The Lightning I Harbor Is Too Strong - Chapter 26

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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 26
After all five monks had examined the Wooden Tablet, Jeong Ishin began his account.
From the moment he opened his eyes in Muzeo Gap, to the moment his feet touched the soil of Joongyeon’s Martial World.
“So you were all alive……”
“There was such a hidden history in the Samdo Jeon I Jin.”
“Demonic wind. Was that truly the cause of the incident at Dae Hyeop Gorge?”
“Ha! A forest in Muzeo Gap? A sword carved from those trees?”
From fifteen years old until nineteen.
Until five became one.
“……That’s how I met Deok Myung in that living tomb, and that’s when I learned it. A hundred years had passed since the Samdo Jeon I Jin was activated.”
Deok Myung let out a soft murmur of astonishment.
“No wonder you seemed oddly devoid of common sense.”
“……”
“Oh, don’t misunderstand, Ishin. That’s not what I meant.”
Deok Gwang, the Long Corridor Keeper, shoved Deok Myung aside and spoke.
“You’ve returned home well.”
Nahan Jeonju, Dae Ryeok Geumgang Do, and the Abbot all wore the same expression.
“You’ve come home.”
Home.
Only then did the last thread of unease that had clung to his heart dissolve.
After that, the monks’ primary topic of discussion was the traitor Jegal Gicheon.
“A truly vicious and treacherous scheme. How could such a thing be done?”
“The righteous Martial World was deceived. They revered a false idol. The name of Oecheon has been defiled.”
“Since he is already gone, we cannot punish him, and so frustration mounts.”
“Now that the truth is revealed……”
Even the monks’ opinions were divided.
Jegal Gicheon’s impact on the Martial World appeared substantial.
It was as expected.
Jeong Ishin himself did not believe that name could be cast down immediately.
“As for Jegal Gicheon…… I plan to find a way gradually. I must also visit the Namgung Clan and the Sacheon Tang Clan.”
“Hmm……”
“And truthfully, there’s a far greater problem than a Jegal Gicheon already dead.”
To be frank.
Jeong Ishin had expected someone to bring this up before he did.
“As I mentioned, I clearly sensed the Heavenly Demon’s aura before crossing the boundary.”
Why was no one bringing it up?
“He must have crossed over as well.”
There had been much to learn through his exchange with Bangsijung.
And among those revelations, there was something that surprised him no less than the distortion in time.
It was the absence of the Heavenly Demon.
“I’ve heard that no new Heavenly Demon has appeared since the Jeongma Great War.”
Deok Hyun nodded.
“It’s true. Even after their defeat in the Jeongma Great War, the Demonic Cult did not cease their schemes. But all of it amounted to nothing more than petty movements. And that was precisely because there was no Heavenly Demon.”
The Demonic Cult. The Heavenly Demon Divine Sect.
A collective where everything is carried out by the will of their lord, the Heavenly Demon.
A chill ran through Jeong Ishin’s body at the sudden thought.
“Could it be…… they believed the Heavenly Demon was alive all this time? For a hundred years?”
“Not all of them, perhaps, but there are certainly those who do. For they have their Divine Maiden.”
“If the Heavenly Demon has returned……”
Another Jeongma Great War might unfold.
All of them understood the words Jeong Ishin had swallowed.
“The entire Joongyeon Martial World is keeping a close watch on any stirring of the Demonic Cult.”
“It is a miracle in itself that the history of the vanquished remains.”
“All efforts are being made to ensure such a calamity does not occur a second time.”
“Though the vanguard of those efforts may need to be reconsidered.”
The monks’ voices, each adding a word in turn, carried unmistakable enmity toward the Demonic Cult.
Yet even this was not the response Jeong Ishin had anticipated.
Their reaction to something more fundamental—the very root of why they had lost the Jeongma Great War—seemed peculiar.
“There are records. It says he was the greatest master of his age.”
“There are no shortage of records calling him supreme across all eras. It is no common epithet. I wonder just how formidable his Martial Prowess truly was.”
It was obvious at a glance.
These monks did not regard the Heavenly Demon as any great threat.
Jeong Ishin grew urgent.
He had witnessed the Heavenly Demon’s Martial Prowess through Dang Mujeong’s martial discipline.
He knew the power of a being who could not be placed on the same plane as ordinary men.
Only he understood this.
At last, Jeong Ishin set aside courtesy and spoke.
“It’s different. The Heavenly Demon is different. ……O, how can I explain this…….”
He was scratching his head, searching for words that wouldn’t come.
“……but……?”
The sound that emerged from his throat spread slowly through his lips.
