Chapter 68
Chapter 68: Third-rate Martial Family Becomes the Best Under Heaven
Zhuge Seolha watched in an absolute daze as Yanghwi pressed the edge of his steel against the throat of Black Killing Sword.
…Honestly. Senior Brother is beyond comprehension.
The spiritual manifestation of his will remained burned into her vision.
It was like a rugged, jagged cliff—weathered and fractured by storms, yet enduring with quiet defiance.
Or maybe an unyielding shell cradling a nascent life waiting to break free.
Although she addressed him as Senior Brother, both of them shared the exact same age.
How could a child so young possess a mental image of such immense gravity?
He was the one… who led me out into the light. He gave me the strength to stand tall.
Since the day her heavenly affliction surfaced, the protective shelter of her father’s arms had defined the boundaries of her existence.
Crossing paths with Yanghwi shattered those walls, granting her the resolve to walk forward on her own two feet.
Because of him, she had been accepted as a disciple by the Sound Empress and gained the chance to finally overcome her cursed condition.
It was only natural that Zhuge Seolha regarded him with profound sentiment.
It was sheer, unadulterated veneration.
I pushed myself so relentlessly, absorbing every syllable of Master’s guidance just so I wouldn’t fall behind him.
Scarcely a year had passed since she entered the Sacred Sound Jade Spirit Gate, yet she had already assimilated its core essentials.
The Sound Empress herself had lauded her talent, naming her an anomaly rarely witnessed across centuries.
And yet, he surged even further into the distance.
Attaining the second-rate realm at a mere nine years of age.
Such a milestone was virtually unheard of, even among the most gifted prodigies nurtured by the realm’s premier factions.
Breaching the second-rate threshold at ten was already viewed as an astonishing marvel.
Even if an infant underwent marrow cleansing straight from the womb and embarked on martial cultivation the second they learned to step, ten was universally recognized as the absolute boundary.
It was completely logical.
The cognitive depth of a child could never rival that of a grown adult, and martial enlightenment demanded profound, transcendent perception.
I want to become just like Senior Brother.
Youth instinctively develops by chasing the shadows of those who tread the path ahead.
To Zhuge Seolha, Yanghwi was an ideal of greatness—a presence she yearned to mirror.
The scenes of the clash she had just witnessed replayed within her mind once more.
— Die!
— Fucking hell!
— Aren’t you ashamed, begging a kid to go easy on you?
— Kill me? You can’t even do it. All talk, as usual.
Shielded as the beloved gem of the Zhuge clan, her heavenly affliction had kept her isolated from the world at large.
To her unaccustomed ears, the way Yanghwi spoke and conducted himself was…
Completely alien, yet wildly captivating.
He must have spoken like that intentionally, using coarse words to seize the psychological advantage, right?
In truth, not in the slightest. Those foul curses were merely the lingering habits ingrained from his previous existence as a rough, vagrant martial artist.
Yet here he was, staring down a terrifying killer without an ounce of hesitation, uttering whatever he wished…
Disregarding biological age, Yanghwi’s accumulated soul was roughly identical in years to Black Killing Sword.
Furthermore, his martial attainment in his previous incarnation had reached far grander heights.
He’s terrifyingly capable. To think someone my age could wield such power. Senior Brother is truly…
Thus, an innocent, grand misconception regarding Yanghwi blossomed within Zhuge Seolha’s heart.
What he had achieved and displayed up to this moment was simply too staggering to process otherwise.
Besides, the sheer spectacle of the fight practically demanded such an interpretation.
Facing an opponent of superior years and superior cultivation… he grasped profound enlightenment right in the heat of combat. He seamlessly unified his personal martial foundation with Master’s teachings.
Such a feat transcended normal comprehension.
It seemed pulled directly from the pages of ancient martial epics, a mythic accomplishment reserved for legendary champions of old.
And after manifesting such a breathtaking miracle, the words he spat out while keeping his sword pressed flush against Black Killing Sword’s throat:
— Old man. How’s it feel to lose to a snot-nosed kid?
Those words carved an indelible impression across Zhuge Seolha’s spirit.
So incredibly cool.
Unconsciously, her lips parted.
“Fuckin’… hell…”
Fortunately, nobody caught her quiet, breathless murmur.
A month slipped by following the duel against Black Killing Sword.
Throughout that span, Yanghwi threw himself entirely into weaving his newfound revelation into the fabric of the Hundred and Eight Heaven-Splitting Swords.
This novel insight was dubbed Resonating Vibration.
Its foundational doctrine was to convert every oscillation and note generated by a sword into an acoustic catalyst for sound techniques.
