Yang Yeom charged in and swung his wooden sword at a speed incomparably greater than his younger brother Yang Hak’s.
But against Yanghwi, Yang Yeom was no different.
He, too, was an opponent who could be defeated in a single exchange.
Thud!
The referee approached the fallen Yang Yeom, checked his condition, then announced,
“Young Master Yanghwi wins….”
Pride and satisfaction swelled across Baek Heonso’s face below the martial platform, while Yang Garyung, Sect Master of the Yangjo Sect, turned scarlet in his seat of honor.
Both brothers had been defeated by the same opponent in a single exchange. The Yangjo Sect’s reputation had been dragged through the dirt.
Even so—
Yanghwi had no intention of stopping here.
This martial competition was, after all, his chance to make a show of force.
Suho Association, I’ll grind that arrogance of yours into the ground until you won’t even dare think of measuring yourselves against my family.
“Is there no one else? If any young master would care to instruct me, please come onto the martial platform.”
“…….”
“…….”
After a brief silence, the largest boy present climbed onto the platform.
“Cheol Byeonghu of the Yuhang Escort Agency. I’ve come to witness your skill firsthand.”
He was nearly the size of a grown man. One look at him was enough to tell that he was fifteen, right at the competition’s age limit.
“I look forward to learning from you.”
As they closed the distance to exchange greetings, Cheol Byeonghu muttered under his breath,
“Pretty cocky for a little brat whose balls haven’t even ripened yet. I’ll teach you some manners.”
What a filthy thing to say.
A provocation tactic, is it?
Losing to someone Yanghwi’s age would be humiliating beyond belief, so apparently he was desperate enough to try even such a cheap trick.
Yanghwi snickered and immediately shot back,
“So that’s why your mother likes her fruit unripe.”
Cheol Byeonghu stared blankly for a moment before realizing what Yanghwi meant.
“You little bastard!”
His face flushed crimson, then purple.
Before the referee could even give the signal, Cheol Byeonghu charged.
Bzzzzzz!
A sound like the beating of a bee’s wings rang out—
and Cheol Byeonghu went flying off the martial platform.
“……Young Master Cheol Byeonghu committed a foul and was subdued by Young Master Baek Yanghwi. Victory goes to Young Master Baek Yanghwi.”
Even the oldest participant had fallen in a single exchange.
An ominous silence now hung over the banquet hall.
Yanghwi’s lips curled upward.
This should be enough for word to spread throughout every corner of Agan County that the Baek Family is harboring a hidden dragon.
There was a reason he had stopped concealing his ability and defeated every opponent in a single exchange.
He wanted rumors to spread.
They dared try to tear the Baek Family’s connection to the Jegal Clan away from them?
They had only attempted it because they thought the Baek Family was weak enough to push around.
Yanghwi intended to tear that perception out by the roots.
While Uncle Jegal is staying with us, I can cause as much trouble as I want without worrying about the consequences. This is my chance.
The Suho Association was an alliance of small and mid-sized martial factions that earned their money through businesses such as guard services, escort agencies, and martial academies.
And if word of what happened today spread?
Their customers would start paying attention to the Baek Family.
That meant Yanghwi could reform Black Path fighters, turn them into Baek Family martial artists, and immediately put them to work generating revenue.
Then the Baek Family gets both a reputation on an entirely different level from before and actual financial profit. Two birds with one stone.
“It seems there will be no next opponent. If someone manages to accumulate more victories than I have, I’ll return to the martial platform.”
With that, Yanghwi stepped down.
The fervor from the beginning of the competition had long since died, leaving only cold ashes behind.
The young participants had lost their fighting spirit, while even the host and referees seemed unsure what to do.
Then—
“Wahahahahaha!”
A booming burst of laughter shook the banquet hall.
“Yanghwi! Splendid! I enjoyed that immensely!”
The voice belonged to Jegal Seon.
“I’m relieved it met with your approval, Uncle. I was worried my meager skill might offend your eyes.”
Yanghwi gave a courteous formal fist-and-palm salute before continuing,
“Then may I consider our wager my victory?”
The condition of Yanghwi and Jegal Seon’s wager had been simple: whether Yanghwi could win the martial competition.
To settle the matter beyond dispute, Jegal Seon rose from his seat.
“I ask all the martial fellows gathered here today. Having watched the children display their skills, it seems to me that my nephew has proven himself the finest among them. Will anyone dispute his victory?”
“…….”
“…….”
Not a single person answered in the negative.
Jegal Seon nodded as though he had expected nothing else.
“Yanghwi! I hereby declare you the winner of the Yuhang Gathering’s martial competition!”
