“Yeonshin... We cannot leave that child as he is.”

An aged voice rang out.

It was the fortress master's office in the Desolate Fortress. An elderly martial artist in a purple robe and Ma Jin, clad in black martial robes, sat respectfully before her.

Sunlight streamed through the completely open wall. A halo of pale green light gathered in the Desolate Fortress Master's hair.

Ma Jin cast a sidelong glance at his father.

“The more we approach him, the further he may withdraw. He seemed to feel nothing for blood ties. I can imagine how he grew up after my sister passed away. He said he was a castoff child.”

“How dare a mere Jeong Clan Estate...”

Ma Yeonjeok, Jung Yeonshin's maternal grandfather, wore the same expression as Ma Jin. It bordered on disgust.

“What right have we to blame that family? We did not even know it had been wiped out, and only spoke of kinship after seeing his talent. That he refrained from cursing a maternal grandfather he had never met is enough to call him a gentleman.”

They were in the fortress master's presence, so his voice was not loud. Ma Jin maintained a cautious manner even as he spoke bitterly.

“He has grown into a proper martial artist, but he is still a child under twenty. Yet he is sensible and knows exactly what takes precedence, making him harder to deal with than an adult. Do not try to keep him in your grasp.”

“I can see that from the fact that he hasn't blindly sought the advantages of a great family. He must know they would turn to poison. He means to stand wholly on his own, unswayed by fierce winds. But that is precisely why...”

Ma Yeonjeok enunciated each word clearly. At last, he turned toward the Desolate Fortress Master, whose expression gave little hint of her thoughts.

“...we must be all the more careful not to neglect him. If the Son of Heaven, His Majesty the Emperor, is the sky, Yeonshin can become the brightest sun in that azure expanse. The current Divine Sword Squad Leader is not enough. Yeonshin can surely become a treasured sword worthy of remaining at your side.”

“That is for the fortress master to decide. It is not a matter for you to discuss in retirement, Father.”

After rebuking his father, Ma Jin turned his eyes toward the most exalted person present—the absolute ruler whom everyone in the Desolate Fortress revered and served.

The Desolate Fortress Master's face rarely changed. The rumors that she favored Lightning Genius had not arisen without reason.

She was like the radiance of the sun. Though her light might feel warm for a moment, it shone indifferently upon the world. It always had.

Her motionless red lips moved.

“Continue.”

Even reclining alone at an angle against a tree trunk, her presence was on another level.

Ma Jin swallowed. Few were unaware of her absolute martial might, against which even purple-robed masters could scarcely speak of any chance of victory.

The same was true of her appearance: that of a twenty-year-old, unchanged since the founding of the Ming dynasty.

To the people of Xiangyang, she was the Jade Emperor incarnate.

“It remains a distant prospect. Yet it has already been decades since you spoke of retirement—of washing your hands in a golden basin.”

Ma Yeonjeok stroked his white beard as he spoke.

“This is what I propose. Rather than sending the child out on missions, keep him here in the fortress for ten years and teach him until he is complete as a martial artist. Keep him from being tainted by the vulgar ways of the martial world at such a young age... As we arrange his marriage and build his martial strength, he will change. He will become a divine sword that you alone can wield.”

“... Yeonjeok.”

The Desolate Fortress Master spoke. No emotion touched her exquisite face.

“Yes, Fortress Master?”

“Is your heart free of ulterior motives?”

“By ulterior motives, you mean...?”

“You are not speaking as the former Divine Sword Squad Leader. All I see is a member of the Desolate's Ma Clan, seeking to exalt his family's name.”

“...”

Ma Jin knew his father's nature. Once he became utterly fixated on something, he had never failed to obtain it. That disposition was likely what had allowed him to become Divine Sword Squad Leader.

Suddenly, Ma Yeonjeok bowed his head.

“You are right, Fortress Master. It was difficult to bear. Handing the Divine Sword Squad Leader's treasured sword over to the current leader was truly agonizing. I have been your friend for decades. Allow me to speak honestly.”

“Father! Mind what you say!”

Despite his great bulk, Ma Jin fidgeted anxiously.

“You have never acted this way except over matters concerning your sister. You need not forgive me. The family must endure for generations. Even after we die and turn to dust, we will be revered and enjoy immortal lives. In the end, a name is all a person leaves behind.”

“Enough.”

The Desolate Fortress Master's quiet voice swept aside Ma Yeonjeok's impassioned words.

