Chapter 3: Hyeonheo (玄虛)

Chapter 3: Hyeonheo (玄虛)

When Pung looked up, a white-haired old man stood before him.

He was atop a boulder some ten paces away. The spot had certainly been empty a moment before, but now the hem of a worn, spotless robe stirred lightly in the mountain breeze. The hands clasped behind his back were as gaunt as dead branches, yet his upright frame held a tautness unlike that of stone or ancient wood.

Pung had heard the footsteps approaching from afar. He had even caught the minute shifts of weight just before each foot touched a fallen leaf. Yet the last ten paces had vanished entirely.

‘How?’

In his five years underground, Pung had learned never to miss a movement in the dark. When a handful of dirt fell from the cavern ceiling, he knew which fissure had widened. He could count the joints of a snake crawling beyond a boulder. Yet the old man before him was as still as though he had been rooted there from the beginning.

The old man’s gaze slowly swept Pung’s face, shoulders, and toes. Brief though it was, he could not quite conceal the astonishment that crossed his eyes. It soon settled into deep puzzlement.

“That herb will die if you pull it by the root tips.”

Pung’s eyebrows twitched at the unexpected remark.

The old man gestured with his chin toward the base of the herb.

“Stone-sleep grass draws its nourishment through the fine roots spreading to the sides, not the central root. There should be a flat stone buried about two inches beneath your left hand. Remove that first.”

Without taking his eyes off the old man, Pung felt through the soil. Sure enough, his fingers found a flat stone about two inches down. When he tilted it up, the fine roots came free of the soil unharmed.

“You know medicinal herbs?”

“Live long enough, and you learn a fair number of useless things.”

The old man smiled but came no closer. He seemed to have noticed Pung gathering strength in his legs. Pung sensed no clear intent to kill, but that alone was no reason to lower his guard. Five years ago, when he had fallen into the Bottomless Abyss, the mountain had looked no different from any other day, and the red flowers had been beautiful.

Pung wrapped the stone-sleep grass in a scrap of cloth and placed it in his basket. As he straightened, he set his right foot half a step back. The old man’s gaze followed the movement down, then rose again.

“That is not the footwork of a boy who gathers herbs in the mountains.”

“Why have you been looking at me like that?”

At the blunt question, the old man stroked the end of his beard.

“Because you are a curious sight.”

“What have I done?”

“I was crossing a distant ridge when I felt a great surge of energy rise from this valley and vanish. It was neither lightning nor a wild beast. I came down to investigate, and here you were.”

Pung recalled his leap across the cliff a short while before. He had drawn energy from his dantian and channeled it into his legs, then thought he had withdrawn most of it. Apparently enough had lingered for this old man to sense.

“You think that energy was mine?”

“That was what I meant to ask. But now that I see you up close, I wonder whether asking will be enough.”

The old man stepped down from the boulder. Not a single dry leaf bent beneath his toes as they touched the ground. He advanced about two paces, then stopped when he saw Pung’s shoulders tense. There was no greed or naked hostility in him, but his eyes were sharp, as though he had come face-to-face with a question that had haunted him for years.

“You hold enough energy in your body to fill a great river and more. It refines itself with every breath, and every acupoint in your body is open and unobstructed. Not only the Lesser Heavenly Circuit but the Greater Heavenly Circuit already flow together as one, yet you breathe and stand exactly like a boy who gathers herbs in the mountains.”

The old man’s eyes narrowed further.

“Your bones and sinews are so strong they might have been shattered and born anew. Your energy, too, is far purer than it should be at your age. Yours is a body that appears to have undergone a complete transformation, yet there is no sign you have ever used that strength in the world. Whatever extraordinary fortune came your way, it was no ordinary encounter.”

Pung did not answer. The old man seemed to have discerned far more about Pung’s body than Pung himself knew. That did not mean he could tell a stranger what had happened in the Bottomless Abyss.

“Who are you, sir?”

“Before that, let me confirm one thing.”

The old man raised his right hand, showing his palm. He did not appear about to attack, but Pung saw beyond his words and expression.

The energy gathered in the old man’s lower abdomen compressed minutely in time with his breathing, then rose through his chest to his shoulder. The flow split among dozens of channels before converging again along the inside of his arm. By the time it reached his palm, it had thinned to a water mist, but the strength hidden within it had not scattered in the least.

