Flying Dragoon Thirteenth Unit (2)

“Hah… hah…”

With breath scraping up to his throat and his mind dulled by exhaustion, Bi Sayoung recalled the day he ran from his sect.

“Eldest Brother! I’ll go to the front! If even you leave, our Bijong Sect might truly be finished!”

“Silence! The Bijong Sect is already finished! Avenging that—that’s my duty as Eldest Brother!”

Those were the last words before Bi Sayoung fled the mountain and headed for the front.

Bi Sayoung of Platoon Seven, Flying Dragon Thirteenth Unit, had come from a crumbling sect.

There was still a mentor-uncle and a few junior disciples at the main hall, so it was not “exterminated” yet—but it would be, soon.

Their inner cultivation manual had been cut off together with the teacher and uncles who never returned from the Muhwang Tomb Blood Incident.

The Bijong Sect had no widely famed pinnacle master, but its lightness skill was praised as among the very best in the martial world; for such a school, losing the inner art was a death sentence.

Without inner cultivation, a body-lightening art was mere footwork.

Bi Sayoung volunteered for the front because he could not bring himself to send the younger disciples.

Without an inner art, none of them would survive the Blood Demon cultists anyway; if someone had to die, he felt the eldest senior should go first.

And another part of him wanted to stop clutching a dying sect and take revenge on at least one demon.

But there was one thing he had not considered.

That on the front he would find disciples of the Diancang Sect—whom he hated as much as cultists—and even have to fight in the same battalion, the same platoon.

The first time he met Ju Taegyeong, who introduced himself with a haughty face as a Diancang disciple, Bi Sayoung answered stiffly:

“I am a disciple of the Bijong Sect.”

Ju Taegyeong looked at him without changing expression and asked:

“Was there such a sect?”

Curses surged to Bi Sayoung’s lips; he swallowed them.

Maybe the man truly didn’t know.

Quelling his anger, he said:

“My master and uncles died in the Muhwang Tomb Blood Incident.”

That incident: martial artists from all over followed maps to the tomb in Yunnan; the greedy Diancang Sect tried to barge in late and monopolize it; the other sects united to oppose them, and in the end the tomb collapsed, annihilating the gathered martial artists—and even Diancang.

Weakened, the Diancang Sect then lost its mountain to the Blood Demon Cult’s offensive, and all of Yunnan fell under cult control.

It was all the Demon Cult’s scheme.

They had correctly predicted Diancang’s greed.

Even so, for those connected to the tomb incident, Diancang was no different from the cult.

It was Diancang that claimed ownership of a tomb found in Yunnan, murdered scores to seize it, and drove resisters into the tomb to suffer the catastrophe.

To Bi Sayoung, Diancang was the same as the Cult—a mortal enemy—and the culprit that ceded Yunnan to them.

Even so, Bi Sayoung had not wanted much.

He knew it was unrealistic to force an apology from a first-class Diancang swordsman.

Humiliating as it was to hope, even a look of guilt—if he saw that—it might have eased him.

Instead, Ju Taegyeong smirked and asked:

“Is that so? Then your elders died from overreaching greed. So what? You plan to brag about it?”

At that snide smile and voice, Bi Sayoung’s last thread of reason snapped.

He charged like a beast.

“If not for you—! Your Diancang scum caused that massacre!”

Ju Taegyeong snorted and struck back as if waiting for it.

A fierce blow, properly loaded with inner force.

In that instant Bi Sayoung felt the man truly meant to kill him.

Just as the man’s knife hand was about to pierce his throat, as Bi Sayoung waited helplessly for death, Captain Seol Pung stepped in and blocked Ju Taegyeong’s hand.

He lived by a hair.

At Seol Pung’s cold glare, Ju Taegyeong snorted as if bored, gathered his followers, and left.

Leaving only,

“Insult Diancang again, and I will certainly kill you.”

Bi Sayoung despaired.

He had never felt so powerless, so pathetic.

Life after that changed little.

At second-rate level, he could not match Ju Taegyeong—couldn’t even reliably kill a single demon.

Even the most common low-grade Wild Hound Ghost required at least first-class—Weapon Qi User level—to take down.

