Free Web NovelWhen I pressed him, Tang Un laughed and asked,
“Are you enjoying it?”
“Yes!”
“Then shall we make a deal? If you finish reading the Book of Changes you were reading today, I’ll tell you the rest of the story.”
“.......”
See? Teaching really was his calling. Ha. Ha. Ha.
“Then what about the other four?”
“The stories of the other four masters... I suppose I’ll have to tell you those after you finish the Divine Farmer’s Materia Medica.”
“.......”
“And now, shall we continue?”
Quietly, I picked up the Book of Changes.
Yeah. This teacher was not a normal person.
*****
The next day, Tang Jung showed up at the crack of dawn and shoved a large bowl straight at me.
“Here. Chug it.”
Inside the bowl he held out was a pitch-black liquid I couldn’t identify.
The rancid fish stench snapped the sleep right out of me. I wrinkled my nose and asked,
“What is this?”
“I boiled some crucian carp.”
Was it really crucian carp?
It wasn’t poison, was it?
When I stared at the bowl of medicinal liquid with suspicious eyes, Deokju leaned in and whispered,
“It’s Ink-Blood Fire Carp. Grand Elder went through a lot to catch a precious spirit creature.”
“Don’t say unnecessary things.”
Tang Jung scolded Deokju with a grumpy face.
Still, he looked like he was secretly waiting for my reaction.
I clapped my hands and made a big fuss.
“You caught a spirit creature for me to eat? Grandfather, I’m so moved.”
“Ahem. Moved, my foot. Hurry up and drink it.”
“Yes, sir!”
Like I hadn’t been suspicious a second ago, I gulped down the Ink-Blood Fire Carp Decoction in big swallows.
Tang Jung’s mouth corners crept upward little by little.
The smell was awful, but if it was good for my body, I could endure this much.
But the moment it hit my stomach, a scorching heat surged up from my lower abdomen.
Startled, I looked at Tang Jung, and Tang Jung tapped the floor twice.
“If you’re done, sit here. I’ll do guided circulation.”
“Yes.”
I sat obediently, and Tang Jung placed his hand on my back.
The heat that had been burning around my navel slid up toward my chest in one rush.
“W-what is this?”
“Don’t talk. You’ll harm yourself.”
He covered my mouth and breathed a thin thread of true energy into my body.
In that instant, the Ink-Blood Fire Carp’s spirit energy started to move along Tang Jung’s true energy.
No—move wasn’t enough.
The hot spirit energy charged at the dark-blue true energy like a predator rushing down edible prey.
The sensation of that force tearing through my insides turned my vision white.
It was nothing like the time Tang Jung had explored my body before.
This felt like a huge ball of fire burning through my blood vessels.
“Stay alert and breathe.”
Tang Jung’s sharp voice stabbed into my ears.
I forced my mouth open and tried to breathe.
My muscles trembled, and cold sweat beaded over my skin.
Tang Jung’s true energy skimmed my fine meridians, controlling its pace—almost touching the spirit energy, almost not.
When the dark-blue true energy opened the way, the hot spirit energy chased right after it.
From my lower abdomen to my back.
From my back to my head.
From my head back to my chest.
From my chest back down to my lower abdomen.
Each time the two energies circulated through my fine meridians, I felt pathways that had been narrower than a needle’s eye widen little by little.
When the spirit energy—burning like roaring flame—finally cooled to something merely warm, Tang Jung slowly withdrew his true energy.
I sucked in rough breaths.
I’d only been sitting there, but my whole body was drenched in sweat.
“Don’t forget this sensation. You need to be able to circulate energy like this on your own.”
“I was circulating energy just now?”
“Yes. You have to absorb spirit energy, so I moved it for you. Do you have any sense of how it works?”
“No. Not at all.”
“......”
Tang Jung stared at me like he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard.
“...Would it kill you to at least pretend you thought about it before you answer?”