He could see the energy inside another person’s body.

Pung caught his breath. The sensation resembled looking into the flow within his own body underground, yet it was utterly different. The old man’s energy was narrower than his, but it was flawless, like a blade honed and polished over many years. As that current left his palm, the fallen leaves around him slid away without a sound.

Watching Pung’s reaction, the old man spoke.

“If you wish to withdraw, do so now. But if you are a child unable to control his energy, I must make certain before you leave this valley. Woodcutters and herb gatherers travel the lower slopes.”

As he finished speaking, energy spread broadly from his palm. It was less a palm strike meant to batter a person than a probing hand seeking to enfold Pung and trace the currents within him.

From the instant that energy left the old man’s palm, Pung read every strand of its weave. He could plainly see which threads sought his chest, which headed for his dantian, and which currents meant to sweep the acupoints at his wrists and shoulders. He guided the energy approaching his dantian aside as though brushing away a slender thread.

The old man’s energy lost its course and dispersed before it even touched his skin.

The breeze stilled. A few scattered leaves rolled between them. For the first time, the old man’s composure slipped.

“Stop.”

Pung’s warning was low, but the old man did not withdraw his hand. Instead, one strand extending from his palm grew thinner and sharper, darting toward Pung’s wrist. Rather than searching broadly, he was trying to seize a single channel and gauge the depth of Pung’s power.

Choices flashed through Pung’s mind. If he retreated, the old man’s energy would follow. If he blocked it head-on, the collision might send a shock down the valley. He chose the thinnest of the three currents running along the inside of the old man’s elbow.

His toes brushed the soil.

Before the old man’s eyes could widen, Pung slipped inside the reach of his palm. His left hand pushed the old man’s wrist upward while two fingers of his right rested lightly below the elbow. This was where the three currents parted and joined again. Pung knew with certainty that if he released even a little force there, the old man would lose the use of his entire arm for a time.

Pung applied no force.

“I told you to stop.”

The old man’s sleeve fluttered a moment too late. Pung’s fingers rested on a vital point, while the old man’s other hand had halted less than half a foot from Pung’s chest. They seemed close enough that one move from each would leave neither unharmed. But Pung already knew: he could press his fingers down first.

The old man’s gaze moved from his own elbow to Pung’s eyes. His astonishment was now too plain to hide. The man who had approached without bending a single fallen leaf stood frozen in the posture with which he had begun his attack, while Pung’s two fingers already barred the path of his next surge of power.

This time, the old man asked first.

“Can you see it?”

Without answering, Pung pressed a little harder. The energy flowing through the old man’s arm trembled beneath his fingertips. The current that had been flawless moments before lost its way and circled near the shoulder.

“Withdraw your energy first.”

After holding his ground a moment longer, the old man folded his palm inward. Only when the energy probing Pung’s body had fully receded did Pung step away. At that instant, the old man’s other hand slowly dropped. Perhaps the edge of a sleeve had grazed him as he darted in: a threadlike red scratch marked the inside of Pung’s left index finger.

The old man’s expression tightened at the sight of blood.

“Ah.”

He took a small porcelain vial from inside his robe and tossed it to Pung. Pung stepped aside instead of catching it, and the vial fell onto the leaves and rolled once.

“Wound medicine. There is no poison in it.”

“How am I supposed to believe that?”

Rather than answer, the old man picked up the vial and removed the stopper. He poured a little powder into his palm, touched it with the tip of his tongue, and swallowed. Then he rubbed the remainder into a small wound on his own arm. Pung had not disabled the vital point, but apparently the edge of his nail had grazed the skin and left a shallow cut.

“If that is still not enough, you need not use it.”

He set the vial at Pung’s feet and withdrew three paces. Pung first tested its scent. He smelled notoginseng root and bletilla, used to stop bleeding, and coptis, used to quell inflammation. He saw none of the murky energy found in poisonous herbs. When he applied the powder to the wound, a sharp sting came first, then the bleeding quickly stopped.

“You could have simply asked me from the beginning.”

“There are things words alone cannot confirm.”

“So you force your energy into a stranger’s body first?”

