Chapter 921: A Strange Bitch, A Strange Guy, A Strange Guy (6)

Qing let out a long sigh in her head.

Demonic arts, my ass. I want to go home...

She’d struck out. So obviously she should go back. Why would she insist on getting tangled up with some weird guy?

No—weird guys.

And while she was at it, she should shake off the Plunderer Demon too. If he tried to follow, she’d drag him straight to the Martial Alliance. Seriously.

It looked like the rampage she’d been worried about had stopped, so she figured this was about the time to wrap it up and stand.

Having made up her mind, Qing opened her mouth.

“Thank you for what you said, but my purpose is to find Heaven-Sundering Reverse-Blood Heart-Needle Pointing Art. It’s not something that warrants a recluse descending from the mountains. My search has failed, so I’ll take my leave now, without disturbing you any further.”

When you refuse someone, you have to be polite.

Qing straightened her posture and bowed her head.

If he’d just said, “I see,” and “Then go,” that would’ve been perfect, but some near-prophetic instinct told her that wasn’t how this would go.

And sure enough.

“Ah, so that’s your stance? You believe revenge only has meaning when you achieve it yourself, rather than borrowing another’s hand. Indeed... the nerve to go searching for demonic arts—truly, you’re a heroic woman.”

Kim Heojung, interpreting everything however he pleased.

“Then how about cultivating Black Warrior Dance? To accomplish the revenge you want, a world-class divine art that accepts pure nature would be far better than filthy demonic arts like that.”

Why is this “revenge” locked in as fact?

And you were just warning me about side effects, and now you’re asking if I want to learn? Do you need a hunchback buddy or something?

Qing forced down her disbelief.

“Didn’t you say it was a single-heir sect? I already have a teacher and a sect I serve, so I can’t join another sect. Thank you for the offer.”

“I-it’s fine, it’s fine. In this world, the only owner of the Black Warrior Sect is me, Kim Heojung—I am the Black Warrior Sect itself—so as the owner of the Black Warrior Sect, I will make a special exception and permit you the teaching.”

This bastard—did he have no sense, or did he just refuse to have any?

Well, it was probably no sense.

There were always people like this.

You don’t reject them bluntly because you’re trying to spare their pride, you keep it polite, and they don’t realize it’s a no—so they keep pushing.

And if you do cut them off cleanly, they get mad or act heartbreakingly wounded, and somehow you feel guilty even though you never asked for any of this.

Qing tried manners one more time.

If he still didn’t get it, she’d just say no. Whatever.

“I-I’m sorry, but... the side eff—no, um, I mean... the ability of that divine art to make someone resemble Black Warrior is... very difficult for me to bear.”

“I’m hurt, miss. Why would I ever try to damage your beauty? You can cultivate without worry. The Black Warrior Sect also has a training method that prevents the side effects of Black Warrior Dance. Progress will be a bit slower, but if anything, it worked out even better.”

Better for what, exactly?

And didn’t you just proudly say “side effects” yourself?

I went out of my way to soften it with ‘ability’ and all that, and you just straight-up called it side effects—so it is side effects.

And then something hit her.

Wait. Then why does he look like that?

She was genuinely curious, but saying it out loud would be... a little rude.

No—very rude.

But she wasn’t the only person sitting here.

“What the hell. There’s a method like that? Then why do you look like that? Why didn’t you cultivate it with the method that has no side effects?”

Yes! Martial-arts robber—beautiful interruption!

While Qing silently cheered, Kim Heojung’s already-warped face warped even more.

“That’s because... I was fooled. That dog bastard—no, I mean—when the one who taught me martial arts came looking for me, he was already old as hell, and it seems my talent was enough to stoke that old bastard’s impatience. If someone came saying they’d teach martial arts while looking like this, I wouldn’t have followed them either. If a guy runs his mouth about how all the beauties in the world will throw themselves at you, but he shows up looking like this, what idiot would follow him? I was fooled too. Fooled, I’m telling you!”

Rage started bleeding into Kim Heojung’s voice.

So. He learned martial arts to pick up women.

If you looked at it that way, it even made sense why he treated his teacher like a once-in-a-lifetime mortal enemy—why he kept letting slip that raw, blue hatred, calling him “that bastard,” “that dog bastard,” without even realizing it.

Honestly, if some freak with that face tried to lure you with “I’ll teach you martial arts,” even I would think some monster was trying to eat people.

“You know what that dog bastard said to me?”

Kim Heojung’s teacher used to say it like it was glued to his tongue.

Once you achieve great mastery, all side effects disappear.

Look at me—don’t I look perfectly fine?

So if you want to go out into the world and hold beauties in your arms, you have to work harder. Work. Woooork. Wooooooork. Is that how you’ll achieve great mastery? Are you going to live as a hunchback and die as one?

