The World’s Greatest Junior Martial Brother - Chapter 3

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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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Cheonha Jeil Sajae (3)
The faster you need to go, the more you should take the long way around.
The boy took control of the entire hall in an instant!
Without a single slash of a blade or a single swing of a fist, Jin Muok subdued the two young men who had been acting like the arrogant brats of some noble martial household, using nothing but his presence.
Looking down at the trembling lips and the hook-shaped nose, Jin Muok ground his molars together.
“I won’t ask twice.”
The two young men nodded frantically, almost tripping over each other.
“Why did Baekri Unhak leave the sect and go back home?”
“H-how would someone like us in the training ranks know that, sir…?”
The lips hurriedly tacked on a respectful address. They were still half out of their minds from the shock a moment ago.
“H-he went down on his own two feet, on his own two feet. With him sick every single day, what sort of training or instruction could there possibly be, sir…?”
For a moment, Jin Muok’s head spun, and he gripped the table to steady himself.
Let me say it again: Baekri Unhak did not have the kind of martial bones that came with a Heavenly Martial Body, but that didn’t make him frail, either.
And if someone like that had been getting sick every day?
‘Something terrible has happened to Unhak’s body!’
I have to return to the sect at once. If it’s Baekri Unhak, he would surely have gone back there.
“Thank you for the meal, Gu Pa-pa.”
After giving Gu Pa-pa a proper bow, Jin Muok spun on his heel, and the hook-nosed one, as expected, opened his mouth.
“I, I am Peng Donghyeok of Lucheon in Hebei! Who the hell are you?”
Peng Donghyeok tried to pressure Jin Muok with the status of being a child of the Hebei Peng Clan. But he had picked the wrong man.
“If you’d resisted just now.”
Without so much as glancing back, Jin Muok added,
“It wouldn’t have ended with just you.”
He would have held the entire Hebei Peng Clan responsible!
Leaving behind a remark so chillingly arrogant, Jin Muok walked off, and a figure who had been watching the scene from afar narrowed deep, penetrating eyes.
“That boy?”
…No, that can’t be right.
* * *
If it were up to my wishes, I’d cover a thousand li in a single stride, but this frail body can barely manage ten li in a day and a half.
From Henan Province here to Sichuan Province, where my sect is located, it will take at least one month even if I hurry, and two months or more if I take it slow. It’s truly a grand journey.
On top of that, I’ve been reborn as a ten-year-old brat with not a single coin to my name.
I want to see Baekri Unhak right now, and the urge to make up for the mentoring I failed to give him ten years ago burns hot as a furnace, but physical distance is cruelly far.
If only I had some Inner Power right now.
“No. First, I need to adjust to this body.”
Surviving day by day through begging, I had only been dumped into the Jamnyong Market fifteen days ago as an orphan with no one in the world. Now, I must become one with this body: the Northern Storm Jin Muok.
Once he had made up his mind, Jin Muok sat cross-legged and examined every corner of his body.
“For a beggar, my condition is surprisingly good.”
Jin Muok swung his arms about, mildly startled. If it’s this good, being a beggar might not be so bad after all.
The most important thing: Inner Power.
“Nothing.”
Perhaps he had no affinity with the Gaebang, because there wasn’t a single speck of Inner Power in him.
“Well, that’s actually a relief.”
Whatever it is, it’s better to learn it even a single year sooner, whether it’s the civil or the martial arts.
Cultivating Inner Power in particular yields purer results when started at as young an age as possible. That is why the children of distinguished martial households begin circulating the Microcosmic Orbit by the time they are old enough to hold a spoon.
That is precisely why tradition is so formidable.
In his previous life, Jin Muok had been a fairly strong martial artist, but that strength came from forms and improvisation alone. Having only encountered martial arts at the late age of twenty-five, he had been rather unremarkable when it came to Inner Power.
But now, things are different.
If I operate the Bukcheon Sinmun’s cultivation method in this pure ten-year-old body, I should achieve tremendous results.
Surpassing the Northern Storm of my previous life!
That’s all well and good, but I must return to the sect as soon as possible and look after my disciple Unhak. If the Murim Alliance’s martial artists were telling the truth, Unhak’s body must have suffered a serious calamity.
Having fully confirmed his own condition, Jin Muok now faced the immediate problem.
“How do I get to Sichuan?”
There are two ways to travel from Henan to Sichuan.
“By land or by sea.”
Jin Muok folded his arms and lifted his eyes upward.
“The land route can cut the time short compared with waterways, but you have to cross the enormous barriers of the Qinling Mountains and the Daba Mountains.”
And besides that.
“Plank roads.”
Plank roads are artificial paths made by boring holes into sheer cliffs and fixing wooden supports into those holes.
In a word, crossing a thousand-foot drop by relying on a wooden plank is nothing less than a journey staked on one’s life.
