Hyeol-u spared only a sidelong glance at Namgung Hye as she sat there sniffling.
Unlike before, he felt nothing in particular.
Crying from the frustration of defeat was a luxury the unskilled could not afford.
If she had lost, she should grit her teeth and bide her time for the future — not sit there weeping.
Especially as an heir of the Namgung Clan.
CLATTER—!
Hyeol-u tossed the wooden sword down beside her.
"You've got a long way to go. Still haven't weaned yourself off the teat, I see."
STOP.
She abruptly cut off her crying, shot to her feet, and screamed.
"What did you just say to me......?"
STOMP, STOMP.
Hyeol-u closed in on her, his footsteps heavy enough to be menacing.
Eyes glinting sharp.
Namgung Hye flinched and stepped back.
"Your mouth needs fixing first. It is a fact that I'm your older brother, is it not?"
"Hmph! Dream on. As if the word 'brother' would ever come out of my mouth for a lowborn illegitimate son like you. Wake up!"
CRACK, SNAP—!
In a fury, she stomped both wooden swords to pieces one after the other and shrieked.
"Next time, I'll come with a real sword. Just you wait! When I do, you'll be on the ground in front of me with your arms and legs cut off, crawling like a worm and begging for your life. Got that? In fact, you're already nothing but a worm in our family."
"What......?"
To hear such a vicious tirade from such a pretty face.
Of course, insults of that caliber were child's play to Hyeol-u.
Having become inured to the unspeakable curses of his past life, he called out after Namgung Hye in a dignified tone as she turned and strode away.
"Hahaha, by all means. When that day comes, you'll be crawling back too!"
'Tch, she wins one bout with wooden swords and thinks she's queen of the mountain.'
The footsteps that had paused briefly in the bamboo grove began to move again, gradually fading into the distance.
***
"BLURGH!"
The moment Namgung Hye's footsteps receded, Hyeol-u dashed into the bamboo grove.
Doubling over, his entire body contorting, he began vomiting up his food.
"HURGHK, GAAAGHH!"
The sky turned yellow and the ground spun beneath him.
Then again, enduring attacks laced with potent qi in an untrained, feeble body — it was only natural.
'Namgung Seong, you wretch......'
Nearly twenty years old with no martial arts, a weak constitution, and the stamina of a rotten twig.
He was, quite literally, a useless lump.
"Eek! Young Master!"
So-i came running and slammed his palm into Hyeol-u's back.
THWACK, SMACK—!
"Don't hit me — rub my back...... HURGHK!"
THUD.
Having emptied what felt like his entire stomach, Hyeol-u simply collapsed sideways.
Given the savagery with which So-i had pounded his back, his innards were too rattled to settle down.
Hyeol-u lifted bloodshot, tear-rimmed eyes and glared at So-i.
"You bastard......"
"Hehe. It stopped, didn't it! When your stomach's upset, it's best to get everything out."
"That's not how you help someone do it......"
Having the instinct to step in was wonderful.
But the boy had his own brand of thick-headedness.
In any case, word must have spread about the gate guard incident — how he had struck their pressure points and given them a thrashing.
For a good while, nobody came calling at the cottage, and things passed by in relative peace.
Two months later, in late May.
The bamboo grove burst into bloom all at once, covered in yellow bamboo flowers that looked like rice blossoms.
As usual, Hyeol-u rose around the Hour of the Rabbit, circulated the Three Powers Heart Formula for one full double-hour, then performed the Iron Sword Thirty-Six Paths in silent practice — from the first form, Divide Heaven and Earth, to the eighth and final form, Endless Iron Sword — before wiping the beaded sweat from his brow.
He was satisfied.
Over that time, he had shed weight until he was almost unrecognizable, and he had grown taller besides.
In height alone, he now stood at six cheok — a strapping figure on par with So-i.
Compared to Hyeol-u's previous life, he was still carrying extra weight and was perhaps a touch shorter.
But the real marvel was the dark stone in the yard — the red iron ore.
Whenever he sat atop the boulder and circulated his qi, the metal qi intrinsic to the iron ore and the fire qi the stone had absorbed from the sun interacted in a cycle of mutual generation.
In short, his qi center would boil with fire qi, then be tempered by metal qi — a process akin to the quenching of forged steel — repeating over and over as it grew.
Thanks to that, the qi center that had once been the size of a bean had swelled to the size of a child's fist, and was dense and hard.
'That's not all.'
The fundamental principles of the Wish-Fulfilling Heart Art — the advanced mental method he had cultivated in his days as Hell Reaper Hyeol-u.
