A small room illuminated in its natural emerald hue by a human head-sized Yaming Pearl, dispelling the darkness.

Made entirely of black metal, this room rarely saw visitors.

Kwaaang!

Until now, accompanied by a rather loud noise.

“Phew! I almost died!”

A hole about two spans wide was punctured into the black metal floor, and a round head popped up from inside.

It was Na Rin.

“Ah, what a predicament.”

If it weren’t for her small stature, had it been a full-grown adult, at least one limb would have been destroyed.

Grumbling, Na Rin crawled out of the hole and dusted herself off.

‘But what is this place for?’

She didn’t know there would be such a room beyond the dead end.

And a metal room at that.

‘It seems a bit cramped for a training hall.’

Na Rin ignited the Sammaejinhwa flame on her fingertips to create light and calmly surveyed the room.

About twenty steps in size from end to end.

Far too small a space for a master who would require metal walls to hone their martial arts.

“Whoa!”

Na Rin nearly tripped over something that caught her toes, but regained her footing.

It seemed like a protruding rock.

Bringing the flaming fingers closer to the floor, she saw embossed letters written.

“Seal… Demon… Altar…?”

Following the direction of the large letters, she saw what looked like an altar with the Yaming Pearl placed atop it.

Behind it stood a bronze stele about twice the height of a person.

‘Is this also part of the test?’

The Demon Sealing Cave and the Demon Sealing Altar.

No matter how you look at it, they seem to be related.

Na Rin leaped onto the altar, lightly surveyed the surroundings, and headed towards the bronze stele.

‘If this flow is correct, the name of this stele must be…’

Mabongbi (魔封碑).

“It should be Feng Mabi (封魔碑)!”

Na Rin unconsciously shouted, her voice echoing loudly.

Hap! It won’t collapse, right?

Na Rin covered her mouth and looked around. Fortunately, the metal room was sturdy.

‘Is there any meaning to reversing the word order?’

Whether it’s a stele that sealed demons or a stele sealed by demons.

The meaning is more or less the same.

Na Rin amplified the Sammaejinhwa flame to check if any other characters were engraved on the stele.

She felt her inner energy being rapidly drained, but paid it no mind.

There was plenty anyway.

“Let’s see what it says…”

「Oh fated child.」

Goosebumps rose on Na Rin’s spine.

Having devoted her entire second life to reading martial arts novels, Na Rin knew all too well the significance of a passage beginning with “Oh fated child.”

“Th-this is it!”

The flower of martial arts!

The romance of the martial world!

The hope of all the young hopefuls in this world!

A fateful encounter!

“I’ve gone crazy. Crazy.”

What is a fateful encounter?

It is an essential element in martial arts novels, referring to the protagonist obtaining a divine medicine or a legendary secret manual that instantly boosts their inner energy, or taking an reclusive master as their teacher.

Especially in cases where the master does not appear in person, the fateful encounter often begins with a letter starting with “Oh fated child.”

‘The day has finally come for me too.’

Na Rin focused all her attention on the stele’s inscription with sparkling eyes.

She couldn’t miss a single word.

「I am the one who raises demons. The one who tests the hearts of people. And the one who sealed the demons.」

“…What?”

Na Rin tilted her head.

Shouldn’t the first sentence always contain something like “I am the incredibly powerful so-and-so!”?

Usually, such writings do not begin with confusing passages like this.

Because that way, they fail to capture the attention of passing fated children.

Na Rin felt somewhat unsatisfied, but decided to read on since she had already started.

「Oh fated child, I implore you. Do not cease the war against the demonic mind. Do not win too easily. Do not sever the demon’s breath. But never lose. Never be complacent. Never tire.」

“Why are there so many don’ts?”

As if proving it’s not a religious group, it just keeps spouting nonsense.

Na Rin skimmed through the stele’s inscription and stopped where she thought the main point would be.

「…If you place the eight directional stones in their proper positions, the door will open.」

Eight stones, it says.

Na Rin shone the flame on her fingertips towards the base of the stele.

As expected, the stele’s pedestal was composed of eight pieces of stone, and she saw several lines engraved beside it.

“Ah, these are the Eight Trigrams.”

While someone unfamiliar might say “What’s that, XX?”, Na Rin was originally from a Taoist sect.

Even without deep study, arranging the Eight Trigrams in order was a piece of cake for her.

Na Rin rearranged the pedestal sequentially from behind the stele.

「☰[Qian], ☱[Dui], ☲[Li], ☳[Zhen], ☴[Xun], ☵[Kan], ☶[Gen], ☷[Kun]」

But.

“What? Nothing’s happening.”

After waiting for a while, there was no movement, let alone any sound, and Na Rin’s lips naturally pouted.

Was it a scam? Is it a scam?

Or was this also just another test in the Demon Sealing Cave?

If it turns out to be a test of a low-level warrior’s intelligence, that would be infuriating.

“I thought it was a fateful encounter!”

Irritated, Na Rin kicked the Demon Sealing Stele with a ‘thwack!’.

But what’s this? Perhaps because it had loosened from inserting and removing the pedestal?

The 1-zhang (about 3m) tall Demon Sealing Stele began to sway and wobble.

