Episode 6
As I closed in on him, I summoned every ounce of the twenty years of inner strength I had cultivated within my body, preparing for a surprise attack.
Then, the moment his gaze shifted upward, I struck.
His underlings screamed in shock at the sudden turn of events.
“What—what is this?!”
“B-Boss!”
But those guys should have attacked first instead of screaming.
Because I had no intention of stopping there.
I left the sword embedded in Mak Gu-sam’s chest as it was, spun around swiftly, and drew the sword strapped to my back, swinging it with force.
Shu-hak!
A streak of sword light sliced horizontally through the air, severing the neck of the man standing right beside me in a single clean cut.
Puhak!
“Ughhh!”
“Jang-oh!”
Only when blood sprayed everywhere did the others shout.
“It’s an ambush!”
“Stop him!”
Shuaak!
“Kyaaaah!”
Blood splattered all over me as I slashed another man from his groin up to his shoulder, thinking to myself,
They don’t need to ‘stop’ me—they need to ‘kill’ me.
Foolish fools.
Puhak!
“Kyaaaah!”
When I slashed the third man’s chest diagonally, they finally aimed their swords properly at me.
“Y-You bastard!”
“How dare you!”
A sneer escaped my lips.
Your response is way too slow.
I hurled the sword I was holding at the men who were trembling and pointing their blades at me.
The spinning blade buzzed through the air, and they barely managed to block it, startled.
“Waaah!”
Chak-cheng!
But at that moment, I was already pulling the sword out of Mak Gu-sam’s chest and charging at them.
And in an instant,
like wings of light unfurling, sword light scattered through the air.
Shu-haak!
“Ughhh!”
“Kyaaaah!”
For the first time in my two lives, I unleashed the One-Second Divine Response of the Sunwoo Thirteen Sword Technique.
By then, the ronin who had come with me began to move.
From my perspective, it was a bit late, but for them, it was a hurried charge.
“Attack! Support Lord Sunwoo!”
“Waaah!”
The bandits were now utterly broken.
Except for their boss, Mak Gu-sam, the rest were third-rate lackeys who couldn’t even use inner strength. Without a unifying figure, they had no reason to risk death by charging at us.
“P-Please spare me! It’s the butcher!”
“Run! Scatter!”
I laughed fiercely as I slaughtered those who foolishly turned their backs during the fight.
My soul rejoiced in the familiar air of battle returning.
The fight didn’t last long.
Since there were only six of us, we couldn’t capture all the bandits. Seventeen bodies lay scattered around the area, and roughly fifteen had fled.
Only then did I relax, toss my sword aside, and collapse onto the ground with a groan.
“Ugh, I’m dead…”
But the ronin’s eyes no longer held the pity they once did.
Instead, their gazes were filled with clear astonishment—and fear.
Jang, the warrior, hesitated for a moment before asking me,
“Lord Sunwoo, are you perhaps… a revenant?”
Caught off guard by the absurd question, I smiled tiredly and replied,
“No way. That’s nonsense. And even if such a thing existed, a master who came back from the dead wouldn’t collapse from fighting like this.”
He shook his head slowly.
“Of course, that’s true, but at your age, it’s not easy to kill without hesitation. Besides…”
He glanced around and continued,
“Seeing you lying here so comfortably among all these corpses makes me wonder such strange things.”
His words made me look around, and sure enough, the place was soaked in blood and littered with bodies.
Though, truth be told, I was probably more drenched in blood than the surroundings.
The scene was so familiar that I must have unconsciously relaxed.
Still, I couldn’t just say that outright, so I gave an awkward smile and offered an excuse.
“I must have been too exhausted to notice. Let’s rest a bit more before moving on.”
Even as I said I wanted to rest a little longer, the ronin looked at me with disbelief.
While I rested, the ronin gathered the spoils and severed Mak Gu-sam’s head.
There was probably a bounty on him, so taking it to the authorities would be quite profitable.
