Lord Jang dreams a dream reminiscent of Zhuangzi’s tale. The distant past unfolded in his mind like the fluttering wings of a butterfly—dreamlike and hazy, drenched in the scent of tree bark. In the center of that dream stood Wonjeok, the Myung Clan monk who had shaved his head clean. It was a dream so vivid that even now, in the present, it brought anguish.

“Jang Sam-bong...”

The name echoed from deep within a dense forest. A voice softly muttering the name of Wudang’s founder. The rustling leaves seemed to answer it, gentle and whispering.

A middle-aged beauty with deep green hair stood there. Her sharp eyes, like the pointed tips of leaves, stood out. At a glance, she seemed gentle, but a closer look revealed a sharpness to her nature—giving her an air of mystery. She was the one who led the Myung people into the Central Plains, uniting them with the Han. The chief of her clan.

It was Yeon, the young Grand Empress Dowager, in her prime.

In this rare moment, her lips trembled with sorrow.

“We part ways here.”

Her voice was as sharp and decisive as a blade, even though the words were directed toward none other than the Martial God of Mount Wudang.

“Your natural form... you've mastered the Northern martial arts. You’ve dug so deeply into the Natural Sword that it would be hard for anyone to surpass you.”

The old Taoist chuckled. His wrinkled face seemed to carry every emotion under heaven. An old pine-patterned sword hilt was tucked into his dusty gray sash, and his expression was as rich as a child weaving a garland of flowers.

“It was nothing but petty pride.”

Yeon shook her head.

“You extended great kindness so that our clan would not be shunned. Thus, we are no longer foreigners. Go back. We will forever honor you as a benefactor.”

Even as only her lips moved, her entire presence seemed to ripple like a violent storm.

The battle-ready aura she emitted was immeasurable, beyond even Wonjeok’s century of wall-facing meditation and his mastery of the Three States Mirror.

Jang Sam-bong laughed.

“The pupil surpasses the master. There’s no longer any need for me to teach the arts of the Central Plains. You may descend the mountain.”

He was as familiar as a Taoist priest from a tiny village shrine, yet carried the extreme essence of worldly experience.

Anyone of the Myung Clan would have sensed it immediately.

He was too human—so much so that he no longer seemed human.

As if no matter the situation, he would always remain true to human nature.

Wonjeok, who had cherished his century of wall-facing meditation, could only chant inwardly in the vivid, dreamlike, Daoist vision:

Amitabha.

He realized it was Cheonhamok who had trapped him in this dream.

It repeated endlessly, as if to shatter and dissolve his spirit.

Now faded and polished with time, it was an ancient memory permitted only to the Myung people.

Wonjeok stood beside Yeon. At that time, although no longer a Shaolin disciple, he had long since renounced the world. Yeon had built a small temple nearby, appointing Wonjeok as the clan’s protector, instructing him to compete for the title of Bukmyeong Gwonhu among the clan’s best.

“If you sense a True Person crossing into this place, immediately advance using the Forward Step. Both of you.”

Yeon spoke.

It was an order to Wonjeok and to a young man of the Myung Clan with hair the color of soft tree bark—who would later be called Geumbyeokja, another guardian.

“But even so, a frontal charge is a bit...”

“......”

“The clan leader has changed too. I guess ruling a nation does that to you. It’s kind of humiliating.”

The youth muttered.

It was the time when rumors spread that the greatest master of all ages had descended from Mount Wudang.

When Dalma was hailed as the greatest of all ages for inventing the Tendon-Altering Sutra, and when the First Heavenly Demon made the world laugh, the Myung Sect's Wumak was considered the strongest.

It was an era when a single Martial God could pacify the world.

Joint attacks were not disgraceful.

Far beyond Yeon’s shoulder, who stood in Jang Sam-bong’s way, hidden deep within the lush forest, was Cheonhamok—still just a sapling.

“Since I have not come to fight...”

Jang Sam-bong’s lips moved.

“With just one Step on the Clouds, I could pass you by. But I wish to secure a single promise. And I have something else to do as well.”

“You broke into the heart of our clan just for a mere promise? Taking Cheonhamok as hostage?”

At Yeon’s flat question, Jang Sam-bong smiled faintly.

“I admit it was an unrefined threat.”

At that moment, green wisps of vapor whirled from Yeon’s fingertips.

Visible strands of wind rose along her arms.

