he drew a line about one-tenth and said.
“Hyeolcheondoma told me. This longer side is the size my father thinks he is. “Did the justification come from this path?”
Instead of answering, my father asked back what I had asked at the hunting ground.
“Did I ask you which of the Mazons you trust the most?”
“yes.”
My father gave his answer now.
“No one believes it.”
I could tell. With this answer, he also answered that the line drawn by Hyeolcheondoma was not accurate.
“Which side are you? “Are you the one who believes in people or the one who doesn’t?”
“It will depend on what kind of person the other person is.”
“How can you know what kind of person he is?”
“You’ll find out as you go along, right?”
“It’s a stupid idea. The human mind is something that can never be known. “No matter how transparent a person may be next to you, you should never think that you know that person.”
Suddenly, Ian came to mind. It’s like thinking you know her well, but you keep discovering new sides to her.
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Did you say we had to maintain discipline at our school?”
“yes.”
“Let’s stop talking nonsense about having to catch corruption. “Tell me your honest thoughts.”
“Can I be really honest with you?”
“When did you lie?”
“Not really. “I think this answer will be rude.”
“Say it.”
“I think at some point we lost our magic.”
The area under my father’s eyes trembled. At least it wasn’t something to say in front of my father.
“What do you think of as magic?”
“The magic I think of is….”
After a moment, I revealed a thought I had been keeping for a long time.
“I think this is our school’s unique belief in defeating absolute evil.”
My father looked back at me with his eyes wide open, probably because the answer was unexpected.
“…is this our school’s belief in defeating absolute evil?”
“I don’t think it’s political factions that stand in opposition to us.”
“Then what is it?”
“It is absolute evil.”
Clearly, what I say now will not be easily accepted by my father. Nevertheless, I calmly conveyed my thoughts to my father.
“There is so much cowardice, viciousness, and extreme evil in the world that humans cannot bear it. It is an absolute evil that would make even the devil click his tongue. I think that the justice and cooperation advocated by all political factions may be able to suppress small evils, but they cannot handle this absolute evil. This is because political factions inherently have forgiveness at their core. “How can we endure the rampaging evil while giving up on being a human being who cares for others?”
My father was staring at me. It was my first time seeing him so focused on what I was saying. Perhaps deep down in my father’s heart, he is thinking this.
-Weren’t we the absolute evil?
-No, father. I hope that the Heavenly Demon Church in my world is not an absolute evil. I won’t do it.
My words continued.
“I think we must find the reason for our existence here, as we are the only ones in the world of martial arts who can destroy the meaner and more vicious evil. It doesn’t matter whether we are good or evil. Sometimes with the face of good, sometimes with the face of evil. I believe that true magic was finally established when a great evil that political factions could not handle fell on our knees and trembled before us. Only then will Moorim truly bow before the majesty of our school. When they can’t solve a problem on their own, they will ask us for help. They say that only the Heavenly Demon Church can save Wulin. “This is what I think of as magic.”
I can assure you that my father has never thought or heard of something like this even once in his life.
Because this idea was not something I learned or realized at my school. This is what I felt myself while wandering around the midfield all my life.
“If we don’t establish the magic path properly, we won’t last long. In order for us to survive… we must punish ourselves.”
Even my father, who was good at hiding his emotions, could not hide his shock at this moment. This is the father who blows an earth breeze in the face to confirm a lie. But at this moment, my father showed no reaction. Even though the story unfolded that even if the earth wind blew, it would have blown ten times more.
My father was deep in thought. Even though I lived a longer life than my father, I couldn’t guess what he was thinking right now.
But I feel one thing for sure.
It’s only been a few days since I returned, but the fates of my father and I are changing. We are beginning to turn towards a different future.
Finally, my father broke the long silence.
“Do you have any more arrogance left to shake?”
“No, not today.”
I scratched my head and smiled awkwardly.
“I think I know why Hyeolcheondoma came to me and told me to punish you.”
“Why?”
My father’s confident eyes shined intensely.
“I read something from you. That’s why I’m trying to test you through me.”
“I guess I read the possibility of him becoming a successor.”
“It may be a risk that will destroy our school.”
“Either way… this old man like a skull has some sense.”
My father stared at me for a moment, then walked out of the pavilion in stride as if he had made up his mind.
“Follow me.”
* * *
My father took me to the deepest part of Cheonmajeon. It was a place I had heard of and knew well.
A small signboard hung above the stone cave.
Socheon-dong (小天洞).
I was shocked and shouted to my father.
“You’re not telling me to go in here, are you?”
This is a kind of training center for the later masters who will become Cheonma.
Usually, the disciples or children of the Heavenly Demon enter when they are taking a test.
It should never be ignored as a training center.
You can go in as you please, but you cannot come out. I heard that if you can’t break through the gate, you’ll never be able to get out. The success rate is half. In fact, half of the Heavenly Demon’s blood relatives who entered this place lost their lives here.
That’s why my ambitious older brother never said he wanted to join this place.
However, it was also a place that one had to pass through at least once in order to become a Cheonma. Because all those who became Heavenly Demons passed through this place. Looking at it this way, Cheonma is also one of the extreme occupations.
“I went here too when I was your age.”
“So how soon did you come out?”
“Two months.”
“oh my god. “Are you telling me to spend two months of my brilliant youth in this dark and damp place?”
“Don’t be mistaken. For me, it’s two months, but the average breakthrough time is three years.”
My father is a man who is evaluated as having the greatest military talent among the Heavenly Demons of all time. Cheonmujiche may have been able to do this because he inherited his father’s blood.
“Father, why are you doing this to me?”
“Didn’t you say it earlier? “I plan on punishing you.”
“Isn’t this too harsh a punishment?”
“The sheep you killed will spend eternity underground.”
“He received cheers and applause from the people he had bullied.”
But my father had already made up his mind.
father. Are you really sending me to a place where I could die? You said that old man told you to punish him?
Suddenly, I remembered the mind-reading words my father had mentioned while hunting.
‘Do you mind if your son dies? Or are you hoping that I will come out stronger?’
It was a place where you would be punished if you didn’t make it out alive, but it could be a reward if you did come out alive.
‘Or are you trying to protect me from the blood chopping block that sticks out of my pocket like an awl?’
Because my father did not reveal his feelings at all, I had no idea what his intentions were.
When my father touched the stone slab next to the cave and injected his own internal force, the stone door opened.
Drum.
When my father looked at me telling me to stop nagging and go in, I no longer refused.
“great. “I will come out faster than my father.”
Drurr.
My father spoke through the closing stone door with a heartless yet spiteful smile.
“Good luck. Don’t die.”