Chapter 593: Journey to Kunlun (6)

From the last Sword-Cut Wall circuit, everyone had tried to bring as many people along as possible.

Well, if it’s the Heavenly Martial Emperor’s insights, the value is beyond reckoning.

Masters and those stuck at bottlenecks flocked in droves, hoping to snag even a single hair’s worth.

Then why Kunlun? Why so few people?

At most a sparse nine—and that was nine even without my party, since they asked us to excuse ourselves as this was a sect event.

They said the space was tight, but how tight could “tight” be?

Did the Heavenly Martial Emperor wedge himself between two rocks and swing a sword?

I can’t picture it, and that old man doesn’t feel like the type.

If anything, he’d collapse a cliff while muttering “Who swings a sword in a place like this,” rather than flail in a cramped spot... right?

“Oh—right. Master Danlun attained a realization. Looked like explaining it to me turned him inward mid-sentence.”

“Yes, yes. Very good. That aside—let’s go. The place gets no sunlight; if we’re any later it’ll be pitch-black.”

And so Master Danlun became a “that aside.”

Everyone truly acted like they didn’t care.

When I made a face that said, Is this okay? Is he being excluded? He does hole up where no one is... Bungsain—wedged in as a non-voting “representative of the three senior disciples”—offered commentary.

“Master Danlun never cared for martial arts, and now that he’s past fifty, it isn’t strange to step into super-transcendent at any time. Everyone figured he’d at least reach it before seventy.”

“Past fifty” comes from Confucius: at fifty a man discerns Heaven’s decree upon his life.

“Seventy” comes from his saying that at seventy a man may follow his heart’s desire without overstepping the bounds of law—because he’s that wise.

Mm. So Master Danlun is fairly up there.

Seems truly no one expected much.

Our group started toward a more and more secluded place and then slipped into a narrow defile barely wide enough for one person to pass.

If Jegal Ihyeon tried, he’d have to tuck his shoulders to squeeze through.

At the end, a little clearing.

A small basin nestled between cliffs, like an inverted cone.

Wider toward the top—like a hole punched in the sky.

I finally understood Sect Leader Cheon Bija’s warning that it would be blacker if we delayed.

Even now, it was already under shadow—dim and murky.

If the people crowding close by weren’t Kunlun Daoists, this would be just the kind of creepy, secluded spot where I’d mete out punishment for “what exactly did you bring me here to do?”

I swept my eyes around.

But aside from the peculiar terrain, there was nothing that looked like sword-marks.

“This is the Sword-Cut Wall? No matter how I look, I don’t see any sword-scars.”

“Really? Are your eyeballs bent? If you can’t see with eyes, why do you carry them? Are they decorations so you won’t look blind?”

A sudden torrent of filthy words.

“Eh?”

“Look at this, look at this. When you see an elder, you slam your skull to the floor and boom out a greeting—what’s with ‘eh’? Heavens, the future of the martial world is dark—dark! A depraved great demon parades around calling herself an orthodox heroine—what exactly is going on these days?”

A string of pure gemlike (say it fast) denunciations.

Now that I think of it, he was like this last time too.

A year has passed; I’d forgotten the way that foulmouthed old man’s gravelly picking burrowed into my ears.

I tilted my head, following the voice.

Way, way up—two soles floating in empty air.

The Heavenly Martial Emperor—grandpa.

“Hey, cut it out with the ‘great demon’ thing. And I’m in the Flower Realm now, you know? The great demon and I are over for good.”

“Hmph. If you’re in Demon-Heart State you’re a demon, and if you’re in the Flower Realm you’re a Daoist? If a woman who kills people grins because she enjoys it isn’t a great demon, then what—go on, let’s hear it.”

“Hear what?”

“What kind of circus is the martial world running so that killers like you aren’t called great demons? In my day they’d shriek ‘black arts’ and ‘demon’ if your hand speed was even a little cruel.”

“Sir. Could you—like—do one thing at a time?”

I looked around.

Huh. It got brighter?

Before, the world was a gray wash, black-and-white contrast; now it was a panorama in full natural color.

“Well, you’ve entered the Flower Realm, so you can see more. A shame—if you’d fallen into Demon-Heart State I’d have cut you down on the spot.”

“Are you really my ideation? I hear you ascended as an immortal; are you coming down to pretend you’re a figment?”

Back at Zhongnan, during the Heavenly Martial Emperor’s “counseling hour” (with added insults), he’d said it:

my mind reacted to the sword-will etched in the wall, and the figure of the Heavenly Martial Emperor that I habitually pictured assembled itself.

Except—it doesn’t feel like that.

I’m sure he slipped his tongue a few times last time, too?

“You vicious girl—so suspicious.”

“No. It doesn’t add up. I saw seven forms at Zhongnan; how does that continue? What, was Kunlun nine forms?”

“Hardly. How would boys who can’t even stand properly have nine forms? I wasn’t going to leave any behind, but when I was handing out parting gifts to the Nine Schools, wouldn’t it be pitiful to leave them out?”

“Eh.”

“How long do you plan to stay buried underground? Practicing Earth-Burrowing? Granted, it pleases me that, seeing this great senior, a wench like you can’t dare be on the same level and buries herself—but still.”

“Excuse me? Urk!”

Suddenly my vision went black and a crushing pressure slammed my whole body!

Save me, Heavenly Flower Sword! The old codger is finally grabbing me! I knew it when he started tsk-tsking “this wench, that wench”!

A snickering, sleazy laugh rang by my ear.

And a moment later—

The ground in front of the Heavenly Martial Emperor heaved.

Then dirt and gravel exploded upward, and—pop—my upper body burst out, gasping hard.

“What the—do you pack the earth now too?”

“Enough. Sit.”