Bee Wing Resonating Vibration. If I can merge this seamlessly into an organic whole, it will grant me an intrinsic tactical edge against virtually all martial disciplines.
The reason Yanghwi, lingering within the second-rate realm, had managed to crush an established first-rate master like Black Killing Sword was technical compatibility.
Every discipline under heaven held innate superiorities and vulnerabilities when pitted against another.
A form designed to dismantle Style A might expose an intrinsic blind spot before Style B, perpetuating an eternal cycle.
Rigidity yields to yielding grace. Fluidity can be shattered by sheer velocity.
Defined by divergent currents and principles, martial forms inevitably locked into an endless spiral of checks and balances.
If I can thread Resonating Vibration through every single stance, I can dictate the advantage against almost any style in existence.
Achieving such harmony demanded the meticulous recalibration of each individual movement and a restructuring of the entire system’s cadence.
Even blessed with the memories and refined discernment of his prior life, it remained a monumental undertaking that could never be mastered within a solitary month.
Were it not for one crucial factor…
“A fascinating concept, Young Hero. What if you approached the transition like this?”
Standing right beside Yanghwi was the Wave-Piercing Sound Empress, counted among the Ten Paragons Under Heaven.
A sovereign entity who had stepped into a transcendent plane beyond the mortal sky—a peak he had never come close to reaching in his past life.
“Your blade strikes with swiftness, yet carries formidable weight. You have integrated opposing extremes with rare grace. If one were to translate that rhythm into music… mm.”
Chara-rang, thud!
Her fingers moved gracefully, evoking deep, resonant pulses that echoed in rapid, rhythmic cadence.
The resulting vibration bore an uncanny resonance with the structure of the Hundred and Eight Heaven-Splitting Swords.
“Something along these lines. Do you grasp the intent?”
“Yes. My gratitude, Honored Teacher.”
Whenever intervals opened while tutoring Zhuge Seolha, the Sound Empress dedicated herself to refining Yanghwi’s combat arts.
The insights offered by a supreme practitioner who had breached the apex realm to step into the transformation stage, or perhaps even greater heights, held value far beyond a thousand chests of gold.
Moreover, her guidance reached beyond the path of the sword.
“You referred to this as the Pear Blossom Six Harmonies Art?”
“Indeed, Honored Teacher.”
Even while consumed by the integration of his martial revelation, Yanghwi never once neglected his daily physical conditioning.
He fortified his flesh and bone via the Pear Blossom Six Harmonies Art while expanding his internal pathways through the Harmonious Heaven Primordial Art.
“A commendable discipline. A day seized during one’s formative years carries the weight of a full month in the future. The fundamentals can never be honed too thoroughly. Still, while your foundation possesses depth, it lacks breadth.”
After contemplating for a brief moment, the Sound Empress chose to pass down several foundational teachings of the Sacred Sound Jade Spirit Gate.
“I cannot bestow the innermost secrets of our sect, yet expanding the scope of your foundational arts brings no harm.”
The heritage of the Sacred Sound Jade Spirit Gate ran so profound that its sonic arts and lightfoot techniques were revered across the martial world.
Assimilating a portion of that profound lineage transformed the Pear Blossom Six Harmonies Art from rudimentary calisthenics into an intricate kinetic movement art.
“What would you say to naming it the Six Harmonies Body Refinement Art (六和鍊身功)?”
The Six Harmonies Body Refinement Art: uniting the underlying principles of the Six Harmonies into an unbroken unity to temper the mortal frame.
It was an art of continuous motion that functioned simultaneously as physical tempering and combat footwork—the mastery of bodily control.
As expected of one of the Ten Paragons. To devise such an extraordinary discipline so effortlessly.
It cultivated inner qi through physical movement while ingraining absolute mastery over the physical form, serving both as an agile lightfoot art and an evasive stepping method.
It stood as a quintessential foundational technique possessing limitless possibilities for expansion.
“I offer my deepest thanks for your boundless favor, Honored Teacher. I shall establish the Six Harmonies Body Refinement Art as the core heritage of the Baek house and ensure it is preserved through all generations.”
Although he had already imparted the Hundred and Eight Heaven-Splitting Swords along with the Harmonious Heaven Primordial Art, the martial depth of the Baek house was still noticeably deficient.
The clan possessed no designated palm or barehanded arts, nor did they have any transitional techniques to bridge their training.
From this point forward, members of the Baek house could master their elementary forms through the Pear Blossom Six Harmonies Art, then rely upon the Six Harmonies Body Refinement Art to determine their specialized path.
Its inner flow aligns with the Vessel Thousand Steps, making it an extraordinary stepping stone for advanced lightfoot techniques. My debt to her is immeasurable.
