◈ The Martial Genius who Remembers Everything ◈
Chapter 512: Into the Darkness (7)
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When I lost everything in my previous life.
When I felt there was no longer any meaning in living.
For the first time in my life, I rebelled against power and martial strength.
Until then, I had shrunk back at even a word from Gye Cheolyeong. Yet I made only one demand of the Martial Alliance leadership.
“I want to return to the Sojeong Unit.”
Naturally, they ignored me. From that day on, I defied the leadership’s orders.
Even as I was beaten, harassed, and humiliated every day, there was only one thing I demanded.
“I want to return to the Sojeong Unit.”
Dam Ak, who had pitied me at the time, eventually sent me back to the Sojeong Unit.
It was not because I wanted to fight on the front lines again.
Nor was it because I missed those Sojeong Unit bastards who had tormented me for being from the One Hundred Eight Peaks.
The reason I wanted to return to the Sojeong Unit was simple.
‘They were the first to be sacrificed, and the fastest, on that front line.’
The so-called “meat shield unit.”
A place where death itself meant freedom.
I desperately wanted to become one of those quickly replaced, and the battlefield was no longer a place I feared.
Moyong Seol joined the Sojeong Unit around then.
I did not know why she had entered the unit.
Some guessed that she had lost her clan in the war and been cast aside because she was no longer useful.
Others said she had assaulted a superior and been transferred as punishment.
But I could not know the truth.
She never spoke of it, not even once.
We simply found it strange.
A promising talent from one of the Five Great Clans was fighting alongside us on the front lines, taking orders from a Unit Leader far weaker than her.
She was an alien presence, doing her best in a place that did not suit her.
At the same time, the name Sword Empress naturally became a wall between her and us.
The Sojeong Unit bastards constantly spouted dirty jokes and curses, but the moment she appeared, they all fell silent.
One day, she asked me.
[Young Master Jin, do you want to die?]
It was not the sort of opening one would use with someone they had never even spoken to, even if they knew of each other.
After replying, “What business is it of yours?” I ignored her and walked past.
The next time we spoke was when I cursed at her.
“Leave me alone!”
“Damn it! If you wanted to protect someone so badly, why didn’t you protect your own clan?”
On that battlefield, as precarious as thin ice, where I faced death multiple times, she saved me every time.
She saved me, even though I had come there because I did not want to live.
“Are you deaf?! I said let me die!!!”
Even after that, she continued saving me.
Rather, she drew even closer to me.
[Will you listen to me for a while?]
As if I were something precious.
“Get lost.”
I rejected her immediately.
Yet Moyong Seol came to see me every night and asked me to listen to her story.
Her repeated visits eventually made me wonder.
Why me?
When I asked, she answered.
[I heard your memory is remarkable. My memories keep growing faint… Please preserve them for me.]
People who had already vanished.
I did not understand what meaning there was in remembering their remnants and passing them on, but she wanted it desperately.
Though my resentment toward her was immense at the time, I granted her request.
I do not remember why.
Perhaps it was because she had forced my meaningless life to continue, and I had nothing else to do.
The trouble she had caused as a child.
Her memories with the people of her clan.
Her longing for her family.
Her daily life at the Martial Arts Academy, and her time in the Dragon-Phoenix Association.
She spoke endlessly about herself, and I quietly listened.
There was no other conversation between us.
She spoke of herself, and I simply listened.
As though she were engraving her memories onto a slate called me, she conveyed every word with care.
Sometimes she told the same story again. At other times, the details changed.
Not everyone’s memory was perfect like mine.
As the Orthodox-Demonic War began entering its latter half, the Martial Alliance’s situation rapidly worsened.
And I found myself wanting desperately to live.
Was it because I had grown satisfied with life in the Sojeong Unit? Because I feared the Demonic Cult bastards?
Because the pain of losing my dead family and the people of my sect had faded? Or because I had listened to Moyong Seol’s stories?
I did not know.
I simply wanted to live.
Together with the Sojeong Unit.
And together with Moyong Seol.
The documents I had been forced to memorize under orders from the Martial Alliance leadership finally proved useful then.
I found a way to get the Sojeong Unit out.
Survival.
Had my will to live ever been stronger than it was then?
I told the Sojeong Unit my plan.
But…
[You want to live more than anyone else here. So you live.]
No one in the Sojeong Unit chose to come with me.
Not even Moyong Seol, who had forced me to keep living.
[If you want to live that badly… then survive.]
Even when I cursed the Moyong Clan and insulted her, I had never seen such a hardened expression on her face.