“Waterways are comparatively safer than overland routes, but you have to brave the violent currents of the Yangtze Three Gorges, and the pace is sluggish.”
Two routes, each with its clear advantages and drawbacks.
Jin Muok weighed them for a moment, then coolly assessed his own circumstances.
“With a ten-year-old’s body and not a shred of inner power, crossing the plank roads of the Qinling and Daba Mountains is impossible. If I push ahead recklessly and end up injured…”
I could try to save a month and end up losing a full year!
The conclusion was simple.
The waterway!
The obstacles of the Yangtze Three Gorges still stood, but for now I’ll set them aside.
“There’s no sense fretting over things that haven’t happened yet.”
What I needed now was passage money.
He had earned the fare by taking day labor.
Some would scoff at the idea of a ten-year-old doing manual work, but in labor, skill matters far more than brute strength, and Jin Muok, who had handled countless jobs in the army, found carrying loads no hardship at all.
The passenger boat he boarded docked in Hubei, and after transferring to a flower boat crossing the Yangtze Three Gorges, Jin Muok spent the time undisturbed, circulating the Byeonggi Cheonsang, the mental method of his sect.
Inner power gathering bit by bit.
“Is there really such pure, clean energy?”
As the saying goes, new wine must be poured into new wineskins, and Jin Muok’s body was nearly flawless in its purity. So when he guided the energy through the Microcosmic Orbit, tiny as grains of sand, the most transparent essences flowed into his Dantian.
Jin Muok was accustomed to rough, coarse, almost savage energy, so this clean and pristine inner power felt utterly unfamiliar.
He had never experienced anything like it.
“Hmm.”
As the alien sensation coiled through his Dantian, Jin Muok shivered, and a sailor glanced back at him.
“What? Are you seasick or something?”
Hardly. It’s just unfamiliar, that’s all, just unfamiliar.
Jin Muok shook his head with a smile when a robust song rang out from somewhere.
“The Yangtze’s waters run fierce, but they’re no fiercer than the Naha’s!”
A booming lead voice broke out.
“Heave-ho~ heave-ho~.”
Then an enormous chorus rose in answer.
“The gorges run deep, but they’re no deeper than Bongmang’s grief!”
“Heave-ho~ heave-ho~.”
A majestic yet somehow wistful melody filled the gorge and the churning current alike. This was the Yangtze Three Gorges, a stronghold of both culture and strategy.
“The trackers’ chant is spirited no matter how many times I hear it!”
“Right? Just the first few notes and my strength comes surging right up!”
The people gazing along the riverbanks spotted the workers hauling the boats along with ropes and kept marveling at them.
Known as the Sibu, or Qianfu, these were the men who towed the boats.
The Yangtze’s currents were both violent and treacherous, and boats could not overcome them by their own power alone. So they solved the problem with outside help, and that help came from the Sibu, the boat-trackers.
Hauling the vessels directly with ropes, they pushed through the stretches where the current ran strongest.
It was a direct and primitive method, yet it was certain, and across all ages and places, human strength has remained the most reliable source of power.
“Heave-ho~.”
“Yo-ho~.”
Call and response blended together, filling the Yangtze’s rough waves and the sheer cliffs of the gorge with life.
“Whenever I hear the trackers’ songs, I can’t help feeling a little wistful.”
The trackers’ songs refer to a distinctive work chant called the Yunha Hoja.
This is the sequence of actions in which the towing workers, the Sibu, sling ropes over their shoulders and walk along the riverbank, matching their steps to a low, deep rhythm while urging one another on.
“Yeah. There’s something romantic about it.”
Merchants chatting idly on the deck. Some of them, truly caught up in the mood, took out wine gourds and sipped as they talked.
Gulp!
Jin Muok, stealing glances at the merchants, unconsciously swallowed.
‘Come to think of it, it’s been over ten years since I last had a drink.’
And I used to be quite the drinker!
It’s been over ten years since I last heard the Yunha Hoja, too, so ten years have truly gone by.
Had things been different, he would have coaxed the merchants into sharing a cup, but this was not the time, so Jin Muok desperately shut his eyes.
Begone, demon!
Beating the drum and the janggu all by himself.
At present, Jin Muok had at least escaped the look of a beggar.
He had spent three days bathing in a stream to scrub away the grime and stench, and with the wages from day labor he had tailored a passable set of clothes.
Once he had dressed up, he was surprised to find himself rather handsome.
Jin Muok’s effort to push away thoughts of liquor and devote himself once more to the Byeonggi Cheonsang was desperate.
‘Was this method really this excellent?’
The Byeonggi Cheonsang proved to be a far greater martial art than he had known.
When his previous self first encountered the Byeonggi Cheonsang, a mental method of unparalleled renown, he was a man in his mid-twenties whose mind had already hardened. Thus he had been so preoccupied with obtaining the tangible result of inner power that he had paid little attention to the details of his martial studies.
Because of that, I couldn’t properly analyze the Byeonggi Cheonsang.