Later, when we moved on and it was time to eat, we finally had a chance to talk again.
Jang glanced around cautiously before asking,
“Lord Sunwoo, are you perhaps a first-rate warrior?”
I shook my head with a smile.
“No, not yet. I’m still second-rate. I’ve only got about twenty years of inner strength.”
“But just now, your sword seemed to shimmer with a misty glow—is that sword energy?”
“That was a technique from the Sunwoo Thirteen Sword. It’s originally a phantom sword style, so the afterimages probably made it look that way.”
The ronin perked up their ears and let out impressed exclamations.
“Ahhh, the famous Sunwoo Thirteen Sword?!”
“No wonder it’s the signature technique of Guizhou Province!”
Jang looked a bit envious.
“Truly, a renowned sword style is different. To wield such power at the second-rate level… I can only imagine how incredible it will be when you reach first-rate.”
I just smiled quietly.
Honestly, I was looking forward to it too.
When I reach first-rate and can release sword energy, the phantom sword style of the Sunwoo Thirteen Sword will truly show its might.
“But that’s still a long way off.”
I thought with a wry smile.
To release sword energy, I need at least thirty years of inner strength—half a gapja, or sixty years.
A second-rate warrior with over thirty years of inner strength who attains the ‘Sword Energy Master’ level—that is, the enlightenment to release energy that can harm others—is called a first-rate warrior.
I already have that enlightenment, so that’s not the problem. But I can’t rush the thirty years of inner strength.
I’ll have to keep working hard to build it up.
Jang sighed.
“I’m forty now, and I’ve only built up twenty years of inner strength. Seeing you, barely in your early twenties with twenty years of inner strength, makes me regret not working harder. I’m just ashamed.”
I gave a bitter smile.
I didn’t say it to him, but the only reason I have twenty years of inner strength now is because my father gave me a miraculous elixir last night.
Without it, I probably wouldn’t even have ten years’ worth.
He even gave me two more identical pills afterward.
But he warned me not to take any more for the time being.
I knew why.
Half of the inner strength in my body wasn’t built naturally—it was absorbed from external energy.
That meant I was in a perfect state to fall victim to possession.
So for now, I had to focus on building my own inner strength and purifying the external energy.
Then, a thought struck me, and I asked Jang.
“By the way, what kind of mental technique have you learned?”
I asked because, as a wandering ronin, I doubted he had mastered a proper mental technique.
He cleared his throat awkwardly.
“Well, just the Six Harmonies Mental Technique. It was the only one I could get my hands on… ahem.”
“Ah, the Six Harmonies Mental Technique.”
My eyes softened with pity.
I had guessed he hadn’t learned a good technique, but to have learned the Six Harmonies was truly unfortunate.
It was a third-rate mental technique you could easily find in any secondhand bookstore on the street.
“Actually, it’s impressive you’ve built up twenty years of inner strength with the Six Harmonies.”
I wasn’t just saying it—it really was remarkable.
Such an achievement would require relentless effort.
Noticing my pity, he avoided my gaze, brushed off his clothes, and stood up.
“Well then, let’s get moving! If we don’t push on before dark, we won’t make it in three days.”
I couldn’t say anything more.
Even if I told him I once had to copy and beg for martial arts techniques because I couldn’t find any to learn, he’d only pity me.
My gaze deepened as I watched him.
The scattered remnants of the Green Tiger Gang only managed to regroup long after Sunwoo Jin and his group had passed.
Returning to the scene of the incident, they erupted in fury upon seeing the piled-up corpses of their slain boss and comrades.
“Those cruel bastards! Even enemies deserve a proper burial!”
“Look! They took all our belongings! Those filthy thieves!”
“Damn them to hell! May the Blood Demon Cult’s fiends devour them all!”
As they vented their rage, one of them suddenly spoke up, breaking the grim silence.
“But… what do we do now?”
