Chapter 3
A month had passed since I started practicing breathing and energy circulation.
Power had begun to gather in my dantian. Klone’s body was terribly weak, but maybe because she had been raised like a precious child and only ate good food, her natural energy was very pure.
When that pure energy met the energy of nature, it created a very good synergy.
Of course, this was only possible because I used to be a master who had conquered the martial world.
“Are you going to sleep sitting up again?”
Arte looked at me strangely.
Well, I had spent every night for the past month sitting cross-legged, so it made sense that she found it strange.
“Did something happen to your head?”
Arte pointed at her temple and made a little circling motion with her finger.
From Arte’s point of view, someone who had never lived sitting on the floor, my cross-legged posture looked very odd. And unlike the other prisoners, who lay down whenever they had even a tiny chance because of the hard labor, I insisted on sleeping sitting up. Of course I did not look normal.
I could have waited until everyone was asleep and then secretly gotten up to practice, instead of making people misunderstand me, but that felt like a waste of time.
“This is comfortable for me, Arte. So just go to sleep.”
“If you say it is comfortable, then fine, but…”
Arte looked worried about me, but soon fell asleep. Before long, her loud snoring filled the room.
I uncrossed my legs and stood up. It was nothing compared to what I had built over ten years by taking spiritual medicines, but I had gathered a fair amount of internal energy. It was enough to move on to the next step.
Sword training.
I picked up a piece of straw from the floor and carefully began moving my feet through a footwork pattern. It was clumsy, but I had no trouble turning my thoughts into movement.
Using the straw, I practiced the most basic sword forms. If someone saw me from far away in the moonlight…
‘I would look insane.’
Still, I practiced seriously.
The piece of straw only swayed weakly. To anyone else, it would probably look like it was just fluttering in the wind. But I knew better.
I had reproduced the form of a sword technique. Excited, I kept swinging the straw, and soon all the energy drained out of my body. I dropped to the floor and gasped for breath.
“Haah, haah.”
Cold sweat formed on my forehead.
Hard labor every day, then training all night long—of course it was putting strain on my body.
‘I need more practice. And I need to build more internal energy too.’
And so another month passed.
During that time, I got used to this world—annoyingly, even to prison—but I still could not figure out the title of the novel I had entered.
There was only so much information you could get inside a prison. Most of the stories people told were about crimes.
Or they were infuriating stories, pitiful stories, or absurd stories.
I guess I will not get any real information until after I escape.
Letting out a long breath, I gripped the straw and continued practicing swordsmanship.
I trained every night. As time passed, the days grew longer. My stamina improved as my internal energy grew, and I even got something to use as a practice sword instead of straw.
It was a broken pickaxe handle. The moment I gripped it, I remembered what I had done to get it and let out a small laugh.
I had deliberately broken the handle, tucked it into my waistband, concentrated my internal energy into my legs, and then dropped a rock on top of my leg.
‘M-my leg is hurt.’
The guard had fallen completely for my acting, cursed at me for being unlucky, and kicked me out of the work area. I walked awkwardly back to the room without bending my knee.
I hugged the precious pickaxe handle I had gained with such difficulty.
‘My precious sword.’
There was no time to be moved by it. I immediately cut through the air with the handle.
A sound tore through the air—a sound only masters could make and hear.
‘Finally!’
I had completed the sword form.
A smile would not leave my sweaty face.
The internal energy filling my dantian, and the forms of the Ice Fire Sword technique.
If Heuk-hwi, the man who killed me, saw my level now, he would laugh. But I had become strong enough to survive.
The problem was stamina.
To be safe, it would be best to build internal energy for about a year before escaping. But at this rate, I would die of frustration first.
Because the guards were becoming more vicious by the day.
‘One week from now, I escape.’
I picked the day.
The clothes were old and full of holes, but when they smelled of sunlight, they still made me feel good. I was holding my clothes and sniffing them with a smile when Arte spoke to me.
“Klone, you look happy. Did something good happen?”
‘Because tonight I’m leaving this place.’
I could not tell Arte what I was really thinking, so I just answered with a grin.
“What is that? You’re only smiling like an idiot. More importantly, are you okay where you got hit the other day?”
Arte reached out, trying to lift my clothes to check. Startled, I quickly stepped back.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
Arte looked me up and down suspiciously.
Ever since I had gained some strength, I had been using my internal energy to protect my body whenever the guards hit me. So there were no bruises or scars.
Of course Arte would find that strange.
“If you do not want to show me, then I will not look. But please listen to me today. I do not want to see you get beaten again.”
Arte pitied me. I got whipped by the guards almost every other day.
“Try to control your temper a little, Klone.”
That felt unfair. I had already controlled my temper a lot. How much more was I supposed to suppress it?
And there was no guarantee that staying quiet would keep me from being beaten.
The guards picked fights over ridiculous things and found excuses to hit us no matter what.
Sometimes they made us do pointless work too, just to torment the prisoners.
For example, moving a pile of stones from the right side to the left side. If there had been some reason, like needing something underneath the stones or clearing a path, I could have understood it—but of course there was no reason.
The guards did not even bother making up fake excuses. To them, we were not people worth explaining things to. We were just bugs.
Our suffering was nothing but amusement to them.
I endured it when I could. I was leaving soon anyway, and I did not want to create trouble. Once I had set the date of my escape, I had even started feeling more tolerant.
But even tolerance has limits. And I had hit that limit the other day.
A guard who already disliked me came swaggering over and started bothering me.
‘Why are you walking like that? Does the leg you hurt last time still hurt?’
At first I thought, why is this crazy bastard suddenly pretending to care? But the words that followed made it clear it was not concern. It was harassment.