As before, I plopped down—thud—planting my giant backside on the ground.

At his gesture, a massive sword flew over and hovered.

He perched on it, tossed his left leg across his right thigh, and sat at a cant.

“You’re a bit gentler than last time?”

“I told you—I’m what your mind made. Then, you were in a state where you wanted to be cursed that hard. Now, less so.”

“Makes me... a lot better, I guess.”

“If a Flower Realm warrior still acts like that, we have a problem. Has the thrill of killing faded any?”

“No? Still electric. Always the best.”

“With that open mouth, you spit anything.”

“Isn’t this my mind anyway? If I lie, you’ll just lay into me for ‘now she’s a liar too,’ right?”

He can read my thoughts, after all.

“Oh? Get comfy a little and you think we’re buddies?”

“Ooh. Since you mention it, wanna be friends?”

“Now—what comes to mind with Kunlun?”

The Heavenly Martial Emperor—ever shifting the topic the moment anything disadvantageous or annoying appears.

“Wasn’t a question. I know you’re thick; no need to grind that stalled brain. Straight to Cloud-Dragon Eight Forms.”

“Well, it’s purple.”

“Hmph. Purple, my foot. If the user wears violet, even a third-rate art looks like divine skill. If you teach divine skill to the village idiot, will an unrivaled master pop out? Eh—ram it hard enough and you’ll stamp the Flower Realm somehow.”

“Huh? Did you just say ‘ram’—”

“Cloud-Dragon Eight Forms, Dragon-and-Phoenix Nine Forms, Dragon-Form Steps, Great Pure No-Phase Sword, Great Pure Steel Qi, take out the Shedding Fate Saber, Bell-Ringing Golden Palm, Cloud-Crane Palm, Falling-Goose Fist, Cloud-Dragon Soar, Dragon’s Spiral Kick—and these supposed ‘orthodox’ brats even use hooks. A hook-throwing art they call Curved-Tail Fox—hooks on ropes. Now, after all that, even a blockhead like you sees the problem, yes?”

“Gods, you only say your piece. My answer? I’ve got no clue.”

“So now you won’t even try to think? What do you do with this, then?”

He jabbed his index finger, pressing the air.

My head tipped back in time with each poke.

“Hey—that’s ‘See the Moon, Forget the Finger,’ isn’t it? You said there weren’t nine forms. When you carved these sword-marks, that form wasn’t even made yet—how are you using it now?”

“You won’t think about the puzzle I set and put all your attention on whether I’m ‘real.’ Want a plausible story? I came out of your ideation, so it’s suspicious the owner uses ‘See the Moon, Forget the Finger’ you already know?”

“That is wildly suspicious.”

“Did you think I set the sequence of forms by whim and fancy? I completed all nine first and then made my rounds. By the time I carved my wall, I knew the lot.”

“Being too logical is more suspicious.”

“Try thinking a little. Should I flop around and embarrass myself in front of juniors? I’d practiced it thousands of times and carved it at the most splendid angle.”

For a moment, an image flashed—him alone, adjusting the angle of his body to look coolest in front of juniors as he swung.

“Ugh—don’t. The parts that were still cool are getting weird. My respect is leaking away.”

“Drop it. Kunlun brats think of nothing but flying. Sure, their hometown terrain was so vicious you couldn’t just walk around, so I do get it. But look at the names of their arts. You know names matter, right?”

“Because martial arts are, in a sense, sorcery?”

“Exactly. So—dragons, phoenixes, cranes, clouds, plus the lofty Great Pure heavens. If you go up and down those brutal Kunlun spurs, how can you not yearn to fly?”

“Hehe. I haven’t been to Kunlun. Honestly I tend to look down on mountains.”

“You’ve been to Mount Hua, yes? Compared to Kunlun, Mount Hua is a gentle hill. A hill.”

“Ah.”

Understood in one blow.

Mount Hua—just a hill.

Before the move, what kind of life were Kunlun Daoists even living?

“Nothing but hard labor. Why go to such a godforsaken backcountry—no, a place needs people to be a ‘country.’ It’s just the middle of nowhere. They went there on their own feet and then spent their lives staring at the sky, thinking, ‘I’d love to fly,’ always choosing what’s easy for themselves. Pathetic.”

“Staring at the sky isn’t unique to Kunlun. The Zhongnan folks did it too—though at night, and specifically stargazing.”

“Not the same. The Zhongnan lot kept their feet planted firmly on earth before looking up. Unlike Kunlun’s brats, they didn’t look at the sky without knowing how to stand, flitting about awkwardly. Like you.”

“Why am I getting roasted again, here?”

“Hmph. I heard they’d moved and thought, ‘Ah, an enlightened bunch at last,’ but when I asked, they only made excuses.”

Kunlun Mountain is simply a people-less nowhere.

The Demonic Sect in Tianshan, at least, sits where the Silk Road lies open north to the Western Regions and south to the Middle Kingdom.

So Kunlun’s greatest hardship was recruiting disciples.

Martial arts are best learned young, but to take on a disciple you had to walk a thousand miles to the Middle Kingdom.

Go and “pick one up,” sure—but when do you get back!?

And you went out alone; you returned with a child just initiated into martial skill at your side.

I nodded along.

“Then it was worth moving.”

“Who’s criticizing the move? But shoulders hunched like a girl, they go, ‘It’s not that; we really had no choice,’ sniveling out excuses.”

“And then?”

“If you moved, say it with your chest. ‘We moved, so what—problem?’ Learn to challenge back. Why can’t you be aboveboard?”

He snorted, huffing through his nose, then looked down at me with eyes that said, Thoroughly disappointing.

So I felt very wronged.

Why are we talking about Kunlun—and why am I the one getting scolded?