Everything around him began to lose momentum.
It seemed to approach an infinite stillness.
‘What is this? My mind is still working properly, isn’t it?’
Even as the question formed, a single thread of wind touched that bewildered mind.
Though it should have carried no physical force, there came a sound—Thunk!
His head snapped back, his body tumbling backward.
He was falling.
Shrieeeeeek!
“……!”
He plunged through the thick mist.
The sensation of falling was unmistakable.
Cliffs rushed past on either side.
Jeong Ishin’s mouth opened by instinct.
“Muzeo Gap?”
“Correct.”
“……Elder?!”
Musang was falling beside him.
What in the name of—
“It is no jest.”
“Ah!”
“When I didn’t know how to explain, I took action instead.”
The Divine Sea Wandering Dream.
It was likely the same Upper Dantian technique that Dang Mujeong had employed.
And indeed, the scene Jeong Ishin had witnessed before repeated itself.
Above, the Heavenly Demon looked down at him.
An overwhelming dominion.
The form of a black demon shimmered and writhed.
A sword strike descended as if the night sky itself were collapsing.
The moment darkness swallowed everything, wind blew once more.
The darkness receded like a snuffed candle—Whoosh!
“…….”
Five monks came into view.
All of them gazed down at him with expressions of concern.
Musang behind them turned to regard him with an enigmatic look before turning away.
He left with only a casual remark.
“At that level…… there is nothing to worry about.”
“……!”
O Seo, who had leapt up, returned to Jeong Ishin’s arms.
Once Musang had left the room, Deok Myung smiled awkwardly and spoke.
“It seems the Patriarch has done something.”
“……Yes, it appears he examined my memories.”
“I see.”
At that, not only Deok Myung but all the monks exclaimed in wonder.
Of course, Jeong Ishin was most astonished of all.
His heart pounded as though it might burst from his chest.
Musang’s parting words had been simple. There was no need to puzzle over their meaning.
‘To defeat that Heavenly Demon?’
He already knew that Musang was a being of a different order entirely.
He was something that approached not as human but as nature itself.
The martial techniques Dang Mujeong had deployed with all his careful preparations were nothing compared to what Jeong Ishin had unfolded without moving a single hand.
“Indeed…… you are truly remarkable.”
Now I understood why the monks had shown no disturbance at the mention of the Heavenly Demon.
But Deok Hyun gently corrected Jeong Ishin’s words with a soft smile.
“Of course, the Great Patriarch surpasses us all. He is the one who restored Shaolin to glory. But what we admired, Ishin, was you.”
“Me…… ?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Behind Deok Hyun’s faint smile, Deok Myung continued with a deeply moved expression.
“Ishin. A martial technique that touches the Divine—one that reaches the mind—can only be deployed if its target places absolute faith in the one who performs it.”
“Absolute faith?”
“Yes. No matter how vast the difference in realm, one cannot simply gaze into another’s Upper Dantian at will.”
“That means…….”
I trusted Musang completely and entirely.
‘…… But why?’
Was there something wrong with trusting family?
It was a mystery.
Then Deok Hyun tapped the back of Jeong Ishin’s hand and spoke.
“Because you genuinely regard us as family, I shall do the same.”
“Shaolin has always been that way to me.”
“Your gratitude touches us deeply. It is thanks to the Great Patriarch’s care that Shaolin endures.”
And so the five monks, their eyes shining with such tenderness, withdrew.
Jeong Ishin’s life at Shaolin had begun.
* * *
For all its bold beginnings, life at Shaolin proved not so different from life at Baekun Hermitage.
I never left Baekun Hermitage, Musang’s dwelling.
Jeong Ishin had asked to be regarded not as a disciple of the Great Patriarch, but as his grandson.
It was both genuine and a solemn vow.
Even the Abbot, Deok Hyun, respected that intention.
In truth, from Shaolin’s perspective, accepting Jeong Ishin as the successor of the Great Patriarch’s lineage was only reasonable.
The Yeogeun Sesu Sutra stood at the very foundation of Shaolin’s martial teachings, and Jeong Ishin was its sole heir.
Yet proceeding thus would create no small number of complications.
“Your very existence becomes the problem.”
“My existence? That might hurt a little.”
“Nonsense seems to grow by the day.”
Musang, now regarding Jeong Ishin much as he might address the elder monks of the Deokcja generation, explained.
“We cannot make your existence coherent.”
It was a matter of generational rank.
Musang’s wavering gesture carved characters into the courtyard ground.
Gong-Deok-Beom-Mu-Hye.
The first character, Gong, referred to the Great Patriarch.
