Wiho could not shake the feeling that the back of his head was prickling as he climbed the mountain path.
That look in the Goguryeo commander's eyes. Those cold eyes that had seen straight through the shadows beyond the bundles of straw and rocks refused to leave his mind. He had thought he had concealed his presence perfectly, but the instinct of a god of war who had crossed hundreds of battlefields had picked up on Wiho's presence—one that had long since surpassed the limits of humanity.
When he reached the cave entrance, Beomseol, who had been crouched atop a rock, perked up her ears.
"You're late."
Beomseol turned her head away haughtily and tapped the rocky ground with her tail.
"The ominous sound of strange soldiers' iron carried up from below my mountain, and I thought you might have been caught up in it and killed."
"The salt and cotton cloth you asked for."
Wiho calmly set down the sack he had carried beside the rock. Then he took out a small, elongated object carefully wrapped in paper. It was pulled malt candy.
"This... you told me not to buy it, but the owner of the cloth shop pressed it into my hand and told me to have a bite."
Beomseol's gaze snapped toward the candy. Her ears stood straight up, and her tail stopped moving mid-swish. She gave an affected snort and turned her head even farther away.
"Tsk. I told you not to buy useless sweets. Have you not heard me say I have no interest in the food of lesser creatures?"
"Then I'll throw it away."
When Wiho moved to put the candy back inside his robe, Beomseol sprang nimbly down from the rock. She reached the tip of his nose without making a sound and seized his wrist. Her hand was small, but the chill clinging to her fingertips was heavy.
"Do not thoughtlessly throw trash onto my mountain! I... It would be a waste to throw it away, so I will dispose of it personally."
Beomseol snatched the candy from Wiho's hand and turned sharply, walking deep into the cave.
Watching her retreating back, Wiho let out a quiet breath. She was cold and surly on the surface, but he knew she had waited on the rock at the cave entrance without coming down until he returned. She might have been a spirit deity who had lived for hundreds of years, but to Wiho, she was a woman with an oddly clumsy and endearing side.
That night, a gentle fire of kindling burned inside the cave. Beomseol sat behind a rock, chewing on the pulled malt candy and lightly licking the malt syrup from the corner of her mouth. Even as she ate with obvious relish, every time her eyes met Wiho's, she raised her sharp gaze and demanded, "What are you looking at?"
Wiho rubbed the poleaxe's shaft with an oily rag as he told her what had happened in the township.
"The Goguryeo army has turned the entire township into a forward base."
Beomseol stopped chewing. Her yellow eyes glimmered in the darkness.
"Goguryeo... You mean the ones who tried to kill you six months ago?"
"That's right. And the one leading that unit was the very commander who summoned me to his tent."
Wiho continued speaking as he carefully polished the poleaxe's blade.
"That commander is no ordinary man. Six months ago, I saw only martial strength at the limit of human ability. But when I saw him from a distance today, his instincts and spiritual energy had already surpassed the human realm by far. He nearly sensed me behind the straw bundles through spiritual energy alone."
Beomseol set down the paper with its crumbs and slowly rose. She walked barefoot across the ground and approached Wiho. Standing beside the six-foot-tall Wiho, Beomseol was a little over five feet tall, and the shadows of the two figures stretched and overlapped across the cave wall.
Beomseol reached out and lightly touched Wiho's forehead. Her cool touch traced the scars left across it.
"You have begun to wield the energy of my mountain. Ordinary human eyes cannot see it, but a martial warrior with keen spiritual energy would have sensed the mountain's energy emanating from you as the 'breathing of a beast.'"
"The breathing of a beast..."
"That commander is no clumsy human."
Beomseol's ears trembled faintly.
"If that man has the township in his grip, the passageway you use to descend the mountain will soon become dangerous. I have no intention of letting those Goguryeo bastards turn my mountain into their doormat, but... Wiho."
Beomseol looked straight up into Wiho's eyes. Deep within her cold yellow irises, a subtle worry and warmth—neither of which had been there six months ago—flitted past.
"If you face him, can you win?"
Wiho looked down at his own hands for a moment. They were hands honed over six months of breaking through his energy beneath the waterfall and sharpening his senses in the forest at night.
"I won't know until I fight him. But... I won't lose."
Beomseol's lips curled slightly, as if she liked his answer.
"You're fairly good at bluffing. Good. Starting tomorrow, I'll raise the difficulty of your training. I will teach you not only how to breathe out the mountain's breath, but also how to turn your entire body into a barrier."
Beomseol spun around and returned to her place. Yet her tail, dragging across the ground and sending ripples through the dust, could not hide her private satisfaction at Wiho's growth.
Meanwhile, at the magistrate's office in the township below the mountain.
Though the night was deep, the Goguryeo commander sat beneath the candlelight with a map spread before him. Candle shadows lay thick across his well-ordered features.
"General, you still haven't eaten at this hour?"
His aide-de-camp asked as he set down a cup of hot tea. The commander pointed to the map and asked quietly,
"Do you remember the poleaxe wielder who single-handedly held back the Silla army's retreat six months ago on the narrow passageway at the entrance to Seoraksan?"
The aide-de-camp hesitated.
"You mean that enormous slave-born man who supposedly had no name? Wasn't he recorded as having been torn apart and killed by a pack of tigers and your pursuit party after refusing your offer and fleeing into the mountains?"
The commander lifted his teacup and took a sip. His fluid gaze narrowed.
"That was what I thought as well. He had been wounded in the hand and entered Seoraksan in the dead of night, so I believed he had become food for the beasts. But when I passed the outskirts of the township this afternoon, I sensed something strange behind a bundle of straw."
"What? You mean it was that poleaxe wielder?"
"I cannot say. But if my senses did not deceive me, it was no ordinary beast. It was the energy of a strange martial warrior—huge and heavy, yet with breathing that seemed to melt into the entire mountain."
The commander rose from his seat. He gazed at the dark ridgeline of Seoraksan, faintly visible outside the window.
"This township is a passageway that Silla and Goguryeo have taken and retaken by turns. It is the perfect place for remnants of Silla to hide. Expand the search net."
"How should we proceed?"
"Strictly control the comings and goings of merchants and mountain folk descending from the mountain. Verify the identity of every person bringing in animal hides or medicinal herbs, and report to me immediately if you find anyone over six feet tall."
A deep smile spread across the commander's lips. Though he was a villain serving a different power, a chill unique to martial warriors who coveted exceptional talent and enjoyed pitting wits against one another clung to him.
"If I cannot have that sword, I must break it. If that bastard is still alive... this time, he will either come under my command or be buried in this mountain forever."
At the commander's order, Goguryeo soldiers scattered in every direction across the township and began tightening the net.
In the deep silence of Seoraksan, time flowed soundlessly toward the reunion of Wiho and the Goguryeo commander.