Survival Guide for the Reincarnated - Chapter 24

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 24

The first case would be when someone is obsessed with something.

When there’s something they’re so absorbed in that they don’t even notice Yang Seol-jin devouring Snow Palace from the bottom up.

And the second case would be.

When they’re being threatened.

If there was something that made it impossible for Seol Jung-cheon to move, both as a man and as the Palace Lord of Snow Palace.

That would explain what happened in my previous life.

Woon-hwi wasn’t a fool, so it wasn’t that he hadn’t investigated.

But the more he investigated, the more incomprehensible Seol Jung-cheon’s actions became.

Even with erased records, even with the few stories he’d heard from Yang Seol-jin in his previous life.

Unresolved questions remained.

And now, playing Go, he felt it.

It wasn’t that he was being threatened by someone.

It was the first case mentioned earlier.

Seol Jung-cheon was currently deeply absorbed in something.

“Father.”

“…Speak.”

“One can lose sight of reality while chasing illusions.”

Silence flowed. Seol Jung-cheon looked at his White Stones. The stones scattered here and there seemed to have lost their center, just like his heart.

“The ancient sages said that Go is life itself. Sometimes one must make the choice to lose one territory to save the whole.”

Seol Jung-cheon’s expression deepened. He hadn’t expected his son, especially the illegitimate one he had least expectations for, to convey such profound insight.

“As Father well knows, life is like Go—even in calm flows, unexpected storms can rage. But mistakes can turn into blessings in disguise, and a single choice can change the entire flow.”

Woon-hwi’s Black Stone was placed on the board.

“Just like this Black Stone.”

Woon-hwi’s single move completely changed the flow of the game.

Victory or defeat was no longer of any concern.

Seol Jung-cheon read the meaning of the stone Woon-hwi had placed.

The sincerity contained in his son’s words.

And the strong will to correct what had been lost.

Silence continued for a while.

Woon-hwi didn’t pick up a stone, and neither did Seol Jung-cheon.

There was no reason to.

It was over.

A difference of five and a half points.

It wasn’t a large difference, but its meaning was by no means light.

Who was Seol Jung-cheon?

The person who played Go best on Snow Mountain.

“Shall we continue?”

No.

No.

The person who ‘used to’ play Go best on Snow Mountain.

“I lost. I did.”

“No. You did not lose.”

It was then that Seol Jung-cheon tilted his head.

“I did not face my complete father today. Today, we simply shared our hearts.”

A smile formed on Seol Jung-cheon’s lips.

Could someone be this mature?

And.

“How could I deny a loss?”

The eyes of the two men crossed in the air.

“Today, this father lost. It was such a clean defeat that I don’t want to argue.”

Seol Jung-cheon.

He was a man who knew how to accept results.

Woon-hwi slowly rose from his seat.

“Next time I come, I’d like to read Father’s deeper heart.”

“I too will read your deep heart then.”

Woon-hwi smiled slightly.

“You have already read it.”

Woon-hwi had shown everything without hiding.

His heart toward his father.

His heart caring for Snow Palace.

All of it contained not even a trace of falsehood.

* * *

Seol Jung-cheon watched Woon-hwi returning to Seol-ap.

Though it was a far distance, for a man of Seol Jung-cheon’s caliber, it was very close.

Woon-hwi didn’t look back.

He just walked looking straight ahead, and before long disappeared from Seol Jung-cheon’s sight.

Even so, for a while, Seol Jung-cheon continued to gaze at that spot.

His youngest son’s change was difficult to explain theoretically.

It wasn’t a simple personality change. Everything had just changed.

Especially his appearance when playing Go.

Each stone, each move was extraordinary.

Ordinary people would have evaluated it as that of a master who had rolled and rolled in Murim for decades or more, but Seol Jung-cheon was different.

He saw through it.

Woon-hwi’s skill wasn’t that of a simple old master, but of someone who had somehow stood in ‘heaven.’

It was amazing.

It was also true that he had been careless. It had already been ten years since he couldn’t ascend from the edge of Great Void Formless to Primordial Sole Existence.

He had wandered searching for his own solution, and in doing so, had neglected Snow Palace’s affairs.

‘That’ would be the perfect answer to ascending to Primordial Sole Existence, he had thought.

There was no room for excuses.

Woon-hwi had made him realize it.

Not to waste time.

To come to his senses.

His son’s change had surpassed an amazing level.

Even so, he didn’t ask for reasons.

Because it was fine.

Even if he used Demonic Arts, even if he ate people alive.

Seol Jung-cheon could understand all of it.

No, he could embrace it.

Because he was his son.

It wasn’t something like a sore finger or anything like that.

Seol Woon-hwi was Seol Jung-cheon’s son.

Even if the entire world pointed fingers, he was someone who could definitely be a source of strength, and someone who should be a source of strength.

That is what a father is.

He had never failed to give his heart to Woon-hwi.

He always gave it.

He simply didn’t express it directly.

That was right.

If he hadn’t done so, cracks would have formed in the massive organization called Snow Palace.

Seol Jung-cheon the Palace Lord, Seol Jung-cheon the father.

Between these two, he found the best path.

As a martial artist, and as a father.

It was 18 years ago.

Seol Jung-cheon, who had remained at the realm of Dao Transformation Authority Truth, prepared for his journey to ascend to Great Void Formless.

He had always lived only in Snow Palace.

By changing his environment, he sought to gain new experiences and the enlightenment that would come from them.