“Wait—then you, Master Musang, would be…….”
“The Great Patriarch. …… When he participated in the Jeongma Great War, I was but a child not yet ten years old.”
“…….”
Jeong Ishin grasped the meaning of those words at once.
A hundred years.
He had been shocked by that number all along, but it had never felt real.
This was natural. He had not lived through that span of time himself.
There was merely a rift in time caused by crossing a tear in space.
Yet there was someone who had lived through that expanse.
“A hundred years…….”
The weight of such a distant age made his head throb.
‘Wait. If the Abbot is of the Deokcja generation now…….’
Mu-Hye-Gong-Deok-Beom.
Musang before his eyes stood so far apart from the current Abbot and the senior monks that the Great Patriarch’s rank was scarcely visible at all.
Musang spoke.
“If you take refuge in the Buddha’s teachings and become the successor of the Great Patriarch, you will assume the rank of Deokcja generation.”
The same Deokcja generation as the current Abbot.
Only five ranks above.
“If you wish it, they would call you Elder. You would become the first rank in Shaolin, nay, the first rank in all the Martial World.”
“No! No!”
Now I understood why Deok Hyun had smiled so broadly when asked to be treated as Gongheon’s grandson.
* * *
“Ha. To hear myself called venerable by the Abbot—truly dizzying.”
“…I was genuinely startled.”
“The Head Monk is searching earnestly for a solution, so bear with the monotony a while longer, won’t you?”
Every single day, monks would visit him.
Always at least one of the five.
Jeong Ishin shook his head at Deok Myung’s words.
“I’m not bored at all. You speak with me like this, and looking down from such a height at the vast emptiness below… I could never tire of it.”
The temple halls arrayed below seemed like a single painted scroll.
Shaolin, woven together with verdant greenery, was beautiful in its own right.
Fallen leaves were beginning to drift down, and he wondered what the landscape would be like at the height of autumn.
Deok Myung, however, interpreted that serene expression differently.
He patted Jeong Ishin’s shoulder in consolation.
“Muzeo Gap. You spent years in that hell where none are said to return alive—is it any wonder that any landscape seems beautiful? Truly pitiable and admirable all at once.”
“Ah…”
“So then, Ishin. If you’re inclined, would you care to see Dalma Won?”
“Pardon?”
“It’s a most lively place. Many children your age there.”
“But didn’t the Head Monk say just now he was searching for a solution…?”
“Ah, come now!”
As he tilted his head doubtfully at Deok Myung’s assurance that a brief visit was acceptable, he saw someone bounding down the steep slope at a run.
It was Deok Gwang, the Keeper of the Sutras.
“Deok Myung! Where’ve you been? Trying to seduce our successor Keeper of the Sutras again!”
“What!? Who dares pin such a horrible position on me!”
The Keeper of the Sutras and the Abbot of Dalma Won seemed to be on very poor terms.
From what he’d heard, they were supposed to work together and oversee the entirety of Shaolin’s martial philosophy.
To Jeong Ishin’s eye, they looked like they’d be tearing out each other’s hair if they had any.
Fortunately, the quarrel didn’t last long.
Or rather, the quarrel itself lasted, but the spectacle of it was brief.
“Quiet.”
Musang, who had appeared beside Jeong Ishin without warning, swept his hand through the air.
The two men never noticed Musang’s arrival, nor did they perceive their own bodies moving.
Only when they slid down and came to rest on the downslope below Baekun Hermitage did the pair flinch in surprise.
“Go.”
At Musang’s curt command, they had no choice but to turn and leave.
With just the two of them remaining in the courtyard, Musang spoke.
“I’ve found what I owed you these past days.”
“…Yes?”
“I passed the secret formulae of the Yeogeun Sesu Sutra to the Head Monk.”
“Ah, that was only natural of course…”
“I am the same as you.”
“…”
While Jeong Ishin stood speechless, blinking, Musang let out a soft laugh and settled onto a rock.
“I found no martial technique that would satisfy you. I even considered creating something new, but I lacked confidence you’d be pleased with it.”
“That’s not it at all. How could I ever—”
“Enough. What martial technique would I teach to a warrior who has mastered the Yeogeun Sesu Sutra?”
Musang continued calmly.
“So I examined you, and examined you again, until I discovered something utterly absurd.”
“Absurd…a fact?”
“Yes.”
Musang asked with the tone of one genuinely unable to comprehend.
“Why is your Qi Perception the way it is?”
“…Yes?”
The lightning I harbor is too fierce.
Author |
Woo Sanyou
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(주) Samyang C&C

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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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