Pay‑to‑Win King of Martial Arts (Novel) - Chapter 22 - Registered (2)
Chapter 22 – Registered (2)
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Translated by Heavenly Cat
Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net
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After thinking about it from every angle, I came to the conclusion that there was only one possible answer if I wanted them to recognize me as a registered lay disciple.
That was to prove both merchant talent and martial talent at the same time.
If I proved only merchant talent, they would simply tell me to let my dantian be crippled and get out.
If I proved only martial talent, they would ask why I should not be accepted as a main-sect disciple.
But even if I was confident in my merchant talent, could I really prove my martial talent?
Once I considered that too, the whole thing became a tangle.
For the moment, postponing the issue seemed the only correct course.
“Oh? You’re rather enthusiastic.”
Cheong-hwa said that with a smile.
Naturally he was pleased, since I was now training diligently instead of making it obvious that I hated every second of it.
At the moment, I was being put through a brutish training regimen in which I hugged a boulder and moved it from one side to another.
In truth, I never liked this sort of physical labor very much.
‘I’d rather eat something good one more time with this kind of time.’
But what could I do?
The position of registered lay disciple appealed even to me.
It would guarantee my life as a merchant while also letting me learn Wudang’s superior martial arts.
This was the very definition of eating the pheasant and getting the egg too.
“Heh heh. So I hear you beat down a hall master of Ascending Thunder Gate in Yichang. It seems you’ve discovered the fun of martial arts. Competitive drive and a sense of superiority are also powerful motivations for a martial artist.”
Cheong-hwa still didn’t know that I had been offered the special status of registered lay disciple.
That was because I had asked Cheong-su to keep it secret.
Of all people, the one most obsessed with me becoming a main-sect disciple was Cheong-hwa, so I had no idea how he would react.
“Yes, just accept your fate. It was your destiny to become a main-sect disciple of Wudang. I don’t know how talent like yours went unnoticed for so long, but now Wudang has finally found you. What a great blessing that is?”
“Yes, yes.”
“If only you’d fix that tone of voice.”
Since I was doing something I didn’t like, it was only natural that my tone came out flat.
Did moving boulders bring in any money?
“At first, you could barely move it even once. Truly, your adaptability is astonishing.”
Even while I was harboring such irreverent thoughts, Cheong-hwa encouraged me.
Even I would probably feel pleased if someone who had struggled and wheezed at first began to try hard and then actually improve.
[ Sturdy Body – Grade 8 ]
[ Price: five nyang of silver ]
Of course, this too was thanks to the effect of Robust Body, which I had purchased from the Martial Talent Shop.
In my previous life, I had been cursed with the kind of constitution that never gained muscle properly, but added belly fat with ease.
Ah, and by the way, the five nyang of silver for Sturdy Body came from Cheong-su.
After all, I was the one who had saved four hundred nyang of silver, so I asked for a bit of money with complete confidence.
Cheong-su, looking displeased, tossed me around ten nyang of silver.
When I asked for more, his face turned into the sort of expression he wore when he was about to give me an acupoint-opening beating, so I ran away immediately.
Thud.
I set down the boulder and wiped my sweat.
No matter how monstrous one’s strength, one still needed to rest if one wanted new strength to come back.
I immediately opened the money pouch at my waist and looked inside.
The sight of the shining silver inside made a smile rise to my face on its own.
“Oh, my little darlings.”
“What is one to do with someone so hopelessly vulgar?”
Cheong-hwa clicked his tongue, but I pretended not to hear.
If I wanted to cherish my own money, why should I bother about what someone else thought?
“One, two, three, four…”
I rolled the silver in my hand.
There were few moments in life more enjoyable than counting money.
After counting it all, I found I had six nyang of silver and some copper coins left.
I briefly considered buying another talent with it, but since I had no idea when a discount might appear, I decided to wait and see for now.
Six nyang of silver was not a small amount, but neither was it a great one.
“It seems you’ve built a suitable frame of muscle and bone now.”
Cheong-hwa said that.
At once my ears perked up.
Unlike the other third-generation disciples, I had until now been doing nothing but stamina training.
“And that means?”
“That from now on you should begin holding a sword. Wudang is, after all, a sword sect.”
“To think I’d be taking up Wudang’s sword. Truly, one must live long to see all things.”
“How long have you even lived?”
“Longer than you probably think, Immortal.”
“Enough nonsense. Take this.”
