Two days earlier.
Seon U-yun had shown Tang Yu-hyeon his trust.
"I'll trust you."
"Good. That is all I need."
Tang Yu-hyeon filled his own cup and continued.
"For now, tell that to the Moon Orchid Enchantress."
"What? That means......."
"This is not a war. Is there any reason to drag it out?"
Let us not forget. Striking the Moon-Crossing Pavilion was, after all, part of a Poison Study Pavilion lesson.
However coldly the Tang Clan handled the raising of its juniors, it would not place a candidate for Young Master in danger of death.
Setting aside the fairness of the succession contest, each one of them was a precious resource, and destroying that with one's own hand was a loss.
'It would be another matter if the heirs got along badly. They seem to get along, and no one would go out of his way to take on the trouble.'
There was no one who would deliberately hand him a hard task, and no one who would quietly swap it for something of greater difficulty.
Which meant that however far the Moon-Crossing Pavilion's power had spread, it fell far short of the Tang Clan.
Send in the Black Steel Corps and it would plainly be settled in under a double-hour.
And with the wooden token Tang Roe had given him besides, finishing the assignment on the spot would have been no hard thing if he set his mind to it.
Even so, the reason Tang Yu-hyeon had dragged out the time was purely the Moon Shadow Sword and Seon U-yun.
To keep a Tang Clan raid from driving Gwak Hwa-ran to move the Moon Shadow Sword elsewhere.
And to safely rescue Seon U-yun and the other victims.
But delay any longer and he would lose the latter.
So now was the time to move.
"Fourteen days is time enough for someone to grow slack while taking her ease."
The longer a stretch of time runs, the more a person's guard loosens and the more groundless confidence takes root.
Gwak Hwa-ran was arrogant and high in her own regard, so she would not muster her subordinates right away.
Not unless she were reassured that the Tang Clan was nothing much.
"So we strike the Moon-Crossing Pavilion in two days."
"Understood. Is there something separate for me to do?"
Seon U-yun asked with his eyes shining.
There was a boyish resolve in him at taking part in a great matter on which he had staked his life.
"Survive."
"Pardon?"
Seon U-yun asked back at the words whose meaning escaped him.
"Whatever happens, whatever injustice you suffer, whatever they hold over you to threaten you — just survive. That is all."
"It does not matter if I am hurt or shut up?"
"It would be better if you were hurt as little as possible, but yes."
Tang Yu-hyeon did not tip his cup; he rolled it in his hand.
"Because so long as you are alive, wherever that may be, I will come and find you."
".......I will try."
He did not answer readily to a thing he could not guarantee.
Tang Yu-hyeon snorted a laugh, feeling he could see Seon U-yun's character even in that simple answer.
"That will do."
As he put the laugh away, the serving lad said, "Coming in," and laid out appetizing dishes.
Before they withdrew, Tang Yu-hyeon set two gold coins on the table.
"I wish to enjoy myself quietly with my friend."
"Oh, of course, sir! I will make certain no one comes up to this floor!"
The serving lad took the gold coins and left with his mouth stretched to his ears.
Tang Yu-hyeon spread out his energy and waited for every trace of presence to fade.
"Then shall we get to our work?"
"There is more left?"
"A great deal."
Tang Yu-hyeon drew a book and five spirit elixirs from his robes.
Seon U-yun stared blankly at what was held out before him.
They had plainly been handed to him, and yet they did not feel like his.
"It seems right that you should be the one to finish it, rather than me."
His eyes wavered as though he could not believe it.
For me? Truly?
That was what they seemed to ask.
Instead of confirming it in words, Tang Yu-hyeon gave him a smile.
It would be easier for Tang Yu-hyeon to raise his realm to the beyond-peak within two days and face Gwak Hwa-ran than for Seon U-yun to fight her.
But he must not be the pillar that brought the Moon-Crossing Pavilion down.
The Moon-Crossing Pavilion had already seized Sichuan's underworld.
The moment Tang Yu-hyeon took it, the Tang Clan would be absorbing the Moon-Crossing Pavilion.
And then those who feared the Tang Clan's power growing, feared it reclaiming its former standing, would light their eyes searching for a flaw.
'It has not even recovered its old glory yet. I cannot let it be torn down again.'
So it was better to entrust the Moon-Crossing Pavilion to someone trustworthy and keep a friendly relationship with him.
