Chapter 211 - The Road to the Solution (1)

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Two days already.

The mountain path showed no sign of ending.

Dong Mu-toe's stride was constant. An ambiguous speed—a little too fast to call walking, yet far too slow to call Lightness Arts.

Formation Taoists' Lightness Arts tended to be this way.

It was not the method of martial artists who drew up internal power to gain propulsion by pushing off grass or rocks. Instead, it was a style of reading the minute flow of Formation Energy running underfoot and borrowing it slightly to push the body forward. A kind of Formation Path-style footwork that glided along with the flow of the earth's energy channels.

The problem was that the earth's energy channels running through this mountain range were thoroughly uncooperative.

"Damn it, the energy channels are an absolute mess. Twisted every which way—reminds me of that guy, it really does."

'Go to Formation Tower. As quickly as possible.'

That one sentence.

To think a single sentence could carry this much weight.

It wasn't that the moment he heard those words, his feet had started moving in one direction only. After that, he had exchanged quite a few more words with that fellow Kim Rae-won.

The decision to go to Formation Tower had also been his own. He would be able to ask that man more questions that way, and he had to make a trip to Formation Tower at least once in a while regardless.

But now that he thought about it, it hadn't been his own decision after all.

These were clearly his own legs, yet as if someone had laid a directed formation under the soles of his feet, his body was being drawn only toward the northwest.

He could clearly stop.

Resting was certainly possible.

Only changing direction was impossible.

How to put it?

As if somewhere ahead there existed a breathtakingly beautiful unsolved formation that had been yearning desperately for him alone to come and undo it—the idea of going any other way simply never entered his mind. Like a mantis infected by a horsehair worm seeking water.

He had tested it many times along the way.

For example, at a fork where the road split three ways, when he deliberately moved his foot eastward, he couldn't take more than a few steps before his feet naturally veered back toward the direction he had been 'compelled to go' all along.

Or when he deliberately took a midday nap he wouldn't normally seek, he would rise as if sleepwalking, and begin moving in a half-dreaming daze without even realizing it—these things repeated themselves.

'Go to Formation Tower. As quickly as possible.'

It was clear these two commands were acting as constraints.

"It really is impressive."

He couldn't even begin to guess at the operating mechanism of what Kim Rae-won called a Vow, let alone its origin. A mechanism that controlled and bound an individual this perfectly without placing any psychological or physical restraint whatsoever.

What was the medium—was there even one? Was it transmitted through energy acupoints? Was it an intrusion through intention? Or some form of Immortal Art?

Rustle.

Dong Mu-toe pulled a folded bundle of papers from inside his robe.

Already twelve sheets filled to the brim on both sides. Notes scribbled here and there while walking.

『Structural Deduction of the Vow』

Every Formation Path diagram and formula he knew was tangled together in a disordered mess, but for now it was all meaningless conjecture—nothing more than indecipherable scrawl.

Dong Mu-toe shook his head with a sigh and opened directly to the last page.

A drawing with an Eight Trigrams diagram and a meridian map overlaid on top of each other, with arrow markings extending in every direction. And at the end of it all, everything converged into the word 『Faith?』

"My connection with the world that believes in me."

That was the only thing Kim Rae-won had ever said about faith.

"What on earth does that even mean."

The connection between belief and the world.

If it were a religious concept, one could perhaps understand it.

But Dong Bong-soo was no man of religion. At least from what Dong Mu-toe had seen, that fellow didn't have the faintest shred of faith in him. He was, at his core, a being who could never have such a thing.

And yet.

'Faith, he says.'

Was he using others' belief as fuel in some manner?

"Then it would be a structure where the believing side supplies the fuel and the believed side receives the propulsive force...?"

From the perspective of Formation Path, a classic reverse-flow structure.

Ordinarily, a formation consumed the caster's own energy to produce an effect. The caster supplies the energy, and the one who receives that power is also the caster—that is the standard structure. The same holds true for martial arts. Extending the principle further, that is the law of nature itself.

Who eats on behalf of someone else?

One eats, moves, and protects oneself in order to survive, in order to move, in order to protect oneself.

