Chapter 387 : Seed (6)
Chapter 387: Seed (6)
Jin Hayeon's flash of surprise vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared, and she was back to her usual composed self in no time.
"May I ask why you want to learn the White Hand Demonic Art, Young Master?"
"I need it to develop something that could stand up to a powerhouse on the level of the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi, if one ever showed up again."
"…Is that so?"
Something unreadable flickered across her expression for a moment, but she quickly nodded and started walking him through the formula of the White Hand Demonic Art.
Since it was a martial art she'd been training in every single day for half her life, she had the entire thing memorized backwards and forwards. Beyond merely explaining them, it was no difficult matter for her to grind ink and write them out on paper.
Il-mok went over her explanation and the written formula a few times to make sure he had it down. Then he settled into the lotus position and slipped into meditation.
Even for Il-mok who had already attained a lofty realm, this particular session was going to be tricky.
The reason was the leftover Blood Qi still floating around his meridians.
Since that Blood Qi was likewise needed for the cultivation of the Flame Art, he could not very well do away with it.
Using the Qi of the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword, Il-mok first drove that Blood Qi together into meridians where the White Hand Demonic Art did not pass.
With the path now cleared for the Yin Qi to move, he reached out and made contact with the Yin Qi sitting in his dantian.
Like pulling a single thread out of a ball of yarn, Il-mok carefully extracted a small portion of the Qi and circulated that Qi in accordance with the formulae of the White Hand Demonic Art.
After completing one full Lesser Heavenly Cycle, Il-mok did something unexpected.
He didn't send the energy back to his dantian.
'Holding three different energies in one dantian would be no different from living with a bomb planted inside one's body.'
That was exactly why he'd had Jin Hayeon repeat her explanation so many times. He'd already understood the formula a while ago and just needed to tweak it.
After thinking it through with everything he'd learned about martial arts over the years, Il-mok had already decided where he would form the dantian for the White Hand Demonic Art.
And the spot he was now guiding the Yin Qi toward wasn't the dantian in his abdomen, but the one in his head.
Way back in the day, when the concept of the martial world was only coming into being, the world had been home to martial arts of every conceivable variety.
And since the styles varied so much, the spots where they formed their dantians varied just as much.
Out of all of them, the three most-used locations were named the Upper Dantian, the Middle Dantian, and the Lower Dantian.
The Lower Dantian—the one everyone thinks of nowadays the second they hear the word dantian—is located in the lower abdomen.
The Middle Dantian, on the other hand, is located in the acupoint called Danzhong where the heart resides.
Lastly, the Upper Dantian is located in the Yintang acupoint, the point in the forehead between the two eyebrows.
In fact, plenty of martial arts actually use Danzhong and Yintang acupoints to host their dantians.
The reason behind this is that since all Qi will travel through Danzhong in the end, why not just form a dantian in there?
As for Yintang, since handling Qi in the higher stage is ultimately a matter of intent and willpower, why not form the dantian into the brain where you could control it with way more finesse?
So why, after centuries of evolution, did all those wildly different ancient martial arts eventually narrow down to using just the Lower Dantian, like everyone does today?
There are a few reasons for that.
The biggest one was efficiency.
Since martial arts are an art that requires the use of one's whole body, sending Qi out to the four limbs and every conduit from a central spot like the Lower Dantian was plainly more efficient and better in every way.
Bluntly speaking, if you form your dantian in the brain, the speed at which Qi reaches your hands will be faster than it would reach the legs. And on the battlefield with its ever-changing nature, that’s a big no.
The other reason was safety.
Heart Demon and internal injuries were a constant occupational hazard of cultivation. So imagine if your dantian happens to be sitting in your brain or your heart. What would happen then?
One mental slip or minor injury could send you straight to the afterlife.
Because of those two huge problems, every martial art in history ended up centered around the Lower Dantian.
And the solution Il-mok had devised once he’d decided to learn both Ice Arts and Flame Art is to place the two Qis with conflicting nature in those very same abandoned Upper and Middle Dantian.
The only question for him was which one got the Yin Qi and which one got the Yang Qi?
Naturally, what came to mind first was a memory from his past life.
Naturally, the first thing that popped into his head was a famous saying from his past life.
'Cool head and Warm heart.'
The bald guy's chest is on fire.
...Okay, no, not that. What he'd actually been trying to remember was the saying about a cool head and a warm heart.