'As he is now, Seon U-yun can be trusted with it.'
He was skilled at handling people and could survive anywhere, and he did not turn his eyes away from injustice set before him.
That was enough.
"You have practiced fist arts, have you not?"
"Yes, well....... Though I never had a proper master."
"This is a martial arts manual written long ago by the Fist King, who reached complete mastery of fist arts and fire arts, and spiritual medicine that helps amplify yang qi."
All of it was precious beyond any reckoning of price.
Seon U-yun hesitated, unable to take it readily.
"May I really accept something this precious? On the strength of what in me? It seems far more than I deserve."
"It is not more than you deserve."
Tang Yu-hyeon spoke firmly.
Look at the eyes and you see a person's essence.
Tang Yu-hyeon trusted the Seon U-yun he had seen through his own eyes.
The discernment honed over more than eighty years was good at telling apart those who should be kept close and those who should not.
He disliked those who sat down at the smallest hardship.
But those who used hardship as a foothold to leap upward, he did not dislike.
And was it merely a matter of not disliking them?
He would push at their backs so they could go where they wished, and beyond it.
Before it was for the Tang Clan's benefit, this was an ancestor's wish for a better world.
"You are entitled to take this much."
Gwak Hwa-ran learned fire arts? Then grow until such a thing is laughable.
Tang Yu-hyeon pushed the spirit elixir giving off a red glow across to Seon U-yun.
"I would like you to grow strong. And if I may add a little selfishness, I would like you to land a blow on the Moon Orchid Enchantress."
Tang Yu-hyeon smiled brightly, as though facing a friend.
"Paying back a person who thinks only she is great in kind — no, greater still — does that not sound entertaining?"
Honestly, it did sound entertaining.
The problem was only that Tang Yu-hyeon's offer was so favorable it invited suspicion.
Seon U-yun rolled his eyes about.
Do you want revenge? Yes.
Will nothing settle you but killing Gwak Hwa-ran yourself? Yes.
Would you be a fool to kick this away? Yes.
Does Tang Yu-hyeon seem likely to do you harm? .......No?
He had no certainty, but Seon U-yun, who had dealt with a great many people, thought that whatever Tang Yu-hyeon's intent, he did not look like a man who would do him harm.
"That's true enough."
"Pff. It is, is it not?"
Tang Yu-hyeon laughed as though the slight pause before the answer were endearing.
He could see plainly what Seon U-yun had thought in that brief gap.
'How adorable.'
Still, he does not do his reckoning carelessly.
Tang Yu-hyeon moved behind Seon U-yun like flowing water and laid a hand on his shoulder.
"I will help you. There is no telling what will happen once you leave here, so let us build up as much inner arts as we can."
"What?"
"What are you doing? Eat."
Tang Yu-hyeon gestured at the spirit elixir with his chin.
The oddly forceful manner stirred some resistance in him, but Seon U-yun's hand dutifully closed around the elixir.
"You know how to perform qi circulation and breath regulation?"
"Roughly."
"Roughly will not do."
"I know how."
"Are you certain?"
"Yes."
Doubt was smeared thickly over Tang Yu-hyeon's gaze.
'Well. I will be beside him to help, so it should be fine.'
Tang Yu-hyeon pulled Seon U-yun over and sat him on a soft cushion.
"Now. Let us focus and begin."
"Yes!"
Seon U-yun nodded and popped the spirit elixir into his mouth.
FWOOSH.
The tongue wrapped around the elixir burned.
He could feel it clearly going down his gullet, the way scalding water does.
Seon U-yun closed his eyes and settled his posture.
At the same moment, Tang Yu-hyeon laid a hand on his shoulder.
"Do not rush. Slowly."
A gentle energy whirled through Seon U-yun's whole body.
It flowed along his blood vessels and soaked softly into him.
If he could just guide it to his qi center like this.......
'Ugh?!'
Seon U-yun's body flinched.
Near his qi center came a feeling of sparks suddenly flying.
The energy he had thought no more than a small flame grew larger and larger, as though mocking him.
Where a moment ago it had felt like the turbid qi in his body being purified, now it seemed to want to burn every impurity away.
His body felt ready to burst under a vast ball of fire.
"Hss. Focus."
At the low voice, Seon U-yun gathered himself.
If it was for the sake of growing strong, should he not bear this much pain easily enough?
Seon U-yun breathed out slowly and concentrated again on gathering the energy.
