When I pressed him, Tang Un laughed and asked,
“Are you enjoying it?”
“Yes!”
“Then shall we make a deal? If you finish reading the Book of Changes you were reading today, I’ll tell you the rest of the story.”
“.......”
See? Teaching really was his calling. Ha. Ha. Ha.
“Then what about the other four?”
“The stories of the other four masters... I suppose I’ll have to tell you those after you finish the Divine Farr’s Materia dica.”
“.......”
“And now, shall we continue?”
Quietly, I picked up the Book of Changes.
Yeah. This teacher was not a normal person.
*****
The next day, Tang Jung showed up at the crack of dawn and shoved a large bowl straight at .
“Here. Chug it.”
Inside the bowl he held out was a pitch-black liquid I couldn’t identify.
The rancid fish stench snapped the sleep right out of . I wrinkled my nose and asked,
“What is this?”
“I boiled so crucian carp.”
Was it really crucian carp?
It wasn’t poison, was it?
When I stared at the bowl of dicinal liquid with suspicious eyes, Deokju leaned in and whispered,
“It’s Ink-Blood Fire Carp. Grand Elder went through a lot to catch a precious spirit creature.”
“Don’t say unnecessary things.”
Tang Jung scolded Deokju with a grumpy face.
Still, he looked like he was secretly waiting for my reaction.
I clapped my hands and made a big fuss.
“You caught a spirit creature for to eat? Grandfather, I’m so moved.”
“Ahem. Moved, my foot. Hurry up and drink it.”
“Yes, sir!”
Like I hadn’t been suspicious a second ago, I gulped down the Ink-Blood Fire Carp Decoction in big swallows.
Tang Jung’s mouth corners crept upward little by little.
The sll was awful, but if it was good for my body, I could endure this much.
But the mont it hit my stomach, a scorching heat surged up from my lower abdon.
Startled, I looked at Tang Jung, and Tang Jung tapped the floor twice.
“If you’re done, sit here. I’ll do guided circulation.”
“Yes.”
I sat obediently, and Tang Jung placed his hand on my back.
The heat that had been burning around my navel slid up toward my chest in one rush.
“W-what is this?”
“Don’t talk. You’ll harm yourself.”
He covered my mouth and breathed a thin thread of true energy into my body.
In that instant, the Ink-Blood Fire Carp’s spirit energy started to move along Tang Jung’s true energy.
No—move wasn’t enough.
The hot spirit energy charged at the dark-blue true energy like a predator rushing down edible prey.
The sensation of that force tearing through my insides turned my vision white.
It was nothing like the ti Tang Jung had explored my body before.
This felt like a huge ball of fire burning through my blood vessels.
“Stay alert and breathe.”
Tang Jung’s sharp voice stabbed into my ears.
I forced my mouth open and tried to breathe.
My muscles trembled, and cold sweat beaded over my skin.
Tang Jung’s true energy skimd my fine ridians, controlling its pace—almost touching the spirit energy, almost not.
When the dark-blue true energy opened the way, the hot spirit energy chased right after it.
From my lower abdon to my back.
From my back to my head.
From my head back to my chest.
From my chest back down to my lower abdon.
Each ti the two energies circulated through my fine ridians, I felt pathways that had been narrower than a needle’s eye widen little by little.
When the spirit energy—burning like roaring fla—finally cooled to sothing rely warm, Tang Jung slowly withdrew his true energy.
I sucked in rough breaths.
I’d only been sitting there, but my whole body was drenched in sweat.
“Don’t forget this sensation. You need to be able to circulate energy like this on your own.”
“I was circulating energy just now?”
“Yes. You have to absorb spirit energy, so I moved it for you. Do you have any sense of how it works?”
“No. Not at all.”
“......”
Tang Jung stared at like he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard.
“...Would it kill you to at least pretend you thought about it before you answer?”
Ah. Was I too blunt?
I turned my head and went, heh heh, and Tang Jung snorted and poked at my body with his fingers.
“These vessels that rise from the Perineum Point to the Crown Point are the Governing Vessel. And these vessels that descend from the Crown Point back down to the dantian are the Conception Vessel. When you make one full circuit of the Governing and Conception Vessels, that’s the Small Heavenly Circuit.”
“Ah-ha.”
I still didn’t understand.
Maybe it showed on my face, because Tang Jung let out a heavy sigh.
“Fine. I’ll explain again later. Anyway, just rember this exists.”
“Yes.”
“Now let’s go climb the cliff.”
“...Yeees.”
*****
Tang Jung’s “tonic-feeding” continued.
Even after seven days and nights—
“Want to try so grilled shellfish?”
“He spent the entire morning picking the at from thousand-year mother-of-pearl. It’s what was left after making a spirit pill, but the yin energy is still strong, so you should eat slowly.”
And another seven days and nights after that—
“Here. Eat this too. I stead it well, so you’d better eat it down to the root.”
“It’s thousand-year fo-ti. He was worried it would taste too bitter for you, so he stead it with licorice.”
Every ti, Tang Jung brought sothing new and made eat it.
He said I was past the age to undergo marrow-and-bone cleansing, so he was trying to get a similar effect through spirit dicines—carefully reduced so I could endure the potency.
If I swallowed a powerful spirit dicine all at once, he said I could fall into qi deviation, or sothing like that.
“No matter how greedy you get, you’ll only break yourself. I’ll give you the spirit pills I made after your dantian is established and you can circulate energy on your own.”
I didn’t know anything, so I just assud Tang Jung was right.
Unlike , Deokju looked startled.
“The Poison King truly cherishes you, young lady.”
“...Huh?”
“No one consus spirit dicines like this. And for a supre master to guide your circulation so you can absorb spirit energy— even the rising stars of Shaolin wouldn’t get to enjoy such extravagance.”
