The Shadow Behind the Shadows
The ronin's faces turned corpse-white. The Gale Whirlwind Palm was simply too fast — with their abilities, there was no way to evade it. Worse still, the palm force blanketed an area of nearly twenty feet, and that made it all the more terrifying.
It was accepted wisdom in Murim that a First-rate master could shatter a thirteen-pound boulder with palm force from five feet away. For a Peak master, that distance stretched to around ten feet; for a Transcendent, twenty. Which meant the one attacking them now was a peerless master standing at the very Transcendent realm.
Pah-pah-pah-pah-PAK! Before Ouyang Qiangang's palm force even reached them, the ronin's swords and blades were caught in that overwhelming qi wave, bending like taffy or shattering outright. Those swept up by the palm shadows that followed were struck as if by a giant hammer, every bone in their bodies crushing as they spewed mist of blood.
KRAK! CRUNCH!
"Aaaaargh—"
Along the path Ouyang Qiangang advanced, agonized screams followed one after another like beads strung on a thread. Everywhere his hand touched, ronin dropped as corpses — skulls caved in, chests punched clean through. He granted the ronin a mere ten feet apiece. Nothing more was needed. Resistance was impossible; you had to be able to see a technique coming before you could block it, dodge it, or answer it.
"T-This is impossible..."
From one of the ronin's mouths spilled a voice thick with despair and terror. It was no battle — it was a one-sided slaughter, and calling it anything else would have been generous.
At some point, the palm shadows vanished as if washed away. Of the thirty ronin, not a single one remained standing on two legs. Not even a faint moan could be heard. They had been annihilated.
Do-cheol and the dozen-odd guards who had survived stared at Ouyang Qiangang with half-lucid faces, forgetting even to swallow. Never in their lives had they seen a peerless master sweep away enemies with such overwhelming ease — and that master was on their side. Relief dawned across the warriors' faces.
Blood streaming from his torn grip, Do-cheol approached Ouyang Qiangang.
"H... Hahu, young master..."
Ouyang Qiangang raised a finger to his lips. The gesture for silence, and Do-cheol shut his mouth at once.
Doctor, the thief has completed unlocking the document storage room of the third warehouse.
Only then did Ouyang Qiangang look at Do-cheol and speak.
"Have the grounds cleaned up, and send word to Yeomga Manor immediately. I will deal with the remaining enemies."
Before the words had even faded, his figure vanished as if snuffed out.
Yawol the Shadowless Thief, having slipped into the storage room, picked the lock of a crate tucked in the corner and drew out a heavy bundle of ledgers. Famed for over a decade as the Imperial Capital's greatest thief, he was, astonishingly, a slight young man of barely twenty-five.
Just as a grin of triumph crossed his face and he moved to open the ledgers to find which one held the blueprints—
"Save your effort. What you're looking for isn't in there."
A languid voice sounded behind him.
"...!"
Goosebumps erupted across Yawol's entire body. He had been working with his senses honed to their absolute limit, yet he had felt nothing — not a whisper — until someone appeared at his back. In more than ten years of prowling the gangho, it had never happened once.
I have to run!
Yawol hurled the ledgers in his hand at the figure behind him — Ouyang Qiangang — and threw everything into the Phantom Shadow Step he had refined his whole life. His body split into a flurry of afterimages, creating the illusion that he was scattering in every direction at once. But against Ouyang Qiangang, already running at maximum combat mode with his dynamic vision amplified, such cheap trickery had no chance whatsoever. Engaging his Flash Step, he ignored the afterimages entirely and planted himself in front of the real Yawol just as the man reached the window.
"Where do you think you're going!"
"...!"
Terror bloomed in Yawol's eyes at the sight of Ouyang Qiangang standing before him. Whether he saw it or not, Ouyang Qiangang's index finger flicked out like lightning and struck his numbing point with perfect precision.
"Ughk!"
Yawol went rigid as a log and toppled, rolling across the floor with a thud. His art of thievery was built upon his footwork — and the moment that foundation was sealed, his fate was as good as decided.
