Chapter 99

Chapter 99

In any case, I finally decided on my routine.

Squawk.

When I heard the monstrous bird cry, I got up from my seat.

And then I ran.

I ran as hard as I could.

I ran until I couldn’t squeeze out another ounce of energy and collapsed on the spot when I reached my limit.

And then I immediately began circulating.

Of course, I wasn’t simply doing what I had been doing before. Instead, I was constantly adjusting the formula to see if I could increase my physical regeneration even a little bit more.

“Uwek!”

I spat out another glob of blood.

I suddenly wondered how much blood there would be if I pooled together every drop I had spat out during this endeavor, but I knew that was a stupid question.

There was definitely at least enough to fill a beer keg.

I wiped away the blood.

Even though my body recovered automatically, that wasn’t true of my clothes.

I’d had to learn to spit blood without getting any on my clothes. Now, I could spit without a single drop landing anywhere near me.

[FAD’s one-line comment: very impressive.]

“...”

I waited for my damaged body to recover as I let my thoughts drift, imagining what I would do after these hundred days were over.

In my imagination, I faced off against the Demon Lord of the Black Swamp. The monstrous entity overwhelmed me even in my thoughts.

Still, it wasn’t to the point that I couldn’t recover from it.

Rather, the more I imagined it, the more I felt like I was getting used to its aura. This became a form of training as well.

The authority of a demon lord...

How could I respond to this power that could turn its enemies into nothingness in an instant?

Do I Flame Dash and accelerate as fast as I can? Or should I use the flames to disturb its vision...?

When my body recovered, I stopped imagining the demon lord and began running again. When I again became exhausted, I sat down, circulated, adjusted the formula, and imagined again.

...

...

[Current Progress: 23.3%.]

...

...

Repeating a simple routine every day to become stronger.

People usually called what I was doing exercising and training.

[Current Progress: 25.9%.]

...Nnêw n0vel chapters are published on n0v/e/(lb)i(n.)co/m

...

Eventually, I lost count of how many times I had repeated this simple, familiar, and tedious work. At this point, I probably could have done it in my sleep.

I would be lying if I said the process wasn’t boring.

Of course, there were a few people who could enjoy such training... but generally, humans adapted to things at a frightening pace.

To put it another way, humans become numb to repeated stimuli and lose their enjoyment.

If this symptom worsens, the act of training itself becomes torturous.

[Current Progress: 27.1%.]

I... didn’t particularly hate training.

But that was only when I was certain that the training was helpful.

[Current Progress: 33.2%.]

The 50th day.

After spending half of my total days, I suddenly had a thought.

Was I doing this properly?

Of course, my body was constantly becoming stronger. I could now run for an hour without a problem.

However, I still wasn’t at all convinced that I was going about this the right way.

I thought about it a dozen or more times each day.

Was there a better method? Was the method I was using wrong? Was I unknowingly running in the wrong direction...?

It was on another such day.

—You trash.

Through the fog, I saw the form of my master.

“...”

Of course, I knew that he wasn’t real.

—Do you really think you are at a level where you can adjust my martial arts?

It was obviously a hallucination. To begin with, Master didn’t talk like that.

Whenever I did something stupid, his first reaction was to hit me over the head.

Then... was this one of the trials of Spirit Mountain?

Or had I just gone insane?

I’d had expectations placed upon me by my house, and I’d walked the path of those expectations.

The result had been brutal and horrible.

I’d become too familiar with failure, and even more so being ignored by others.

However...

“Maybe I am a stain on Master’s legacy... That is what I am most afraid of.”

I was familiar with not meeting people’s expectations.

But I was still afraid.

If it was anyone else, it would be fine, but at least Baek Nogwang...

I at least didn’t want to disappoint my master, the person I respected more than anyone.

What would Master think of me?

What expectations did he have for this kid named Luan Bednicker?

Was he comparing me to his other four disciples?

At the lowest point of this person called Luan Bednicker, these thoughts of inferiority still circled my heart.

It was then...

Fourth Senior Brother suddenly spoke.

[My real name is RAN-4700 Type-A.]

“...Pardon? Ah, yes, I heard from FAD.”

Despite my dull response, my senior brother continued to speak.

[I am a fourth-generation android. My original purpose was as a military unit.]

“What do you mean...?”

[My first master was a soldier. After one of his arms was cut off in a war, he retired.]

Was this... the story of Fourth Senior Brother’s past?

I couldn’t remember ever hearing about this before.

As I realized the context, I carefully said, “Were you a slave?”

I didn’t say, “like our master.”

[It was similar, but my master didn’t treat me like a slave. Even after he retired, he always sparred against me so he might be able to return to the battlefield.]

Fourth Senior Brother’s voice lowered a little. His voice was still steady, but I could sense that he was nostalgic about his past.

[My master didn’t like easy victories. He didn’t spare any effort in making me stronger. In a short amount of time, a lot of data was input into me, and I repeated the spars I lost in my mind throughout the night to create new patterns. Even still, I couldn’t defeat him. Even though he only had one arm, he was a master martial artist.]

“...”

[But one day, I suddenly thought about combining two different moves in my mind to create a new movement. My master wasn’t able to respond to it and was defeated. He was very glad, then, and he said something to me...]

“What did he say?”

[That I was now a martial artist.]

“...”

[I think that was when I was born.]

I couldn’t understand most of what my senior brother had said.

The world he had lived in seemed vastly different from mine.

However, that world still had people, and emotions were not something you understood but instead accepted.

I accepted all of my fourth senior brother’s words through his emotions.

[See, Luan. I don’t have a heart. I don’t have muscles, nor do I have blood. I don’t have an inner core, so I can’t accumulate internal energy, and since I don’t have muscles, exercising doesn’t make sense. But does that mean I cannot strive for the martial truth? Is just speaking about the martial way an unforgivable sin for me?]

“...”

[From the moment I was born, I thought about it continuously. For a long time, though, I was unable to find an answer. ‘A machine that strives for the martial path’ wasn’t recorded in any database.]

While listening, I suddenly felt that Senior Brother was smiling beyond the screen.

[At that point, I met Master, and he said this: why couldn’t I just make a martial path that doesn't care about any of that?]

“Pft.”

Although Fourth Senior Brother hadn’t attempted to sound like Master, I still imagined it in my head and ended up laughing.

[I won’t say anything about the qualifications needed to be a trailblazer. However, everyone has the right to aspire to their own martial path. Even a tree knows to lay down its roots so it won’t shake in the storm. From the way I understand it, that tree has its own truth it follows.]

“Its own truth it follows...”

[My martial truth isn’t anything grand; it’s just to never lose my heart in my pursuit of strength. Because power is always relativistic, and battles are bound to be inconsistent.]

Fourth Senior Brother spoke to me.

[Luan, what is your martial truth?]

“...”

Although it could be a question that defined me as a martial artist, I didn’t feel particularly pressured.

Senior Brother was right: martial truths didn’t need to be grand.

“My martial truth... is to improve every day, even if it’s just a little bit.”

It didn’t need to be obvious.

It didn’t mean that my body had to become stronger, that my internal energy had to intensify, that I needed to realize the formula of a technique.

Just the improvement of my mind by gaining new information was a big step forward in my growth.

And so...

“Thank you, Fourth Senior Brother.”

I felt myself take another step.