Yongcheon Escort Agency
Not long after returning home, my coin pouch had grown so light it might as well have a hole in it.
I had spent five taels of silver buying the house. Another 730 copper cash went to the deed, the household register, my identity token, and the broker’s fee. Repairs cost me another tael of silver.
Even the money I’d spent on one meal a day, having food delivered every afternoon, had already come to about half a tael.
Could I save money by giving up delivery and cooking for myself? I worked it out and found the ingredients and firewood would cost even more.
I’d never cooked a thing in my life. Even if I tried to boil and stir-fry my way through it, I’d end up wasting money and eating miserable scraps fit for the trash heap.
I had just spent another five taels on the willow-leaf saber. My total take from killing Jang Ho-dal was only seventy copper cash.
What I had left was six taels of silver and a few hundred copper cash.
That wasn’t nothing. If I spent carefully, it could last me about two years.
Still, I couldn’t shake the irritation of watching blood-earned money disappear so quickly. Maybe it was time I did something.
Suitable work didn’t just appear every day.
If I let the money run out and then scrambled to find work, I’d have to force myself to do jobs I didn’t want. Earning a little while I still could was better for both body and mind.
Besides, staying cooped up at home was making me restless.
If I wanted work, I needed someone who understood the local scene and, more than anything, knew how not to stab me in the back. A trustworthy information source.
Luckily, I had exactly that kind of connection.
“Work that pays well? Good grief, if I knew of something like that I’d have gone first-- oh, right. I heard Yongcheon Escort Agency is hiring people.”
“An escort agency? Forget it.”
Gu-sam shook his head as he chewed on the snack he’d brought out.
I’d come back to my hometown after so much trouble. I had no desire to leave again.
I was sick of walking all day and even sicker of sleeping outdoors on cold mountain dew. If I half-assed some escort mission, I could wind up taking a blind blade and never make it home again.
“They aren’t hiring escorts for runs. It’s security for their establishments. The bigger shops in Seochon all hand their protection over to Yongcheon Escort Agency.”
Gu-sam suddenly leaned closer and dropped his voice conspiratorially.
“Simhyangru’s included. Word is, if you do well, they might even assign you there, so every swordsman with a blade at his hip and every half-baked thug in town went running over to the agency. Look at the inn. It’s practically empty.”
“Simhyangru...”
It was the lavish eight-story building that, on my first day back, had made me realize Seochon was no longer the hometown I remembered.
As I sat there in silence, sipping tea and thinking, Gu-sam grinned.
“What is it? Why are you smiling?”
“Nothing, nothing. Heh heh heh. Hero, if you happen to get into Simhyangru, don’t forget about this disciple.”
“Tsk. You’ve barely dried the blood on your head and you’re already like this. Your bones’ll go bad.”
“No, no. I mean, if you could at least let me hear Ye-hyang play the pipa from outside once, I’d truly regard you as my lifelong benefactor.”
“Is Ye-hyang really that famous?”
“I don’t know whether she’s a beauty, but her pipa playing is supposed to be unbelievable. There are regulars who come from far away just to hear it...”
Gu-sam went on and on as if he’d personally been to the gate of Simhyangru, though he probably hadn’t gotten anywhere near its high walls. The more I listened, the stranger it felt.
Why would such a thriving pleasure house be in a place like this?
*
Yongcheon Escort Agency stood on a broad stretch of foothills where a mountain ridge split to either side.
Several buildings were built with their backs to the harsh mountains. The brick wall was as high and thick as a fortress rampart. The front gate was wide enough for two loaded carts to pass side by side without trouble...
It couldn’t match the large escort agencies in Hubei or Henan, but it was still a formidable operation.
The front of the agency was crowded with dozens of criminals and killers carrying swords and blades.
The ferocious scene, which looked like some kind of rogue-market gathering, drew an involuntary snort of laughter from me.
Blade-carriers didn’t usually loiter around escort agencies unless they were desperate.
Escort work was hard and dangerous.
It also didn’t pay all that well. Unless a man had the wanderer’s disease and couldn’t stay still for a moment, few made it their trade.
They didn’t look like they’d come to become escorts. Like Gu-sam had said, they were probably drawn here by the lure of Simhyangru.
Men in navy escort uniforms embroidered with “Yongcheon” over the left chest were lining up the martial artists.
Most obeyed the instructions without complaint, since they were here for an interview, but martial artists were rough, crooked people who liked to think they were something special.
There were constant disturbances: some openly refused to move, some tried to cut the line and got caught, then glared and reached for their hilts. The trouble never stopped.
And yet no actual blade fight broke out, thanks to a giant who looked like the head escort, guarding the gate like Zhang Fei at Changban.
Whenever trouble started, he would haul his massive body over, easily a head or two taller than everyone else, and walk forward as if a mountain had come to life.
If he stared down at you from inches away, his face buried in sideburns like a slab of rock, the pressure was immense.
The moment he drew the broad saber at his waist, it felt like he might split a man from crown to crotch.
