Chapter 2

Chapter 1: Who Are You? (1)

“Ugh.”

The moment I realized I had come to my senses was when I felt a headache hit me as if it had been waiting for me to wake up. On top of that, the pain from the jaw that the damn Yoon Siho had hit me with during the sparring session was so intense that it felt like it was about to split my skull and burst out. It was a perfect duet of agony.

Trying to endure the pain, I clenched my teeth, only to feel an even more terrible pain surge up.

“Ow!”

It felt like I had been struck by lightning. It was as if someone was digging into a bleeding wound.

“Thanks to that, I’m a bit more awake. Damn it.”

Although it’s hard to say it was thanks to that, the intense pain did clear the daze I had when I first regained consciousness. The problem is that it hurts so much.

The headache was as severe as the pain from the badly hit jaw, which was a bit strange.

“Still, what was that?”

It sounded like someone was evaluating me from a third-person perspective, but it was definitely not something I heard through my ears. It was a voice that rang directly in my head.

What kind of split personality is so clear? Maybe that’s why it felt so close to my heart. It sounded like the voice of someone I wanted to see when I was in a tough spot.

“Still, I can’t hear it anymore?”

Anyway, the voice is no longer audible.

At this point, I’m curious how selective this split personality is.

If you ask if I know what a split personality is, I have nothing to say.

“Sigh...”

Maybe I took the wrong path.

Thanks to my eccentric grandfather, I was exposed to martial artists from a young age.

Typically, officials who hold government positions and receive salaries dislike and almost despise martial artists who ignore the law and act as they please. However, my grandfather was someone who looked at people for who they were, regardless of their background or status. If he felt a connection, he would share drinks and friendship with anyone, and he formed close relationships with many good people. Among them were quite a few martial artists.

Thanks to that, I was often exposed to martial artists from a young age. I learned about the extraordinary power of people and became fascinated by it. That vague admiration became my driving force.

But the result is this mess.

Thanks to the introductions of a few people who thought highly of me, I was able to enter the Wudang Sect as a lay disciple, but due to a lack of talent, I’ve been struggling ever since.

Everyone said I had good potential and a strong build, but the results speak for themselves.

It’s not hard to understand why the elders, who are hard of hearing, might have made a mistake.

“Are you awake?”

“Huh? Oh.”

While I was lost in my thoughts, a guy who had approached me spoke.

“It’s time to review the sparring session. Come out quickly.”

He’s one of the fellow initiates who entered with me, but he speaks as coldly as if he’s talking to a stranger for the first time.

He probably doesn’t like me.

As I watched the back of the fellow initiate who had just thrown those words and left, I sighed again.

Reviewing the sparring session.

It’s a time when everyone points out the rights and wrongs of what happened during the sparring, and I’ve never received a good evaluation. Especially not when the opponent is Yoon Siho.

Yoon Siho.

Ever since I entered the sect, he has been mocking and tormenting me as if he finds it amusing. He has a strong backing, so I’ve been completely isolated.

It might sound like I’m blaming others, but in a way, my lack of growth is largely due to him.

A sapling needs water, soil, and sunlight, not kicks.

“No, I can’t.”

For a moment, I felt like running away, but I quickly shook my head and regained my composure.

What drives a person?

What does a person follow?

I once heard a story from my grandfather about this philosophical question. And he answered it like this:

“People seek what is familiar to them. They move along the path they create, whether it’s good or bad.”

To put it simply:

People move by inertia.

If you can do it today, you can do it tomorrow. If you can do it tomorrow, you can do it the day after. So if there’s a way of life you truly value, don’t treat it as a task to be completed, but as a way of life. Embrace it as naturally as breathing, and it will become a part of you, like blood and flesh.

This was one of the serious pieces of advice my grandfather gave me.

A person who knows how to value what is precious has a certain charm.

I thought I would never forget this story, especially because my grandfather looked so cool when he said it.

I’ve been walking that path.

“I want to become stronger.”

The ideal is high, but the wall of reality is even higher.

Struggling in front of a wall you can’t climb is painful. Sometimes it feels like drowning while still alive.

If it weren’t painful, it would be a lie. Anyone would feel this way if their efforts don’t yield results.

Some might call it stubbornness. Others might call it obstinacy. The only thing that follows is criticism.

But even if I’m stubborn and obstinate, I want to struggle with all my might right now.

