Jin Cheon-hee knew intuitively that Tang Ah would be a formidable opponent. This would be a fight on a completely different level from anyone he had faced before.

Phantom Archer, acting as referee, announced, “Tang Ah of the Sichuan Tang Clan! Weapons: iron whip and hidden weapons! Jin Cheon-hee of the White Qilin Medical Pavilion! Weapon: Ice Clarity Sword! Begin!”

The instant Phantom Archer finished speaking, Jin Cheon-hee activated his internal energy. The world around him seemed to slow down.

Profound Primordial Complete Foundation Divine Art. Thought Acceleration.

The divine art, which abnormally developed the brain, dramatically sped up his thinking process during combat. This had the sensory effect of making his surroundings feel as if they were moving in slow motion. It was thanks to this very art that Jin Cheon-hee had been able to dodge the flurry of fists from all those wooden dummies.

‘I just have to figure out how to deal with the attacks I can see but can’t dodge.’

Of course, accelerated thoughts didn’t mean he was invincible. Among the dummies’ attacks, there were combinations that were impossible to react to, even if he saw them coming. But short of those, he could avoid most ordinary attacks.

‘This is how I beat the Three Murderous Tracking Rats so easily, too.’

They had boasted that the three of them together could defeat a Peak Realm master, but against Jin Cheon-hee, who could read their moves in advance, they were at a disadvantage.

‘Hidden weapons and a whip. I have no experience against this kind of martial art. I should start cautiously.’

Jin Cheon-hee initiated a light, probing attack.

Supreme Unity Immortal Severing Sword. First Form: Path of the Immortal Cloud!

It was, unmistakably, a thrust, but the movement of his sword hand was as fluid as a cloud. It looked simple, but hidden within the single thrust were six potential variations. The moment it made contact with an opponent’s weapon, the form would flow into one of those six variations. And it wasn’t just versatile; it was fast as lightning.

“Ooh, impressive,” Namgung Woon murmured, watching intently.

‘Alright, let’s see how she responds to this jab.’

The moment he thrust the sword, something shot from Tang Ah’s hand, moving so fast that it looked quick even to Jin Cheon-hee’s accelerated senses.

‘A snake…?’

No, it was the whip that had been coiled around her arm, hidden beneath her sleeve.

KAGANG!

A heavy, solid force met his blade. In that same instant, the whip tried to coil around his sword and bind it. Jin Cheon-hee sensed the movement and immediately executed a variation, to pull his sword free.

“Tsk! Most people are finished in that first exchange,” Tang Ah clicked her tongue. The whip snaked back, coiling protectively around her body.

“That’s a shame for Lady Tang,” Namgung Woon commented. “To have her first strike blocked by Little Brother, who has only been training for two years.”

“What? Two years?!” Tang Ah shot Jin Cheon-hee a shocked glare. Namgung Yeon, having overheard, also looked surprised.

“That’s what I heard. Is that right, Little Brother? Has it really only been two years?”

Jin Cheon-hee didn’t answer. A single bead of cold sweat trickled down his temple. ‘That was just a brief clash, but my wrist is still ringing. So this is the power of someone who has trained in martial arts since before they could walk.’

He had never felt the true, overwhelming power of a great family’s legacy like this.

‘And a whip… I have zero experience against this. ‘Unfamiliar’ can also mean ‘overwhelmingly strong’.’

Her claim of finishing opponents in one exchange suddenly felt very real. If it weren’t for the Profound Primordial Complete Foundation Divine Art, he would have been utterly unable to react.

She grinned. “We may be a family of hidden weapons, but our other martial arts are nothing to scoff at, you know. Today, my unsealed Black Flaming Dragon will be sated with blood. This will be fun. Kekekekeke!”

She covered one eye with her hand and cackled. Namgung Woon watched her with a look of profound pity and muttered under his breath, “Tang Ah, why are you racking up so much karmic debt for your future self? You’re going to end up just like all the other Tang Clan elders…”

“Kekeke, kehahahaha!”

She’s going to be kicking her blankets. She is definitely going to be kicking her blankets. One day, she would be blindsided by the sudden, cringing shame of her youth, and she would blame the Tang Clan’s martial arts as she tore her hair out.

But for now, that day was far off. Her adolescent brain was thoroughly under the control of hormones and the Tang Clan’s unique internal energy.

Jin Cheon-hee, however, remained calm.

‘She doesn’t seem to have lost her sanity to a demonic art. Is this a side effect of the Tang Clan’s internal energy?’

He had, surprisingly, diagnosed her perfectly.

‘On Earth, kids around her age were the ones who’d throw tantrums, saying they were done with pediatrics and demanding to be sent to a general surgeon.’

Children with chronic illnesses often had to visit the pediatric wing for their entire childhood. When they were little, they didn’t mind. But as they got older, a time would come when they’d be mortified to be sitting in a waiting room full of toddlers. That age was, typically, right around Tang Ah’s. The ‘storm and stress’ period of adolescence. They would be so embarrassed they’d forcibly drag their parents to a different department.

‘Come to think of it, I don’t remember a “Tang Ah” in the novel. Is it a childhood name, or a title?’

A whip-wielding Tang Clan master had appeared, but was only mentioned by a title, so it was hard to be sure if it was the same person. The novel didn’t have illustrations, and trying to confirm an identity from just a few lines of text was next to impossible.

‘Let’s change my line of thinking. How was the whip described in the novel?’

