Sichuan's Mad Dragon (Novel) - Chapter 27 - When the Tiger Stretches

Chapter 27 – When the Tiger Stretches

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Red Beggar and Ju-seong’s southward journey finally stopped when the weather warmed, and even became hot enough to sweat.

“The overall atmosphere is really…”

“Indeed. I heard the fight between the Southern Commerce Association and the Green Wood Lotus has intensified…”

The Southern Commerce Association was a union of merchant groups that profited from trade with the Southern Barbarian lands, and the Green Wood Lotus was the existing tea merchants.

The two alliances were hiring dark path practitioners and mercenaries as they waged a bloody fight.

“Can the heads not just step forward and settle things like men with a life-or-death duel? The martial world people are fine since they signed up to make a living by the sword, but even the small shopkeepers in the markets are living in fear, you can feel it.”

“How could it be otherwise? The atmosphere is like this, so even the inn serves noodles carelessly, and the dumpling skins are too thick because they did not even have time to roll them out.”

“As if a beggar has any grounds to be picky. Just eat quietly.”

Red Beggar complained but still licked the bowl clean. Indeed, being a beggar, he ate without discrimination.

Ju-seong also forced down the tasteless noodles. With dark path practitioners and mercenaries running rampant, the overall mood of the town was gloomy.

Common people who had not learned martial arts were also being harmed, but the government was likely turning a blind eye after taking bribes from both alliances.

So now, the southern part of Yunnan Province had become a battleground for the two great merchant alliances, a martial arts arena, a contested field.

‘If they want to fight, they should go to some empty lot on the back mountain and slug it out.’

Ju-seong began his commentary.

“With money, they think to buy swords, and having bought swords, they want to use them. Two such fellows met, so how could they not swing at each other day and night? Shamelessly dancing with blades day and night, only the innocent bystanders get cut and stabbed.”

“Wow, you should rather take the civil service examination and become an official. If Brother took office, the country would run smoothly.”

Red Beggar was clapping when an unfamiliar man’s voice came from behind.

“Haha, young friend, you are quite eloquent. But you are bold. Waggling your tongue like that around here will get you killed before your time.”

Ju-seong turned his head to look at the speaker. By appearance, he was not a mercenary or dark path man, but seemed to be a guard martial artist or family member of one of the two merchant alliances.

Ju-seong responded indifferently.

“My tongue is mine to wag, so what are you butting in about?”

“Because your tongue seems too sharp for your skill.”

The man spoke snidely. Ju-seong and Red Beggar were currently suppressing their presence as much as possible.

They could not completely appear like commoners without reaching the level of Returning to Simplicity, but at least when inferior types looked at them, they would seem about third-rate.

Ju-seong coolly shot back a barb.

“Do not meddle, and just eat your tasteless noodles, idiot. The noodles will swell like my guts.”

The man’s forehead seemed to bulge with veins, and he immediately stood and came to Ju-seong and Red Beggar’s table.

“Some stinking beggar and a scholar-looking fellow come and run their mouths. Let me teach you some manners…”

As he was saying that, Ju-seong swung his leg under the table and scraped the man’s shin.

It was such a sudden attack that the man’s waist folded before he could even react. Striking the shin rather than the belly causing the waist to fold meant it was a pain response.

If he had much real combat experience, regardless of his shin being shattered, he should have pushed off with his good leg to create distance. That was the textbook move.

Curling up like a shrimp like this was begging to be hit.

So Ju-seong obliged him.

-Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!

Grabbing his hair with one hand, he threw three punches to turn his face into a pulpy mess.

He did not even use internal energy, but his well-trained external art and fierce momentum already had the man in a daze, legs trembling.

Ju-seong met the man’s eyes quietly, then let go of his hair and said.

“Get lost, dumbass.”

The man scrambled out of the inn like a boy who had wet his bed and was being chased out. He was limping on one leg as he went.

Ju-seong watched his retreating figure, then asked Red Beggar.

“Do I look like a scholar?”

“Well, you are rather pretty.”

“But you and I both train extreme yang-type martial arts, so as our level rises, our faces will become rougher and our features coarser.”

“That is the first I have heard of it.”

“If you train extreme yang or extreme yin martial arts, your face changes. If a man trains extreme yin martial arts, his face and body lines become softer, and his voice thins.”

“Hmm…”

Red Beggar’s mood suddenly dropped and he fell silent. Ju-seong was not the type to accommodate such things.

“What, beggar. Speak up.”

“That sexual predator also had features as delicate as a woman’s and soft skin, they say. He might have trained extreme yin martial arts.”

“An unmanly fellow doing unmanly things is nothing surprising.”

It was not that training extreme yin martial arts was unmanly, but rather referring to violating women.

“By the way, are you sure that bastard is in the southern part of Yunnan? I have heard nothing about any victims on our way here. Even with my dog nose, I need leads to pick up a scent.”