The period he initially thought of wasn’t long.

Just a couple of months at most.

But after entering a slash-and-burn village, everything changed.

What began as an escape gradually became something more as Seol Jung-cheon opened his heart as a human being.

The woman named I-ryeong was, truly speaking, the woman Seol Jung-cheon loved most among all the women he had met in his life.

And so a child came to be in I-ryeong’s womb.

At that time, Seol Jung-cheon revealed his identity and everything about himself, and he should have brought I-ryeong to Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace then.

No, perhaps he should have brought her even before that.

Seol Jung-cheon, who had returned to his quarters, picked up the pile of documents on his desk.

There, it was written like this:

–

Records of Broad Blood Vessel Constitution

First Record: I-ryeong

Manifestation Level: Supreme

Symptoms: Severe consumption, extreme weakness

Result: Death after childbirth

Characteristics: First recorded holder of broad blood vessels as a commoner, not a martial artist

–

Second Record: Baek Cheon-woo

Manifestation Period: 300 years before I-ryeong’s death

Manifestation Level: Supreme

Affiliation: Heavenly Sea Gate

Symptoms and Results:

Extreme weakness until age 14

Practiced Violent Sea Heart Method.

Yang Gwang I Hyeon at age 20.

Three Flowers Gathering at the Crown at age 21.

Death from blood vessel explosion at age 22.

Characteristics: First case to prove the potential of broad blood vessels

–

Third Record: Sword Emperor Jin Mu-heun

Manifestation Period: 120 years before I-ryeong’s death

Manifestation Level: Medium

Affiliation: Wanderer

Symptoms and Results: Congenital weakness, delayed growth

Highest rank 22 in Martial World Ranking.

Found murdered near Heavenly Mountain.

–

This was both an effort not to repeat past mistakes and a record of guilt.

Broad Blood Vessel Constitution.

That was the name of the terminal condition I-ryeong suffered from.

Seol Jung-cheon truly wanted to save her.

However, there was something that even the internal energy capable of shaking the world could not do, and that was the natural order.

If he injected powerful internal energy, the fetus would die.

If he injected weak internal energy, I-ryeong would die.

Regardless of the strength of the internal energy, one of the two would inevitably die.

From the moment he intervened, if I-ryeong were to die, the fetus would die too, and if the fetus were to die, I-ryeong would also die from the aftermath.

He could not go against this natural order.

Though I said earlier that he should have brought I-ryeong to Snow Palace, sadly, even if he had brought her, he wouldn’t have been able to save her.

That’s what Broad Blood Vessel Constitution is like.

I-ryeong said this at that time.

Please save the child.

Smiling, she asked him to take good care of the child, to watch over him, and to I-ryeong who said such things, Seol Jung-cheon promised he would do so.

For over several decades, Seol Jung-cheon, who hadn’t cried even when his father died, wept for the first time that day.

He agonized.

Whether he should give this to Woon-hwi or not.

Woon-hwi’s broad blood vessels were about six times that of an ordinary person.

I-ryeong, recorded as supreme, was about nine times, and the Sword Emperor, recorded as medium, was about three times.

As one could see from the records alone, broad blood vessels were a terminal condition that was almost like a blessing for martial artists.

The internal space of the blood vessels was abnormally wide, increasing the flow of energy, and when circulating energy, they could circulate a far superior amount compared to ordinary martial artists.

In childhood, the symptoms of weakness would be severe, but after beginning to learn martial arts, those symptoms of weakness would disappear.

He hoped things would go well.

He hoped he would become mature.

He hoped he would realize things on his own.

Maintaining the middle path is always difficult.

Still, he didn’t give up.

He wanted to support every path that Woon-hwi wished to walk.

The world is harsh. Already, countless people target him simply for being of Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace bloodline.

He had to realize it himself. No one should tell him.

If that happened, he would surely become a hothouse flower and die a miserable death.

Murim is absolutely not a beautiful world like a fairy tale.

It’s cruel, reeking of blood everywhere you go, bound by grudges where people kill and are killed by each other—a living hell.

He put the documents down as they were.

On the lips of Seol Jung-cheon looking out the window hung an incredibly gentle smile.

If someone else had seen Seol Jung-cheon’s smile, they would have been greatly surprised.

He was a person with almost no change in expression.

He didn’t even show a smile to those who came back with excellent achievements.

He didn’t smile even when Dae Seol-rin and Cha Seol-rin ascended to Harmony Realm.

“…How fortunate.”

That was the smile of a father, not a martial artist.

Slowly, the smile disappeared from his lips.

“Vice Palace Lord.”

At his words, the Vice Palace Lord who had been waiting outside promptly responded.

“Yes, Palace Lord.”

“Was it indeed Poison Snake Valley’s doing?”

“…Yes. It was correct.”

“Prisoners?”

“None. They all committed suicide.”

There was much to do.

I was thinking of formally raising the issue with Poison Snake Valley, but that was secondary.

There was no telling when something called Ice Snow Erosion Poison would be completed.

The research data might already be accumulated.

Even if not now, it could definitely be created someday.

Then I had to prepare for it.

I needed to research new cultivation methods that could protect not only Ice Snow Energy, but also the energy of Ten Thousand Year Snow Mountain.

That came first.

After establishing defensive measures, whether to annihilate Poison Snake Valley or start a war with Origin Blood Sect.

I could resolve those matters then.

I had given Woon-hwi several gifts, but it wasn’t enough.

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