Looking at the siblings' dumbfounded faces, I settled my course of action more firmly.
The Sword Star's whereabouts aside, I'm also the only one who knows what this book can do.
Then what if I produce things out of thin air, and they're all tremendously precious?
Whatever I say will be lent credibility.
Half-believing is enough. Then they won't be able to kill me, and likewise they won't be able to kill the people I'm trying to save.
After that, there's no problem.
Once I calm this chaos and just survive, there'll be a next step.
I'm sick of just getting swept along, too.
If I've got the means in hand, all I have to do is carry it out.
Just like I learned to read first to catch Teacher's eye and got acquainted with Mister Jang the bookshop owner.
Becoming a retainer easily was a kindness, but I was the one who deliberately created the process leading up to it.
If anything, this is how I've always done things.
“First…….”
To grasp the situation more clearly, I pretended to dust off my hands and bought all the martial arts.
I'd planned to run my mouth and say he'd entrusted these to me too if they appeared as secret manuals, but conveniently, that wasn't how it went.
The feeling from when the book read me briefly passed over me.
This time, instead of being read, something was engraved into my brain.
Is this what they call a formula?
The locations of the acupoints in various parts of the body, how true qi flows through them, and how techniques should manifest.
It felt like a complete summary of that kind had entered my head.
At the same time, the knowing of the Heavenly Martial instantly interpreted what it was.
If it had been a secret manual, it would have taken a long time, but because it was pure knowledge, it was as easy to understand as if it had always been mine.
Making it part of my body was a different matter, but it was enough knowledge to run my trap pretending to know.
At the same time, since it was a Namgung martial art and a Namgung pill, I could clearly understand the effect of the Azure Heaven Empty Heart Pill as well.
This isn't simply a pill that boosts inner arts.
It's a life-saving pill that heals serious internal injuries, and at the same time a pill that draws out a momentary surge in cultivated power.
So I could decide on the next words in an instant.
“It would be best for Miss Namgung to take this. And…….”
What now? I have to firmly establish my identity while the two are still startled.
“I know you must be confused. But understand that the Alliance has various secret organizations.”
My affiliation clear, everything else vague.
I don't know if such things really exist.
But how could they not?
Sure enough, the siblings' expressions turned serious.
The Namgung are said to be people easily fooled.
According to Hong-hyung, Namgung martial artists on their first venture into the martial world come back having been swindled, practically without fail.
And that they're still called the foremost of the Five Great Clans because they come back alive anyway.
Namgung Ran was badly startled, but on the other hand, she seemed to be starting to accept it.
That I was some reclusive eccentric master with a secret, and so I'd seen through her and given her advice.
That's why she was able to cross the Peak so easily.
Thinking of it that way would make more sense.
Namgung Ho-won's thoughts reached that far too, and his already stiffened expression seemed to stiffen further.
Namgung Ran, who gives off qi, is easy to read emotionally.
But Namgung Ho-won doesn't have enough cultivated power for it to react to his emotions.
Still, I already knew to some extent.
A few changes in expression, the treatment Namgung Ran receives in the Namgung Clan.
Considering that, what might be dwelling in the heart of the young man named Namgung Ho-won?
If I could scratch that itch too, everything would get easier.
Was there something like that among the items for sale?
Or maybe once I learn to handle the Heavenly Martial Body properly, I could do something.
I filed it away as one possibility.
For now, I first had to figure out how far the function I'd gained reached.
“I will keep this short. I was lying in wait here for a secret mission, and unfortunately, I am in no state to exercise force directly.”
It could look like a ridiculous excuse.
I know that too.
It's something I'm throwing out just to probe them, because they're Namgung.
At once, doubt crept into both their expressions. It was so momentary that they themselves probably weren't even aware of it.
It was a hint you could only catch after going from the orphanage to Jeong Manor reading people, going along when to go along and pushing back when to push back.
“Miss Namgung, how far have you learned your sword art?”
I pieced together an identity. Many collateral members of the Namgung have branched off elsewhere.
It would be fine to act as though I had some connection to the Namgung main house.
These two couldn't possibly remember every collateral member who disappeared without ever venturing out.
I'll play an eccentric master with ties to the Namgung.
