Chapter 128. Making a Name (1)
***
The last day of the preliminaries.
Five nights had passed since the All-Under-Heaven Youth Martial Arts Tournament had splendidly opened its curtain. Though it had been only four days, many young experts had poured out.
In truth, people had not expected much from the preliminaries. With the rising stars of the major sects such as the Three Stars, Five Phoenixes, and Nine Dragons being automatically excluded, what could one really expect?
But then, what do you know?
Those worries turned out to be nothing more than needless concern.
As someone once said, if something explodes when you least expect it, the joy doubles.
That was exactly the case now.
Young experts no one had ever expected suddenly popped up one after another, heating the tournament up like an active volcano.
First appearances, nameless.
Young men who no one knew where they had been hiding began to stand out, turning the direction of the tournament into complete uncertainty.
Lining them up, naming them, and by doing so, making heroes.
That was what gossip-loving onlookers enjoyed most.
The newly risen Rising Stars were given a strange nickname: "the young ones on the tiles." The reason was simple: all the finalists were watching the tournament from the tiled rooftops of the buildings lining both sides of the Main Avenue.
At first, it was merely novel to see people watching from the rooftops. But after the specific name "Wa-sang-cheong" took hold, watching the tournament from the rooftops itself became a privilege reserved only for the finalists. As the winners of the martial matches climbed up to the roofs one by one, the next winners naturally followed suit.
Now, who had started it no longer mattered. Those who passed the preliminaries and advanced to the finals naturally went up onto the rooftops as if it were an unwritten rule.
At first, even the Martial World Protection Unit paid attention to them, but now they treated it as perfectly normal. Since people on the roofs stood out clearly, they were actually much easier to manage.
Sometimes the members joked among themselves, asking who had first started climbing onto the roofs, but now it was no longer important, and no one even remembered.
Simply.
The only thing that mattered was that the Wa-sang-cheong were the finalists who had passed the preliminaries.
***
Dong Bong-su was, as always, already standing early on the roof of the Guest Residence Pavilion today. He had secured his advancement to the finals first on the opening day of the preliminaries, but even after that, he had watched almost every match held here. In some ways, he believed that watching was far more important than fighting in person.
Whenever someone used a move, a corresponding flow of true energy always followed. Dong Bong-su constantly observed and felt this. At the same time, he tried to read even the minute movements of the muscles that accompanied it.
The eyes are faster than the hands. But the brain is faster than the eyes. Still, instinct is far faster than the brain.
If one watches and grows accustomed to it until the instinct reacts as a conditioned reflex, the body will respond on its own to anyone's attack, whatever it may be.
Boom! Boom!
Down on the Main Avenue side, restoration of the central Martial Arena that he had destroyed was underway from early morning. For the three days after the first day, the tournament had been held on a temporary wooden martial arena set up beside the central one. It would probably be the same today.
The restored central Martial Arena was once again paved with blue stone, but on top of it, something like a coating of metal chunks several times darker than ordinary steel was being laid over it. Even at a glance, its strength looked far superior to normal iron.
'Is that cold iron?'
The upper echelons of the Martial Alliance must have judged that blue stone alone would not be able to endure a proper final.
Listening to the clanging sounds, Dong Bong-su was interpreting, analyzing, editing, and then recombining in his head all the martial arts he had seen during the preliminaries.
As time passed, the sun gradually climbed higher in the sky. Naturally, the start time of the final day of the preliminaries drew closer.
The Muhwa Gate opened again, and just like before, spectators poured into the Main Avenue.
Along with them, the other Wa-sang-cheong besides Dong Bong-su also began to take their places on the rooftops one by one. Not only on the roof of the Guest Residence Pavilion where he was, but also on the tiled roofs of the Anti-Demon Hall, the Conquering Evil Hall, the Hall of Ten Thousand Martial Arts, and other buildings surrounding the central and temporary martial arenas, the finalists climbed up in turn.
"Wow—! So many people have already gathered?"
"Haha. That's right."
But not everyone who climbed onto the roofs was a Wa-sang-cheong.
The two who had just come and were standing on both sides of Dong Bong-su, Ha Seon-hyang and Paeng Ho-ryu, were not Wa-sang-cheong, yet they came up to the roof every day. Paeng Ho-ryu was not even a finalist.
After losing to Dong Bong-su, Paeng Ho-ryu had wrapped a bandage around his shoulder and kept following him around annoyingly. Because of that, though only a few days had passed, Ha Seon-hyang and Paeng Ho-ryu had become quite close. Funnily enough, it was Dong Bong-su who had served as the medium that brought them together. Since the taciturn Dong Bong-su did not talk, the two of them chatted all day and grew close that way. It was as unintended a meeting and friendship as Paeng Ho-ryu's claimed "inevitable" elimination from the preliminaries.
Dong Bong-su merely looked down at the Main Avenue with his arms crossed and did not even glance at them.