But when I resolved to live as she told me to and tried to fight for my life, the chill in her expression made even my heart freeze.
Disappointed in them for fleeing into futile fantasies instead of facing reality, I left the Sojeong Unit.
Only much later did I learn that the unit members had never reported my desertion to their superiors, and that Moyong Seol had remained with the Sojeong Unit until the end despite being given a chance to leave for the Northern Sea.
In the end, I had run away.
I ran from my sect’s destruction and from the deaths of my martial brothers without learning a thing.
Then I ran again, from the Sojeong Unit, from Moyong Seol, and from the Demonic Cult.
I was always the one who ran away.
“Why do you look so serious?”
Dang Seohui asked flatly as we ran.
“…”
I looked at her, unable to grasp exactly what she meant.
“Do you believe Yong Soa? If so, why are you going? Are you really going to confirm the body?”
At her words, a chill settled in my chest.
…I did not want to hear news of her death twice.
“If you don’t believe Yong Soa, there’s no need to worry.”
Yet Dang Seohui’s next words were unexpected enough to snap me out of it.
They pulled me out of the depths I had been sinking into.
“Senior Dang, how much do you know about Yong Soa?”
“Probably as much as Hall Master Jin does.”
“Has Yong Soa’s foresight ever been wrong?”
“Yong Soa does not call it foresight.”
Despite moving at a considerable speed, Dang Seohui’s voice did not tremble.
“‘Unwritten History.’”
Just hearing it made my insides twist as defiance rose in me.
The arrogance was unbearable.
History… history, huh.
‘Is he actually insane?’
No matter how much martial artists liked grand names, he only saw fragments of an uncertain future, yet he called it hiiistory?
That name really sobered me up.
“That little… No, that bastard Yong Soa. Was he drunk when he came up with that name?”
“Yong Soa hardly drinks.”
“Ha… Of course he doesn’t.”
He was the kind of person who could not tolerate even the slightest disorder…
“The liquor Yong Soa likes is too expensive.”
“…”
From the sound of it, Dang Seohui had heard directly from Yong Soa about his ability.
“Anyway, Yong Soa’s foresight isn’t always correct, right?”
Otherwise, Dang Seohui would have had no reason to ignore Yong Soa’s words and come with me.
“It has always been right.”
“A-all of them were right?”
“Reluctantly, I had no choice but to acknowledge the name ‘Unwritten History.’”
“…”
Then why had Dang Seohui persuaded Yong Soa and followed me?
“Then do you think Young Lady Moyong is dead as well?”
Dang Seohui looked at me.
A green gleam flashed across her black pupils.
Soon, she turned away and looked ahead.
Yet her gaze grew calm, as though searching for something beyond it.
“Yong Soa has always been right, but there was one time he was wrong.”
What was she suddenly talking about…
“The Martial World Regular Examination.”
I held my breath.
After a brief silence passed between us, I continued.
“Was there something during the regular examination that did not go as he expected?”
Had Yong Soa not passed his own examination as the top student?
“I do not mean Yong Soa’s examination. I mean Hall Master Jin’s.”
“…?”
Was she talking about the time he suddenly appeared during the examination and said he would help me?
I still wondered about it. Why had he suddenly wanted to help me in the middle of the examination?
“Yong Soa saw a future where Hall Master Jin became the top student. That was why he intended to help only Hall Master Jin.”
“I refused him.”
I had rejected the hand Yong Soa offered and ultimately chosen my companions.
“At that time, Yong Soa was greatly flustered. He said the ‘matter’ had gone wrong.”
“What matter?”
“I do not know.”
That led to another question.
What sort of matter was important enough for him to seek me out on the Demon Spirit Plateau, even though we had been enemies, and offer his help?
But it was not important right now, so I did not ask further.
Dang Seohui muttered as though speaking to herself.
“But when I think about it now, I do not believe he was wrong after all.”
What did that mean?
“What Yong Soa saw was only Hall Master Jin entering as the top student. Since Hall Master Jin was a disciple of a small sect, Yong Soa believed Hall Master Jin would certainly fail without our help.”
It was true that near the end of the regular examination, every kind of bastard had targeted us, leaving us nowhere to run.
“But contrary to our expectations, Hall Master Jin became the top student in the end, together with his companions.”
“…!”
Listening to Dang Seohui, I understood why she had no choice but to accept his foresight as history.
“Seen that way, one cannot say he was wrong.”
A chill ran down my spine to my tailbone, and goosebumps rose over my body.