Talent is like a star, they say. If the stars shining in the night sky are someone’s talent, even if it’s small, there must be a star that shines for me.

“Let’s do our best.”

“Huh?”

***

Thud!

I got hit in the already painful jaw again.

My vision turned white again.

It really hurts, damn it!

“Right now, we are reviewing the previous sparring session, not engaging in another one. Do not physically attack.”

“Yes, I’m sorry.”

A Wudang Sect inner disciple, who was there to train the lay disciples, warned Yoon Siho, who had hit my jaw under the pretense of a review.

Of course, there was no punishment.

Empty words have no power.

That’s why Yoon Siho can act so recklessly.

I understand. He has strong backing, so no one wants to mess with him. Yoon Siho knows this, so he only answers with a sly smile.

Look at him now. He doesn’t even care about me, who is sitting on the ground after being hit.

Here we go again. Did I hit my head wrong or something?

The voice I thought had disappeared started to ring in my head again.

“Lian Qingyun, focus.”

The inner disciple’s stern voice, which finally noticed my distracted state, was severe. He immediately recognized my lack of concentration.

It’s chaos inside and out.

I’m really going to go crazy.

“Just now, when you got hit in the jaw, if you were to use a different technique instead of Yen Shou Hong Quan, what technique do you think would be correct?”

The answer came immediately from my head.

But it wasn’t an answer I thought was right at all.

“...Liu Feng Sa Fei?”

My mouth reflexively spat out those words.

“Haha! Liu Feng Sa Fei in that situation? Hahaha!”

Thanks to that, I got to see Yoon Siho’s rotten laugh.

“Anyway, if your head is different, your body suffers.”

Yoon Siho’s sharp gaze flashed as it met mine.

It’s a look I’ve seen many times before.

“Try it.”

As if I had fallen into a trap, Yoon Siho moved again.

In sync with Yoon Siho’s movement to hit my jaw again, a voice erupted in my head like a bolt of lightning.

Words filled with stormy emotions poured out.

The movements that followed those words were strangely natural.

It was hard to understand how such words could pour out all at once in that short moment. It was hard to understand how I could accept all those words.

But one thing was clear: my body was moving according to those words.

Liu Feng Sa Fei.

I knew it, but the way it was taught to me today by this voice was new.

Similar but different, familiar but deeper, I moved my body according to the techniques of Liu Feng Sa Fei.

Thud!

Following the voice in my head, my outstretched hands pushed away the fist aimed at my jaw.

Thwack!

My legs, which had regained their balance, held me steady against Yoon Siho’s advancing momentum.

Thud!

As my hands quickly blocked Yoon Siho’s desperate counter, a natural reaction started from my waist, moved to my shoulder, and extended to my arm.

The attack, a reaction to a reckless offensive, split the gap in the opponent’s defense.

I felt a heavy sensation in the center of my outstretched palm.

Smack!

It was the feeling of striking Yoon Siho’s jaw. The sensation was so intense that it felt like I had split his jaw, leaving a dull pain that was vividly clear.

Thud!

And the result fell to the ground.

Yoon Siho, who had lost consciousness, was convulsing with foam in his mouth.

“Liu Feng... Sa Fei?”

The name of the technique I used came out of the inner disciple’s mouth, who was staring at me in shock.

I couldn’t answer.

It was something I did, but it didn’t feel like something I did.

I just alternated between looking at the fallen Yoon Siho and my own hands.

***

After Yoon Siho, who had fallen unconscious, was carried away, and the strange gazes that had been fixed on me disappeared, I finally found myself alone and recalled the Liu Feng Sa Fei I had used against Yoon Siho.

“Liu Feng Sa Fei.”

It blocks and seals all directions—front, back, left, right, up, and down. I learned it that way.

But no one uses it the way I did today.

I might have been mistaken, but the martial arts I used today were definitely different from what I had learned.

“Why doesn’t Liu Feng Sa Fei feel like Liu Feng Sa Fei?”

The voice in my head, answering my question, still had a hint of sarcasm, but I couldn’t ignore it anymore.

If this were really a split personality, it wouldn’t make sense for it to know something I don’t.

That means, though it’s hard to believe, this voice isn’t from me.

“Who are you?”

I asked in a trembling voice, alone in the room.

“...What?”

The answer that came back was beyond my comprehension.