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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 120
Chapter Title: A Teacher's Guidance
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"You'll hurt yourself with that mouth. How can someone who doesn't even know pain be so careless? Tsk, tsk."
The dumpling touching her lips was warm, and her tightly clenched mouth involuntarily opened.
As the dumpling entered her mouth, Seop Mugwang's hand moved away.
Seolhwa looked up at him.
Seeing her, Seop Mugwang chuckled, his chin propped on his hand.
"Good girl."
Seolhwa's mouth moved slowly.
"That's it."
Seop Mugwang patted the child's head.
"I don't know how many people you've killed, for what reasons, or how. I don't want to say that what you did was right, nor do I want to dismiss it as something that couldn't be helped because it's in the past."
What was wrong was wrong.
Seolhwa nodded.
"Yes."
"However, what happens in the future can be changed."
"..."
"Have you heard the terms Hwalgeom and Salgeom?"
She shook her head, holding the bitten dumpling in her hand.
But the difference between the two wasn't hard to guess.
"A sword that saves and a sword that kills?"
"Precisely. A sword, you see, inevitably embodies the life of its wielder."
Just as Seolhwa's internal energy glowed red, even though the Namgung's internal energy was fundamentally blue.
"From the very beginning, your killing intent was potent."
Seop Mugwang recalled the first time he met Seolhwa in the forest.
The child, who had turned the Heugunbang upside down without a single change in expression, was enveloped in killing intent.
He knew she wasn't trying to kill him. Her killing intent was more like an instinctive emanation in the face of danger.
"However, look at yourself now."
Pure energy, devoid of any killing intent, flowed from the child.
Was it because she now knew she wasn't in danger?
'No.'
This child was controlling her killing intent herself.
"Your energy might have changed so much because you received Beolmo-sesu, or because you learned righteous martial arts. But the most important thing is..."
Seop Mugwang pointed at Seolhwa with his finger.
"You chose to change yourself."
She had abandoned her immense internal power without hesitation.
She had forsaken 'kill' and embraced 'life'.
The child's change began right there.
"It's not that your killing intent has disappeared. Your killing intent is still potent. However, it no longer controls you."
Instead, the child herself was controlling that killing intent and using it as part of her power.
'Whether she did so instinctively or knew how to control it from the start, I can't say.'
That's how it should be. That's how she should gradually change.
"If you've wielded a sword to kill someone until now, from now on, wield it to save. If your past remains a burden to you, then strive to save more diligently. That's all it takes."
A saving sword. A sword wielded to save someone.
A sword is a weapon. Seolhwa had always believed the purpose of a weapon was to harm, injure, and subjugate others.
A sword was merely a tool to achieve such purposes.
Thus, understanding Salgeom was not difficult. But Hwalgeom? Saving someone with a sword?
"How can a sword save people?"
"You must find that answer yourself."
Seop Mugwang propped his chin on his hand and grinned.
"As you search for that answer, you will one day reach the place you wish to reach."
A martial artist, ultimately, is one who intensely contemplates what kind of world they wish to create through their power.
How to use the power they possess. What standards to uphold, and what to strive for.
How to live their life.
They are individuals who spend their entire lives training to find that answer.
In that sense, the child had only now truly embarked on the path of a martial artist.
Even if it was still difficult and the path long, Seop Mugwang had no doubt.
"You'll do very well."
It was a guidepost given by a senior who had already trodden that path, to a child who sought to forge her own.
It was a teaching bestowed by a master.
'The place I want to reach.'
Seolhwa mulled over those words again and again.
She didn't quite understand yet. But she knew that if she found the answer to that question, her life would reach a significant turning point.
After contemplating for a long time, Seolhwa performed a Pokwon towards Seop Mugwang.
"I will engrave it in my heart."
"Yes, yes."
Seop Mugwang's lips curved into a smile once more.
It didn't take long for his expression, which had been filled with a pleased smile, to harden.
"..."
Seop Mugwang stared at the inn's entrance with a serious expression.