Ah. Was I too blunt?
I turned my head and went, heh heh, and Tang Jung snorted and poked at my body with his fingers.
“These vessels that rise from the Perineum Point to the Crown Point are the Governing Vessel. And these vessels that descend from the Crown Point back down to the dantian are the Conception Vessel. When you make one full circuit of the Governing and Conception Vessels, that’s the Small Heavenly Circuit.” freewebnσvel.cѳm
“Ah-ha.”
I still didn’t understand.
Maybe it showed on my face, because Tang Jung let out a heavy sigh.
“Fine. I’ll explain again later. Anyway, just remember this exists.”
“Yes.”
“Now let’s go climb the cliff.”
“...Yeees.”
*****
Tang Jung’s “tonic-feeding” continued.
Even after seven days and nights—
“Want to try some grilled shellfish?”
“He spent the entire morning picking the meat from thousand-year mother-of-pearl. It’s what was left after making a spirit pill, but the yin energy is still strong, so you should eat slowly.”
And another seven days and nights after that—
“Here. Eat this too. I steamed it well, so you’d better eat it down to the root.”
“It’s thousand-year fo-ti. He was worried it would taste too bitter for you, so he steamed it with licorice.”
Every time, Tang Jung brought something new and made me eat it.
He said I was past the age to undergo marrow-and-bone cleansing, so he was trying to get a similar effect through spirit medicines—carefully reduced so I could endure the potency.
If I swallowed a powerful spirit medicine all at once, he said I could fall into qi deviation, or something like that.
“No matter how greedy you get, you’ll only break yourself. I’ll give you the spirit pills I made after your dantian is established and you can circulate energy on your own.”
I didn’t know anything, so I just assumed Tang Jung was right.
Unlike me, Deokju looked startled.
“The Poison King truly cherishes you, young lady.”
“...Huh?”
“No one consumes spirit medicines like this. And for a supreme master to guide your circulation so you can absorb spirit energy— even the rising stars of Shaolin wouldn’t get to enjoy such extravagance.”
“Seriously? This counts as extravagance?”
“Helping another person’s energy circulation is not easy in the first place. It consumes enormous mental focus, and if there’s even a small mistake, both people can easily fall into qi deviation. Even between master and disciple, it’s something they avoid.”
“Really? It was that dangerous?”
In novels, masters always did it for the protagonist.
Was it because he was the protagonist?
Anyway, Tang Jung’s arrangements worked perfectly.
My body reacted immediately to the byproducts of the spirit medicines Tang Jung fed me.
My stamina improved day by day, and I started to feel—faintly—internal energy inside my body.
The body that couldn’t climb more than one-tenth of the cliff... after a month, it could crawl all the way to the top—
“AAAAAH!”
Yeah, right!
The moment I relaxed, thinking I was almost there, a gust of wind slammed into me and threw off my balance.
Screaming, I drove my fingers into the cliff, but the rock I grabbed crumbled to powder and couldn’t support my weight.
“Young lady!”
Deokju shot her arm toward me in shock, but her fingertips didn’t reach.
I plunged straight down.
“AAAGH!”
Every time I flailed, sharp wind claws raked my face.
This is insane!
I’ve never even gone bungee jumping—what is this?!
I couldn’t bear the ground rushing up at me, so I squeezed my eyes shut—
—and in that instant, a hard hand hooked around my waist. freēwēbnovel.com
“A martial artist must never close their eyes in any situation. If an enemy swings a sword at you, will you close your eyes then? Look until the end. You can’t be nothing but fear.”
After scolding me, Tang Jung set me down beneath the cliff.
Yeah, sure—what, you want me to keep my eyes wide open and watch my skull crack?
I collapsed onto the ground with a thud and glared up at Tang Jung, panting.
My legs were so weak I could barely stand.
Even under my resentful stare, he was calm as ever.
“If you’ve regained yourself, let’s climb again.”
“...What?”