Ju-seong said this, then thought for a moment and added.

“Not that I am hoping for victims to appear.”

Just then, the inn door swung open violently and a group of people stormed in. Ju-seong and Red Beggar rose from their seats without a trace of surprise.

“Ah, here they come.”

“That took quite a while.”

From the fight earlier until now, everything was planned.

The man at the front was the pathetic fellow who had been beaten and fled earlier. He immediately pointed at Ju-seong and said.

“That is him, Senior Brother! That guy picked a fight out of nowhere and beat me up!”

The man called Senior Brother was a man around thirty with a sword. Confidence overflowed from his face, clearly someone skilled with the sword in this area.

“My, young friends. I hear my junior brother had an unfortunate incident with you. Let me introduce myself: I am Wu Cheol-myeong, vice chief of the Flying Tiger School in this area.”

Ju-seong said nothing and just stared at the man. The man narrowed his brow unpleasantly and asked.

“When someone introduces themselves, is it not proper courtesy to introduce yourself as well? Why are you keeping your mouth shut? You are not a mute.”

Ju-seong ignored Wu Cheol-myeong or whatever his name was, and fixed his gaze on the one who had been beaten by him earlier.

Feeling Ju-seong’s gaze, the fellow flinched.

‘Damn, what is with this young guy’s eyes?’

As he thought that, Ju-seong’s figure suddenly flickered, seeming to vanish, then charged in stepping on strange positions.

Seeing such excellent movement technique, Wu Cheol-myeong thought the man must surely be a young master from a famous house or a rising star from an orthodox sect.

-Crack!

At that instant, a low street knee kick struck his junior brother square in the face.

Moving like a ghost, he had leapt up while thrusting his knee to target the bridge of the nose.

Fortunately, he had not infused internal energy, so it was not instant death, but the junior brother sprayed blood and fell unconscious. His already swollen face from the earlier beating was even uglier now.

Ju-seong landed calmly and said.

“One-step execution.”

A man had fought a man and lost, then called his superior. That was not manly. Wu Cheol-myeong agreed with that, but given the current atmosphere, he could not let this slide.

This was not a time to appear weak.

Wu Cheol-myeong’s expression hardened coldly as he addressed his junior brothers.

“These reckless brats need to be taught a lesson.”

Being from a martial school, his speech was refined and his clothes neat. This type of person somehow irritated Ju-seong more.

To avoid damaging the inn, Ju-seong first stepped out into the middle of the street. The school disciples also did not stop him, thinking it better for giving a thorough beating.

Red Beggar came and stood beside Ju-seong, and a dozen or so Flying Tiger School disciples drew their swords and surrounded them.

In their unified uniforms, the disciples circled their prey, while the beggar and clown also put their backs together and spun in circles.

-Swish, tap!

When Wu Cheol-myeong drew his sword slightly from its scabbard and then pushed it back in, the disciples charged in unison at that signal.

Ju-seong bared his teeth and grinned fiercely. His voice rang out with glee.

“Let us play!”

About twenty martial artists began clashing.

The school disciples were all second-rate, and Wu Cheol-myeong watching from behind appeared to be first-rate.

Ju-seong began moving his limbs while keeping Wu Cheol-myeong’s surprise attack in mind.

He scattered Fluttering Red Lotus Palms to block the approach of multiple opponents, and with the technique of Golden Whip Fist, swung his fists like iron whips to subdue them.

Using various grasping hand techniques to deflect incoming swords, he created openings and charged in.

-Thud-thud-thud, crack!

With the tenth technique, Red Crow Hundred Linked Fist, he subdued them, grabbed their collars and delivered a vicious headbutt.

Before he could be surrounded alone, he pushed off the ground and returned to Red Beggar’s side.

Something he had realized lately. Not the techniques of the Three Yang Fist, but simple kicks, obvious punches, and butting heads with his forehead, such irregular movements.

Sometimes those were more useful than proper formal techniques.

After all, techniques were movements useful in fighting, and forms were collections of those techniques.

‘In the end, there is no need to be bound only by fixed techniques and forms, that is the point.’

Ju-seong’s movements began to find more freedom. Lately, he had been gaining practical experience fighting the Sichuan Black Dragon Gang and the bandit chief of Diancang Mountain.

The two began to rampage in earnest.

The clown raised yellow energy like a heat haze, while the beggar scattered sparks like alcohol droplets, spraying milky-white energy.

As the white and yellow energies mixed and swirled together, they looked like…

‘An egg?’

Ju-seong wrapped his hands in hot yolk and fought like a yaksha. With his back against Red Beggar’s, he checked the swords thrusting in.

When Red Beggar swung his bamboo staff wide to create distance, he quickly charged in to subdue someone and came back.