Even blade-hardened killers, men who ate by killing people, would shrink under that kind of presence.
Escort agents were martial artists too. If necessary, they killed without hesitation. That head escort looked like the type who would happily bathe in blood even when it wasn’t required.
He might only be putting on a show and not be all that impressive after all.
But no one drew a blade to test him.
The weaker lot dropped their tails immediately, and the more capable swordsmen hadn’t forgotten why they had come to the agency in the first place.
They probably figured that if they clashed with Yongcheon Escort Agency, life in Seochon would become difficult fast.
When I took my place at the back and waited, someone came stomping out from the gate, huffing as he went.
“Hey, brother, did you pass the interview?”
“How should I know!”
“Kekeke, pass? What pass? Look at that face. He got hit good and proper.”
“Looks like Simhyangru hits softer than this place does.”
“Feels like nobody’s passing at all. Are they really hiring gatekeepers?”
The form of the interview was obvious enough. Since I had worked once before as an outside escort hand, I knew roughly how things went.
The more applicants they had, the higher the cut line would be.
One by one, the martial artists in front disappeared through the gate. A little later they came back brushing dust off their clothes, nursing sour stomachs, and headed toward town in search of a tavern.
Only in the late afternoon did my turn finally come.
I followed the escort inside. After passing over a stone-paved walkway, I entered a wide practice yard where the interviewers were waiting for me.
“Take up that wooden saber and show Head Escort Feng what you can do.”
They didn’t even bother asking my name before starting the test. Then again, the men before me had been beaten dusty and sent away, so names were probably pointless.
I unfastened the willow-leaf saber and set it on the rack, then picked up the wooden one.
It was about the same length as my saber, but weighed less than a third as much. I loosened up, swinging the wooden blade around and around, so light I didn’t even need to care about the balance.
It was my first time holding a practice saber carved from wood. Even when I learned saber technique in Zhejiang, I had naturally used a real blade.
That didn’t mean a wooden sword was harmless. A solid strike from one could still break bones or kill a man.
Head Escort Feng, the middle-aged martial artist serving as the examiner, didn’t even bother with a formal stance.
“Come at me. I’ll give you the first move.”
I slowly gripped the wooden saber with both hands and raised it to eye level. Beyond the tip of my blade, he stood about twenty paces away.
In real combat I would have moved with as much caution as possible, but there was no need for that now.
After quickly calculating how to approach and attack, I kicked off the ground and charged. In one breath I closed the distance and unleashed the most domineering opening form of the Nameless Saber Technique.
Head Escort Feng gave a cold smile and shifted his wooden saber into a better grip.
He must have judged me the way he’d judged the others, as someone who was rushing in thoughtlessly.
He didn’t dodge my strike. He met it head-on with a swing of his wooden blade.
Clack!
The moment the sabers collided, I let my force slide along the angle of impact, then twisted left. I spun the blade above my head and aimed for his neck.
Head Escort Feng knocked aside the slash coming for the back of his head and countered with a wide sweep of his own. His strength was nothing to sneer at, and his response was quick.
I dropped my stance at once and stepped into the blind spot of his vision.
Whirrr--!
The heavy sound of cutting air, like a bee’s buzz, passed over my head.
From the crouch, I thrust the wooden saber straight toward his lower abdomen.
Head Escort Feng kicked the blade aside with his foot and retreated quickly.
I pressed after him with quick steps, unleashing a vicious series of thrusts at his thigh and ankle.
His footing wavered, but he didn’t tangle himself up or fall.
In real combat, a man hit by that would panic, take a blade to the leg, and crash on his backside, but Head Escort Feng calmly slipped past the point of the blade.
Those were the motions of proper footwork, honed through endless training and real fighting.
I hunched my body, then exploded toward him and drove the saber out.
Head Escort Feng started to swing at my shoulder, then abruptly leaned back and threw himself away.
It had clearly been a strike that should have caught him off guard, yet he still sent my rising blade away by more than a hand’s breadth with a clean deflection.
Even so, it wasn’t enough to reverse the momentum.
The Nameless Saber Technique was a relentless offensive art, one that clung to an opponent until he broke. It had defenses, but it preferred attack whenever possible.
When it worked, it was as bold and exhilarating as a mountain gale; when it didn’t, it was as brutal as a death struggle.
It wasn’t enough to memorize and practice the forms. You needed the nerve and grit to close with an enemy in a desperate clash. Good eyes, too. Fast hands as well.
Fortunately, it was working reasonably well on Head Escort Feng.
I drove him relentlessly across the practice yard, moving in every direction without pause.
Within moments, after more than ten exchanges, it was clear.
This man was a master. There was no question he was no weaker than I was.
He should have taken a hit or two, but Head Escort Feng kept dodging or blocking everything, and before long he shifted from defense to offense.
For someone of his level to be working only as a head escort...
In a smaller sect, he would have been more than qualified to serve as instructor or hall master.
