Namgung Se-ga, the warrior, was reincarnated in Romance

Even though there are many fateful encounters in the world, I thought none of them were mine.

Throughout my life, I had never seen a precious martial arts manual lying on a strange cliff or in a cave, and I had only heard rumors about the famous Shaolin’s Great Hwan Dan or the Volcano Sect’s Ja So Dan.

Ten-year-old and hundred-year-old Rehmannia glutinosa (*precious roots aged ten and hundred years, respectively) were only briefly seen, as they were carefully wrapped and reserved for the direct descendants of the family or the herbal medicine shop.

Born as a collateral branch of the great Namgung family, he did not receive the special martial arts training, but from the age of five, he held a sword in his hand.

Bearing the name of Namgung, practicing the Changcheon Mu-ae Sword, and wearing silk clothes without worrying about starving, he thought it was better than the orphans who roamed around in rags.

Even though I had never won the Murim Alliance Dragon and Phoenix Conference (a righteous martial arts tournament where latecomers compete), which is held once every three years, consistently securing a spot, albeit the last one, was a testament to the success of that early education.

When I was just past my twenties, I roamed the martial world under the name of a top-tier martial artist, fighting against the Green Forest and the Evil Faction.

While most direct descendants of the family made early marriages and had children to prepare for the future of the family, it had recently become the trend for collateral branches to marry later. There was no property or farmland to be inherited, nor was there an exceptional martial art that needed to be passed down through generations.

Just because I consistently honed my skills, I looked youthful even after turning thirty and still appeared youthful even after turning forty. Grateful for this, I occasionally helped with family matters and wandered the martial world.

In the year I barely entered the peak stage at the age of forty-two, the Demon Sect went on a rampage.

Among the Nine Great Sects, the Gongdong Sect and the Cheongseong Sect were the first to perform (*the act of martial arts sects and families refraining from external activities and practicing self-discipline after a major incident).

The Jongnam Sect and the Hwasan Sect set up a long front line over the western shore. Hundreds and thousands of martial artists jumped into the campfires like moths, only to perish. Many commoners were also dying entangled in the battles of the martial artists.

The mountain is burning and the water has dried up.

The Five Great Families and countless other families that did not reach their level pooled their strength together. Jang Mu-hyeon, the Supreme Sword of the Wudang Sect, jumped into the front lines to engage in a life-and-death battle with the Celestial Demon. Tens of thousands of warriors followed him. I was there too. In that battlefield where flesh was torn and bones shattered, I died.

And then came back to life.

When I first opened my eyes, I felt so drained that I thought my lower dantian (*the place where internal energy and vitality are stored, usually around the lower abdomen) had been shattered in the fierce battle. It was thought to be located in the lower abdomen near the navel, and I realized it had been broken.

However, naturally gathering energy (*the act of accumulating internal energy). When I realized that during the practice of energy cultivation, if someone else’s hand touched me, I could suffer internal injuries, I found that even a grain-sized amount of energy could flow through my meridians with familiarity.

Moreover, the thought that the inability to move one’s limbs freely while being fully conscious might be due to the strange sorcery of the Demon Cult also crossed my mind.

I realized it wasn’t true when I saw the pale cloth wrapped around the hand waving in front of me.

Is there really such a bizarre thing in the world?

It took seven days and nights to realize that no matter how much I strained my whole body, all I could do was flail my limbs that wouldn’t even respond to my commands.

All those who have been hovering around me and striking up conversations have been foreigners (*people with diverse hair and eye colors). They were all foreigners.

I found it strange that the masters from the Northern Sea Ice Palace (a martial arts faction believed to be located north of the Central Plains) had silver hair and blue eyes.

The fact that the men and women speaking here had colors that were not only golden, red, and blue, but also purple or very light blue, was truly shocking.

How can a person’s hair shine with such a light?

Is this what the six realms of reincarnation in Buddhism look like?

Even after thinking deeply, it was not something that could be answered. I, being out of my mind, opened my mouth to ask various things, but of course, our words did not communicate.

They conversed in a sweet tone, chirping like birds and murmuring poetry.

Later, I thought that since this body was that of a young child before learning to speak, my tongue was clumsy, and not asking various questions might have been helpful.

If a newborn baby were to ask, “Where is this, who am I, and question various things,” they might have been suspected of being possessed by a devil.

They said that the woman with lavender hair and blue eyes was my mother, and the man with black hair and red eyes was my father.

The couple’s relationship was not good, so the father wandered outside, and the mother, being weak-hearted, was always listless.

The mother would come to see my face about once every three days, and the father would bring a cool breeze and linger around the baby’s cradle for about a month before disappearing.

Because of this, most of the people who took care of me were nannies with brown hair and brown eyes.

It was a humiliating experience, akin to having dementia, to have someone else wipe your behind after crossing the age of forty, but it was a relief to drink milk from a suspiciously tough bottle instead of breast milk.

I ate, slept, and practiced the heart technique during my free time. Thanks to the opening of the Imdok Yangmaek (*a crucial meridian that is open at birth but naturally closes with age), regaining the lost internal energy was easier than expected.

Since I had never practiced the Donggong (*a martial arts technique practiced while moving), I only used it during the deep night when the nanny wouldn’t disturb me.

Thus, I became not Namgoong Jeongyeon, but Mikael Ernhardt.