“I will decide Lightning Genius's affairs. You are no longer to assert authority over him on the strength of blood ties.”

Her crystalline voice held a strange, transcendent quality. Her robes brushed against the tree rooted at the pinnacle of the world.

RUSTLE.

Extending her snow-white bare feet, the Desolate Fortress Master slowly stepped down and raised her head. Sunlight settled lightly on her translucent face.

“Captain of the Radiant Demon Squad, you should depart now. Look after Lightning Genius.”

She addressed Ma Jin.

“I obey.”

Assuming an even more deferential posture, Ma Jin clasped his hands in a martial salute.

* * *

Jung Yeonshin stood quietly, thinking.

This was different from when he had beheaded the Martial Alliance's rising disciple. There were many eyes watching here. The highway stretching to Huizhou was broad, and the stream of passersby seemed to grow without end.

This was orthodox Murim's territory. The grounds for killing felt insufficient.

'I might turn even the Namgoong clan against me. I couldn't handle that in Huizhou.'

He could not kill the man here. That was fine. He could inflict an equivalent measure of humiliation instead.

Jung Yeonshin recalled what Do Yoowon of the Command Bureau had told him. The Desolate Fortress often prepared likenesses of mission targets. It had done so for the mission involving the Blood Flame Cult's Seventh Apostle, too. That went without saying for an operation that had been so long in preparation.

A likeness was a drawing depicting someone's facial features, and the face he recalled resembled the man before him.

It was an unexpected encounter. Caught off guard, he had failed to make the comparison immediately.

'What if he'd simply passed me by?'

Jung Yeonshin reproached himself. When weighing his mission against martial training, the mission naturally came first. He must not neglect to watch his surroundings.

While he was briefly lost in thought, the young man spoke.

“You don't care to hear my epithet? How laughable. A rootless mongrel showing such ridiculous defiance.”

The Hwangbo youth gave a derisive chuckle. Jung Yeonshin slowly shook his head and spoke.

“There is a limit to how deeply you should lose yourself in your own little world. The Hwangbo clan? It's small compared with everything under heaven. You are insignificant.”

“... So you're mad. The usual treatment won't be enough for you.”

The corners of the youth's mouth fell. He strode forward. His steps seemed heedless, yet followed a method. Yeonshin could immediately sense the advanced study of footwork behind them. The fluctuations of core energy were extraordinary.

His bearing suggested that he could respond to anything even as he walked.

'Good.'

From the moment the match began, Jung Yeonshin kept the youth's entire body within his field of vision. He paid no heed to the pitying looks of the spectators who had gathered at the mention of the Hwangbo clan.

At last, he would face the martial arts of the orthodox Eight Great Families. He wondered how powerful these arts, said to stand at the pinnacle of worldly martial learning, truly were.

Jung Yeonshin took a step. The Movement Art's core energy gathered at the Yongquan point beneath his foot. It was the first step of Evading Swift Step. A faint puff of dust rose from his heel.

He intended to gauge the difference in caliber between his arts and those of the Eight Great Families.

SHING! THUD!

The Hwangbo youth drew his sword and stamped his foot down hard. As his upper body leaned forward, the dazzling blade of his treasured sword rose from his waist. Tracing an extremely narrow ellipse, the sword's path extended straight toward Yeonshin.

Jung Yeonshin raised his right hand.

CLANG!

He flicked the flat of the blade aside with the back of his hand. The watching martial artists' eyes widened. It was a feat anyone here would have struggled to believe.

Jung Yeonshin shook out his hand. The youth's sword force had felt light through the vibration. That was thanks to Evading Swift Step, which had already carried him diagonally forward. He had deflected the strike's force wave completely off course.

“What?!”

The youth's expression went blank, as though he could not comprehend what had happened in that instant.

This time, Jung Yeonshin advanced.

BOOM!

As the Classic of Initiating Transcendence amplified his core energy, martial force from the Infinite Blossom Fist Strike erupted from his extended left arm. The sword the youth reflexively raised was driven upward.

Core energy already suffusing Jung Yeonshin's body raced through the pressure points throughout it. The Shenshu point on the right side of his lower back blazed with internal energy. In an instant, his spinal erectors and the psoas major in his lower back filled with tremendous power. The follow-up came in a flash.

Twisting his body, he thrust his right fist straight forward. A thud sounded from the youth's solar plexus.

It struck true. The moment the smooth fabric of the Hwangbo clan's robes enveloped his knuckles, the force wave of Formidable Wall, the Infinite Blossom Fist Strike's second strike, erupted outward.

