Urban Vagabond: Reload

“I’ll ask you straight. Who taught you your swordsmanship?”

The moment my eyes met Sword Demon’s as he asked that question, I had a hunch that I absolutely must not answer carelessly.

This might be my only chance.

He was someone who had even mastered Bone-Shrinking Art—despised as assassin’s martial arts—to erase his tracks and go into seclusion.

Depending on my answer, he might disappear to some place I would never be able to find again.

I hesitated for a moment, then forced myself to open my mouth.

“...This isn’t something I should be talking about lightly in a place like this. Would it be all right if we moved somewhere else?”

A trace of hesitation flickered across Sword Demon’s face as he silently stared at me, then he nodded.

“Follow me.”

I followed behind him, heading back toward the old villa complex where we had fought Nightfiend Sword.

Amazingly, his hiding place was very close to the rooftop room where Nightfiend Sword had been holed up.

From the window, you could even see the building with the rooftop room where we’d fought him.

“It’s shabby, but come in.”

I stood in the entryway for a moment and looked around the bleak space, furnished with only the bare minimum.

It really is the place from the video.

The old wallpaper, the moldy ceiling, the stale, musty smell of the house.

When I found the stain on the wallpaper that I’d grown familiar with after replaying the video hundreds of times, a faint smile tugged at my lips before I knew it.

“Don’t just stand there like that. Sit anywhere over there.”

“...Yes.”

A little later, Sword Demon took barley tea out of the fridge, unfolded a small low table in the living room, and sat down facing me.

Seeing me keep darting glances around the house, he lifted one corner of his mouth.

“Looks like it’s your first time seeing a place this run-down. Is it that fascinating?”

“...It’s not that. It’s something else.”

“Something else?”

“It feels like whoever lives here never let themselves get attached, and is always ready to leave at any time... It made me think the house is a little pitiful.”

Maybe I’d hit the bull’s-eye, because Sword Demon’s eyes widened for a moment. Then he took a sip of barley tea and spoke.

“With that baby face you don’t even look twenty yet, but going by how you talk and act, you’re like some old man in his forties.”

Just like I knew Sword Demon’s future thanks to my regression, it felt like he was seeing right through my essence with his years of experience and sharp eye.

I didn’t avoid his intense gaze as I nodded.

“I’m a bit mature for my age. My parents say that a lot too.”

“You’re thick-skinned too. But did it never occur to you that following me might be dangerous?”

Even when you’re sure the other person won’t hurt you, there’s nothing you can do about the way your throat goes dry when you’re face-to-face with the piercing gaze of a martial master.

Gulp.

But I forced a smile and put on a front.

“If you intended to hurt me, you wouldn’t have bothered dragging me all the way to your place. You would have just used a needle. Like you did on Nightfiend Sword.”

A smile spread across Sword Demon’s lips and the fine wrinkles at the corners of his eyes deepened. His now-softened gaze dropped to my hands wrapped around the cup.

“If you’re going to bluff, shouldn’t you at least hide your trembling hands first?”

“Ah, it’s not that I’m not scared.”

“What?”

“Hahahaha!”

Maybe thanks to my honest answer, the mood lightened a little.

This time, I was the first to speak.

“May I ask you one question as well?”

Sword Demon nodded without resistance.

I took that response not as consent to a one-sided interrogation, but as a positive sign that he was willing to actually have a conversation with me.

This is where it really starts.

For the past week I had run myself ragged trying to get Sword Demon’s guidance in swordsmanship.

He was the creator of the sword art that had become the foundation of my sword in my previous life, and in his prime he had been a master of the sword, counted among the top five in the Korean martial world.

If I could be taught by someone like that, I should be able to find a way to rise to a realm far beyond the me of my previous life.

But before that, there was something I absolutely had to confirm.

“Did you send us to Nightfiend Sword on purpose?”

“I did.”

“...May I ask why?”

“Use poison to control poison.”

“Sorry?”

Sword Demon turned his head and looked out the window.

At first I thought he was looking toward the rooftop room where Nightfiend Sword had lived, but his vacant eyes were just staring blankly into empty space.

As if he were looking at someplace impossibly far away.

He answered in a quiet voice.

“There are people looking for me. I thought you brats were sent by them.”

From those words, I could pick out a few pieces of information.

First: from the fact that he went as far as to use an expression like “use poison to control poison,” it was fair to say that he and the people looking for him were effectively enemies.

Second: the reason Sword Demon had been in seclusion for twenty years was probably also connected to them.

“If I had been someone they sent, what were you planning to do?”

“I would have cut you down.”

The answer that came back was a single, plain sentence.

Sword Demon didn’t release killing intent, didn’t twist his expression, didn’t lower his voice.

And yet that one line felt far more terrifying than Nightfiend Sword, who had bared his ferocity and shouted that he would kill me.

“...You’re serious.”

“Would I bring you all the way here just to lie? But there’s no need to be scared. I brought you here because I judged you’re not one of their errand boys.”

He refilled my cup with barley tea and continued.

“I apologize for making you go through danger because of my misunderstanding. When you go back, I’ll give you some elixirs I have here. If you take them, they’ll help you increase your inner power.”

Watching Sword Demon offer such a plain apology and honestly acknowledge his own mistake only strengthened my conviction.

“There’s one more thing I’d like to ask. Have you been staying near Nightfiend Sword on purpose? So you could step in if he started hurting people?”

Sword Demon quietly nodded.

“I didn’t know who he really was. From the qi I could feel, I just assumed he was some black-path thug. He’d stayed quiet until now, but after he met you, it seems like the nature he’d been suppressing finally exploded.”

If I’d known he was that big a mad dog, I would have cut him down myself a long time ago—he muttered the rest under his breath and sipped his tea.