Doctor! Ten unidentified intruders are approaching the first warehouse at high speed. Judging by their lightfoot technique, I assess them as warriors at least twice as strong as the initial intruders.
At Akasha's warning, Ouyang Qiangang's expression turned to ice. Against enemies of that caliber, the dozen surviving guards would be wiped out — it was only a matter of time. Seizing the back of the rigid Yawol's neck and unleashing the Heavenly Meteor Divine Art once more, his figure vanished from the spot like a ghost.
Shwaaaaa— In the pouring torrential rain, ten black-masked figures stood before Do-cheol and the surviving guards. The way they regarded the trembling warriors was like beasts savoring the final moments of their prey. That was how much composure they radiated.
Whoosh— The sheets of rain seemed to waver, and then Ouyang Qiangang stood before Do-cheol, gripping Yawol by the nape.
The eyes of the tall black-masked man — Il-sa, leader of the Dark Shadow Fourteen — glinted with a chilling light.
"Caught Yawol already, I see. So you're Hahu Gang?"
Ouyang Qiangang answered with a snort of laughter.
"And who might you be?"
"Heh. They say the Divine Doctor has a sharp tongue — seems you're no different. And you've learned martial arts on top of it. Well, no matter. You'll be dead soon anyway."
Il-sa sneered coldly and gave his order in a ruthless tone.
"Leave not a single one alive. Kill them all!"
Shaaang—! The nine of the Dark Shadow Nine, swords drawn, sprang at Ouyang Qiangang like bolts loosed from a crossbow. Hwiiiish— They were the elite of the elite of Gold Pagoda Mountain Manor's Imperial Capital branch — raised solely for slaughter, rivaling the first-rate killers of the Sea of Blood.
The nine, all but Il-sa, moved with uncanny footwork and in an instant deployed the Three Calamities Triple Formation centered on Ouyang Qiangang. Swish-swish-swish— Bone-cutting killing intent and sword light filled the air. Their attacks — the Three Calamities Formation stacked three layers deep — were linked with the precision of invisible threads, so that block one, and the other two would unfailingly strike at his blind spots and openings.
But Ouyang Qiangang, standing at the heart of that killing formation, wore a chill smile — tension was the last thing on his mind.
Doctor, in that formation the Three Calamities cover one another's gaps, and the attacks link together without pause like a turning wheel. However, when the formations rotate, a 0.02-second fracture opens along the axis connecting each group's center!
Ouyang Qiangang's gaze turned razor-sharp. Unfolding the Nine Palace Lost-Trace Step, he slipped through the torrent of attacks by the narrowest of margins, waiting for the instant Akasha had described. That moment came at once — the very instant the nine's movements crossed paths to set up their next strike, Ouyang Qiangang unleashed the Explosive Thunder Flame King Fist into the crossing seam.
SWRAAAAAK— It was as if a colossal meteor had plunged into the middle of a lake. KWAAAAANG— The Three Calamities Triple Formation, unable to withstand the monstrous mass carried on the Explosive Thunder Flame King Fist, blew apart. With their formation collapsing, the nine killers lost their balance and staggered as if about to fall.
The result was gruesome. With the formation broken, they were no longer Gold Pagoda Mountain Manor's elite killers — they were nothing but prey standing before a predator named Ouyang Qiangang. The peerless Gale Whirlwind Palm swept them away without mercy.
KWA-KWA-KWA-KWA—
"Aaaaargh!"
SPLAT! CRUNCH! Amid horrific screams, the Dark Shadow Nine — their bodies crushed — flew in all directions spewing mist of blood.
Just those few seconds. That was the entire count needed to annihilate the Dark Shadow Nine.
A deep silence settled before the warehouse. Shwaaaaaa— Only the sound of rain could be heard. And in that rain, Il-sa, head of the Dark Shadow Fourteen, stood with a bloodless face, staring at the sight of his subordinates all turned to corpses.
