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Chapter 8
His face was expressionless, but there was something cold about his gaze.
Hmm… What’s with him?
He couldn’t possibly have read my mind and realized I was thinking he looked like someone who had no friends, could he?
“Tsk. Is that what you call a Taoist? He’s nothing but a street thug.”
But right at that moment, Maeng Ryeongji’s voice suddenly cut in.
As Eunhyun passed right beside us, Maeng Ryeongji deliberately spoke loudly enough for him to hear.
Yikes. If she thinks his attacks were too cruel, fine.
Did she really have to criticize him to his face?
I turned to look at Maeng Ryeongji.
Her expression was quite fierce.
Oh no. If she saw me, then Eunhyun must have noticed that Maeng Ryeongji was glaring at him, too.
The training ground was still quite noisy because of the cheers for the successful applicants and the people who had stayed to watch the rest of the entrance examination.
So I hoped Eunhyun either hadn’t heard Maeng Ryeongji’s comment or would simply pretend he hadn’t heard it.
But—
“…”
He suddenly stopped.
Then he turned around and looked directly at us.
The same indifferent gaze he had shown while relentlessly attacking his opponents on the sparring platform swept over us.
Or rather, it swept over Maeng Ryeongji.
…Oh.
Being glared at by a handsome guy feels strangely unpleasant.
“What? What are you looking at?”
Maeng Ryeongji spoke rudely.
You were the one who started it!
“Are you cowards from beyond the borders?”
Eunhyun coldly spat out the words.
“…?”
Why is he suddenly calling us cowards?
It sounded like an insult, but I couldn’t understand exactly what he meant, so I only tilted my head.
“Tsk.”
He looked at the tiger skin draped over Maeng Ryeongji’s shoulders and gave a mocking laugh.
Ah.
Was he insulting her because of where she came from?
The Central Plains martial world had, for a very long time, deliberately kept its distance from the forces beyond the borders.
There were even quite a few people who simply dismissed them as barbarians.
In fact, even the name Southern Barbarian Beast Palace contained the word “barbarian.”
Anyway, it seemed that by calling them cowards, Eunhyun was trying to mock them for having remained isolated from the Central Plains and joining the War Between the Orthodox and Unorthodox Factions late.
Honestly, if it were me, I probably would have said something much worse.
So I wasn’t even particularly offended.
“What kind of bullshit…”
“I can tell what sort you are.”
His expression was certainly irritating.
“You bastard!”
Maeng Ryeongji didn’t seem to understand exactly what he had said.
But she clearly realized that he had insulted her.
She suddenly became furious and grabbed Eunhyun.
“Let’s see if you can stay that relaxed in front of my axes!”
She distorted her face as though she were about to pull out her axes right then and there.
Eunhyun silently placed his right hand on his sword.
…Huh?
Are they actually going to fight?
But as I watched, the atmosphere gradually became more and more serious.
Do they really need to draw their weapons and fight over this?
Even if Eunhyun’s attacks had been too harsh, he hadn’t actually injured Maeng Ryeongji.
So I couldn’t understand why she had provoked him with insults like “street thug.”
And Eunhyun could have simply ignored her and pretended he hadn’t heard anything.
Why was he accepting the challenge when he had another match coming up soon?
No… Well, okay.
They have their pride, too.
I remembered that they were both still only in their mid-to-late teens.
Thinking back, even in my previous life, there were sometimes boys in middle or high school who would fight like this.
They were the kind of guys who acted cocky because they thought they were important.
Once someone provoked them and they lowered their voices in that intimidating way, it was difficult for them to back down.
They thought that if they backed away at that point, they would look weak and everyone would look down on them afterward.
But if nobody stopped them, they would end up fighting even if they had to grab each other’s hair.
Ironically, the people actually involved in the argument secretly hoped that another student would intervene or call a teacher.
“…”
Unfortunately, the martial arts instructors only glanced over at us with interest.
They showed absolutely no intention of stopping the fight.
Hmm.
If someone I’ve already become friends with gets marked as a troublemaker before we’ve even entered the academy, that won’t be good for me either.
And I definitely didn’t want to spend the rest of my time here receiving Eunhyun’s hostility simply because I was always with Maeng Ryeongji.
Oh well. I can’t help it.
We’re friends now, so I’ll stop them myself.
I stepped between Maeng Ryeongji and Eunhyun, who were glaring fiercely at each other.
“Both of you, calm down.”
I placed a hand on each of their shoulders and separated them.
“…?!”
Wait.
Why is this guy even circulating internal energy into his shoulders?
Still, he wasn’t seriously resisting me.
He had only instinctively pushed back once.
So the two of them stepped back several paces, looking somewhat surprised.
Ah.
So I guess they secretly wanted someone to stop them after all.
Eunhyun blinked with a bewildered expression.
