My Father Is the Number One Under Heaven - Chapter 49
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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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Chapter 49. I’ll Give You What You Want
From that day forward, Peng Dohwan began to secretly follow Yeo Unwhui, observing his every move.
But for all his grand intentions, there was little to report.
Yeo Unwhui’s daily routine proved simpler than expected.
When he had no pressing business, he spent most of his time with his family.
Peal of laughter.
“Yulie, walk slowly now. You might hurt yourself.”
Peng Dohwan watched from a distance as Yeo Unwhui strolled through the Garden with his family.
‘…Hmm. Cute, really quite cute.’
His gaze drifted, unbidden, to Yeo Unwhui’s daughter, Yulie.
Even for someone who ordinarily cared little for children, Yulie struck him as utterly delightful and charming.
The way her eyes crinkled when she smiled, the grace of her playful gestures—how endearing it all was.
Moreover, the young girl possessed such natural warmth that she greeted everyone she met, high and low alike, as she danced about; and Peng Dohwan could well understand how the Peng Clan servants’ faces lit up at her salutations.
Watching her now, he felt an unexpected longing to take a wife himself.
His eyes then shifted toward Peng Seoyeon.
He had childhood memories of playing often with Peng Seoyeon and her brother Peng Seojin, who were his age back then.
As they grew older, their closeness had faded naturally and their contact had ceased, yet there was no particular animosity between them.
She had always been upright, impartial in her dealings with others, and kind; and from childhood she and the exceptionally talented Peng Seojin had borne the high expectations of their house.
Peng Dohwan himself was talented enough, but even by his estimation, Peng Seoyeon and Peng Seojin stood apart.
So when he heard that Peng Seoyeon had one day caught the eye of some scholar and abandoned the family to leave, he was utterly astonished.
It had been entirely unexpected.
He had thought her incapable of such a thing even if the heavens split in two.
To say he wasn’t disappointed would be a lie.
And so when he learned recently that she had returned to the Peng Clan Estate with her husband and child, he had felt no particular joy at the news.
Yet seeing the family like this today, all together, stirred something warm in him, and the sight was pleasing.
Even this brief glimpse of them walking through the Garden made it clear.
How happy that family was, and how deeply they loved one another.
Even Peng Dohwan, who still scarcely understood what love truly meant, could feel it.
And yet—
“Wait. No, that’s not it. Come on.”
This wasn’t what he was supposed to be doing.
Focus. Get your head in the game.
Fortunately, he noticed Yeo Unwhui parting from his family and heading elsewhere to attend to his next task.
“Hmm?”
Yeo Unwhui arrived at the Training Ground, the most remote and sparsely populated corner of the Peng Clan Estate.
Peng Dohwan himself almost never came here.
Yet before long, the entire Baekrang-dae had assembled in this place.
‘What on earth are they gathering here for?’
Peng Dohwan found this deeply puzzling.
The reason the Estate’s martial warriors seldom used this location was that it lay too far from the warriors’ quarters, surrounded by nothing—a sparse and barren place compared to the other training grounds.
Consequently, without some special reason, hardly anyone came here.
Those who had recently begun service as warriors at the Peng Clan Estate often didn’t even know this place existed.
And yet—
‘What… what is that?’
Then he witnessed something incredible.
‘What am I even looking at right now?’
It was training. Group training of the Baekrang-dae.
But it was training so fearsome it could scarcely be called by that name.
“Graaaaaah!”
“Awwwww!”
“Yaaaarrgh!”
As the training commenced, every member of the Baekrang-dae began scaling the mountain at tremendous speed.
Later they descended through terrain nearly vertical, and then repeated the whole process again and again.
Remarkably, they weren’t practicing or refining any particular Martial Arts technique—they simply repeated this same exercise endlessly, day and night.
‘What in the world are they doing? Have they all lost their minds?’
Peng Dohwan muttered, utterly baffled.
It was pure madness, this was. Madness for no clear purpose!
Even an army facing imminent war wouldn’t train like this.
What could they possibly be striving for with such extreme measures?
And more than that—
“Ha… ha…”
What made it even more absurd was that Yeo Unwhui sat in the center of the Training Ground the entire time, leisurely sipping tea and reading a book.
It wasn’t even like he was trying to mock them. What was the point of all this?
Yet the members of Baekrang-dae seemed utterly unbothered by Yeo Unwhui’s conduct.
‘They’re enduring it? Those men?’
Even Gisoo and Gisang, the brothers with the most volatile temperaments in Baekrang-dae, and Dogyeong and Gutaesan, who were no better in that regard, gritted their teeth and focused solely on their training.
It was strange.
Peng Dohwan, who had spent most of his childhood in Baekrang-dae, knew better than anyone how rough and prideful these men were.
Yet as they gasped madly for breath and struggled as if dying, watching Yeo Unwhui casually sip tea and read a book as if mocking their suffering—they didn’t so much as flinch.
How could such a thing even make sense?
Peng Dohwan, who knew full well that these men would even talk back to the clan lord if they took issue with something, found the entire situation utterly incomprehensible.
