Mansoo's axe split the wood with a precision that even a three-year-old could recognize as abnormal.
Two years. Two goddamn years for this pathetic body to learn what any newborn animal mastered in a few weeks. Walking without falling. Running without collapsing after ten meters. Using my hands for something other than gestural babbling and food accidents.
At three, I was finally... functional. Not competent. Far from it. But at least I no longer spent my days staring at the ceiling cursing infant biology and the cosmic laws that had seen fit to give me a second chance in the least practical body possible.
I talked. Not much. Just enough for Eunbi to stop looking at me with that worry that had taken up permanent residence at the corner of her eyes. Simple sentences. "I'm hungry." "Where is Father?" but "Where was Father?" "Can I go outside?" The bare minimum to pass for a slightly delayed child rather than a mute abomination.
The villagers continued to whisper. But now that I could at least feign normality, their rumors had lost some of their intensity. The Choi child was strange, yes. But he talked. He walked. He no longer stared at them with those too-old eyes that made them feel judged by something they didn't understand.
They were wrong, of course. I still judged them. I still memorized their faces, their names, the Father's names, and their little cruelties. But I had learned to lower my eyes. To smile when necessary. To play the role of the shy, quiet kid who didn't bother anyone.
The social mask. A skill I must have possessed in my previous life. Because it came too naturally. Too easily. As if my facial muscles remembered how to lie even if my brain had forgotten why.
That morning, spring had chased away the last traces of winter. The air smelled of wet earth and rising sap. Buds were bursting on the branches like tiny explosions of green life. Eunbi was humming as she prepared breakfast—a lullaby I recognized without knowing where it was from. names, and where it was. A melody that hurt me somewhere between the ribs.
I was outside. Because staying cooped up in that cottage was starting to feel like slow suffocation. Even a ghost dressed as a child needed space.
Mansoo stood near the woodpile. An axe in his hands. A pile of wood to split in front of him. And I, sitting on a stump a few meters away, watched him work.
At first, I noticed nothing. A man chopping wood. Ordinary. Banal. The kind of daily task any peasant accomplished without thinking.
And then... I saw.
Really saw.
The way he stood. Weight distributed evenly on both legs. Knees slightly bent. The center of gravity was low, somewhere it was low and stable, like someone who expected the ground to move beneath his feet. This wasn't a farmer's posture. It was a fighter's.
The axe rose. Not with a jerky motion. Not with the laborious effort of someone relying on brute strength. No. It followed a fluid arc. Precise. Economical. The kind of trajectory you only get low and get after repeating the same gesture thousands of times. Tens of thousands of times.
The wood split. Not with the irregular crack of an approximate cut. A clean sound. Sharp. As if the blade knew exactly where to strike for the fibers to yield without resistance.
And his breathing...
I froze.
His breathing followed a rhythm. Slow. Deep. Each inhalation was synchronized with the upward motion of the axe. Each exhalation coinciding with the strike. This wasn't just efficiency. It was...
Technique.
My body knew before my mind found the words. My muscles tensed. My hands clenched on my knees. Because somewhere, in that void where my memories should have been, something recognized what I was seeing.
This wasn't a man splitting wood. It was a martial artist using an axe because he didn't have a sword. Every movement carried the echo of something greater. Something older. A discipline I couldn't name but that my body identified like you recognize the smell of a house where you grew up.
The Way of the Breath.
The words appeared in my head without warning. Not thought. Known. As if they had always been there, carved into a part of my mind that rebirth had failed to erase.
Mansoo set down the axe. Wiped his brow. Took a drink of water from an earthenware gourd. And the whole time, I didn't move. I stared at him with an intensity I no longer tried to hide.
He looked at me. Our eyes met. And in that brief instant, I saw something pass across his face. Recognition? Resignation? As if he knew this moment would come. That it was inevitable.
"You should go inside, Hyeon. Your mother will worry."
His voice was neutral. But not neutral enough to mask the tension underlying every word.