Among the five stages — One White Water, Two Black Earth, Three Green Wood, Four Red Metal, and Five Purple Fire — the introductory processes of Four Red Metal and Five Purple Fire had been progressing naturally, courtesy of the red iron ore.
'There's no need to count years of inner arts. Even just breaking through the first stage of the introductory process allows inner power to flow continuously.'
But his train of thought was interrupted by a voice from quite close by.
"Haha, hard at work again today, I see."
The owner of that clear voice.
It was the First Young Master, Namgung Ryong, who occasionally visited Namgung Seong's bamboo grove cottage.
On the whole, he seemed unchanged.
But looking closely at his face, the pallor of illness had deepened slightly.
The eyes that had once shone bright now carried a dull film, as though his vitality had waned.
"You're here early."
"That I am. The bamboo is flowering for the first time in a hundred years. I was so curious that I've been walking around to see it."
"I see......"
"Whether this is an auspicious omen or a dire one, I cannot tell."
Hyeol-u walked alongside Namgung Ryong, gazing at the bamboo flowers he pointed out.
They were humble to look at, but once bamboo experienced the most splendid moment of its life — a single flowering — it met its death.
Was the ailing Namgung Ryong weighing his own fate against the bamboo's bloom?
His face, heavy with worry, looked especially haggard today.
"Haha, I see now — you have quite the sentimental side, Elder Brother. The bamboo that flowers may die, but it lives on again through its seeds."
'Just as one might possess someone else's body, for instance.'
Swallowing those words, Hyeol-u watched Namgung Ryong's expression.
A faint look of relief settled there.
But his complexion remained poor.
"A nice thought, but our household is in no state to take comfort from it. Money is draining out like water through a cracked pot with no bottom. At this rate, we won't last more than a few months."
'Ah, so that's what this is about.'
The fact that Namgung Ryong — who had never once brought up household finances since their first meeting — was raising it now meant the situation was truly dire.
But what exactly was making things so difficult?
"Enough with the suspense — just lay it all out. Even a sheet of paper is lighter when held by two, as they say."
"Hmm......"
Namgung Ryong hesitated for a moment, reluctant to speak his mind.
At last, he did.
The Grand Steward, claiming that feeding so many mouths required building future revenue streams, had sunk enormous sums into iron mines and smelters at Ma'anshan.
Hyeol-u caught a whiff of something foul in the story.
'Something stinks. And it reeks.'
The fat, pig-like face of the Grand Steward surfaced in his mind.
"But we've been hemorrhaging losses, and the debt keeps piling up. If we tried to sell it off now, the price is so rock-bottom we'd lose every coin we invested — and apparently the miners' wages have fallen behind too. If things go wrong, even this estate could be gone."
It was a genuinely dire problem.
Every member of the Namgung Clan stood to be tossed out onto the street without a coin to their names.
"Is there no solution......?"
Namgung Ryong's face was etched with worry.
He had said even a sheet of paper was lighter when shared, but after hearing the story, Hyeol-u felt more like the single sheet had become two.
One man shits; another gets stuck cleaning it up.
Curiosity prickled — he wanted to know just how the situation had gotten to this point.
"Elder Brother, don't worry. They say that when driven to the brink, a path always opens. It'll be fine — a solution will turn up before long. By the way, you said Ma'anshan, yes?"
Curious timing.
The red iron ore in the yard flashed through his mind unbidden.
"Ah, yes."
"Good. I'll look into it my......"
'Ah, wait.'
Hyeol-u caught himself — he may have overstepped.
He had a hunch, but not a shred of proof. What exactly was he going to "look into"?
"Look into......?"
"Well...... first, I'll need two horses. I need to go to Ma'anshan."
"You?"
Instead of answering, Hyeol-u fixed Namgung Ryong with a hard stare, putting all his resolve into his eyes.
"All right, I get it — stop glaring. Your eyes are going to pop out."
"The survival of the clan hangs in the balance."
"Fine. But the moment it seems dangerous, you pull out immediately. I will not have my brother hurt or lost over this."
"Yes......"
A lump rose in his throat.
In thirty years of living in his past life, no one had ever spoken such warm, heartfelt words to him.
Namgung Ryong was actually three years younger — only twenty-one — and yet he felt like a true older brother.
Watching Namgung Seong's face soften with quiet pleasure, Namgung Ryong gave a faint smile — then tilted his head.
"But do you even know how to ride a horse?"
"What kind of question is that?"
In his past life, he had ridden horses until he was sick of them.
