Chapter 470: I Don’t Believe in Legends (6)

Qing was waiting for the food to come.

Once the order was made, the time until the dishes arrived dragged on endlessly.

Far too long...

Everyone had just come down the mountain after days of eating, sleeping, and hacking away at blades in misery. Now their bodies were like beaten rags.

They slumped in their chairs, eyes vacant and hollow.

Jin Jangmyeong even started nodding off.

That was when it happened.

Ssshhk—one man stepped up to their table.

Qing looked up. Beneath the brim of a bang-gat, a well-grown beard peeked out. A striking beard.

Not as though it had been carefully trimmed.

That sort of beard was simply born, not groomed.

But—who the hell was this?

Qing didn’t know a single person with such a magnificent beard.

And certainly not one who wielded twin swords.

“Say... from what I see, that’s quite a lot for you to finish. Would you allow me to help myself to a little?”

The fuck is this bastard?

Qing blinked in disbelief.

He’d come all this way just to ask for food?

And with such brazen shamelessness, too.

Aside from the dozing Jangmyeong, both Master and Murong Juhee were staring at Qing with the same speechless expression.

Do you know him? What are you going to do?

Qing’s gaze flicked up, above the brim of the bang-gat.

Sure enough, a blue number—unmistakably one of those not used in the Central Plains—was floating there.

What? A virtuous one?

Qing was extremely generous toward the virtuous.

And honestly, the three of them didn’t look capable of properly eating anyway.

“Fine, just this once.”

“Hm? Truly?”

The man was actually startled.

He hadn’t expected her to agree so easily.

“What, didn’t you say you wanted to eat with us?”

“That takes the fun out of it.”

Qing’s brow flattened into a straight line.

Fun?

Was he hoping to rob them if she refused?

How starving must he have been to come begging at someone else’s table? She’d pitied him enough to let him join, and now he was looking for amusement?

Should she just chase him out?

Just as Qing was thinking that—

“Hey there. Sword-friend. Long time.”

The man lifted his bang-gat ever so slightly.

Qing’s eyes went wide.

That familiar face beneath the beard.

It was Namgung Sinjae.

“What the—what are you doing here?”

Qing’s delighted shout jolted Jin Jangmyeong awake.

“Ran away from home again.”

“Ah.”

Come to think of it, hadn’t he also been on the run when they first met?

Apparently he just enjoyed running away.

Namgung Sinjae bowed politely.

“Forgive me, Elder. I am called Namjae, a sword-friend of this comrade. I only meant to tease her a bit—please look on me kindly.”

“Well, that happens.”

“And greetings to you as well, young lady?”

“Excuse me, you—”

“Not ‘you.’ Call me Namjae.”

Of course Murong Juhee recognized him at once.

Namgung Sinjae plopped himself down in a chair with easy confidence.

“So, friends. Ah—what were your names again? I can’t recall.”

What he meant was obvious: since they were disguised, what names should he use?

“This Elder is Baekjang, I’m Baekil, that one’s Baeki, and that one over there is Baeksam.”

They’d changed aliases again, knowing the Tyrant Force Sect would be hunting them.

The names were sloppy enough that anyone could tell they were fakes, but in Jimo, where everyone was using false names anyway, no one would care.

“Right, that’s it.”

Only then did Qing feel a jolt of amazement.

If he was asking what to call them, it meant he’d recognized her despite the disguise.

How? Even she couldn’t tell herself apart in the mirror.

“What the—how’d you know?”

“Height, length of the arms, the stride of the legs. Those alone set the range of a swordsman’s blade and his step. That’s how one measures a swordsman’s distance.”

He claimed he had recognized her by the proportions of her limbs.

“......?”

Qing tilted her head.

Do people usually recognize others by that?

Is that even possible?

She glanced at Cheon Yuhak.

Can you really tell someone by that?

Cheon Yuhak shook his head.

Of course not.

“Anyway, let’s eat first.”

That was why, instead of using a private room, they had come down to the first floor.

Why?

Qing herself had no thought behind it.

Though in fact, it was Cheon Yuhak’s reasoning.

Coming into the finest inn dressed like beggars was already suspicious.

If they had taken a private room on top of that, even more eyes would have been on them.

And suspicious people drew scrutiny.

Better instead to make themselves into a spectacle.

If Qing showed off her unmatched eating prowess in public, they would no longer be “suspicious”—just “weird.”

After all, truly suspicious people avoided attention.

So that’s what Qing did.

Dish after dish vanished, until three full meals were devoured.

At first the other guests only glanced at her.

Then they stared openly.

Soon, entranced, they couldn’t look away from the inhuman gluttony unfolding before them.

Would she really finish it all?

The sight was thrilling, palm-sweating.

At last Qing popped the final bite into her mouth and raised her fist high.

The inn erupted in cheers, applause, whistles, and shouts.

—Fweeeeeeet!

“What an eater!”

“A true God of Food! A God of Food indeed!”

“God of Food? Look at that piggish gorging! Not a God of Food, a Wild Boar!”

“Amazing!”

“Boar! Boar! Boar!”

“Waiter! What was that dish the young lady just dev—just ate!?”

Wild Boar. San-jeo.

Qing’s eyebrow twitched.

Boar? Which bastard started that?

Still, thanks to her, the inn was now as lively as a feast.