I stood up. My childish legs trembled slightly. Not from fear. From excitement. From anticipation. Because for the first time since my rebirth, I had just seen something that looked like an answer.
"No." My voice came out stronger than I intended. "Not yet."
Mansoo frowned. "Hyeon—"
"Father." I rarely used that word. It sounded false in my mouth. Like a polite lie. But now, at this moment, I needed it. "Teach me to breathe like you."
The silence that followed was so complete I heard the rustle of leaves in the wind. The buzz of a bee somewhere in Eunbi's garden. The beat of my own heart pounding against my ribs as if trying to escape.
Mansoo didn't move. He looked at me with that expression I was beginning to recognize. That mix of surprise and something darker. Heavier.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
Liar.
"You breathe differently when you work. Slow. Deep. In rhythm with your movements." I walked toward him. Every step deliberate. "It's not just fatigue. It's a method."
"Farmers learn to conserve their strength. It's nothing—"
"You stand like a warrior." The words came out now without filter. Too frank. Too precise. But I couldn't stop anymore. "Your balance. Your posture. The way you strike. That's not something you learn from chopping wood."
Mansoo's face emptied of all expression. He carefully set down the gourd. Looked around us. The yard was empty. Eunbi was inside. The village was far enough away that no one could hear us.
"How..." He stopped himself. Inhaled deeply. When he spoke again, his voice was low. Dangerously calm. "How do you know these things?"
"I see." Simple. True. Incomplete.
"Three-year-old children don't see that."
"I'm not just any child."
Another silence. Heavier than the first. Laden with all the questions he wasn't asking. All the answers I couldn't give.
Mansoo crouched down. Put inhalation was—he put himself at my level. His eyes—those dark brown eyes that had seen too much—scanned my face as if looking for something. An explanation. A reason. Anything that could make this logical.
"Who are you really?" he murmured.
The question everyone wanted to ask. That no one dared to voice.
"I am Choi Hyeon." Because it was true. Even if it wasn't. "Your son."
"My son doesn't..." He fell silent. Shook his head. "You're three years old, Hyeon. You're not supposed to recognize martial techniques. You're not supposed to see... what you see."
"And yet."
"And yet," he repeated. His laugh was bitter. Ragged. "The gods have a twisted sense of humor."
He straightened up. Looked again toward the house. Toward the hills beyond. Toward anyone but me.
"If I teach you," he said finally, each word weighed as if it carried the weight of an oath, "you must never, ever, tell your mother about it. You must never practice in front of anyone else but me. Do you understand?"
"Yes."
"Hyeon." His hand settled on my shoulder. Heavy. Firm. "I'm serious. If someone discovers... what you're capable of. The questions they would ask. The people it could attract..."
He didn't need to finish. I understood. Being different was dangerous. Being exceptionally different was an invitation to catastrophe.
"I'll be careful."
He looked at me for a long time. Then nodded. "The barn. Tonight. When your mother is asleep."
. . .
The barn smelled of musty hay and damp wood. A lantern hung from a beam, casting flickering shadows on the walls of gapped planks. Farm tools lined one wall—sickles, rakes, anyonerakes, and an old plow with a broken wheel. In the corner, a few bags of grain. The kind of ordinary place where secrets shouldn't hide.
But tonight, the barn had become something else. An improvised sanctuary. A clandestine dojo for a child who wasn't really one and a father who had fled his past.
Mansoo closed the door behind us. Checked the gaps between the planks. Made sure no one could see us from outside. Then he turned to me.
"Sit down."
I sat down. Legs crossed. Back straight. Hands on my knees. A position I didn't remember having learned but that my body adopted naturally.
Mansoo sat facing me. The mirror of an identical posture. Between us, the light from the lantern created a circle. Inside, us. Outside, the world.
"What I'm going to teach you," he began, his voice barely above a whisper, "is not a game. It's not an exercise to impress other children. It's..."
He searched for his words. His hands clenched the rakes and clenched and relaxed.