Jegal Seon was neither the organizer nor a member of the Suho Association, merely a guest.
Yet no one objected.
Everyone understood that his very presence here was like a scholar who had placed first in the imperial examination choosing to sit among children in a remote village school and trade verses with them.
That was how vast and profound the gulf was between the great Jegal Clan, whose name commanded respect throughout the realm, and the little martial factions clustered together in a single county like Agan.
Had it not been for Baek Muryang, Jegal Seon would never have set foot in a place like this.
After returning to Baek Family Manor with his sworn younger brother and the children, Baek Muryang called out heartily,
“I’ll be drinking with my brother tonight! Have everything prepared!”
Food and wine soon piled high in the main residence’s banquet hall, and Baek Muryang sat down with Jegal Seon.
Their children, naturally, joined them.
“Brother, you truly astonished me today. With a son displaying such extraordinary ability, the Baek Family’s future shines as brightly as the full moon.”
“Even so, how could we compare with the Jegal Clan, Younger Brother? I hear your eldest son possesses talent so extraordinary that few under heaven can rival him.”
It was true.
Jegal Seon’s eldest son and Jegal Seolha’s older brother, Jegal Munha, possessed exceptional talent and was considered a pillar of the future, already praised as someone destined to become the foremost figure of the younger generation.
“Hahaha! So word has spread even this far?”
Jegal Seon then turned toward Yanghwi.
“You won as promised, so the wager is yours. I’ll grant what you asked of me before. But first, would you satisfy one curiosity of this uncle of yours?”
“I could satisfy ten, Uncle.”
Jegal Seon’s question was simple.
“Why did you do it? Today, you displayed once-in-an-era talent. Forgive me for saying this in front of your father, but your martial talent shines brightly enough that it could bring disaster upon the Baek Family.”
Yanghwi knew that.
He had acted despite knowing it.
And because it was something he had been thinking about ever since turning back time, he answered without the slightest hesitation.
“Once, Father told me that his dream was to restore our family to the stature of a great clan.”
“Did I?”
Baek Muryang looked puzzled.
Of course he did. It had happened in Yanghwi’s previous life.
Yanghwi shamelessly pressed on.
“Yes. You told me while you had me sit beside you and drank alone. From that moment onward, my dream also became to see our family stand among the great clans. That is all.”
It was a simple answer.
But it was enough for Jegal Seon.
“Ha! You’re even more extraordinary than I thought. Martial talent and cunning both!”
Outstanding talent was like an awl hidden inside a pouch—it would pierce through and reveal itself eventually.
If that was inevitable, then Yanghwi would reveal himself completely.
He would become not merely a crane among chickens, but a dragon among chickens.
Like a flame drawing moths toward itself, he would attract admiration and attention until people gathered around him.
That was the ambition Yanghwi had just declared.
“A great clan must take countless people into its service and govern them according to the laws of the family. You mean to make yourself the foundation upon which such a clan is built.”
Yanghwi lowered his head and offered another formal fist-and-palm salute.
“It is merely the shallow idea of an inexperienced child. If I am mistaken, I hope you will correct me, Uncle.”
“You are not mistaken. I am merely concerned. The path you have chosen is one where men often break before reaching the end.”
Those who stood out inevitably made more enemies.
There was a reason people said that time itself was the greatest enemy of heroes.
But Yanghwi only smiled with complete confidence.
“If I break, then I was simply destined to break before reaching the end.”
Everything was for the sake of turning the Baek Family into the Greatest Clan Under Heaven.
If he wanted to establish even the foundation within his lifetime, he would have to take risks.
“……Indeed. Nephew, you are right! Then I suppose we should discuss the reward I owe you.”
Jegal Seon looked thoroughly delighted.
When Yanghwi had first named his request, Jegal Seon had burst into laughter.
After all, Yanghwi had suddenly asked to accompany him on his coming journey despite supposedly knowing nothing about Jegal Seon’s purpose.
The reason Jegal Seon had found that request so amusing was simple.
“Let me ask you, Yanghwi. Did you figure out what this uncle of yours came here to do?”
“It was merely a guess based on my limited understanding.”
Jegal Seon regarded his sworn nephew with eyes full of interest.
The boy had done nothing but astonish him since the moment they met.
“Then let us see whether you guessed correctly. Tell me.”
After a brief moment of thought, Yanghwi spoke.
“You said you had business that brought you to our family, Uncle. And you brought Seolha with you.”
“So you assumed there was a reason I brought her.”
Whatever Jegal Seon was searching for was surely something Jegal Seolha needed.
In my previous life, Jegal Seolha supposedly died young. Uncle was stricken with grief and withdrew from the world for many years afterward.
