Ha Ilming

Ha Ilming is the outwardly unaffiliated leader of the academy's sixth group whose ambush strategy and secret use of the forbidden Demon Art of Blood Reversion end in exposure and suicide.

Biography

Origins and Academy Entry

As the 108th cadet and leader of the sixth group, Ilming registers as a Red Martial Sword Clan member with no official higher affiliation. He is the only individual group leader who is neither a Six Clans prince nor an openly high-ranked heir, so equal formation training appears to leave his ordinary group at a structural disadvantage. Rather than accept that contest, he decides to injure the rival leaders at night and let his group pass after their formations lose their strongest members. (Chapters 26–27)

Ilming attacks two princes and a princess. Chun Wonryou's sound-based perception detects him before he can finish her; preparation lets him injure Chun Mukeum's leg, but an intruder forces him to retreat before eliminating Mukeum. Yeowun then cracks Ilming's rib during another attempted ambush. The accumulated injuries stop the campaign, yet Ilming converts the damage he has inflicted into a second-test advantage. When his formation plan becomes unusable, he personally breaks the opposing formation with internal energy, a two-handed sword stroke, and a shield push, proving that his strategy rests on substantial individual strength as well as deception. (Chapters 27–29)

Academy Tests and Rivalry

Ilming's resentment focuses on Yeowun after he identifies the seventh prince as the fighter who injured him. Chun Yuchan stops their confrontation and reads Ilming's damaged rib from a slight rigidity in his step and finger-sword balance, showing Ilming that the high-ranked heirs still surpass him. He spends vacation drilling internal energy and formations, only to be hospitalized again when Yeowun accidentally breaks through the ceiling of his training room. These humiliations harden his determination rather than changing his method. (Chapters 29, 33–36)

After returning, Ilming joins the twelfth group in an ambush on Bakgi's smaller party and takes their yellow tag. Yeowun's faction retaliates with superior numbers, and Ilming refuses to abandon his team even when he could flee alone. A broken rib leaves him unable to keep up with Bakgi's kicks; after capture, Yeowun breaks his fingers in repayment for what Ilming's followers did to Ohjong. Ilming activates Blood Reversion, gains enough power to throw Bakgi back, and continues attacking as his mind fades, but Yeowun knocks him unconscious and takes the tag. (Chapters 63–82)

Academy chief Lee Hameng discovers the reversed blood flow and interrogates Ilming about who taught a forbidden art whose manuals were supposedly destroyed. Ilming endures broken limbs without naming the source. When Hameng makes clear that the Red Martial Sword Clan will be investigated, Ilming bites his tongue and reverses his internal energy in a deliberate suicide. He dies protecting the secret behind his power, turning the outsider identity on his registration into evidence of a larger unresolved sponsor. (Chapter 82)

Appearance and personality

Ilming is a sharp-eyed cadet with slicked-back hair. He is calculating, industrious, proud, and capable of enduring severe pain without submission. His loyalty is selective: he will use ambushes and forbidden power against rivals but refuses an easy escape that would abandon his own cadets, and he dies rather than expose his teacher. He repeatedly mistakes ruthlessness for control, underestimating perception abilities, faction loyalty, and the cost of Blood Reversion.

Martial arts and abilities

Near-Master cultivation and swordsmanship

Ilming reaches the cusp of the Master level while still a cadet. He can exchange attacks with trained heirs, channel strong internal energy through finger strikes used like a sword, enlarge his arms for a two-handed upward stroke, and reinforce a shield-and-body charge with energy focused in his leg. He practices internal energy in the morning and formations later in the day, combining individual force with command of the sixth group. Damaged ribs create a concrete weakness: they stiffen his right step and arm, unbalance his finger attack, and eventually keep him from defending against Bakgi's repeated kicks. (Chapters 27–36, 63–74)

Demon Art of Blood Reversion

Blood Reversion is a forbidden art that reverses blood flow and produces a violent surge in internal energy. When Ilming activates it after losing consciousness, veins rise across his skin, his eyes turn red, and his strengthened body survives impacts and overpowers Bakgi's first attempt to stop him. The increase comes at the cost of control: his head turns white, he attacks like a beast, and he tries to defeat Yeowun before his mind disappears. The altered body prevents Yeowun's first heavy blow from breaking his skull, but it does not stop a concussion or defeat a fighter with greater internal energy. (Chapters 75–77)

The reversal does not automatically subside while Ilming is unconscious. Hameng must press blood points and inject energy to restore normal circulation. The art is also incriminating because its manuals were destroyed decades earlier, making a seventeen-year-old user's teacher a security threat. Ilming later reverses his internal energy while biting his tongue, converting the same principle into suicide before Hameng can extract that information. (Chapter 82)

Ambush and formation tactics

Ilming studies the standardized formations well enough to reason that removing leaders will destabilize otherwise equal groups. He plans repeated night attacks, prepares for specific heirs, coordinates more than thirty cadets around isolated targets, and improvises a spear formation when injuries ruin the expected plan. These tactics work against incomplete information but repeatedly fail against senses he does not anticipate and opponents whose alliances are stronger than his temporary bargains. (Chapters 27–29, 63–74)

Relationships

• Chun Yuchan: A rival who reads Ilming's injury and overwhelms him.
• Chun Wonryou: One of his intended ambush victims.
• Chun Yeowun: The leader whose faction decisively retaliates against Ilming's group.

Items

The supplied chapters do not consistently identify a named signature item for Ha Ilming.