Chapter 2 The Seonwoo Clan (2)

Chapter 2: The Seonwoo Clan (2)

Upon hearing that I had deliberately taken the blame to go to the front lines, Yeon-hae looked somewhat flustered and turned away.

That look felt somehow different from my memory, leaving me uneasy.

‘What is it? What’s different?’

Back then, Yeon-ha had only kept comforting me as I cried endlessly…

Was it because I wasn’t crying this time that it felt different?

I was deep in thought about that when

The second visitor I’d been waiting for arrived.

Tap!

The visit came much sooner than I had anticipated.

Startled by his new form silently gliding down from the roof, I cried out.

“Father?!”

The second visitor was none other than my father, Seonwoo Jung.

He was staring at me with a heavy expression.

‘What is this? Even Father feels different from back then?’

Is it because I’ve changed?

The time he visited me, the look on his face as he watched me—it was completely different from my memories, and I was flustered.

Back then, he came with a resigned look and asked if I had any final requests.

Back then, I made the pathetic request, asking if he could just let me run away. Father sighed, shook his head, and simply left.

That heavy expression, that silent gaze, was completely different from the past.

As I stared at him with a tense expression, he suddenly opened his mouth with great effort and asked.

“So you truly were framed?”

My eyes widened in shock.

He must have overheard what I said to Yeonha earlier.

So he’d been here all along?

Then, could it be he’d been here all along?

Why?

Unable to answer his questions, I just stared at Father’s face. He spoke again, his voice heavy.

“Jin, I knew… you were hiding your talent and pretending to be foolish. But I didn’t know you wanted to leave the family. If only I had known sooner…”

Deep regret was etched on Father’s face as he spoke.

That expression was so unexpected it flustered me.

And from his father’s lips, which opened once more, flowed words I never imagined I would hear from him.

“I’m sorry, Jin. Because of this worthless father, your life has been ruined.”

My mind was in utter disarray.

What? What on earth is this?

All this time, Father had completely neglected me.

He never interfered with what I did, but he also never stopped my brothers and sisters or my mother from tormenting me.

As a result, I became completely isolated within the family, and I resented my father deeply for making me this way.

But what the hell is this situation?

Could it be…?

A picture I’d never imagined in my past life was now coming together in my mind.

The maternal family of my three brothers, excluding me, held immense influence within the Seonwoo clan.

Even our patriarch father always had to coordinate opinions with them.

So if Father favored one person, he couldn’t control the other maternal clans?

That’s why he had to neglect everyone, and consequently, I, without maternal relatives, had no one to protect me?

No, was neglecting me actually protecting me?

‘Then, could it be?!’

The face of my father, whom I had always resented and thus never once missed, looked new to me today.

Of course, my thoughts were merely a hypothesis, and the resentment I’d harbored for so long didn’t vanish in an instant.

But the look of deep regret on my father’s face was all too vividly real.

Father asked me.

“Is there anything you’d like to ask of me?”

Suddenly, I snapped to attention.

Whatever his true intentions were, I couldn’t let this long-awaited chance slip away.

Swallowing hard, I asked in a solemn tone.

“Would you grant me access to the family’s private library? Just for one day.”

Father looked surprised and asked back.

“The library? For just one day?”

He carefully chose his words in his mind, then spoke slowly and earnestly.

I had to persuade Father somehow to let me into the library.

“Father, I am ashamed to admit I have neglected my training and know nothing of our family’s martial arts. Before being sent to the front lines, I wish to learn even a little of our family’s martial arts.”

That was it. One of the greatest regrets from his previous life had been precisely this.

After all my direct siblings died or went missing, I somehow ended up being thrust into the role of head of the family. Yet, due to my dissolute past, I knew nothing of the Sunwoo clan’s martial arts.

So when I went to the front lines in Yunnan Province, I had to learn martial arts from the very bottom, through immense hardship.

‘And that was by stealing others’ martial arts techniques, no less.’

Memories of that arduous and sordid time surfaced.

Memories of being treated as completely useless, ignored and ostracized even by my comrades on the front lines.

Therefore, in Guizhou Province, where the great sects were absent, the Sunwu Sect, which had long been counted among the top five sects, could rise much faster than before if only they could master the Sunwu Thirteen Swords, their signature technique.