Gazing toward the Sound Empress, he was overtaken once more by genuine awe.
Her outward appearance mirrored that of a delicate fifteen-year-old maiden, often obscuring the truth, yet she stood as an unrivaled supreme being commanding the reverence of the world.
…Wait, now that he thought about it.
“Honored Teacher. May this disciple dare ask a question?”
“Inquire.”
“Would you mind telling me… what your true age might be?”
The slender fingers of the Sound Empress, which had been dancing playfully across the empty air, instantly stiffened.
…At that exact breath, an icy dread cascaded down Yanghwi’s spine, locking every muscle in his body with paralyzing tension.
“Young Hero.”
“…Yes, Honored Teacher.”
The Sound Empress offered a luminous, brilliant smile.
“Allow me to bestow a piece of wisdom.”
“I am listening with utmost care.”
“Unchecked curiosity invites calamity, and inquiring into a lady’s age is egregiously discourteous.”
“I… I shall engrave that into my heart.”
A gentle breeze stirred the air, and the Sound Empress vanished without a trace.
Only after her presence faded did Yanghwi release the breath trapped within his chest.
“Phew, I thought that was the end of me.”
She would hardly strike down a disciple, yet the suffocating aura she had radiated an instant prior was unmistakably lethal.
It was painfully clear he had prodded a deeply sensitive nerve.
…To think that her age was such a delicate subject. Was that an unexpectedly human flaw?
A sudden realization struck his thoughts.
Legends claimed that enduring metamorphosis reshaped a master’s vessel into their idealized conception of self.
Could the art of rejuvenation follow a comparable path?
If so, then the supreme physical form envisioned by Honored Teacher was…
Stop right there.
Probing any further down that path felt perilous.
Shaking his head with fierce determination, he drove the hazardous notions from his mind.
“Senior Brother.”
“Whoa, you nearly made me jump out of my skin.”
Zhuge Seolha had leaned her head out from behind the wall.
So lost had he been in his reckless train of thought that her stealthy approach had escaped his notice entirely.
“Junior Sister. What brings you here?”
“I got sick of training all by myself. I came over to spend time with you.”
“Ah.”
Talented, driven, and unyielding though she might be, Zhuge Seolha remained a nine-year-old girl.
Losing interest after prolonged bouts of solitary effort was perfectly natural for someone her age.
“You’re looking to play?”
“That, yes. But I was also hoping you could evaluate my martial progress.”
Surely letting the Sound Empress evaluate her made far more sense.
Was she merely looking for a chance to boast?
“Very well. Show me what you have.”
“Right!”
Zhuge Seolha brought her palms together right before Yanghwi’s eyes.
With a crisp, explosive snap, a burst of compressed qi surged forth.
“Hey, what are you doing?!”
Fortunately, with his weapon already drawn, he reflexively unleashed Resonating Vibration to deflect the concussive force in the nick of time.
A single fraction of a heartbeat later, and that ambush would have landed square on his face.
“Who taught you such reckless behavior? You troublesome little…!”
Yanghwi raised a hand in mock discipline, but Zhuge Seolha merely replied with effortless calm.
“Why make such a fuss? I only did it because I was certain you could deflect it with ease, Senior Brother.”
Her gaze brimmed with an unshakeable, almost devotional certainty.
Faced with such unquestioning trust, finding the heart to reprimand her proved impossible.
“Ridiculous. What were you even trying to accomplish with that?”
“I attempted to project an offensive wave by channeling qi directly into the acoustic burst, but the execution felt far too sluggish.”
Sound itself was fundamentally swifter than virtually every conventional offensive medium.
Scholars and poets often likened exceptional speed to the flight of an arrow, yet sound traveled vastly faster than any projectile.
“Simply pouring qi into a sound doesn’t guarantee instantaneous speed. The acoustic wave itself travels swiftly, but the tempo at which you circulate and direct your internal qi is an entirely different matter.”
Hearing his lucid, practical breakdown, Zhuge Seolha’s face lit up with an radiant grin.
“I understand now. Thank you, Senior Brother. Oh, there’s actually one more thing I need to ask of you.”
“What else could there be?”
“You’re preparing to head down the mountain soon, aren’t you?”
“That’s right. Nearly two months have passed since my arrival.”
A shadow of wistful melancholy darkened Zhuge Seolha’s features.
Passing long stretches of time in secluded training with only the Sound Empress, having a companion of her own age like Yanghwi had breathed vibrant warmth into her everyday existence.
Her lips pressed into a faint pout, Zhuge Seolha spoke softly.
“Regarding that favor… take this.”
Extending her hands, Zhuge Seolha presented him with a sealed letter.
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