By Zephyria The Lifeline (6)
“To win someone over? Me?”
Seong Mu-yeon let out a hollow laugh.
“Do you know how much I suffered at first? I almost died a few times.”
The memory of his past hardships made the tip of his nose tingle.
“And?”
“I just… became friends with them.”
It felt new. There was a time when he had to be careful even taking a single step outside Emerald Pavilion. It felt like a very distant memory.
There were still people who disliked him, but now there were more people who looked at him favorably.
A faint smile appeared on Seong Mu-yeon’s lips.
“Just you wait. There may come a day when Elder reconsiders.”
Yak Seon still looked like she didn’t understand. Seong Mu-yeon and Mount Hua didn’t fit her standards.
She was closer to the world’s standards, so it wasn’t something to be upset about.
“You’re going to keep doing this until then? You’re really persistent.”
“Of course. Because it’s a desperate matter for me. I didn’t mean to bother you. I’m sorry, but I can’t back down either.”
A moment of silence fell between the two, and the shouts of the Disciples echoed through the Training hall.
“You said you’d do anything.”
“Yes. I mean it.”
“Then how about that?”
“What…”
Following Yak Seon’s gaze, the Training hall where Disciples were training hard came into view. The Disciples were packed, sweating profusely and pushing their bodies to the limit on this cold winter day.
…Excuse me?
Running was in full swing in one corner of the Training hall. Among the Disciples moving in unison to warm up their bodies, there was one person who was noticeably slow.
“Can’t you run faster! Faster!”
“Uwaaaaaaaah!!”
Seong Mu-yeon ran like crazy, chased by the sharply piercing voice of the instructor, no, Yak Seon. But his breath was already at the tip of his chin, and his overworked limbs were flailing pitifully.
“Haa! Haa! Why, me! Haa, I’m sick!”
“Who doesn’t know that! Run! Run like your tail’s on fire!”
“Uwaaaaaaaah!”
Seong Mu-yeon gasped for breath, as if he were about to vomit his lungs out. His head seemed to be spinning. But Yak Seon was a cold-blooded person with not an ounce of mercy.
“A healthy mind resides in a healthy body! If you want to overcome your illness, you need to become stronger than you are now! Run!”
“Haa… haa…!”
This damn stamina…
He had been neglecting his body training for a long time, moping about his situation, cooping himself up in his room, and not seeing the sunlight. Now he was paying the price.
“Keuheuk…”
Before long, his knees buckled and he naturally collapsed to the floor.
“Young master!”
“Young master Seong!”
Gang Woong and Seomun Yuha, who were training nearby, ran to support him when Seong Mu-yeon collapsed.
“Oh my, Young master! Are you alright?”
“Come to your senses!”
“Elder! At this rate, Young master will die. Please, just this once, show some mercy. Please?”
Gang Woong appealed to Yak Seon with tears in his eyes. But it was no use.
“He won’t die! Get up, Seong Mu-yeon! Your illness doesn’t make your body unusable! You just can’t use your inner force. A man with perfectly good limbs is just cooping himself up in his room like an old man about to die, so it’s only getting worse!”
“I really can’t move anymore…”
“You weakling!”
The Mount Hua Disciples filling the Training hall looked at them and whispered. It was probably absurd from the Disciples’ point of view. It was already strange to be with an ordinary person here, but it was also amazing that he collapsed after running just that much. Some of the immature third-generation Disciples burst into laughter, but they quietly shrank back after receiving a glare from Gang Woong.
In the end, Yak Seon made Seong Mu-yeon finish the training. She was truly a terrifying person.
Immediately after, Seong Mu-yeon barely crawled into the shade of a tree with limbs trembling like a newborn fawn and collapsed with a thud.
“Haa… haa…”
His vision was yellow and spinning, and it tasted like death.
“Young master, have some water.”
Gang Woong handed him a canteen with a look of pity. When he saw Seong Mu-yeon unable to even open the canteen, he wiped his eyes and even opened it for him and held it to his mouth.