Pung’s face was hard as he challenged him. The old man offered no excuse. Looking down at his own blood on the ground, he suddenly bowed his head. It was no slight nod; he bent distinctly at the waist.

“I was arrogant. I saw someone with such sight and strength as a mere child and presumed to test you at my whim. I never considered what you might have suffered because of that power. I am sorry.”

The unexpected apology silenced Pung. He had never seen an old, powerful man bow to a boy so much younger than himself. Hwang U had said that when you did wrong, you should apologize first, whether the other person was a child or an adult. Few people actually did.

The old man straightened and looked directly at him.

“You read the entire weave of my energy before it even touched your body. More than that, you found the point where the current divided in an instant and severed it with a fingertip. I have devoted half my life to martial arts, yet before you just now, I was no better than a child carelessly swinging a stick.”

“…I do not understand what you mean.”

“I mean that your sight and strength already surpass those of many accomplished masters.”

Pung recalled the feeling of brushing aside the old man’s current. He had neither strained for strength nor steeled his mind. Everything had lain open before him from the outset, and his hands had simply chosen the thinnest path. Even he did not know when it had become so natural.

“Then what is the problem?”

“The problem is that you yourself do not know how to handle that power.”

The old man looked toward the spot where he had first released his palm force. The grass there lay bent in one direction, and a shallow imprint marked the soil where Pung had stepped without thinking. Yet where Pung had diverted the force, only a few fallen leaves had been disturbed.

“Just now, you dispersed my energy without doing the slightest harm to your surroundings. A martial artist could train a lifetime and still struggle to reach that level. Yet in the very next moment, you failed even to rein in the force of your foot against the ground. What you can do and what you have learned do not match.”

Pung looked down at the depression in the soil. He had cut off the old man’s energy with his fingertips, yet failed to account for the strength in his own foot. It had been too easy for him to notice, and that ignorance made it all the more dangerous.

“A great vessel holds great power. On your own, you found the paths of energy and even learned to circulate and withdraw it. But what works within your own body is not the same as wielding strength before another person. If you enter the martial world without learning how much each meridian can bear, or how force returns once you release it into the world, one day that power will destroy you before it destroys anyone else. I have seen many children perish that way.”

Pung curled his wounded finger, its bleeding now stopped. His decision not to return home passed through his mind. With only a wall between them, he had been able to read every detail of Hwang U’s breathing, yet in the end he could not go inside. What frightened him was not the person beyond the gate, but how much he himself had changed.

A belated fear ran down his spine.

“Then what should I do?”

“First you must understand how the energy in your body arises and how it is gathered back in. If your eyes can read another person’s energy channels, you must use them to see precisely where your own power travels.”

“Can I not simply suppress it?”

“Suppression alone is not enough. Internal energy must be refined through breathing and a cultivation method, stored in the dantian, and circulated through the prescribed acupoints before it truly becomes yours. However great the power, if it defies the principles of circulation, it is no different from poison damaging your meridians.”

The old man continued, looking from Pung’s shoulders to the ground beneath his feet.

“All your acupoints are open, and your energy channels are incomparably wider than those of an ordinary martial artist. Your bones and sinews are strong, as though you have undergone a complete transformation, but your habits in using that strength remain unrefined. For now, the vessel is merely holding. Unless you learn where your internal energy arises, which channels it passes through, and where it leaves your body each time you release force, that great power will someday destroy your body first.”

Pung remembered his first days learning to handle his strength in the Bottomless Abyss. Throughout those five years, no matter how quickly his wounds healed, the pain had never simply vanished. A stronger body did not mean he could use his power without limit. When the flow went awry, he would become short of breath, and a dull ache would linger deep in his dantian.

“Why are you trying to help me?”

The old man did not answer at once. He rolled up his sleeve, examined the elbow Pung had grazed, and flexed his fingers several times before speaking.

“I once belonged to the Martial Alliance. I saw many gifted children dragged into the wrong hands, and what became of them there. When I first saw you, I thought someone had taught you a dangerous martial art and then abandoned you. So I acted in haste, and just now I paid the price.”

The words Martial Alliance meant nothing to Pung. But he could tell that the old man was not trying to conceal his mistaken judgment.

“Tell me your name first.”

“I am called Hyeonheo.”

Having given his name, Hyeonheo spread his empty hands.

