I Obtained Guan Yu's Martial Arts - Chapter 64

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Acquired Guan Yu’s Martial Arts — Episode 64
Karma — Part 4
Where there is light, darkness always dwells in its shadow.
In the places beyond the reach of the Celestial Dynasty Five Houses—those who wielded imperial authority and martial prowess—glittered the forces of the Black Path, formidable and numerous.
The Black Path Five Forests.
Among the countless underworld factions scattered across the Central Plains, these five sects were deemed to hold power comparable to the Celestial Dynasty Five Houses themselves.
The Black Shadow Sect—masters of assassination.
The Ten Thousand Poison Sect—dealers in toxins and venom.
The Ghost Spirit Sect—practitioners of sorcery and mysticism.
The Blood Tear Sect—adherents of heterodox arts.
The Lower Filth Sect—keepers of secrets and information.
It was to one of these that Cho Ryang had journeyed.
A sect of assassins who had honed their skills solely for the art of killing.
The very place where the Killing King Baek Hoon—who had ascended to the pinnacle of martial prowess with his blade of death—held the title of Sect Master.
The assassins of this sect were said to specialize in the execution of martial masters.
Cho Ryang had commissioned the Black Shadow Sect to eliminate Guan Hui.
“Are you insane?!”
Cho Seol, who had been shrieking, covered her mouth with her hand.
“You’ve lost your mind. How could a warrior of the Righteous Path ever resort to such underworld filth…!”
“Be silent, Cho Seol.”
Cho Ryang fixed his sister with eyes that glimmered with murderous intent.
The eyes that had once brimmed with mischief and brilliance were no longer there.
In their place dwelt only the ugly emotions of vengeance and inferiority.
“When I fought to uphold the dignity of the Five Dragons and Three Peaks, you did nothing. So don’t come whining to me now.”
“That was a duel you chose to fight, brother. Was I supposed to throw myself into a one-on-one match?”
The logic was absurd.
Had Cho Seol intervened, the name of the Hwa Jong Sect would truly have been dragged through the mud.
Interfering in another’s duel was an ugly violation of the very code of Jianghu itself.
“I’m not speaking only of that moment. There were countless times you could have helped me. But what did you do?”
Cho Ryang stepped forward, exuding a chilling murderous aura, and seized her jaw roughly.
“All you did was stand by and watch.”
Crack!—
Cho Seol wrenched herself free from her brother’s grip and drew her inner energy from her core.
“You chose your own path, brother. I warned you countless times not to do this.”
“…Yes. You did.”
Cho Ryang, regarding his sister as one might an enemy, reached down and caressed his sword hilt.
From the movement of his hand, it seemed he was deliberating whether to cut her down.
“So keep flapping your mouth as you do now. I’ll kill anyone who has brought shame to the Hwa Jong Sect with my own hands.”
“…Shame.”
Cho Seol turned the word over in her mind again and again.
Who truly had brought disgrace upon the Hwa Jong Sect?
No matter how deeply she considered it, the answer was not Guan Hui.
The guilty one stood before her.
“That’s right.”
Cho Seol gazed at her reflection in the mirror and lowered her head.
She had thought it was only her brother’s fault.
But looking back now, that was not true.
Could there truly have been no way to stop him?
Had there not been an opportunity to prevent things from coming to this pass?
“It’s my fault. I should have stopped my brother long ago.”
“It’s too late now. There’s nothing you can do at this point.”
“No. It’s not too late yet.”
Shing—
Cho Seol drew her blade from her waist.
The scarlet silk threads of the pommel drifted through the air.
“I will stop him.”
“Kuhaha. Amusing. You dare challenge your own brother?”
Cho Ryang drew back his lips in a sneer.
His bloodshot eyes entered Cho Seol’s field of vision.
Crimson irises and blood vessels standing rigid around the sun acupoint.
All symbols of the Heart Demon.
“Right. Now that I think of it, I haven’t yet punished that woman for merely standing by and watching.”
Shing—
Cho Ryang drew his blade.
The black sword he’d purchased from an assassin of the Black Shadow Sect radiated a sinister aura with palpable force.
“Come. I’ll let you have the first move.”
Instead of answering, Cho Seol assumed a fighting stance.