Maeng Ryeongji also moved her lips as if she wanted to say something.
If they were going to stop this quickly anyway, why bother fighting in the first place?
“Ahem.”
Quite a few people were staring at us because Maeng Ryeongji had been shouting loudly earlier.
How should I scold them?
If I reprimanded them too loudly in front of everyone, both of them would probably be embarrassed.
So I quietly scolded Maeng Ryeongji first.
“That’s enough. You were the one who started by using harsh words.”
Maeng Ryeongji, who had been staring blankly for a moment, spoke.
“Suryeo… uh, wow… What was that? Is that some secret technique of the Ice Palace?”
What is she talking about?
Maybe she didn’t know what to say.
She waved her hands awkwardly in the air and started talking nonsense.
“It’s not a secret technique.”
I explained that if she wanted to criticize someone as a martial artist, she should first try speaking to them politely at least once.
And that picking a fight with someone who hadn’t directly attacked her or committed some truly outrageous act was exactly the behavior of a street thug who picked fights in inns.
“Uh… Yeah. I wasn’t acting like a proper martial artist…”
Maeng Ryeongji answered somewhat awkwardly.
Eunhyun heard that too, right?
That basically meant she admitted she was wrong.
Eunhyun stood awkwardly, touching the shoulder where my hand had rested.
I didn’t particularly want to start a conversation with him.
But if I only scolded Maeng Ryeongji, it wouldn’t look very fair.
So I decided to say something to Eunhyun as well.
After all, beating someone who was crawling away with internal energy was a little too much.
“Um… Taoist of Mount Hua?”
“Ice Palace…”
“I’m Seol Suryeo. We’ll soon be classmates, so can we speak casually?”
“…As you wish.”
Huh?
He’s speaking politely to me?
Perhaps because Maeng Ryeongji had been rude first, he had simply returned the same treatment.
Since he was showing me basic courtesy, I spoke to him more gently.
“Ryeongji was a little too harsh with her words, wasn’t she? She didn’t mean to insult your sect.”
“…”
“You heard her say that she was sorry and that she hadn’t acted like a proper martial artist, right? I’ll apologize on her behalf as well.”
I subtly added my own apology to Maeng Ryeongji’s words and tried to mediate between them.
“…?”
Eunhyun’s eyes trembled.
He looked like he had never expected me to apologize.
His hand had left the hilt of his sword, but his reaction was still ambiguous.
Can’t you just say it’s okay?
Eunhyun only blinked while glancing awkwardly between my face and my hand.
“Ryeongji meant that your attacks were too harsh.”
I added another explanation.
He looked genuinely confused.
I had thought it was strange that he didn’t seem like someone who enjoyed bullying the weak.
So perhaps he really hadn’t realized how rough his attacks had looked?
“I know you weren’t breaking the rules of the entrance examination. From your point of view, perhaps giving every opponent your best was simply a matter of showing them respect.”
“Ah…”
“But as you saw, the other applicants aren’t all as strong as you.”
“…”
“Because you completely crushed opponents who were much weaker than you, Ryeongji misunderstood it as you deliberately being cruel.”
Personally, I had never really thought that Eunhyun had some genuinely bad habit of drawing blood from people just because he enjoyed it.
Perhaps he had simply put himself in the other person’s position.
If someone stronger than you went easy on you, you might find that insulting.
“…I understand.”
He didn’t argue.
Instead, he gave a small nod, as if he had understood what I meant.
Unlike when Maeng Ryeongji had suddenly picked a fight with him, he seemed perfectly capable of understanding when someone explained things calmly.
I wonder if that was enough to satisfy Maeng Ryeongji.
I gave the blinking Eunhyun a small wink.
Then I put my arm around Maeng Ryeongji’s shoulder.
“Let’s go. You can settle the score later during class.”
I gave her a big grin.
Only then did Maeng Ryeongji seem to snap out of it.
She burst into her usual hearty laughter.
“…Y-yeah! Good! If I’m with you, we’ll really be able to overwhelm those Nine Sect guys! Hahaha!”
Overwhelm them, huh…
If there are theoretical subjects, I’m pretty confident I can crush those.
Maeng Ryeongji had looked dissatisfied when I apologized to Eunhyun on her behalf.
But after I soothed her a little, she quickly returned to her cheerful mood and excitedly waved her fist in the air.
“I’ll see you at the entrance ceremony.”
Eunhyun still had several more matches to fight, so it was probably better for us to leave first.
I waved at him and took a few steps back.
“Oh…”
“What? They’re not going to fight?”
Yes, yes. We’re not fighting.
Please just continue watching the entrance examination.
I had finally managed to settle everything.
Or so I thought.
“Kahahaha!”
Someone who had arrived only afterward suddenly let out a booming laugh.
