“No. 48, No. 87. Go up.”
A flat word from the instructor.
They had been swinging their large wooden swords when the instructor called them.
“Yes, sir.”
No. 48 and No. 87 quickly stood before the instructor.
They were boys who looked about fifteen or sixteen.
They wore filthy straw mats blackened with grime, their hair a wild tangle.
Naturally, they had no shoes either.
Judging by their appearance, they were no different from beggars.
But go up?
Up where?
They had no idea why, and were only sweating nervously, when sure enough....
WHAM.
The instructor’s kick drove into No. 48’s solar plexus.
“You bastards, I told you to go up. Are you deaf? Move, now!”
“Yes, sir.”
Clutching my solar plexus as pain flooded in, I quickly climbed the stairs with No. 87.
This much pain did not matter.
It happened all the time.
Just as he set foot on the stairs, the instructor’s voice came from behind him.
“You know, right? If you keep going up, you’ll reach the Iron Dragon Corps. Hurry up and go. Once you get there, they’ll handle you.”
The place where the Iron Dragon Corps was.
The stairs leading up over the cliff.
Was he finally allowed to climb them?
They were nothing more than crude stairs carved out of rock, but the moment he set foot on them, even the sensation felt different.
How could they be so soft?
Of course, real rock could not possibly be soft. It was only how his heart felt.
He had heard the rumors.
Up there was paradise.
The Non-Dragon Corps.
It did not mean dragons that flew through the sky.
It used the character for “not,” and referred to those who had not yet become dragons.
It was the place where the children lived, a place everyone in the Rising Dragon Sect passed through.
The place where No. 48 had lived until now.
Below the cliff.
When he raised his head and looked up from the Non-Dragon Corps, he could see another world.
At times, he could even see the soles of the shod feet of those sitting on the edge above.
Soles no different in size from his own.
The truth was, he wanted to become like the birds that flew even higher in the sky.
To fly freely, farther toward that place.
But he knew by instinct.
The body that had grown before he knew it told him.
That was impossible....
“If not that, then even those soles....”
Feet moving freely back and forth.
If he could not become a bird, then he at least wanted to climb atop the cliff.
He was simply envious.
If he went up there, would he be able to roam wherever he pleased?
Freely?
Would he even be able to try wearing the leather shoes that only the instructors wore?
If he could wear those, he felt as if he could run anywhere.
An unknown world.
And a goal.
The soles of feet above the cliff.
What was up there?
He endlessly envied the instructors who went up and down as if entering their own homes.
In truth, he did not know exactly what paradise was.
But they said, vaguely, that it was a good place.
Perhaps the longing for a new world had created the exaggerated rumor of paradise.
Paradise....
Even the name was so pretty.
No. 48 crawled up the cliff along the narrow stairs.
No. 87 followed behind him, groaning as he climbed.
A new world.
His small heart pounded.
The moment he climbed onto the top of the cliff, a broad training ground came into view.
It was not much different from the training ground of the Non-Dragon Corps.
Even so, it looked special somehow.
They had called it paradise, so something had to be different.
“Is it you bastards? The new ones coming in this time?”
A corpsman with a tiger-like face was waiting at the top of the stairs.
“What? Yes, sir.”
No. 48 and No. 87 froze stiff in tension.
He was from the Silver Dragon Corps.
He, too, had passed through the Non-Dragon Corps, then the Iron Dragon Corps, and had been promoted again to the Silver Dragon Corps.
In a sense, he was No. 48’s senior.
“Smell that. My nose is rotting. Take it all off.”
“Yes, sir.”
The two quickly stripped off their clothes and threw them aside.
Though calling them clothes was generous, since they were nothing but a single scrap of ragged cloth.
The Silver Dragon corpsman snatched up the clothes and threw them mercilessly into a campfire burning off to one side.
CRUMBLE.
As the clothing burned, sparks flew here and there.
Ash fluttered up.
“Hey, you bastard. What are you doing, tossing those in all of a sudden?”
Another Silver Dragon corpsman warming himself by the fire shouted irritably.