"Y-You... what in the world are you...?"
Instead of an answer, Ouyang Qiangang vanished before his eyes like a mirage. The Flash Step. Sensing the danger, the leader swung his sword on pure reflex, but his blade cleaved only empty air. Then, from behind him, came a voice like a devil's whisper.
"Too. Slow."
THUD! Ouyang Qiangang's hand struck Il-sa's back with casual ease. His mouth gaping wide, Il-sa couldn't even manage a scream as he crumpled to the cold ground along with the pouring rain. He had fallen, but he still breathed — Ouyang Qiangang had merely sealed his muting point and his numbing point.
He looked down at Yawol the Shadowless Thief and Il-sa with deeply sunken eyes.
Akasha, run the situation summary again. Have you identified who these men are?
There is no hard evidence, Doctor, but the probability that they are the dedicated assassination unit Gold Pagoda Manor secretly operates in the Imperial Capital is 99 percent.
Ouyang Qiangang clicked his tongue. That does seem the most likely. I'd rather like it if Great Hero Yeom could wring a confession out of them. He had spared Yawol and Il-sa, of course, precisely to dig into who stood behind them.
The enemies knew you only as Hahu Gang, the Divine Doctor. Given that, I judge it highly likely they do not yet know you are Ouyang Qiangang.
Interesting. He chuckled and went on. Most of the men they sent today are dead, and both their leader and the thief are captured. They'll be all the more curious now about what power stands behind Hahu Gang.
They will.
Shwaaaaaa— The menacing downpour streamed down Ouyang Qiangang's face, but his gaze only sank deeper and deeper.
Spider Blood's Imperial Capital branch, under Gold Pagoda Mountain Manor. A secret chamber deep in the night, where the blood-reeking darkness had yet to lift. Branch Head Sa An's face was so pale it seemed drained of every drop of color.
The man before him, head bowed and whole body trembling — Jeok-gwi — wore a similar expression. He had observed this warehouse raid from a distance and returned only after seeing how it ended.
Sa An's snake-cold voice sliced through the chamber's air.
"The mission failed, and the Dark Shadow Fourteen was annihilated as well?"
"To be precise... Yawol and Il-sa were captured, and the rest are all dead, Branch Head." Undispelled fear still clung to Jeok-gwi's voice.
"Who in the world...?"
"It was the work of Hahu Gang — the man we knew only as the Divine Doctor — acting alone."
"Even a Peak master would find the Dark Shadow Fourteen's Three Calamities Triple Formation difficult to face head-on. Are you telling me Hahu Gang's martial arts are that strong?"
Jeok-gwi continued, his face frozen with terror.
"Branch Head, he was... a Transcendent. The Dark Shadow Fourteen's Three Calamities Triple Formation posed no threat to him whatsoever."
A pained groan slipped from between Sa An's lips.
"Mmm..."
"I believe we must acknowledge what must be acknowledged. Otherwise, tonight's failure cannot be explained at all."
After Jeok-gwi withdrew, Sa An was left alone in the secret chamber. Thirty ronin, Yawol the Shadowless Thief, and even the elite Dark Shadow Fourteen... all of it lost in a single night... He closed his eyes for a moment. A revolutionary salt-refining method. And a mysterious Transcendent master... and both of them emerged at once from a man called Hahu Gang who has no backing whatsoever? Impossible. That man is a proxy, without question. Behind him stands a colossal backer we know nothing of — one who designed and bankrolled all of this!
He took up his brush and began drafting the secret missive to be sent to Cai Wencheng, Head of Spider Blood. He neither minimized the failure nor offered excuses. Instead, he packed the page with his razor-sharp analysis.
...Therefore, it is my assessment that identifying the unknown power standing behind Hahu Gang must take precedence over any further projection of force against the man himself.
I respectfully request that every intelligence network of Spider Blood be mobilized to investigate his true identity and the forces behind him.
As Sa An sealed the missive, his eyes glinted with a sinister light in the darkness.