The next day, Jin and Mo-Ryo sat together on one of the rooftops. A long silence stretched between them.
Jin: "Are you still mad at me?"
Mo-Ryo: "...Yes. Your jokes are heavy. Maybe Shuang and my mother had pure intentions, but you... I feel like you aren't mentally stable, you..."
Jin smiled faintly. "You want to call me 'Brother,' but your pride is stopping you, right?"
Mo-Ryo didn't answer.
Jin continued: "I'm like you. I always wished I had a brother—someone to be a help, a support, a friend. An older brother should be your shield in this life. But humans don't get everything; that is God's wisdom in our lives. If we got everything we wanted, we would become too idle, and if we were deprived of everything, we would become too callous."
Mo-Ryo: "Is this talk really coming from you? If you're this sane, why did you humiliate me yesterday?"
Jin: "I wasn't humiliating you. I was just bullying you a little with my wife... but, well, I didn't expect it to go that far."
The boy fell silent for a moment before the distress on his face deepened. "Is it because I'm weak?"
Jin: "You aren't weak at all."
Mo-Ryo: "Then how did you do that to me?"
Jin went silent, gazing at the sky. This time, it wasn't the look of a "mad sage," but a look of deep reflection on life.
Jin: "It's not because you're weak. It's because I am not normal to begin with."
Mo-Ryo: "Nonsense. Do you even know what 'not normal' means? Stop this rubbish."
Jin: "Hmm. Have you heard of the 'Black Wanderer' from last year?"
Mo-Ryo: "Yes. Rumors about him spread throughout the entire Jianghu, but I don't believe them."
Jin: "Do you know what his hat looks like? Or the weapon he used?"
Mo-Ryo: "They say it's an ordinary black straw hat, and he uses an ivory-colored blade."
Jin reached into his storage ring, pulled out the hat and the broken blade, and placed them before the boy. Mo-Ryo went quiet, but perhaps that wasn't enough for him.
Jin: "Have you heard of the two 'Miracles' of the Heavenly Demon Cult?"
Mo-Ryo: "Why are you asking?"
Jin: "Just answer, and I'll tell you why."
Mo-Ryo: "Yes. One became the heir to the Heavenly Demon, and the other became an Elder at twenty. They say he killed two Superior Demons on his own."
Jin pulled out his Elder Council membership medallion and placed it on the table. The boy was stunned. How could someone from the Cult be here among them, becoming a son of the family? How could these "illogical rumors" be true?
Jin: "The traditional image of justice and demons and all that nonsense might cross your mind. To hell with all of it. They are the ones who manipulate people's opinions of them. Absolute good and absolute evil are cosmic constants, but life is gray. There is no pure good or pure evil because people today cannot achieve those concepts. This isn't a children's cartoon, kid. Forget that absurdity and believe only what your eyes see and what your heart feels."
Mo-Ryo's mind was racing. This was an incredibly strange situation.
Mo-Ryo: "Why... did you tell me this? Aren't you afraid I'll hate you or turn my sister against you?"
Jin smiled: "If she were going to hate me, she would have done it already; she wouldn't have waited for you. Besides, I trust your ability to see things realistically."
Mo-Ryo: "Why do you trust me so much?"
Jin: "My intuition tells me so."
Mo-Ryo asked: "So... are you looking for good or evil? Power? Authority?"
Jin: "I am searching for what I've lost. But my nature has dragged me toward 'good'."
Mo-Ryo: "Did you ever try to be a hero?"
A shadow of sadness crossed Jin's face. "Maybe I saw it superficially like that in the past, but there is no such thing as a 'hero' in our situation. A hero is someone who protects with a sincere heart without expecting anything in return—someone who doesn't commit an act their healthy heart rejects unless absolutely necessary. We are not like that. And evil? What is evil, really? Can I call someone seeking personal power truly 'evil'? Or is the person forced by life to steal or kill the evil one?"
Mo-Ryo was baffled. After a moment of silence, he asked, "How can someone as mentally unstable as you say things like this? How can you be so contradictory?"
Jin smiled with a profound, suffocating sadness that didn't quite make it into his words.
Jin: "You know, one of the worst things a person can face is realizing they have a flaw, yet being unable to explain or treat it."
Silence reigned for a long time before the boy asked, "How can I become like you?"
Jin laughed—not out of joy, but in mockery of the question.
Jin: "Like me? Do you think I'm a good person? Do you know... I used to search for justice among the commoners, and I caused the destruction of hundreds of families. I killed the family of a young child myself, and now I am raising him myself. Do you know how painful that is for one's mind and heart?"
They fell silent again. Mo-Ryo didn't know what to say, and the weight of the words pressed heavily on Jin's heart.
Mo-Ryo: "In what imperial family were you raised to become like this?"
Jin laughed loudly, then began to cry as he spoke: "Someone always asks me: How great is your lineage? What noble family birthed you? Where does your instinct, your talent come from? Where, where, where..."
He gathered himself. "When I was your age, I was just an ordinary kid. No energy, no physique, no martial arts, no supreme weapon, not even a family. Just a small book and an ordinary steel sword. Could you live alone among monsters for two years like that?"
Jin continued: "I had no academic or intellectual background. I only had some situations I saw and some stories I read. I kept thinking about them over and over until I learned a great part of life from that alone. I ate only monster meat. I stayed awake for a whole week sometimes. The dilemma is that I was your age—actually, I wasn't even in a fraction of the position you're in. And in the end, you people talk to me about lineage and I don't know what else?"
Mo-Ryo: "I know you're not looking for sympathy. I understand you want to give me motivation, but... this crushes me even more. To have all these advantages and be unable to do anything. Why do you want to help me anyway?"
Jin: "Because my wife told me you were suffering from a complex about this. And also... when you thought you were dead, did you cry because you were dead, or because you wanted to protect your family until the end?"
Mo-Ryo: "For my family."
Jin smiled and flicked the boy's forehead. "Then you are the real hero."
The boy was stunned. A disturbed man judging life, someone who lost his identity yet defines identity, someone who lost his passion yet gives it to others. How was this possible? That discussion was everything Mo-Ryo needed—he who had lost his purpose and felt his talent didn't match his status. Miraculously, he found the guidance he needed from someone who needed guidance himself!
The young boy smiled and spoke with sincerity: "Thank you... brother."