Pay‑to‑Win King of Martial Arts (Novel) - Chapter 167 - I, Muk Hui-yeong (4)

Chapter 167 – I, Muk Hui-yeong (4)

I returned to the guest quarters and immediately sat down cross-legged. The Supreme Elder had given me a clue, so I intended to reflect on myself. I did not know where to begin, of course, but I thought that if I sat still long enough, an idea would come.

“Young Master Muk!”

But someone came to find me. Around here, there was only one person who would come looking for me.

“Come in.”

Peng Chae-hyang, who had dragged the Supreme Elder away, opened the door. She must have run all the way here, because her breath was ragged and her face flushed.

“What is it this time?”

I asked. This was already her second visit just today. Peng Chae-hyang drew a deep breath and said,

“My grandfather did not say anything strange to you, did he?”

“You ran all the way here just to ask that?”

“Yes.”

At the seriousness in Peng Chae-hyang’s face, I let out a small laugh.

“He did not say anything much.”

“What did he say, then?”

“Something about enlightenment? Ah, I ought to express my thanks to the Supreme Elder. Please tell him I said thank you. I found a clue toward my realization.”

“Grandfather does not really talk even to me about martial arts. He usually only talks nonsense instead.”

“Nonsense?”

“Things like when I am going to meet a man and so on…”

Peng Chae-hyang said that with an awkward blush.

So that was why she had been so wary about whether the Supreme Elder had said anything strange. Then again, the Supreme Elder really had kept probing to see whether I viewed Peng Chae-hyang as a woman. Not that I had any interest.

“He did not say anything of that sort, so do not worry.”

“That is a relief.”

While we were talking, the bundle of papers in Peng Chae-hyang’s hands caught my eye again. Normally one should not casually pry into another person’s documents, but if it caught my eye on its own, that could not be helped. Earlier she had dragged the Supreme Elder off immediately, so I had not been able to see what she was holding, but now the contents came into view.

What Peng Chae-hyang held was a ledger of the sort one would expect to see in a merchant company. I gestured at the bundle in her hands with my chin.

“Is it clan business?”

“Ah, this? Yes. It is driving me crazy. It is the matter of my pavilion, but I do not even know how to handle it.”

Peng Chae-hyang pulled a miserable face. In return for helping me, she had merely asked for a spar, but mutual benefit was not something one exchanged only one for one. There was no downside to being on good terms with Peng Chae-hyang, and I also wanted to repay the favor she had done me, so I said,

“Want me to take a look?”

“Huh? You can take a look?”

I let out a short laugh. It seemed Peng Chae-hyang still thought of me as a martial artist first. Of course, even among Merchant Kings there were plenty who did not handle the merchant company’s business personally, so she likely assumed I was one of those.

“Honestly. Give it here.”

It was time to teach Peng Chae-hyang that my true specialty lay not with the sword, but with the brush.

After skimming through it, I looked at Peng Chae-hyang and said,

“It does not look all that difficult.”

“Honestly. You say that as if you are familiar with it.”

“Because I am.”

The contents really were not much. The pavilion headed by Peng Chae-hyang was called Iron Origin Hall, and it was a fairly important pavilion in charge of the Hebei Peng Clan’s military supplies.

And the documents were about reconciling the current physical stock of weapons and armor in Iron Origin Hall.

“You just need to go to the storeroom and match up the quantities, do you not? Depreciate or discard the old items.”

“…I did all that, but…”

“You did all that, but what?”

“I am not confident I did it right…”

Peng Chae-hyang lowered her voice. I clicked my tongue. Then again, it was basic work in a merchant company, but for martial artists it might be fairly difficult.

“Where is the supplies storeroom?”

“Inside the pavilion.”

“Let us go together. I will take a look.”

“Really?”

Peng Chae-hyang’s eyes sparkled. She abruptly clasped both my hands in hers, then immediately recoiled in surprise at her own action.

“You really are staging a one-woman play all by yourself.”

When I answered with a wry smile, Peng Chae-hyang’s face reddened.

“Come on.”