Yanghwi looked at Jegal Seolha.
More precisely, he sharpened his qi sense and focused on the strange qi pulse emanating from her.
Jegal Seolha immediately turned her head toward him.
With only a thin veil between them, the two children’s gazes met.
As I thought. The qi inside Jegal Seolha could never come from an ordinary constitution.
Yanghwi spoke.
“My guess is that Seolha was born with some special constitution or innate body, and that you need something unusual because of it.”
All things originate from the primordial whole and are composed of the Two Energies—yin and yang.
These in turn connect to the Three Talents of heaven, earth, and man, the three pillars upon which the world is formed. Thus, human beings standing between heaven and earth sometimes receive the qi of nature and are born with extraordinary qualities and abilities.
Such things were also known as special constitutions or innate bodies.
Among the commonly known examples were the Nine Yin Severed Meridians, the Heavenly Martial Body, and the Heavenly Demon Body.
What constitution does she have? The qi pulse itself feels yin in nature, so… Nine Yin Severed Meridians? No. That isn’t it.
The defining feature of the Nine Yin Severed Meridians was an intensely yin and frigid nature.
The qi emanating from Jegal Seolha was yin, but it did not feel cold.
Rather than cold, it feels almost…
At that moment, the silent Jegal Seon regarded Yanghwi with an even deeper gaze.
“Yanghwi. Your intelligence truly leaves me speechless with admiration. You were right about everything. I came to Baek Family Manor… in search of the Sound Empress.”
“The Sound Empress? Younger Brother, surely you don’t mean the Heaven-Shattering Sound Empress?!”
Baek Muryang shot to his feet in shock.
Jegal Seon nodded gravely.
“I do, Brother.”
The Heaven-Shattering Sound Empress, one of the Ten Venerables Under Heaven.
One of the ten absolute masters whose names were invariably mentioned whenever anyone spoke of the strongest martial artists under heaven.
She was renowned as a master of sound arts and as the possessor of the greatest lightness technique under heaven.
“According to an investigation by the Crouching Dragon Pavilion, our family’s intelligence division, the Sound Empress was last seen at Mount Gokyeol near Agan County.”
Jegal Seon drew his precious daughter tightly into his arms.
“Our Seolha… must become the Sound Empress’s disciple if she is to overcome the affliction she was born with.”
At that moment—
with the final clue of the Heaven-Shattering Sound Empress added to everything else, Yanghwi realized the truth.
And it was a shocking truth indeed.
Don’t tell me Jegal Seolha was the Soul-Enthralling Demon Empress.
More than ten years from now, a demonic martial artist known as the Soul-Enthralling Demon Empress would appear in Hubei, where the Jegal Clan was based.
A great witch who bewitched and controlled countless martial artists with overwhelmingly powerful soul-enthralling arts, unleashing a bloody catastrophe across the region.
According to the rumors, she could do those things because she possessed the Peach Blossom Body.
The Peach Blossom Body.
A constitution said to fill the upper dantian with peach-blossom qi, causing its bearer to beguile and entice the opposite sex even against her own wishes.
In extreme cases, it was said that merely seeing her face or hearing her voice could be enough to stir uncontrollable desire.
Her upper dantian is already open because of the peach-blossom qi. That’s how she noticed me trying to read her. At least one thing is certain now—Jegal Seolha has the Peach Blossom Body.
That explained why she always wore a veil.
Why she had never spoken a single word.
And the nature of her qi—yin, yet not cold, but almost feverishly warm.
The Peach Blossom Body explained everything.
Jegal Seon must have been searching for the Heaven-Shattering Sound Empress, who had reached an absolute level through sound arts, so Seolha could learn to control the peach-blossom qi carried in her voice.
Then what if Jegal Seolha didn’t actually die young in my previous life? What if she survived, and Uncle withdrew from the world for some other reason rather than mourning his daughter’s death?
He probably never found the Sound Empress in his previous life.
And knowing Jegal Seon’s personality, he would have done anything for a daughter suffering under such a cruel inborn affliction.
If he had turned to demonic soul-enthralling arts as a possible solution, only for everything to go disastrously wrong—
It’s only speculation, but it fits well enough.
If so, simply accompanying Jegal Seon and his daughter might not be enough.
There could be something more Yanghwi needed to do.
I’ve never attempted anything like it, even in my previous life. But if I’m right…
Yanghwi recalled the mnemonic formula of the Heaven-Harmonizing Origin Art.
A formula containing peerless principles capable of embracing every form of energy under heaven—principles he had devised after personally mastering countless internal cultivation methods and even suffering qi deviation himself.
It might be possible.