70
The wind fell still.The air over the frozen plain seemed to hold its breath, settling into a brief hush.
Yi In-jung stopped his sword practice and planted the blade upright in the ground.In that instant, the scent of long-ago Guwol Mountain returned without warning—cool and damp, a smell where blood and fallen leaves were mingled.
Back then, he had been a youth barely past twenty.The war had just ended, and the world was still breathing without having washed away the stench of blood.
Having left the army, he wandered from place to place, until one day deep in a ravine of Guwol Mountain he came upon a single, weathered hut.The old man who kept the hut did not ask his name.He merely tossed him a piece of dry firewood and said,
"Just because the wind quiets, does not mean the wind has stopped."
Yi In-jung did not understand the words.They passed him like the wind itself.
The old man then handed him a wooden sword—old, worn smooth by countless hands, a blade with neither edge nor weight.
"Your sword has only exhalation, no inhalation. Pa!Pa!Pa!"the old man said in a low voice."You may win like that. But you will not live long."
Thus began the training in the mountains.
Every dawn, the young man took his stance by the stream.The old man spoke almost nothing.At times he sat on a rock with his eyes closed, listening only to the wind.At times he did not look at the young man at all for an entire day.
Days passed, yet nothing was learned.He was not even allowed to grip the sword.
Unable to endure the frustration, the young man finally spoke.
"Master, I came to learn the sword… why will you not let me hold it?"
The old man stared at him for a long time before answering slowly.
"One who cannot govern his breath has no right to wield a blade."
"Inhalation (Heup) is taking the world in.Stillness (Ji) is holding it within.Exhalation (Pa) is offering oneself outward.
If even one of the three is disturbed, the sword becomes mere slaughter."
From that day on, the young man set the sword aside.Instead, he sat on a rock all day long, breathing.
At dawn, he heard the breath of mountain beasts.By day, the sound of wind brushing through leaves never ceased.
At first, it felt like meaningless torment.Then one day, realization arrived without warning.
There was a moment when the flow of the wind and his own inhalation became indistinguishable.
Breath is not done with the body.It is done with the mind.
That day, the old man smiled for the first time.
"Now your breath is longer than your sword.""The blade you wield will move together with the world."
Yi In-jung slowly opened his eyes, as if waking from that memory.
On the plain, Park Seong-jin was still standing in his sword stance.His inhalations were even, his body steady.
What Yi In-jung felt now was not that he was teaching what he had learned,but that he was passing on what he himself had once received.
He nodded quietly.
"Yes… Heup–Ji–Pa."
"That is not the breath of fighting.It is the way of living.It is law (法), and it is the Way (道)."
He lifted his sword and slowly extended it toward the sky.The wind that brushed past the blade grazed the back of his hand.The sensation was like the air of Guwol Mountain long ago.
==---*
Park Seong-jin stood alone in the courtyard each day.He recalled the breathing Yi In-jung had taught him—Heup, Ji, Pa—and felt the sharp air seep into his palms.
It was a silent night, not a single word to be heard.The darkness of the steppe lay deep, and within it his own heartbeat rang clearly.
To do well what Yi In-jung had taught him, he did not take up the sword.Breath came first.
As if letting go of the urge to reach for the blade, he slowly shaped his stance, cutting the empty air with his fingertips.
Heup — inhale.Cold, dry mountain air fills his lungs.
Ji — pause.It feels as though the blood in his entire body settles into stillness.
Pa — exhale.As the breath leaves, the world wavers for the briefest instant.
At first, the breath resisted him.The inhalation snagged in his chest, and suffocation surged during the pause.His vision blurred, his head swam.
Unable to endure it, he dropped to his knees.Ragged breath spilled onto the snow.His fingers trembled without his knowing why.
What am I doing wrong?
He closed his eyes.
Only then did sound begin to reach him.The whisper of wind settling on snow.The low, distant breathing of horses.And a faint vibration rising from deep within his chest.
When I stop, I can hear, see, and feel what comes near.When I move, I hear nothing, see nothing, feel nothing.To see myself is therefore the hardest thing.
He inhaled again.
This time, slowly—very slowly.The air passed his throat, brushed his chest, and sank below his navel.The breath touched the center of his body.
He paused there.His whole body fixed into one, and thought emptied.
Then he exhaled.
As the breath left, the thoughts he had been clinging to scattered with it.In that moment, a subtle warmth rose from the fingertips of the hand that held no sword.
It was neither hot nor cold—it was a living current.
Without realizing it, Park Seong-jin murmured,
"My breath… is longer than the blade."
Snow fell soundlessly onto his shoulders.He did not move.
Time passed, and his body remained still,because his mind was standing upright.
The edge of darkness loosened, and dawn light spread across the snow.
At last, he steadied his breathing once more and opened his eyes.His breath was calm, and his gaze had unmistakably changed.
"Now… I can take up the sword."
He slowly raised his hand toward the empty air.White breath streamed from his fingertips and flowed long into the dawn sky.
In that moment, Park Seong-jin crossed a threshold.
He stepped into the place of a warrior who fights with breath.
That threshold was the boundary dividing a soldier from a true martial being.