(TL Note: A Korean joke: A bald head is cold and breezy because it has no hair. The chest is on fire is a Korean idiom. In Korea, saying your heart or insides are getting hot or burning up is a sign of frustration. The Korean netizen twisted the saying from “Have a warm heart while having a calculating mind” to something like “The baldy is frustrated.”)
The way Il-mok saw it, having a burning heart is better than being hot-headed, and a cold mind is better than a frozen heart. That’s why he decided to form a dantian for the Yin Qi on his Yintang acupoint.
It was a rather emotional judgment, but in truth, the question of which energy went where wasn't all that important.
He could already vividly picture what would happen if he tried using Yin Qi and Yang Qi at the same time if he placed the two in the same place. Every meridian in his body would burst and he would board the train to the underworld then and there.
So his plan was to use both the Upper and Middle Dantians as glorified warehouses.
The base of everything was still the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword. The two new Qi were strictly reserved for when he pulled out his new secret techniques.
'At the bare minimum, I need to lay off using either the White Hand Demonic Art or the Yang Arts in actual combat until both of them hit Transcendence.'
Transcendence.
Back when he'd first started learning the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword, that realm had felt like a towering mountain that was always out of his reach.
But now that Il-mok’s had achieved Transcendence in the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword and stepped beyond the initial stage of the Realm of Truth, he no longer saw that thing as a towering mountain.
For even if it were a mountain of an entirely different shape and path, one who has climbed a far loftier summit has no great difficulty in scaling a new one.
"Huuu."
Il-mok guided the Yin Qi congealed in his Lower Dantian and began to nurture the newly formed vessel within his Upper Dantian.
But since it was a dantian sitting in his brain, he wasn't about to do anything reckless or push its growth too hard.
Once it was at least minimally formed, he stood up and started running through the White Hand Demonic Art's forms as slowly and as carefully as he could.
He sealed off the Blood Qi floating around in his meridians with the Qi of the Soul-Stealing Heartless Sword and then started guiding the Yin Qi from his Upper Dantian.
Since the flow of Qi was now starting from the Upper Dantian instead of where the original White Hand Demonic Art formula said it should, he had to tweak things little by little as he went.
He carefully ran through the forms of the White Hand Demonic Art a few times using that Upper Dantian energy. And whenever it ran out, he'd drop back into the lotus position to pull the Yin Qi from his Lower Dantian to refill the upper one.
And so the cycle of training repeated itself, on and on for some time.
With his outstanding talent and lofty realm, combined with various factors such as the roughly twenty years' worth of internal cultivation that had been stored in his Lower Dantian, the absurd growth rate of Demonic Arts, and the tutelage of Jin Hayeon who had achieved Transcendence in the White Hand Demonic Art, Il-mok was able to elevate his attainment in the White Hand Demonic Art at an absurd pace.
The instant he had drawn the last of the Yin Qi remaining in his Lower Dantian into his Upper Dantian, Il-mok let out a cold sigh and snapped his eyes open.
"Congratulations on your attainment, Young Master."
Hearing Jin Hayeon's words of congratulation, a certain voice resounded inside Il-mok's head.
— Hey, buddy. You've got quite a buildup going, don't you?
It was the side effect of the White Hand Demonic Art.
When cultivated by a woman, the side effect was that her emotions would freeze over, but for a man, it took the form of raw sexual urges.
— She's into you too, you know. Just go ahead and pin her down already.
As lustful temptation came fixing its sights on Jin Hayeon, Il-mok muttered inwardly.
'Shut up.'
The side effect, which had been smoothly whispering away in his ear just a second earlier, recoiled in shock and scurried back into hiding.
'Tch. Yeah, that's the side effect for you.'
Though Il-mok inwardly clicked his tongue lightly, he wasn't all that worried about it.
If that one belonged to the Heavenly Demon Divine Arts, he would have to fear for his life. But his realm in martial arts is now so high that ordinary Demonic Arts wouldn’t so easily shake him.
On top of that, his grasp of the White Hand Demonic Art and Yin Qi was already at a level where calling it Extremity wouldn't have been weird at all.
The only catch was that his Upper Dantian was nowhere near big enough yet, and the Yin Qi inside it was nowhere near enough, so he hadn't officially stepped into Extremity. And since he doesn’t have enough Yin Qi, he can’t train in the latter forms of the White Hand Demonic Art.
And that’s a problem.