I rose from my seat. Reflecting on the past was something I could do anytime. But helping someone was not always something that could be done at any time.

We left the guest quarters at once and headed toward Iron Origin Hall. On the way there, Peng Chae-hyang asked with a doubtful look,

“You really do know how to read this stuff, right?”

“Have you spent your whole life being deceived?”

“You absolutely cannot make a mistake with this. It is really important to me.”

Peng Chae-hyang spoke in a nervous voice. But I could not quite understand it.

From what I saw, even if a mistake were made, it was the sort of paperwork where one simply corrected it later.

And Peng Chae-hyang did not strike me as a timid or unconfident person either.

“If you fail at this, does someone scold you?”

“…”

I had only tossed the question out casually, but Peng Chae-hyang fell silent. It seemed I had caught a mouse by chance while backing up like an ox. In other words, there really was someone who scolded her.

“How curious. Who scolds a young lady of the Peng Clan?”

“Who else?”

Peng Chae-hyang sighed.

“The Clan Head.”

“The Clan Head? Your father?”

“Yes.”

The fact that she even called her father Clan Head outside a public setting made it seem the two of them were not that close. She had looked far more informal with her grandfather, so that came as something of a surprise.

“Your father must be rather strict.”

“Well, yes. But of course he would be. We are one of the Five Great Houses of the martial world.”

Peng Chae-hyang said it in a dispirited voice.

“I have never once gone hungry, and I get to enjoy things others never can, like fine elixirs and peerless martial arts.”

“That is true.” “Exactly. I have no right to complain. I just have to do what is expected of me properly. I am over twenty already.”

Peng Chae-hyang clenched both fists tightly. Even so, desperation and fear still coexisted in her eyes. Right now she was hypnotizing herself.

To me, it looked rather pitiful. I had not grown up in a good household, but as someone who had risen all the way to the seat of a Great Merchant, I had seen many people from great houses.

And in meeting them, I came to realize something.

The extent of a person’s mental suffering depends less on environment than on the innate temperament they are born with.

Of course, a bad environment makes suffering more likely. In the end, it comes down to whether one views one’s current circumstances pessimistically or positively, and if the environment is bad, one is naturally more likely to sink into pessimism.

When I was young, I suffered because I was poor. So I thought all of that suffering would vanish if only I got money. But once I had money, I suffered because I feared losing it. Since pessimism had seeped into my very nature, I suffered under any circumstances.

Then what about someone like Peng Chae-hyang, born into wealth from the beginning? She would not suffer because of money, but perhaps she would instead suffer under achievement and the expectations of her parents.

And when such mental pain reaches the extreme, enough to become unbearable, people take their own lives. I had seen many such people. Some of those who committed suicide had looked, to outside eyes, like people with absolutely no reason to die.

“Young Lady Peng.”

“Yes?”

“Even if someone grew up in a good household, that does not make hardship stop being hardship. Everyone has their own difficulties.”

“I hear that one a lot.”

“Do you?”

“Yes. My friends say things like that. Usually the ones from good houses who do nothing but play are the ones who talk like that the most.”

“…Hmm.”

What I had said really could be abused that way. In truth, my words ought to apply to people like Peng Chae-hyang, who struggled fiercely. And yet idlers used words like that to defend themselves. Since I knew that, I had nothing to say in return.

“I do not want to become someone like that. I want to become an honorable person worthy of my clan’s expectations.”

“I see. From what I see, you are doing well already. How many younger-generation experts already have a sobriquet?”

“Fortunately, I have made achievements in martial arts. But I have no achievements when it comes to managing the clan. That is what worries me.”

“No one person can be good at everything.”

“The Clan Head said that if one is to head the Hebei Peng Clan, one has to be good at everything.”

“But even that Clan Head is not good at everything.”

“Do you not know my father? Peng Gyeong-seung, the Saber Emperor, one of the Three Great Sabers Under Heaven. His martial arts need no mention, and the Hebei Peng Clan is wealthier than it has ever been. He is good at everything.”