‘If your leg hurts, crawl on all fours. That takes less effort, so it’ll heal faster. What are you doing? I said crawl.’
He insisted on making me crawl on all fours, and I resisted. What happened after that is obvious, so I will not bother describing it.
“Do not worry. That will never happen again.”
Arte shivered as she remembered that day. I patted her on the shoulder a couple of times to comfort her.
“Really? It really won’t happen again?”
I nodded. Not because I would stop it from happening, but because there would be no chance for it to happen again.
‘Because I’m going to break that bastard’s wrist.’
“Hurry up and get out here!”
A guard banged on the iron door and yelled at us. My last day in prison had begun.
“Aaaah!”
A scream rang out. It had been a while since I heard someone else screaming, and it excited me.
I took the whip hanging on the wall and swung it. When it struck the floor, a cloud of dust rose from the carpet.
They said supplies were scarce and told us to snap branches off trees to use instead of forks, but the guards’ room had a carpet? And not just any carpet—a very expensive-looking one, full of obvious oriental style.
A huge body was crawling across it on all fours.
“Y-you crazy—!”
It was a guard who used to whip prisoners. The same guard who had ordered me to crawl on all fours the other day.
What was his name again? Musk, was it?
Musk struggled up and reached for his sword.
Seeing him grab a sword made my heart race.
I do not fight unarmed people. But if the other person picks up a weapon? That is basically giving me permission to beat them without holding back.
“How nice of you to even pick up a sword.”
I smiled brightly and brushed back my stiff hair.
“Now I don’t even need to feel guilty if I kill you. Though I don’t know whether this place has something called self-defense. Are you going to strike first?”
“What nonsense are you talking about? How did you get in here? What are the guards outside doing?”
“How did I get in? I opened the door and walked in.”
As I shifted my body, Musk looked through the gap in the door to check outside. The color slowly drained from his face.
“I put the guards outside to sleep.”
Musk saw the guards lying in the hallway. His eyes shook wildly.
“Y-you, w-why are you talking like that? D-did you kill them?”
After Arte pointed out the way I spoke, I had been trying to fix it. For a while it seemed like my effort was paying off, but the moment I got excited, my old way of speaking came right back out.
I had only put pressure on their points and made them sleep. Needless killing should be avoided, and besides, I could not waste energy on killing them. If I wanted to escape safely, conserving stamina was basic.
“A-a witch?”
While I had paused to think, Musk had moved farther away and now blurted that out.
That is not a very creative thing to say.
“No.”
I threw the whip aside and approached him.
“Don’t come any closer!”
Musk waved his sword threateningly.
“This is self-defense.”
I moved quickly behind him and wrapped my arm around his neck.
“Ghk!”
As he choked and gasped with his mouth hanging open, I took the sword from him.
How long had it been since I last held a proper sword?
The blade had not been maintained well, and yes, it was garbage like its owner Musk, but…
Just holding a sword again made my whole body tremble with joy.
I slowly sent internal energy into the blade. A faint light leaked out from the dull edge.
‘Not a bad level of strength.’
If a sword is too weak, just injecting internal energy into it makes it explode. Musk’s sword was not that worthless.
Still, I would have to use it carefully.
I let go of his collar and stood in front of him.
“Did no one ever teach you what happens when you use your hands the wrong way?”
Musk was on the floor, coughing and struggling to breathe, so he did not really hear what I said.
But I had not come to his room for a conversation, so I kicked the hand he had braced against the floor.
He slid forward, reaching out with that hand.
And in that moment, I swung my sword at his wrist.
“Aaaaargh!”
His scream shook the room. Musk rolled his eyes back and trembled on the floor.
“Next time, do not wave your hands around carelessly. Ah, but I suppose now you have no hand left to wave. Then your mouth instead.”
I tapped the tip of my bloody sword against his mouth.
Seeing Musk wet himself and shake in terror made me soften a little.
Should I kill him, or let him live?
That was what I was thinking when—
Boom!
An explosion sounded, and chunks of stone fell from the ceiling.
“What, what was that?”
The building had definitely shaken.
Crash!
Another huge blast sounded. The quiet prison erupted into screams from all directions.
“Ah… I was trying to leave quietly.”
Now it had gotten loud.
But who sets off bombs in a prison?
I was curious, but getting out of a prison that might collapse at any moment came first. I had no time to decide whether this chaos was good or bad.
Holding the dull sword, I turned.
If I could just leave now, I would be free.
But then a man blocked my path.
“So this is where you were. I have been looking for you for a long time.”
I swung my sword on instinct.
Clang.
The sound of blades crashing rang out. My weak sword snapped in half.
“You are holding something dangerous.”
The man stepped closer.
He was tall and broad-shouldered. At a glance, anyone could tell he was a master.
‘His energy is no ordinary thing.’
And on top of that…
He was seriously handsome.
‘Men who are handsome and skilled are usually dangerous.’
I gripped even the broken half of my sword tightly. If needed, I was ready to slash and run.
But then the man held out his hand to me.
“Klone.”
And he called my name very gently.
He lowered his long, sharp almond-shaped eyes as he looked at me.
In an instant, a coldness settled over his face. Strangely, it looked sensual.
Why?
The answer came at once.
His lips—his delicate lips were far too red.
A sentence suddenly flashed through my mind.
‘He was so dazzlingly handsome that anyone who met his eyes would lose themselves. His red lips were especially charming. If beauty were power, he could have become emperor.’
I know him.
At the same time, I realized which novel I had entered.
“I came to escort you.”
The man bowed politely.
He was the male lead of the novel I had reincarnated into.