“Seriously? This counts as extravagance?”
“Helping another person’s energy circulation is not easy in the first place. It consus enormous ntal focus, and if there’s even a small mistake, both people can easily fall into qi deviation. Even between master and disciple, it’s sothing they avoid.”
“Really? It was that dangerous?”
In novels, masters always did it for the protagonist.
Was it because he was the protagonist?
Anyway, Tang Jung’s arrangents worked perfectly.
My body reacted imdiately to the byproducts of the spirit dicines Tang Jung fed .
My stamina improved day by day, and I started to feel—faintly—internal energy inside my body.
The body that couldn’t climb more than one-tenth of the cliff... after a month, it could crawl all the way to the top—
“AAAAAH!”
Yeah, right!
The mont I relaxed, thinking I was almost there, a gust of wind slamd into and threw off my balance.
Screaming, I drove my fingers into the cliff, but the rock I grabbed crumbled to powder and couldn’t support my weight.
“Young lady!”
Deokju shot her arm toward in shock, but her fingertips didn’t reach.
I plunged straight down.
“AAAGH!”
Every ti I flailed, sharp wind claws raked my face.
This is insane!
I’ve never even gone bungee jumping—what is this?!
I couldn’t bear the ground rushing up at , so I squeezed my eyes shut—
—and in that instant, a hard hand hooked around my waist.
“A martial artist must never close their eyes in any situation. If an enemy swings a sword at you, will you close your eyes then? Look until the end. You can’t be nothing but fear.”
After scolding , Tang Jung set down beneath the cliff.
Yeah, sure—what, you want to keep my eyes wide open and watch my skull crack?
I collapsed onto the ground with a thud and glared up at Tang Jung, panting.
My legs were so weak I could barely stand.
Even under my resentful stare, he was calm as ever.
“If you’ve regained yourself, let’s climb again.”
“...What?”
“Hurry and finish. That way we can get back before dinner.”
No.
I just almost died.
Tang Jung’s tone—like it was nothing—left so dumbfounded I couldn’t speak.
I could endure scraped hands and feet and cramped muscles.
If I wanted to learn martial arts, I had to build my body first.
I knew it was necessary.
But what I’d just experienced was different.
My body, which had felt its life threatened, still wasn’t moving the way my mind wanted.
My pupils were blown wide, my vision hazy, and my heart thrashed like a fish flung onto land.
And he was telling to crawl back up that terrifying cliff without even letting breathe?
I swallowed down the misery, tried to push myself up—
—but my muscles trembled so hard I couldn’t stand.
My knees buckled, and sothing surged up in my throat.
I shouted.
“Grandfather!”
“What is it now?”
“Training is too hard!”
“I thought you were going to say sothing serious. Training is supposed to be hard. You just do it.”
Tang Jung answered like he was stating an obvious fact.
That reply drove my voice up on its own.
“Don’t you think you’re being too much?! I just fell and almost died—how can you tell to climb again?!”
The mont I yelled, both Tang Jung and Deokju’s eyes went round.
They looked genuinely shocked.
Then tears burst out all at once.
I bit my lip hard and rubbed at my eyes.
Tang Jung, flustered, lowered himself so our eyes were level.
“B-baby...? Baby?”
“...Hngh.”
I was flustered too.
What is this—why does my voice sound like that?
I only ant to complain about how unfair it was, but my throat tightened on its own.
Tang Jung’s cheeks twitched like he found my sniffling ridiculous, and he tried to soothe .
“Alright. Alright. This old man wronged you and made you miserable, huh? It’s my fault. You’re a good girl—there, there. Stop crying.”
“I’m not mad because I’m sulking... I really—sniff—almost died... ugh!”
I wanted to rebut him with perfectly reasonable logic, but all that ca out was tear-soaked mumbling.
Tang Jung finally cracked and burst into laughter.
“Hahaha! Alright, I get it. I know. If training is too much, you should say so. You were following so well, I thought you could endure it. Now—sniff. Sniff.”
I did say so, and you treated it like I was whining every ti!
I narrowed my eyes and glared up at him.
Tang Jung wrapped the edge of his sleeve around my nose, and his face was full of laughter.
“Co on. Sniff.”
...This old man really thinks it’s funny when I cry.
The mont I got annoyed, the tears dried right up.
After wiping my ssed-up face, Tang Jung carefully pulled into his arms and sat on his knee.
He patted my body, still trembling in tiny shivers, and spoke softly.
“I was just about to start teaching you a Heart thod. It’s about ti we ford your dantian.”
“Really?”
“Of course. It’s true. Brat—did your tears stop the mont I ntioned a Heart thod?”
As long as I don’t have to climb cliffs, there’s nothing I can’t do.
Tang Jung lightly pinched my cheek, then took out a clean cloth and a small bottle from his sleeve.
“What’s that?”
“Mulberry-Ash Lye. Mulberry ash water.”
“Ah—ow. That stings.”
“Endure it. You have to disinfect it, don’t you?”
Despite his firm voice, he gently cleaned my blistered, scraped hands with careful attention.
Even though Chasing-Palace ridian Points would fix it anyway.
I felt awkward—like I really had been throwing a tantrum—but Tang Jung only stroked my hair in silence.
“This old man was impatient. Even rice needs ti to steam before you eat it, but my heart was in a hurry, so I made you chew raw rice.”
There was a faint self-reproach in his tone.
So even Tang Jung thought he’d pushed training too hard—
“But in war, even raw rice is a blessing. Better than starving to death—so chew it.”
...Nope. He didn’t.
“If you’re done crying, then it’s ti to do what we need to do. Now. Stand up.”
“Yes.”
I wiped my nose with a sniff and climbed off Tang Jung’s knee.
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