With only basic inner practice, it was obvious he could train a lifetime and hit a ceiling at second-rate.

Everything felt unfair—pointless.

Captain Seol Pung had once offered to train him.

He flatly refused.

He hated being pitied as the weak more than death.

So he “lived” like that.

But if living means having a goal and pursuing it, then he hadn’t lived at all—only breathed.

Then, a month ago, a madman entered his platoon.

A mere second-rate like Bi Sayoung, a chubby fellow no one would believe was a martial man.

Yet the lunatic picked a fight with Ju Taegyeong on day one—

Poking his sore spot by calling him Diancang Sword Viper, then declaring he could beat him within a month or two.

It was gloriously insane.

And that madness…

Felt unspeakably cathartic to Bi Sayoung.

Maybe that’s why he took the bait, pretending to be provoked into joining the training.

He realized the very next day:

That was truly foolish.

Had he not, he wouldn’t be dying on his feet like this.

From his defeated crouch on a branch, he saw Captain Seol Pung—wearing a thirty-gwan steel vest and even a blindfold—skim away lightly across the canopy.

Bi Sayoung had prided himself that for short bursts of lightness he could hold his own even against pinnacle experts; the sight shredded his pride.

But there was nothing he could do.

For a month he had killed himself to keep up, but with a mere ten gwan on his vest, he could last only half a shichen (≈ one hour) before dropping, while the captain kept flying.

“Hff, hff, hff—damn it.”

He was dying, but he would not quit.

Quitting was worse than death.

And behind him, that lunatic was still coming.

“Hahaha! Sayoung! You’ve stalled at half a shichen again?! I might catch you soon! Hahaha!”

Seonu Jin had to be crazy.

Falling from branches, dangling and scrambling back up, caked in dirt from multiple spills—today even his face looked like it had slammed into the ground; only bloodshot eyes burned red in the mud as he clawed forward along the limbs.

How could anyone laugh in that state?

Yet seeing him, Bi Sayoung gritted his teeth and rose.

He would not lose to that man.

Seonu Jin’s body had grown unrecognizably lean in a month.

Now perfectly average in build, he insisted on “making up” the lost weight by hanging the equivalent as steel on his vest—and ran.

To lose to a man of equal second-rate level, wearing more weight than himself—Bi Sayoung would die before allowing it.

Besides, that man was learning the Bijong Body-Lightening Art from him.

Three days into training, Seonu Jin had come to ask for help.

“Brother Bi, truth is I’ve never learned a proper body-lightening art. I honestly don’t know how to follow the captain’s regimen. Could you help me?”

The request from a newcomer he already liked—humble, asking for help—felt good.

Asked how, the man spoke carefully:

“Could you teach me some of the Bijong Body-Lightening Art? Ah! Not secret skills—just the basic set! And not for free—I know a solid inner cultivation art. If you’d trade basics for that… could I share it?”

Bi Sayoung had been stunned.

An inner art was exactly what he needed.

The offer was dazzling, which made it harder to accept.

His pride hurt.

Seonu Jin wilted and said,

“I see. Not enough. It’s a decent manual, but too cheap to trade for a legacy like Bijong’s. I understand.”

Bi Sayoung barely kept from smiling.

No one had ever recognized his sect’s art like this.

He coughed and told the dejected man:

“Our body-lightening is exceptional, so I cannot pass it on lightly. But most elders are gone; I’m almost acting sect head—and we are comrades-in-arms. For the basic set… that much I can do.”

Seonu Jin nearly leapt for joy, clasped his hand, and thanked him again and again.

Thus Bi Sayoung taught him the Bijong basics—and, in exchange, learned a proper inner method called the Kwaeui Heart Method.

It came from the Kwaeui Sect, extinguished decades ago; they too were famed for lightness, so it fit Bi Sayoung like a glove.

(In truth, Seol Pung and Seonu Jin had quietly compared manuals they knew and pre-selected one suited to Bi Sayoung; he, of course, had no idea. Nor did he know that Seonu Jin had learned Bijong’s art from him in another life.)

