Volcanic Age - Chapter 15

“It is as I had anticipated.”

Ju Seo Cheon’s eyes held the appearance of Yu Jong Mok.

Despite being considerably different from when he was performing the Fourteen Stances of the Plum Blossom Sword, Yu Jong Mok was still steadily doing the Five Elements Plum Blossom Sword Art. He was making sure that his apprentice could see easily while doing this. He decided to adopt larger stances when facing Ju Seo Cheon to increase his field of vision.

It would have been hard enough to execute the movements slowly but he was also considering his disciple.

But his consideration strangely stopped when the third stance of the Five Elements Plum Blossom Sword Art started.

A posture that couldn’t be grasped well came out.

It wasn’t because Yu Jong Mok got tired in the middle of it was troublesome. It was the opposite.

He had lost all awareness of his learner and was wholly absorbed in the Five Elements Plum Blossom Sword Art.

“My choices affect the future. I had no idea I would serve as master again.”

When Yu Jong Mok displayed his martial arts just now, Ju Seo Cheon saw something odd.

The five elements are out of equilibrium. Having eaten the Water Spirit Fruit, the water attribute has multiplied tremendously.”

With the help of the Water Spirit Fruit, he used its strength to stop his vessel from leaking.

He initially thought that was all there was to it, but it soon became apparent that there was more. Even though it was weak, its traces were still visible.

Before Yu Jong Mok revealed to him the Fourteen Stances of the Plum Blossom Sword, Ju Seo Cheon was unaware of this.

With all of his might, Yu Jong Mok created the sword qi, and soon he was able to sense water energy and frost energy emanating from it.

Ju Seo Cheon instructed him to use the Five Elements Plum Blossom Sword Art carefully because of this.

The Five Elements Plum Blossom Sword Art was a martial art containing the five elements, just like its name implied. It was just perfect to fix the unbalance of the five elements.

And having requested him to execute it slowly was to make him concentrate. He may be able to miss it because it was really minute.

“I didn’t know that one miraculous medicine would make it like this…”

He fixed his weak constitution which he thought was a chronic disease and that became a clue to increase his boundary.

 

While he was thinking, Yu Jong Mok executed the Five Elements Plum Blossom Sword Art until the last stance and then immediately began circulating his internal energy.

 

It was to absorb the insight he gained right now and increase his boundary.

 

Ju Seo Cheon stopped his breathing and stood guard to not obstruct Yu Jong Mok.

 

“The unbalance of the five elements is merely the trigger.”

 

The remains of the Water Spirit Fruit, it’s not that there was a lot of water energy either. Even if it was an unbalance, that level wasn’t serious at all.

 

It only complimented the minute parts, the frost energy stabilized even more and increased to the size of a fingernail.

 

Then what is Yu Jong Mok’s real insight?

 

“Rest.”

 

Yu Jong Mok was a diligent hard worker.

 

But that level of hard work was a bit excessive. It was to the point that he was called a blockhead.

It was the same even after he fell from being a candidate for the Plum Blossom Sword Examiner. 

 

He never stopped to rest his entire life and always continued to work hard.

 

Some of his fellow disciples got sick of his diligence.

 

This hard work was so excessive it was seen as an obsession. It didn’t matter no matter what anyone told him.

 

He had been diligent and worked hard his entire life and after entering Mount Hua Sect he had been tense all the time, never stopping to rest.

 

You could already see that by looking at the enhancement gymnastics.

 

Yu Jong Mok had just pushed himself too much.

 

“Ahh, there’s a need to let it go at times.”

 

The five elements were a cycle and a  natural flow.

 

Yu Jong Mok thought, pondered, and understood the consequences that would bring when he fixed the unbalance of the five elements.

 

He realized that sometimes he had to leave things to flow naturally like water after comprehending the cycle.

 

He would awaken and comprehend the wood energy, the five elements, and the cycle.

And he finally succeeded in overcoming that wall.

 

A long time passed and Yu Jong Mok finally opened his eyes.

The light in his eyes and the degree of his qi changed completely.

 

Leisure that couldn’t be seen before was now seen.

 

But his soft and comfortable smile remained the same. Now that leisure was added on top of that, he now looked like a wise man.

 

“It’s not me who is the one teaching but you. All of this is thanks to you.”

 

The first thing he said was words filled with a sweet voice.

Ju Seo Cheon yelled in a thrilling voice.

 

“Congratulations master!”

 

Ju Seo Cheon got sincerely happy.

 

Before returning in time he had only been luggage to his master. 

 

He was regretful as hell that he wasn’t able to see him on his deathbed.

 

Ju Seo Cheon didn’t feel comfortable as he felt like he had only been a weight to his master… so he felt happy that at least he was able to fix an old problem like this.

 

Ju Seo Cheon got thankful for his new life once again.

 

“Ho, so he reached Peak?”

 

Yu Jong Mok had reached the Peak. It didn’t take a day for that news to spread.

 

“Those are really happy events!”

 

There were many experts around the nine factions such as Mount Hua. It wasn’t called a great sect for anything.

 

Even if that was the case, they weren’t that numerous. Peak-level experts were treated as a precious force even in great sects.

 

And Yu Jong Mok became one of those pinnacle experts. It was enough to receive attention.

 

The fellow disciples of Yu Jong Mok went to meet him and congratulated him.

 

Ju Seo Cheon saw for the first time that there were so many visitors coming to their residence in all his life, including his current and previous ones.