After repeating this several times, when six or seven had fallen, the two separated and dashed off in different directions.

Ju-seong deflected two sword blades slashing from both sides with the backs of his hands.

Red Beggar blocked three thrusting swords by spinning his bamboo staff.

-Tap-tap! Thwack! Crack!

Using finger techniques to strike numbing points, he subdued two. Using an upward kick with a strangely twisting trajectory, he struck another’s chin and put him to sleep. Finally, using grasping hand, he shattered the wrist holding a sword.

“Aaargh!”

Screams erupted and groans flowed.

Ju-seong’s techniques were venomous and efficient, like a cold hunter.

Meanwhile, Red Beggar wrapped his bamboo staff in milky-white energy and slowly spun it, then struck explosively in bursts.

The bamboo staff was basic to hold with two hands.

But Red Beggar frequently let go with one hand, regripping with the other at the very end.

Holding the end of the staff and striking, its reach was beyond what ordinary long swords could touch.

-Boom! Whoosh, boom!

Gripping the end and striking down, he would spin it once to make a feint, then strike down again at an unexpected moment.

Striking like a hammer, like a whip, two or three people went flying.

Watching the fight, Wu Cheol-myeong judged that Ju-seong was slightly superior in skill and engaged him.

“Why the hell are you coming at me?”

“Shut up, impudent brat.”

Pale blue internal energy instantly wrapped around Wu Cheol-myeong’s sword. Not a vivid blue, but a certain purity was felt.

The color was unstable, shimmering like a heat haze, but that blue energy rippling like a tiger’s stripes had its own style.

Ju-seong also raised deep yellow energy like wings on both hands and resisted.

In a fight between ordinary people without martial arts training, bare hands versus sword would not even constitute a match.

Even for martial artists, the sword was generally advantageous. The sharpness unique to blades naturally imbued sword energy, and the reach of attacks was longer.

So at the same level, a fist fighter should avoid meeting the sword if possible.

Ju-seong first evaded attacks while observing his opponent’s techniques.

The Flying Tiger School seemed to train in orthodox martial arts with some history. The energy it raised felt pure.

Accordingly, the attacks were honest, and the techniques were biased toward quick thrusting.

Against precise thrusts, the correct response was to close in and use the opponent’s force.

Ju-seong sensed that while his opponent was at the same level as him in simple martial arts, his insight in fighting was far below.

“Cyan Wind Piercing Mountain!”

Suddenly, Wu Cheol-myeong shouted the technique name.

‘What an idiot.’

Shouting technique names was a custom often seen in friendly matches between orthodox sects.

It seemed he had unconsciously shouted the name because it was a finishing technique difficult to execute.

Wu Cheol-myeong pushed off his rear foot and shot upward, receiving the speed to thrust his sword forward. The blue energy shimmering like a heat haze drew a straight line through the air and bored in like a fierce wind.

-Sswaaak!

Ju-seong felt not even a moment of crisis as he casually twisted his upper body in a spin to dodge. This too was movement applying the principles of the White Phoenix Nine Heavens Movement Technique.

Then his left palm pushed at Wu Cheol-myeong’s shoulder, opening his upper body wide.

Ju-seong ruthlessly pounded the man’s chest, solar plexus, ribs, and abdomen like a washerwoman by the stream beating laundry.

-Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud…

The rather expensive-looking silk outer robe was shredded with sparks flying.

The bones and flesh beneath were also bruised and broken.

Of course, he did not beat him enough to kill, just enough to make a mess inside and out, requiring a few months of recovery.

This too was only possible because of the deep gap in their levels.

Their simple level might be the same.

But their caliber as martial artists was worlds apart. This was because Ju-seong was by nature a yaksha-like man, and because he was a man who pondered martial arts even while eating, drinking, walking, and running.

When the fight was all over and he looked around.

Spectators had gathered, and the Flying Tiger School disciples or whatever were all knocked out.

Red Beggar and Ju-seong looked around briefly, then brushed off their clothes and went back into the inn.

They had escalated the fight and shown their skills.

Those who got beaten were most likely affiliated with either the Green Wood Lotus or the Southern Commerce Association.

Then the opposing faction would approach them amicably to recruit them. What they wanted was human resources. And from that, they hoped to gain information.

Sexual predators of the martial world were elusive in their movements and excelled at lightfoot, hiding skills, and concealment.

So to catch the bastard’s tail, they needed the informational power that came from deploying many people.

“We have gained real combat experience, secured backing, made our debut in Yunnan Province known, and crushed the noses of arrogant fellows. We achieved all this in less than half a period. When a tiger stretches, it should accomplish at least this much in one go.”

Indeed, this was the first martial world debut for two outstanding young men who had been buried in the corners of the martial world.

Red Beggar did not seem to feel such sentiments and chided him.

“Brother, please be a little quieter, this is embarrassing.”