CLS-Chapter 237

Chapter 237

“Ahhhh-choo!“

After sneezing violently, Wei Yan-ho wiped his nose with his sleeve, causing Yi Seol-hwa to unconsciously scrunch her face.

“Do you have a cold?”

“No.”

Wei Yan-ho tilted his head as if puzzled.

“There’s not even any dust around, so I don’t know why. Is someone talking bad about me?”

“Have you done anything worth being talked about?”

“Of course not. If everyone in the world lived as virtuously as I do, conflicts would disappear from the world and peace would come. It would truly be paradise descending upon the mortal realm.”

“…Everyone would probably starve to death, though?”

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

Wei Yan-ho, who had been dreaming of a world full of Wei Yan-hos, clicked his tongue upon discovering the biggest flaw in his plan. What a shame.

Yi Seol-hwa’s gaze fell on the sleeve that had wiped his nose, but strangely, Wei Yan-ho’s sleeve remained spotlessly clean without a single wrinkle.

“Huh?”

“Hehe.“

Wei Yan-ho explained with a face that said he knew exactly what she was thinking.

“The most important thing in being lazy is keeping your clothes clean.”

“Why?”

“That way you can wash them one less time and change clothes one less time. How bothersome would those things be?”

“…”

Training to be lazy, keeping clothes clean to be lazy… If you just removed the premise of laziness, wouldn’t he be an exemplary young man without equal?

‘As if that could ever be removed.’

Yi Seol-hwa had long ago given up on separating laziness from Wei Yan-ho. No one in the world could be perfect. Of course, among those who shared blood with Wei Yan-ho, there was someone who was serious, handsome, had a good personality, was strong in martial arts, and even overflowed with charm.

‘I’m really strange too.’

But it was frustrating that her eyes didn’t go to him at all.

Her eyes kept going to the inferior younger brother rather than the excellent older brother. Was it a problem with her personality, or a problem with meeting him first?

“Oh?”

Wei Yan-ho smacked his lips.

“Can I have one of those?”

Wei Yan-ho pointed at the candied treats being sold at a street stall.

“Candied treats?”

“Yes.”

“…You don’t really need my permission for that.”

“Ah, that’s true.”

Wei Yan-ho nodded.

“How should I put it… I came down from the mountain, but I feel like I’m under surveillance and just stepped out briefly for an outing? I keep feeling like I should ask permission before moving.”

Yi Seol-hwa laughed softly.

This person always had such unexpected sides to him.

“You must like candied treats.”

“Hmm?”

“You used to eat candied treats often when you were at the Orthodox Alliance too. That Shaolin monk had such a hard time.”

“Ah, well, that’s right.”

Wei Yan-ho scratched the back of his head.

“Actually, I wasn’t originally very interested in things like candied treats, but after spending five years in that cave and coming outside, sweet foods just stuck to my palate and wouldn’t come off.”

“Did you eat raw food for five years?”

“If you call it raw food, it was raw food, but…”

Wei Yan-ho trailed off.

He had eaten air and drank dew, so it was raw food in a sense, but it was quite different from what people generally thought of as raw food.

But there was no need to explain such things in detail.

“You must have suffered a lot.”

“It was terrible.”

Wei Yan-ho shuddered. Just thinking about life in that cave made his body tremble involuntarily.

And…

‘Master.’

Wei Yan-ho slightly turned his head to look at the distant sky.

He knew.

The Baek Mu-han that Wei Yan-ho had met was literally a created personality. It was half of Baek Mu-han’s soul planted in an Internal Core, so it couldn’t be called the complete Baek Mu-han.

Baek Mu-han’s soul had already disappeared or ascended to heaven. So the Baek Mu-han who held memories of being with him would have been annihilated without being able to go to the afterlife, even if such a place existed.

Nevertheless, he sometimes wondered if Baek Mu-han wasn’t looking down at him from somewhere. If he were watching him now, he’d probably be rolling around clutching his stomach, thinking ‘that damn brat is fooling around with my martial arts like that.’

‘Who told you to leave like that?’

If they had conversed just a little longer, Wei Yan-ho would have somehow prevented him from leaving, but Baek Mu-han had refused to be a burden to his disciple until the very end.

Thinking about it made Wei Yan-ho feel inexplicably melancholy.

Wei Yan-ho stroked his belly. Every time he felt the Internal Core still remaining in his stomach, he thought that Baek Mu-han might still be watching over him, but this Internal Core was just a lump of internal energy without any will.

“Are you very hungry?”

“Huh?”

“You keep stroking your belly. Would you like to eat something first?”

“No, that’s not…”

Wei Yan-ho, who was about to say it wasn’t like that, changed his words.

“I’m hungry. If you’re not busy, I’d like to eat something… Not candied treats or anything like that, but something properly greasy and meaty.”

“O-okay.”

Wei Yan-ho’s face, which had been somewhat wistful, was instantly colored with greed for meat.

‘What an easy person to read.’

Rather than showing it in his expressions, he was someone who had no will to hide anything. That aspect made those dealing with him comfortable.

People who were acquainted with Wei Yan-ho all found him bothersome without exception, but they didn’t dislike him. Rather, from Yi Seol-hwa’s perspective, they seemed to find him more amusing.

‘Master is like that too.’

The Gong Mu-jin she had seen all her life was someone who truly had no social skills to be found even if you washed your eyes and looked for them. Who would have imagined that such a person would show himself bickering with a child young enough to be his own son?

Whether it was an advantage or disadvantage was unclear, but when people got entangled with Wei Yan-ho, they would put down all their status and dignity and become busy with petty squabbling.

‘He really is an interesting person.’

“Let’s go over there.”