At least compared to his past life, where he had to steal martial arts techniques by watching over the shoulders of other disciples.

Father asked with a complex expression.

“You mean to say you can master martial arts in a single day, just by reading a book?”

“I believe it would be better than doing nothing.”

After a moment of thought, Father nodded.

“Very well. I’ll let you try.”

Yes!

I almost clenched my fist and let out a cheer.

Finally, I could fill the void of my past life.

But Father wasn’t finished.

“But!”

“Huh?”

Just as I tensed slightly at his sudden interruption, more unexpected words flowed from his mouth.

“Mastering the internal cultivation technique alone is extremely dangerous. I will teach you myself. Sit in the lotus position right now.”

“Huh? Yes, yes! Understood, Father!”

Though flustered, I immediately assumed the lotus position.

Then, warm energy began flowing into me from my father’s palm resting on my back, guiding me.

“What I shall impart to you is the Hunwon Muguk Gong. I will recite the incantation several times; listen carefully and memorize it all. In the beginning, there was Yin and Yang, and Chaos.”

The Primordial Chaos Ultimate Energy Technique?!

I was so shocked I nearly screamed.

The Hunwon Muguk Gong was a heart technique only the head of the Sunwoo family and the young master could learn.

So Father was now passing down the Sunwoo Clan’s supreme secret technique to me.

It should have been an incredibly thrilling and joyful moment, yet somehow, I felt strangely off.

I should have been overflowing with excitement and joy over the new martial art, but strangely, the warm heat radiating from my father’s palm touching my back felt more deeply moving.

It was so… warm.

It was the warmest feeling I had ever experienced from my family in my entire life.

***

The next day, I was granted access to the family head’s private library.

My brothers protested vehemently, saying it was absolutely impossible, but Father dismissed them, stating that if I were to die at the hands of the Mains without accomplishing anything, it would only bring dishonor to the family name.

And so, stepping into the head of the family’s private study for the first time in two lifetimes, I cracked my knuckles and grinned maliciously.

“Heh heh.”

One day is enough?

That’s plenty!

Today, I wasn’t going to practice martial arts—I was just going to memorize them.

Just cramming it into my head. That was the ability I was most confident in, after all.

As a child, I was called a prodigy because of my memory alone. After being thrown into the front lines, I had to develop that memory even further just to survive.

Since I knew no martial arts, I had to briefly observe my comrades’ techniques and learn them by imitation.

Later, Squad Leader Seolpung, impressed by my ability, gave it this name:

‘Scene Memory Technique’.

I was that human photocopier who could remember and draw even the number of leaves in the forest after just one glance.

So I could say with confidence:

‘All of you here today are destined to enter my mind. So give up quietly and come in. I’ll use you without regret, heh heh!’

The head of the household’s private library was a small room filled with bookshelves on all four sides. And most of the books there were martial arts manuals.

The thought that all those martial arts would enter my mind made me feel full, even without eating.

Of course, I couldn’t expect them all to be useful. They included everything from basics like the Three Calamities Sword Technique and Six Harmonies Fist to health exercises like the Five Golden Joy.

‘But so what? It’s a million times better than not having any to learn, like in my past life.’

First, I pulled out the Hunwon Muguk Gong I learned from Father yesterday and the family’s secret art, the Sunwoo Thirteen Swords, and began reading them carefully three times each to avoid getting the sequence mixed up.

Memorization was perfect, but the difference in understanding between the already-learned Hunyuan Wuji Gong and the completely unfamiliar Sunwoo Thirteen Swords was stark.

Honestly, he didn’t understand a single thing about the Sunwoo Thirteen Swords.

‘So learning martial arts just from some sketchy drawings and text really was nonsense after all. In those martial arts novels, people become masters just by practicing alone with a secret manual.’

Wuxia novels really were just wuxia novels.

But even so, he kept cramming martial arts techniques into his head.

I didn’t understand a thing, but I believed it would help me someday.

Time flowed by like water.

After meticulously reading half the books in the library three times over, it was already afternoon.

By then, his head was throbbing unbearably, and his body was completely spent.

‘I feel like I’m dying. I can’t push myself any further.’