“Gasp!”

Na Rin reached out to grab the swaying stele, but failed to hold onto it and ended up pushing it instead.

And so.

Kuuuung!

The Demon Sealing Stele finally toppled over.

‘I’m doomed.’

Na Rin was certain.

The Demon Sealing Stele, clearly an important element in martial arts novels, had fallen like a towering tree cut down by a lumberjack.

‘No. It’s too early to give up.’

Fortunately, it didn’t break, so if she stood it back up, it would be as if nothing happened…

“Huh?”

There was something strange on the ground where the Demon Sealing Stele originally stood.

A pit filled with purple powder, using the eight-directional pedestal as a bowl.

The purple hue, sometimes resembling small beads, sometimes sparkling sand, and sometimes seemingly crushed amethyst, glimmered with a captivating brilliance.

“What is this?”

It definitely looks unusual.

As Na Rin rummaged through the purple sand with her hand, something hard caught her fingertips.

This smooth and round texture…?

At that moment, a realization flashed through Na Rin’s mind.

‘Beads!’

That’s right.

Tae Neung had said the content of this test was to obtain the three scarce beads.

‘What? It turned out well.’

Na Rin, who had been delighted to discover an inscription starting with 「Oh fated child」, realized this was all part of the test and smacked her lips.

Could it be a test where failing to find the beads by being tempted by the inscription would result in failing the test?

‘It’s a pity I didn’t get a fateful encounter, but I should take the beads.’

Na Rin grasped the hard object in the sand with both hands.

“Ungh! Huh?”

To her dismay, the beads wouldn’t budge.

Had the sand compacted tightly together? Despite Na Rin’s considerable strength even without using inner energy, the beads showed no signs of coming out.

“How strange.”

It was a situation that was hard to comprehend, but not a big problem.

If strength doesn’t work, she could just pull them out with inner energy.

Just a tiny, tiny bit of inner energy flow would easily…

‘It’s not easy?’

What is this? Why won’t it come out?

Dumbfounded, Na Rin poured 1 gapja of inner energy into her arms.

Let’s see if it still doesn’t come out after this.

“Haaaaaah!”

But, how could this be.

It won’t come out. It doesn’t even budge.

1 gapja of inner energy is no child’s play.

It’s enough to easily pull out something stuck in a rocky mountain, so how can something buried in mere sand not come out?

‘Now that it’s come to this, I’ll pull it out even if it’s out of spite.’

Na Rin dusted off her sand-covered hands, spat on them and rubbed, then squatted with legs apart, properly assuming a stance.

The flat-planted feet pushed against the ground, and inner energy circulated flawlessly from the bent hips to the tightly clenched fists.

“Hoo. Hoo.”

As if warming up, the amplified inner energy passed through the first heavenly circuit and the middle cinnabar field, then through the first heavenly circuit again.

Gathering all the heated 4 gapja of inner energy and pulling it up in one go!

“Kyaaaah!”

The moment Na Rin’s vision flashed and a thunderous roar of rocks seemed to come from below.

Ssshing!

With a melodious sound of scraping the purple sand, the hard object buried deep below finally revealed itself.

Clang!

“Huff. Huff… Hehe.”

Na Rin’s lips parted and the corners of her mouth lifted.

The object dangling from her small fingertips, pulled out from the purple sand.

‘It wasn’t beads.’

The identity of the round and hard thing that had touched her fingertips was a white Yaming Pearl.

The metal ornament that seemed to grasp the Yaming Pearl connected to a leather-wrapped handle, stopping at a cloud-shaped guard.

From there extended a blade, supple like an orchid and unbelievably sharp, in pure white.

That’s right.

What Na Rin had pulled out was not beads, but a sword called the King of All Soldiers.

‘It doesn’t look like an iron sword, nor a black iron one.’

Na Rin tilted her head and examined the blade.

The blade seemed like silver, like glass, and in a way, even like a mirror.

When slightly tilted, it exuded a clear and fresh white light even in the dark.

‘The energy it holds feels too warm to be cold steel or eternal cold steel.’

Rather than a chilling coldness, it gave off a crisp feeling like the morning sunshine…

“Puhahaha!”

Laughter came out spontaneously. The reason was obvious.

“It’s a famous sword! A famous sword!”

Na Rin didn’t think deeply and concluded her examination of the sword.

Although she didn’t know what it was made of or who made it, this sword was definitely a famous sword. After all, a sword buried in such a completely suspicious place couldn’t possibly be an ordinary sword, right?

‘Because this world is a martial arts novel!’

Na Rin hugged the large Yaming Pearl that had been placed on the altar and headed towards the fallen Demon Sealing Stele, humming. She thought there might be clues about the famous sword (presumed) in the content she had skimmed over.

“…Wait a minute.”

The purple sand pit where the sword had been buried.

Na Rin’s steps stopped in front of it.

Doesn’t it seem like the amount of sand has decreased?

‘Is it because the sword was pulled out?’

As she approached and touched the pit, the purple sand collapsed in an instant, making a swoosh sound as it fell below. The pit that had been filled with sand was now like a hollow well, holding pitch-black darkness.

In other words, there was an empty space below.