Morning rose over Silent Edge. The pale sun barely crested the mountain's edge when Ilho jolted upright.
"Crap, the sun's up! Am I late?!"
He scrambled toward the door, as he turned to shut the door he looked up and froze. A shadow loomed above.
There, perched like a silent gargoyle on the edge of the roof, was Sa Gwan. Cloaked in silence, eyes like unmoving ink. Ilho's breath caught in his throat.
"Ahh—!"
He fell straight on his ass.
But when he looked again—Sa Gwan was gone.
"...What the hell?"
Sa Gwan was now crouching in front of him, he patted Ilho on the head. Ilho flinched. Sa Gwan stood before him, not a sound to his movement. In the next instant, he vanished again. Ilho looked around, spinning in place, heart racing. Then he spotted him, this time standing in the middle of the training grounds, surrounded by bamboo sticks, and a single scroll resting at his feet.
Ilho rushed down and picked up the scroll. Still saying nothing, Sa Gwan vanished once more...now perched atop the stone wall that lined the outer edge. The seal was old, bearing a faded insignia.
Phantom Veil: First Form – Shadow Step
He sat among the bamboo poles that lined the grounds and unraveled the parchment, eyes dancing over diagrams and stances. For the rest of the morning, Ilho tried to mimic the movements. It wasn't flashy or explosive like Jinhu's. It was subtle, coiled, precise. Almost silent.
He looked around.
"Hey! Are you gonna... I don't know... say anything? Give some tips?!"
Nothing.
Ilho groaned. "Seriously?"
He trained until his clothes were coated in dirt. Arms sore, ankles aching. He tried again and again to recreate the movement—his foot placement, his angles, his breath. It all felt… wrong. He needed feedback. He needed guidance.
But the man on the wall remained silent.
That afternoon, Wu Jin arrived, arms crossed as per usual.
"No joint training for the next two weeks, he's all yours." he said flatly.
He eyed Ilho—dusty, slumped in the dirt, scroll open at his feet.
"How long must you torture him with your silence?" Wu Jin asked. "Everyone knows you don't speak. But that boy... he's more like you than you think."
A pause.
"Just give him a chance."
The word chance hung in the air like a ghost.
Sa Gwan looked away. Memories stirred. A broken clan. Wandering ruins. Six years alone. No one had given him a chance—until Wu Cheng and Wu Jin had pulled him from a cave, starving and half-dead. They had offered him purpose. Given him the Twilight Flow—and sanctuary.
Now...
"When he earns it," Sa Gwan said softly.
Wu Jin gave a small nod and disappeared.
--
Montage: Days 2–13
The next twelve days were pain.
Ilho woke at dawn and trained until moonlight touched the tiles. He built bamboo posts into a maze. He danced through them again and again, whispering steps, collapsing in frustration, only to stand again and try once more. He shouted at Sa Gwan. He swore at the scroll.
Once, he even kicked a bamboo post so hard it flung across the training grounds, and then he stormed off. When Ilho had turned around there Sa Gwan was, replacing the bamboo stick with another. No words. No judgment.
Ilho just sighed.
"This is insane."
Each night, he collapsed in bed with joints screaming and lungs burning. But something strange was happening. His balance had improved. His movements were lighter. His steps began to echo less. When he moved without thinking, he sometimes felt like he left a ghost behind.
Still, Sa Gwan never said a word. Only watched. On the eighth day, Sa Gwan finally broke the silence with one sentence:
"Power is visible. Precision is not. One fools the world. The other kills it."
That stuck with Ilho. He wrote it into the corner of the scroll.
From then on, he practiced not to be seen...but to disappear.
--
Day 14
Something was different.
As Ilho walked into the training grounds that morning, he saw feathers tied near the tops of the bamboo stalks. Delicate. Balanced. Flags pierced the stop of the stalks. Blue, red, yellow, all blowing in the wind.
"What the hell am I supposed to do now?" he groaned.
He turned to Sa Gwan, perched again on the wall. Without a word, Sa Gwan dropped down in front of Ilho, turned to face the field, and vanished in a blur. All the flags disappeared. Not a single feather moved. Ilho's jaw dropped. Sa Gwan calmly walked back across the field, replacing every flag with perfect grace. Then he walked up to Ilho, patted him on the head once, and returned to his perch.
Ilho stood there, stunned. "...Okay. Fine."
He spent all day trying. Over and over, he dashed between poles. But the feathers always fluttered. He knocked over three bamboo poles by accident. Sweat drenched his clothes.
He screamed into the sky, "WHY DID YOU PICK ME?!"
No answer. But he refused to quit.
As the sun dipped below the trees, casting long shadows across the courtyard, Ilho stood still—breathing deep. Qi flowed from his feet. His eyes focused. His body poised. Then he moved. Like wind slipping through reeds. Like thought before speech. And just like that... all the flags were gone. Not a feather moved. Ilho stood at the end of the bamboo trail, huffing, hands on his knees, flags clutched in his fists.
"Holy shit... I did it... I think I did it? Who knows? That guy won't say a word—"
"Good job."
Ilho screamed.
Sa Gwan's face was inches from his shoulder.
"AHH! Don't sneak up like that!"
Ilho threw the flags at him. "Why? Why me? Wu Jin said you picked me. But why?"
Sa Gwan tapped him on the forehead with two fingers. He softly muttered.
"Because you need this to become a shadow. Precision is deadlier than strength."
He held up a thin needle. In one fluid motion, Sa Gwan tossed the needle into the air, snatched a loose thread from Ilho's sleeve, infused it with qi, and threw it. The thread looped through the needle's eye mid-air and embedded itself in a bamboo pole. The needle dangled, suspended perfectly.
Ilho just stared, Thinking to himself....That's a sewing trick from hell.
That night, Ilho stood on the balcony outside his room, arms folded, staring down at the bamboo poles below. The breeze carried the faint sound of distant training.
Behind him—
CRACK.
"Fuck! Can't y'all appear like normal people?! Maybe try the stairs?!"
Wu Jin grinned, rod in hand. "Still scared of the rod?"
Ilho grumbled, "That thing's got trauma baked into it."
Wu Jin chuckled. "Sa Gwan is special. The fact that he spoke to you? That means you are too."
He placed a hand on Ilho's shoulder.
"No one's ever learned his Phantom Veil forms. Many have tried. All failed. Me included."
Ilho blinked.
Wu Jin continued. "The fact that you mastered the first form… that's incredible. Don't be so hard on him. He's trying too."
Ilho looked down at the training grounds...at the flags, at the poles. Maybe he was.
"Oh, by the way," Wu Jin added, "the other two finished their footwork training. Starting tomorrow, you three train together."
He turned away.
CRACK.
"See you then."
Ilho remembered Sa Gwan's words "precision is deadlier than strength."
He grinned. "I guess we'll find out tomorrow how precise i can be."