"Master?"
"...Just a moment."
Seop Mugwang abruptly stood up.
"Wait here. Don't go anywhere, and eat the rest of the food."
Just as she was about to ask what was happening, Seop Mugwang vanished.
It was so instantaneous that Seolhwa couldn't even track his movements.
What could have happened?
It was the first time Seop Mugwang's usually lighthearted and playful expression had turned so serious.
Seolhwa maximized her senses and scanned her surroundings. But she felt nothing.
'What is it?'
Should she go out?
No, he told her to wait here, so waiting patiently would be...
"Is that man your master?"
At the familiar voice that burrowed into her mind, the hairs on her body stood on end, and goosebumps erupted.
Seolhwa, who had been looking towards the inn's door, froze in place.
Thump. Thump.
Her heart pounded rapidly, and cold sweat trickled down her chin, dripping onto her clothes.
Her mouth was so dry that she involuntarily swallowed hard.
"With such an excellent master here, why would you seek a new one?"
The voice was now coming from right behind her.
Her teeth clattered together in her clenched mouth.
Seolhwa forced herself to turn and look at the man who was now sitting opposite her.
He was in the very seat Seop Mugwang had occupied moments ago.
'Hyeolma.'
Hair as red as blood. Eyes an even deeper crimson.
Despite his suspicious appearance, wearing a mask that covered half his face, no one in the inn seemed to find him strange.
Before him lay a wine bottle and a cup that hadn't been there moments ago.
As if he were invisible to the others, the man calmly poured himself some wine.
"It's been a long time."
Just as Hyeolma's dark red lips formed an arc beneath his mask.
Suddenly, the inn became noisy.
"Oh, come on! I saw it, I tell you! That guy next door was with the downstairs wife!"
The smile beneath Hyeolma's mask vanished.
'No.'
Seolhwa wanted to get up and stop the noisy man. But her body wouldn't move.
The fear of death enveloped her, suffocating her.
"You're accusing an innocent person! My eyes are so sharp— *cough*...!"
Seolhwa flinched.
No one in the inn saw it, but Seolhwa did.
A single drop of wine, calmly rising from the cup Hyeolma had poured, flew like a dagger when he flicked his finger and embedded itself into the man's Sahyeol.
With just a light flick of his hand, the man causing the commotion had died.
"What, what's wrong? Hey!"
"What?! He's not breathing?! Old So! Hey! Wake up, hey!"
"Oh no, what are you doing! Hurry and take him to a doctor!"
The dead man's companions lifted him and hastily left the inn.
After a brief stir in the inn due to the man's death, people were gripped by an inexplicable fear.
It wasn't because they had witnessed a sudden death before their eyes. It was because of Hyeolma's potent killing intent, which had permeated the inn's air.
"I, I have something urgent to do..."
"Hmm..."
As if on cue, people one by one stood up and left the inn. It was as if they were possessed.
Seolhwa remained frozen, unable to do anything.
Hyeolma, before Seolhwa, calmly tilted his wine cup again.
Finally, when everyone had left the inn, and only Seolhwa and Hyeolma remained in the now empty inn.
"It's quiet now."
Hyeolma's lips curved into an arc again as he set down the wine cup.
"Ilhwa."
"..."
"Are you enjoying yourself?"
"..."
"I had no intention of interrupting your amusement, but I found myself wondering how much longer I should overlook it."
Gurgling, the wine poured from the cooled bottle filled the glass, steam rising from it.
"Since you ruined something precious to me, I too have decided to take something precious from you."
Seolhwa's clenched fists trembled.
What kind of person was Hyeolma?
He punishes those who harm him with death, those who steal from him with death, and even those who merely displease him, with death.
Such a person was saying he would exact a price commensurate with the death of the Yuk Hyeolju.
The wine in Hyeolma's cup began to boil.
"Don't worry too much."
The boiling wine quickly turned into smoke, vanishing without a trace.
"One master is enough, wouldn't you say?"
Crack! A crack appeared on the empty wine glass.
