When I returned home, Soo-oh was sprawled out on the yard in a starfish position.
Cheonma sat quietly on the porch, waving his hand at me.
“How long will it take for him to grow to Cheonma’s level?”
Debating whether to ignore Soo-oh, who was pretending to be asleep with her eyes closed on the floor, I decided to ask Cheonma.
“If she does it properly, it will take at least 40 years.”
Cheonma pondered my words for a moment and immediately provided his answer. Forty years? Is that how long it takes? By then, Cheonma would be even stronger.
“Gap!”
“Yeah, no. Lie down again.”
Boom.
A light popping sound filled the air, and just then, as Soo-oh raised her head to avoid Cheonma’s gaze, she got hit in the stomach. She had aimed to jump up and charge with a steel sword from her original spot but ended up collapsing back to the floor after taking a blow to her solar plexus.
“What did you shoot?”
“Qi. You can’t sense it at all?”
“No.”
Based on all the information I’ve gathered so far, it seems I’m supposed to not be able to feel it. However, I realized that if a huge monster were to shove me in, it might be possible. Of course, the price would be that the monster gets depleted as fuel!
“I couldn’t sense the energy from that Tongcheon guy either.”
“That’s right.”
Now that I think about it, he too wasn’t originally born in this world but was someone from another world who crossed over here.
I wonder if there’s a place somewhere I don’t know about where worlds clash? If I ever get to such a place, I might meet those fighting with glass bottles, right?
I’m looking forward to it.
If I can get close to them, I learned I could even control them. In other words, if I can get into that fighting arena, it means I’ll be able to soak up a ton of warmth.
Like a plague, I’ll rack up warmth.
If there’s a lot, it will surely be warm.
Hehe.
Ahem. No, let’s not indulge in too warm of fantasies. It’s only making it colder.
“I really don’t know what you are.”
I sat next to Cheonma, who was gazing at me intently. Then, relating to her from a human perspective, I spoke.
“You called me. Unfortunately.”
It’s a monster that shouldn’t be called by a person. It will do anything for warmth. Even now, I’m deliberately advertising my house’s location to many people to shake up the Cheonma Church, summoning Gumi Mil and Oh Myeong-seong.
I have to endure that. After all, they held me captive for four years, right?
Yet Cheonma crossed her legs and rested her chin on her hand.
“That’s not for you to decide. From the start, no one here feels that meeting you has brought them misfortune.”
Soo-oh, who had crawled over to my feet, jumped onto my back. Of course, I could see everything from the dual perspectives of Soo-oh and Cheonma, but I just let it be.
“Me too!”
The kid was all dirty from the dirt and sand. How do I wash this off?
I held Soo-oh’s face, which was rising beside me, and pressed it lightly.
“Wait, wait! No, Choseol, we weren’t counting like this!”
I wasn’t pressing hard, but rather pressing on the tender parts. And I’m significantly stronger, too.
Have I really forgotten all the housework and separate workouts I’ve done until now?
“Soo-oh. You smell.”
After I said that and released my hand, Soo-oh hurriedly stepped back and sniffed her clothes before grimacing.
“I can’t help the smell of sweat!”
“You avoided me because you said I stink?”
Recalling the event from just moments ago, Soo-oh took a guilty step backward, wearing a troubled expression.
“That’s cowardly! That’s different!”
“While we’re at it, go fill a jug with water from the cliff.”
When I suggested she fetch some water while washing up, Soo-oh grumbled and headed to the kitchen. She then picked up a large jug from the kitchen and hopped straight off the cliff.
For an ordinary person, that would absolutely mean splattering, but Soo-oh managed to safely land on the ground by catching her footing against the cliff a few times to slow her descent.
And that jug, in comparison to her, was enormous.
The Qi grants a person superhuman strength.
I’m curious about where such power comes from. The gap between those who can use Qi and those who can’t is immense.
So, the Murim, a society of extraordinary beings, coexists alongside the ordinary human world.
Thinking calmly, this place is indeed strange.
The physical capabilities differ to the level of being completely different creatures, yet it’s not passed down genetically; it’s based on the knowledge of martial arts.
To me, it seems like an informational life form of martial arts coexisting with humans.
Of course, bloodlines that have practiced the same martial arts for a long time benefit through co-evolution with that information life form, but it doesn’t mean that those who don’t have the lineage can’t learn.
So, the area where humans coexist with that informational life form is the Murim, while those who can’t are seemingly in the ordinary human world.
The reason I started thinking this way is because of the information I gained from Daegon.
Daegon himself doesn’t have an ordinary body. Very long ago, he did, but then he became a god in his original world and escaped from a physical form, existing solely as a spirit.
But then again, he could no longer adapt well to reality. In having a strong influence on reality, he also had to accept too many changes from it.
If we were to put it in gaming terms, it’s like increasing attack power while lowering defense.
