Chapter 4. Myoseonja, Primordial Heaven-Shaking Art
— — —
The rabbit doll looked at me and spoke.
-Rabbit? How rude. You shall call me Myoseonja.
"Myoseonja," my foot.
I couldn't tell if I had gone mad or if this thing was insane. Dolls couldn't talk, so perhaps I had lost my mind?
"Am I having fever dreams because the training is too grueling?"
-Yesterday, this Myoseonja was busy recovering strength and couldn't speak, but today, you collapsed the moment you arrived. To think we are so ill-matched.
I was so dumbfounded that I spoke up.
"In all the world, have you ever seen a deity that looks like this?"
-Quiet, what would a young brat like you know? Have you ever seen a deity? If not, hold your tongue.
I am over sixty years old. I am at an age where I am called a senior wherever I go—
-You dare discuss age in front of this elder with a mere sixty years?
"……!"
Did this thing just read my mind?
-Why are you so surprised? Your thoughts are ringing clearly in this elder's ears.
'How is that possible?'
-Did you not shed blood and drop it onto the Nether-Returning Spirit Bead? That was when our contract was sealed.
Pushing aside all sorts of questions, I asked the most important one.
"Explain so I can understand. What is your true identity? Are you also an artifact created by the Ghost Spirit?"
The Ghost Spirit was the greatest master of the heterodox paths of his time. If he was capable of an extraordinary technique like the Great Art of Regression, a talking rabbit doll was entirely possible...
-Preposterous!
The rabbit doll hopped about as it retorted.
-This body is a peerless treasure created by a Daoist long ago, who took pity on his young daughter suffering from a severed meridian. That Ghost Spirit is merely a distant descendant.
"Is it true that the ancient master created you simply because his daughter needed a companion?"
-That is both true and not.
"What does that mean?"
-Inside this Myoseonja's body, the greatest martial arts under heaven and the greatest medicinal pill under heaven are contained.
Myoseonja twitched its ears as if to show off.
"Impossible. Your boasting seems excessive."
-Have you lived your life only to be deceived?
"……I have been deceived and betrayed, yes."
-Ahem.
Myoseonja changed the subject, looking awkward.
-Seeing is believing. I will give you a medicinal pill; consume it, then follow the oral formula I recite to circulate your energy.
"A medicinal pill?"
-You have to carry out the Ghost Spirit's revenge, do you not? And your own revenge as well. You will need power for that. Don't be too grateful.
"……Is that so?"
I rose from my seat.
"You make an offer that is excessively tempting."
I am not pure enough to accept the goodwill of someone whose identity I do not even know. If anything, I am in a state where I want to doubt everything.
"Myoseonja, answer my questions properly from now on."
-What? What a frustrating fellow. You should be bowing in gratitude for meeting such a fortuitous encounter, yet you dare to interrogate me...
I grabbed Myoseonja’s long ears without hesitation.
-Kieeeek! What are you doing!
Lifted high into the air, Myoseonja shrieked and thrashed about like a doll.
-H-how dare you pluck me up like a radish? Let go of me this instant!
"I am in a very foul mood right now. I am not in the mood to be led around by the nose by a suspicious doll that won't even explain itself properly. Give me one reason why I shouldn't tear you to shreds right here."
-……!
I don't know if it was my imagination, but the rabbit doll seemed to gulp down a dry swallow.
-T-this is why the Evil Path fellows are... utterly barbaric.
Then, it placed what I couldn't tell were its front paws or hands onto the back of my hand.
-Alright, alright. I was just excited because it’s been a long time since I had a proper conversation. I apologize.
"……."
Its tone had changed.
Seeing the dejected rabbit, I felt a bit sorry and let go of its ears.
"If such a great medicinal pill is inside you, does that not mean it was an arrangement for your daughter who suffered from severed meridians?"
-That is correct.
"Then why does it still remain in your body? Did the daughter die?"
Myoseonja’s ears drooped.
-Yes. At such a young age, poor thing.
"……And after that?"
-I was sealed away somewhere in the Forbidden Grounds by my master, who was heartbroken after losing his daughter. For hundreds of years.
"……!"
The time I spent trapped in the Brain Prison was twenty years.
But this rabbit doll had been trapped in the Brain Prison for ten, twenty times that long.
"That must have been incredibly agonizing."
At my casual remark, Myoseonja’s ears twitched.
-Are you sympathizing with me?
"It was not easy to endure even twenty years. To think of hundreds of years—that is a solitude I cannot even fathom."
-Haha! Right? Isn't it amazing?
With its mood swinging so wildly, its mental age was clearly on par with the ancient master's young daughter. Even if its tone sounded like an old man's.