And then he only confessed right before dying.

I’m sorry. I thought I didn’t have long to live, so I rushed and created a training regimen, and unexpected side effects occurred.

I don’t know if it was because of the medicinal decoction, or because I broke taboos and mixed multiple methods, or because I performed great arts while skipping stages.

Still, thanks to that, didn’t you become a peerless master this quickly?

So I also recorded my method.

Go. Go find the other three of the Four Guardian Sect, and fulfill the long-standing wish of the sect.

But if you cannot fulfill the Four Guardian Sect’s desperate wish, then you must find a genius in the world who is close with water energy and teach them. Here—this is the secret manual passed down only to the sect leader of the era, and the Black Warrior Sect’s sacred heirloom—so you are now the owner of the Black Warrior Sect—gkh—gkheugh. Wh—khehk—y-you...!

“That dog-dick bastard—there’s a limit to how shameless you can be! I served him for twenty years! Twenty years—twenty years! For a full twenty years I nursed that old bastard like a slave, crawling and scraping!! And then what—what the hell is this!!!”

Kim Heojung’s voice kept rising.

That kind of layered rage—getting mad, then getting madder, until you can’t control it anymore.

“I don’t give a damn about the Four Guardian Sect! I don’t give a damn about its desperate wish!! The Black Warrior Sect ends here!!! You think I’m going to grant the wish of the dog bastard who ruined my life?! This dog-dick martial art needs to disappear! Disappear, I’m telling you!!!”

Kim Heojung panted—HFF, HFF—short, harsh breaths.

Facing that sudden eruption, Qing’s expression went awkward, and for some reason the pattern on the paper pasted to the wall looked so interesting today. She couldn’t stop staring at the wall.

But the Plunderer Demon, apparently lacking a human heart, opened his mouth without a shred of tact.

“Hoh. A method with no side effects? Then it must truly be a world-class divine art. A martial art that handles nature’s energy without even taking it into oneself.”

“Don’t you dare say that kind of—!!”

Kim Heojung flared.

Gongryang Sayoon jumped in to mediate.

“Kim Heojung, rather than that, may I have more honey cookies? That extraordinary taste won’t leave my head and lingers at the tip of my tongue.”

It wasn’t mediation. It was a request for more honey cookies.

Did Gongryang Sayoon also lack a human heart? Of course, if someone asked, they’d probably answer, “I’m not human, so perhaps that’s why.”

Kim Heojung, having had his tragic story treated as “that kind of thing,” jolted—

Ah! Now isn’t the time to get angry!

Endure it. Endure. Fairy Maiden and the Woodcutter. Fairy Maiden and the Woodcutter. Three kids. Three kids—

He repeated it to himself.

While teaching Black Warrior Dance, he could naturally correct posture, hold hands, hug, and then if that led to belly-to-belly contact, then kids would happen too. And if the angle didn’t come out right, he could use “training” as the excuse—make it a paired training method with a plausible name.

Fairy Maiden and the Woodcutter was a Joseon story where, (omitted), the point was—

If there were two children, you could hold one in each arm and run away, but if there were three, you couldn’t carry them all at once, so you couldn’t escape.

A very useful lesson!

Maybe it was a story from some primitive ancient age before Joseon’s greatest invention—the baby carrier—existed, but then again, if you had four kids, problem solved!

A terrifying scheme that would make even Zhuge Liang cry.

If he had to name it, it would be something like the Three-Daughter Lockdown Tactic.

Kim Heojung forced a smile at Qing, forced down the anger in his voice, and put on the speech of a proper young man.

“There are extras in the kitchen cooling down, so please have as much as you like. Now, where were we? You don’t need to worry about side effects, so wouldn’t it be far better for you to cultivate our sect’s divine art rather than demonic arts, miss?”

It was... honestly, a tempting pitch.

But if she was going to learn something anyway, why did it have to be Black Warrior Dance? If she could get it through Merit Exchange, then she could just learn Yellow Dragon Dance, the Four-Direction fusion art, and be done with it.

Qing, on a whim, quietly called up the exchange window and searched the name mentally.

Huh? What—why isn’t it showing up?

Yellow Dragon Dance, Azure Dragon Dance, Vermilion Bird Dance, Black Warrior Dance, White Tiger Dance—none of them showed up at all.

So Qing folded the thought away neatly.

Heema had cultivated something before—what was it, Heaven-and-Earth whatever—and that hadn’t been searchable either, and couldn’t be learned through oral formula, so maybe these were unfinished too?

Or maybe they were sorcery-based rather than martial arts, so the system didn’t allow them...

And more than anything—

She didn’t want to get entangled with this guy any further.

It was creepy in a way that wasn’t just “his face is creepy,” even though his face was absolutely creepy.

