Blue Surpasses Indigo

As Jo Yang let go, Yun-seon—who had been suspended in midair—slammed chest-first onto the ground. The excruciating pain, as though his ribs had snapped, robbed him even of the ability to scream.

“Kang Yun-seon?”

Hyeongjin, as if in disbelief, craned his neck and stared fixedly at Yun-seon. He had thought the man would have either perished from a seizure or fallen to the Taiyi Divine Sect, yet here he stood, face intact and openly appearing before him.

“Yun-seon, did you hear it all?”

Jo Yang, on the other hand, remained calm as though he had expected this. Looking down at the curled-up, pain-ridden Yun-seon, he asked. The deep wrinkles on his face smoothed out, and he offered a gentle smile. It was so kindly that one could hardly believe this was the same man who had just been spewing venomous words.

“If I said I hadn’t, would you believe me?”

Struggling up from his prone position, Yun-seon straightened his clothes. The answer was already decided, yet Jo Yang acted as if he were granting him a chance—an act so revolting it made Yun-seon sick.

“Surely you understand that’s impossible?”

Jo Yang chuckled heartily, then returned to the seat of honor at the table. Should Yun-seon even attempt to flee, all it would take was telling Hyeongjin to kill him. From the moment he was exposed, Yun-seon had no escape from his grasp.

“Junior Brother, to see you unharmed even in that desperate moment means you’ve been truly lucky. But today, it seems you will not pass unscathed—what a pity.”

Hyeongjin stepped closer to the seated Yun-seon, offering words of consolation. Though his tone feigned sympathy, his expression was one of sheer delight.

“What would you have me do? Please, give the order.”

As Hyeongjin bowed respectfully toward his master, Jo Yang stroked his long beard twice. Narrowing his eyes, his gaze resembled a snake poised to strike its prey.

“Indeed… what should be done with this boy? For the bond we’ve shared, I cannot bring myself to finish him with my own hands.”

“Then perhaps expel him from our Sect and leave him to fate?”

At Hyeongjin’s suggestion, Jo Yang shook his head.

“Surely other sects would be desperate to have him. If he were to spread what he heard today there, would that not bring disaster?”

As Hyeongjin pondered, a sudden idea struck him.

“Ah, but was this boy not dragged off by the Taiyi Divine Sect and had his tongue cut out during torture?”

“Ah… that is not a bad idea.”

Hearing their back-and-forth, Yun-seon’s hands and feet trembled—not from fear for his future, but from revulsion at these men who lived their lives behind masks.

Yun-seon slowly closed his eyes and steadied his breathing. His chest thudded heavily, but it was bearable. At last, the time had come to reveal the card he had long concealed.

“Uncle, Eldest Sahyung… unfortunately, neither of you can kill me.”

Hyeongjin, who had tried to frighten Yun-seon by listing gruesome tortures, could not hide his surprise at this unexpected statement.

“Do you fear I’ve grown fond of you and thus cannot harm you? Then you sorely underestimate me.”

To Hyeongjin, Yun-seon’s insolence—mocking even in this plight—was contemptible, and it greatly displeased him. He strained to keep his emotions in check, his lips twitching uncontrollably.

Meanwhile, watching Yun-seon’s composure, Jo Yang suddenly grew curious. In his usual gentle tone, he asked:

“What card do you hold that makes you so confident?”

Only then did Yun-seon turn to Jo Yang, raising the corners of his lips in a broad smile.

“Uncle, have you been cultivating well the Taiyi Divine Arts I taught you? Considering your immense talent, by now you should have easily mastered the second stage, no?”

Jo Yang was slightly unsettled, but he forced a contrived smile to conceal it.

“Well then, do you truly think I have mastered it?”

Feigning surprise, Yun-seon slyly asked again.

“Have you perhaps not? Or was there never any need for you to?”

He slowly rose to his feet, brushing the dust from his clothes.