It was a sign of the manifestation of the Formless Sword.

Wonjeok knew that sword—refined by the King of Wind's explosive force—had once shattered even the mad arts of the Dark Heaven Emperor.

‘If he had stepped one inch closer, his head would’ve been cut off. He disappeared in the blink of an eye.’

That strange spell, "Yogeo Sam-bong"—Go, Sam-bong—had been whispered since the founding of the Ming dynasty.

Everything was Jang Sam-bong.

Even here.

“I did not choose my clan, but I chose my master...”

Step.

Suddenly, the Geumbyeokja moved close to the old Taoist, standing before Yeon as if in confrontation.

He shifted their formation like flowing water.

“No matter what, I cannot betray my master. I spent more than a decade chasing after you, begging for teachings. Isn’t that right, Elder Sam-bong?”

“...You have thought long enough. It’s time to acknowledge it.”

Swoosh.

The wrinkled hand was placed atop Geumbyeokja’s crown.

Did he think it was just a pat?

The smiling youth’s eyes suddenly turned a brilliant gold.

Golden smoke seeped from his stiffened lips.

Rumble!

The sound of the Governing Vessel and Conception Vessel opening roared like thunder from Geumbyeokja’s head.

Within that deafening roar, the aged voice blended in:

“At last, I accept you as my disciple. Forgive me. But the price of having me as your master is not small.”

“......!”

“Cheonhamok will grow into a great tree. The Wood Qi must flow through your Baihui acupoint. You must see to the end of that tree.”

Geumbyeokja ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) did not answer.

He merely trembled as if struck by lightning.

It was a sudden and shocking event—one that struck Wonjeok with awe and confusion every time he recalled it.

Jang Sam-bong, who had traversed the Central Plains and the Northern lands, had suffered countless betrayals but had never harmed others first.

Except once.

That day, he was less than human.

He was divine.

With a single gesture, he pierced through all the acupoints of a young genius, transforming him into a master.

He spoke only incomprehensible words and acted impulsively.

As if facing all the long-postponed matters of a dying man.

“My head once refused to distinguish between Heaven and Earth, which made my youth very dark. But you are different. You will not die young. However...”

Jang Sam-bong spoke.

“Your youth will be dark in another way.”

In a flash.

Just as Geumbyeokja’s hair turned golden, Yeon was already standing to Jang Sam-bong’s left. She released a silent thought like a storm.

[Is it my day to die? You strike first.]

Thunk—

Her reaching hand was slapped away by the sole of a leather shoe, bouncing off with a thud.

A shockwave burst at the impact point, carving faint ripples through the air.

In an instant, the ground in a ninety-zhang radius collapsed like a crater.

It was a footwork technique: Ma Gwang-gyeol’s Step, the signature move before even the founding of the Divine Sword Corps.

Kwaaaaang!

A beat later, an ear-splitting explosion.

Within the dense cloud of dust, like the smoke of cannons, Yeon’s thought burst out, filled with wrath.

[Moon Wind...!]

“What’s going on?”

Through the gaps in the dust, flashes of ear-like blades, severed and sharp, occasionally shimmered. Evidence of the mixed-blood Myung clan.

The old man, who had been the shortest-serving Divine Sword Corps Leader among all the past generations, was standing crookedly.

"Old folks, acting with no dignity at all."

His speech, and even his tone, was as casual and bumbling as an old gossip on the street.

Jang Sambong looked as if he had seen an old neighborhood thug and grimaced.

"Why have you followed me?"

"Because it's hard to tear our budding young one's eyes away from you. Isn't merely witnessing the world's greatest expert like taking an elixir?"

"That's greed, pure greed."

"If, after raising an exceptionally bright child from the age of five or six, you still say that, then I'll take your words as golden law and listen respectfully. You, who don't even have children."

The old man, destined to become the first Divine Sword Corps Leader, spoke. He wore a shabby pink long robe that dragged to his feet, plain without any inscriptions. It was before the name Ipwang had even been born in the Central Plains.

At some point, Wi Yeon, gripping Geumbyeokja's scruff, spoke expressionlessly.

"Wolpung, child of a half-blooded clan. Though your bloodline is lowly, your sword talent was extraordinary, which is why you were entrusted to us. Yet here you are, defiling yourself without gratitude."