'I used to steal horses from the Blood Sand Wind bastards and rampage across the battlefield on them.'
Not that he could say such a thing aloud.
"Of course. Living in a martial house, that much is basic, isn't it?"
"Is that so......?"
"Absolutely. Trust me on this."
Namgung Ryong still seemed skeptical, but so what?
He had permission to take horses. That settled the matter.
Immediately after breakfast, Hyeol-u set about his preparations with haste.
His swift resolve and quick action were driven in part by a keen sense of crisis — there was not a moment to waste.
Even an ox's horn is best pulled in a single surge of momentum, as the saying goes, and those words rang true.
"Pack a bundle. We'll be gone a few days."
"Huh? Where are we going?"
"Ever heard the saying, 'Where the needle goes, the thread follows'?"
"Isn't that...... something you say about married couples?"
The boy's face suddenly turned pink.
"No, it doesn't just apply to couples. A master and servant bound together — that counts too. We may have been born on different days, but in death......"
"Together!"
And with that, they headed straight for the stables.
Built with the Chaohu lake at its back, the stable was enormous.
At least a hundred stalls, from which the sounds of snorting and hooves striking the floor could be heard from time to time.
Pleasant sounds, but the moment So-i realized they were headed for the stables, he began fidgeting like a dog desperate to relieve itself.
"Um, Young Master. That's a stable."
"Yeah. Who said otherwise? We're riding horses."
"......!"
"What, you don't want to?"
"I-it's just......"
"Never ridden a horse?"
"A horse I was riding once went wild and bucked me off — I nearly died."
"Is that so? Don't worry. I'll gentle them right up for you."
Hyeol-u approached the man standing in front of the stables.
"Two horses, please."
"Huh? Who are you? And what do you need horses for?"
The stablemaster Jo Sun's tone was hostile from the start.
The stable that had once teemed with a hundred horses now held a mere ten.
Demand for horses was sky-high.
So the taste of the bribes that desperate people slipped him on the sly was quite sweet — and now here was some kid he had never seen before, claiming to be Third Young Master Namgung Seong, asking for two horses.
'Ha, the Third Young Master can't even pull rank around here? Tch, nothing to be done.'
"Look here. I have the First Young Master's express permission. So if you would......"
"What? Give me a break. You need Grand Steward Namgung Cheol's authorization, not the First Young Master's, to check out horses. Absolutely not!"
Jo Sun snorted and turned away.
That was when a single nyang of silver was thrust right under his nose.
'Oh ho? Should've led with that. Must be in a real hurry.'
The moment he saw the silver, Jo Sun's mouth fell open and he eagerly reached out.
But Hyeol-u, as if by accident, let the silver slip through his fingers.
CLINK.
"Oops."
"What, you can't even hand over money without dropping it? And you think you can handle a hor—"
The instant Jo Sun bent deeply at the waist—
CRACK—
His face kissed the ground.
The foot on his back was Hyeol-u's.
A couple of vertebrae must have shifted at least.
A quick glance revealed that Jo Sun's face was mashed up and his lips split.
"You bastard! You take the clan's coin and then take bribes on top of it, and you dare disrespect me — the Third Young Master?!"
"Ghhh! Ughhh......"
"Today I shall make a summary judgment of you, to demonstrate that the laws of this house are not to be trifled with! From this day forward, you shall sit in a dark room, unable to speak, eating your meals and relieving yourself in the same spot!"
SNAP, SNAP, SNAP—!
The black cane danced across Jo Sun's body.
From the Shangguan point below the temple to the Amen point on the back of the skull.
The Jianjing point on the shoulder, the Quchi point at the elbow.
Having struck the pressure points that would paralyze everything from head to upper body, Hyeol-u swept his gaze around.
Several grooms in the stable had looked up in alarm, only to quickly avert their eyes.
No one wanted to catch a stray spark.
WHINNY—!
Hyeol-u strode straight into the stalls and grabbed the reins of two horses to lead them out.
But the horses reared up on their hind legs and shrieked.
"Easy, easy! Good horses!"
He tightened his grip on the reins and patted both horses alternately on the cheeks.
NEIGH.
The screaming horses caught his fierce glare, clamped their mouths shut, and began cautiously reading his mood.
"Ha, people or beasts — they never listen until you smack them or stare them down. Right?"
"Whoa......"
So-i's jaw dropped.
"Young Master, you can't handle animals like that!"
"Enough, let's go!"
THUNDER, THUNDER, THUNDER—!
The hoofbeats of two horses shook heaven and earth as they shot through the clan's main gate and vanished into the distance.