Chapter 11. Dream Awakening (11)
Drip-drip!
The two buckets of water that he carried on each side of a yoke were indeed heavy; yet, in spite of that, he hadn't spilled a single drop in the past. Now, however, water continued to spill out.
'No way!'
Woo-Moon concentrated, being careful not to move his upper body and arms too much. Tensing his arms up, he worked on the Divine Phantasm Step with just his lower body.
It was extremely difficult for him to keep his upper body aligned with his core properly while practicing this footwork he was yet to master. In truth, even those who had mastered it wouldn't have been able to do such a task easily.
By the time Woo-Moon arrived at the inn, he had spilled more than half of the water in the buckets, and his clothes were already soaked.
"Come on..." Woo-Moon frowned, and his mood dampened. It only lasted for a moment, though. Soon after, he poured the remaining water into a large tank and ran back to the stream.
"I'm going to do it right this time!" With determination, Woo-Moon filled the buckets with water.
Although he kept his shoulders tense, trying to maintain balance as he practiced, the water still moved as he moved to the side.
"Eek!" He momentarily shifted his weight to his upper body.
Splash!
As he seemingly exerted too much strength on one side, the water in the opposite bucket flowed out.
'This is harder than I thought.'
Woo-Moon thus practiced his footwork while carrying water buckets. By his fifth and sixth attempts, the amount of water left in the buckets had increased significantly compared to his first try. The more he practiced, the better his sense of balance and upper body stability became.
When he opened his eyes early in the morning, Dae-Woong smiled pleasantly at the thought that his son was already up and working.
"Son! Where are you?" he called Woo-Moon.
There was no answer.
'That's weird. I thought he'd be cleaning at this hour.'
Finding it strange, Dae-Woong went out the inn's back door, where he found Woo-Moon.
He couldn't help but find the scene strange. His son was soaked like a drowned mouse, and he was moving in a weird way as he carried two buckets of water.
'What's he doing? Why is he walking sideways and crossing his feet like that? And why does he look so blurry? It doesn't seem to be foggy this morning.'
He initially thought that there was some fog outside, but then he realized that only Woo-Moon looked distorted and he could see the surroundings clearly.
Dae-Woong looked as if he didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the scene.
"Woo-Moon! What are you doing now?"
Woo-Moon was completely focused on his footwork, so his father's shout startled him.
"Father!"
Dae-Woong grabbed Woo-Moon's shoulders and shook him. "Are you alright? What are you doing? You've just gotten out of your foolish state, and now you're starting to do crazy things? What's wrong with you, punk?!"
"No, Father. That's not it..." Not knowing what to say, Woo-Moon was at a loss.
'Should I tell him I'm studying martial arts?'
However, Woo-Moon suddenly remembered the time when his brother Woo-Gang left for the Mount Hua Sect. It made his mother, Baek Jin-Jin, very unhappy, upset, and worried. At that time, she said there was nothing good about being a martial artist and joining the murim. If he were to tell them he had been studying martial arts, he was certain that Jin-Jin would be deeply saddened.
"I have to keep this under wraps for now. It's not the nicest thing to do, but at least...'
"Don't worry. I'm just bored, not crazy. I soaked my clothes with water on purpose, it's getting hot," Woo-Moon said after organizing his thoughts for a moment.
"Because you were bored? That's why you were walking like that?"
"Yes, Father."
Dae-Woong doubted it, but it wasn't like it didn't make sense at all. He had also played a lot of weird pranks when he was young.
'No, walking like that just because he's bored isn't normal. That's just making things harder for him. And he nearly spilled all the water... Tsk.'
Seeing Woo-Moon's blurry figure made Dae-Woong concerned. He thought the old daoist had cursed his son because he sold off the landscape painting.
"Are you okay? Did you have any nightmares last night?"
"Yes. Why?"
"You were moving in a really weird way earlier, you almost looked blurry. I was wondering if a ghost possessed you or something. Are you sure you didn't have a nightmare? Do you feel chilly?"
"I'm fine, dad. What about you? Have you been getting enough rest lately? You just woke up from your sleep and you're already saying you saw a ghost."
"Is that so?"
"How can I look blurry? I'm not a ghost, dad. Maybe it's just your eyesight becoming worse."
Dae-Woong responded loudly. "What are you talking about, punk?! Your father is still in his prime! Stop treating me like an old man?"
"But why do you say that I looked blurry, then?"
A ghost possessing his son was definitely a ridiculous idea to consider.
"Well, I guess I'm still half asleep and my eyes played a prank on me."
"That's probably it. Now please get out of the way, I'm going to work."
"Oh, got it."
Leaving behind Dae-Woong, who was still looking at him with his head tilted in puzzlement, Woo-Moon poured the water into the large water tank behind the inn.
'Since I'm already running late, I should clean up as quickly as I can.'
Woo-Moon finished his morning work in a hurry and headed to the blacksmith's shop.
"Mister Choo, I'm here!"
"Huh! Why did you come back when I told you not to bother?"
The first person to greet Woo-Moon was Min-Sang.
'He's not my brother, so I can't beat him up,' Woo-Moon thought, going into the blacksmith's shop with a smile on his face. There were still things to learn from Min-Sang, so Woo-Moon was trying to please him as much as he could.
"Oh, you're already here, Woo-Moon."
"Yes, sir."
Mr. Choo greeted Woo-Moon as he fired up the forge.
"Well, you're going to start working with the hammer today, aren't you? Here, take it."