“I……. I have learned the Heavenly Wind Sword Art.”
“The Emperor Sword Form or the Azure Vault Boundless Sword?”
“I have not been taught them yet.”
“Mental cultivation method?”
“Only up to the Azure Spirit Art.”
“Good. I will tell you the formula of another one. I do not know how much help it will be right now, but…….”
After deliberately pausing for a bit.
“Do not sit. Come over here. And swallow that quickly.”
Can I do it? Can't I?
That's what I was hurriedly checking now.
But on my face, I wore the solemn yet troubled expression of a master caught in a predicament.
Namgung Ran came over, bewildered.
I had her turn around and placed my hand on her back.
I wasn't sure it would work. I'd only had the Heavenly Martial Body for less than an hour.
If it didn't seem like it would work, I could just stop.
Even if all of this is a lie, we can help each other.
While I was on Namgung Ho-won's back, I'd examined his body. Examining his bones, I'd confirmed why he was crippled in the inner-school qi arts.
That process was, in the end, moving qi to examine.
Wasn't doing someone's qi circulation for them called True Qi Guidance?
Would it work on Namgung Ran, a Peak Master?
I could feel her tense, not knowing what was going on.
Soon she swallowed the pill.
I could clearly see the energy of the Azure Heaven Empty Heart Pill melting on her tongue and traveling down her esophagus.
Even within the Peak Master's sun-bright energy, the burning, condensed qi was caught in my sight.
I have no inner arts, but True Qi Guidance shouldn't require great cultivated power.
I began to move the Empty Heart Pill's energy, which had not yet become Namgung Ran's own qi.
I'd already realized this was possible right after first obtaining the Heavenly Martial Body.
At least I could somehow control the energies directly touching me.
I'd naturally come to realize what accumulating qi was, too.
The formula of the Azure Vault Great Expansion Divine Art is ultimately a methodology for how to move qi so it circulates through and is controlled within the body.
I've never once learned martial arts.
But with such a neat manual in my head, carrying it out isn't very hard.
All the more so when everything is plainly visible.
The flustered Namgung Ran soon yielded to the flow of qi I was moving.
I didn't go slowly.
There was no time for that.
She flinched, but I ignored it and began moving the qi of the first part a bit quickly.
***
Namgung Ran was flustered.
She wondered if it was True Qi Guidance.
It was different from that too.
To begin with, True Qi Guidance meant flowing one's own true qi into another's acupoints so that they too would follow that path.
A method of performing qi circulation in their place so they could absorb the essence of a mental cultivation method.
But this was not the true qi of this mysterious Licentiate.
The pill's qi she had just swallowed had begun to move on its own before it could even fully dissolve.
She could tell the hand on her back was doing it.
But she could not figure out how such a thing was even possible.
Could her father do something like this?
He could, but he would use his own true qi; there was no reason to do it like this.
So this was a nameless technique she had never even heard of.
Why do it this way in the first place?
Right after, she realized.
Had she ever sensed any trace of martial arts from this Licentiate until now?
None at all.
It was not a matter of hiding it, either.
Now, with his palm center on her back, she could faintly sense it even with her own qi sense.
He was completely empty.
No different from the common folk.
Yet there was no way he could do something like this.
Namgung Ran fell into confusion.
Impossible things were happening one after another.
But he said her father had entrusted it to him.
Then she only had to trust him.
Namgung Ran quietly began circulating her qi, following the flow moving on its own.
It was not calm.
It was violent and hurried.
She could feel that.
But that did not make it unstable.
The qi circulation was being carried out with astonishing cleanliness and precision.
As if he were looking into every part of Namgung Ran's body, every acupoint.
And that flow was.
‘The Azure Vault Great Expansion Divine Art……!’
She had not yet been taught it, but she knew what it was. It was the path that would lift the Heavenly Wind Sword Art she had already learned to a higher realm.
She had never thought it possible to learn it hastily like this, yet it was circling the path so naturally and smoothly.
‘Could it be done this quickly and precisely?’
Everything was unfamiliar.
But she knew this much: this was a miraculous encounter.
***
It was a gamble for me too.
My body, as the Heavenly Martial observes it, is full of turbid qi.
There are few acupoints that are intact.
