Chapter 26 - No Acupoints

Tang Wu wanted more than for Dong Bongsu to become his disciple. He wanted him to become an actual member of the Tang Family.

"Grandfather! To decide something this important on your own, without the elders' approval..."

When the words she had anticipated finally came out of Tang Wu's mouth, Tang Hwa spoke up in dismay.

Tang Wu turned toward her with a faint smile and moved his lips. At the same time, he held up the Dragon-Phoenix Golden Needles.

Believing Dong Bongsu could not hear their conversation, the two freely exchanged secrets through Sound Transmission.

But here was the thing.

They only acted that way because they knew nothing about Dong Bongsu. Being unable to hear did not mean a person could not "eavesdrop." Some people could "read" a conversation with their eyes even without hearing it.

Lip Reading.

Dong Bongsu was reading their entire conversation from the movements of Tang Wu's lips alone. Tang Hwa wore a veil, so he could not tell what she was saying, but Tang Wu was doing all the important talking anyway. Simply analyzing the man's lip movements was enough to work out what Tang Hwa was saying too.

In the end, Dong Bongsu learned everything: why Tang Wu wanted to bring him into the fold badly enough to offer him the Tang surname, and even why he had brought out the Dragon-Phoenix Golden Needles.

'So that was it?'

Keeping a protective veil over his eyes, Dong Bongsu continued analyzing their conversation from behind it.

At some point, he went further, seeing through to things even Tang Wu did not know. No—things Tang Wu could not see in the first place would be a more accurate description.

Half human, half character.

Dong Bongsu was not a complete game character, but being subject to the system of New Murim Online had given him a strange body, neither human nor game character. As a result, his physical structure was truly different from that of an ordinary person. The mysterious bodily changes this had produced were what fascinated Tang Wu and drove him to take these measures.

Tang Wu was offering Tang Hwa all sorts of analyses of Dong Bongsu's constitution, but the bottom line was that he did not know. He was simply interpreting things however he pleased despite his ignorance.

Sneering inwardly, Dong Bongsu was already mapping out how he would act next. If the other man wanted to interpret things on his own, all the better. Dong Bongsu only had to put on a show to match, and the other party would obligingly become an actor and perform his role to perfection.

It was a chilling ability.

Tang Wu was caught in two traps: the assumption that he was communicating through Sound Transmission, and the assumption that Dong Bongsu was merely a mute horse handler. Caught in that double trap, he could never have imagined Dong Bongsu possessed an ability like this.

A little later, Tang Wu and Tang Hwa's private conversation—which had not been private at all—finally ended. Its privacy existed only in their shared belief that the conversation had been theirs alone. Its lack of privacy lay in the fact that Dong Bongsu had read or reconstructed everything they said. Of course, only Dong Bongsu knew that.

By the end of the conversation, Tang Wu had persuaded Tang Hwa, leaving her no further reason to stop him. Without another interruption, she silently stepped back.

Tang Wu smiled faintly at this, then looked at Dong Bongsu again.

"I will ask you once more. Are you willing to accept the Tang Family's surname?"

Dong Bongsu had never had a reason to refuse.

Besides, now that he knew every scheme lurking in Tang Wu's mind, why would he turn down such a fine offer?

He did not hesitate. With a manufactured look of resolve in his eyes, he nodded boldly.

Unaware of the face hidden behind that false expression, Tang Wu looked thoroughly satisfied.

"Good. However, you are not yet a full member of the Tang Family. You must go to the Tang Family and prove before its elders and patriarch that you are worthy of bearing the Tang surname. You may even die in the process. Will you still do it?"

It had gone a step beyond pain so terrible he might wish for death, and become the possibility of actually dying.

'So what? That changes nothing.'

He still had no intention of refusing. He knew he would not die.

If everything Tang Wu had told Tang Hwa through Sound Transmission was true, no one in the Tang Family would reject him. No—they would be unable to. They might plot to put him in danger afterward, but they could not prevent him from joining the family, nor did they have any reason to. That was how extraordinary the information conveyed through Tang Wu's Sound Transmission had been.

Even Dong Bongsu himself had never suspected his body held such a secret.

Once again, he found New Murim Online entertaining. A "game" in which he could not let his guard down for even a moment or overlook a single thing—New Murim Online was perfectly tailored to Dong Bongsu.

For the first time in a while, a smile formed on his lips.

In that simple smile, Tang Wu sensed "Sosam's" sincerity.

Dong Bongsu's true feelings differed from the sincerity Tang Wu perceived in "Sosam," but sincerity was sincerity.

Tang Wu's cool gaze and Dong Bongsu's passionate one met fiercely in midair.

A moment later, as though he had finally made up his mind completely, Tang Wu declared,

"You are no longer a horse handler of the Danri Family. You belong to the Tang Clan, the foremost family in Sichuan."

With that, Dong Bongsu shed the shell of a horse handler.

"I will now perform the Great Ritual. Are you ready?"

When Dong Bongsu nodded once more, Tang Wu signaled with his eyes to Tang Hwa, who stood behind him. He was asking her to stand guard.

Tang Hwa bowed her head in assent and left the room.

If someone burst in during the Great Ritual, it could cause qi deviation and put them in danger. She would stand guard to keep others from approaching.

Now that the two were alone, Tang Wu approached Dong Bongsu.

"I will now perform the Great Reformation Ritual on you. It will clear your mind and restore your speech. From this moment on, close your eyes and do not move, no matter what happens. Do you understand?"

Having "heard it directly" from the man, Dong Bongsu knew that the Great Reformation Ritual was not the only thing Tang Wu intended to perform on him, but he did not particularly care. He was using Tang Wu, and Tang Wu was using him.

