CLS-Chapter 457

Chapter 457:

“I must have told you before, right? My martial arts are different from any other martial arts in the world. Of course, I too started from the Ten Thousand Swords Hundred Schools. You can’t create new martial arts from nothing, after all. But I discarded my martial arts and rebuilt them anew countless times. What emerged from that was the Mad Sword Style.”

“Even after all that bragging, you still have more to brag about?”

“Of course! It’s an achievement I built up through a lifetime of refinement—even if I brag about it over and over, it’s still not enough!”

“……Yes.”

Wei Yan-ho shook his head as if thoroughly disgusted.

If only he had even a little humility, he could genuinely respect and keep respecting this master, but that damn personality of his was literally eating away at all the points.

‘If I’m this irritated……‘

How badly must the people of that era have suffered?

Wei Yan-ho was experiencing firsthand why the people of the Ten Thousand Swords Hundred Schools kept their distance from Baek Mu-han, even though their family had produced the greatest martial artist of all time.

“Master, it’s complete chaos outside right now.”

“When has the martial world ever been peaceful?”

“It’s not that level. It really looks like all hell is going to break loose.”

“Is that so?”

Baek Mu-han seemed to ponder for a moment, then nodded.

“Then that’s perfect. Take this opportunity to gain fame. A man needs fame, after all.”

“Hey! I’m telling you the martial world is about to collapse.”

“Wherever there are people, that’s the martial world. As long as there are people, the martial world will never disappear.”

“Yes. I heard your head-in-the-clouds talk very well.”

“You brat!”

When Wei Jeong-han raised his hand, Wei Yan-ho reflexively pulled his neck in like a turtle.

“Use words, use words! Now is not the time for this. If we can’t catch the criminals who solved the secret manual, the martial world might truly collapse.”

“You’re talking nonsense.”

“What?”

Baek Mu-han clicked his tongue.

“What are you going to do after catching the criminals?”

“Well, we need to find out the cure.”

“When you stab someone with a sword, do you think about what cure there might be while stabbing them?”

“……That’s not it.”

Wei Jeong-han looked at Wei Yan-ho with pitying eyes.

“To begin with, hurting people is easy, but curing them is a hundred times more difficult. If those bastards took the entire martial world hostage to plot something, that would be one thing, but if their purpose was just to create chaos, there’s no need to create something called a cure.”

“Then there’s no cure?”

“The probability is high. It was made based on the Explosive Blood Pill, wasn’t it?”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I know everything you know.”

“Ugh……“

Wei Yan-ho scratched his head vigorously.

He knew this wasn’t really his master, but a master who knew everything he knew and understood everything he thought…… Even if it was an illusion, it was terrifyingly awful.

“I can hear you grinding your brain.”

“If I don’t use my brain, I’ll die, Master.”

Thwack!

Wei Yan-ho rolled on the ground again, tears streaming from the intense flick to his forehead. This pain never seemed to lessen.

“If there’s no way to solve that Explosive Blood Pill, then even finding the one who created it won’t provide an answer.”

“That would be the case.”

“But it is impressive. To plant such enlightenment within a secret manual. I never even thought of such a thing.”

“Could you do it if you tried?”

“Who do you think I am?”

“……”

“I just don’t do it because it’s bothersome. If I set my mind to it, there’s nothing I can’t do.”

“I suppose so.”

Wei Yan-ho answered but slightly pulled his neck in and prepared for an incoming flick. But this time, Baek Mu-han didn’t swing his hand.

“You’re not hitting me?”

“I thought about hitting you, but I don’t think I need to be the one to beat you up. There’s someone else who will beat you.”

“Who?”

“The owner of the secret manual.”

Wei Yan-ho chuckled.

“Hey, do you know when that was made?”

“You’re talking nonsense. It was definitely made recently.”

“……What?”

“To begin with, that thing called the Explosive Blood Pill was made recently.”

“How do you know that, Master?”

“If something with such effects had existed long ago, the Demonic Cult wouldn’t have been so utterly defeated.”

“Hmm……“

It made sense.

“In the end, that means the one who created the Explosive Blood Pill and the one who created some means to achieve the same effect without the Explosive Blood Pill are likely the same person. If that secret manual is definitely that means……”

Baek Mu-han looked at Wei Yan-ho with a pitying expression.

“You’re going to get beaten badly, very badly.”

“It would be fortunate if I just get beaten. I’ll probably die.”

“The probability of that is high too.”

“Your disciple might die and you say such things?”

“Life and death are one and the same. And I’m already dead, so what’s there to pity about you? I’m the pitiful dead one.”

“You should stop talking.”

Baek Mu-han quietly looked at Wei Yan-ho and then opened his mouth.

“I know you have no particular interest in the realm of martial arts. But from what I hear, the situation you’re in now won’t leave you alone.”

“……”

Wei Yan-ho’s lips twitched.

After pondering for a long while, Wei Yan-ho raised his head to look at Baek Mu-han. Baek Mu-han quietly waited for him.

“Actually, it’s a bit hard, Master.”

“Hard?”

“Yes.”

Wei Yan-ho revealed his hidden feelings.

“I’m just a lazy bum, you see. If I hadn’t met you, Master, I would have just been a useless fool.”

“At least you know that much.”

Twitch.