“Still, there is no need to worry too much. What Yong Soa sees is only a great ‘current.’ Yong Soa himself has often changed small events and ‘adjusted’ the direction of history.”
Adjusted it?
“What do you mean?”
“Yong Soa sees one cross-section of the current. So he has already proven that events within that current can be changed in any number of ways.”
I could not understand what Dang Seohui was saying.
More precisely, it was likely the gap in our understanding of Yong Soa’s ability.
“Anyway, Senior Dang, you also think that what Yong Soa saw this time may not be certain, right?”
“Yes.”
Then Dang Seohui added something even more cryptic.
“…And if it is Hall Master Jin, perhaps Hall Master Jin can change the current.”
I still did not understand, but I did not respond.
There were signs of someone in the new cave we had entered.
Strangely, only a single presence had entered my energy sense.
‘What is this?’
Until now, those who had become isolated alone had either lost their minds and blankly repeated the same actions or gone mad, swinging their swords at friend and foe alike.
But the lone figure caught in my energy sense now…
“…”
They were hiding in one corner of the cave, silencing even their breath.
Still, their stealth art was far too clumsy for someone preparing an ambush.
I could have passed them by, but I could not ignore such an uneasy feeling in a place like this. I sent fist force at the ceiling and shattered it.
Crash!
“Eek!”
As the ceiling collapsed, the figure hiding like a pill bug desperately rolled away.
The sight was so absurd that I sent several more Great Yang Palms after them.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
“Eek! P-Please spare me! I have an elderly mother, a wife and children, and a lame puppy to care for! If you spare me, my descendants will remember your name for generations!”
That voice sounded strangely familiar…
Whirr!
I fired the Flying Dragon Claw, caught a fold of their garment, and pulled them toward me.
“U-Uaaagh!”
They thrashed wildly like an animal caught in a trap, and by the time they reached me, the part of their garment caught by the Flying Dragon Claw had torn away.
“You should have stayed still.”
“P-Please spare me. Please spare me, sir…”
The person dragged before me begged desperately, then cautiously raised their head to check my face.
“Jin… Sowoon?”
“You’re not adding Great Hero? Do you want to die?”
“Y-You… How did you get here…?”
“Didn’t I tell you not to enter this place?”
It was none other than Do Gwangsu, an acquaintance from my previous life.
It seemed he had taken the treasure map and stubbornly entered this place.
“Seriously, Do Gwangsu is still Do Gwangsu, same as ever.”
“I do not understand what you mean…”
Tch. He was as troublesome as ever.
“G-Great Hero…?”
“Still, are you all right?”
“What do you mean?”
“Are you confused? Or are you not afraid of death or anything like that?”
Do Gwangsu looked exactly as I remembered him.
Judging by his miserable appearance, he had likely spent at least half a month in this cave. Other than looking exhausted, he showed no signs of the aftereffects of Mindless Illusion Powder.
“Did you kill the people you came in with?”
“What?! What are you talking about?!”
“Otherwise, why would you be alone in this cave?”
“T-That is because the others started acting too strangely…”
Had he been hiding this entire time because of that?
Ever since he entered?
“Have you been staying only here?”
“No. I moved around while avoiding people. I could drink groundwater, but there wasn’t enough moss or mushrooms, so I had no choice but to keep moving…”
It seemed he had suffered quite a lot after entering.
No, was it more surprising that he had survived this long?
Countless people stronger and crueler than Do Gwangsu had died here. In light of that, his survival was almost paradoxical.
“By the way, why have you been keeping your head down? It’s fine, stand straight. Your back will hurt.”
“N-No, I am f-fine.”
“I said straighten up! I’ll share some food with you too.”
“N-No, I said I am f-fine…”
When I abruptly pulled Do Gwangsu upright, his head reeled backward.
At the same time,
Thud!
Something hard and heavy fell to the floor through a tear in his martial garment.
“…!!!”
“What is this?”
Do Gwangsu suddenly flailed his limbs as though possessed.
“I-It is nothing! It is nothing!”
I casually knocked Do Gwangsu’s hands away and inspected the object.
It was weathered with age, a wooden box of the sort used to carry precious books.
“Y-Young Master Jin! No, Young Master Jin, sir!! Ah, no, Great Hero Jin!!! That is…!”
The moment I opened the wooden box, intending to laugh at his pitiful martial arts for the first time in a while,
“!!!”
I could only gasp.
“…Fuck.”
Why was this…
“Why is this here???”
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