Crackle, crackle....
Something burst inside the clothes.
A faint smell of burning meat drifted out as well.
“Those bedbug bastards must’ve been clinging on something fierce.”
The Silver Dragon corpsman sitting in front of the fire stirred the burning clothes with a stick.
Members of the Non-Dragon Corps, who could not wash properly and lived through all four seasons in a single set of clothes, lived with bedbugs, fleas, and lice clinging to them.
How many had there been for even the smell of burning meat to rise?
“Spread your arms and legs.”
Now naked, the two spread their bodies wide at the same time.
Their cocks dangled between them.
The Silver Dragon corpsman snorted at the sight.
“Well, would you look at that. Useless as they are, they’re pretty hefty.”
SPLASH....
The Silver Dragon corpsman poured a bucket of water over them with relish.
Black rivulets of grime streamed down along the flow of water.
Slap, slap.
Then he scrubbed their bodies roughly with a mop.
It was a strange experience.
It was the first time they had ever washed properly with water like this.
After he scrubbed them for a long time and poured water over them again, clear water finally flowed down their bodies.
Though only cold water had touched them, their skin felt soft and fresh.
“Put these on.”
The Silver Dragon corpsman tossed them one set of clothes each.
They were the first proper human clothes they had ever received.
Not a straw mat, but real martial uniforms made of cotton.
***
“Form ranks. Everyone marches to Mount Sanhyeop.”
The man looked utterly ordinary, as if he had just passed middle age.
An antique martial uniform, and the scabbard of a greatsword made of polished wood.
He seemed to be in a different class even from the Golden Dragon Corps, said to be the greatest fighting force here.
The second in rank among the Rising Dragon Sect’s elders.
It was Second Elder Jang U-geun.
“N-No. F-Forty-Eight. W-Where are w-we g-going...”
“I don’t know.”
No. 48 quickly cut off No. 87’s words.
If he listened to that sentence to the end, he would grow old and white-haired.
How long was he going to keep stammering like that?
“Where are we really going? We just got up on top of the cliff. We haven’t heard a single explanation.”
No. 48 quickly shifted his eyes around.
All he could see were the backs of the people ahead and the other Iron Dragon corpsmen.
They had dragged him into the formation as soon as he climbed up. Where on earth were they taking him?
More importantly, what?
March?
Was that not a word used when an army headed for a battlefield?
Regardless of his worries, the corpsmen began lining up one by one and moving out.
No. 48 stood behind the children his own age.
It was the rear of the Iron Dragon Corps.
The Golden Dragon Corps stood in the very front row, followed by the Iron Dragon Corps.
Last came the Silver Dragon Corps.
They were the three armed corps that supported the Rising Dragon Sect.
The column descended in a line along the path at the edge of the training ground.
After they went a little farther down, a shabby one-pillar gate appeared, with a signboard reading “Rising Dragon Sect” hanging from it.
It was an old gate built halfway up the mountain.
“What’s that?”
Black lines scrawled over a white background.
No. 48 did not know how to read.
“Well, whatever it is... this feels good, at least. So this is the outside world.”
No. 48 blinked, savoring the refreshing feeling to his heart’s content.
His heart was still pounding.
He did not know whether it was paradise or whatever else, but he had finally climbed above the cliff.
And on top of that, he had even left the Rising Dragon Sect and come outside.
Whether he looked here or there, all he saw was green trees and brush, so it was not all that different from the scenery he had seen from the Non-Dragon Hall. But the feeling was unmistakably different.
For some reason, the trees here looked far more elegant and old.
When he glanced to the side, No. 87’s face was flushed as well.
He was busy looking around, letting out one “Wow” after another.
“Hey, No. 48, No. 87, you bastards. Get it together. Keep that up and you’ll die.”
A voice calling No. 48 came from just behind him.
It was No. 32.
He was a fellow Non-Dragon Corps member who had climbed above the cliff about two months earlier.
For all that he was now a senior, his movements carried a fair bit of ease.
“What are you talking about? Why would I die?”