Wei Yan-ho’s eyebrow twitched.

Did he have to add such commentary at a moment like this?

“But lately, people keep demanding more and more from me. They keep pushing me, saying only I can do it. Actually, I don’t know how to do anything either. I just got a bit better at fighting thanks to meeting you, Master.”

“Hmm……“

“But I’m still uncomfortable fighting with people. And now they expect even more than fighting. Someone tells me I need to save the martial world……”

Wei Yan-ho let out a deep sigh.

“People seem to want a hero to save them from this crisis. But no matter how much I think about it, I’m not that kind of person. Maybe my brother would be different, but not me.”

Baek Mu-han nodded.

“You and the word ‘hero’ don’t really go together. Even though you’re my disciple.”

“Exactly.”

“But what does it matter? A hero doesn’t necessarily have to be a model for people, does he? If you accomplish great things, that makes you a hero.”

“I don’t have confidence I can do that.”

“What a fellow.”

Baek Mu-han looked at Wei Yan-ho as if he found him pathetic. But his eyes were filled with warmth.

“You cannot become a hero. You don’t have the heart to sacrifice yourself for a great cause, do you? Someone like that cannot become a hero.”

“You’re right.”

Though it might be somewhat cold words, Wei Yan-ho readily admitted it. Because those words were true.

“But in the end, you won’t be able to help but move.”

“Why?”

“Because you’ll have people you want to protect.”

Wei Yan-ho couldn’t say anything.

‘A bit uncomfortable.‘

Facing his inner feelings head-on was quite an uncomfortable thing. After all, what Baek Mu-han was saying now were his own words.

“Then what is there to hesitate about?”

“But I’m just a lazy bum.”

Baek Mu-han quietly looked at Wei Yan-ho and then opened his mouth.

“It’s not your fault if you can’t stop it.”

“……”

“If you can’t stop it, then no one can stop it. No one will resent you. If you did your best but it didn’t work out, there’s nothing that can be done.”

Baek Mu-han smiled gently.

“But Master, the enemy is incredibly strong. And I’m just a lazy bum.”

“You are my disciple.”

“But……”

“Do you trust me?”

Wei Yan-ho quietly looked at Baek Mu-han and then nodded greatly. Though he was a master who always tormented him, he trusted his master more than anyone in the world.

“Didn’t I tell you? I planted a seed in you. If you set your mind to it, that seed will become a tree greater than anything in the world.”

“For something like that, you made me learn the Dream Cultivation Technique too, so you don’t seem to have confidence in yourself.”

“It’s a safety device.”

Baek Mu-han placed his hand on Wei Yan-ho’s head.

“It might be a bit hard for young you to handle. But it’s something you’ll have to do someday. Let’s think of it as that time coming a bit early.”

“I……”

“Yan-ho.”

Baek Mu-han opened his mouth with an incredibly serious voice.

“Trust me. You can do it.”

“Master.”

“And if it doesn’t work out, you can resent me. So reduce your burden.”

“……”

“The things that will happen to you from now on will become harder. There will be days you want to cry, and days when it’s hard to endure. The more such times come, remember this. Even work that seems to have no end does have an end someday. But that end can never be seen by someone who stays in place. Even when it seems completely useless, don’t stop taking that one step forward.”

“Yes.”

“You brat.”

Baek Mu-han smiled gently. Then he stepped back from Wei Yan-ho.

Seeing Baek Mu-han’s expression gradually hardening, Wei Yan-ho straightened his posture.

This was his master’s teaching.

“I will ask you.”

“Yes.”

“What is a sword?”

“That’s……”

Wei Yan-ho couldn’t answer.

Sword.

What is a sword?

Despite wielding and wielding swords for all those long years, Wei Yan-ho didn’t know the answer.

“I strived for long years to know what a sword is. I thought, worried, and also wielded. And only in my later years did I come to know what a sword is.”

Wei Yan-ho swallowed hard.

But the answer that came back was obvious.

“A sword is ultimately just a sword.”

“……What?”

“Metal. Metal drawn out appropriately long with a sharpened edge. Nothing more, nothing less.”

“……No, Master.”

What kind of talk is this?

If that’s the case, why so grandly……

“It was wrong from the beginning. What I should have worried about wasn’t what a sword is. What I should have worried about was what a human being is.”

“Human.”

Obvious words, and not obvious words.

“Whether it’s a sword or blade, it’s humans who use them. If what’s held in a human’s fingertips is a sword, how can one know the sword without knowing the human?”

A brilliant white sword appeared in Baek Mu-han’s hand.

“In the end, a swift sword is a human swinging a sword quickly, and a powerful sword is swinging it strongly. Then what is the Ten Thousand Swords?”

His master’s sword slowly pointed upward.

Wei Yan-ho’s eyes shook.

Everything is there.

Everything is in there.

Swords, humans, the world…… all of it was within his master’s sword. As if the entire universe was contained within it.

“The Ten Thousand Swords is ultimately humanity.”

Wooooong.

His master’s sword was slowly swung.

As if to destroy everything in the world, and yet as if to embrace it all.

“Cry, laugh. Everything you are will ultimately become the sword.”

The cave collapsed from his master’s swung sword. And Wei Yan-ho’s world also collapsed.

There was the sword of humanity that contained everything in the world.