“What else? We go back to the Green Tiger Gang and pick a new boss.”
“…Can we even run the business properly if we pick a new boss from among us? We only had one second-rate warrior—the boss.”
The cold reality hit them like a bone-chilling blow, and they all fell silent.
Then, from down the road, someone appeared riding a horse—just one horse, one rider.
Everyone instinctively turned to look.
One with the sharpest eyes swallowed hard and whispered,
“It’s a woman.”
The others gasped in surprise, whispering urgently,
“What?!”
“A woman?!”
“Alone?!”
“Is she pretty?!”
Holding out his palm to signal the others to wait, he soon whispered again, eyes gleaming.
“I can’t see her face clearly because of her bangs, but she’s probably pretty. And her figure’s good. She looks a bit small—maybe late teens?”
Then, swallowing hard, he turned to his comrades and asked, “What do we do?”
As their eyes met tensely, one finally spoke up.
“A girl walking in here alone like that… what if she’s a master?”
His words doused the fire burning in their hearts.
“Watch out for women and old men.”
It was an old saying in the martial world.
Suddenly, fear flickered in their eyes.
The memory of what had happened with Sun Woo-jin earlier came rushing back vividly.
They shuddered.
“Maybe we shouldn’t mess with her after all?”
One of them spoke nervously. At that moment, the sharp-eyed man who had first seen her stole another glance her way.
Though her eyes were hidden beneath her bangs, the delicate oval jawline beneath was unmistakable—she had to be beautiful.
Torn by the thought of letting such a beauty walk away, he suddenly spoke up.
“But could a girl in her late teens really be a master? She’s too young.”
His words sparked a new light in the bandits’ minds.
True enough.
No matter how dangerous it was for a lone girl, how strong could a teenager really be?
Sure, if she were a direct disciple of one of the Nine Great Sects, or a child of the Five Great Families, or one of the absolute powers of the martial world—the children or disciples of the Japanese Emperor, the Three Sages, the Four Demons—then maybe.
But why would someone like that come here?
In the end, they made up their minds and boldly charged toward her as she rode past.
“Stop right there, you bitch! How dare you pass through the territory of these heroes without permission?!”
“Get off your horse immediately! And start stripping! Hahaha!”
“No! You can strip while on the horse! Hahaha!”
She watched the bandits, who were laughing among themselves as they spoke, with a calm gaze. Then, suddenly, she asked them.
“Has someone named Sun Woo-jin, the Third Young Master of the Sun Woo family, passed through here?”
The moment they heard the name, the bandits’ laughter died instantly.
They were so shocked they even hiccupped.
“Y-You… how do you know him…?”
“Are you… are you one of that butcher’s gang?”
Seeing their reaction, a satisfied smile curved her lips.
“So he’s already passed through. How long ago was that?”
The bandits, briefly shaken by the terrible memory, quickly hardened their expressions again.
He passed just a little while ago, and the fact that this young girl was alone hadn’t changed.
“Good! Then we’ll collect the boss’s debt from this girl!”
“Yeah, that’s right! The guy who passed won’t be coming back, anyway!”
As the bandits regained their fighting spirit, Ha Cheong-yeon muttered softly.
“So he passed through earlier, huh? Looks like we’ll be meeting soon.”
Then, she lightly sprang up from her horse.
Whoosh!
The bandits stared dumbfounded as she soared into the air like a swallow skimming over water.
Her movement was graceful, almost mesmerizing.
She spun elegantly once in midair, then struck down toward the bandits like a lightning bolt.
Swish!
“…!”
They didn’t even have time to react.
In an instant, a web of sword light filled the space, and the bandits, frozen in shock, were sliced apart, blood spraying like fountains.
Gush!
Blood splattered everywhere as she was already rising back into the air, returning to her saddle.
In just one second, she had killed fifteen men with her sword energy, casually flicked the blood off her blade, sheathed it, and began riding away as if nothing had happened.