Return of the God of War - Chapter 51

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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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Episode 51. I Shall Become Your Aquarium
The battle had ended.
A ghastly field of carnage, reeking of blood.
Among corpses so mangled that one could not tell who from whom.
Leaving behind a wasteland like purgatory, Cheon Hwarin gazed out toward an unnamed lake shore.
“Whose memory weighs on you so, Hwarin?”
Muk Yeojin’s voice reached her from behind.
At the sound, her gaze slowly turned.
The eyes are windows to the heart.
In that instant, what flickered across hers was longing.
“…There’s this foolish friend of mine.”
It was unexpected.
She who never spoke of personal matters had, for the first time, laid bare her heart.
Muk Yeojin dropped down beside Cheon Hwarin with a thud.
“A friend of yours, is it? How intriguing. What manner of person were they?”
“Frustrating, dull, utterly without romance—selfish through and through.”
“If you could see that friend again, what would you most wish to do?”
Muk Yeojin continued asking about one already departed for a reason—he carried the same ache in his own heart.
And he knew that if such a gnawing pain remained locked inside, it would fester and burst.
Wounds of the heart rot from within.
Only by voicing them, however much it hurts, can one truly heal.
“If I could see my mother again… I would wish to travel with her. And you?”
Cheon Hwarin pondered for a long moment before speaking quietly.
“Simply… to sit face to face and share a meal.”
After waiting for the poison to drain from her heart,
Muk Yeojin applied salve to that wound.
“Hah, that won’t be easy, will it? With that murderous gaze of yours fixed on them, do you truly think the rice will go down smoothly? And your friend—”
Thwack!
“Oof!”
Muk Yeojin crashed flat onto the ground.
A squeal like that of a trampled frog erupted from him, her fist landing squarely on his crown.
Cheon Hwarin watched him writhe, clutching his head, and let out a soft laugh.
This man who wouldn’t flinch even with bones crushed to powder—surely he suffered through such dramatics only to ease her mood. She understood it well.
It was then that Cheon Hwarin could finally decide the matter she had been weighing.
‘Yes. You are the one.’
Cheon Hwarin grasped the White Lotus Jade Token and rose slowly.
Then she spoke words without apparent meaning.
“After that first failure, I thought one must never chase two hares at once. I devoted myself solely to growing stronger. But seeing things now, I was wrong about that too.”
Muk Yeojin, rubbing his head with both hands, looked up at her.
“What nonsense is this suddenly?”
But Cheon Hwarin simply said what she had come to say and turned sharply away.
“Yeojin, you must chase not two hares, but three, four—all of them. You are more than capable of it.”
With only those words left behind, Cheon Hwarin departed from the lake shore.
Muk Yeojin watched her receding figure, and no matter how long he pondered, her meaning eluded him.
* * *
It was a memory he had forgotten.
Only now could he grasp the meaning of what she had said then.
‘Come to think of it, Hwarin revealed quite openly at that time that she was a Returner.’
Soon after, Jeom Soi brought out the noodles Cheon Hwarin had ordered.
“Eat.”
Without hesitation, she slurped them down.
Gwi Young, standing awkwardly by, reluctantly pulled her bamboo hat down just enough to conceal her face and ate her noodles.
After a time, having finished even the broth, Cheon Hwarin drained the wine Bu Yeon had poured for her and rose from her seat.
“I’ve eaten and drunk well. I shall settle the bill another time.”
“There is no need. Since we’ve crossed paths, let us at least exchange names. I am Bu Yeon, steward of a modest trading house in Guangdong.”
Then Cheon Hwarin glanced sidelong at Muk Yeojin.
“As for my name, ask your master.”
She turned to leave, when Muk Yeojin’s voice called out to the departing pair.
“I am no master—merely a friend of Bu Yeon’s.”
Cheon Hwarin turned her head back to regard Muk Yeojin.
“The son of the Sado Cheonju and a mere merchant are friends?”
Muk Yeojin lifted a shoulder with a shrug.
“Why not? If one sets one’s mind to it, what’s the difference between merchant or beggar—or even a guard, for that matter? Couldn’t we be friends with any of them?”
……
Cheon Hwarin looked back and forth between Muk Yeojin and Bu Yeon.
Then she turned and walked out of the inn.
Gwi Young cast a brief glance at Muk Yeojin before following her out.
The moment both women vanished from sight, Bu Yeon asked with a puzzled expression.
“Did you know that man from before, Lord Muk?”
“You could say that, yes.”
“Something about him didn’t seem ordinary—who is he?”
Muk Yeojin laughed quietly and spoke.
“Tell your children about this one day, won’t you? Say that their father, in his youth, once poured wine for a Sub-Sect Leader of the Demon Cult.”
Bu Yeon’s eyes widened in shock.
“That handsome man was a Sub-Sect Leader of the Demon Cult? Cheon Hwarin?”
“That’s right.”
Bu Yeon sighed.
“Why didn’t you mention that beforehand?”
“Why? Were you planning to invite him to view flowers behind the hill?”
Muk Yeojin spoke in jest, but Bu Yeon’s answer defied expectation.