No matter how high-ranking their opponent, if they disagreed, they’d charge in without hesitation. That was who they were.
The reason Baekrang-dae had been treated as a headache-inducing liability by the Peng Clan until recently was entirely because of their hopeless nature.
Had they possessed such patience from the start, they would never have been treated that way.
What on earth could have happened recently to change them all so completely?
“This is truly enough to make spirits weep, truly.”
To Peng Dohwan, it was nothing if not shocking, absurd, and utterly unbelievable.
In any case, that inexplicable mad training continued for half a day.
Though he couldn’t fathom how such a thing was even possible.
Snap.
That infernal training ended the moment Yeo Unwhui closed the book he’d been reading.
“Hmm. You’re all holding up better than I expected.”
Yeo Unwhui smiled faintly, observing each member of Baekrang-dae, nearly half-delirious from the ordeal.
“At any rate, you’ve worked hard. And should you ever wish to stop, just say so. I’ll grant your wish. But if you simply continue to carry out my orders faithfully, just as you have today, I swear I will give you what you desire. I promise you this.”
‘…What?’
At Yeo Unwhui’s words, Peng Dohwan’s expression twisted.
‘Give us what we desire? What does that even mean?’
There was clearly some agreement he hadn’t been made privy to.
And there was no way for him to learn what it was now.
Meanwhile, all the members of Baekrang-dae, who had been gasping as if on the verge of death from exhaustion, suddenly blazed with renewed fervor and replied loudly.
“Thank you for your hard work, Lord Unwhui!”
“We won’t give up! We’re not the type to know the meaning of surrender!”
“Ha ha ha! That’s the spirit.”
After such grueling training that drained every last drop of strength, they all laughed clearly and openly.
That sight, that smile—it unsettled Peng Dohwan in a way he couldn’t quite name.
‘What on earth is it? Why do they all have those expressions?’
Irritation surged up within him without warning or reason.
Damn it. Damn it. Damn it!
It was the members of Baekrang-dae who had suffered through the hellish training, yet curses were spilling from Peng Dohwan’s own mouth.
He was doing this because he felt wronged and indignant about what Yeo Unwhui had done to him days ago, and because he wanted to uncover the mystery of his identity—yet the more he pursued Yeo Unwhui, the dirtier his mood became.
It was as if he alone was being isolated and left behind.
He knew it made no sense.
But Baekrang-dae was the one he’d believed he understood better than anyone.
Yet now they felt impossibly distant.
They engaged in training whose purpose he didn’t understand, spoke in conversations he couldn’t follow, and laughed joyfully with expressions he’d never seen before.
As time passed, something like betrayal began to take root within him.
‘Damn it all!’
In any case, he found his own feelings in this situation to be utterly confusing and bewildering.
Then,
Hmm.
Yeo Unwhui caught a brief glance of Peng Dohwan watching him from afar and quietly smirked.
He’d known long ago that Peng Dohwan had been following him all day.
‘Such an impatient temperament…’
He must have been intensely curious. About several things, in fact.
Then why not just come and ask? It wasn’t as if he wouldn’t answer.
Still, he planned to leave him be for a while longer.
He was also curious to see what choice that one would ultimately make.
‘Well, that aside.’
In fact, there was a reason why Baekrang-dae was undergoing this training right now.
It was an obvious truth, but the vessel for Martial Arts was the body.
To hold superior martial arts, one needs a superior vessel—a superior body. For nearly everyone, this natural principle applies.
Of course, it is a commonplace truth.
But he was different.
Yeo Unwhui had inherited everything from the Martial God and undergone a Complete Rebirth, gaining a perfect vessel and a perfect body.
The finest body for the martial path belonged to Yeo Unwhui.
These men, however, were not the same.
Though most of them had trained in martial arts since childhood, reaching a stronger realm required bodies more refined than they currently possessed.
Thus, before Yeo Unwhui could teach the Baekrang-dae anything, he needed to widen and strengthen their vessels first.
For now, this was a kind of preliminary work toward that end.
He understood, of course. These men were no longer young, and each had grown so accustomed to their own fighting methods and martial arts that their foundations were firmly set.
To now refine their bodies—their vessels—into something more solid and spacious would normally be absurd.
But Yeo Unwhui did not see it that way.
His eyes perceived what others could not.
That potential for further growth and strength still remained in these men.
Simply learning superior martial arts techniques faster was not the answer.
Yeo Unwhui was certain that they would see true results only by first going through a process like this.
And so he had begun these demanding physical conditioning sessions.
Though they must surely feel as if they were dying.
Yet despite the grueling training’s end, the Baekrang-dae members did not collapse or sprawl across the floor.
They were enduring through sheer force of will.
They appeared to harbor no complaints whatsoever, following Yeo Unwhui’s words with the faith of stone.
“From here on, it’s autonomous training. Do whatever training you wish and rest well. We’ll continue this tomorrow.”
“Yes, Commander.”
No matter how exhausted they were, the Baekrang-dae’s response was flawless.
Yeo Unwhui, pleased, let out a short laugh, turned, and left the spot—and only then did the entire Baekrang-dae collapse onto the Training Ground floor as though they had made a pact.
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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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