“Oh my. Look at this drama queen.”
Yak Seon sneered at Seong Mu-yeon, who was being fed water like a baby bird by a boy much younger than him.
“You will have to do physical training every day at this time from tomorrow. Without missing a single day!”
“……”
“Why aren’t you getting up!”
“What is it this time? I finished training!”
“You have to eat.”
Yak Seon dragged him to the dining hall and placed a huge amount of food in front of him.
“Now, you have to eat it all.”
“…All of this?”
More food than Baek Ryeo-il usually ate was piled up like a mountain, blocking his view.
“You know, I’ve seen a lot of guys dying from severed meridians. But they all die before the medicine is even made.”
Seong Mu-yeon, who was starting to feel rebellious, froze at those words.
Yak Seon continued indifferently, even transferring the food piled on her plate to Seong Mu-yeon’s plate.
“What’s the point of going through all the trouble to make medicine? You might just die in a month. It’s not like I’ve only experienced it once or twice. You have to survive and endure. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Yak Seon placed the last piece of meat on his plate with a look full of pity. It wasn’t just the look of someone looking at a pitiful person. Her quiet eyes also contained a sense of resignation, as if saying, ‘You’ll probably die soon anyway,’ which sent a chill down his spine.
“O-Of course!”
Seong Mu-yeon ate diligently with tears in his eyes. He stuffed himself until his stomach hurt. Because he wanted to live. Was there anyone else who was as desperate for life as he was? He could eat this much food any day.
Yak Seon’s face brightened when she saw that Seong Mu-yeon had emptied his plate.
“Oh? You seem a little different from the other guys.”
“Of course! I will definitely live!”
Seong Mu-yeon patted his bulging stomach with satisfaction.
But.
Thump!
“Now, you can eat one more bowl, right?”
Yak Seon brought another plate and put it down, and Seong Mu-yeon’s face hardened. Overwhelmed by the enormous amount of food, his face gradually turned white.
“It’s very important to eat a variety of good ingredients. But what did you put in this soup? Hey! What ingredients went into the soup?”
Yak Seon shouted loudly towards the kitchen and went to find the cook herself. Seong Mu-yeon took advantage of her absence and quickly ran away.
‘I can’t eat anymore!’
Emerald Pavilion was empty. It hadn’t even been a day, but he felt happy as if he had returned after a long time. He glanced at Baek Ryeo-il’s empty room and crawled into his bed in his own room.
Until now, he had been too focused on his physical condition, reducing his activities under the pretext of preserving his body, and holding his breath. In recent months, that thought had become even more severe, and he had hardly been active. Moreover, he couldn’t use his inner force and had to use only his physical strength, so he felt how weak his body was.
‘By the way, where did he really go?’
Seong Mu-yeon was bothered by Baek Ryeo-il’s last appearance in the Guest room. Somehow, he felt a little different from usual. Was he angry because he suddenly collapsed? But there was nothing Seong Mu-yeon could do about it, so a sense of injustice suddenly arose.
But his frustration was only temporary. Suddenly, his overworked limbs trembled, and he felt exhausted and overeaten, so he felt sleepy.
‘He’ll be back in the evening. Then…’
A week passed in a flash without seeing Baek Ryeo-il’s shadow.
Still, thanks to having trained in martial arts in the past, Seong Mu-yeon quickly adapted to the training he went out to every dawn.
…It would have been nice if that were the case, but it wasn’t.
Even after several days, the training was still difficult, and he was tormented by Yak Seon, who forced him to eat like a cow.
As the Disciples quickly scattered to the dining hall after the training, Seong Mu-yeon sprawled out on the Training hall. When he didn’t seem to want to move, he just raised his arm and waved it at Gang Woong, who was awkwardly hovering around him.
“I really don’t want to eat today… Leave me here…”
Seong Mu-yeon’s eyes widened at Gang Woong’s words.
“Master Baek? When did he say that? He didn’t even come in yesterday, did he?”
Gang Woong tilted his head.
“What are you talking about? Master left early this morning.”