Chapter Text
The bird sitting on the roof of one of the restaurants in Hwa-Um looked out over the crowded streets, where people were either just walking or going into shops to buy something. There were also those who did nothing but simply look at what was happening around them. Among them was an artist who had found an unusually interesting view from the city of the famous mountain where the Mount Hua sect had its headquarters.
The man raised the brush to the level of his eyes and changed the position of it in his hand to better understand the distance from one side of the mountain to the other or what was the distance between the closest house to him and the mountain. Then, with light masks, he sketched the main objects on the canvas, which would soon acquire a more complete and refined look.
He was so absorbed in his task that he did not notice that a group of children, along with a young man in green robes, were watching him. The stranger, whose face expressed serenity, the most excessive calm that could be found in humans, suppressed a chuckle in his throat, turned and walked away. His chestnut hair fluttered slightly at the ends with each step, and his blackened fingers contrasted sharply with the green robe, which attracted the attention of the townspeople, who, unless they were stupid or blind, knew to what family this man belonged.
A hairpin stuck out of the small bun tied at the back of his head. It looked so old that it could have been taken for an antique. However, what caught my attention more was the slightly faded pink color. It was plum blossoms that someone had once made clumsily.
The young man continued walking until he stopped in front of the path that led the traveller all the way up the mountain to the sect building. The corners of his lips turned up, and the glint in his eyes only intensified.
The first step took his breath away, and he could not turn back. He remembered. Every tree he encountered on his way had once been a small sapling that had sprouted from a seed. He remembered how the path curved on the mountain slopes.
He stepped forward, his legs did not become tired, and his soul became lighter and lighter.
The clouds were getting closer and closer, along with the gate of the sect, where two disciples were standing. Their faces were completely unfamiliar to him, but the plum blossom embroidered on their clothes spoke for themselves. It was funny to see their surprise, and then interest when that hairpin caught their attention.
"So you sent that letter to Cheong Myeong?" one of them asked, finally looking him in the eye, then suddenly lowering his head. "He's waiting for you."
They opened the gate doors for him and followed him until he entered the sect's territory.
The youth walked along the pavilion past the main residence, but stopped abruptly when he looked there. That's right, he couldn't act like he did before. Before the war with the Demonic Sect, everyone knew him by sight, and the then sect leader was so used to his frequent visits here that he no longer paid attention to the fact that such a guest had arrived on Mount Hua. But that was then, and as the years passed, everything changed and was forgotten.
Even if he didn't care about everyone around him, he had no desire whatsoever to become an object of suspicion or anything else for the new sect leader and elders, considering that one person showed great respect for them.
So he ignored his interest in seeing why screams and groans of pain were coming from the neighboring pavilion and entered the main residence, where the sect leader usually received guests. He walked through the corridors from memory and stopped in front of one of the doors, which he knocked lightly just in case, so as not to interfere with something more important. But when permission to enter came from there, he opened the doors, walked inside with his head slightly bowed, closed the doors behind him and folded his hands in greeting in front of the sect leader and elders, in front of whom lay various documents.
“Greetings, leader of the Mount Hua Sect. My name is Tang Bo, it is a great honor for me to meet you.”
“There is no need for a formal greeting,” these words and the soft tone of voice, which had no hint of authority, surprised the young man so much that he could not say anything except continue to look at the man who was smiling sincerely at him. The two elders also looked at him without a hint of authority. In the absence of such an oddity, it was… interesting. “Cheong Myeong’s friend is our friend too. He is currently training children in the neighboring pavilion and is waiting for you.”
“Thank you,” Tang Bo bowed respectfully again, turned around and left, closing the door behind him.
Only then did he decide to take a closer look at everything around him. As he remembered, the main residence always flaunted the wealth of the sect, albeit in a different way, so as not to violate the concept of Taoism, but this residence did not show such a thing. There were no expensive figures created by skilled craftsmen, no gifts from officials of all ranks - everything here screamed about simplicity, the one that the Taoists followed, despite the fact that the building was not built with the cheapest materials.
Tang Bo looked towards the meeting room one last time to imprint the faces of the new sect leader and elders into his memory before heading outside.
As he passed under the archway to the other pavilion, a human body flew past him, doing several somersaults on the ground before stopping. There were many disciples lying around, some of whom stood up on shaky legs and ran again, headlong, towards the man, who sent the attacker flying with one kick to the stomach. Tang Bo quietly hummed a melody that he had once heard and moved straight towards it, easily stepping over the bodies, as well as dodging those who fell towards him.
As he approached the crowd, the fight stopped in an instant, and the people who were frozen with their swords in different directions to attack or defend were looking exclusively at him, including the man who unceremoniously pushed everyone around him and came forward, but kept enough distance between them to strike if necessary. However, Tang Bo slowly approached him almost point-blank.
They stared at each other. One of them was sure of the other's identity, while the other had yet to be convinced. The hand holding the sword tightened its grip on the hilt, and the thin lips pressed together so tightly that they turned white. Pink eyes studied his face, his manner of standing, his slight smile, absolutely everything, and then their attention moved to the hairpin and the position in which it was fastened in his hair.
At the same time, the left hand hesitantly raised, stopped, and moved again to push aside a strand of hair that had fallen out and was slightly covering the other eye. With such a familiar movement, the calm on Tang Bo's face cracked, giving way to what he tried not to show to anyone, even with his eyes or the way he bit his lips.
At that very moment, the sword fell to the ground with a loud metallic sound that echoed among the crowd, which did not even have the strength to move.
Meanwhile, Tang Bo, no less happy than Cheon Myeong, who had closed the last distance between them, was tightly squeezing the other's back and shoulders, burying his face in the shoulder, trying not to shed tears. He was sure that after some time, both of them would have bruises from how hard they were clinging to each other.
He remembered the moment when the sword pierced his heart, he remembered how he died in Cheong Myeong's arms and how he asked him to fulfill his last request. But fate gave him a second life, in which he would never die so easily.
“Tang Bo-ya...” he heard a quiet whisper on his shoulder, and the arms around him tightened until the bones almost crunched. “I... If I were stronger...”
“I'm here,” he interrupted him, running his hand through his hair soothingly. Before, Tang Bo would never have thought that Chun Myung would allow this to happen in front of other people. “I have always been, am, and will be by your side.”
“Tell me this is not a hallucination. Please.”
“I am real. And alive.”
He himself did not notice how he began to sway soothingly from side to side to the whispering of the students around them.