“From the moment you set me up at the martial tournament, I knew your intentions toward me were not pure. I’ve been quick-witted since childhood—you’ll find I’m not easily deceived.”

Glancing sideways at Hyeongjin, he saw his face flushed red and blue, clearly furious. Yun-seon was certain now he was striking their nerves.

“Yet something puzzled me. You, Uncle, are said to be a peerless grandmaster, without rival in kangho. So why covet the Commentary on the Explanation of Profound Secrets—no, the Taiyi Divine Art?”

This time Yun-seon stepped right up to Hyeongjin’s shoulder, where he stood frozen.

“Eldest Sahyung, when I began learning Silent Poetry, another great doubt arose. By chance, I gained the opportunity to study the Taiyi Divine Arts as well. But in cultivating both, I found a grave problem: their qi flows are completely opposite, making them impossible to practice together. So why did Uncle insist on acquiring it?”

Jo Yang’s expression grew gradually ferocious. He glared at Yun-seon as if he might rip his mouth apart at any moment.

“Then a rumor came to mind: ‘He who gains the Commentary on the Explanation of Profound Secrets shall obtain all the world’s honor and riches.’ You’ve heard it too, Eldest Sahyung, haven’t you? Fool that I was, only then did I realize—ah! What Uncle sought was not martial arts at all!”

Jo Yang, furious to his very core, slammed the chair he sat on. The paulownia armrest shattered with a deafening crack. Yet Yun-seon remained unfazed.

“The Commentary held more than martial arts. Not merely a secret manual, but something else entirely! That unknown truth was the real reason Uncle sought it. Eldest Sahyung—did you know this?”

Looking slyly at Hyeongjin, Yun-seon’s face was bright like a child’s. In a way, it almost seemed he pitied him.

“Th-that may be so, but there’s still no reason to spare you.”

Seeing his master so agitated, Hyeongjin sensed Yun-seon was not lying. Still, silencing this cunning brat’s mouth came first.

Hastily steadying himself, Hyeongjin pointed his sword at Yun-seon. It dawned on him that the acting had not been limited to him and his master—this bastard had been playing the fool all along. Rage boiled within him.

“No. Uncle cannot kill me. Without me, the secret can never be unraveled.”

Jo Yang’s brows twitched violently. At last he realized Yun-seon’s clever stratagem. This was the trap he had set, anticipating such a moment.

‘I thought him a naive, foolish child, but I misjudged him. How did Yul-cheon raise such a fox? Truly, it defies belief.’

Yun-seon turned back toward Jo Yang, continuing his explanation step by step.

“The Commentary on the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra was originally an interpretation of a Buddhist scripture created in Ryeo Nation. Naturally, it was written in the Ryeo tongue.”

When Yun-seon first memorized the scripture, he sensed something off—the sentences and arrangement of characters differed from the Gyeong Nation’s style he was used to. The hidden manual of the Taiyi Divine Arts was the same: a sequence of characters impossible for any Gyeong Nation native to comprehend.

Since Ryeo borrowed Gyeong Nation’s characters, they struggled to capture the full meaning of their spoken tongue in writing. Though they never created their own script, over decades they devised a unique method: separating Gyeong’s logographs into sound and meaning components, then rearranging them to match Ryeo syntax. Fortunately, Yun-seon had learned Ryeo notation from his master since childhood, so he was able to interpret it properly.

“The manuals I later gave you were all altered—sound and meaning characters switched around. For one sound, there can be many characters. How could you possibly know which I used? If you kill me here, the scripture’s secret will be buried forever.”

Hearing this, Jo Yang recalled Kang Yul-cheon’s final words.

“Even if you obtain it, you will never comprehend it.”

The reason he had failed despite countless methods of study was not merely his own lack of ability or effort. For four whole years, he had been utterly deceived by Yun-seon.

“You wretch!”

Jo Yang trembled so violently that even his beard quivered like dancing waves. He could not kill Yun-seon, but leaving him barely alive would suffice. In an instant, he darted like the wind to Yun-seon’s face and struck his left cheek with all his might.