"It's the foundation of everything. The Way of the Breath. The first technique every martial artist learns. And the last they truly master."
The Way of the Breath. The words resonated in my chest like a distant gong. Familiar. Essential. As if someone had just reminded me of my own name after years of forgetting.
"Why is it called that?" I asked. Even though part of me already knew the answer.
"Because everything begins with breathing. Gi—the vital energy that flows through all living things—enters your body with the air. If you breathe badly, you waste Gi. If you breathe well... you can do things ordinary people call impossible."
He inhaled. Slowly. Deeply. And even in this dark barn, I felt it. A change. Subtle. As if the air itself were becoming... denser? More alive? Something intangible but undeniably present.
"Close your eyes," he ordered.
I closed my eyes. Darkness settled. My world shrank to sounds and sensations. The distant crackling of the lantern. The smell of hay. The hardness of the ground beneath my buttocks.
"Breathe normally. Don't try anything. Just observe. Each inhalation. Each exhalation. Where does the air go? How does your body react?"
I breathed. Observed. The air entered through my nostrils. Cold. Descended into my throat. Filled my lungs. Then came out again. Warm. Ordinary.
"Now, slow down. Count mentally. Inhale for four beats. Hold for two. Exhale for six."
I followed the instructions. Four beats. One. Two. Three. Four. Air filled my lungs until they felt ready to burst. Pause. One. Two. Then the exhalation. Slow. Controlled. Six beats that seemed to last an eternity.
"Good. Continue. Find the rhythm. Don't force it. Let it clench and force it. your body adapts."
Minutes. Or maybe hours. Time lost its meaning in that voluntary darkness. There was only the rhythm. Inhale. Hold. Exhale. Inhale. Hold. Exhale.
And then... something changed.
It wasn't spectacular. No explosion of light. No cosmic revelation. Just... a sensation. As if the air I was breathing had texture now. A quality it hadn't had before. As if it were carrying something more than oxygen.
Gi.
I felt it. Not with my hands. Not with my closed eyes. But with something else. A sixth sense I hadn't known I possessed. A perception awakening after three years of forced sleep.
The energy entered with the air. Warm. Alive. It flowed into my lungs. Dispersed in my chest. Touched something at the center of my body—a warm, pulsing point, like a second heart I had never noticed.
"You feel it, don't you?" Mansoo's voice carried a note that sounded like disbelief. "Already. Damn... you feel it already."
I opened my eyes. The world had... changed? No. Not changed. But I saw it differently. The lantern light seemed sharper. The shadows deforce it. Shadows are deeper. And Mansoo...
Around him, an aura. Almost invisible. Like a heat haze undulating in the air. A presence my eyes didn't really catch but that my new sense perceived clearly.
"What is that?" I murmured. Even though I knew. Damn, I knew it. Shadows knew it.
"That's me." Mansoo smiled. A sad smile. "My Gi. The energy I've cultivated for years. That I try to keep hidden. But you apparently just saw in... what? Ten minutes?"
He laughed. But the sound held no joy. "My teacher told me I was a prodigy because I felt Gi in three days. Three days, Hyeon. And you..."
He didn't finish. He didn't need to.
"How?" I asked. Because even I didn't understand. "How did I..."
"Because you're not normal." Simple. Brutal. True. "Your body remembers. Even if your head has forgotten. Somehow, you've already done this. In... another life? Another time? I don't know. And frankly?" He looked me straight in the eyes. "I don't want to know."
Silence settled. Heavy. Laden with everything we weren't saying.
Then Mansoo stood up. He extended his hand to me. "On your feet. If you can feel Gi, then we can go further. But Hyeon?"
"Yes?"
"It's going to hurt. The first time you try to consciously circulate Gi... it's like learning to walk with your legs on fire. Your body will resist. Your circuits aren't developed yet. You're too young. Too small. It should be impossible."
He smiled. Bitter. Tired. Resigned.
"But nothing you do is normal. So go ahead. Show me what you're capable of."