“In my youth, I was known a little in the martial world. Now I am merely an old man living apart in the mountains.”

“What is the martial world?”

Hyeonheo’s eyebrows rose. He studied Pung for a while as though trying to decide whether he was joking, then his mouth twisted oddly.

“A boy who stopped my hand twice does not know the martial world?”

“Is it somewhere different from the market below the mountain?”

Hyeonheo let out a disbelieving laugh. None of his earlier sharp wariness remained in it.

“A place wider than the market and more perilous than the mountains. We call it the martial world: the world where those who practice martial arts form sects and great clans, repaying kindnesses and settling grudges. Some proclaim themselves righteous. Others make no attempt to hide their greed.”

“Then how do you know who is good?”

“The trouble with the martial world is how difficult that is to know.”

With a bitter smile, Hyeonheo lowered his sleeve over the wound.

“Some harm others under the banner of the orthodox sects, while some called unorthodox protect the weak. You must not trust a person merely because of the banner they carry. And you should be wary of those who act first and claim good intentions, as I did today.”

Pung watched him in silence. At least he did not blame others for his own mistakes. He had explained how to spare the herb’s roots, kept his distance when Pung grew wary, and tested the medicine on himself after drawing blood. Pung could not call him trustworthy yet, but he was worth another look.

“My name is Danpung. Most people called me Pung.”

“Pung.”

Hyeonheo repeated the name softly.

“Who is your master?”

Pung did not answer. The underground cavern, training that tore his flesh and broke his bones, the darkness that never answered—each rose in his mind in turn.

“I cannot say.”

“Will you not tell me, or do you not know?”

“I will not answer that either.”

Hyeonheo nodded without pressing him. After watching Pung’s breathing for a moment, he pointed farther up the mountain.

“My dwelling is about half a day from here. I have old medical texts and records concerning the energy channels. They may help us understand how your body responds. Come with me if you wish.”

Pung did not agree at once.

“I have conditions.”

“Let me hear them.”

“Do not put your energy into my body without my permission. And if I say I am leaving, you must not stop me.”

A faint smile touched Hyeonheo’s lips.

“You are not my disciple. I have no reason to hold you here. I accept both.”

“There is one more.”

“Quite a few, then.”

“I will walk behind you.”

Hyeonheo burst out laughing, but Pung did not smile. He had merely chosen a position where, should the old man attempt anything suspicious, he could see the flow of energy and evade it. Hyeonheo seemed to understand. His laughter faded, and he nodded.

“Very well. See with your own eyes and judge for yourself.”

Pung slung the basket onto his back. He did not fully trust Hyeonheo. But now that he knew the danger, it was better to investigate than to wander alone and hurt someone out of ignorance. If Hyeonheo broke his promise, Pung could leave. If he attacked, Pung could cut into a gap in his energy channels as he had just done.

Hyeonheo was about to lead the way onto the mountain path when he stopped. Looking up toward the cliff where Pung had been gathering herbs, he laid a finger against his lips.

Pung held his breath as well.

Wind swept through the valley. Amid the birdsong and rustling leaves came a faint scraping sound. Someone had brushed against tree bark while lifting a foot. Unlike Hyeonheo’s approach earlier, it was a movement that had tried too hard to remain silent and failed.

Pung raised his eyes. A pine branch atop the cliff shook once. Something like the hem of a black robe vanished behind a boulder, and hurried footsteps receded beyond the ridge.

“Someone you know?”

Without answering, Hyeonheo approached the foot of the cliff. Crushed moss and broken pine needles remained beside a rock. In the middle of a patch of tree bark, a black needle finer than a hair had been embedded.

As Hyeonheo brought his hand near the needle, the fine hairs on its back curled faintly. Rather than pull it out barehanded, he snapped off a twig and cut away the bark around it. The spot the black needle had touched rapidly rotted, as though ink had been spilled over it.

“A poisoned needle.”

“Yes. Not something a man carries deep into the mountains merely to watch people.”

The last trace of amusement left Hyeonheo’s face. He wrapped the piece of bark in cloth and tucked it inside his robe, then studied the northern ridge along the fleeing stranger’s trail.

Pung looked that way too, until a tug against the inside of his finger drew his gaze downward.

The silver ring was pulsing faintly toward the northern ridge.