The whip. In reality, it wasn’t a weapon with more killing power than a sword or spear. But in the Wuxia world, it was said that one could use internal energy to control it as if it were alive. In fact, one of the Ten Great Masters of the Murim was the ‘Blood Whip Queen’. That person was one of the ten strongest in the world.

‘I have no idea if this girl is the Blood Whip Queen.’

In any case, the whip was an incredibly powerful weapon. And if she was… then he was currently facing a future top-ten master.

‘It’s not just that I have little experience sparring against anyone… this is extremely tricky. My only hope is the Profound Primordial Complete Foundation Divine Art.’

The second great benefit of the art: an overwhelming eidetic memory. With it, he could rapidly recall the novel’s contents and, more importantly, memorize his opponent’s attack patterns and respond on the fly. This was why the Zhuge Clan members had always been able to develop counters to other martial arts so quickly.

‘For now, I’ll stall for time!’

Jin Cheon-hee pulled his sword back into a defensive stance.

“Not coming? Then here I come!” Tang Ah lunged.

Jin Cheon-hee began to parry and block, weathering her storm of attacks. Hidden weapons zipped through the gaps in her whip strikes.

Kagagang!

Every time he deflected one, gasps of admiration erupted from the observers. Then, a cloud of mist sprayed from her mouth.

Paralysis poison.

‘This is one of those ‘see it coming but can’t dodge it’ situations, isn’t it?’

The wooden dummies’ attacks flashed in his mind. If he dodged the whip, he’d be hit by the hidden weapons. If he blocked, he’d be hit by the poison mist.

He circulated his Five-Elemental Cultivation Art to detoxify, but the famed Tang Clan poison was far more complex than he had anticipated.

‘In that case, I attack.’

Jin Cheon-hee switched his sword to his other hand, instantly shifting from pure defense to offense. Tang Ah hadn’t expected this; her eyes widened. He successfully parried her whip and launched a sword-form at her throat. If it connected, it was over.

He expected his Master to intervene before it landed, but Zhuge Rin was just watching silently, a faint smile on his lips.

‘Master…?’

In that moment of hesitation, his arm wouldn’t move.

‘Huh?’

His body creaked. His nerves weren’t responding. His stiffening limbs refused his commands and froze. He couldn’t feel anything; it was as if his arm belonged to someone else.

Across from him, Tang Ah cackled. “Kekekeke. Has my family’s darkness finally begun to consume the Little White Dragon? That took a while.”

‘Poison? Was just circulating my qi not enough to detoxify it?’

As his body locked up, his Master’s voice rang out. “There is no need to be disappointed. To draw out several hundred exchanges from the Tang Clan’s finest new talent, with only two years of training… and in your very first real duel. I am proud.”

With those words of praise, Tang Ah’s iron whip slammed into him.

“Wail, my Black Flaming Dragon!”

BAAAAAAK!

Jin Cheon-hee’s body was sent flying. Victorious, Tang Ah roared in frustration, “Keuaaaak! That was really only two years?!”

Jin Cheon-hee’s final counter-attack had made her heart stop. If the Tang Clan’s paralysis poison had been even a fraction of a second slower, she would have been the one who lost.

“Hak, heok…” Tang Ah panted, catching her breath. “It’s not really two years… is it, Divine Physician?”

Zhuge Rin just smiled his sly, unreadable smile. “It is indeed two years. As for practical experience, this would be his third time, I suppose? The first was escaping the men in black to save the Beggar’s Sect’s former Faction Leader. The second was his journeying the Murim against the rabble from the Hao Sect.”

Hearing the truth from the Divine Physician’s own lips, everyone was struck dumb. Even Namgung Woon, who had been the one to mention the two years, was gaping.

“I… I knew it, but I didn’t know it was like that. So this was, for all intents and purposes, his first duel?”

Jin Cheon-hee pushed himself to his feet. He had already detoxified the paralysis poison. Seeing this, Tang Ah was even more shocked.

“I used enough to take down an elephant! How did he break it down that fast?!”

Namgung Woon said, “It is… strange. You can explain the internal energy with elixirs, but his forms, his judgment… none of it looked like a first fight.”

“I lost, Master,” Jin Cheon-hee said, rubbing his head.

“See? I told you it would be a good experience. Hahaha.”

“I think you were right. It’s frustrating that I lost, though.”

You were actually trying to win? Tang Ah thought, relieved she hadn’t held back. If she had lost here, it would have been such a humiliation that her clan would have dragged her home for closed-door training.

Jin Cheon-hee, on the other hand, felt his mind clear.

‘Ah! The wooden dummies! I found the answer!’

How to deal with an attack you can see but can’t dodge.

He clenched and unclenched his fists. A short, sharp burst of enlightenment shot down his spine. He used the Profound Primordial Complete Foundation Divine Art to memorize this feeling, this breakthrough, in its entirety.

His Master said to him, “You’ve found something, haven’t you.”

“Yes!”

“It seems Yoo Ho will have his work cut out for him, then, if he’s to train your external arts.”

Jin Cheon-hee knew exactly what that meant.

‘I won’t be beaten by those wooden dummies like that anymore!’

And just as he’d predicted, he became able to safely navigate the dummies’ combination attacks, and in time, succeeded in destroying all three with a real sword.

Yoo Ho, for his part, ground his teeth and got to work repairing and upgrading the wooden dummies. External arts, after all, could only be improved by getting hit. This situation, where he had to beat Jin Cheon-hee, suited his own interests just fine.