CLS-Chapter 122

Chapter 122

One strike!

It was just a single strike.

But the aftermath of that strike was terrifying.

Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!

Seo Ju-ak, who had taken that single blow, bounced across the floor like a stone skipping on water until he flew to where Yi Seol-hwa was and crashed down.

‘Is he dead?’

Writhe, writhe.

Seo Ju-ak’s whole body protested that he wasn’t dead yet.

But he probably would be soon, wouldn’t he?

“Krrrgh.”

Seo Ju-ak propped himself up with his arms trembling against the floor.

“Hehehehe.”

The man approached Seo Ju-ak slowly with an ominous laugh.

“That’s right. You can’t collapse yet.”

Ghostly fire blazed in the man’s eyes.

“My grudge isn’t just this much.”

He must be an irreconcilable enemy. How else could he be filled with such venomous hatred?

“I… I…”

The man shouted as if breathing fire from his mouth.

“Because of you, I…!”

The man rushed at Seo Ju-ak like a rabid dog.

“Eek?”

Seo Ju-ak, who had been preparing lines like “I underestimated you” or “taking advantage of my carelessness,” screamed when he saw the young man charging right at him.

“W-wait a moment!”

But the man showed no mercy.

Crack!

A human fist struck a face, but it sounded like bamboo breaking.

Seo Ju-ak couldn’t even scream and just fell to the floor with his mouth gaping open.

“Hehehehe.”

The man looked around.

“This isn’t it, this… This! Ah, found it.”

The man found something on the floor and picked it up.

‘A rock?’

What the man picked up was a fist-sized stone.

‘What is he trying to do?’

After taking a deep breath, the man looked at Seo Ju-ak, who seemed half-unconscious, and said:

“There’s one thing I’ve desperately felt for five years. It was a truth that you could never understand unless you experienced it yourself.”

“…?”

“That is, a stone fist hurts more than a bare fist.”

‘What kind of talk is that!’

What on earth was this madman trying to do?

Seo Ju-ak tried to tremble in fear, but there was no need. The man didn’t even give Seo Ju-ak time to tremble in fear.

“Experience even a thousandth of what I endured!”

At that moment, the man began striking down with the stone in his hand.

“…”

Seomun Da-yeon, who had followed Wei Yan-ho, couldn’t help but be flustered by the scene unfolding before her eyes.

“What is that?”

There were two men and one woman.

The woman seemed dazed, holding her sword limply in one hand and staring blankly at the two men, while Wei Yan-ho was mounted on top of someone, mercilessly beating them with a stone.

“A stone?”

Why would a swordsman use a stone instead of his sword?

“Waaaah!”

Regardless, Wei Yan-ho was striking down mercilessly with the stone.

But what was that glinting around his eyes?

Tears?

Why was the person doing the beating crying? This wasn’t some loving discipline…

The situation was incomprehensible, but what she needed to do was clear.

“Wei Yan-ho, stop! You’ll kill him at this rate!”

Seomun Da-yeon rushed to Wei Yan-ho and pulled him away. Even while being dragged away, Wei Yan-ho stretched out his feet toward the man writhing on the floor and kept kicking him.

“Die! Die!”

“C-calm down.”

What on earth was happening here?

Wei Yan-ho panted for a while before opening his mouth.

“When I think of what I suffered because of that bastard…”

Grind, grind – from the sound of his teeth grinding, his grudge seemed considerable.

“Is that person the Flower-Obsessed Scholar right now?”

“Yes.”

That?

The Flower-Obsessed Scholar Seo Ju-ak was famous as a handsome man as well as a sex demon. If he hadn’t been handsome in the first place, he wouldn’t have been able to target innocent young women.

But the person lying on the floor now…

Well, it was hard to call him handsome, but also hard to say he wasn’t.

What I mean is, I don’t know what the original looked like, but with his face swollen like a steamed bun right now, it was impossible to determine his appearance at all.

‘So a person’s face can swell up that much.’

He must have been beaten so intensively on the face that it was swollen beyond recognition.

“I-it seems to be the Flower-Obsessed Scholar.”

Wei Yan-ho glared at Seo Ju-ak and trembled.

“I haven’t even finished a thousandth of the beating yet.”

“If you beat him more, he’ll die…”

“Wouldn’t it be fine if he died?”

“…”

Emotionally, she very much agreed. Since he was a sex demon who had ruined the lives of countless women, it would naturally be better if he died.

‘Should I not have stopped him?’

She thought she might have been too hasty, but having stopped him once, it would be awkward to encourage him to beat the man again.

“Let’s escort him to the Orthodox Alliance for now. They’ll decide whether to kill him or not.”

“Hmm…”

Wei Yan-ho seemed dissatisfied, but thinking it would be awkward to get worked up and beat him again, he didn’t say anything more.

“Fine, then.”

Only after the situation was somewhat resolved did Wei Yan-ho notice Yi Seol-hwa.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes? Oh, yes!”

Yi Seol-hwa tried to bow her head but sat down on the spot.

She was already injured. She had forced herself to stand, but as the tension was released, the strength left her body.

“Cough.”

When she spat up blood from her mouth again, Wei Yan-ho clicked his tongue and approached her.

“Tsk, tsk.”

Wei Yan-ho grabbed her wrist.

“I’m fine…”

“Stay still. What do you mean you’re fine? If we don’t stabilize you now, it could be a lifelong problem.”

Yi Seol-hwa looked up at Wei Yan-ho with a flustered expression.