. . .
He showed me how to visualize. How to imagine Gi as a current of water—no, like blood—no, like light. Fluid but substantial. Warm but not burning. Alive.
"Gi circulates naturally in your body. Even now. Even without you knowing it. It follows the meridians—invisible paths that connect all your organs, all your muscles. The Way of the Breath is learning to control this flow. To amplify it. To direct it."
Standing now. Legs apart. Knees bent. Hands in front of me, palms open toward the sky.
"Inhale. Feel the Gi enter. Visualize it descending. Not just into your lungs. Deeper. Down to the Danjeon."
"The Danjeon?"
"The center. Just below your navel. That's where Gi gathers. It's your reservoir. Your foundation."
I inhaled. Slowly. Counting the beats. And I felt... something. Like a drop of warmth falling into my chest. Descending. Seeking. Finding that warm point at the center of my body.
The Danjeon pulsed. Like a heart beating for the first time.
"Good. Now exhale. But this time, when you exhale, try to push a little of that Gi toward your arms. Just a trickle. As if you wanted the energy to flow from your center to your hands."
I exhaled. Pushed. And...
The pain exploded.
Not in my arms. Everywhere. As if someone had injected acid into my veins. My muscles contracted. My knees buckled. I fell forward.
Mansoo caught me. His firm hands under my shoulders.
"I warned you." His voice was soft. Almost compassionate. "Your circuits aren't ready. You tried to force Gi through paths that don't really exist yet. It's like... like trying to push a river through rocks. It works. But it hurts."
He sat me back down. Gave me water. I drank. My hands trembled. My arms were numb. That residual burning sensation persisted, pulsing in rhythm with my heart.
"Why?" I managed to articulate. "Why does it hurt so much?"
"Because you're alive." He smiled. "Gi is life. And life... burns. Everything that burns hurts before it warms."
He sat down beside me. Looked at the flickering lantern.
"When I was your age—your real age, not the age you pretend to be in your head—I didn't even know what GiHe extendedGI was. I ran in the fields. I played with sticks. I didn't start training until I was twelve. And even then, it took me months before I felt Gi. Years before I could do what you just did in a few minutes."
He looked at me. "Who were you? In your life before?"
"I don't know." True. Painful. Frustrating. "I don't remember. Just... fragments. Sensations. Skills without context."
"And you want to recover that. Recover who you were."
"I want to find someone." Serin. The amber eyes. The face that haunted me. "I don't know who. But I know she exists. Somewhere."
Mansoo nodded slowly. "Then I'll help you. Not because I understand. Not because I think it's a good idea. But because..."
He stopped. His hands clenched into fists.
"Because I know that feeling. Searching for something you've lost. Someone you can't forget even if you wanted to."
He stood up. Extended high He extends his hand to me again.
"We'll train every night. One hour. No more. Your mother must not know. The village must not know. It's our secret. The first." He pulled me to my feet. "Do you agree?"
"I agree."
"Good." His hand lingered on my head. One second. Maybe two. Then he ruffled my hair. Not the way you did with a child you found cute. The way you did with... a comrade. An equal.
"Welcome to the Way of the Breath, Hyeon. It's going to be long. It's going to hurt. And at the end, you may not be who you hope to become."
He opened the barn door. The cool night air entered. With it, the smell of earth and pines.
"But at least, you'll have tried."
. . .
That night, lying in my bed, I didn't sleep. My body still pulsed with that residual pain. My circuits—those invisible paths I had tried to force—protested with each heartbeat.
But beneath the pain, something else. A satisfaction. A beginning.
I had felt Gi. I had touched something real. Tangible. A fragment of what I had been. Of what I could become again.
And Mansoo... This man who fled his past had agreed to teach his monstrous adopted son. Not out of duty. But out of... what? Understanding? Solidarity between exiles? Resignation to the inevitable?
I didn't know. But it didn't matter.
Because now, I had a mentor. A secret. And a direction.
It was their first secret. It wouldn't be their last.