“You bastards won’t know until it happens. You’ll soon realize the Non-Dragon Corps was better.”
No. 32 grinned and poked No. 48 in the side.
“Still, what do you think? Now that you’re here, it’s a whole new world, right?”
“I don’t know. We joined the formation as soon as we came up from the cliff. Where are we going?”
“Where else? To fight.”
“Against who? Why?”
At that moment, a word came from beside them.
“Hey, be quiet. You’ll get hit.”
The one walking beside No. 32 was a boy as tall as a pole.
No. 92.
He, too, had become an Iron Dragon corpsman at the same time as No. 32.
Both of them had possessed the best skills among the children their age.
That was why they had been selected for the Iron Dragon Corps first.
“Hey, Sam-i. You said we’re marching, right? What are we going to do there?”
The children called No. 32 Sam-i.
No. 92 was Gu-i.
The children of the Non-Dragon Hall had no names.
Most of them died, so there had not even been a need to give them names.
The newly arrived children were simply given whatever numbers happened to be left.
“Huh? Nothing to do. You just need to perform the energy transfer well.”
“That’s all?”
“Yeah.”
Energy transfer was the act of passing one’s own internal energy to another person.
It was by no means easy.
For a proper energy transfer, a deep understanding of acupoints, meridians, and the dantian was essential, and a high level of concentration was required as well.
Above all, if the practitioner’s internal energy was not deep enough, it was a difficult technique that could not even be attempted.
Anyone who heard it would have laughed.
Children who did not even have whiskers yet, talking about energy transfer?
If they had actually tried to do it, everyone would have stopped them.
It was that dangerous and difficult a technique.
Even a slight mistake in circulating energy could bring about qi deviation.
But the sect they belonged to was the Rising Dragon Sect.
A sect built upon the foundation of powerful internal energy.
When they had just begun to walk, they had already been forcibly injected with energy transfers during their days in the Non-Dragon Corps.
Learning energy transfer as part of internal energy training was also the natural course.
In other words, for them, it was daily life.
They did not feel it was especially difficult.
The children who found it difficult all died.
“But the seniors are carrying greatswords. Don’t we get any? The other Iron Dragon seniors have them too.”
Now that he looked, No. 32 and No. 92 were empty-handed as well.
Only about half of the Iron Dragon Corps had greatswords.
“What sword would they give us? It’ll be a few more months before we get one. Even if we had one, we wouldn’t have any use for it.”
“They’re really only telling us to do energy transfer?”
“If you don’t want to get beaten for no reason, do it properly. More importantly....”
No. 32 stared fixedly at No. 87.
“No. 87, how did you get in? The instructors just sent you up?”
“H-Huh? I-I don’t know. Hehe.”
Even at No. 32’s sarcasm, No. 87 grinned foolishly.
At that moment, a clatter, like an acorn rolling, came from inside No. 87’s chest.
“Everyone be quiet. Sam-i, you too. If he was ready to come up, that must be why he came up.”
Perhaps the chatter grated on his ears, because No. 92 stepped in.
He was tall and sharp-eyed, and even in the Non-Dragon Corps, he had acted like an older brother.
His nature was kind.
“Oh, come on. We need to educate them beforehand so they won’t die, don’t we?”
“That’s why I’m telling you to be quiet. What if the seniors say some—agh.”
CRACK.
Sparks flew from No. 92’s skull.
“You bastards.... Iron Dragon Corpsmen, and you dare chatter like that? You haven’t even been given names.”
It was a Silver Dragon corpsman who had been walking behind them.
He had struck No. 92’s head with the back of his greatsaber.
“I’m sorry, Instructor.”
No. 92, his face crumpling as if he might cry, kept bowing his head.
“I’m already troubled enough, and now these green little bastards.”
The Silver Dragon corpsman spat out a thick bowlful of phlegm and slung the greatsaber over his shoulder.
“You bastards....”
No. 92 glared at No. 32 and No. 48 with resentment in his eyes.
“......”
Whether he did or not.
No. 48 felt bad for No. 92, but he kept flaring his nostrils.