Smack!

Yun-seon’s head whipped to the side, and a molar clattered to the floor. Unsatisfied even with that, Jo Yang continued shaking, bellowing out.

“How dare you!”

For a moment, Yun-seon’s mind went blank.

“What… did you say?”

The Yun-seon who had been smirking and mocking moments ago was gone. His eyes locked on Jo Yang, now brimming with shock and terror.

“How dare the likes of you!”

This time he lifted his foot and kicked Yun-seon hard in the solar plexus. Defenseless, Yun-seon flew like a roof tile and crashed heavily into the beam of the main hall.

“They say you’re sharper than your master, but in the end your worth is the same. Like master, like disciple. Ungratefully spurning the grace that sheltered you—despicable…”

Yun-seon, his organs jarred by the blow, spat a mouthful of blood onto the floor. The suppressed qi below his dantian surged again. The treatment he had received from the inn girl was all for naught.

“Heeheehee…”

Sprawled on the floor, Yun-seon’s shoulders suddenly began to shake. Then he burst into grotesque laughter, the sound swelling until it became piercingly loud.

“Has he gone mad?”

It seemed he had lost his mind—though now in a different way from before when he had recklessly attacked. Hyeongjin felt chills at his reaction, while also fretting that others outside might rush in. His master appeared to have lost all reason, so he might need to handle the aftermath himself.

“So it was you.”

After a long fit of hiccupping laughter, Yun-seon finally raised his head and stared directly at Jo Yang’s face. Tears that had welled in his eyes rolled down beneath his chin.

“How dare you… how dare you…”

How could he forget? Four years ago, that day—the blue-robed man who struck his powerless master with a thunderous palm. The instigator who lured the Black Butterfly Twin Assassins to ultimately slay his master and senior brother.

Though he had not seen the face, Yun-seon remembered the voice distinctly. It was entirely different in tone and cadence from the countless times he had heard Jo Yang before. Today he finally heard his true voice—untainted, without pretense, revealing his true nature.

“Yun-seon, Yun-seon… how truly foolish. Your enemy was right before you, yet you floundered so.”

Like a madman, Yun-seon pounded the floor with both fists, screaming. His wretched cries now blurred beyond distinction—were they laughter or tears?

Some time had passed since the martial tournament ended. Yet seeing Yun-seon still tearing up over Yu I-jeong’s death, Ju-un grew irritated.

“What’s so sad about the death of someone you’d never even met before? Are you still sniveling over it?”

After a long silence, he finally spoke in a trembling voice.

“Because his situation felt so much like mine.”

“No one could rival you in pitifulness, so spare me the nonsense. He either overestimated his skill or died because his trick failed. What fellowship do you think you share?”

Having always lived indifferent to others, she found Yun-seon’s sentiment exasperating. Tired of consoling him, she suddenly rose and made to leave.

Yun-seon grabbed Ju-un’s arm, shaking his head firmly.

“It wasn’t that he tried a trick and failed. He deliberately chose Elder Bu Neungpa. There must have been a grudge we do not know of. He stepped forth knowing he would lose.”

“Hmph. How could a blind man pick out Elder Bu?”

Ju-un snorted in disbelief, her expression showing how pathetic she found Yun-seon’s foolish talk. She shrugged her shoulders as if she could bear no more, then left him behind in the room and returned to her quarters.

“The voice… he recognized him by the voice.”

Watching Ju-un’s back as she left, Yun-seon murmured softly.

He knew. Just a single word, yet one he would never forget until death.

“How dare you!”

If he could hear just that one line, he would instantly recognize his master’s murderer.

청출어람(靑出於藍), The Blue Surpasses the Indigo:

A metaphor meaning that a disciple or junior surpasses their master or senior, derived from the idea that the blue dye extracted from the indigo plant is bluer than the indigo plant itself.