 

“I believed that you would be able to do it someday. As expected of the Smiling Gentle Sword.”

 

“It’s not much but please take it.”

 

Yu Jong Mok’s influence wasn’t that wide. The ones he could call as close were merely five.

 

The number of people that visited him recently surpassed the hundred but most of them were people that wanted to form a connection with him.

 

It was an obvious thing but in Mount Hua Sect there weren’t only people belonging to that sect.

 

In the case of the inner disciples of high status, they would have servants to carry their buying and some escort knights.

 

Besides them, there were also clients, merchants, and all kinds of other people around them.

 

There were a considerable number of them having the objective of forming a connection with the disciples of the head temple.

 

No, precisely speaking almost all of the visitors had that thought.

 

This place was none other than the Mount Hua Sect, one of the nine factions. If they could establish a connection they would have gained one of the most reliable swords.

 

In the case of normal-sized sects, almost no one would be able to push them around them if they had a connection with a disciple of the Mount Hua Sect.

 

Put that in a bad way, it meant that they could exercise the connection to the Mount Hua Sect as an authority.

 

“Ugh, the master is so…”

 

Ju Seo Cheon let out a sigh inwardly.

 

He had learned how to rest but his upright nature was still the same.

‘He could just say that he is tired and no one would approach him anymore…’

 

Ju Seo Cheon was worried about him but Yu Jong Mok only smiled softly and faced the people.

 

But the fortunate thing is that his master knew how to differentiate between an honest and dishonest man so he wasn’t treated as a pushover or get into any sort of owing debt or favor

 

He showed great proficiency at not accepting gifts or accepting them at a moderate line.

 

* * * * * * * *

At the peak of Lotus Peak was the Shang Palace.

 

It was a structure that existed since the beginning of Mount Hua Sect and it hadn’t changed once throughout its long history.

 

They had called the best architects to structure it and a considerable amount of effort, time, and money were spent on maintaining it. That place was that important.

 

The landscape you could see of Mount Hua from Shang Temple was such a grand and beautiful sight that everyone would drop their jaws looking at it.

 

Its reputation was so amazing that elegant people would dream of it at least once.

 

Besides the scenery, the palace itself was also really incredible.

 

It was obvious as they had spent an astronomical amount of money by calling the best architects, even though that happened a long time ago.

 

Its perfect structure was one thing and its outer appearance was also outstanding.

 

They didn’t have the same power as the emperor so they made it look poorer than the golden palace but it was still one of the best structures in the Midlands.

 

“Yu Jong Mok, I knew he would be able to accomplish it.”

 

Inside the temple, an old man with a flashing white beard was sitting in front of the top seat and laughing in a good mood.

 

There were a hundred experts below this old man.

 

Those people were called the Hundred Experts. Most of them were composed of pinnacle experts and there were also some Transcendent Realm Experts among them.

 

Did that mean that the peak of Murim was the Hundred Experts?

No.

 

Some beings were above Transcendents and had surpassed the limits of humans and received awe and respect.

 

They were the Heavenly Ten Seats.

 

The Hundred Experts were always under the sky.

 

There is always someone flying above the one that was running.

There were ten absolute experts above the sky.

 

And they were called the Heavenly Ten Seats.

 

The old man that was sitting in the top seat was one of those people.

The Sword Master and wise man Woo il Moon.

 

The master of Mount Hua Sect!

 

“If it wasn’t for his weak constitution he would have already become a Plum Blossom Sword Examiner. it’s really regretful.”

 

Middle-aged men were sitting at the sides of Woo il Moon.

 

They were the aides of the leader of Mount Hua, the Five Elders that had the most authority after the leader.

 

“Hm, I heard that his weak constitution got better after he reached the pinnacle rank…”

 

“Oh.”

 

Woo il Moon showed interest.

 

Yu Jong Mok was a peak expert but he wasn’t considered a proper force until now. It was because of his weak constitution.

 

That wasn’t a bad thing. He had a good personality, was so hard working he was called a cold-blooded person and had quite the talent.

 

But he lacked endurance due to his weak constitution so he didn’t receive proper tasks.

 

“Hm, how about examining him once again?”

 

Yu Jong Mok’s treatment by Mount Hua Sect was akin to letting talent go to waste.

 

“A good choice.”

 

The future was altered once more.

 

After then, during a conference in the Shang Temple, Yu Jong Mok was brought up.

The leader and the Five Elders launched the assembly, which was formally and practically the best gathering that had a place on Mount Hua.

The issue of what to do with a pinnacle expert was sufficient to allow entry into the Shang Temple conference.

Then after roughly fifteen days.

Yu Jong Mok didn’t cough once after eating the Water Spirit Fruit for the next fifteen days following the conclusion of the meeting at the Shang Temple.

The main executives decided that Yu Jong Mok’s fragile constitution had fully recovered. They assigned him a new assignment and phoned him.

And in Kang Ho, that was manifesting itself.

I swear to God.

Something really unprecedented had happened.

After Ju Seo Cheon became Yu Jong Mok’s disciple, there has never been a time that he went out to Kang Ho besides friendly matters. He didn’t know how surprised he got after hearing that news.

“Ugh.”

He had to admit that he was uneasy.

If Yu Jong Mok showed up in Kang Ho, his future was doomed.

Even though Ju Seo Cheon was the person who foresaw events that would take place decades in the future, this does not indicate that he was fully informed.

The circumstances at hand were similar. He had never before experienced a future like this one.