I stayed holed up underground for a good long while, terrified of stepping out and running into Cheongwol.
When I dozed off lightly and woke, the sounds of villagers slowly rising drifted in like a murmur.
It was the same dawn as always.
“...”
I swallowed dryly and touched the back of my neck.
It was still there.
Was I really surviving this?
Yesterday's events still didn't feel real at all.
Life-Pursuing Ghost Cheongwol.
And I got tangled up with that lunatic, she even found my SM gear, and I survived?
“...”
I thought about it for a long time.
Trying somehow to make sense of this absurd situation.
...No matter how much I thought, I couldn't understand it.
“...Damn it.”
Whatever.
Pondering it endlessly wouldn't change a thing.
It was the survival method I'd learned from Beggars' Sect elders who slept carefree anywhere.
If you're alive, you're alive—what's there to nitpick?
Does thinking change it?
Good is good.
Strictly speaking, you only want to smash and kill when you resent or hate someone. If they're filthy and disgusting, you just want to avoid them.
Like if you're walking and bump shoulders, starting a fight, but then the guy suddenly drops his pants, flashes his tighty-whities, and shakes his hips—you'd want to run.
Beggars' Sect elders brim with chivalry and rage like fire at injustice, but they don't sleep in shit-stained spots.
Maybe that's how I came across to Cheongwol?
Asking a nun from the famously chaste Emei Sect, "Can you pee outside?"
It might be the most sordid—and at the same time, the luckiest—thing I'd ever said in my life.
Easy to forget, but chastity standards in this world were far, far more conservative than we imagine.
Modern folks get exposed to dirty pics or porn on smartphones, so their thresholds drop without realizing.
Central Plains people are different.
It's a world where grown men hunch over at a single ink-drawn erotic painting, hemming and hawing.
Bikinis and short shorts—Western foreigners' skin-baring, environment-destroying invasive fashion—don't even exist. Even the courtesans here don't expose that much.
I hear stories from Beggars' Sect elders.
Tales from men who've spent a night with courtesans.
The stories gush about how soft and beautiful they were, but the main event? Dull missionary.
Why would I bother making all sorts of toys out of boredom?
Yet hearing those bland tales, seeing those men hem and hunch, just makes me sigh.
The myriad plays my dirty mind conjures aren't normal in this world.
The plays I know would make me worse than a beast here.
In such a world.
An Emei Sect disciple, no less.
Especially one nicknamed "the flower that blooms once every millennium in the Emei Sect"—the shock of what I said to Cheongwol... I couldn't even imagine.
So that's why I saw her flee in that bizarre way.
“...”
Still, if she found me repulsive, that was a relief.
That's why I survived, right?
Embarrassing, sure, but as I said—good is good.
Think of me as filthy all you want.
Just let me live...
I slunk out of the basement like a cockroach.
Maybe because my sexual tastes got exposed, I felt shrunk in on myself.
A day where even basking in sunlight felt sorry.
“...”
Looking around the room, my clothes were shoved aggressively into the corner of the bedding.
The ones I'd lent Cheongwol briefly while drying her wet uniform yesterday.
It showed how frantically she'd left.
...How goosebumped must she have been.
And Cheongwol fleeing like that.
A future even the protagonist wouldn't see.
If I ever meet the protagonist later, should I tip him off?
Tell him if Cheongwol chases you, ask if she can pee outside. She'll run.
“...”
Still, if we could just go our separate ways like this, I'd want nothing more.
I prepared for business today as usual.
Mind troubled or not, work was work.
About to open the big shop window to signal the start...
“...Huh?”
What caught my eye was a single postcard stabbed into the wall.
I frowned and read the short message.
But in my head, it read differently.
“...”
Ah.
Of course.
That embodiment of obsession wouldn't let me off.
...Should I run?
As my thoughts deepened, the back of the postcard seemed to speak too.
It was the Life-Pursuing Ghost's voice.
****
Cheongwol's sword sliced through the morning air.
Sweat scattered, sprinkling the ground.
The hem she'd tried to dry was soaked again before long.
She wanted to clear her mind.
Too much had happened yesterday.
The bandits' faces resurfaced vividly.
To forget the guilt and relief she'd felt then, she swung her sword.
Even with eyes closed, the sword flowed smoothly.
She forcibly suppressed the explosive urge to swing wildly.
This desire to rampage endlessly—was it a heart demon?
...She let even that thought flow into her sword path.
‘Can you obey an shameful command?’
Her foot slipped slightly.
Her nose wrinkled.
Composure. Composure.
With a long exhale, she kept swinging blindly...
‘-For example, making you, y-you pee outside...’
But at the weed-like thought sprouting again, she stabbed her wooden sword into the ground.
“Haa... haa...”
Cheongwol stopped all motion, breathing lightly.
“...That damn bastard...!”
Her dizzy mind wouldn't empty.
The more she thought, the hotter her face burned. Anger, shame, something in between kept assaulting her.
That one filthy word from Han Seojin tormented her more than killing the bandits.
“...Ah!”
At the sudden presence, Cheongwol whipped around.
There stood one person quietly watching her with wrinkled eyes.
Emei Sect's Sect Leader.
Muwol Satae.
It was she who had saved and taken in Cheongwol, orphaned by bandits slaughtering her parents.
Cheongwol still couldn't forget that day's shock.