Her sword hand extended forward in a straight line, while her opposite palm drew back toward her chest.
It was the opening posture of the Plum Blossom Sword, the supreme martial art of the Hwa Jong Sect.
“I won’t inflict serious harm.”
Thud—
Cho Seol burst from the inn’s foundation, channeling her inner force into the blade as she moved.
The guests already in the inn sensed the dangerous aura and fled in all directions.
Confirming that no innocent bystanders remained, she unleashed her techniques without restraint.
Whoosh—
A warm, gentle Righteous Way energy gathered along the sword’s edge, and rose-tinted sword light bloomed forth.
The sight resembled plum blossoms unfurling across a branch.
The first move. Plum Blossom Butterfly Dance.
As butterflies flutter among petals, the blade-formed petals danced like butterflies in midair.
A flashy feint that mesmerizes the eye, concealing a lethal strike that steals life in a single breath.
Yet Cho Ryang merely laughed in derision.
Clang!—
He deflected her technique lightly with the flat of his blade, then drove his heel toward her abdomen.
“Fool. You think such empty tricks would work against someone of my lineage?”
The Empty and Real technique proves especially potent against opponents encountering it for the first time, but against those who have pierced through its secret, it holds no meaning.
Without the feint, there remains only crude sword strikes.
“How dare you raise your blade against your own brother.”
Cho Ryang kicked toward her abdomen once more, then stopped before her fallen form.
“One leg will serve as your punishment. Until this is finished, stay down and silent.”
Cho Ryang smiled like a madman, then brought his raised knee crashing down, grinding her ankle beneath his foot.
Crack—
The sickening crunch of shattering bone filled the inn.
In an instant, Cho Seol’s foot twisted grotesquely,
“Aaaaahhhh!”
Unable to bear the terrible agony, a scream tore from her lips.
“Brother… please…”
Even through the pain, she gasped for words.
Even amid such agony, she sought to stop her brother from treading the path of darkness.
“…It’s too late.”
“Guan Yu is… innocent.”
“Silence!”
For a moment, Cho Ryang’s eyes seemed to clear, only to glaze over again with madness.
“The Black Shadow Sect always fulfills a contract once accepted—there is no stopping this. So be quiet and watch.”
Cho Ryang murmured to himself, as if swearing an oath.
“Once that man’s head falls, everything will return to as it was.”
* * *
After Cho Ryang departed.
Cho Seol handed the innkeeper a silver coin to cover the damages, then limped outside.
Those who saw her hobbling gait turned to stare.
A woman whose beauty earned her the title of “Fairest North of the River” now walked with her ankle grotesquely twisted.
The men hesitated whether to offer aid, but the sword at her waist kept them from approaching.
Yet ironically, this afforded Cho Seol an unobstructed path to her destination.
Without the ceaseless advances that normally plagued her.
“…Ugh.”
Wincing at the pain, her steps came to a halt.
She had arrived at a stable—a place where horses could be bought, sold, or boarded.
“Welcome, young lady. How may I serve you?”
Seeing the proprietor with a rough cloth wrapped around his head, Cho Seol spoke urgently.
“I need a horse. I must reach the Guan Family Estate in Yun City at once…”
“What? Did you say the Guan Family Estate?”
One of the guests watching the horse’s condition swept his gaze over her with a puzzled expression.
The middle-aged man wore an oiled silk robe and sported a weasel-like beard—Ji Dairen, the merchant master of the Yun City Merchant Guild and the foremost landowner in Yun City.
“Who are you that you’re heading to the Guan Family Estate…… Wait. Are you perhaps the Plum Blossom Cho Seol?”
“……Yes, that’s right.”
“No. Why would Miss Cho be coming to the Guan Clan in such a state…… No, this is not the time for such questions.”
Ji Dairen’s eye for detail, honed by a lifetime in commerce, was remarkably sharp.
Sensing that something was amiss, he waved her forward rather than waste time with questions.
“This way. I have my carriage here—we can go together in it.”
“……Thank you.”
Cho Seol hesitated for a moment, then nodded and followed him.
Under normal circumstances, she would have felt reluctant to follow a strange man, but not now.
Given the gravity of the situation, she could not afford such reservations.
