Danmok Hyeonu believed that Ryeon’s condition was entirely his fault—a failure to protect her properly that day.
Stemming from that thought, his mind became cluttered, and as the tip of his sword began to waver, a Heart Demon took root. It was a stroke of immense fortune that he hadn’t spiraled all the way into Qi Deviation.
Danmok Hyeonu still hadn’t fully overcome his Heart Demon. Even after finishing his closed-door training, he could only send all sorts of snacks—like Candied Hawthorn and Yakgwa—to Ryeon. He couldn’t bring himself to visit her in person until Danmok Cheongi ordered him to oversee their studies.
“Do you remember what I said? To master the characters you’ve learned, you must use them frequently.”
“Yes!”
“From today on, exchange letters with each other once a day. Even just a single line is fine.”
Danmok Bi, lately obsessed with learning anything alongside his sister, nodded excitedly. He was looking forward to receiving replies from his sister Ryeon and Hwaryun.
Once the writing lesson concluded, it was time for the tea ceremony. To be precise, it was time to drink the tea Ryeon brewed, something she insisted on doing together.
Danmok Hyeonu tried to dissuade her, saying it was absurd for an uncle to be served tea by his niece every time, but Ryeon pushed forward, claiming she wanted to practice the tea ceremony she had learned from her grandfather.
Ryeon adjusted her sleeves.
[Danmok Ryeon]*Harmony: 7 Stars – You may remain unnoticed.
Mind’s Eye: 4 Stars – You can see flaws.
Purification: 2 Stars – You can purify vitality.
Stamina: 6 / 100
Spiritual Energy: 52 / 100
Tip: Let’s increase the achievement of Purification. Keep Spiritual Energy below 50. If this state persists for more than a month and nine days, it will lead to death.
No one knew how to use this power called Spiritual Energy. It was a territory she had to pioneer all by herself.
Every single day, she brewed tea to feed those around her and purified the environment to expend her Spiritual Energy. Yet, by the next day, it was full again. And the day after that, full again…
It wasn’t a joke; she was literally earning her life one day at a time.
Ryeon couldn’t miss this opportunity to feed tea to three people at once.
This was the reason she was boiling water, panting in the sweltering heat.
As Ryeon brewed and set down four cups in a row, Danmok Hyeonu smiled gently as he looked at the boys.
“Your sister brewed this herself, so always drink it with gratitude.”
“Yes! Thank you, Sister.”
“Thank you, Sister.”
They studied every day and drank tea every day, yet Danmok Hyeonu said the same thing every day, and the boys expressed their gratitude every day. Ryeon simply beamed at them.
“It seems people from Hangzhou would bring a thousand pieces of gold just to drink a cup of this tea.”
Danmok Hyeonu, having taken a sip, smiled broadly. Ryeon quietly looked down at her teacup.
None of the tea leaves were bought fresh this year; they were all aged leaves from several years ago.
It likely barely tasted fit for human consumption, yet Danmok Hyeonu always heaped praise upon her.
Then Danmok Bi, who usually twisted his body in boredom during tea time and gulped his drink down, would add his own admiration in his limited vocabulary.
It’s super delicious, as tasty as yesterday’s Yakgwa, like something a celestial would drink—he cycled through these phrases every three days.
While Ryeon smiled, finding her little brother cute, her eyes landed on Hwaryun, who was grinning silently beside Bi. She could tell just by his eyes. He was teasing her with his gaze alone.
After all, no matter how good the tea tasted, could a cup brewed by the fumbling hands of an eight-year-old really compare to a celestial’s drink?
“These are not empty words, Ryeon-ah. Your fingertips are skillful, and your depth of heart can be felt in the taste of the tea. I can foresee that your achievements will be extraordinary when you learn the sword from the Retired Patriarch in the future. Just like your father…”
Danmok Hyeonu, who had been speaking, hurriedly trailed off.
Just as the atmosphere was about to turn awkward, Danmok Bi burst in.
“Sister! Are you going to learn the sword from Grandfather?”
He looked like he was dying of envy. Danmok Hyeonu’s face, which had stiffened momentarily, quickly softened.
“It was decided she would do so once she memorizes the Thousand Character Classic. Bi-ya, the Retired Patriarch will teach you the sword as well once you memorize all the characters.”
“Yes! I’ll memorize them all too!”
“Right, right. If you memorize them all, I will give you a prize too. All three of you.”
At the mention of a prize, Danmok Bi’s eyes sparkled.
