The first thing he noticed was the wooden roof rough beams lined with soot and some kind of dried fungus. A single crack ran across it like a split lip. Morning light poured through like an overzealous leak, stabbing him right in the eyes.
Then the smell hit him.
Old sweat. Damp straw. Feet.
"...Shit," Sim Gwan muttered, rubbing the crust from his eyes. His voice sounded younger, scratchier. He sat up and the world swayed. A sharp sting ran through his ribs. Right. He remembered now.
He'd been beaten.
Not in some epic duel. Just a friendly spar that went sideways because "Jin Mu" had stepped in the way of a senior disciple who'd been too lazy to pull a punch. That same senior was now probably out there pretending to train while sneaking sips of rice wine behind the kitchens.
Classic.
His body was sore. Bruised. But alive.
He swung his legs off the cot and took stock.
Plain brown robes threadbare and uneven. A sash made of faded hemp. A pair of shoes that could generously be called "shoes" if you were drunk and blind. He caught his reflection in a dented brass plate on the wall: thin, sharp-jawed, sunburned. Eyes that looked older than they should've.
"Jin Mu," he whispered, just to hear it out loud.
It didn't feel like a name. It felt like a punchline.
Then a knock.
Or, more like a bang followed by a grating voice.
"Hey! Breakfast, you turtle-slow bastard! If you don't come now, I'm eating your share!"
Sim groaned and stood. His knees popped like firecrackers.
---
The courtyard was a crater of mediocrity.
Bare dirt, a crooked tree in the corner, and a few uneven training dummies leaning like drunk farmers. Around fifteen disciples milled about stretching, yawning, practicing sloppily. No elegance. No structure.
The Howling Tiger Sect. Fifth-rate, forgotten, and underfunded. Their name sounded like it promised something savage, wild something bold.
But really, it smelled like socks.
The sect was tucked into the lesser slopes of Mount Wan. No divine beasts. No ancient tombs nearby. Just lots of rocks, fog, and secondhand spiritual energy leaking down from higher-tier sects like cold piss from a broken roof.
There was no "great master." No elegant daoist robes flapping in the wind. Just a Sect Leader with three missing teeth and a limp from a duel he'd lost twenty years ago.
A tin pot of a sect.
And now, his sect.
Sim walked toward the mess area, past a disciple using a stick to scratch his back and another nodding off mid-stretch. Someone farted. No one flinched.
"Mu! Oi!"
A round-faced girl waved at him from a cracked stone bench. Hair tied up in a messy bun, sleeves rolled up, eyes too sharp to match the lazy grin she wore.
Lee Baek-Ha. Technically a junior disciple like him. In practice, she ran the kitchen and all gossip. Which, in this sect, meant she basically had more power than the elder in charge of accounting.
"You walk like an old man. Again," she said, tossing him a bowl.
He caught it one-handed. Thin gruel. Floating root chunks. Maybe radish. Maybe beet. Maybe just something.
He nodded. "Smells better than the bunkhouse."
She snorted. "You must've hit your head harder than I thought."
They sat.
The early sun was still clawing its way over the peaks. Mist rolled across the dirt like a bored stagehand. Sim spooned the soup. Bitter. Not awful. Just forgettable.
Just like Jin Mu.
"How's your head?" Baek-Ha asked without looking at him.
He shrugged. "Fine. Memory's a bit fuzzy."
She paused. Looked at him sideways. "What's the last technique you trained?"
Sim blinked. "...Uh. Tiger's Tail Step?"
She relaxed, nodding. "That's good. You didn't hit your brain that hard, then. That's the footwork form everyone hates."
He filed that away.
Memory gaps would be expected after a concussion. He could get away with the occasional "I forgot" or "I'm relearning." That bought time.
He needed time.
Because he wasn't Jin Mu. And this body's cultivation?
It was trash.
---
[Cultivation Stage: Early Qi Gathering]
One of the lowest stages. Barely past Body Tempering. No Golden Core. No foundation. Barely enough qi to light a lamp.
He scanned the disciples in the courtyard.
A few had faint auras. Nothing solid. Most were stuck like him grinding their teeth against their own mediocrity. But one, the one doing slow stances near the training rock, had something.
Shin Rok. Mid Qi Gathering. Sharp footwork. Good balance. Probably top three in the outer disciples.
Sim's old knowledge itched to activate. He'd read about this.
The way people stood told you more than any spiritual scan.
Back straight? Energy efficient. Lazy shoulders? Leaking qi.
Overextended strikes? Style without substance. Short bursts with precision? A killer in the making.
He knew how to read them.
That was his secret now.
He didn't have power.
But he knew the game better than they did.
---
Later that morning, a bell rang.
Disciples gathered near the central stone slab, where Elder Han gray beard, sunburned scalp, belly barely contained by his robe stood with a scroll.
"Today's training: forms until noon, sparring after. Those assigned to kitchen duty know who they are. If you don't, you'll find out when Baek-Ha smacks you."
Mild chuckles.
Elder Han opened one eye. "And if anyone loses a tooth during sparring again, you better find it and stick it back in yourself. The sect can't afford a pill for that."
He walked off.
And just like that, training began.
---
Sim Gwan was not good at Tiger's Tail Step.
The footwork was supposed to be smooth, lateral, like circling prey. But in his new body, it felt like his legs were on delay. His balance was off, his breath control worse.
His first stumble got him a slap on the back of the head from Baek-Ha, who was correcting form with a stick.
"Eyes forward. Back straight. Your spirit animal's not a turtle."
"I'd take a turtle," he muttered. "They live longer."
---
By the time sparring came, he was soaked in sweat.
The matches were fast and ugly.
Shin Rok flattened three people without breaking a sweat.
Baek-Ha beat a boy twice her size by slamming her heel into his knee.
Sim's turn came.
His opponent: a smirking idiot named Dae Hwan who carried a wooden practice sword like he'd carved it himself from smugness.
The fight was one-sided. Not in Sim's favor.
He dodged the first two strikes. Then caught one to the ribs. Another to the shoulder. He winced, fell back, tasted dirt.
The crowd booed. One or two laughed.
No one cared.
That night, in the bunkhouse, Sim lay in bed with his bruises and stared at the ceiling.
He didn't have talent.
He didn't have a cheat system.
He didn't have a magic scroll hidden under his bed.
He had one thing.
He knew this world better than anyone else here.
And sooner or later, that would be enough.
---