Chapter 575:
Humans need rest.
This was a fact that required no proof. No matter how robust a person might be, if they couldn’t achieve recharging through rest, they would soon break down.
People with grand ambitions often overlook this truth in their haste.
But this is a grave mistake.
In their haste, they try to reduce even their sleeping time to make more effort, but this doesn’t produce efficiency. A body that hasn’t been recharged through sleep and rest can’t display even half of its usual capabilities.
What’s truly unfortunate is that this effort-supremacism is rampant in the martial world.
Most martial artists sleep no more than two shichen a day, sustain themselves on fasting pills instead of proper meals, and grow up hearing that only through effort upon effort can they become respectable masters.
Since these are suitable anecdotes to alarm disciples or children who don’t make effort, many masters and parents emphasize effort with such words.
Those who grow up hearing such words seek the reason for their lack of improvement in their own insufficient effort. So they reduce their sleeping time and even cut down meal times, making effort upon effort.
Those who cannot make such effort think they lack perseverance and give up on becoming strong, while those who can make such effort again seek the reason for their lack of improvement in effort and increase their training intensity.
Effort-supremacism is rampant in the world. But this is an extremely strange thing.
When thinking rationally, if desired results don’t appear, one should consider the reasons from multiple angles to find solutions. But in the martial world, every reason becomes insufficient effort.
Those whose overworked bodies haven’t even had time to recover, who force themselves awake, swing their swords from dawn with eyes swollen and barely opening. What efficiency could such training have?
‘It’s a foolish thing to do.’
The person who proves how foolish this is was none other than Baek Mu-han.
Baek Mu-han had to raise Wei Yan-ho into a top-class master within the limited time of five years. Honestly, even Wei Yan-ho’s sleeping time should have been precious. But while Baek Mu-han controlled Wei Yan-ho’s sleep time, he didn’t reduce sleeping time to extremes.
There were hardly any instances of using energy circulation to recover and immediately entering harsh training again. When exhausted to near death, he always made sure to take rest to recover the body.
“Fatigue is not limited to the body. Mental fatigue is actually a bigger problem. Physical fatigue might be removable through energy circulation, but mental fatigue can only be resolved through sleep.”
Baek Mu-han emphasized rest – that was the end of it. It wasn’t worth discussing further.
Therefore, the conclusion was…
‘I’m not playing around right now.’
Wei Yan-ho felt comfort in the blanket covering his belly.
How long had it been since he’d lain on such a comfortable bed?
All people are different.
What can be the right answer for someone might be the worst wrong answer for another.
In that sense, Wei Yan-ho was very different from ordinary people. To maintain optimal condition, Wei Yan-ho was someone who needed to rest five times more than others.
‘Master also told me to rest. I’m not playing around right now. This is one step back for two steps forward, right?’
Was this an excuse?
No.
Confirming there wasn’t a single point of doubt in his heart, Wei Yan-ho embraced his pillow with a comfortable expression.
‘When it’s time to rest, you have to rest.’
Come to think of it, he’d been so unlike himself lately.
Sleeping fitfully on the road while traveling, and even after barely arriving in the Central Plains, he couldn’t rest properly and rushed all the way to Luoyang. It was remarkable that Wei Yan-ho had endured such a forced march that would be difficult even for ordinary people.
If the situation hadn’t been so urgent, he would have thrown a tantrum lying on the roadside and had plenty to spare.
‘So this much rest is natural.’
Though the problems of the Central Plains weren’t all resolved, and things were still extremely urgent… there’s also the saying to take the long way when in a hurry. So Wei Yan-ho’s rest now had justification.
Clearly it did, but…
‘This is strange.’
Something felt a bit uneasy.
Wei Yan-ho slightly opened his eyes to survey the situation.
‘There’s no reason to be uneasy.’
The environment was perfect. The thick blanket and soft bed that Wei Yan-ho liked. The window was slightly open in case he got hot while sleeping. The cool breeze seeping in made him feel refreshed.
The sunlight also didn’t come in excessively, making it just right for enjoying a nap.
So environmentally there was no problem at all…
‘Why am I uneasy?’
Could there be some uneasiness about enjoying such rest within Wei Yan-ho’s heart?
Wei Yan-ho closed his eyes and looked inward.
As his martial arts realm had reached great heights, Wei Yan-ho had become able to perfectly observe his inner self. But no matter how much he looked inward, he saw no guilt about resting.
Wei Yan-ho wasn’t that kind of person to begin with. Wei Yan-ho knew this well himself.
‘Then what’s the problem?’
Wei Yan-ho, tilting his head in puzzlement, reached out to grab the blanket and pulled it up.
‘I don’t know. I’ll sleep a bit more and think about it.’
From the moment of deciding to sleep until actually falling asleep – how much time this takes is a measure for judging an excellent lazy person. Of course, Wei Yan-ho was an incomparable lazy person under heaven, and he fell asleep in an instant.
The blowing wind was tickling Wei Yan-ho’s hair.
***
‘Hmm.’
Wei Yan-ho looked around as if it were natural.
A pure white space.
This world that Wei Yan-ho came to when he fell asleep was now all too familiar. Since leaving the cave, there hadn’t been a day he didn’t come here. It was natural if it was natural. When he slept, he naturally came here, and there wasn’t a day he didn’t sleep.
Wei Yan-ho’s head turned toward one place.
A man was sitting in meditation. Wei Yan-ho silently gazed at that back view that seemed to fill his entire field of vision.