When it came to fighting black-path and demonic outlaws, he never compromised, and his hand was so ruthless that the disgraceful character “Demon” had been attached to his epithet.

But by my standards, Sword Demon was righteous-path through and through—upright enough to be called a hero.

Then why?

The Sword Demon sitting in front of me now looked a little lonely, but his eyes were clear and his body looked strong.

It was hard to believe that in just five years he would be reduced to a ruined invalid and make an extreme choice.

You’re not someone who should die like that.

I still didn’t know Sword Demon very well, but there was one thing I was sure of: I didn’t want to see the future I knew play out again.

“Your expression looks complicated.”

“I’ve got a lot on my mind. There’s a lot more I want to ask, but...”

Sword Demon shook his head firmly.

“This time, I’ll be the one to ask. Who did you learn the sword from? No—let me change the question.”

His quiet gaze simply rested on me, but it felt like I was being cut over and over by a finely honed blade.

“How is it that you’ve learned my swordsmanship?”

“...”

It suddenly occurred to me that this conversation was a kind of duel.

How to swing the sword, where to move your feet, how much strength and inner power to put into each form.

Through this light back-and-forth, we were probing each other; and based on the information we’d drawn out, we were trying to grasp what lay beneath the surface. It felt very similar.

Sword Demon must have become certain through our conversation just now, and by watching my movements.

That I was using his sword.

It was because he’d reached that certainty that the question had changed.

My palms grew damp with sweat from the tension.

In this situation, I was clearly the weaker party.

And precisely because of that, I needed to press the attack more actively.

“...You published a book a long time ago. Back when you were a sword instructor at the Martial Alliance, I understand you released a book about the mindset one should have when approaching swordsmanship.”

Sword Demon quietly set down his cup of barley tea. Looking a little surprised, he muttered.

“That book is from over thirty years ago...”

“I went through a lot of trouble to track down a copy after it went out of print.”

After watching the videos Sword Demon had left behind and hearing the news of his death, I searched for everything related to him.

And that was how I managed, with great effort, to get my hands on a single out-of-print book.

Its title was Living by the Sword.

From the first time he picked up a sword as a child, through his youth and into middle age—it was a story about how a man named Choi Geon had treated the sword throughout his life.

I learned who the swordsman Choi Geon was by reading it until it was worn out, and it gave me some answers about the swordsmanship that had been blocked for me at the time.

On top of that, the book had given me great comfort in enduring a lonely life... and after coming back to the past, I’d tracked it down again and put it on my shelf.

“I watched every video, read every article, every record I could find that had anything to do with you. I don’t know why you suddenly retired and disappeared, but I know your public track record up to that point to some extent.”

“...”

So Sword Demon Choi Geon, like Kim Bokja, was a great benefactor to me.

I packed my next words with all the sincerity I had and unleashed the strongest move I’d prepared.

“I am a devoted fan of Sword Demon Choi Geon.”

“...Huh.”

Seeing such a lofty swordsman wear a bewildered expression made it clear my move had landed.

I couldn’t afford to miss the momentum, so I immediately followed up with another strike.

“So please teach me the sword.”

“What a shameless brat... Rejected, you little punk!”

As Sword Demon flatly refused, I asked back with all the wounded injustice I could muster.

“Why not?”

“Because your words are a mix of truth and lies. You expect me to believe you stole my swordsmanship just from reading my book and watching the handful of videos and reports about me? Does that make any sense to you?”

It was a sharp rebuttal, but it was also true that I had never formally learned swordsmanship from him.

This was where I needed to be a little shameless.

“I guess I admired you so much I ended up resembling you. Maybe we’re just a good match. If anything, doesn’t that make me an even better candidate for a disciple?”

“Good grief! You really don’t know shame, do you!”

“If you’re really that curious, you could just try teaching me and see for yourself.”

“What is wrong with this kid...”

Sword Demon clenched his fist like he was about to smack me one, but in the end he just let out a long sigh and shook his head.

“I’ll ask you the opposite, then. Why did you come to me?”

“Sorry?”

“With your talent, you could get into any sect you want. You’re not unaware of it yourself. It’s not just your bones—your constitution is exceptional... The Eight Great Sects must all be drooling over you.”

Maybe it was {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} just my imagination, but the moment he mentioned the Eight Great Sects, Sword Demon’s expression looked darker.

“You figured out my constitution, did you?”

“I knew when I checked earlier. It’s not as precise as a machine, but I can roughly gauge it. I actually thought it was strange I hadn’t heard your name in the news.”

“...”

So when he approached me disguised as a middle-aged man, fussing over my injuries, he had used the chance to check my bones and constitution.

“With bones and constitution that outstanding, what could a late-bloom prospect like you possibly be lacking that you’d come asking for instruction from some washed-up has-been who retired twenty years ago? You could find teachers far better than me.”

I firmly rejected Sword Demon’s self-deprecating words, a bitter smile on his face.

“I can’t agree with that.”

Sword Demon Choi Geon was a very stubborn person, but when it came to stubbornness, I was confident I wouldn’t lose to anyone either.

“There are only two people in the world who can help me complete my sword.”

“...Two people?”

Sword Demon’s eyebrows twitched for a moment.

He might call himself a washed-up has-been, but maybe his pride had been pricked just then.

Still, once he heard the other name I was about to say, he wouldn’t be able to deny it.

“One is Sword Demon Choi Geon. The other is Richard Han, The Strongest in the World.”

“...What did you just say?”

“Other than those two, I don’t think there’s anyone I particularly need to learn from.”

“Pff—puhahahahahaha—!”

A booming, hearty laugh burst out, loud enough to make the room shake.