"Drink it, trash!"
Senior Brother Kang held his head down, pushing harder. The stench invaded every sense. Jihun's hands clawed desperately at Kang's iron grip, but four years of malnutrition had left him as weak as a kitten.
Around them, a crowd had gathered. Outer disciples. Inner disciples. Even a few servant disciples who should have known better—who should have felt sympathy for one of their own.
Instead, they laughed.
"Senior Brother Kang is too much!"
"Look at his legs kicking! Like a dying insect!"
"Someone record this with a memory stone! This is too good!"
Jihun's lungs burned. His vision started to darken at the edges. The filth filled his nose and mouth. He was going to die here. Drowned in shit by a man who outranked him simply because he'd been born with better meridians.
Is this really how it ends?
Just when unconsciousness reached for him, Kang yanked his head up.
Jihun gasped and choked, vomiting onto the ground. Filth dripped from his hair, his face, his clothes. The crowd roared with laughter. He heard the distinct hum of memory stones capturing the moment for eternity.
"That's what you get for looking at Senior Sister Yuna," Kang said, his voice carrying across the courtyard. "A worm like you doesn't deserve to even glance at an inner disciple. Know your place."
"I... I wasn't..." Jihun tried to speak through his raw throat.
"Are you calling me a liar?"
Kang's fist drove into Jihun's stomach like a battering ram. The air exploded from his lungs. Jihun collapsed, curling into a ball on the stone ground.
"Pathetic." Kang wiped his hands on a cloth another disciple handed him, as if touching Jihun had contaminated him. "Four years in this sect and you're still worthless. Your father wasted his life savings bringing you here."
The words cut deeper than any physical blow.
Because they were true.
"Let's go," Kang said to his entourage. "This garbage isn't worth our time. Someone make sure those memory recordings get distributed. I want everyone to see what happens to those who forget their station."
They left, their laughter echoing across the training grounds.
Jihun lay there, unable to move. Each breath sent spikes of agony through his bruised ribs. The taste of filth coated his mouth. His eyes burned—whether from the stench or unshed tears, he couldn't tell.
I wasn't even looking at her. I was walking to the storage shed to get cleaning supplies.
But it didn't matter. The truth never mattered.
Kang had wanted to humiliate someone today, and Seol Jihun was the safest target. The weakest outer disciple in the Blazing Sun Sect's three-hundred-year history. The one person everyone could abuse without consequence.
The crowd had dispersed. Training continued as if nothing had happened. To them, this was normal. Entertainment, even.
To Jihun, it was just another day.
The sun crawled across the sky. Jihun remained on the ground, listening to the sounds of the sect around him. Disciples practicing sword forms. Masters shouting corrections. The rhythmic thud of fists against training dummies.
The sounds of people with futures.
Why do I even stay?
The question whispered through his mind like poison. He'd asked it before, hundreds of times over four years. But today, it felt different. Heavier. More final.
Why did he stay? Pride? He had none left. Hope? That had died somewhere around year two. Fear of disappointing his father?
His father.
The memory surfaced unbidden. A weathered face, calloused hands, eyes that had shone with desperate hope as he'd pressed the sect entrance fee into Jihun's hands.
"Make something of yourself, son. Make our sacrifice mean something."
Their house. Sold. His mother's jewelry. Sold. Everything the family had accumulated over three generations. Sold. All so Seol Jihun could join the Blazing Sun Sect and have a chance at becoming a martial artist.
And what had Jihun given them in return?
Shame.
Letters home had stopped after the first year. What could he say? "Dear Father, I'm the sect's punching bag. Everyone calls me trash. I clean toilets for a living. Your sacrifice meant nothing."
So he'd stopped writing. Let his father imagine he was busy training, busy becoming someone important.
Let him keep his hope, even if it was built on lies.
The sun began its descent toward the horizon. The training grounds gradually emptied as disciples headed toward the dining hall for the evening meal.
No one glanced at Jihun.
To them, he was as much a part of the scenery as the stones he lay on.
Finally, when the last footsteps faded, Jihun pushed himself up. His arms shook with the effort. His stomach lurched, threatening to expel what little it contained—which wasn't much, since he'd missed breakfast and lunch.
He looked down at himself. His outer disciple robes—already the cheapest, most worn set in the sect—were now covered in filth and vomit. The stench was overwhelming.
Jihun stumbled toward the well behind the servant quarters. This late in the evening, no one would be there. He could clean himself without an audience.
The well's rope was old and frayed, but it held. Jihun hauled up bucket after bucket of ice-cold water and dumped them over his head. The shock of cold made him gasp, but it was better than the alternative.
He scrubbed his hair, his face, his clothes while still wearing them. There was no point in going back to his shed for clean robes—this was his only other set, and it was in worse condition than what he wore now.
The water turned murky at his feet, carrying away the physical evidence of his humiliation. If only it could wash away the memory as easily.
By the time he finished, night had fallen completely. Stars dotted the sky above—beautiful, distant, uncaring. The sect grounds were quiet except for the muffled sounds of disciples in their quarters.
Jihun's stomach growled. He'd missed dinner. Again.
He briefly considered going to the dining hall to see if any scraps remained, but the thought of walking through the sect looking like a drowned rat, still reeking despite the washing, was too much.
Instead, he made his way to his quarters.
Calling it "quarters" was generous. It was a converted tool shed at the edge of the sect grounds, barely large enough for a sleeping mat. The walls had gaps that let in rain and cold. The door didn't lock properly. But it was his, in the sense that no one else wanted it.
Jihun pushed open the creaking door and stepped inside. The space smelled of mildew and old straw. His sleeping mat was thin enough to feel every bump in the wooden floor. A single cracked clay pot held his possessions: one spare set of robes (more patches than original fabric), a wooden comb missing half its teeth, and a faded letter from his father he could no longer bear to read.
He collapsed onto the mat without bothering to change out of his wet clothes. The cold fabric clung to his skin, making him shiver, but he was too exhausted to care.
Four years of this. Four years of being beaten, mocked, humiliated. Four years of having my face shoved in literal shit.
How much more can I take?
The answer whispered back from the darkness of his mind: Not much more.
Jihun stared at the ceiling—warped wooden planks that leaked when it rained. Through the gaps, he could see stars.
Those stars had watched civilizations rise and fall. They'd seen countless martial artists train, fight, succeed, and fail. They'd witnessed four hundred years of the Blazing Sun Sect's history.
And tomorrow, they'd watch Seol Jihun get up and clean toilets again.
Is this really all I'll ever be?
His body ached. His ribs throbbed where Kang had struck him. His throat was raw. His stomach was empty.
But worse than all of that was the emptiness in his chest. The hollow place where hope used to live.
I'm seventeen years old and my life is already over.
The thought should have terrified him. Instead, it just made him tired.
Jihun closed his eyes. Sleep would come eventually—it always did when you had nothing else.
[End of Chapter 1]