"Did the Ghost Spirit find you while you were sealed?"
-He searched through the records of an ancient family and eventually found me.
"For the sake of revenge?"
-…….
Sometimes, silence is the most certain answer.
'What on earth is going on?'
The Ghost Spirit’s arrangements were not limited to just the Great Art of Regression.
.
.
.
The Ghost Spirit and the Great Art of Regression.
A rabbit doll offering the world's greatest medicinal pill and martial arts.
What could be the reason he prepared all these arrangements?
-Hey, Mok Ju-gyeol.
Myoseonja asked, glancing at me as I was lost in thought.
-You are going to eat the pill, right?
"Are there no side effects?"
-If you operate it with the correct mental cultivation method, there will be no problem. This is merely the first-stage pill to build your foundation, and as your realm rises, I will provide the next stage.
The more I heard, the harder it was to believe. How could a doll made of cloth perform such feats?
"If it is true, the ancient master who created you must have been a Daoist of unimaginable greatness."
-That goes without saying.
I could not even begin to guess the scale of this fortuitous encounter.
'Let's keep it simple.'
I would treat this as compensation for taking on the burden of the Ghost Spirit's revenge.
"I accept."
-Good, wait just a moment!
Then, Myoseonja, sitting in a strange posture, excreted a round medicinal pill from between its buttocks.
"!!!"
The appearance, and the way it came out—this was—
'Is that just rabbit droppings?'
The sight was enough to make my mind reel.
'This is... the greatest medicinal pill under heaven? Those rabbit droppings?'
-What are you doing? Swallow it quickly.
'…….'
-Eat it, Mok Ju-gyeol. Seize your destiny.
'Damn it.'
I squeezed my eyes shut and swallowed the pill. Then, an energy as clear as the wind and as fierce as a waterfall began to race through my internal organs along my esophagus.
-Close your eyes and focus. Draw the stagnant energy from your heart and Dantian like water from a well, gather it at the Baihui pressure point, and then...
I began to circulate my energy according to the formula Myoseonja recited.
'This is!'
-Hehe, how is it? Isn't it amazing?
I soon realized that Myoseonja’s words were no lie.
'The Art of Defying Heaven.'
It was completely different from the orthodox martial arts. It even had a different approach than the Ten Thousand Calamities Ghost-Extinguishing Art I had learned. It was so heterodox that I wondered if it was closer to the Demonic Path, yet my mind felt at ease. It was as if it were a Daoist mental cultivation method imbued with immortal energy.
'To think such an art exists in the world.'
-It is the Primordial Heaven-Shaking Art. And what you ate is the Primordial Heaven-Shaking Pill.
The grandiose name was not an exaggeration at all.
'This is undoubtedly a divine martial art.'
I suppressed my surging heart and continued my meditation.
It was a shock that struck a profound realization into the lifelong efforts I had spent agonizing over finding the path of the Evil Path. Perhaps this could provide the answer to the question shared between me and Alliance Leader Jong Yu-gang.
.
.
.
How much time had passed?
When I opened my eyes, the eastern sky was beginning to brighten.
-Already finished? Your comprehension is better than I thought.
Myoseonja twitched its ears.
-Congratulations, congratulations. With this, you have attained the internal energy of a first-rate martial artist.
'Absurd.'
This level of internal energy was comparable to the successors of the Five Great Clans who had built their bodies with all sorts of medicinal pills and great arts.
'My physical constitution has also improved.'
My vision had sharpened, and my body was overflowing with power.
A bead-sized core of internal energy was coiled in my Dantian, and its density was more akin to innate energy than mere internal force.
'Even considering the imbalance between my internal energy, body, and martial arts.'
I had gone from a mediocre martial artist at the entry level of the second-rate to a young, talented martial artist at the late stage of the second-rate overnight. Normally, this would have required years of training.
Between the conflicting emotions of betrayal, regression, and the excitement of a martial artist who had encountered an unexpected fortuitous encounter, I barely managed to calm my heart.
'Ghost Spirit, just how powerful an enemy did you have to prepare such arrangements?'
-Don't get too carried away. There are restrictions for this Myoseonja as well.
'Restrictions?'
-You don't need to know yet. When you possess the qualifications, you will naturally come to know.
Myoseonja twitched its ears.
-First, become stronger, Mok Ju-gyeol. You are still far too weak.
...The sound of a rooster crowing could be heard from afar.
Following that, loud shouts began to wake the world.
"Get up! Rise!"
"Anyone who isn't out in half a quarter-hour, prepare yourself!"
I rose from my seat.