Cheong-hwa tossed a wooden sword through the air to me.
I caught it reflexively.
The weight of the wooden sword settled heavily into my palm.
The thought that I would be learning Wudang’s sword could not help but excite even me.
“What I’ll be teaching you is the Three Calamities Sword Art.”
Those words splashed cold water right over that excitement.
Wasn’t the Three Calamities Sword Art just some pathetic martial art even the lay disciples learned?
At that very moment, Jeon Oh-su and the other lay disciples were probably learning the Three Calamities Sword Art too.
“Do you know what the forms are? Cheong-hyeon should’ve taught them to you.”
“Mount Tai Presses the Summit, Wind and Rain in All Directions, and Sweeping Across a Thousand Armies.”
“So you did listen well in the theory lessons.”
“A wonderfully versatile martial art that even Butcher Jang of Jun County uses.”
“You seem disappointed. But don’t worry. The Three Calamities Sword Art you’ll learn is different from what the lay disciples learn.”
“There are different kinds of the Three Calamities Sword Art?”
“Not so much kinds as depth. The lay disciples swing it a few times and move on. But the overhead chop of Mount Tai Presses the Summit, the diagonal cut of Wind and Rain in All Directions, and the horizontal slash of Sweeping Across a Thousand Armies are the foundation of all sword arts. It is not something to be brushed aside so lightly. Not if you intend to become a true martial artist.”
Cheong-hwa’s voice turned serious.
I agreed, at least, that fundamentals were important in anything.
“So how exactly is it different?”
“How it becomes different is not something I tell you. It is something you create.”
Whenever these Daoists started speaking in vague clouds like this, I felt like I would suffocate from frustration.
There was no such thing as vague clouds in a merchant’s world.
If you asked a merchant for the price of a good and he answered, It’s somewhere between three and five nyang, but that isn’t for me to decide, would you ever want to buy it?
“Exactly how do I create it?”
“Usually people understand when one has said this much. You have excellent talent, but your comprehension is poor.”
“Honestly. Do you know how quick my understanding and judgment usually are? A merchant can never survive without sharp understanding and quick judgment.”
“You are not a merchant by profession. You are someone who is to become a main-sect disciple of Wudang.”
Cheong-hwa chuckled.
He really had a talent for getting under people’s skin.
“Then let me put it precisely in the way you want. Swing each form ten thousand times.”
“Pardon?”
“The difference in depth is indeed enormous. The lay disciples usually swing it a hundred times or so and then move on to the next step.”
For a moment, I nearly dropped the wooden sword from sheer emptiness and rage.
“How can you call such meaningless repetition valuable?”
“It is not meaningless at all. It is more valuable than anything else you can do right now.”
“Haa…”
Sighs kept pouring out.
Still, I was in a position where I had to have my martial talent recognized.
Cheong-su was too busy as Hall Master of the Hall of Preserved Wholeness, and Cheong-hwa was the only one who could teach me martial arts.
“Understood. Then I’ll just swing it as quickly as possible.”
“Whether you swing quickly or slowly is your own business. What matters is filling the count of ten thousand. But you must not lie.”
“Trust me. I am absolutely not the sort of person who lies.”
“You’re lying already.”
Cheong-hwa laughed, and then suddenly vanished without a trace.
The sound of his laughter still lingered in the wind.
“Damn it all.”
I was just about to throw the wooden sword, but barely held myself back.
Needless to say, when it came to martial arts, Cheong-hwa was above me.
I had no choice but to follow his words to some degree.
Of course, ten thousand was still an absurd number.
I lifted the wooden sword above the crown of my head and chopped downward.
“…One.”
Only nine thousand nine hundred ninety-nine more to go now.
At times like these, one had to think positively.
The cup did not have only one drop left in it.
It still had one drop left.
I swung again.
“Two.”
Again.
“Three.”
Again.
“Four.”
…
“Aaaaargh!”
My positivity shattered completely after exactly five swings.
***
‘What am I supposed to do with that brat?’
Some time later, Cheong-hwa came secretly to watch Muk Hui-yeong swing the sword.
He had known the state would not be good, but it was worse than he had expected.
He had told him to do an overhead chop, and yet Muk Hui-yeong was only flicking the sword with his wrist.
And he even had his lips pushed out while doing it.
That was not an overhead chop, and it certainly was not respect toward martial arts.
You raise the sword above the crown of the head and bring it down with the force of splitting your opponent exactly in two.