If the head escort was this skilled, I couldn’t even guess how strong the agency chief, said to have come from the Qingcheng Sect’s outer branch, might be.
That didn’t mean he was beyond my reach.
I hadn’t survived this long only because I was lucky enough to run into weaker or equal opponents. I had brought down plenty of men who were stronger or more vicious than I was.
If this were a fight for my life, I would have used every method available.
I’d have thrown out every murderous trick I knew, stomped on feet, tossed daggers, and scattered the quicklime powder hidden in my left sleeve.
But this was only a demonstration of skill. There was no reason to resort to filthy tricks.
He restrained his own underhanded methods as well. I didn’t sense any murderous intent from him.
The forms of the Nameless Saber Technique I had been practicing alone finally met an equal partner, and for the first time in a while, my blood ran hot with excitement.
Opportunities to cross blades with a true master did not come often.
Even if I lost here and was turned away, simply having exchanged blows with a man like this would have made the trip to the agency worthwhile.
A gambler loses fingers, his wife, and children and still goes back to the tile game.
A merchant keeps earning a margin even in loss-making trade.
A Confucian scholar may fail the civil exams his entire life and still never surrender the delusion that he will pass before he dies.
A martial artist wants, above all else, to become a formidable master and make a name under heaven.
That was true of the later-generation elites raised like fighting cocks by great sects, and just as true of demonic cultists who devoured people for a living, and rogues who survived on a diet of blades and blood.
Take away the endless drive to grow stronger from a martial artist, and all that remains is filthy violence and the stink of blood.
I wanted to be strong too.
I wanted to become a master, wash away all the frustration I’d carried for so long, and live openly and freely without being bullied or starving, without having to look over my shoulder.
If I didn’t have that hunger, I would never have lived by the blade all this time, no matter how much I needed to survive.
As Head Escort Feng turned truly aggressive, my hands and feet quickened.
The wooden blade, now carrying real force, slashed through the air savagely at pressure points and vital spots. He wasn’t just humoring me to gauge my skill.
He, too, was giving it everything he had.
There was fighting spirit burning in Head Escort Feng’s eyes as well, a determination to bring me down. It seemed he hadn’t had a proper exchange like this in a long while either.
That ferocious spirit, full of martial pride, was unmistakably the spirit of a martial artist. So was I. There was no way I was stopping here.
We traded offense and defense fiercely, forgetting even that we were in an escort agency’s testing yard.
Whirrr--!
Clack! Clack!
The wooden saber was light, so every collision sent a jolt through my grip.
It was a wooden sword with no edge, but if it landed wrong it could still split a skull or crush bone, so the tension was no less than with real steel.
I kept moving without pause, cutting, blocking, thrusting, evading, all to seize the upper hand.
My breathing grew hotter and hotter, and every part of me, right down to my fingertips, was taut and alert.
After I ground down his sharp strikes with a string of Nameless Saber forms, a hand’s breadth of opening finally appeared at his flank.
I hurled a feint at his face to blur his sight, then dropped low, slipped into his blind spot, and drew a long horizontal cut.
That was it!
Too late to dodge. Blocking it would be difficult too. This would end it.
It was a strike filled with certainty, but what met the end of my blade was not flesh and bone.
Head Escort Feng, caught off guard, widened his eyes and leapt away to the other side, twisting the wooden saber with nothing but wrist power to barely knock my blade aside.
Even in that instant, he must have put enough force behind it, because pain shot through my wrist.
I used Eight Directions Steps to sweep the saber wide and bleed off the momentum, then rushed in again before he could settle his stance.
“Haaah!”
Head Escort Feng didn’t dodge the incoming strike. With a bold shout, he thrust his wooden saber straight out.
Just before impact, he curled the tip inward with exquisite control, pressing down on my blade before driving a long thrust through the opening.
The technique was so perfect it sent a chill down my spine.
I had never seen this form before, and yet it felt oddly familiar. As I twisted my body to avoid it, I suddenly understood.
This wasn’t saber work. It wasn’t sword work either. If what I was seeing was correct, this was...
Spearmanship.
Rannachal.
The fundamental spear form of all spear arts, as widely known as the Three-Stage Sword Technique.
I had never seen Rannachal performed with a saber.
He was using a blade only because circumstances had forced it; originally, he must have been a spearman.
The fact that spear technique had come spilling out in the middle of a saber exchange meant he was cornered.
Rannachal wielded with a spear was difficult to block with a sword, but its power delivered through a wooden saber was nowhere near the same.
I gripped the wooden blade with both hands, stepped forward with my left foot, and used a Nameless Saber form to slash upward with all my strength.
Clack!!
One hand can’t beat two.
Head Escort Feng’s terrifying thrusting saber, which had been boring in like a snake that had swallowed a stone, twisted off line and wavered after getting struck on the head.
I didn’t miss the opening. I kicked off the ground and charged.
Head Escort Feng stared at me with a stern look, as if he were about to pour out his last ultimate strike, and raised the wooden saber over his head.