There was something deeper, something more fundamental, that repelled her.

“Thank you, but I still don’t even properly understand what I’ve already learned. I fear learning something new right now may only become poison to me.”

“Poison? You’ve already witnessed Black Warrior Dance’s divine authority yourself. How could communing with Heaven-and-Earth nature become poison?”

Qing sighed hard in her head.

Right. This type never understands if you refuse indirectly.

It’s not that I’m afraid of poison, I’m just saying I don’t want it—why can’t you understand that...?

So what now.

“As regrettable as it is, I have responsibilities within my sect, and I must return. Even if I learned something new, I wouldn’t be able to bear the time it would take.”

“T-then I will accompany you! The Central Plains sects, surely, do not refuse guests, yes? And among masters, don’t they fight to host one another and provide every kind of luxury and beautiful women—no, kkhm—there is such a culture, isn’t there? I will stay and observe your martial arts.”

The occasional real thought that slipped out was... kind of alarming.

Still, Qing shook her head.

“Our sect forbids men from entering due to internal regulations, so that’s also difficult. Thank you, but since I’ve confirmed Heaven-Sundering Reverse-Blood Heart-Needle Pointing Art is not here, I intend to leave now.”

Kim Heojung pressed his lips tight.

For a moment, with the misplacement of his eyes, nose, and mouth and the grotesque shape of his face, even Qing couldn’t read his expression—and tension rose.

Then—

“Say, could I stay a while? Or how about this? It sounds like you hate your sect. Wouldn’t spreading it far and wide be a pretty enjoyable revenge? And while you’re at it, if you spread the version with side effects everywhere, it’ll definitely be treated as a wicked demonic art. If you spread the martial art your teacher treasured so horribly as a demonic art across the entire world...? I can help actively.”

Even now, the Plunderer Demon was coveting the martial art.

As expected of a martial-arts robber—professional to the bone. Because that was basically him asking to be taught Black Warrior Dance.

“...Why.”

“Hm?”

“Why the hell...!”

Kim Heojung’s voice turned damp.

A damp voice—meaning: a crying voice.

“You hate me because I’m ugly, right? I know. I know. But is it my fault I look like this? I was fooled too. I didn’t want to end up like this either.”

Qing startled.

If this bastard blew up, she’d have to suffer through the same hell again.

Except this time, the Plunderer Demon—who coveted Black Warrior Dance—wouldn’t be on her side. He’d be on that side.

No. That’s too much.

So Qing desperately put on the gentlest voice she could.

“Kim Heojung? Calm down for a second. Don’t say things like ugly. Let’s think nicely, okay? Uh—right—your look is distinctive. Your eyes, nose, and mouth each have their own convictions. Once someone sees you once, they can’t forget you. Right? It’s all about how you look at it—there’s no need to blame yourself. Even I’m like—wow, you’ve got character. There’s nobody in the world who looks like you. You’re one of a kind. Unique.”

If Gongryang Sayoon were here, they might’ve said, The Heavenly Flower Sword is worse.

But Gongryang Sayoon had gone to hunt for more honey cookies and showed no sign of coming back.

Amazingly, Kim Heojung’s mouth twitched slightly.

It looked like his mood improved!

“M-miss... do you truly think so?”

“Of course! A person’s important part is the inside, not the outside. And anyway, everyone gets shriveled and ugly when they’re old—nobody lives by eating someone’s face. If anything, personality matters more, right? And from what I saw, you brew tea well, your cookies were incredible, and you look like you’d be a great cook too. Am I right?”

“That is correct. Not because it’s my cooking, but because no cook in Joseon—no, not even the royal kitchen—could surpass my skill. I have eaten the cuisine of noble households in Hanseong, so I know this for a fact.”

“See? That’s all charm! And how important is food-power in living? And also, uh, um—right—you’re a master. A master who’s in... Transcendent—no, in that realm, wow, your ability is impressive.”

“Strictly speaking, it is not the Transcendent Realm. It is called Mind-Becomes-Thing—the realm of Thing-Change. It is a different track entirely from the low-grade martial arts of the Central Plains.”

“Right? Look. You’re absolutely someone amazing, and when you look at the good parts, you’re this impressive person. So you don’t need to cling to something as small as a shell of flesh, right? You can be proud of yourself. You’re someone who was born to be loved. From now on, let’s decide to be proud of ourselves. Okay? Come on—promise.”

His expression was hard to read as always, but the way he was grinning made it clear his mood had fully melted away.

Relieved, Qing held out her pinky.

But then—

Kim Heojung grabbed her hand with both of his, hard.

And then—

“Miss, I have waited my entire life for a woman like you. Please marry me. I will make you happy for the rest of your life.”

Ah.