Woo-Moon picked up the hammer.
"Min-Sang, teach him how to make a sickle."
"Wait. I want to make a sword," Woo-Moon replied.
Mr. Choo stared at Woo-Moon. "You can't make a sword without knowing how to make hoes and sickles first. And I won't teach you how to forge a sword here. Start with those two, because they're easier, and then use the techniques and skills you've learned from that to make a sword."
Woo-Moon knew that it would be better to simply buy a sword from a blacksmith shop in a nearby village. However, he was determined.
'Huh, he's being mean. Alright! I'll still make my own sword!'
He decided to learn how to make a hoe and sickle from Min-Sang.
"Just like yesterday, I'll show you how to do it once, then you're on your own."
Woo-Moon didn't like this either, but he couldn't help it.
Woo-Moon concentrated as hard as he could, and his vision heightened as he watched Min-Sang make a hoe and then a sickle. When Min-Sang's demonstration ended, Woo-Moon took his hammer and stood in front of an anvil.
'I was able to work the bellows after watching how it's properly done. Making a hoe and a sickle shouldn't be a problem.'
Woo-Moon began to hammer down on the iron confidently.
Clash!
Remembering how Min-Sang had done it, he tried to copy the young man's movements.
"Ha-ha-ha!"
Min-Sang burst into laughter when Woo-Moon was done, pointing at the ugly hoe in front of him. It was incredibly different from what Min-Sang had made earlier. If he were to put it up for sale, no one would buy it.
'Why? I did exactly what he did, so why...?'
"Do it again from the beginning," Mr. Choo said.
'Why is it so poorly made? Should I ask Min-Sang to show me one more time? No.' Woo-Moon put the hoe back into the forge and blew the bellows.
Woo-Moon's memory of Min-Sang's hammering technique was still vivid. He was better than anyone else when it came to remembering something and replaying it in his mind, after all.
He turned the hoe into a glowing-hot piece of metal, then started hammering it once more.
'The result is...'
It was the same as before. Well, it was actually a little bit better in comparison, but still by far not up to par.
He kept hammering until lunchtime, but all the hoes he made were poor-quality at best.
Whenever Woo-Moon failed, Min-Sang would laugh at him, but the same couldn't be said for Mr. Choo, who looked at Woo-Moon's back as the latter returned to the inn. In truth, he was quite surprised.
Min-Sang was deliberately ignoring Woo-Moon's efforts, as he was already hell-bent on ridiculing his fellow apprentice. However, the fact that Woo-Moon could produce a hoe of such quality two days after he started working as a blacksmith was actually quite amazing.
Woo-Moon returned to the inn with complicated thoughts weighing on his mind.
They would always get many customers during lunch. To help the cook, he started cutting ingredients in advance so they'd already be prepared once the busy hours came in.
The Gentle Celestial Sword had at its core a universal truth. In other words, the essence of the sword was hidden behind every single thing in the world..
It could even be found in cutting vegetables and meat with a kitchen knife.
He could come across this fundamental truth and get enlightened to some extent even while he was cooking, eating rice, washing himself, or sweeping the floor.
While Woo-Moon was cutting the ingredients, customers began to come in one by one. Soon, he left the kitchen and helped the waiter. There were even more customers today compared to other days, so he was getting really busy.
"Cook! One plain noodle and Five Spice Sliced Steamed Pork!"
"Got it!"
He cleaned a table, received a new order, and relayed it to the cook. He initially found it a little annoying to be a waiter, but that feeling went away pretty quickly. Serving guests like this was fun in its own way.
After a group had finished eating and left, Woo-Moon came over to their table and stacked the dishes for dishwashing.
"Wow! Here we go, look over there," said the son of Mr. Roh, the clothing shop owner, tapping his friend's hand.
The two children looked at Woo-Moon with sparkly eyes. There were more than a dozen bowls to be cleaned up. Usually, they were supposed to be carried in two or three stacks, but Woo-Moon always tried to move them all at once because he hated making multiple trips to the kitchen. Thus, he stacked all of them on top of each other like a tower.
"Woo-Moon, you punk! What are you doing? I told you not to do that, didn't I? You're going to break them all again!"
"It's fine, it's fine! I didn't drop any of them yesterday."
The tower of bowls was taller than Woo-Moon and looked like it was about to collapse, but he actually managed to pick it up and walk to the kitchen without dropping it.
"Wow!"
A few children had come running and clapping. Other customers were also amazed.
"He can't even see what's in front. That's amazing. What a show," said one of them.
Just then, someone stormed in through the inn's door.
'Oh, sheesh.... The door's going to break, and I'll have to fix it again.'
Woo-Moon frowned. The man who had just smashed the door open was the warrior of the Leebi Merchant Guild that he had seen before. He was Yim Choo, someone who used to hang out with Woo-Moon when he was young.
He came in with a swagger, showing off the saber on his waist. With a smile that revealed his buck teeth, he spoke servilely to the woman wearing a veil who followed behind him.
"Hehe, it's pretty shabby here, but the food is good, my lady."
Yeon Si-Hyeon was a tall, beautiful lady with long legs and a slim figure. The moment she entered, the inn's interior appeared to brighten up.
Si-Hyeon looked around the inn, and her eyes stopped on Woo-Moon, who stood precariously with the most impressive stack of bowls he had ever carried.
Their eyes met, and Si-Hyeon was amazed at the sight of his impeccable balance.