One can act for another's sake. But one cannot eat a meal in another's place—isn't that obvious?

And yet.

Kim Rae-won had clearly said it.

My connection with the world that believes in me.

In other words, this faith was drawing in the energy of others—the immaterial element called others' 'belief'—and converting it into the caster's own power.

"Insane."

His pace quickened.

When excited, his feet always sped up—an old habit of Dong Mu-toe's.

"This isn't a formation. It's not Immortal Arts either, and certainly not martial arts."

He had been thinking about it wrong from the start.

Trying to force something unknown into the framework of the world he knew—no wonder nothing fit.

Wasn't this a completely new dynamic, one that might not exist anywhere in the academic systems of the Central Plains, or perhaps even the Immortal Realm?

An unknown territory he had never encountered.

Ah.

Ahh.

Feeling the goosebumps rise on his skin, Dong Mu-toe continued scribbling on his paper even as his pace quickened.

And so, as he gradually drew closer to Formation Tower, his thoughts grew more defined.

He decided to execute the last resort one could attempt when something was utterly impossible to understand and likely always would be.

"Just..."

Unbearably reluctant, but—

"Believe. Let's try believing. That bastard—no, that guy, no! No! That sir..."

He would try having faith in Kim Rae-won. Try venerating him. Revering him.

From this moment on, he, Dong Mu-toe, had decided to believe in a god.

A god by the name of Kim Rae-won.

Perhaps then he might find the thread to unravel this curiosity.

To blaze a new path of truth, what was there he could not do?

If Kim Rae-won told him to eat shit, he would eat—

He'd eat it, god damn it!

***

It was once again around the time the sun sank and the sunset stained the sky a deep crimson that Dong Mu-toe's eyes finally took in a familiar sight.

The foothills of the Cloud Ridge mountain range.

Seen from a distance, mountain ranges folded like stacked sheets of paper extended in a northwest direction. Following that range considerably further up, one would reach the entrance to Formation Tower. Still a full day's journey away.

His legs ached.

The limits of a body that was no martial artist's, one might say.

Well, it was thanks to that very fact that he had become a Trigram Leader.

Because his body was weak, his mind had to grow strong.

Because his mind was strong, his Formation Path had to become exceptional.

Because his Formation Path was exceptional, it didn't matter that his body was weak.

A beautiful vicious cycle.

No—was it a virtuous cycle?

"Either way is fine."

Reaching the entrance to the Cloud Ridge mountain range meant the same thing as arriving at Formation Tower's Communication Post.

The Communication Post was the small-scale relay outpost of Formation Tower spread throughout the land.

It was a place where a dozen or so lower-ranking Formation Taoists stationed there collected commissions from each region and served as intermediaries relaying messages to the main headquarters of the Alliance Under Heaven Formation.

Soon enough, a respectable two-story wooden building came into view, with a flag bearing Formation Tower's emblem fluttering from its roof.

Dong Mu-toe made his way toward it.

Since the Vow wasn't reacting much, it seemed to have interpreted stopping at the Communication Post as a 'transit stop on the way to getting there faster.'

A young Formation Taoist standing watch at the front looked up with a slight start as he spotted him.

"Oh?"

His eyes settled on Dong Mu-toe's robe.

More precisely, his gaze fixed on the color of the embroidery stitched into the robe.

Something that appeared to be silver yet wasn't quite.

"That..."

The young Formation Taoist was greatly flustered.

"Platinum?!"

Silver and platinum look similar at a glance.

But the depth of their luster is entirely different.

Silver is bright and cold. Platinum is heavy and weighty.

In Formation Tower, silver embroidery thread signified the Formation Master rank. Intermediate Formation Taoists.

Platinum, on the other hand—

"Tri—Trigram Leader?!"

Because a Trigram Leader had appeared so unexpectedly, the Watch Formation Taoist stood momentarily dazed before quickly rushing over.

"My apologies. My eyes are poor and I failed to recognize Your Honor the Trigram Leader..."

"Never mind that."

Dong Mu-toe waved his hand.

"Is there tea?"

"Pardon? Oh, yes! There is! If you go inside the Communication Post, I can brew it right away..."

