Challenges of My Disciples (1)

The truth was, from the moment that they stepped onto the stone path, all thirteen of my disciples were caught in the first trap of the Hidden Mind Sect. There are always three types of repressed memories within the human mind, and these traps exploited them heavily.

The first trap deals with anger or denial, most of the time those caught in it will experience memories that angered them or something they were still in denial about.

The second deals with sorrow and grief and forces you to see those that have been lost in your life. Family, friends, loved ones, all who had an impact on one's life that have departed from the world.

The third relates to the memories of childhood, be it painful or happy memories. The third is the most challenging because to pass it, you must give up those memories.

The third trial forces you to move on, but that wouldn't be for a while.

---

Bae Suk would wander the fog that enveloped him, his mind led astray by the voices from his past. Every few steps the fog would morph, showing Bae Suk another moment from his past which he had forced himself to forget.

This time, it was a training session with his old master, at the time he was twelve, and his master was from the Kunlun Sect.

The training he would go through each day was intense, but instead of losing body fat to allow his muscles to grow, each and every day he would appear fatter and fatter.

"You're even fatter than yesterday, look at you! Just picking up the wooden sword makes you sweat, how could such a talent like you go to waste?"

His old master left after that day, and this only brought forth further eating from Bae Suk.

As Bae Suk continued to walk, the next memory the fog showed was the last day he had spent with his family.

An old, run down house formed from the fog, and the sliding doors in the middle of the house slid open. Revealing the single room that the house held.

Bae Suk stopped walking before he entered the house however, the control the fog had over his mind had been broken once this house had formed. As not even the fog could make him willingly step into this house again.

'They kicked me out when all I had done was gain some weight. I don't want to look at them.'

Bae Suk had repressed this day for a reason, it was a bitter last moment he spent with his family before they kicked him out. Even if he had moved on from the incident, he couldn't bring himself to forgive them for sending him away after such a bitter moment.

But the fog had no intention of letting Bae Suk have his way, as the house formed from fog soon moved toward Bae Suk at an unbelievable speed. Bae Suk couldn't react to the fog and was swallowed by the accelerating house.

Tak!

The sliding doors shut Bae Suk into the house, giving him no opportunity to escape.

"Just die you fat bastard! I never want to see you again!"

Crash!

Before Bae Suk knelt his younger self, bleeding from the head and covered in red wine. His brown tattered clothes barely stretched over his fattened stomach, and his sleeves looked as if they'd burst any second from Bae Suk's large arms.

"Mother I don't know what happened! I've been eating less food as instructed but my body just keeps growing larger!"

"That's a lie! Hic- You've been sneaking food in the middle of the night. Hic- N-no wonder that Kunlun master doesn't want to teach you, you lie and steal whenever you want!"

"Mother! I'm no-"

"Son, no, Bae Suk."

A man dressed in clean white robes standing in the center of the room spoke softly, and while the younger Bae Suk looked up to the man, the current Bae Suk refused to look.

"Y-yes, father?"

"You don't deserve the life you've wasted. Get out of my sight before you get cut down. Worthless pig."

Bae Suk scowled as he heard his father's voice, even after seven years of ignoring the lingering memories he still couldn't let go of his anger.

"Father!" The younger Bae Suk cried out. "Please don't do this!"

"I said out." Bae Suk's father said coldly, pulling out his sword in the process.

The younger Bae Suk stood up and walked out of the room with his head staring down at the ground. But as the younger Bae Suk approached the sliding door, he faded into the wall instead of opening the sliding doors.

'Huh?'

The room around Bae Suk began to unwravel as Bae Suk stared confused at the sliding door. The younger version of Bae Suk reappeared before his eyes and began walking backwards toward the spot he knelt previously.

"Just die you fat bastard! I never want to see you again!"

'What is going on? Am I stuck in this once moment now?!'

Crash!

As soon as the urn of wine crashed on his younger self's head, a sharp pain enveloped Bae Suk's head. But when he went to touch his head to see what caused the pain, a sticky liquid clung to his hand.

'Blood?' Bae Suk thought as he looked at his crimson stained hand.

"You fat bastard! Have you no words to explain yourself, because you know that you have no defense!"

Bae Suk looked up to his bother in horror as he realized he was no longer a spectator.

"Hic- Speak! You know you want to! Or do you no longer have a tongue to speak with!"

Bae Suk stood up with a rageful glare in his eyes and clenched his fists to hold himself back. "It doesn't matter if I say anything to you two! You'll kick me out even if I defend myself! I didn't eat anything in the middle of the night, and if you think that, you're delusional!"