The Ilhwa Sword Venerable came to see me again the following night.
“They say things should be done three times, don’t they? Let’s fight one last time today.”
I could not tell whether her visit was because she valued her promise with Father, or because she had enjoyed yesterday’s sparring match.
“Very well.”
I readily accepted the third bout.
“After returning from yesterday’s match with a draw, I slept all day. When I lost on the first day, I couldn’t sleep a wink, but on the day I came back after drawing with you, I slept like the dead. So well that I wondered if I had ever slept that deeply before.”
“You must not have slept well usually.”
“That’s right. I had never once fallen into a deep sleep. Do you know what I even thought?”
“What did you think?”
“If I want to sleep soundly, should I go and spar every day?”
I laughed, and the Ilhwa Sword Venerable smiled as well as she drew her sword.
After one exchange of combat ended, we stepped apart for a brief rest.
And whenever we had questions, we asked them then and there.
“During your twenty-third attack earlier, you dodged to the left. Why left? Wouldn’t the right have been faster?”
“I moved to the left in order to reduce the Second Young Master’s options. If I had dodged to the right, you would have had three choices. But by dodging left, you had only two.”
“Because of my center of gravity.”
“That’s right.”
When one reaches a level such as the Sword Venerable and I had, even after exchanging hundreds of moves, one can replay the battle just as one reviews a game of Go.
When I asked, the Sword Venerable told me exactly what she had been thinking, without hiding anything.
You can tell when you hear it. Whether a person is truly speaking sincerely to you or not. Father would scold me, asking how I could know what lay inside another person’s heart, but at the very least, the Sword Venerable answered me sincerely.
She, too, asked me questions whenever something puzzled her. I answered with my own thoughts as they were. Just as I sensed sincerity from her, she would also feel that there was no falseness in my answers. Teaching someone was no loss. It had been the same when I taught Ian; one often learns more while teaching.
“I don’t know when it was. The last time I was immersed so purely in martial arts like this. Perhaps this is the first time.”
Considering her age and position, “the first time” was not something that could be said lightly.
“How much more so for me?”
“Shall we begin again?”
“Gladly!”
This time, as if by mutual agreement, we leaped into the air and fought. This bout was, quite literally, an aerial battle.
Whenever it seemed the other would fall to the ground, we would launch an attack that allowed them to step off it and leap again, keeping them aloft. In that process, neither of us ever made a surprise attack. We helped each other remain airborne as we crossed swords.
Brilliant sword-light embroidered the night sky, and we flew like that until we had exhausted all our inner force, then descended to the training ground.
Only the sound of our breathing could be heard in the training ground. If this had been the first day of our sparring, we would have judged the result by who steadied their breath first, but neither of us cared at all.
“Do you have any wine?”
She, who did not drink, was asking for wine.
“Yes, I do.”
I went into the house and brought out some wine.
“This is good wine.”
“You know quite a bit about wine?”
“Not drinking it doesn’t mean I know nothing about it. And I did drink in the past.”
The two of us drank together. Wine shared after sparring with the Sword Venerable had a special charm to it. Though she had supposedly given up drinking long ago, she drank quite well. Well enough that I wondered if perhaps she secretly drank alone.
“Second Young Master, may I ask you something?”
“Yes, Senior.”
“Why did you suddenly change like this? You weren’t originally this kind of person, were you? It’s not as if I observed you closely, but I did have a rough idea of what sort of person you were.”
“It wasn’t sudden. I had been preparing for a long time.”
“You lived hiding your true self?”
“Something like that. If I had revealed my true colors when I was too young, my brother would have killed me. I kept myself crouched low until I could protect my own life.”
“You truly are a frightening person, Second Young Master.”
When the bottle we had passed back and forth was empty, she said,
“Let’s do it one last time.”
I was startled. The Ilhwa Sword Venerable’s tone had changed.
She, who had always used respectful speech, had naturally begun speaking down to me.