She had to reach Guan Hui and warn him before the Black Shadow Sect carried out the assassination.
“Come now! Let us make haste. To the Guan Family Estate!”
“Yes! Master Ji. Yah!”
The driver, reading the urgency in Ji Dairen’s face, spurred the horse on.
The carriage, drawn by two black stallions, hurried out of Jenan toward Yun City.
And four days passed.
“I truly cannot thank you enough.”
As she stepped down from the carriage, she bowed respectfully to Ji Dairen.
The bandage he had provided was wrapped around her ankle.
Ji Dairen, who had once worked as a courier, also knew something of the physician’s art.
“I have imposed upon your kindness in so many ways. Because of me, you could not attend to your own affairs.”
Originally, Ji Dairen had planned to complete his transactions in Jenan and then head to Henan.
Instead, he had changed course and made directly for Yun City—all because of Cho Seol.
“It is nothing. For the sake of the Guan Clan, such a thing is only natural.”
Ji Dairen waved his hand dismissively.
The true reason he had ridden his fine horses to exhaustion and come all this way was not for Cho Seol, but for Guan Hui.
“Go now, please. I have other matters to attend to.”
“……Thank you, Master Ji.”
Bowing once more in gratitude, she turned and approached the grand estate.
A magnificent manor bearing the inscription “Guan Clan Family”.
Standing before it, she clenched her fists lightly.
‘I have to do this.’
Some would call it betrayal, others would say she abandoned her own blood.
Whatever judgment fell upon her, it would taint her name with disgrace.
If she thought selfishly, remaining silent now might be the wisest course.
But Cho Seol could not do that.
‘The Sage teaches: When Righteousness Calls, Do Not Defer.’
The Analects say that in the practice of Righteousness, one does not yield even to one’s teacher.
Until now, bound by the love of blood, she had been unable to stop it—but before a greater tragedy unfolded, she had to act.
There was only one way for her and her kin to atone for their sin.
‘I must set it right.’
Cho Seol’s Plum Blossom Sword held the principle of the Righteous Way within it.
Before she carried a blade as a warrior, she carried the cultivation of a seeker of the Way.
So it was right that she should walk the path she deemed correct.
With her resolve hardened, she took a heavy step forward and called out.
“I have come to see the Family Head. It is urgent.”
* * *
The moment Cho Seol sat in the reception hall, she gathered her composure and confessed everything honestly.
From how the Cho siblings came to Yun City, to how Cho Ryang had commissioned the Black Shadow Sect.
Having laid bare everything with sincerity, she bowed her head, acknowledging her own responsibility in not stopping them sooner.
“…….”
“…….”
After hearing her full account, Guan Hui and General Manager Guan Nantian exchanged glances.
A question hung in their eyes—what should be done?
“Hmm.”
The general manager, losing the silent contest, finally spoke.
“Miss Cho, I have one thing I wish to ask. Why have you come all this way to inform us of this?”
Guan Hui’s gaze turned toward Cho Seol.
Guan Hui was equally curious.
Why had Cho Seol taken the Guan Family Estate’s side, even at the cost of becoming enemies with her own blood relative, Cho Ryang?
Why had she dragged her injured leg all this way to lay bare her own fault?
“Righteousness is what is correct, and honor is what is just.”
Cho Seol adjusted her posture with quiet grace, her gaze turning toward the Guan Clan’s Family Head and the steward.
Her eyes shone with a clarity like that of a mountain lake at dawn.
“A martial artist who walks the Righteous Way must simply do what ought to be done.”
“……!”
The steward’s pupils trembled visibly at her words.
The Family Head’s words from moments before rose unbidden in his mind.
—For me, the world divides not into black and white, but into righteousness and wrong. I wish to walk the path of the Righteous Path, steward.
It was a singular thing indeed.
The young woman before him was now speaking the very words the Family Head had spoken then.
The steward glanced at Guan Hui, then looked back to Cho Seol.
Now that he studied her closely, he saw that her cheeks had flushed slightly as she spoke of Guan Hui.
The steward, observing this intently, slapped his thigh with his palm—Smack!
‘I’ve found the lady of the house!’
“I’ve found the lady of the house!”
“……?”
“……!?”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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