So for now, even if I learned it myself, my progress would be dreadfully slow.
To become anything right away, I have to invest not in myself but in my blades.
This is the best option.
I succeeded in completing the Great Heavenly Circuit at speed.
To be honest, I'd worried something might go wrong midway.
What if it caused qi deviation?
Of course it wouldn't happen to me, but that alone would put my lifeline on the line.
But the qi I moved while watching plainly circled precisely through this girl's body and made it contain the sky.
In the process, besides the Azure Vault Great Expansion Divine Art itself, I gained an understanding of inner arts cultivation methods as such.
It is vitality, it is power, it is the root of all things.
The Neo-Confucian theory of principle and qi might be the literal truth, in this world at least.
What was merely energy spread throughout heaven and earth comes to hold a world, practically an inner image, just by circling within the microcosm called a human being.
That was what I had just done inside the body of the girl named Namgung Ran.
Certainly, the understanding the scroll provides is superficial. Using it and pursuing deeper understanding is what I have to do.
That process struck me as surprisingly rational.
Even scientific.
Though if the science I knew finds every answer from outside, martial arts must be about holding the world within oneself and seeking the answer there.
Just tasting a fragment, I could feel its deep abyss.
This is a story without end.
I swallowed hard.
Before I knew it, I was dripping with sweat.
There was no time to be intoxicated by my entry into inner arts, in an order wrong by a long, long way.
If I'm only given time, the day will come when I learn these formidable inner arts on my own.
For now, I have to live.
Anyone could see I was exhausted, so it'd be fine if my bearing slipped a little.
In a tired voice that wasn't acting at all, I called to Namgung Ho-won.
“There will be some progress. Look after your sister for a moment.”
“Licentiate……. Who on earth are you? What you just did…….”
“Just know that I am someone who must get out of here alive. I have ties with the Namgung as well, so I know such things.”
“That…….”
“You understand that knowing more would do you no good, yes?”
“……I will do so.”
The doubt didn't vanish completely.
But if there's something shown right before your eyes, and a bigger crisis bearing down right now, it stops mattering for the moment.
“These were not originally things I kept to use like this. But let me just say that no one knew things would go so badly wrong.”
“……I see.”
Namgung Ho-won still seemed a little suspicious.
But now the next situation was more important.
“Remember. We must get out of here alive.”
Then I said it a little bitterly.
With the air of a secret agent whose mission has gone wrong.
I refined my identity further.
I'm someone from the Alliance's special operations unit who'd been operating undercover.
From now on, I intend for that to be how orthodox figures come to know me.
“I am trying to keep you two alive, but if it truly comes to it, at least I must make it back alive.”
Then I looked back.
People were scattering, and a red army was coming over the halfway point of the mountain.
So, what should I do now?
I'd just realized I could circulate qi through someone else's body.
Naturally, doing it myself is easier.
Breathing slowly, I began taking in qi.
I just have to build the foundation of the Azure Vault Great Expansion Divine Art in my body bit by bit.
No need for sitting meditation or anything.
I could even complete someone else's qi circulation standing up.
Bit by bit, I'll open my acupoints and turn my body into one that can use inner arts.
‘Still, I wish I had time.’
Then I think I could secure a minimum of inner arts with elixirs.
So what should I do?
Namgung Ran, breathing deeply while standing with Namgung Ho-won supporting her, opened her eyes slightly.
“I think a way to survive has appeared.”
It suddenly occurred to me that this is what it means when one's reined-in presence changes.
The qi waves she sent out were different.
The energy circling around her had been merely bluish before, but now it was far clearer.
Is this what they call a Qi Field?
It was a Qi Field resembling the sky, like the symbol of the Namgung Clan. Since it wrapped around her and gave off a clear energy, her realm was vividly distinguishable.
Let's see, engaging the Blood Heaven Unit and wiping them out……. impossible, no matter what, but this would be enough to shake them off and escape.
I felt Namgung Ho-won's expression grow a little complicated as he watched his sister from behind.
Just wait a little. I'll find you a way somehow.
I glanced at the scroll.
Remaining points: 13,878. Now what more can I do with this?
And then a scream rang out.
The vanguard of the Blood Heaven Unit had reached the top of the pass.