So he settled at a point somewhat removed from reality. If necessary, he conveys messages through his limbs or resides in a body like Choseol to enter reality.
I thought this was similar to martial arts.
Considering that there are martial arts that cause one to lose their ego, becoming stronger by having something powerful come down on their bodies doesn’t seem very different at all.
As I was organizing these sudden thoughts, Cheonma was looking at me, smiling.
“What is it?”
“Unlike the way you think of yourself as a monster, you look like that child’s mother.”
If I appear human, it means my disguise is working well. Presenting myself as human while being unaware of it is certainly rewarding.
But wait.
“Mother? No, at the very least, a friend, right? Soo-oh’s parents are both alive, I think.”
I know their location as well. While I might not know the exact path since I fainted while Soo-oh was being dragged away, I have an idea of where they are.
Combining backgrounds I’ve seen when Soo-oh was younger, especially with the mountains nearby, it’s not hard to guess the location.
At my words, Cheonma’s expression turned serious.
“So, you plan to leave Soo-oh behind so easily?”
Ah, now that I mention it, when I went to the village, Soo-oh consulted Cheonma. In four years, I’ll leave Soo-oh behind. The fact that a child consults a teacher means their relationship is good, so I shrugged it off.
And the way it’s worded as if I’m abandoning her is a misunderstanding.
“It’s not easy.”
But I shook my head. It’s not because I’m leaving lightly. We’re not family, but we do have a close relationship like family.
“What’s more important is something else.”
“Warmth, right?”
“Yeah.”
Cheonma’s face briefly flashed understanding. She’s also experienced the coldness I feel.
Cheonma straightened up.
And she sat facing me, cautiously asking,
“That day. When that Tongcheon guy transformed into a monster, you said it was warm.”
Huh?
Wait a moment. Back then, I was genuinely thrilled, so I lost focus. I have no idea what Cheonma saw me like then.
I don’t recall what kind of state I was in either.
Ahhhh.
What should I do?
But truly, Daegon was warm. It felt like standing naked in the middle of Antarctica, getting a hand warmer for a brief moment, then stepping into a hot spring.
My entire body relaxed, the heat felt blissful.
The problem was that he’d pull me back out of the hot spring and toss me back into the middle of Antarctica, so I almost went insane. But somehow, I managed to keep my sanity.
“Still cold?”
At that question, I nodded.
Honestly, if I were to say it, it felt like I’d spill everything out if I opened my mouth, so I merely nodded.
That should suffice.
Warmth is fleeting, while coldness is eternal. The cold doesn’t remain the same; perceptually, it worsens over time. It continuously becomes colder without the nerves failing.
They say if a person gets too cold, their brain breaks down, causing them to feel the cold as warmth and stripping off their clothes, but that doesn’t happen to me.
Every day, every moment, I feel increasingly colder.
At times like this, I even envy the dead monsters who taunted me…
No, let’s not think about that.
Then Cheonma asked me,
“How can you feel warm?”
Hmm. Hmmm.
Well, I could just say that if Cheonma goes out into the Murim and slaughters people, she’d make me warm, but I swallowed those words down.
Yes.
I have to maintain the rules. If I ever let go even once, I wouldn’t have the confidence to grasp it again.
If I don’t keep it up obsessively, it’ll be impossible to return to how things once were.
It’s not a matter of who’s watching; it’s an issue of whether I can endure.
I can clearly visualize the future of descending into a single-minded creature craving warmth, eventually ending up unable to go anywhere.
Even the warmth that occasionally flickers seems to vanish into a clear future.
If there’s intelligence, one can anticipate what lies ahead.
So, I must continue to shout that I love freedom. Strictly speaking, it’s a freedom without responsibility, so rather than calling it freedom, it’s more like indulgence. But doesn’t “indulgence” sound bad?
“Cheonma.”
“Speak.”
“You should live freely. Ignore my wishes. You don’t need to have any of that. You don’t need anyone to understand. Just do what you wish.”
I believe if infinite freedom is given, humans will endlessly live while killing one another.
With that, I will divide myself.
Thus, warmth will continuously come to me.
“If that wish is what moves for your sake?”
Cheonma said as she quietly observed my expression, prompting me to shake my head again. I quoted Cheonma’s own words.
“Don’t move for the sake of having nothing. Do you remember Jeonyang?”
At the mention of the name of the man she loved, her expression hardened.
This is certain.
“I want both you and Soo-oh to live doing what you want.”
Only then.
Can I feel warm.
At my response, Cheonma let out a deep sigh and announced her intent to take her leave, returning to the Cheonma Church Main Hall. A fleeting thought crossed my mind, questioning whether mentioning the dead was too much.
But this is right.
I held my breath and waited, pretending not to acknowledge Soo-oh, who was listening to our conversation behind the house.