“This may sound strange, but when I am with you, Second Young Master, I feel as though I am with a friend.”
Perhaps she had sensed a fragment of my past life. In front of Father or Ian, I worked tirelessly to act more frivolous and playful so as not to drag with me the darkness, hardship, and years of the past, but I did not do that in front of her. Especially while sparring, I was more serious than anyone.
We learn from masters, and we learn from the weak as well. The realization that comes from that gap is so strong that we often neglect the learning that can be gained from equals. We belittle its value by saying it is only more of the same.
But today, I realized that even more of the same could become the finest banquet.
We talked, then fought. We fought while learning, and fought while attaining understanding. Now we set down our cups and fought. I can say it without hesitation.
Our battle was elegant. What we held was not killing intent meant to harm the opponent, but only the refinement of enjoying a spar.
And throughout all of this, I did not say a single word about the Blood Heaven Blade Demon. I even forgot the thought of making her my ally.
Thus we clashed fiercely and exchanged our final techniques, bursting apart in a brilliant explosion.
“It may be irreverent of me to say, Senior, but I feel as though we shared a friendship through the sword.”
She agreed with my sentiment.
“I do not know what kind of relationship we will have in the future, but today’s spar with you, Second Young Master, will remain in my memory forever.”
The Ilhwa Sword Venerable, too, regarded the value of this spar highly.
“Yes. I will never forget it for the rest of my life. Thank you for granting me such great instruction.”
“I wonder if I truly was the one who gave instruction.”
Perhaps she thought she had received more herself.
But I was certain that I had learned more. She may have learned a few lessons, but I had absorbed everything.
Through the sparring of the past three days, I had thought deeply about the Flying Heaven Swordsmanship, and the firm system of Great Completion I had achieved was shaken.
I could tell. The wall of Tenth-Star Great Completion had collapsed, and now my realm had begun moving toward Twelfth-Star Great Completion. At this new change that had come after so long, my heart began to race.
We did not exchange words of farewell.
The Ilhwa Sword Venerable drew the Ilhwa Sword and extended it forward, and I answered with the Black Demon Sword.
Clang!
With the clear farewell of sword striking sword, our sparring came to an end.
* * *
Having returned to her residence, the Ilhwa Sword Venerable was drinking alone.
After her sparring with Geom Mugeuk ended, many emotions stirred within her.
Three days had passed as though she had been bewitched by something.
She remembered the first day, when she had lost the spar.
That day, every sort of thought had crossed her mind. She had even thought of putting on a mask, returning, and killing Geom Mugeuk.
The self she had been that day and the self she was today were completely different people. They were the same person, and yet at least in terms of her relationship with Geom Mugeuk, she had become someone entirely different.
Then, from outside the thatched hut, Sa Ujong’s voice was heard.
“It is Ujong.”
In his hand as he came inside was a dish that could serve as drinking food. As he set it down on the table, Sa Ujong asked,
“Is something troubling you?”
Ever since he had served her closely, he had never once seen her drink.
Yet today, she was suddenly drinking.
‘A bad sign.’
Sa Ujong judged the situation as such.
Because the Ilhwa Sword Venerable had moved in extreme secrecy, Sa Ujong knew nothing of the sparring matches over the past three days.
The Ilhwa Sword Venerable gave no answer to his question.
At times like this, Sa Ujong felt a deep sense of self-reproach. She had never once shown him her true feelings without reserve. He had thought it was because she was a person with dried-up emotions, but why was she suddenly drinking?
“Does this perhaps have something to do with the Second Young Master?”
The Ilhwa Sword Venerable glanced at Sa Ujong. That gaze, telling him not to speak nonsense, was cold.
“Nothing happened.”
Sa Ujong quickly lowered his head.
“I spoke out of turn. Forgive me.”
For times when she was in a bad mood, Sa Ujong had a tailored prescription.
“Ah, I brought a new one. He is waiting in the secret chamber, so…”
“Enough.”
“Pardon?”