“Clan management and martial arts are not everything. I have not met him in person, but I think there is at least one thing he is not good at.”

“Are you speaking ill of my father right now?”

“Yes.”

My straightforward answer left Peng Chae-hyang speechless. The title of one of the Three Great Sabers Under Heaven, the Saber Emperor, the Clan Head of the Hebei Peng Clan. None of that mattered to me. The thing he was bad at was obvious at a glance.

“Then what is he bad at?”

Peng Chae-hyang asked in a slightly angry voice. Hearing someone criticize the father she respected clearly did not sit well with her. But I was merely speaking the truth.

“Raising his children.”

“…Pardon?”

“That is not how one should raise children. Education means encouraging them to grow even further in what they are already good at, and comforting them until they become good at what they are not. Forcing one’s own way of thinking onto one’s child and projecting oneself onto them is bad education.”

Peng Chae-hyang fell silent. I let out a bitter smile. Judging from her expression, she seemed unconvinced.

“That is just my opinion. I have no intention of forcing it on you.”

“I see.”

“What I just said could be wrong, or it could be right. But I will tell you one thing that is always true.”

“What is it?”

“Do not die. Living is better than dying.”

I said it in complete seriousness, but Peng Chae-hyang burst out laughing.

“What is that supposed to mean? Do I look like someone who is going to die?”

“You do not look that way, no.”

“Ah, that is funny.”

The stiffness in Peng Chae-hyang’s face softened. It had not been a joke, but she took it as one. That was better. If she took it seriously, it would only mean she had truly thought of dying.

“Anyway, thank you. And I will pretend I did not hear you speak ill of my father. Since you only said it because you were thinking of me.”

“Fine.”

Thinking the conversation was over, I looked through the documents Peng Chae-hyang had handed me again. In truth, they were so simple that there was nothing to review. I was only pretending to reread them because she was so anxious.

“You grew up in a fairly good household too, did you not, Young Master Muk?”

But Peng Chae-hyang had no intention of letting the conversation end. The question was unexpected enough to make me tilt my head.

“Why would you think that?”

“Because you said the kind of thing my friends say. I do not mean that you are like them, but usually talk about everyone having their own hardships is the kind of thing rich people say when they claim they too have it hard.”

“They say it because they really are having a hard time. And you are wrong. I did not grow up in a good household at all.”

“You are lying. You are a lay disciple of the Wudang Sect, and you already own a merchant company. How could that be otherwise?”

Peng Chae-hyang had grounds for thinking I came from a great house. At my age, owning a merchant company really was impossible for most people unless they were wealthy.

But I was not most people.

“I built it all myself.”

“Without a single bit of help from your parents?”

“Yes.”

“Normally when someone asks that, one expects an answer like, Because my parents raised me well.”

“It was not that my parents raised me well. It was that I grew up well.”

Peng Chae-hyang laughed. Once again I was serious, but she seemed to take it as a joke.

“That is harsh.”

“Even if it is harsh, it cannot be helped. It is the truth.”

“I really thought you were from a great family. The way you speak, the way you carry yourself, the ease you have. People born in hardship usually do not have that kind of ease.”

“That much is true. At first, I had no ease at all.”

Only after becoming Merchant King did I acquire that sort of composure. Living life effectively twice also had something to do with it.

“Now I am curious about your past. What kind of life you lived.”

“Want me to tell you?”

“Is that alright? It is personal. We are not even that close…”

Peng Chae-hyang watched my expression. Even so, it was obvious she was curious. I did not really think my past was anything I needed to hide, so I could say it.

“If anything, because we do not have such a deep relationship, I can speak more easily.”

“Then tell me. It will take one gak to walk to Iron Origin Hall anyway.”

“Your estate really is large.”

To think it took a full gak just to move about inside one’s own residence. Then again, the estate of the Radiant Crystal Merchant Company I acquired in my previous life had also taken about that long to cross from one end to the other on foot.

“Where should I begin…” I opened my mouth. Somehow, the reflection on my past that I was supposed to have done upon returning to my room had turned into something I would be doing together with Peng Chae-hyang.