Yi Seol-hwa pointed to an inn towering on one side of the marketplace.

“It’s rumored to have the best food in the area. They say high-ranking people sometimes come down and stop by.”

“Have you never been there?”

“It’s expensive…”

Seeing Yi Seol-hwa fidget with her fingers, Wei Yan-ho burst into laughter.

“I’ll buy you everything you want to eat today.”

“Really?”

“I have lots of money. You know that.”

She knew.

Yi Seol-hwa nodded with a stern face.

‘Because he’s incredibly rich.’

She was someone who had witnessed firsthand Wei Yan-ho raking in gold with a rake from where he sat. So she could also guess how much money Wei Yan-ho had. Even at this very moment, more money than Yi Seol-hwa could earn or even see in her lifetime was probably accumulating day by day in Wei Yan-ho’s vault.

“Is that martial arts manual still selling well?”

“They say sales have dropped a bit lately. I need to find other ways to make money quickly…”

Wei Yan-ho smacked his lips.

The martial arts manual business was great for making money, but it had the disadvantage that once you sold all you could sell, no one would pay money to buy it anymore. And no matter how much he had warned them, by now it was probably time for pirated copies to start circulating.

“Still, I’ve made plenty of money from it. With just a half-piece.”

“Half?”

“Yes.”

“Th-that’s a half-piece?”

“Yes, well.”

Wei Yan-ho shrugged his shoulders.

“Shouldn’t everyone know by now? Hmm, come to think of it, if that fact had spread, sales would have dropped dramatically, but strangely it’s maintaining at a decent level.”

“What are you talking about? Is that martial arts manual fake?”

“The manual itself is real.”

“But?”

“The manual is real, but the contents inside are fake.”

“Then it’s fake.”

“No, it’s not.”

Wei Yan-ho grinned.

“I clearly sold it as a martial arts manual that came from the Sword Emperor’s cave, so I didn’t lie.”

“W-well, that’s true, but…”

“I sold the proper thing. The problem is that the product was originally made wrong or made with a ‘go screw yourself’ attitude.”

Yi Seol-hwa was completely bewildered.

What on earth was this about? Then what were the elders who were still holed up in their rooms conducting joint research, thinking they could utilize that martial arts manual?

“Is it really a half-piece?”

“Yes. Hasn’t the rumor spread?”

“Of course not. Our elders are still researching that martial arts manual. There are even rumors that the reason prestigious people barely came as escorts for this competition is because of that manual.”

“That’s strange. Can’t they tell even after looking at it?”

Wei Yan-ho’s face became uncomfortable.

He had intended to half-scam them, but if it turned out like this, wouldn’t it become a complete scam?

“How does Young Hero Wei know it’s a half-piece?”

“I knew because I saw it.”

“Other people didn’t know even after seeing it?”

“…That’s strange to me too. Why don’t they know even after seeing it?”

Wei Yan-ho tilted his head.

If everyone else had lower martial arts levels than Wei Yan-ho, that would be one thing, but that martial arts manual had now flowed into prestigious sects and clans. Among them, there would surely be those with martial prowess equal to or better than Wei Yan-ho’s. But they don’t know even after seeing it?

“Huh?”

Wei Yan-ho’s mind spun rapidly.

If this was the case, the problem wasn’t with those who couldn’t see what was wrong after looking at it, but with Wei Yan-ho who had immediately recognized that the martial arts manual was a half-piece at first glance. Wei Yan-ho realized this fact and frowned.

‘That’s strange.’

Without needing to think deeply about it, the moment he saw it, it was immediately obvious to his eyes that the martial arts manual was strange. Why couldn’t other people see that? The flow itself was going well and then suddenly twisted so drastically?

“Mmm…”

“Do you think you know something?”

“Mm, I know one thing.”

“What?”

Wei Yan-ho said with a serious face.

“I’m hungry.”

“…”

Yi Seol-hwa had once again missed the fact that she shouldn’t expect anything from Wei Yan-ho.

“Yes… Let’s go eat.”

“Yes!”

Wei Yan-ho was already grinning with a face that had blown all worries to the sky. And seeing that face, Yi Seol-hwa also forgot all her concerns and worries.

‘What would change if I worry about it?’

The weight she occupied in this martial world would truly be nothing more than a speck of dust. So what was the point of thinking about it? The higher-ups would surely handle things appropriately.

Yi Seol-hwa, whose carefree attitude had rubbed off from being with Wei Yan-ho, thus missed an opportunity. If she had been more proactive at this moment, the history of the martial world might have changed, but that was something that the current  her couldn’t know.

“How splendid?”

Wei Yan-ho looked at the inn with a surprised expression.

To think there was such an inn in this mountain corner – how many people would there be to eat this expensive food here?

“It’s mainly where people visiting Mount Hua stop by.”

“Don’t they serve food at Mount Hua?”

“They do, but there seem to be very few people who accept it with a pleasant expression.”

Wei Yan-ho empathized intensely.

‘Humans should be omnivorous.’

Not herbivorous, that is.

If humans could live by eating only grass roots, why would we raise cattle!

Drawn by the fragrant smell of food flowing from the inn, Wei Yan-ho was naturally pulled toward the entrance.

It wasn’t simply a problem with vegetarian food. Mount Hua’s food, which avoided fire and irritating spices, made you want to cultivate your noble spirit after just one bite.

To put it nicely, you could feel the energy of nature pulsing; to put it badly, it overflowed with such wildness that it made you wonder whether you were a rabbit or the rabbit was you.

Wei Yan-ho, who had been practically eating raw grass and then smelled proper food, half-lost his reason.

“Oh? What brings you here?”

“Huh?”

Wei Yan-ho’s reason began to rapidly return.