"It is time."
My eyes fell on Myoseonja, who was left sitting there.
"Can I leave you here like this?"
-Ah, don't worry about that.
Myoseonja did a somersault on its own and transformed into a small coin with a rabbit drawn on it.
*Poof!*
-How is this? Now you can carry me in your pocket, right?
There is nothing this thing can't do. I thought as I put the coin into my pocket.
'……The Ghost Spirit, and this—what kind of clan are they?'
This was already beyond the realm of sorcery or witchcraft. It felt more like true magic.
'And what kind of person is the enemy who threw such beings into the Brain Prison?'
There is no such thing as a free meal in the world of martial arts.
Someday, I will have to pay a price even greater than what I received from the Ghost Spirit.
'Thanks to this, I can significantly accelerate my plans.'
My heart raced. The most extreme plan was beginning to take shape in my mind.
***
The first training session of the day was physical conditioning. It was a simple yet agonizing regimen where one had to keep running, even if they vomited or their legs cramped.
After pushing the body to its limits like yesterday, one must ensure there is time for recovery. Thus, the schedule alternated between training the Fist Hardening Technique and conditioning the body’s stamina and muscles.
“Huff! Haaah!”
“Don’t you dare stop! If you stop, I’ll make sure your heart stops too!”
The instructors were kicking the backsides of the lagging members to spur them on.
—The training is more brutal than I thought?
‘It is not a corner of the Nine Nether Heavens for nothing.’
—You certainly have a lot of pride in it.
Needless to say, the Ten Thousand Evil Alliance was my pride.
However, the Ten Thousand Evil Alliance forty years in the future had become nothing but pigs of the Evil Path, blinded by profit and schemes, having lost their original edge.
“Huff, huff. Are you not tired?”
Ma Cheon-bo, gasping for air, spoke while glancing cautiously at the instructors.
“What happened since yesterday? Did you eat something really good?”
Yesterday was wrong, but today is right.
—Ahem.
Brutal as it might be, this was, in the end, training tailored to the physical limits of second-rate martial artists. For me, having gained the internal energy of a first-rate martial artist overnight, it was bound to be underwhelming.
……Even I find it absurd. Under normal circumstances, my breath would have already been rising to my throat.
My breathing remained steady even after circling the training grounds dozens of times.
“You madman.”
Ma Cheon-bo and the other members could only look at me as if I were a monster.
“Stop crawling and get up! Fifty handstand push-ups, one hundred pull-ups on the bar! Execute immediately!”
“Yes!”
I performed the movements in time with the command.
Although my internal energy was but a handful compared to my prime, my body felt this light simply because I was young.
—Heh heh heh, this is only the beginning. Once you reach great success, you will be a Martial God.
Myoseonja boasted as if this were the moment.
‘Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen.’
I perceived the trembling of my muscles, the rhythm of my breath, and my posture and balance without a single gap.
As I did, I could easily feel the presence of the true energy moving on its own between the repetitive motions. As the clear internal energy flowed along my meridians, even the exhaustion of my physical body was being washed away.
‘This is an incomprehensible martial art.’
I could not help but acknowledge that Myoseonja’s grand claims were true.
Even so, I became curious. Even if it were a martial art of infinitely high caliber, would it be possible to graft it onto the Ten Thousand Calamities Ghost-Extinguishing Art and the Eighteen Swords of Ten Thousand Calamities to harmonize them in balance?
‘For now, it is possible. Because you are still only at the first stage.’
But as time passed, that imbalance would surely become a problem. If I could master it properly, perhaps I might see the principles of the martial arts that Alliance Leader Jong and I had pursued.
—You are quite a tenacious fellow. To be thinking of martial arts even in this state.
I let Myoseonja’s words drift to the back of my consciousness and repeated the movements.
‘Sixty-seven, sixty-eight, sixty-nine.’
The strength in my grip began to wane, and my forearms began to stiffen. Then, I naturally learned the trick of using my back to pull my body up.
‘One hundred twenty-four, one hundred twenty-five, one hundred twenty-six.’
How much time had passed?
“…….”
Before I knew it, everyone’s gaze was fixed on me.
“…….”
I thought to myself, seeing the looks of astonishment.
‘Hmm, was that too much?’
—Wouldn’t it look strange to anyone?
That was true. But it did not matter. I had merely accelerated my original goal of standing out quickly.
“Mok Ju-gyeol.”
Instructor Seok, who had been standing far away, approached me.
“Yes, Instructor.”
He narrowed his brows.
“What is the meaning of this?”
I had to choose my answer carefully.
From this moment on, my fate would diverge onto a path different from my past life.
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