“Flowers? Don’t be ridiculous! I just had an enormous fortune sitting right here! Just thinking about it, so many opportunities come to mind that could benefit the company—ah, what a waste. What a terrible waste.”
Seemingly genuinely regretful, Bu Yeon drained his cup several times in quick succession.
Muk Yeojin watched this display with an amused expression and let out a laugh.
To regard a Sub-Sect Leader of the Demon Cult as a business opportunity.
He couldn’t help but think he’d chosen an excellent chief steward.
“Come now—let’s forget the fortune that walked away and look forward to the one that will come. Who knows? Perhaps your own destined encounter awaits just around the corner.”
And so the drinking continued until the early hours of dawn.
But aside from the occasional martial artist who recognized Muk Yeojin and offered a greeting, no other fortune came calling.
Perhaps the last encounter had been so enormous that all the smaller fortunes had fled in terror.
* * *
After parting with Bu Yeon.
Muk Yeojin sought out Pi Yangcheon instead of returning to his quarters.
Despite Nangung Yeongryeong’s objections, he had rented a small cottage away from Sword Palace.
“Master, your disciple is here!”
Though it was still early dawn with mist clinging to the air, Pi Yangcheon was already awake.
Upon seeing Muk Yeojin, he frowned.
“Have you been drinking?”
Hisssss!
In an instant, the pungent smell of alcohol vapor dissipated from Muk Yeojin’s body.
His flushed face returned to its natural color at once.
“I had been, but now I haven’t.”
Pi Yangcheon’s expression grew incredulous.
“What brings you here at this hour? Training isn’t for another four days.”
Since becoming Pi Yangcheon’s disciple, Muk Yeojin had been receiving consistent instruction from him.
However, the training sessions occurred only once a week.
Though one might think it too lenient.
Pi Yangcheon’s training was of such intensity that even Muk Yeojin would gasp for air.
For Muk Yeojin it meant merely a week’s rest; for anyone else, a single session would require a month of bed-bound recovery.
“I came because I have something to give you.”
Muk Yeojin drew a small wooden box from his sleeve.
“What is it?”
“Open it and see.”
As he opened the box, the interior of the cottage was suddenly enveloped in a fragrant aroma.
“It is West Lake Dragon Well Tea—the finest grade, so rare that even the imperial court seldom procures it. You met my friend at a banquet some time ago, remember? I went to considerable effort to obtain it through his connections.”
“Spare the preamble. Why are you giving this to me?”
“You’re fond of tea, after all.”
The man had once flared up in anger over wine being served in a teacup, so naturally he must care for tea.
Pi Yangcheon’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“You know I’m not asking that. What scheme are you plotting now?”
It seemed Pi Yangcheon had suffered at Muk Yeojin’s hands before, for he questioned everything with suspicion.
But.
“This time, I harbor no hidden intention. It is simply a gift for someone dear to me, born from a pure heart.”
Pi Yangcheon’s eyes widened at words he had never expected to hear.
The West Lake Dragon Well Tea he’d received by chance was indeed the finest grade he himself had seldom laid eyes upon.
Though his expression betrayed a flash of genuine gratification, he answered gruffly, as if determined to mask it.
“Just as I thought—still green behind the ears, you don’t know a thing. You don’t feed a fish you’ve already caught. If you want to become a great man, you think about catching new fish and filling your aquarium.”
“I don’t see it that way.”
“What?”
“If you catch a fish and give it neither food nor attention, it will die quietly before anyone notices. Then your carefully tended aquarium becomes a tomb. So I will keep feeding them. But more than that—when one grows large enough to outgrow its home, I will ask it: Is this aquarium too small for you? If it says yes, I will release it into the sea.”
“And what if one day not a single fish remains in your aquarium?”
“Then would that not be the greatest joy of all?”
“…Why?”
Muk Yeojin’s eyes grew grave in that moment.
“Because by then, that boundless ocean would have become my aquarium.”
“…!”
Pi Yangcheon trembled visibly.
What ocean did this man speak of?
It could be Sadocheon itself, or all of Zhongyuan, or perhaps everything under heaven beyond.
Arrogance. Idle dreaming.
He should have scoffed—yet Pi Yangcheon could not.
Something shimmered in Muk Yeojin’s eyes, and it reached him across the space between them.
Yearning and desolation both.
Pi Yangcheon found himself genuinely curious.
What, in heaven’s name, drove him?
What force animated this boy, barely a man, with such burning purpose?
Yet whatever the answer might be.
Muk Yeojin’s gaze kindled something in the old swordmaster’s chest—a spark that had been fading slowly, year by year, into ash.
And then Muk Yeojin spoke once more.
“So you need not sit still as a captive fish, Master. The door of this aquarium will always stand open. Do as your heart guides you.”
Pi Yangcheon understood then.
His disciple had come today for the sole purpose of uttering those final words.
‘I’ve raised myself a truly remarkable apprentice.’
He swallowed hard the urge to parade this beloved disciple through town and sing his praises to all who would listen.
Then, slowly, he drew the White Moon Sword.
“Insolent brat—how dare you lecture me? Draw your blade. Let your master teach you some manners, boy.”
Days later.
Pi Yangcheon, having made his choice, turned his feet toward an early morning destination.
It was to Hye Rangyeong’s quarters.

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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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