The heroine who appeared before the powerless crying girl, felling them all with elegant swordsmanship.
Even amid that terror, that despair, ignorant of the sword as she was, Muwol Satae had been utterly beautiful.
‘Stop crying, child. What's your name?’
‘....’
Back when she hadn't yet received her dharma name.
‘I'm sorry I didn't come sooner. Any remaining family?’
‘...Hic...’
‘Stop.’
Contrary to her firm tone, Muwol Satae held the crying Cheongwol long, soothing her.
When she calmed, she said:
‘...Will you follow me?’
Cheongwol nodded through tears.
‘...Yes.’
That day, their bond began.
To Cheongwol, Muwol Satae was a benefactor standing in for her parents.
Formally, Soun was her master...
But whether from duty for saving her, there was an inexplicable special bond between Sect Leader and Cheongwol.
When she wept quietly missing her parents, the Sect Leader approached wordlessly, patting her shoulder.
When she'd lost appetite from endless vegetable rice, slipping her a sweet in secret.
The warm words in stolen moments, the wisdom teaching her life.
She took up the sword, accepted the dharma name "Cheongwol," cast off her past name to become a true successor—all to repay even a fraction of that grace.
To make her proud.
To make her see saving her as fortune.
...But lately, it all felt creaky.
“...Greetings to the Sect Leader.”
She murmured, clasping hands in salute.
Had she watched that pathetic training?
...She rarely shows, so why today of all days...
Cheongwol lowered her eyes.
Fearing disappointment in the Sect Leader's gaze.
Lately, it was all scoldings.
She couldn't recall the last warm word.
As Cheongwol ventured more into the Central Plains, worry or disappointment—who knew.
Muwol Satae had grown stricter.
Still, wait a moment and it'd pass.
The Sect Leader usually passed without a word.
“...Wol, come here.”
But the following words squeezed Cheongwol's heart suddenly.
Why call now?
Does she know about yesterday?
...No, even the Sect Leader couldn't.
Cheongwol stiffened long, then stepped heavily forward.
“...You stayed out overnight.”
The Sect Leader said quietly.
“Yes.”
“...Roll up your sleeve.”
Cheongwol frowned slightly.
Realizing what suspicion.
She offered her forearm.
There shone the vivid red lotus mark of the Virgin Palace Mark.
Stamped on all entering Emei Sect.
Vanishing only with intercourse, guarding the womb—hence Virgin Palace Mark.
Only then did the Sect Leader nod faintly, releasing her arm.
A sudden pang of grievance rose, and Cheongwol spoke.
“...Do you still doubt me?”
The Sect Leader gazed straight at her chest, expression unchanging.
“...With your qi so unstable, how can I not worry? Some stray thought plagues you.”
This time, truly, Cheongwol's heart lurched.
You see the unstable qi, but not my efforts?
While everyone sleeps deep, I swing my sword.
...You don't see that?
Cheongwol swallowed her suppressed emotions, whispering offhand.
“...I have no interest in sex or men.”
The Sect Leader didn't buy it fully.
“...Everyone has lust. Even Shaolin's abbot likely does. Don't deny it outright, ignoring the hardship.”
Cheongwol's gut twisted.
Right. Maybe lust lurks somewhere.
She was human too.
But didn't she know—more desperately, more deeply, she craved something else, leaving no time for that desire?
...Your approval. One word of praise.
That's all she wanted.
...Or did she know and pretend not?
Either way, it hurt deeply.
She wanted to argue, but it'd echo hollow, unanswered.
She knew from experience.
In the end, Cheongwol shut her mouth again.
Right. Strictly speaking...
“...I'll refrain from nighttime outings.”
The fault was hers.
So she killed off another thread of her heart.
And killing her heart like that let other stray thoughts sprout.
...Yesterday's bandits. Should've killed them more brutally...
“...”
...Cheongwol snapped alert.
What thought was that?
The Sect Leader was speaking.
“Don't forget the sect evaluation coming soon.”
Cheongwol blinked, answering.
“...Yes.”
"That's right. That's all."
Sect evaluation.
Fear welled. Could she meet expectations?
The Sect Leader nodded to leave... then murmured low.
“...Wol, you are Emei Sect's future in your era. Always remember.”
“...”
Only after the Sect Leader left did Cheongwol exhale deeply.
“...Hoo.”
She slowly squatted, burying her face in her knees.
Her expression had twisted badly before she knew.
Emei Sect's future. Emei Sect's Thousand-Year Flower.
She'd never wanted such things.
The Sect Leader's disappointment at unmet hopes irked her now.
She just wanted one smiling face.
Was that desire so extravagant?
‘People tie ropes around themselves without realizing. Social expectations, duty, status—they can bind like ropes. This lack of freedom soaks clothes like drizzle, becoming immense pressure over time.’
Han Seojin's voice echoed again.
Cheongwol gritted her teeth.
“...Shut up.”
Because of you, my training failed, leading to this with the Sect Leader.
Han Seojin wouldn't stop babbling.
‘Controlled, realizing again how small and powerless you are! Only then are you free from the world's expectations, right?’
Endure the pressure or pee outside—one or the other?
Think I'd believe that mad nonsense?
“...”
Her fingertips trembled faintly.
An indescribable emotion writhed somewhere in her chest.
Not shame, anger, injustice—none fit.
Cheongwol took up her sword again.
She suppressed anew the urge to shatter and destroy everything.