"Spare me the nonsense and step back first. Anyone who has adopted and raised a child would know—"

"Silence. I have nine children under my care."

"You really are a queen."

At that moment, a hazy mist clouded Wonjeok's vision.

Three masters had moved.

It wasn’t a speed that could be caught even with the vision of a young guardian, and even now, glimpsed in a dream, it was the same.

[With the Tianhamok on the line, no promises can be made. Wolpung has arrived, so matters have escalated. Go back now.]

"That would be difficult. Only now have I unraveled all the truths tied to the Tianhamok and the Gate."

[Sambong!]

Wi Yeon's figure twisted and vanished.

At the same time, the bluish grassland sprawled into a giant taiji pattern, rippling gently around Jang Sambong.

Maybe because of that.

Even though two transcendents had entered the domain of absolute swiftness, where mountains would collapse at the flick of a finger, there was no backlash.

No thunderous sounds, no trembling.

The surrounding terrain should have been completely upturned, and yet there was only nothingness.

Neither side's form could be seen.

Meanwhile, Wolpung’s violet robe fluttered here and there simultaneously.

"The kid is watching! Speak with words, damn it!"

Wonjeok, who had been supporting the now wide-eyed Geumbyeokja, suddenly lowered his head.

Sarak.

A small barefoot grazed the grass.

A girl, probably around fourteen or fifteen, was looking up at him.

Eyes greener than anything else under the heavens, shimmering like jeweled drops under the transparent sunlight.

'The Lord of Ipwang Fortress...!'

Wonjeok knew this was a world born from the heart demon of the Tianhamok.

Even so, every time he saw the young Lord of Ipwang Fortress, his heart stopped.

Every part of her was vividly real — her presence, her breath, her inner pulse, even her behavior.

And not just her.

It was always like this.

If Wonjeok acted differently from how things had truly happened, even Wolpung, Wi Yeon, and Jang Sambong would react accordingly.

The overwhelming spiritual power of the Tianhamok was recreating this slice of time in all its exactitude.

Through Wonjeok’s memories, the past world itself was being torn apart.

To uncover what exactly Jang Sambong had done on this day, what he had realized, and what he had intended.

'Reincarnation... again and again....'

Wonjeok was trapped in the endlessly repeating wheel of time. In a cycle of the past so suffocating that going mad would not have been surprising. That must be why, even with Wi Yeon and Geumbyeokja present at the Tianhamok’s core, it was still Wonjeok who had been chosen as the target.

Because those two were enormous pillars of the Tianhamok faction.

At that moment.

"This."

The young Lord of Ipwang Fortress slightly moved her lips.

"Won’t you accept it?"

Her speech, peculiar for one of such noble blood, was awkward but dignified. Without a word, Wonjeok accepted the octagonal lacquered lunchbox she handed him. It was something that had already happened dozens of times.

What use was the title of one of Shaolin’s Four Vajra Guardians?

He was dying within a heart demon, unable to endure the cycles of reincarnation.

And then.

"Who is that?"

A slender, pale finger pointed past Wonjeok’s shoulder. Something that had never happened before.

Snapping his head around like a gust of wind, Wonjeok’s face lit up.

"A practitioner of divine cultivation! How are you here...? I saw your facial structure! You’ve grown beyond recognition! No, what on earth...!"

In an instant, using the Diamond Immovable Body technique, Wonjeok closed the distance, scouring the dazzlingly handsome youth’s face in disbelief.

Then, like gripping precious threads, he grabbed both his shoulders firmly, fearing that the figure before him would dissipate like smoke.

Kwaak.

The violet robe wrinkled under his grip.

The sensation was real.

Wonjeok's eyes widened. His mouth opened, then closed. And slowly, as if shedding the long weight of loneliness, words poured out.

"...Come to think of it, your internal breathing was extraordinary even then. With that upper dantian divine qi, you could easily mimic the dream arts of the Dream Phantom Body."

Heh heh, uhahaha.

Empty laughter leaked out.

Before, it had been because of Jeong Yeon-shin’s divine power, but now, it was because of the sheer nobility and purity he felt.

"Yes, the Head Abbot sent you, didn’t  he? Unless your two dantian and meridians have completely collapsed like a wooden puppet, you must have deliberately activated only your upper dantian abilities to arrive here! For the sake of saving a worthless Myung clan half-breed like me, you braved this danger!"

Jeong Yeon-shin did not answer.