And now.
Facing the Byeonggi Cheonsang again in the pure body of a ten-year-old, I’m first struck with admiration for its boundless utility.
Was the Byeonggi Cheonsang always this good?
‘Or have I become dramatically smarter than before?’
No way.
Drumming on his own chest once more, Jin Muok weighed the Inner Power gathered in his dantian and let out a boastful little puff of breath.
The Inner Power, which had already grown from the size of a grain of rice to that of a red bean. At this rate, it won’t be long before it swells to the thickness of a jujube. And after another stretch of time, it’ll be as huge as an egg.
If I keep training like this.
‘I might even outdo Shaolin, famous for its Inner Power!’
Delusions are free.
Still, Jin Muok was desperate. He needed a certain amount of Inner Power to look after Baekri Unhak. Now that his disciple was older than he was, he had to have a body that surpassed that of a ten-year-old to look after him.
Anyway, completely absorbed in the Byeonggi Cheonsang and having reached a state of oneness with the martial arts, Jin Muok sank into deep concentration on his breathing method, undisturbed by anyone.
Woooong―.
Jin Muok circulated his breathing method with great diligence.
Yet outwardly nothing had changed, so not even the people chatting around him could tell that this little brat was building up Inner Power through a heavenly breathing method.
That was how gently yet powerfully the Byeonggi Cheonsang wrapped itself around Jin Muok’s body.
Drip-drop―.
Before he knew it, beads of sweat had formed across his forehead, and the heat that had begun near his dantian spread through the Four Limbs and Hundred Bones.
The surging tide of Qi raced through his whole body, drawing out a mysterious power that had been sleeping in his tiny vessels… Wait, hold on.
‘A mysterious power?’
This brat definitely had not a single shred of Inner Power. His dantian itself hadn’t been developed. That’s why it took a full three days just to open it up, so what on earth kind of power is this?
Still, since it’s here, I have no choice but to put it to use.
‘Well, well.’
Having discovered a Latent Power he never expected, Jin Muok merged it with his Inner Qi and guided it exactly as the Byeonggi Cheonsang taught.
Kooooh―.
Good. Very good.
Once a mysterious Latent Power joined a tiny bit of Inner Power no bigger than a chick’s tears, a surprisingly heavy energy spread in every direction, and Jin Muok, thrilled, instinctively raised his right hand toward the midday sky.
Bukhae Mu…!
Without thinking, Jin Muok nearly unleashed the Bukhae Mupa, the foundation and basics of the Bukcheon Sinmun, when he spotted someone and froze in place.
‘Oh no.’
I hadn’t noticed until now. The fact that someone so formidable had boarded this ship.
Jin Muok had traveled from Luoyang to Hubei by passenger boat, then switched to a flower boat there, and was now making his way through the Yangtze Three Gorges toward Sichuan.
Until now he’d had not a speck of inner strength and hadn’t known, but after moving onto the flower boat and diligently circulating the Byeonggi Cheonsang, a meager amount of Inner Power had formed, granting him that much Qi Sense.
And when he used his Qi Sense to check, there was an incredible person right there.
A Myeonsanyeo conversing idly with a woman in her mid-thirties, Mi Buin, whose figure was full and voluptuous. At first glance it looked like a tranquil scene.
‘A martial artist. And a very strong one at that.’
Perhaps my previous self could have matched her, but reborn as a ten-year-old, she was far beyond my reach. Fortunately, she was unaware of my presence, so all I had to do was feign ignorance.
‘Safe passage. Safe passage.’
Just get to Sichuan without any trouble. That’s the best course of action.
Just as Jin Muok hoped, Myeonsanyeo seemed to have no intention of causing any trouble either, and she was busy chatting away with an old woman.
Then let’s keep going just like this.
Halting the Byeonggi Cheonsang, Jin Muok turned his head and took in the scenery of the Three Gorges.
The strange harmony of the churning, surging waters and the Sibu hauling the flower boat along the low Yunha Hoja gave him a steady sense of unfamiliarity.
The Yangtze’s Three Gorges collectively refer to Qutang Gorge, Wu Gorge, and Xiling Gorge.
Three gorges that are at times majestic, magnificent, and strange.
That’s why, since ancient times, it has been said that Qutang is grand, Wu is graceful, and Xiling is bizarre.
Overwhelmed by the mysterious beauty of the Yangtze and the Three Gorges, the people on board lost themselves gazing at the scenery around them, but Jin Muok watched the Sibu with sharp eyes.
The Sibu’s footsteps kept slowing down. They might simply be exhausted, but his instincts told him a different story.
Something was wrong.
And then, sure enough, the Sibu abandoned the boat and began running off somewhere!
For the Sibu to abandon the boat means giving up their wages. For people who scrape by a living towing vessels, abandoning the work that is their livelihood and a day’s pay worth a fortune can have only one reason!

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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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