Chapter 18. Dream Awakening (18)
"What the he—"
The nameless man suddenly took the lead and ran to the far side of the road, opposite where the guild was. Eventually, they arrived at the highest mountain in the vicinity.
"Come on, we have to go up there!"
"Why the hell do we have to go up there?"
"Nuh-huh! Ask fewer questions, take more steps. It's really important. If you don't listen to me right now, you'll definitely regret it."
Woo-Moon certainly felt like he was being tricked, but he nevertheless decided to follow the man up the mountain. However, the nameless man's climbing speed was simply too great. He didn't appear to be moving that quickly, but Woo-Moon had to run at full speed just to keep up with him, and he was certainly not a slow runner.
After about half an hour of climbing, they arrived at a small cave in an isolated, wild location.
Woo-Moon's eyes widened in surprise upon seeing the beast inside it. A tiger bigger than a house, covered in shiny white fur with silver stripes, was leaning against a huge boulder.
'Is it dead?'
Even though they had approached this much, the tiger didn't react. It was definitely strange.
"It's as I expected. That's a silver tiger. It's one of the rare beasts, an animal with innate spirituality. Actually, it is said that it's close to becoming a spiritual beast. Unfortunately, it seems that it hasn't reached that stage yet, since it doesn't have an inner core. It's probably been a while since the mother died...."
With these words, the nameless man walked toward the dead Silver White Tiger. Woo-Moon followed.
Silver tigers were legendary rare beasts. Their fur and hide were tougher than steel, and their teeth were hard enough to crack diamonds.
They had just taken a few steps forward when something small suddenly jumped from under the Silver White Tiger's corpse and attacked the nameless man.
Grawwwwr!
"Ah, you're finally out."
Woo-Moon looked at the creature—a baby white tiger the size of his fist.
The nameless man just swung his right hand at it as if driving fly away, and the white tiger cub was smacked to the ground.
Woo-Moon wondered if the nameless man had attacked with too much force, considering the beast was just a baby. Just as he frowned and was about to say something, the baby tiger jumped up as if it was nothing, then stood in front of the dead silver tiger and stared at the nameless man and Woo-Moon.
Kyaaaan!
"Haha! Despite being so young, the beast is quite amazing. It's thinking of fighting us to protect its mother's body."
The nameless man suddenly looked at Woo-Moon with a playful expression. "Why don't you raise it, Woo-Moon? Even if it's a rare beast, it'll die if you leave it here alone. After all, it's still too young."
The baby silver tiger was certainly cute, but raising it was an entirely different matter. It was a wild beast. From the perspective of Woo-Moon, who lived with his parents, it was impossible to raise such a dangerous creature. Besides, it was a bit annoying.
"You mean me? No, you'd better raise it. Wouldn't it be a pleasure for you to live a restless life?"
"I can't be bound to a place or take responsibility for anything. The purpose of my life is to live freely with the wind and clouds, so I can't. You raise it."
"Absolutely not!"
As he looked at Woo-Moon, the nameless man took action with the hand that he was holding behind his back, not visible to Woo-Moon. Four streams of colorless qi materialized from four of his fingers, crawled along the ground, and dug into the giant rock behind the baby silver white tiger.
A minute cracking sound came out.
"Huh? Did you hear that?"
Woo-Moon noticed the sound and tensed up, but the nameless man shrugged and smiled nonchalantly. "What are you talking about?"
In the meantime, the four colorless qi streams that had dug into the rock turned and cut through it diagonally, causing a massive boulder to fall toward the silver white tiger.
Kyaaaa!
Noticing the boulder falling toward it as well, the startled cub howled and hurriedly tried to run away, only to look back at its mother's body.
Kyaaaa!
It bit its mother's ear and pulled on it, but it wasn't strong enough. The boulder continued to plunge right above them.
Due to the boulder's size, Woo-Moon momentarily fell into conflict. He wasn't certain if he could hold it or not. However, seeing the cub struggling to save its mother, Baek Jin-Jin's image came to his mind. At that moment, Woo-Moon immediately ran forward.
Just as the boulder was about to crush the silver tigers, the cub closed its eyes tightly in fear. A few moments later, however, it realized that nothing was happening.
The cub opened its eyes again only to see a man holding up the boulder in front of it, saving it and its mother.
Bang!
"Argh!"
The moment he supported the giant rock with both hands, a strong shock coursed through his hands, arms, spine, his legs, then feet. His feet dug into the ground. Like spider webs, cracks appeared and spread around the ground he stood on. Even he couldn't help but notice it. It was quite strange to see his own feet breaking through the ground.
'Ahhhh I don't have time for this!'
He had already sunk knee-deep into the ground.