“Hurry and finish. That way we can get back before dinner.”
No.
I just almost died.
Tang Jung’s tone—like it was nothing—left me so dumbfounded I couldn’t speak.
I could endure scraped hands and feet and cramped muscles.
If I wanted to learn martial arts, I had to build my body first.
I knew it was necessary.
But what I’d just experienced was different.
My body, which had felt its life threatened, still wasn’t moving the way my mind wanted.
My pupils were blown wide, my vision hazy, and my heart thrashed like a fish flung onto land.
And he was telling me to crawl back up that terrifying cliff without even letting me breathe?
I swallowed down the misery, tried to push myself up—
—but my muscles trembled so hard I couldn’t stand.
My knees buckled, and something surged up in my throat.
I shouted.
“Grandfather!”
“What is it now?”
“Training is too hard!”
“I thought you were going to say something serious. Training is supposed to be hard. You just do it.”
Tang Jung answered like he was stating an obvious fact.
That reply drove my voice up on its own.
“Don’t you think you’re being too much?! I just fell and almost died—how can you tell me to climb again?!”
The moment I yelled, both Tang Jung and Deokju’s eyes went round.
They looked genuinely shocked.
Then tears burst out all at once.
I bit my lip hard and rubbed at my eyes.
Tang Jung, flustered, lowered himself so our eyes were level.
“B-baby...? Baby?”
“...Hngh.”
I was flustered too.
What is this—why does my voice sound like that?
I only meant to complain about how unfair it was, but my throat tightened on its own.
Tang Jung’s cheeks twitched like he found my sniffling ridiculous, and he tried to soothe me.
“Alright. Alright. This old man wronged you and made you miserable, huh? It’s my fault. You’re a good girl—there, there. Stop crying.”
“I’m not mad because I’m sulking... I really—sniff—almost died... ugh!”
I wanted to rebut him with perfectly reasonable logic, but all that came out was tear-soaked mumbling.
Tang Jung finally cracked and burst into laughter.
“Hahaha! Alright, I get it. I know. If training is too much, you should say so. You were following so well, I thought you could endure it. Now—sniff. Sniff.”
I did say so, and you treated it like I was whining every time!
I narrowed my eyes and glared up at him.
Tang Jung wrapped the edge of his sleeve around my nose, and his face was full of laughter.
“Come on. Sniff.”
...This old man really thinks it’s funny when I cry.
The moment I got annoyed, the tears dried right up.
After wiping my messed-up face, Tang Jung carefully pulled me into his arms and sat me on his knee.
He patted my body, still trembling in tiny shivers, and spoke softly.
“I was just about to start teaching you a Heart Method. It’s about time we formed your dantian.”
“Really?”
“Of course. It’s true. Brat—did your tears stop the moment I mentioned a Heart Method?”
As long as I don’t have to climb cliffs, there’s nothing I can’t do.
Tang Jung lightly pinched my cheek, then took out a clean cloth and a small bottle from his sleeve.
“What’s that?”
“Mulberry-Ash Lye. Mulberry ash water.”
“Ah—ow. That stings.”
“Endure it. You have to disinfect it, don’t you?”
Despite his firm voice, he gently cleaned my blistered, scraped hands with careful attention.
Even though Chasing-Palace Meridian Points would fix it anyway.
I felt awkward—like I really had been throwing a tantrum—but Tang Jung only stroked my hair in silence.
“This old man was impatient. Even rice needs time to steam before you eat it, but my heart was in a hurry, so I made you chew raw rice.”
There was a faint self-reproach in his tone.
So even Tang Jung thought he’d pushed training too hard—
“But in war, even raw rice is a blessing. Better than starving to death—so chew it.”
...Nope. He didn’t.
“If you’re done crying, then it’s time to do what we need to do. Now. Stand up.”
“Yes.”
I wiped my nose with a sniff and climbed off Tang Jung’s knee.