BANG!

The youth flew back as though struck by a cannonball.

Jung Yeonshin slowly opened the five fingers of his right hand and looked down at it. The combat path was clear. The radiant demon arts were melding into his personal martial arts.

“The Hwangbo clan's martial learning seems profound,” he said. “But you're nothing special.”

His words were matter-of-fact, with a hint of disappointment in his voice.

The youth's face certainly resembled the Desolate Fortress's likeness. Even so, someone like that could not possibly be the Hwangbo clan's young clan head.

That man was said to be a genius with the Solar Divine Meridians. Yeonshin had heard that even White Qilin Namgoong Hwashin, whom he had met before, had not exchanged blows with the Hwangbo young clan head. Given the difference in age, he had expected certain defeat.

“You can't be the young clan head. The second son, perhaps?”

No one answered Jung Yeonshin's question. Everyone remained silent, seemingly at a loss for words, even though a considerable crowd had now gathered on the highway.

He slowly turned his gaze. The woman who had picked a fight alongside the youth wore a stunned expression. Disbelief filled her eyes as she stared at the man convulsing on the ground.

“How could some mongrel possibly... This can't be...”

“I didn't kill him. The Hwangbo clan should have some supreme healing medicine, shouldn't it? Give him some and he'll be back on his feet easily enough.”

“You...!”

The woman whipped her head toward him, her eyes fierce. The upturned corners of her eyes seemed to radiate cold.

“I'll remember you. I am Hwangbo Myeongrin. Gu Gwa of the Truth-Seeking Sect. I won't forget.”

“I have enough strength to spare for your attacks, too. Shall we continue the match?”

“...”

“A martial family wouldn't have sent only greenhorns. Are there no elders here? What about the young clan head?”

Just then, someone caught Jung Yeonshin's arm. It was Shin Sobin, her eyes wide with shock. At the same time, a wave of qi spread from her lips. It was a sound transmission.

“Senior. Aren't you taking the provocation a little too far? We should scout the terrain first. If the Hwangbo clan comes after us in force, we'll have a chase on our hands.”

She was whispering despite using sound transmission. She seemed thoroughly frightened. Jung Yeonshin tilted his head slightly, puzzled.

'Provocation? What provocation?'

He had not even begun yet. He slowly stepped forward.

'The mission is everything.'

There was one thing he particularly appreciated about serving the Desolate Fortress: its clear commitment to the people's welfare.

The merits he had to accumulate to survive were untainted. At least, they had been so far.

Sects that could be classified as neither orthodox nor unorthodox were said to stand between the two paths. The Truth-Seeking Sect, which Jung Yeonshin's party currently pretended to belong to, was one such sect. It avoided vicious conduct, but did not rally beneath the banner of chivalry either. Its members lived in the martial world for profit and fame.

'Then I should act like someone between the two paths.'

The Hwangbo clan's attendants had gathered by now, surrounding the fallen youth and Hwangbo Myeongrin.

Jung Yeonshin circulated core energy throughout his body. As soon as he planted his foot, a favorable breeze curled past his ears. In an instant, the Hwangbo clanspeople loomed larger. With a movement technique like a leaf riding the wind, he slipped through them all.

“Huh?!”

“What?!”

A jumble of startled gasps swept past his back.

Jung Yeonshin saw Hwangbo Myeongrin feeding a medicinal pill to the youth lying on the ground. Sensing his presence, she looked up, her face contorting.

“I challenge you to a match as well. You were the one who spoke of pedigree. If you're a martial artist, accept.”

Jung Yeonshin seized Hwangbo Myeongrin by the nape and pulled her to her feet. His momentum was terrifying. No one could interfere.

Then it happened.

“Wait. That's enough.”

A young man holding a gourd spoke from one side with a smile. The smell of liquor wafted over.

Was he perhaps ten years older than Jung Yeonshin? Despite his silk martial robes, there was something shabby about his appearance. With even a raw poppy held in his mouth, the handsome man looked utterly dissipated.

His smile was languid beneath eyes shadowed with dark circles.

“My younger siblings may have spoken out of turn, but this is going a little too far.”

Heat shimmered from his entire body. The force of his presence was tremendous, as though he had cultivated a divine technique of fierce solar heat.

Solar Divine Meridians. The words flashed through Jung Yeonshin's mind.

He matched the likeness perfectly. This man was the Hwangbo clan's young clan head.