Big.
Incomparably big.
It wasn’t that what was visible was big. What was felt was big.
Though he emanated nothing in particular, Baek Mu-han’s back always felt immense.
That back.
How much comfort had he received from that back?
When his master was always present, he didn’t know. He just thought of him as a wicked old man who only tormented him. But only after his master disappeared did he come to know.
Comfort.
What Wei Yan-ho received from his master wasn’t martial arts.
The comfort he couldn’t receive from his father, his brother, his mother, or Su-ryeon.
Someone who would accept him no matter what he did, understand him, and also scold him.
Someone he could rely on.
His master’s name was another word for comfort to him.
Only when his master no longer existed by his side did Wei Yan-ho come to know this fact. How great it was to have someone who cast shade over you.
So sometimes he came to gaze like this.
As if entranced.
At that back view he could never see again in reality.
‘Huh?’
Suddenly, Wei Yan-ho exclaimed in surprise.
His master’s back view was becoming blurry. As if it would disappear just like that.
Wei Yan-ho urgently reached out his hand.
His body moved like cutting through light to grasp his master’s shoulder.
His master slightly turned his head to look at Wei Yan-ho.
That expression was…
Infinitely wistful…
Crack!
“Kweeeeek!“
Wei Yan-ho collapsed clutching his head.
No matter how many times he got hit, this pain never seemed to become familiar. At the agony that seemed to pierce through bone and shake his brain, Wei Yan-ho rolled around on the floor.
“Aaaaak! Aaaaak!“
“Stop the dramatics! Can’t you get up right now, you brat! How dare you presumptuously put your hand on your master’s shoulder? Looking to get beaten.”
Wei Yan-ho flared up.
“It’s because I was worried, worried!”
“Woooooorried?“
Baek Mu-han filled his mouth with mockery. When that handsome face sneered, it felt twice as unpleasant.
“Who’s worrying about whom? You? About me?”
Wei Yan-ho shrank.
When put that way, there were no words to say. Wei Yan-ho worrying about Baek Mu-han was no different from a mouse worrying about a dragon.
“You were blurry, like you might disappear.”
Baek Mu-han smiled broadly as he placed his hand on the head of the sitting Wei Yan-ho.
“My disciple.”
“Yes?”
“Such a dream will never come true, so abandon that vain hope.”
“……”
“Tsk tsk, how desperate must you have been to see such illusions?”
“Gaah!“
Wei Yan-ho, who was about to rebel, took another hit and rolled on the floor. Baek Mu-han watched Wei Yan-ho and clicked his tongue as if pathetic before opening his mouth.
“You’ve gotten some strength in your belly lately, and now your head has gone bad too.”
“Hehe!“
Even in the midst of this, Wei Yan-ho took ‘gotten some strength in your belly’ as a compliment and was pleased.
“I have gotten quite strong, actually.”
“You have?”
Wei Yan-ho sprang up and stuck out his belly.
“I beat two Demonic Cult bishops to a pulp. Hurry up and praise me. No matter how much you’re my master, you can’t not praise this, right?”
“……”
Baek Mu-han sighed.
“My disciple boasts about beating mere Demonic Cult bishops. If I’d known it would be like this, I wouldn’t have raised a disciple at all.”
Wei Yan-ho flared up again.
“Everyone else says I did well, but why are you so stingy with praise, Master! Could it be that your stomach hurts because this disciple is doing too well?”
Wei Yan-ho regretted the words even as he spoke them.
Baek Mu-han’s expression had changed to one of looking at a bug.
“Praise?”
“……Yes.”
“What exactly did you do well that I should praise you?”
“I caught the Demonic Cult bishops.”
“Why is catching Demonic Cult bishops remarkable?”
“Because they’re strong.”
“Strong?”
“……”
“You mean powerful?”
“No, Master. This disciple was short-sighted.”
Wei Yan-ho completely surrendered.
Strength was a relative thing. To an ant, a rhinoceros beetle might be a monster it couldn’t possibly handle alone, but to a person, a beetle was just a bug they’d have to decide whether to kill with their finger or stomp with their foot.
To Baek Mu-han, a Demonic Cult bishop, was that level of existence.
A bug that could be crushed with a finger if he felt like it. But his disciple was whining for praise for killing that bug – how absurd would that be?
‘This is a bit unreasonable!’
Wei Yan-ho felt wronged. This had to be unfair.
He understood Baek Mu-han’s position too, but thinking this way meant there would never be anything Wei Yan-ho could be recognized for by Baek Mu-han for the rest of his life. Because there were no strong fighters in the current martial world that Baek Mu-han would acknowledge.
“Master.”
“What?”
“There’s something I want to ask.”
“Go ahead.”
Wei Yan-ho hesitated slightly.
Then Baek Mu-han, unable to overcome his impatient nature, shouted loudly.
“You say you want to ask but then keep your mouth shut! Why is your personality so hasty?”
“Ah, I’m organizing my thoughts! Why is your personality so hasty?”
“Want me to show you what impatience really looks like?”
“I was wrong.”
Wei Yan-ho smacked his lips several times, then opened his mouth as if determined.
“Please tell me honestly.”
“Fine.”
Wei Yan-ho looked straight at Baek Mu-han and opened his mouth.
“Could I ever become stronger than you, Master?”
Baek Mu-han smiled broadly.
Then he answered decisively.
“No.”
So very decisive.