Sweat poured like rain from enduring the heat.
'How am I supposed to refine something like this?!'
Seon U-yun clenched his teeth.
Merely holding the energy in place so it would not escape was near killing him; he had no room to worry about absorbing it or completing a circulation.
As if reading that very worry, Tang Yu-hyeon's voice came.
"You do not have to try to refine it. Blazing fire is pure in itself. You need only accept it."
As Tang Yu-hyeon said, Seon U-yun accepted the energy seething near his qi center just as it was.
FWOOSH.
Energy that resembled flame wrapped his qi center as though threatening it.
'Accept it as it is.'
Was even qi circulation and breath regulation affected by thought?
As the impatience left his heart, the energy that had surged so violently flowed calmly into his qi center.
Do not absorb it by force, do not force it away.
When it chased out turbid qi, let it chase; when it churned looking for somewhere to break through, let it churn.
Simply accept it.
"Yes. That is how it is done."
Tang Yu-hyeon poured his own energy in without pause, guiding the bucking force.
"Picture the shape of fire as you imagine it."
Seon U-yun suddenly recalled something he had seen while passing a smithy.
Molten iron heated in the fire, flowing along the channel an artisan had cut for it.
'Yes. That was it.'
The energy flowing through his body resembled molten metal.
It gathered in one place, then burst outward in all directions like a firecracker.
FWOOSH!
The lower qi center opened.
Before long the middle qi center opened as well.
Even after breaking down two great walls, the energy showed no sign of weakening and hammered at the upper qi center.
BOOM. BOOM.
'Nnngh!'
It was like being struck with an iron rod heated in fire.
However hard he tried to hold on, his consciousness drifted further and further away.
When Seon U-yun's body shook as though convulsing, Tang Yu-hyeon poured in more energy to settle him.
"Get a hold of yourself! Break through it recklessly and your body will not hold!"
'Then what am I supposed to do?!'
"You melt it."
Tang Yu-hyeon spoke as though he knew everything inside him.
"Do you think fire only blazes? Or that it only bursts like gunpowder or a firecracker? Not in the slightest. A torch lights the darkness, and white heat melts iron."
"......."
"Do not cage it in a mold of your own making. Think for yourself. Fire can change however it likes. You simply do not know it yet."
Yes. Do not tear it down by force.
Melt it.
Even under Tang Yu-hyeon's guidance the energy was still rough, but with his heart changed it was like looking at a calm shore.
That energy could not pass beyond the great wall.
"The lower and middle qi centers are both open, so only one remains."
Following Tang Yu-hyeon's voice, Seon U-yun let the energy flow into his upper qi center.
Warm as sunlight coming down, and yet strong.
It did not have to be rough.
The more solid the wall, the more surely it falls to softness.
TAP.
He gathered the energy in one place, like laying a hand on a door.
Then he pushed it gently, the way wind lays down wild grass.
'It is not a wall so much as a door.'
And so he pushed open a single door.
His five senses sharpened past any comparison to before.
The chirring cry of crickets, the sound of people chattering on the floor below, were as clear as if heard right beside him.
He could feel the warmth of the cooling tea drifting through the air.
A familiar yet unfamiliar world greeted him.
'So this is the world of the peak realm.......!'
His whole body shivered at a pleasure no words could describe.
The energy that had passed through the upper qi center returned to the qi center without losing its warmth.
HUUUUM.
Mingling with his original qi, an energy of the utmost gentleness settled in.
It felt like holding a small star in his qi center.
"Hoo."
Seon U-yun slowly opened his eyes.
His sight twisted like that of a man suffering dizziness.
His head, having taken in too much at once, complained of an ache, but it was not unpleasant.
'I have grown.'
That fact was clear to him.
"Well done."
Tang Yu-hyeon patted Seon U-yun's shoulder.
"Remember. You are the sun. You are different from the balls of fire that do nothing but blaze and burn things away."
The sun. Another name for the star that never sets.
It is not easily put out, and it wraps others in warm light.
That was what Seon U-yun ought to pursue.
"Now then, there are plenty of spirit elixirs left, so shall we do it four more times?"
Tang Yu-hyeon held a spirit elixir up before Seon U-yun's eyes.
Seon U-yun reluctantly took it and pushed it into his mouth.
Sincerely thinking, all the while, that the smile aimed at him was a devil's.