Shunlin

The man blocking my way wore a sickening grin. He held a knife in his hand and waved it around threateningly at me.

“Leave everything valuable and go.”

When I tried to run, he thrust the knife out threateningly.

“There’s no way you’re getting away. Hurry up and leave your valuables.”

At that moment, I noticed a carriage approaching from behind the mugger. Then it stopped behind him.

“What are you doing?”

I heard the voice of a fairly young woman, and a girl around my age stepped down from the carriage. She wore expensive clothes like the daughter of a wealthy merchant or a high-ranking official. It was obvious that the decorated carriage was expensive too.

“Don’t come any closer. He’s a mugger.”

Even though I warned her, the girl calmly approached the mugger. There was a driver and a woman who seemed to be a servant in the carriage, but they only cried out, “Please come back,” and did not get down from the carriage.

“I am someone aiming to become a Taoist practitioner. A mere mugger like this is no problem.”

Apparently she was trying to enter a sect, just like Yulong. Naturally, she was probably learning the basics of the immortal path, cultivation of qi, and martial arts. Looking closely, she was an astonishingly beautiful girl with the figure of a model, with long arms and legs. She held something like a staff in her hand.

“Don’t interfere.”

The big man swung the knife toward the girl. She dodged swiftly and slammed the staff she was holding against the man’s hand. The impact sent the knife flying.

“Damn it!”

The big man charged as if to slam into the girl. The girl tried to evade him with graceful steps, but the ground was rough, and she stumbled on a stone.

“Ah.”

Seeing the girl let out a cry as she staggered, the big man grinned. He reached out to grab her. At that instant, I moved. Grabbing the big man’s hand, I locked his wrist joint with both hands.

“Ow, what the hell are you doing?!”

Thinking, Is this idiot serious? I put my weight into the big man’s hand with the joint locked and threw him. The big man crashed onto the hard ground without even being able to break his fall, and he seemed to lose consciousness.

The girl looked at me with half-lidded eyes. Apparently she wanted to say that if I could win, I should have fought from the start. But the other guy had a knife. I thought the right answer was to try to run if I could, because there was always the chance something might go wrong.

“Thank you for helping me.”

Since it was true that she had tried to help me, I thanked her.

“It looked like my help wasn’t needed.”

“No, he had a knife. Just taking that away was a great help.”

I picked up the sword I had dropped on the ground when I moved to save the girl.

“Is that a sword?”

In response to the girl’s question, I nodded.

“Yes. It’s Yulong-sama’s sword.”

When the girl heard the name Yulong, she frowned. Was she acquainted with Yulong, and did they not get along very well?

“Are you from the Chian Trading Company?”

“I’m Kou, the servant boy assigned to Yulong-sama.”

“I’m Tang Shunlin. Don’t tell Yulong about this.”

Did that mean she did not want to get involved with Yulong? Still, she was my benefactor, so I would obey her honestly.

“Understood. But what should we do about the mugger?”

“I’ll have my servant call the guards. Could you wait a bit?”

So I waited until the guards came, explained the situation to them, and handed the mugger over. After that, I parted ways with Shunlin and returned to the Chian Trading Company, but Yulong scolded me for being late.

That was because I kept my promise to Shunlin and did not mention that I had run into a mugger. But even when Yulong scolded me, I could take it calmly, only thinking that I was being scolded by a child.

Yulong somehow sensed that kind of feeling and turned an irritated expression toward me.

“Starting tomorrow, you’ll participate in martial arts practice. I’ll specially let you serve as my practice partner.”

“But martial arts…”

“Quiet. Don’t complain.”

Left with no choice, I ended up taking part in martial arts practice. The martial art Yulong was learning was the martial art of the Nanling School, which seemed to specialize in supple body movement and counters.

This was a problem. If I used Shorinji Kempo or Meisen Swordsmanship, I might be able to fight him evenly, but it would definitely sour Yulong’s mood. It would be a problem if I ended up being driven out of the Chian Trading Company under my current circumstances. So I decided to devote myself to being the punching bag.

The martial arts teacher was a martial artist named Ren Xiaodong, a man of about forty. I felt that he was a martial artist of such skill that the current me could never hope to defeat him. To beat him, the quickest path would probably be to learn true immortal arts. If I tried to beat him with martial arts alone, it seemed like it would take well over ten years. That said, this assumed that I could continue improving my martial skill at my current pace.

“Yulong-sama, I heard that Kou has not studied martial arts. Isn’t he unfit to serve as a practice partner?”

“It would be better to decide that after trying him out, wouldn’t it?”

“Very well.”

This was not good for me. Neither of them seemed to have any intention of checking what I wanted. In the end, I was made into Yulong’s sparring dummy.

As expected, swordsmanship practice was impossible, so I served as his bare-handed practice partner. Without using Shorinji Kempo, I ran around and defended myself. As a result, my whole body ended up covered in bruises.

“Don’t run. Fight.”

Yulong said something utterly unreasonable. If I seriously resisted, he would obviously get angry. As if delivering the finishing blow, Yulong unleashed a roundhouse kick. While blocking with both arms, I threw myself backward. I slammed into the ground, rolled over and over, and pretended to lose consciousness.

“Tch, just as I thought, this guy isn’t even good enough to be a practice dummy.”

Hearing that, Xiaodong gave a wry smile. After a while, I got up as if I had only just come to, and put on an exaggerated act of being in pain.

“You’re in the way. Move!”

Yulong shouted. Dragging my feet, I headed toward the mansion. Then I looked back over my shoulder and glanced at Yulong.

“You hit me as much as you wanted. Someday I’m going to beat the crap out of you.”

Yulong was looking my way with eyes that seemed to say, Useless trash.

Having driven Kou away, Yulong wore a satisfied expression.

“Yulong-sama, why did you think of making that brat your opponent?”

Xiaodong asked.

Yulong’s handsome face twisted.

“That guy is insolent.”

“Is that so? He appeared to obey your orders meekly enough.”

“Even if he obeys my orders, his eyes are defiant. It feels like he doesn’t acknowledge me as his master.”

“Aren’t you overthinking it? Still, after watching that training just now, it did feel as though that brat was used to fighting.”

Yulong tilted his head.

“What do you mean?”

“He was watching Yulong-sama’s attacks carefully. He simply didn’t seem able to evade them.”

“Hmph, insolent little brat.”