Chapter 9. Dream Awakening (9)

Dae-Woong hugged his son with tears in his eyes.

"Ugh! You’re suffocating me, let go!" Woo-Moon cried out. He didn’t hate it, though.

"Thank you. Thank you very much, Woo-Moon. Gods of heaven and earth, Jade Emperor, Buddha, thank you all."

"Father, let me go. I need to work now."

Dae-Woong hugged his son, and even though time was passing by, he didn’t even think about letting his child out of his embrace. Woo-Moon tried to squirm his way out.

‘Huh?’

Woo-Moon had been learning martial arts and he was now able to circulate his qi. However, he still couldn’t easily handle Dae-Woong's raw strength. He tried to escape, but he was trapped.

‘As expected, my father was born with divine power. Even though he’s not a cultivator, he is incredibly strong.’

He thought he could escape if he used his qi to strengthen himself, but he was worried about hurting Dae-Woong.

"What? Ah... Did you say you’re going to work? That’s great, my son!"

Dae-Woong’s emotions finally cleared away, and he let go of Woo-Moon.

Woo-Moon got to work, starting by cleaning the inn. The building had always been a little messy, but once he finished the job, both Dae-Woong and the cook were shocked at how pristine everything was.

After cleaning up, Woo-Moon's gloomy heart felt a lot better. Soon, however, boredom struck.

Thinking there was nothing to do, he suddenly remembered the Divine Phantasm Step Jin Won-Myeong had taught him three days before.

‘Time to study it.’

In the beginning, it hadn’t piqued his interest, since it didn’t seem as enjoyable as dreaming in front of the painting. Now that he couldn’t fall into that dream anymore, however, the Divine Phantasm Step suddenly seemed a lot more entertaining.

The hardest part of working at an inn was usually the chores that had to be done in the morning. Now that he was done with everything, Woo-Moon told Dae-Woong that he was going out and headed to where he had last seen Jin Won-Myeong.

"As expected, they’re still here.”

Won-Myeong’s footprints were still on the massive boulder. Looking at it now, he found it truly fascinating.

‘How can an old man like him leave such a deep footprint on a boulder?”

“Well, might as well start.”

Woo-Moon climbed on top of it and reflected on the Divine Phantasm Step’s sutra, which he had already memorized. Afterward, he started tracing Jin Won-Myeong's footprints.

Thump!

"Ugh!"

It was harder than he had thought, but that was only natural. Even among the best martial arts of the Kunlun Sect, the Divine Phantasm Step was considered one of the most difficult. It wasn’t just a regular footwork technique, and since it involved the intricacies of an array, Woo-Moon couldn’t possibly perform it properly just like that when he did not even know what an array was.

The sun was inching ever closer to the zenith, and Woo-Moon was already on his fourteenth attempt. He often fell while trying to follow the footprints, but he at least managed to take two correct steps, which was only possible because of the changes in his body that granted him increased muscle strength and improved flexibility.

"Alright, let's see which one of us will win in the end.”

Feeling competitive, he challenged himself to master the Divine Phantasm Step. His desire for victory flared up.

He repeated the sutra of the Divine Phantasm Step in his mind and carefully guided his qi to reinforce certain acupuncture points. Taking one step at a time, he crossed his legs and moved in a direction that had seemed impossible in the beginning.

He felt amazing. His qi was moving exactly as he wanted. Finally, he reached the difficult third step.

‘Great!’

His feet would trip against each other and his qi would get blocked at this step, resulting in failure, but this time, he actually succeeded easily.

He went on to the fourth step.

Thump!

Woo-Moon fell down, his legs entangled once more.

"Damn it! How do I move my feet like this? Am I practicing martial arts or acrobatics?”

Overcoming this failure, Woo-Moon recalled Won-Myeong’s movements.

The memory was initially blurry, but as he focused on it, it gradually became clearer. In the end, it became so crystal clear that it was as if the scene was happening again right in front of him.

With extreme concentration, Woo-Moon carefully examined Won-Myeong's actions.

No matter how intelligent the average person was, they couldn’t visualize past events as clearly and in as much detail as when they had witnessed them in-person. However, Woo-Moon had lived in a dream for a long time, and if anyone could be considered unrivaled in terms of visualization, that was definitely him.

He continued to try, fail, and then try again until late noon, when he finally figured out what time it was.