The trees and plants he had seen from the Non-Dragon Corps.
The scent of grass he had always smelled.
The breeze blowing softly.
Had the scenery outside always been this beautiful?
Just wearing human clothes made his whole body feel warm.
Though it was an old martial uniform,
he liked the feeling of the soft cotton touching his skin.
Everything.
Until now.
“Look at this little bastard. Look at your face. You must be expecting something.”
No. 32 could not hold back and began grinning again.
“Keep that up and you’ll be the one getting hit this time.”
“Yeah, enjoy it while you can. You’ll come to your senses after one battle. Kihihik.”
War....
Could it be worse than the nightmare of the Non-Dragon Corps?
He did not know where they were headed, but at least for this moment, he felt good.
***
The mountain terrain was rugged.
A huge mountain range cut vertically across the land of Liaoning, where plains were abundant, and people called it the Greater Khingan Range.
There was also a mountain range stretching long beside it.
The Yan Mountains.
It was a range straddling the border between Hebei and Liaoning.
Between the lines of mountains stood one called Mount Sanhyeop.
It had been named so because small peaks were scattered there.
There was a peculiar place there that did not suit the terrain: a broad plain.
After they climbed a little higher past the middle of the mountain, the sight unfolded before their eyes.
“Now, line up. Move.”
At Second Elder Jang U-geun’s command, the corpsmen moved in perfect order.
Some even wore indifferent expressions, as though they had been through this many times before.
“You’re here. Come this way.”
No. 92 grabbed No. 48 and No. 87 by the napes of their necks and put them in place.
“Aren’t you being a little too kind?”
At No. 32’s jab, No. 92 shot him a look.
The basic arrangement placed the Golden Dragon Corps in the front row, the Silver Dragon Corps behind them, and the Iron Dragon Corps last.
It was an unusual formation.
In ordinary battles between martial artists, they did not usually form ranks like this.
Thirty years ago.
A sect called Overlord Fortress, which had shaken the entire murim, appeared here.
Overlord Fortress absorbed every nearby unorthodox group and expanded its power.
At that time, the Rising Dragon Sect also became a subordinate sect under Overlord Fortress.
The expansion of the unorthodox factions.
How could the Murim Alliance simply sit and watch such a thing?
They launched the Orthodox Allied Army.
That had already been thirty years ago.
With the piling up of time, the war flowed in a strange direction.
Because they had fought for too long, it had now degenerated into a farce, nothing more than a mere formality.
A game of blades where the interests of both sides aligned.
A game of army where they lined up and fought.
It was only clown play, only a formal shaman’s rite.
The endless old fight forced upon them a formation unworthy of martial artists.
A clumsy military-style formation.
Still, no matter how tedious the fight might be, it was a battle where blades flew wildly.
Casualties were inevitable.
In the previous battle, two Silver Dragon corpsmen had died, creating gaps in the ranks.
The ones who filled those gaps were two who had risen from the Iron Dragon Corps to the Silver Dragon Corps.
And two who had risen from the Non-Dragon Corps to the Iron Dragon Corps.
No. 48 and No. 87.
Someone’s death had become an invitation to paradise for the children of the Non-Dragon Corps.
“What? You’re the bastard behind me?”
The moment Silver Dragon corpsman Hwang In-gwang saw No. 48, his face twisted.
He was the very same bastard who had smacked No. 92’s head on the way here.
“Tch. Rotten luck. You’d better perform the energy transfer properly. If you don’t, I’ll stomp you flat....”
“Yes, yes, sir.”
Hwang In-gwang snorted and jerked his head around.
In front of him stood Ho Jeong, the Golden Dragon corpsman he had to support.
The sound of leaves colliding with the wind.
The quiet mountain.
There was no one here besides the Rising Dragon Sect.
It had always been this way.
The Rising Dragon Sect was the sect closest to Mount Sanhyeop.
That was why, before battle began, they always occupied the place first.
It was not only a good thing.
They had to battle the silence first, amid the tension.
The sound of the brushing wind, and even the cries of birds coming from afar....
It was a lonely thing.