NOVEL NEXT Chapter 10
Chapter 10
Dan Mok-hyeon-woo believed that it was his fault I ended up like this, thinking he hadn’t protected me properly that night. This guilt weighed heavily on his heart, causing his sword to waver and leading to his inner demons. It was a relief he hadn’t succumbed entirely to his inner chaos.
Even now, he hadn’t fully conquered his inner demons. Despite finishing his secluded training, he continued to send me candies, medicine, and various snacks but couldn’t bring himself to visit me. It wasn’t until Dan Mok-cheon-gi ordered him to teach me writing that he finally faced me.
“Do you remember when I said that to really learn these characters, you need to write them often?”
“Yes!”
“Starting today, I want you to write a letter every day and exchange it with each other. Even just one line is fine.”
Mok-bi, thrilled to be learning anything with me these days, nodded enthusiastically. He was eager to see what Hwa-ryun and I would write back.
After our writing lesson, it was time for tea. Specifically, it was time to drink the tea I brewed, something I insisted on.
Uncle Hyeon-woo thought it was ridiculous for his niece to serve him tea every day and tried to discourage it, but I argued that I needed to practice the tea ceremony I had learned from our grandfather.
‘Let’s see…’
I fiddled with my sleeve, feeling a mixture of determination and anxiety.
Dan Mok-ryeon’s abilities:
– Harmony: 7-star – Can blend into the surroundings.
– Insight: 4-star – Can see flaws.
– Purification: 2-star – Can cleanse vitality.
Physical strength: 6 / 100
Spiritual energy: 52 / 100
Advice: Increase your Purification skill. Maintain spiritual energy below 50. Staying in this state for more than 29 days will result in death.
‘Ugh, easier said than done!’
No one knew how to use this power called spiritual energy. It was a domain I had to pioneer on my own.
Every day, I brewed tea, using my spiritual energy to nourish those around me and purify the environment. By the next day, my energy was replenished, and I started all over again. ‘I guess this is what living day to day feels like.’ It wasn’t a joke; I was literally living on a daily basis. I couldn’t afford to miss the chance to serve tea to three people at once, which is why I kept brewing despite the heat.
As I set down four freshly brewed cups, Uncle Hyeon-woo smiled and looked at the boys.
“Your sister made this tea herself, so always drink it with gratitude.”
“Yes! Thank you, Sister.”
“Thank you, Sister.”
We repeated this routine every day. Uncle Hyeon-woo always said the same thing, and the boys always thanked me. I just smiled, hoping they’d drink and grow strong.
‘Drink up and grow strong…’
“People in Hangzhou would pay a fortune to taste this tea,” Uncle Hyeon-woo said with a smile as he sipped his tea. I looked down at my cup quietly.
‘As if.’
None of the tea leaves were new; they were all years old. It was a miracle the tea was even drinkable. Uncle Hyeon-woo always praised me, though.
Then there was Mok-bi, who always downed his tea quickly, wriggling around, bored of the tea ceremony. Every few days, he’d praise the tea with his limited vocabulary, saying things like it was delicious, as good as the medicine sweets, or that even an immortal would come to drink it.
His cute enthusiasm made me smile, and when I did, I’d often catch Hwa-ryun chuckling silently beside him. Even without words, I knew he was teasing me with his eyes. As if the tea made by an eight-year-old could be that good!
‘This kid…’
“It’s not just flattery, Ryeon. Your hands are skillful, and your heart is deep; it shows in the tea’s taste. When you learn the sword from Grandfather, I can already see your great achievements. Your father would have…” Uncle Hyeon-woo trailed off, his voice catching.
The atmosphere grew tense for a moment until Mok-bi burst in.
“Sister! Are you going to learn the sword from Grandfather?” His face was filled with envy.
I nodded, smiling at my eager little brother. “Yes, Mok-bi. Grandfather thinks it’s time I start learning.”
His eyes sparkled with excitement. “That’s so cool! I want to learn too!”
“You will, someday,” I said, ruffling his hair. “But for now, focus on your writing and tea.”
Mok-bi pouted but nodded, his face was filled with envy.
Dan Mok-hyeon-woo’s briefly tense expression softened quickly.
“When you’ve memorized the Thousand Character Classic, Grandfather will teach you the sword. Mok-bi, if you memorize it too, you’ll also learn from him.”
“Yes! I’ll memorize it all!”