That was an overhead chop.
If he kept doing it like that, there was no chance he would ever improve.
‘Hoo.’
Cheong-hwa wanted to leap out immediately, but he restrained himself.
Partly because he wanted Muk Hui-yeong to realize it himself, and partly because he intended to subtract every one of those fake swings from the count.
When he thought of the despair that would appear on Muk Hui-yeong’s face at that moment, a smile came to him all by itself.
Muk Hui-yeong was a boy worth teasing.
Of course, the figure of ten thousand had not been given in order to torment Muk Hui-yeong.
Cheong-hwa himself, and all main-sect disciples before him, had each swung the horizontal slash, the overhead chop, and the diagonal cut ten thousand times.
“Ahem.”
After some time, Cheong-hwa deliberately made his presence known.
Muk Hui-yeong didn’t even look startled, and immediately changed his posture.
Naturally his posture was full of openings, since until just now he had been merely flicking the sword around like that.
“So, were you doing well?”
His pose as he wiped away sweat while showing Mount Tai Presses the Summit looked exactly like that of a diligent talent.
If Cheong-hwa had not seen him flicking his wrist earlier, he might well have been moved.
“Of course.”
“You weren’t cheating somehow, were you?”
“Ha ha. Of course not.”
“Really?”
Cheong-hwa drew his own sword and then imitated exactly the way Muk Hui-yeong had been moving it earlier.
It was the same motion of holding the sword and merely flicking the wrist.
Muk Hui-yeong’s expression froze all at once.
“I was worried you might be doing something like this.”
“…You saw?”
“How could I not?”
Muk Hui-yeong’s expression crumpled.
“I’ll subtract every count you’ve accumulated so far.”
“Ah, don’t say absurd things. I’ve already swung it two thousand times.”
“Can that really be called swinging?”
Muk Hui-yeong was struck speechless.
No matter how oiled his tongue might be, even Muk Hui-yeong seemed helpless in the face of being caught at the scene.
Clicking his tongue, Cheong-hwa said,
“At this rate, you won’t even be able to enter the evaluation match.”
“The evaluation match?”
Muk Hui-yeong’s eyes widened slightly.
Inside, Cheong-hwa smiled.
As expected, Muk Hui-yeong had a competitive spirit.
He was a born martial artist.
Stirring that spirit had been the correct choice.
“Yes. There is an evaluation match where Wudang’s third-generation disciples gather and spar. It is how they test one another’s skill.”
“And when is that?”
“A month or two from now.”
“I see.”
“Your competitive spirit is boiling now, isn’t it?”
“Pardon? Ah, yes. It is. It’s really boiling. Furiously. Wow.”
The tone was far removed from anything solemn, and it drained the mood somewhat, but Cheong-hwa was still satisfied simply that he had shown interest.
“Would the other elders also attend that evaluation match?”
“Of course. Wouldn’t they want to see Wudang’s future with their own eyes?”
Muk Hui-yeong’s expression turned serious.
Then he stared into empty air as though thinking about something.
Soon after, he pressed his lips shut and began showing Mount Tai Presses the Summit again.
The center of the crown of his head, his forehead, and the sword hilt formed a perfect equilateral triangle.
That meant it was a flawless guard posture.
Muk Hui-yeong narrowed his eyes.
The movement looked as though it were meeting resistance, like cloth being split apart.
“…!”
By the time Cheong-hwa realized it, the tip of the sword was already pointing to the ground.
It was a posture and a sword movement so utterly different from the same man who had been flicking his wrist only moments earlier that it was hard to believe.
Cheong-hwa blinked.
“Yes. I understand now what you’re trying to say.”
Cheong-hwa nodded.
“You mean that it’s unbelievable that someone with your level of martial talent was left abandoned with only the Three Calamities Sword Art. I understand.”
“Pardon?”
Muk Hui-yeong looked at him as though asking what kind of nonsense he was speaking.
But before Muk Hui-yeong could explain himself, Cheong-hwa continued.
“Very well. From now on, I will personally supervise all your training. That will do, won’t it?”
“…No?”
“Don’t refuse. Of course it will burden me, but you are the sort of person worth devoting that much time to.”
“No, that’s not what I…”
“Swing!”
Muk Hui-yeong reflexively raised the sword.
His expression was full of mixed feelings.
Cheong-hwa took that as guilt and gratitude toward himself.
And so the misunderstanding only deepened.