'I can do it!'
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!"
Channeling the power of the Forbidden Divine Art and making his qi through his body, he bent his waist and pushed the boulder away with a mighty shout.
It flew through the air and crashed into the ground in the distance.
BOOM!
The cub looked at Woo-Moon and let out a low-pitch cry.
"Oh! That's amazing, young hero! Hahaha, you're an outstanding figure. You actually managed to toss that giant rock away! Female silver tigers die after giving birth to three cubs, which means that has to be her third child. The third cub is usually much stronger than other silver tigers. However, since the mother dies immediately after birth, its chances of surviving are very low. If you don't help it, it'll die soon."
The nameless man kept blabbering, but Woo-Moon couldn't even hear what he said, because his anger caused his blood pressure to rise so much that he could hear his own pulse. When he had lifted the boulder, he had noticed how cleanly it had been cut.
"Oi, No-name! You intentionally—"
"Huh? Intentionally? I don't know what you're talking about. Hahaha!"
As Woo-Moon pushed himself out of the ground, the nameless man's laughter echoed from farther and farther away. He actually used a footwork technique to get away!
The nameless man then shouted from afar, "Don't hate me too much! This was all for you. The silver tiger is no ordinary beast! Besides, you haven't even realized how great your power actually is! I was just trying to make you aware of it."
Rightfully thinking that Woo-Moon had misunderstood his intentions, the man actually explained himself, which he normally did not deign to do.
Too bad Woo-Moon was so angry that he couldn't even hear the man's words.
"Ugh. One day, I will make that person..."
A lot of time had passed since he left the guild's campsite. After looking at the baby silver tiger for a while, he headed back.
The silver tiger blinked as it looked back and forth between Woo-Moon's back and its mother's corpse. It had really, really big eyes that occupied half its face.
The cub tapped its mother with its short front paws, but its mother didn't move.
Kooo...
The cub licked its mother's cheek a couple of times as tears welled up in its eyes.
Then, it decided to leave its mother, who no longer hugged and licked it, and followed Woo-Moon.
Woo-Moon had already been walking for quite a while by the time he realized that the baby silver tiger was following him. When he stopped in his tracks, the cub also stopped walking.
"..."
Woo-Moon walked again, and the baby silver tiger glanced at him and followed.
After a while, the nameless man returned to the female silver tiger.
"Don't worry. I entrusted your baby to someone I can trust."
He looked at the female silver tiger, who had been with him since he was a child, with a complicated expression on his face. He then dug a hole and buried her.
Though the soil was hard, with his martial arts mastery, this was an easy job.
* * *
A man and a baby tiger walked down a narrow road.
As Woo-Moon continued forward, he noticed the nameless man in the distance. When he passed by him, the nameless man said, "I guess you've decided to raise it, after all, so let me tell you a few things about a silver tiger. First of all, it won't attack the people around you for no reason. As I said before, it's born with innate spirituality."
The best way to deal with the nameless man was silence.
"And while it is a wild beast, it's omnivorous. So you don't have to feel pressured to just keep buying meat and feeding it. Haha. You can give it any food. Convenient, isn't it?"
"..."
Fortunately, Woo-Moon managed to return just before the guild departed. When he turned around, the baby silver tiger was still timidly following him. It was pretty cute.
"Whoew..." Woo-Moon sighed, looking at the nameless man. "Hey, No-name. Let's get some rice for now."
"Rice?"
"We need to feed this guy. Ah, but can we just feed it rice instead of milk?"
"Hahaha. It's a rare beast. Despite being so young, it can eat rice or meat."
"Is that true?"
"Maybe."
"Is that really true?"
"Maybe..."
"Let's go."
"You're a nasty young hero driving an old man to work hard."
Even while saying that, the nameless man went to the place where the guild distributed food.
The cook of the guild was busy organizing things. While he was hurriedly cleaning the tableware and packing up, a random guy approached him.
"Hey, can I have any leftover rice? My colleague and I didn't get to eat dinner earlier."
The cook thought this was the first time he had seen this guy despite having been at the guild for quite some time. Taking that into consideration, he was definitely a porter.
Reaching this conclusion, the cook couldn't be bothered about what the man wanted. Instead, he decided to relieve the irritation he had accumulated from washing dishes and packing up all by himself. He yelled, "Do you think this is a restaurant? I'm busy, so get out of my way!"
In an instant, the nameless man's face darkened. 'Haha. When was the last time I was treated like this? I can't even remember.'
On the other hand, this was also a fresh experience, in a way. He decided to think positively.
Just then, the disciple of the Kunlun Sect, Yu Mun-Gwang, was passing by together with the young men from the guild.
"What's going on?"