“Good, good. When you’ve all memorized it, I’ll give you a reward. All three of you.” At the mention of a reward, Mok-bi’s eyes sparkled with excitement.
I nodded, remembering a similar promise from Grandfather Dan Mok-cheon-gi, which had led to my studies. I glanced to the side and caught Hwa-ryun’s eye. He seemed momentarily pleased by Uncle’s words, but then his expression turned indifferent again as he smirked at me.
* * *
The sound of cicadas was deafening. I lay sprawled out on a bamboo mat on my bed, panting in the heat, with a mountain of books stacked next to me.
‘If I want to defeat the Blood Valley, I need to know everything I can.’
I had lived and died in a future where the Asura Blood Valley rose to power within ten years. Ignoring it was not an option. Whether I could handle this on my own was uncertain, but I couldn’t just sit by and do nothing. Using my studies as an excuse, I had brought every related book from the library.
‘The Blood Valley’s blood arts. Destructive and cruel. The wounds they inflict resemble claw marks. Nothing is known about their inner techniques…’
In martial arts, accumulating sixty years of inner energy through basic breathing techniques—expelling old energy and absorbing fresh energy—was known as an era of inner strength.
A good inner technique could speed up this process, but even the best couldn’t compress decades into a few years.
No matter what miraculous medicine one took, proper inner technique and breath control were essential to convert its energy into inner strength. But the Blood Valley’s fighters didn’t follow these rules. Their sword skills looked as if they had trained for only a year or two, yet they had inner strength surpassing an era. They came in waves, mad with power.
Anyone with common sense could see it was demonic martial arts. The challenge was discovering exactly how it worked and stopping it.
The Blood Valley’s leader had changed several times, and despite the combined efforts of three major sects from the Martial Arts Alliance, they hadn’t cracked its secrets.
Even the Black Lotus, known for not being too concerned with using unorthodox methods, had scoured everything with intense scrutiny but failed to uncover the secrets. That said it all. ‘Is it even possible for an inner technique to exist that builds inner strength so quickly?’
There had been discussions suggesting that maybe they were consuming vast amounts of miraculous medicine, but this theory was debunked. The calculations by the Zhuge family showed that with such financial resources, they could dominate the martial world with gold, not force.
‘Anyway, even if we don’t know how, their inner strength tends to lead to madness… and that madness can only be quelled by drinking fresh human blood.’
I turned the pages slowly. Thanks to my insight, a single glance was enough to leave a clear image in my mind.
‘The abnormal vitality of those who practice blood arts. They can move for at least half an hour even after being stabbed in the heart. And the Blood Valley’s leader possesses several martial treasures? Treasures? What kind of treasures?’
I pondered over the “treasures” I knew about until the heat got to me, and I closed the book. The Blood Valley was important, but wasn’t that an issue for after I survived? Just then, the door to my quarters opened quietly.
“Hmm? Ryun?”
“So you really were lying down because of the heat?”
Hwa-ryun walked in, looking smug. I sat up with a grumpy expression.
My quarters were the coolest place in the house, but I still overheated and panted heavily after just a short time outside.
Nurse Jang often looked at me with a pained expression, saying it must be an inherited trait from the women in our family to be so susceptible to heat.
“Just wait until winter,” she’d say.
Though summer left me a wilted mess, winter always brought back my vitality. Hwa-ryun raised an eyebrow as he watched me panting, then glanced at the books scattered around me.
“Why are you reading about the Blood Valley?” he asked, a hint of surprise in his voice. Feeling slightly guilty, I quickly closed the book.
“Have you ever seen the Blood Valley?” I asked.
The Dongting Blood Incident, a major clash with the Blood Valley, happened over twenty years ago. In ten years, the world had changed twice over, and the Blood Valley was now mostly mentioned as an old-timer’s curse.
“I haven’t seen them, but I know about them. Blood-sucking monsters.”
“Right…” I hesitated.
“Why are you looking into it?” he pressed.
“Well… our family is one of the pillars of the White Martial Alliance. As the eldest, I need to know our history.” Hwa-ryun gave me a slightly surprised look. “And, because my grandfather and father…”
Dan Mok-hyun-seong died in a duel with the Jin Family, but it was the wounds from the Dongting Blood Incident that sapped his life. If not for those injuries, the prodigy known as Dan Mok-hyun-seong would never have met his end at the hands of the newly risen Jin Family in Hangzhou.