Seeing her eat had sparked appetites; the waiter was sprinting around filling orders.

Meanwhile, Qing and her group went upstairs.

“This is my second Master. Master, this is Namgung Sinjae—eldest son of the Namgung Clan, right?”

“That’s right. Greetings. A moment ago you seemed to be using false names, so I couldn’t properly introduce myself. I am Namgung Sinjae. Seo Mun Lady and I are sword-friends.”

In truth, Cheon Yuhak had already seen Namgung Sinjae several times back when he had played the role of a Martial Alliance worker.

But Sinjae, however sharp-eyed, had not memorized the arm lengths of random Alliance errand boys.

So for him, this was a first meeting.

Still, Cheon Yuhak had heard the term “sword-friend” many times before.

For Jin Jangmyeong, though, this was the first time.

He poked Qing in the side.

Qing was ticklish, so of course she shrieked at once.

“Kyaaa! Hey, just ask!”

“So... what’s a sword-friend?”

“Little brother! If you’ve asked what a sword-friend is, then it is only right that I answer!”

Qing tilted her head.

Sword-friends—were they supposed to save the world and preserve peace?

Did the word carry such weight?

“Sword-friend means a friendship bound by the sword, a term only true swordsmen may use. No, calling it friendship is too cheap—it cannot capture the bond, the inexorable tie that is sword-friendship. Do you understand?”

“Not really.”

Of course not.

“And this gentleman?”

“Ah. My younger brother, Jin Jangmyeong. Second disciple of the Divine Lady’s Gate. This is Namgung Sinjae, eldest son of the Namgung Clan.”

“Ah—I’ve committed a faux pas. I mistook the young lady for younger than she is.”

The vein on Jangmyeong’s forehead bulged.

Not every woman took kindly to being told she looked young.

For women around twenty, it was practically a taboo.

Add to that the fact that the man saying it was handsome, and it only made it worse.

There was a reason Namgung Sinjae was nicknamed “Sword Tooth.”

Even at the Daoist gates he’d toyed with words about “half a sword”—the man was shameless.

Being in front of women didn’t change that.

It wasn’t that he lacked tact—he simply chose not to use it.

“But what’s with the twin swords?”

Qing had carried multiple swords herself, but never one at each hip.

She’d always lined them up on one side, or slung one across her back.

Because she drew with her right hand.

But Sinjae wore one at each side.

He meant to use two at once.

“Come now, sword-friend. Are you blind? These aren’t mere twin swords.”

A vein popped on Murong Juhee’s forehead.

Of course, twin swords were often seen as a mark of failure.

But saying so to the face of one who used them was out of line.

Yet Sinjae was a genuine swordsman.

He didn’t care about the stigma.

“This is Two-Sword.”

“Eh.”

“Don’t you understand? Twin-sword arts assume two blades as one style. Two blades but only one martial art—it’s no different than half a sword. Don’t you agree?”

Murong Juhee’s eyes blazed.

“Excuse me!? My clan’s twin-sword style is not a single art—it harmonizes two sword arts together!”

“Pride is fine, but you know the truth, don’t you? Neither art stands alone. From the start, they were made to be wielded together. As I’ve heard, the twin paths of the blades lean left and right, high and low, to avoid entanglement.”

“That’s to prevent the sword-roads from tangling—”

Sinjae cut her off.

“An excuse, isn’t it? A true swordsman makes two independent arts move at once. Not one sword compensating the other, but two different arts, from one hand each.”

“That’s impossible! If you use two sword arts that aren’t designed for it, of course the paths will tangle—”

He cut her off again.

“Impossible? Who decided that? Martial arts is always the struggle to overcome the impossible. If swinging ten thousand times isn’t enough, swing ten thousand more. And ten thousand again. I’ve sworn to see the end of my sword—so I’ll train until I transcend.”

A fine speech indeed.

But Murong Juhee had been cut off twice now. Her blood was boiling.

And the worst part was, his reply sounded convincing.

It was the parable of Moving Mountains all over again.

There was once a foolish old man. He thought the mountains blocking his village had to be removed for progress.

So every day, he carried dirt away.

A wise elder tried to dissuade him.

But the old man said: if not me, then my children; if not them, then my grandchildren; if not them, then my great-grandchildren. Eventually, the mountain would vanish.

A creed of sheer stubbornness—so foolish that it became terrifying.

Even the Mountain Spirit was shaken and asked the Jade Emperor to stop him.

But alas, the Jade Emperor was also a man of “perseverance.”

He was moved by the old man’s resolve to burden his descendants with endless labor.

And so he moved the mountains.

Thus the Daoist text praised the old man’s grit and mocked the wise elder for giving up without trying.

Murong Juhee had no intention of playing the wise elder here.

The best course was simply not to engage with a madman.

And truly, that was the wisest choice.

“But sword-friend, why the disguise? I wasn’t sure at first, but when I saw you ordering food, I was convinced.”

“Ah. Well...”

Qing recounted their recent story.

The rise of the vile Absorbing Qi Demonic Art!

The even greater evil of the heretics’ massacres!

A chain of grudges chasing one after another like a cursed transmission!

The grudge-trail had begun with the Blood Sect’s raid, circled Mount Lao, and carried vengeance from sect to sect, each striking another within a day...