For someone who had just been savagely beating a person with a stone, his voice was far too gentle.

‘Wasn’t he a madman?’

The Wei Yan-ho she had seen could easily be called a madman.

“Hmm…”

Wei Yan-ho held her wrist quietly and chuckled.

“This won’t do.”

“Pardon?”

“As expected, this isn’t my specialty.”

He had tried to imitate Jin So-ah, but what could he, who wasn’t a physician, learn from checking pulses?

“Well, I need to treat you.”

“…Pardon?”

“How should I put it… I’m not a physician, so I can’t do anything by checking pulses.”

“Yes.”

“So I’d need to place my hand on your dantian…”

Her eyebrows trembled.

Dantian.

Was he saying he would place his hand on a maiden’s lower abdomen? She was about to scream when Wei Yan-ho struck first.

“Since it’s a sensitive matter, you decide.”

“…”

If he had insisted on forced treatment, she would have slapped him as a lecher, but when he stepped back like this, her response became ambiguous.

Then Seomun Da-yeon slowly fanned the flames.

“What happens if you don’t treat her?”

“I don’t know well. From what I can see, the area around the dantian seems twisted, and in a little while, blood stasis and internal energy will clump together and block the major meridians here and there.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means the pathways through which qi flows will be blocked.”

“Then what happens?”

“Well, if she were an ordinary person, she’d become disabled or…”

Flinch.

Yi Seol-hwa’s body jerked.

“She’d become paralyzed from the waist down…”

Flinch.

“But since she’s a martial artist, it wouldn’t go that far.”

Yi Seol-hwa sighed in relief.

“She just wouldn’t be able to learn advanced martial arts. If she wants to put down her sword and live as an ordinary woman, that’s not so bad either.”

Yi Seol-hwa’s pupils shook again.

An ordinary woman.

She had been looking only at swords for nearly fifteen years since first climbing Mount Hua at age five. And now, to become an ordinary woman? What kind of talk was that?

“Is there no other way?”

“If she meets a good physician, they might be able to unblock the blocked meridians later, so it’s not impossible.”

Whew…

Yi Seol-hwa sighed again.

“So she just needs to meet a famous physician? What level of famous physician would it need to be?”

“Well, Hua Tuo or Bian Que? That kind of physician?”

“…They’re dead.”

“Right. That’s what I’m saying.”

Yi Seol-hwa felt her breathing become labored.

What kind of people were these two to be having such casual conversation in front of someone about whether they’d become disabled or not?

She felt like she might die of frustration before her internal injuries.

“Cough!”

When Yi Seol-hwa spat up blood again, Seomun Da-yeon said in surprise:

“Are you alright?”

Yi Seol-hwa nodded, but to Seomun Da-yeon’s eyes, her face was excessively pale.

“Shouldn’t you treat her quickly? Why are you just watching?”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“How scary is the world these days? If I touch her without permission and get branded as a sex demon, I’ll be perfect for getting stoned to death.”

“…”

Wei Yan-ho shook his head firmly as if it really wouldn’t do.

“My master said the scariest thing in the world is women, the second scariest thing is women, and the third scariest thing is women.”

‘Is that why you treated me like a servant?’

Something seemed inconsistent between his words and actions, but Wei Yan-ho really seemed to have no intention of forcing treatment. It was rather Seomun Da-yeon who became anxious at his unwavering attitude.

“So you’re just going to leave her to become disabled?”

“It’s not something I can do anything about.”

“Still…”

Come to think of it, this wasn’t something to force. If Wei Yan-ho touched her and something went wrong, who would take responsibility?

Especially if rumors started just from touching a pure maiden, it wouldn’t be good for either Wei Yan-ho or the woman lying there.

“People who eat with their swords must always be prepared to risk their lives. From the moment you grasp a sword, if you don’t think you might die, you don’t deserve to hold a sword.”

When Wei Yan-ho unusually spoke such heavy words, Seomun Da-yeon nodded.

No one had forced them to live as martial artists.

It was they themselves who had resolved to live as martial artists risking their lives. Then she too had to endure this matter.

“Well, that’s why I want to just hide away in a room somewhere.”

Seomun Da-yeon looked at Wei Yan-ho with disdainful eyes. But it seemed to sound different to Yi Seol-hwa’s ears.

Yi Seol-hwa, who interpreted it as something like “If women just stayed holed up in their rooms, they wouldn’t face such things, so why did you come out to the martial world with a sword,” gritted her teeth.

“Please… treat me.”

“Pardon?”

“If you can treat me, I would be grateful if you would treat me…”

From Yi Seol-hwa’s position, it was something she said with great resolve. No matter how much her martial arts were at risk of being ruined, for her, a pure maiden, to entrust her body to a man was impossible without extraordinary resolve.

But Wei Yan-ho frowned as if he found it very distasteful.

Then he turned to look at Seomun Da-yeon.

“Witness.”

“Pardon?”

“Watch well, listen well, and testify exactly as you see.”

“Pardon?”

Wei Yan-ho slowly approached Yi Seol-hwa, bent down in front of her, and said:

“This is what you wanted. Right?”

“…Yes.”

“I’ll inevitably have to touch your body, but you won’t report this to the authorities or anything, right?”

“…Yes.”

“And Mount Hua won’t demand responsibility or ask me to take responsibility for you. I’m just purely providing treatment, and the responsibility for all of this rests with you…”

“Hey, you rascal!”

Unable to bear it any longer, Seomun Da-yeon finally threw the luggage she was carrying at Wei Yan-ho.