By now, Ha Seon-hyang and Paeng Ho-ryu were used to that and did not pay much attention to it. They just talked among themselves, and from time to time, Dong Bong-su would throw in a short comment—that was all he ever said. However, because those few words were always extremely to the point, they always looked forward to them.
In fact, there had not been a single time when Dong Bong-su had failed to predict the winner of a preliminary match held here on the Main Avenue. Because of that, Paeng Ho-ryu even joked that he might stake the entire Paeng Family fortune on the secret betting that went on in the market.
This time as well, with that kind of expectation, he asked Dong Bong-su a question.
"Brother Dong, do you know what the biggest topic in the Martial Alliance is right now?"
Once again, Dong Bong-su only looked down at the Main Avenue without saying a word. In any case, Paeng Ho-ryu knew very well that he had not asked the question expecting an immediate counterquestion.
Paeng Ho-ryu chuckled lightly and continued.
"'All-Under-Heaven Blue, and Blue on the Tiles'."
The world is blue, and the tiles above are also blue. Taken literally, that would be the meaning, but since "Wa-sang-cheong" was included, it was obviously a newly coined term.
"Ah! I think I know that. Isn't that what people call those who appeared in the All-Under-Heaven Youth Martial Arts Tournament and aren't from major sects? They just shorten it and call them Wa-sang-cheong, right?"
At Ha Seon-hyang's words, Paeng Ho-ryu shook his head.
"No. More precisely, this separates 'All-Under-Heaven Blue' and 'Wa-sang-cheong.' Here, 'All-Under-Heaven Blue' refers to the rising stars of the major sects like the Three Stars, Five Phoenixes, and Nine Dragons, the automatic entrants. And 'Wa-sang-cheong' refers to the young ones on the tiles, that is, the finalists who went through the preliminaries."
"Oh, I see. But why is that the biggest topic in the Martial Alliance right now?"
"Well—that is—."
Paeng Ho-ryu paused for a moment. Then he shook his head and laughed.
"Well, I don't really know either. Haha. It's just that people talk about it a lot, so I said that. Isn't that what makes it the biggest topic?"
"Come on, that's so anticlimactic."
It was then. A flat, emotionless voice cut into their pleasant conversation.
"A reversal."
"...?"
Both Ha Seon-hyang and Paeng Ho-ryu stopped talking and looked at Dong Bong-su. Now, almost as a conditioned reflex, expectation filled their eyes.
Dong Bong-su continued indifferently.
"People are hoping that someone will break the current structure of the Martial World."
"What? What does that have to do with All-Under-Heaven Blue and Wa-sang-cheong?"
Ha Seon-hyang pouted, looking like she did not understand.
"...…"
The masses are always the weak. They always look upward. But reality always presses them down to stay below.
So even if it is not themselves, when a commoner hero appears in the world, they project their emotions onto that person and wish for their success.
All-Under-Heaven Blue is already an existing sky. Even if one does not like it, one cannot easily overturn it. But perhaps those people on the tiles, who are closer to the sky even though the masses themselves cannot reach it, might be different.
The crowds who have gathered at the Martial Alliance right now are hoping that the Wa-sang-cheong will overturn the Nine Sects and Beggars' Sect and the Five Great Families, which have ruled for far too long and have become soaked in authoritarianism.
Can the Wa-sang-cheong defeat the All-Under-Heaven Blue? If they can—
'That's what they must be hoping for.'
That is why it becomes the biggest topic.
Looking down at the bustling crowd gathered on the Main Avenue, Dong Bong-su said,
"People are hoping that the roof will pierce the sky. They don't say it directly, but because everyone hopes for that, they are enthusiastic about the Wa-sang-cheong. That's why it becomes the biggest topic."
"...!"
Only then did Paeng Ho-ryu and Ha Seon-hyang feel like they understood what Dong Bong-su was saying. In truth, it was a rather dangerous statement. Overturning the existing system? That was not something to say in the Martial Alliance, which stood as the authority of that very system. Moreover, Paeng Ho-ryu was the family head of the Paeng Family, one of the Five Great Families, yet Dong Bong-su was speaking like that without any restraint.
But the two of them felt it was fine. Because the one saying it was him. Because it was Dong Bong-su, it felt like anything might be possible.
'Where in the world did someone like this come from?'
Paeng Ho-ryu looked at Dong Bong-su for a moment and then said,
"By the way, Brother Dong, I've been curious since the first time I saw you—just who exactly is your master?"
He swallowed the rest of the words: "What kind of person could raise a monster like you?"
Dong Bong-su did not answer. Instead, Ha Seon-hyang, who was beside him, spoke what she thought was the answer.
"Ah, Brother Paeng, you still didn't know? Young Master Dong—uh, big brother, your master is Bukgung Gi—."
"Why is one 'big brother' and the other 'big brother' with honorifics?"
"Big brother—!"
Ha Seon-hyang shouted, and the rest of her words were scattered away by the wind.
Wooooaah—!
At that moment, along with the cheers of the crowd, the last day of the preliminaries began, and the story of Bukgung Gi, the Weapon Eccentric, was postponed for another time.
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