"Oh, heavens!"

Woo-Moon rushed home. Then, after helping Dae-Woong during the peak hours of the restaurant, bringing in water, and cleaning the inn, he returned to Won-Myeong's footprints.

His training lasted until late at night, and he only stopped to eat something for dinner.

‘Good thing the moon is bright today!’

Woo-Moon repeatedly practiced the Divine Phantasm Step with increasing joy.

𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

He could now take five steps. There was still so much left to be practiced that he couldn’t see the end of it, but he was happy with his progress.

‘If I keep practicing one step at a time, I'll be able to learn everything.’

The moon was only crescent-shaped tonight, but he could see his surroundings perfectly anyway, although that only made him think that the night was unusually bright. Immersed in the Divine Phantasm Step training, he didn’t even think about looking at the moon.

Originally, he was planning to go home after training for three or four hours, but he lost track of time due to how focused he was on practicing his footwork, remembering the old Daoist’s movements, and repeatedly saying the sutra.

"Just an hour more!"

As a result, the thing that interrupted his training was the village bell, which rang to let people know that it was five in the morning.

'Oh, damn! I didn't sleep a wink...’

Song Woo-Moon hurried home and went to bed, but woke up in less than two hours and came down to the inn. His eyes were red and bloodshot, and he was sleepy and tired, but after working hard on helping with the chores in the inn, he practiced the Divine Phantasm Step again until it was dark.

On the second day, the joy of practicing the Divine Phantasm Step mesmerized him once more, and he only returned to his senses when he heard the sound of the five o’clock bell.

"Oh, shit! Time went by so fast again!”

Woo-Moon felt bad, thinking that he would be suffering due to lack of sleep. Returning to his room and lying down, he realized what he had been neglecting.

"Ah."

Now that he thought of it, he realized that he hadn’t cultivated his qi at all. Thinking that he wouldn’t get much sleep anyway even if he went to bed now, he decided to skip it altogether.

"Yeah, I’d rather not sleep. Waking up can be a pain,” Woo-Moon murmured, and began to cultivate according to the Forbidden Divine Art.

About an hour later, he opened his eyes. At that moment, he felt a very strange sensation. He wasn't sleepy, and he wasn't that tired either, even though he hadn’t slept a wink. If anything, he felt as if he had slept a couple of hours and woken up.

“This is good. I should cultivate more when I lack sleep."

Since there was still some time left before dawn, Woo-Moon decided to do a couple of body exercises, which he had also started two days ago. Of course, he didn’t use his qi for these.

First, he did pushups.

He had stopped at around two hundred yesterday, and he had been unable to do more. Now, however, he had gone over three hundred, and he could still keep going. He only stopped when he was near four hundred.

His number of push-ups had nearly doubled in just a day because of his newly improved muscles. Not only had his muscle strength increased greatly due to the partial metamorphosis he had gone through, but their quality itself had changed, resulting in a faster increase in raw power compared to others doing the same exercise. Moreover, his blood vessels and bones had also changed. Essentially, the quality of the soil had become better, which in turn resulted in higher crop yield.

On that day, Woo-Moon practiced his footwork in his spare time, in between-helping out at the inn. After a busy lunchtime, he went to where Night Spear Devil Gyeong Hong had killed the Four Evil Bandits the other day.

‘Since it’s such a remote place, I'm sure those things are still...’

"There they are!"

Song Woo-Moon rushed to get the sabers lying next to the Four Evil Bandits’ corpses. There were four sabers, but they had all been split in half by one move from Gyeong Hong. Picking them up, Woo-Moon headed to the small blacksmith shop at the village entrance.

"Hello, anyone here?"

Woo-Moon entered the shop with the Four Evil Bandits’ broken weapons.

Mr. Choo, the blacksmith, stopped working on the sickle he was making and looked at Woo-Moon. He had a strong, muscular build and gave off a stubborn air.

"You're the son of the Song family, aren’t you? What brings you here?" He wiped the sweat off his face.

"I'd like to buy a sword. I don't have any money, but I can trade these for one."

Mr. Choo felt that something was strange.

‘Hmm? Come to think of it, wasn’t this guy...’

Indeed, not too long ago, Woo-Moon had been wandering around grinning like an idiot. However, that was no longer the case.