Unable to endure the mental overload any longer, I decided to step outside the library for some fresh air.

As I stood up, the world spun around me.

Stumbling outside, I eventually collapsed right there on the grass in front of the library.

“Oh my, I’m dying!”

Lying flat on my back, I stared blankly up at the sky.

I felt a little better, but the thought that I still had half left made my head throb again.

Suddenly, temptation washed over me.

‘Should I just stop here?’

After all, reading it wasn’t going to help me immediately. I didn’t even understand most of it anyway.

Wasn’t mastering the Boundless Void Emptiness Technique and learning the initial moves of the Ten-Three Swords of Xianwu achievement enough?

Such temptations were swirling around in his head.

That was when it happened.

Someone’s voice reached his ears.

“Hmph! Just as I thought! What kind of martial arts does that lowly creature think he can master!”

“Exactly. That pig-like nature, slouching anywhere, seems beyond redemption.”

I suddenly looked up and saw my three brothers.

They were escorting two beautiful young ladies through the garden.

My gaze naturally drifted toward them.

Both seemed to be stunning beauties.

But while one had her eyes deeply hidden behind her bangs, giving her a slightly gloomy air, the other possessed such overwhelming beauty that just a fleeting glance made my eyes widen in awe.

I swallowed hard and suddenly compared her to the most beautiful woman I knew.

‘At that level, she wouldn’t be outdone even compared to Lady Tang, would she?’

Dang Yeo-eun, one of the leaders of the Dragon Thirteen, was a direct descendant of the Sichuan Tang Clan.

Of course, even as a direct descendant, she was practically the youngest among the Tang family’s many siblings, which is why she was deployed to the front lines. Even there, she displayed astonishing prowess with her exceptional shadow arts, lightness techniques, and poison skills, not to mention her incredible swordsmanship—unlike anything expected of a Tang family member—earning her the nickname ‘Tang Family Sword Peak’.

She was awarded the Phoenix title, an honor bestowed only upon women recognized as possessing both martial prowess and beauty, destined to lead the martial world in the future.

But to say someone was as beautiful as that young lady of the Tang clan? Even I couldn’t help but be momentarily captivated by her.

But it seemed to grate on my brothers’ eyes.

My eldest brother, Seonwoo Seong, glared at me and shouted.

“You filthy piglet, how dare you look at Miss Zhige?! My apologies for causing you discomfort, Miss Zhige.”

Miss Zhige?

Could it be Miss Zhuge Xueyu of the Heavenly Sword Peak?

I’d heard rumors that a sword prodigy had emerged in the Zhuge clan, which, despite its power and wisdom, wasn’t particularly recognized for martial arts prowess.

‘I heard the Zhuge clan is sending her around various martial arts sects to gain experience… So that’s why she came to our clan?’

Suddenly, I recalled hearing that people from the Zhuge clan were visiting around this time.

I hadn’t paid much attention, thinking it had nothing to do with me, so I hadn’t even remembered.

But regardless, I quickly averted my gaze.

I knew all too well what state men fell into when faced with a beauty.

Especially with immature fellows like my brothers—who knows what they might do to impress a beauty?

It seemed wise to hurry back to the study.

Then, the woman who was likely Miss Zhuge Xueyu asked.

“Who is that?”

My heart sank.

Hey there, young lady!

Who are you trying to kill now?

You mustn’t show interest in me!

Then the brothers scrambled to answer.

“This is my shameful third brother.”

“As you can see, he’s more pig than man.”

“Father specially gave him time to learn martial arts since he must go to the Daema Front tomorrow, yet he’s like this.”

She asked back, her expression startled.

“You’re going to the Daema Front?”

Then she looked at me again with a curious gaze.

‘Oh dear! Young Lady, please!’

I squeezed my eyes shut.

Sure enough, the brothers’ eyes turned fierce, glaring at me as if they wanted to devour me.

“He’s not someone worthy of your interest, young lady.”

“That’s right. As you can see, he’s nothing but a pig.”

“He’s merely going to pay for his sins committed on the battlefield.”

“Ah.”

Though they nodded as if understanding, their gazes never left me.

Then, as if displeased by that, the youngest, Seonwoo-gi, who had been frowning, suddenly began approaching me with a sly smile.