"Give me that one you were drinking."

"What? That's the one I was drinking..."

Dong Mu-toe had already picked up the teacup resting on a nearby rock where the Watch Formation Taoist had been standing and drained it in one go.

As the lukewarm, faintly sweet tea wet his throat, his exhausted body was at least somewhat restored.

"Your name?"

"I am Ha Geun-yeong, Your Honor the Trigram Leader!"

"Good. Taoist Ha. I have some things to ask."

Dong Mu-toe set down the teacup and asked.

"The bidding over the Vast Heaven Limitless Sword Sect and Dark Net Rakshasa Path matter is still in progress, isn't it?"

"Yes, yes! So I've been told. Apparently both sides submitted mobilization commissions to Formation Tower..."

"How is that going?"

"Th-that level of detail isn't something a low-ranking person like myself would know... Ah, come to think of it. Would you happen to be Trigram Leader Dong from the Fire Formation Division?"

"Yeah. Why do you ask all of a sudden?"

"Trigram Leader Eom Bi-ryeong was looking for you, Your Honor."

The hand holding the teacup paused very slightly.

"Eom Bi-ryeong was?"

"Yes. Trigram Leader Eom Bi-ryeong and Trigram Leader Myo Jin-heo came looking for you personally."

Myo Jin-heo too, looking for me?

Ah, those two want to work together on this matter.

"Where are they now?"

"They passed through here a few days ago."

"...Passed through?"

Dong Mu-toe, barely reining in legs that kept nudging him forward, had one eyebrow tip lift slightly upward.

"Where did they go?"

"They said they were heading toward Gangdo. They mentioned the last place you had taken a commission was near Gangdo."

"..."

His own face reflected in the tea looked distorted.

'We've crossed paths.'

Eom Bi-ryeong had gone down toward Gangdo looking for him, while he was going up toward Formation Tower.

In terms of direction alone, they should have met somewhere in the middle—but it was not as if there was only one road. If their actual routes didn't coincide, meeting somewhere in this vast Central Plains would be quite difficult.

'Hmm. Sae-mae would be able to backtrace my trail all the way to Hero Gate.

In that case, it was a hundred percent certainty that Eom Bi-ryeong and Kim Rae-won would come face to face.

'Guild Master Kim and Trigram Leader Eom.'

And Myo Jin-heo was mixed in with them too.

That feeling—something was off.

Should he turn back?

His feet.

He tried experimentally stepping one foot in the direction of Gangdo, toward the southeast.

A sensation of his calf seizing up, and instantly his entire body wrenched.

As expected, this Vow of a thing would not permit a change of direction.

"...Could you send a message for me?"

"Yes, Your Honor the Trigram Leader! Of course! Right away through the Communication Corps——"

Ha Geun-yeong scrambled about bringing out paper and ink.

Dong Mu-toe lifted a brush for a moment, then hesitated, and the corner of his mouth curled slowly upward.

"Heh—never mind."

Dong Mu-toe quickly set the brush back down.

"The message is off."

"Pardon? But Your Honor the Trigram Leader...?"

"Heh heh heh."

"Your Honor the Trigram Leader?!"

"Ah, sorry, sorry. It's just—something very amusing is about to happen, I think. Heh heh heh heh."

Probably.

No—certainly.

Dong Mu-toe drained the last sip remaining in the teacup.

Clack.

He set the cup down and rose to his feet.

"Thank you, Taoist Ha."

"Not at all! Your Honor the Trigram Leader!"

Ha Geun-yeong scrambled to his feet as well.

"Is—is there anything else you need?"

"No."

Stepping out of the Communication Post, Dong Mu-toe glanced back once more.

The southeast direction—Gangdo, beyond the mountain ranges, invisible from here.

Even so, he gazed in that direction for a moment before turning his head away.

'Sorry, Sae-mae.'

Heh heh heh, let's meet again safely at Formation Tower.

You understand, don't you? This feeling that's so amusing I simply can't hold it in?

Stifling his chuckle, Dong Mu-toe turned his body and set off toward the northwest—in the direction of Formation Tower.

The Vow gave him a firm push from behind.