On the other hand, Mr. Choo wasn’t really the kind to pay much attention to others. He wasn’t really curious or surprised at how Woo-Moon had stopped being a fool. Rather, he was more interested in the broken blades that the kid was holding.

"Well, let me see them.”

Woo-Moon put the weapons down on the counter, and Mr. Choo's eyes shone as he examined them.

"These are very well-made. It’s a good metal too, so it’ll still be valuable even if I melt it down."

"Really? That's great. Then I'll buy a sword in exchange."

"Why?"

With a shrug, Woo-Moon voiced out the excuse he had prepared in advance.

"The world’s becoming a mess lately, and there are a lot of evil men out there. I decided to buy a sword and carry it with me so that I can take care of myself.”

These days, it was common for even a merchant to carry a sword. Simple farmers in the countryside didn’t have swords, but even they had bamboo spears or clubs at home. Therefore, Woo-Moon's reasoning didn’t sound strange.

"I'm sorry. We don't sell weapons here."

Since it was a blacksmith shop, Woo-Moon thought that they would have a few swords, which was why he was shocked to find out that there weren’t any. The bigger problem was that this was the only blacksmith shop in town.

"So, can you make a sword instead with these blades?"

"No, I don't make weapons,” Mr. Choo flatly refused.

It was a promise he had made to himself after witnessing a sword he had made with plenty of effort become a tool that killed countless people in the hands of a brutal killer.

As he got older, he realized that it was the person, not the sword, that caused so much death, but he couldn’t break his oath.

Woo-Moon was also facing a terrible dilemma of his own. He wanted to have a sword, but he obviously couldn’t force the bladesmith to make him one.

‘What do I do?’

The next moment, he had a wild idea.

"Okay. Then teach me how to forge instead and let me use your tools. I’ll give you these blades as payment."

Mr. Choo shook his head. "No. What makes you think it’s that easy to smith a sword? I'll just pay for these blades with silver taels. When you get the time to go to a nearby town, you can buy a sword there."

However, Woo-Moon shook his head stubbornly. "No, I don’t want money. I just want my sword. If you can't make it, at least teach me.”

"No.”

"Please teach me."

'This guy...'

Not bothering to listen to him, Woo-Moon insisted on what he wanted, which annoyed Mr. Choo.

"Alright, go ahead. I won’t lose anything anyway.”

The blacksmith shop wasn't that busy, since it only made agricultural tools used by the locals, which meant teaching Woo-Moon wouldn’t be that difficult. It was also quite clear that Woo-Moon wouldn’t give up and would hold out for a month in the blacksmith's shop at this rate.

"You can start by manning the bellows."

Working the bellows was the most basic of the basics in blacksmithing. Heating and softening the metal would always be the first step in forging anything, whether it was a piece of agricultural equipment or a weapon.

As Woo-Moon walked toward the forge, Mr. Choo called someone over. "Min-Sang, teach him how to use the bellows.”

A young man about two years younger than Woo-Moon approached with a frown. It was Choo Min-Sang, Mr. Choo’s only son.

"Hey, why are you bothering us? Do you think blacksmithing is that easy?"

It wasn't a particularly pleasant tone. However, Woo-Moon didn’t care about it. He was just thrilled that he was getting the opportunity to make a sword himself.

"How do I use the bellows?”

"What, you think you can? Just give up and stop bothering me."

Hearing his son’s words, Mr. Choo immediately scolded him. "Min-Sang! Be more respectful when talking to someone older than you. Just teach him how to do it. I already gave him permission!"

"Phew! Fine, fine, whatever. You there, watch me. Hold this lever, push and pull, and it’ll blow air into the forge. You have to make sure to keep the fire under control so it only goes where the metal needs to be heated, and make sure the temperature doesn’t drop. Do you understand?”

Min-Sang’s words were blunt, but his explanation was simple and understandable. That made Woo-Moon realize that Min-Sang was more meticulous and responsible than he had first thought.

When Woo-Moon grabbed the bellows’ handle with one hand, Min-Sang tried to say he should do it with both hands, but then he stopped.

‘I don't think this guy knows how hard it is to work the bellows, but I guess he’ll find out. To attempt this with one hand...'

In fact, it wasn’t like Woo-Moon was a scrawny kid or anything like that. It was just that Mr. Choo and Min-Sang's muscles had become truly massive because of their profession.

Slowly, Woo-Moon began to move the bellows.