Chapter 38: The Method Of Avoiding The Wind (2) (1/2)
Chapter 38: The method of avoiding the Wind (2)
Translator: hwarang
Editor: Kidyeon
I waited for her at the Guest Pavilion. Normally speaking, I would’ve gone to meet my father-in-law face-to-face in order to say my greetings, but I chose not do so today. Thirty minutes later, Song Hwa Rin arrived, with a perplexed expression on her face.
“You came here to meet me?”
She had a very nice aroma. She smelled like she’d just gotten out of the bath. When I saw her in spring, she’d looked like a blooming spring flower, but now she was akin to the fall sky.
“Shall we go for a stroll?”
After a moment of hesitation she nodded.
We headed towards the garden together. It was still early in the morning, thus there were hardly any people around.
“How’ve you been?”
She answered, “Training… lots of training. It’s been extremely repet.i.tive. What about you?”
“I’ve been training too.”
“I heard the news about you forming the lesser sword sect. I also heard that you took down a group of bandits?”
“We were just lucky.”
“Was that really the reason?”
It seems that she’s observing me. She seems to have finally accepted the fact that I’ve changed.
“Why did you act like you did? Did you really want to divorce me?”
In her shoes she probably could see it like that.
“It wasn’t that I was acting like that—I really was sc.u.m back then.”
“And you changed after getting beaten up by me?”
“Yes.”
“And you want me to believe that?”
“You have to. Because that’s the truth.”
She deeply sighed and said, “I really don’t know.”
“There’s also one thing that I really don’t know about”
“What?”
“Didn’t you say it before? That there was a reason that you hate the previous Mengju.”
She gave me a small grin. “Why? Are you that curious?”
“Yeah. I am that curious.”
“But why? You aren’t related to the previous Mengju, are you?”
It was hard to find the right answer. I almost said that I respected him, but I decided to give her an improvised answer. “No particular reason. You know, something like, ‘Once you become curious about something, you’ll really want to get to the bottom of it. If you don’t, you’ll just keep getting more curious.’”
She smiled. It was the first time she’d smiled in a long while. No, was it the first time she’d smiled?
The answer that I gave her was probably a better answer than something along the lines of just respecting the Mengju.
“So it’s not even that great of a reason. I should’ve told you sooner.”
“Well, you can tell me now.”
“There is a person that I really hate. That person, in turn, reveres the previous Mengju almost like a G.o.d. Since the person who I hate likes him so much, I came to dislike him. This is quite a stupid reason to dislike him, don’t you think?”
“Who’s it that you hate?”
Her face darkened. It seems that I’ve touched on a personal matter.
“Let’s stop here.”
“Alright. Thank you for telling me.”
“What’s there to be thankful for. Well, regardless, for what reason did you come to meet me today?”
Contrary to the light mood, I said something that was pretty heavy.
“I want to exchange pointers with you.”
“What?” Song Hwa Rin’s eye became round. I think this was the first time I’d seen her this surprised.
“Let’s spar for a round.”
She asked me with a questionable face, “Is this for real?”
“Yeah.”
“...And the reason?”
“Revenge for that day.”
Song Hwa Rin looked at me flabbergasted.
The last time that we’d parted ways, the last word she’d said to me were, ‘I don’t understand you’. However, considering the fact that I’d come to ask for an exchange of pointers, she was definitely confused.
“Really, I don’t…”
It seems that she was trying her best to figure me out. Well, it’s not like she’ll ever be able to.
After biting her lip, she agreed, “Alright, let’s do it.”
We stood face-to-face on the practice ground. Soo Ran was looking at the situation with a worried expression from far away.
“I don’t know what you’re up to, but since we’re exchanging pointers we should do it for real.”
“That’s what I wanted.”
“With real swords?”
I nodded, causing her to be surprised yet again. She’d just asked to get rid of the possibility, but I’d answered with a yes. With real swords, one wrong move could result in a major injury, or even death. On top of that, this was our first time facing off against one another, thus neither of us knew what sort of technique the other would use.
She was nervous. If it was the me from before, she definitely wouldn’t have agreed. However, she got the feeling that if it was the me of now, she could agree to it.
“Alright. Then... you can’t get too excited.”
Hearing her warn me, I nodded. “Alright.”
She slowly drew her blade.
I also slowly drew my blade and proceeded to approach her.
Stab!!!
She lightly stabbed her sword towards me. It was a variant of a probing move.
Tiing!!!
I easily parried.
Our swords clashed again.
Clang! Chang ! Clang!
It became an exchange of light blows, as there was no need for us to go all out right from the beginning.
It was as I’d expected: She was quite proficient with her skills. Her footwork was superb, while her basics were sharp. Her sword art also seemed extremely familiar. I got the feeling that her master was someone that I knew.
Clang! Chang ! Clang!
As we exchanged blows, I slowly raised the tempo.
She didn’t notice that I was the one in control of the fight. Considering the fact that she could get hurt, I made sure I controlled everything down to the finest detail. I pressured her, I was pressured, I made a risky attack, went back to tightly defending... this continued onwards.
Due to my extravegant planning, she was fully immersed in the fight and was swinging her sword madly. I pressured her to her limit. I didn’t give her any time to think about anything else. This was probably the first time that she’d experienced something like this.
Once I believed that she’d pa.s.sed her limits, I dodged her attack and swung at her neck.
She tried to block it, but was too late. “Ah!”