“Do not bring any more men… from now on.”
“!”
In that instant, Sa Ujong was startled out of his wits.
It was not because she had told him to stop bringing men. It was because the Sword Venerable had spoken respectfully to him. He felt as though he had been struck on the head.
‘What is this? Why is she suddenly acting like this?’
He had taken pride in the specialness of the fact that she spoke down only to him.
He wondered if he had misheard, but he had not.
The Ilhwa Sword Venerable let out a light sigh.
“It was something I should have stopped long ago. No, it was something I should never have begun in the first place.”
When Sa Ujong first brought a young man to her, the root of the trouble had been that she lost to the lust of that moment.
Just once! Yes, just once. I cannot even remember when I last slept with a man. Let me enjoy it just once!
But for lust that had opened the box, there was no such thing as just once.
Once became twice, and twice became three times.
When Sa Ujong said that the men wanted it, and that since she even paid them a great deal of money, it was in fact helping them, she had tightly shut her eyes. To be honest, later on, she did not even feel guilt.
Lust became habit.
Habit was more frightening than lust. Because even when it was not all that enjoyable, she could not stop.
But now, the time had come to stop. Once her sparring with Geom Mugeuk ended, she felt that it was time to begin something anew. Whether with Geom Mugeuk or not.
“Then I will send him back today. Whenever you simply say the word…”
“There will never be such a thing again. Do you understand?”
At her cold gaze, Sa Ujong lowered his head.
“I will keep it in mind.”
“Leave. And if you touch the young men under the pretext of keeping the secret, you will die by my hand.”
Until now, she had made certain the young men were properly taken care of. Whether they were paid properly, and whether they were allowed to leave alive. She had done so to prevent Sa Ujong from killing them in order to preserve the secret.
“That will not happen.”
After hurriedly bowing in farewell, Sa Ujong turned around.
His expression was stiff. He had won her favor by using men, and believed that this secret, hidden affair had solidified his position as the perfect second-in-command.
But what was that unfamiliar coldness? What on earth was that confidence?
He had been certain that he would naturally become the next Sword Venerable.
The Sword Venerable’s heart was wavering. No, it was turning away from him.
He knew the reason better than anyone. The one person who had shaken her recently.
‘Geom Mugeuk!’
* * *
That night, someone was waiting in Sa Ujong’s residence.
The woman’s name was Cheongseon.
One of the Soul-Capturing Demon Venerable’s five disciples, she was a practitioner of ghost arts.
Cheongseon ran into Sa Ujong’s arms as he entered the room and embraced him. It had now been a year since the two of them began seeing each other, and their passion was still at its height.
Held in Sa Ujong’s arms, Cheongseon spoke with a slightly complaining expression.
“Can’t you take that painting down?”
Her gaze was fixed on the painting hanging on the wall. The woman in the painting was the Ilhwa Sword Venerable.
“You are jealous even of a painting?”
“It is not jealousy. I know your loyalty well enough, but is there any need to hang that woman’s painting in your room?”
“One does not become the second-in-command of the Northern Heaven Sword Family for nothing.”
“I know. I know, but every time I see it, it puts me in a bad mood.”
Cheongseon led Sa Ujong to the bed.
“Do you know? Today is the first time you were the one to call for me. I was always the one who came looking for you.”
“Was it?”
“When it comes to being blunt, you are the best in our cult.”
“I have been busy.”
“Because of that old hag, the Sword Venerable.”
“Watch your tongue.”
“Sorry.”
Cheongseon burrowed into him, and Sa Ujong held her fiercely, as he always did.
But Sa Ujong’s gaze was directed at the painting on the wall. The fervent heat contained in those eyes was not loyalty.
Cheongseon did not know. At this very moment, her man was thinking of another woman. A woman far older than herself, at that.
When the moans of pleasure died down, words that would change their fate flowed from Sa Ujong’s mouth. Those very words that, in every relationship, mark the beginning of the end.
“…I have a favor to ask.”