In any case, stubborn not to lose to Seonu Jin, Bi Sayoung forced himself upright and ran.

He didn’t feel it yet, but with a real inner art his long-stalled level had begun to rise again.

Captain Seol Pung’s dawn regimen was an hour of treetop sprinting, then another hour sprinting at high speed while snatching passing insects with hands and feet.

For the rest, the first hour was the limit.

When the captain started the second hour, the others would do breath-cultivation and then practice weapons in the clearing—because of Seonu Jin.

The first week they simply rested after cultivating. A week in, having slimmed down, Seonu Jin declared this “nothing” and dragged himself up to swing his sword.

Bi Sayoung, who had felt he’d die before moving, could only grit his teeth and stand when Seonu Jin gave him and Bae Jonggwan a pitying look and said one line:

“Brother Bi, Brother Bae, are you very tired? You look… hmm…”

He didn’t finish—but those disappointed eyes said enough.

Bi Sayoung sprang up, shouting,

“This is nothing! I’m not tired at all!”

“M-me neither!”

Strangely, once up, the body moved again.

While they drilled weapons, Captain Seol Pung would return from his run and give pointers.

What Bi Sayoung hated most wasn’t morning—it was the external-arts training after lunch.

He’d always thought his friend Bae Jonggwan’s regimen useless.

Before demons that tore trees bare-handed and smashed rock—beasts that didn’t even scratch unless you manifested Weapon Qi—what good was hardening your skin?

Worse, smearing stinking herbs on your body, then striking yourself with split bamboo and clubs—it was mortifying to watch, let alone do.

He swore he wouldn’t be goaded into that, no matter Seonu Jin’s prodding.

“I understand. That training looks too painful for Brother Bi to endure.”

“Don’t you dare bait me! I still won’t do that one!”

Seonu Jin nodded—and told Bae Jonggwan,

“Seems Brother Bi is ashamed of us. It happens. Sharing shame is something only true friends can do together, right?”

Bi Sayoung’s jaw dropped.

Bae Jonggwan was looking at him with wounded eyes.

“I—I’m not ashamed, I just…”

But Bi Sayoung was the sort who thought lying was unmanly.

And in truth—he was ashamed.

Suddenly Seonu Jin’s words sounded right.

Wasn’t a true friend—a true man—someone who wouldn’t avert his eyes like others and would share even that shame?

He had to stand.

“Damn it! Let’s do it! Together, then!”

From that day, Thirteenth Unit folk witnessed three men screaming as they slapped bare torsos with split bamboo.

Worse, Bae Jonggwan—grinning ear to ear—whipped the bamboo with bliss, laying red welts in pride. It was a sight to sour the eyes.

“Wahahaha! Together makes it easier—faster! Even fun, isn’t it? Thank you, my friends! You truly are my friends! Wahahaha!”

As bamboo cracked skin and welts swelled, Bi Sayoung regretted, from his soul, ever saying “together.”

Smack! Smack! Smack!

“Urgh! Agh! Gaaah!”

But he couldn’t quit.

To quit now would be to admit he wasn’t a true friend.

He felt close to tears.

After dinner, evening training was sparring with Captain Seol Pung and the squad.

This part, at least, Bi Sayoung was grateful for.

Where else could a pinnacle master personally cross hands and give advice?

Yet the person he learned the most from in sparring was not Seol Pung—but Seonu Jin.

Losing to Seol Pung wasn’t shocking.

He was a pinnacle master; losing was natural.

Watching Seonu Jin fight, Bi Sayoung felt it in his bones:

He was weak not because his inner power was lacking, but because he simply fought poorly.

With clear judgment and proper responses, even a second-rate could fight splendidly against a pinnacle master.

Seonu Jin proved it with his body.

It shocked both Bi Sayoung and Bae Jonggwan.

They understood why Seonu Jin had provoked Ju Taegyeong, a first-class fighter.

The man truly had confidence.

Bi Sayoung repented of all the lazy days he had excused with “our inner art is lost.”

It was like breaking from an eggshell.

And now—for the first time in so long—Bi Sayoung felt alive. Vividly, fiercely alive.