'Hmm. Honestly, this is kind of similar to where I was back at the Hall of the Demonic Way.'
The situations might've looked alike, but the pressure from the side effect was on a completely different level. Back then, he'd been getting jerked around by it constantly; whereas now, a single light warning from him was enough to send the thing running for cover.
'Master said that once you fully master the Heavenly Demon Divine Arts, you're free from the influence of every Demonic Art. Or maybe, aside from achieving Transcendence in the Heavenly Demon Divine Arts, reaching the Realm of Heavenly Communion that Master once mentioned would naturally do the same thing.’
Of course, since Il-mok wasn't anywhere near that level yet, there was still a tiny lingering risk from the side effect.
'I just need to watch myself a little when I hit Extremity. Hmm. Grow the Upper Dantian a bit, train the latter forms to a decent point, and I'll blow right past Extremity in no time. So... probably not a big deal?'
What an Il-mok-like answer, treating breaking free of Extremity like a quick errand to a convenience store.
Il-mok trained at the White Hand Demonic Art until late that night before going in for some sleep.
Early the next morning, he paid a visit to Wi Jin-hak's quarters.
"This one greets the Cult Leader."
"Come in, come in. I'm not sure what it was about, but did that urgent business with Miss Jin yesterday work out all right?"
Hearing the clueless Wi Jin-hak ask that out of concern, Il-mok kept his expression in check and likewise replied as though it were nothing at all.
"It has been more or less brought to a close."
"Hahaha. Good. Knowing you, I am sure it was handled well."
While Il-mok was struggling to swallow a wry smile at Wi Jin-hak's words, Wi Jin-hak followed up with another question.
"And so, what brings you here so early in the morning?"
The main reason Il-mok had come to see Wi Jin-hak was to learn the Raging Demon Sword Art.
Just as he had learned the White Hand Demonic Art to control the Yin Qi, he wanted to learn the Raging Demon Sword Art to control the Yang Qi.
But this situation was a little different from the White Hand one. There is no way he could treat his Eldest Brother like Jin Hayeon; on top of that, he still has several major issues, separate from the martial arts question, that need to be talked through.
"There were a few things I couldn't quite bring myself to ask yesterday since I had urgent business, so I came rushing here first thing this morning."
"Things you couldn't ask, hmm. Speak your mind freely, then."
Faced with his Eldest Brother's unwavering trust, Il-mok carefully voiced his question.
"What are your thoughts about your marriage to the daughter of the Zhuge Family?"
He knew that Wi Jin-hak had accepted it for the sake of the alliance, but it was still the kind of thing that left a bit of an aftertaste.
"It was not something much to my liking. But I accepted it because of what the Head of the Zhuge Family said to me."
It looked like Wi Jin-hak had picked up on the real intent behind Il-mok's question, because he stroked his beard as he answered.
"The enemy we must face is a formidable adversary against whom victory cannot be guaranteed. And we and our 'allies' don't fully trust each other. So I agree with the notion that we must spare neither means nor methods in order to unite as one."
Then Wi Jin-hak broke into a hearty grin and added, "Dull-witted brother that I am, you didn't come all the way over here worried I might get wrapped around some woman's skirts, did you? Hahaha!"
When Wi Jin-hak struck right at the heart of the matter, Il-mok offered a clasped-fist salute and replied, "That man Zhuge Mun is as dangerous as he is brilliantly resourceful, and it was that aspect that gave rise to my concern, hence my visit."
It was true that he had been worried whether or not his bachelor Eldest Brother would get swayed by a woman, but he couldn’t exactly say that to his face.
No matter how close his relationship with his Eldest Brother is, he still has to treat Wi Jin-hak as the Cult Leader, so there are words he couldn’t carelessly say to him.
"Hahaha. Don't worry about it. As Cult Leader, my top priority is always the safety and future of the Divine Cult. If that woman ever tries to push something that'd hurt the Sacred Cult for the Zhuge Family's sake, wife or not, I won't let it slide."
Wi Jin-hak's words were full of conviction, and Il-mok decided to trust his Eldest Brother on this one.
At least for now.
'Yeah, I was worrying about nothing. There's something scarier than love out there than religious devotion.'
Say what you will, Wi Jin-hak was, when all was said and done, a genuine fifty-plus-year hardcore zealot of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.
With the first issue more or less settled, Il-mok opened his mouth to bring up his second piece of business.