Ryeon nodded, chewing on the fact that she had ended up studying these characters after hearing something similar from Danmok Cheongi. She glanced to the side. Hwaryun, who had been feigning happiness at Danmok Hyeonu’s words only to return to a nonchalant expression, smirked when their eyes met.
*
The sound of cicadas cried out so loudly it felt as if they would tear eardrums apart.
Ryeon, wheezing in the heat, was sprawled out on a bamboo mat atop her bed, reading through a mountain of books one by one.
She had lived through a future where the Hyulla Valley ran rampant just over ten years from now, and she had died in that timeline. Leaving them unchecked was not an option.
She didn’t know if this was something she could do alone, but she couldn’t just sit idly by either.
So, using her studies as an excuse, she had dragged every related book from the library, but…
When a person accumulates Internal Energy for sixty years through standard breathing techniques—, expelling old energy and inhaling fresh energy through the Dantian—it is called ‘one cycle’ of energy.
Learning a superior cultivation method might allow one to accumulate it faster, but decades of time cannot be condensed into a year or two.
This remains true even if one consumes Elixirs. To absorb the Spiritual Energy of an Elixir as Internal Energy, one needs a proper cultivation method and a significant amount of time spent in meditative breathing.
But the warriors of the Hyulla Valley had none of that.
Judging by their sword forms, they looked like they had only trained for a year or two at most, yet bastards possessing more than a cycle of Internal Energy would pour out endlessly and run wild.
Anyone with perception would know it was a wicked martial art. Therefore, one had to figure out it was wicked to defeat it, but that remained a mystery.
The Valley Master of the Hyulla Valley had changed three or four times, and all three powers of the Murim Alliance had rushed in to investigate, yet they found nothing.
It spoke volumes that even the Black Heaven Alliance, who would scour with fire in their eyes and didn’t mind using somewhat unwelcome means, failed to uncover the secret.
There was a debate about whether they were force-fed massive amounts of Elixirs, but that theory was debunked.
Thanks to the Zhuge Clan’s calculation: if they had the financial power to support such a thing, they could have dominated the Murim with gold rather than martial force.
Ryeon flipped the page. Perhaps thanks to her Mind’s Eye, the contents remained vividly in her mind after just one scan.
Ryeon mulled over the ‘treasures’ she knew of, then closed the book, exhausted by the heat.
The Hyulla Valley was important, but wasn’t that a problem for after she managed to survive?
Just then, the door to her quarters quietly opened.
“Hmm? Ryun-ah?”
“You said you were lying down because of the heat. Is it true?”
For some reason, Hwaryun wore a triumphant expression as he looked at Ryeon. Ryeon sat up with a sullen look.
Although Ryeon’s quarters were the coolest place in the estate, she would quickly suffer heat exhaustion and start wheezing if she wandered outside even briefly.
Nanny Jang was terribly distressed seeing Ryeon like this, saying it seemed to be a trait of the women in this family, inherited from the previous generation, to be weak against the heat.
“Just wait until winter comes.”
It was also a family trait to turn into mush in the summer but become lively and energetic in the winter.
Even seeing Ryeon huffing and puffing, Hwaryun merely raised an eyebrow and scanned the books Ryeon had carelessly spread out.
“Why… the Hyulla Valley?”
Feeling a prick of conscience for no reason, Ryeon swiftly closed the book and spoke.
“Have you ever seen the Hyulla Valley?”
The Dongting Bloodshed, where the world clashed with the Hyulla Valley, was indeed a major event, but that was over twenty years ago.
They say mountains and rivers change in ten years; twenty was more than enough for two such changes. Nowadays, ‘Hyulla Valley’ was mostly used as a substitute for curses among the elders.
It was the sort of thing where an elderly man, drunk on a jar of wine, would shout, “You bastard, even the Hyulla Valley would spit you out!” and a knife fight would break out.
“…I haven’t seen them, but I know of them. The blood-sucking bastards.”
“I see…”
“Why are you looking into this, Sister?”
“We… our family is a pillar of the Orthodox Murim. As the Eldest Grandchild, I should know history.”
Hwaryun looked at Ryeon with slightly surprised eyes.
“And because of them, my Grandfather and Father…”
Danmok Hyeonseong had died due to a duel with the Geum Family Manor, but before that, the internal injury he sustained during the Dongting Bloodshed had been burning away his life.
If not for that, there was no way Danmok Hyeonseong, called a genius of the ages, would have died dueling a newly risen martial family in Hangzhou.