The difference was that he already knew what Tang Wu was thinking and what he intended to do to him, whereas Tang Wu had no idea that he knew any of it.

That alone meant the game between them was already over.

What if you knew your opponent's hand in a poker game and had a perfect poker face yourself?

It was already game over. There would be no reversal.

The opponent would merely keep playing in pursuit of that nonexistent reversal, clinging to the threadbare hope of victory.

But Dong Bongsu had already won before the game even began.

● ● ●

Tang Wu opened the case containing the Dragon-Phoenix Golden Needles. Inside lay hundreds of golden needles, each intricately engraved with dragons and phoenixes befitting their name. They varied in length and thickness, suggesting that each served a different purpose.

Dong Bongsu glanced over the Dragon-Phoenix Golden Needles, then quietly closed his eyes. Soon, he entered meditation, gradually sinking into the familiar world of nothingness.

"Whew..."

Tang Wu let out a deep sigh and slowly lifted the Dragon-Phoenix Golden Needles into the air with a technique for manipulating objects from a distance.

In truth, Tang Wu had never been so nervous in his life.

Using the Namgung Clan's wedding as an excuse, he had ventured out into Murim for the first time in a long while, only to "pick up" an unbelievable talent in Fengyang for nothing.

The Wheel-Turning Sacred Emperor Aspect, the Heavenly Yang Divine Martial Body, the Heavenly Meridian Body, the Ninth-Grade Sacred Bone, the Heavenly Martial Heart Meridian, the Purple Mist Ethereal Divine Body, the Cosmic Sacred Bone...

There were many terms for bodies exceptionally suited to learning martial arts. All came with descriptions such as once in a decade, once in a century, or even once in a millennium.

Today, however, Tang Wu had met a talent whose body rendered all such descriptions meaningless. That person was the horse handler named Sosam, sitting right before him.

Tang Wu sharpened his gaze and looked at Sosam again. Sosam had his eyes closed, immersed in a state free of all thought. Perfect. The instant Tang Wu had told him not to think, Sosam had already emptied his mind completely.

A smile once again settled on Tang Wu's lips.

Ten years? A hundred? A talent born once in a thousand years? What did any of that matter?

That boy possessed a body born for the first time since the history of Murim began. It was less conspicuous than the known constitutions, but it was unquestionably one of the finest.

The Body of No Meridians.

Sosam lacked the acupoints and pathways every human should possess. Tang Wu had not noticed it when he first saw him. He had simply considered it the ordinary body of someone who had never learned martial arts. But upon looking again, he realized that was not the case.

Sosam's body was far too "quiet." Even a person who had never learned martial arts possessed a minimum amount of qi, which naturally flowed through the network of acupoints and channels.

Yet there was no such flow anywhere in Sosam's body.

Nothingness.

There was simply nothing there. As though he were not human.

Had Tang Wu not been a master of the Tang Clan, he would not have recognized it with a single look. These were all characteristics found in jiangshi.

The only martial factions capable of creating jiangshi were the Tang Clan and the Blood Tower of The Heavenly Demon Castle. Yet even a master of the Tang Clan or the Blood Tower would not recognize Sosam's peculiarities without having made a jiangshi before.

Tang Wu had dabbled, at least a little, in every martial art and miscellaneous art passed down within the Tang Clan. Naturally, the art of creating jiangshi was among them.

The foundation of jiangshi creation was to artificially seal every acupoint and channel in a corpse. This cut off all qi circulation, blocking the flow of life qi and establishing a flow of death qi.

Sosam, however, was different. His acupoints and pathways were neither obstructed nor deliberately sealed. He had been born without them in the first place. Having no paths meant that any path created would become the path. It also meant being able to go wherever one pleased, whether it was True Qi or anything else doing the traveling.

Tang Hwa, too, had readily backed down after hearing this explanation.

Even she could see that the Body of No Meridians was an extraordinary, unparalleled gift. In the current Murim, those with talent to match it could probably be counted on one hand—if any existed at all.

Then again, who knew? There might be another talent born under the Star of Heavenly Slaughter or the Star of Godhood. Regardless of their innate gifts, those born with such destinies were fated either to imperil Murim or to save it.

Perhaps this Sosam himself had been born under the Star of Heavenly Slaughter or the Star of Godhood. That was not something Tang Wu could verify. Though his own eyes could discern the vitality and intelligence hidden deep within Dong Bongsu's eyes, he could not be certain. Once they returned to the family estate, the elders would establish and verify everything beyond his innate aptitude in Tang Wu's stead.

For now, all he needed to do was bring this remarkable find called Sosam into the Tang Family and claim him first.

Even if the boy had been born under the Cursed Killing Star, the Tang Family could dispose of him. It was no great problem. In that event, the family would earn renown for eliminating the Cursed Killing Star before it could fully manifest.

If he had been born under the Star of Godhood instead, that alone would bring the Tang Family great renown and place it at the center of orthodox Murim. If he was neither, and merely possessed the Body of No Meridians, that was good too. That talent alone would allow them to restore Ten Thousand Flower Rain, of which only the outward forms had survived for the past several centuries.

If Ten Thousand Flower Rain reappeared in Murim after hundreds of years, Murim's mighty figures would bow their heads before the Tang Family's name.

In short, if Sosam had been born under the Cursed Killing Star, he would bring renown; if under the Star of Godhood, glory to the family. Even if neither was true, his Body of No Meridians alone guaranteed the Tang Family's resurgence.

The Tang Family's ancestors must have sent him to Fengyang to open the way for the family's resurgence.

'Heh heh heh. The Tang Family's future rests at my fingertips!'

The thought made Tang Wu all the more nervous.

PA-PA-PAK!

Tang Wu's tautly poised hands finally began to move.