The Raid
Seo Joo-cheon had known nothing of Hwang Manor's existence.
This, too, was a variable born of the novel becoming reality. Of all that a single character possessed — past, present, and future — Seo Joo-cheon knew only the fragments he himself had written.
When the Shaanxi Four Chivalrous Heroes simply followed along in silence, Hak Yu spoke.
"This is a place where someone I have a connection with from long ago resides."
"I see."
Most people would have asked what Hwang Manor actually was, if only out of curiosity. Seo Joo-cheon showed no interest at all.
This Po Un is a truly peculiar man.
That peculiar feeling leaned toward liking rather than dislike. Hak Yu had spent his life constantly watching people, constantly suspecting them. He never trusted any beast that walked on two legs. And yet he found himself thinking that this man called Po Un could be trusted. Even granting that it had been an emergency when he was wounded — would he have gone so far as to consider leaving Yu Seong in this man's care otherwise?
Hwang Manor was an estate only slightly larger than an ordinary civilian home. It was neither conspicuously lavish nor particularly large.
As Seo Joo-cheon passed through the main gate, he turned over in his mind how he might forge a bond of fate with Yu Seong. Yu Seong was one of those talents destined to become an absolute master. That was why Seo Joo-cheon wanted a connection in place. If Yu Seong fell under the Slaughter King or the Macheon Alliance, the martial world would face a killer of unprecedented infamy. He wanted to guide the boy well — to make him a chivalrous hero rather than a slaughterer. And if that hero stood at his own side, all the better. Even if not, if Yu Seong stayed close to Jang Hyeon-nam, that would be icing on the cake. With Yu Seong around, there would be no need to worry about the protagonist's safety.
Even if he couldn't determine Yu Seong's path right now, it was best to keep him somewhere he could keep an eye on.
I'm headed to the Yongcheon Sect as a guest, so I can't take him with me. From where I stand, it would be good if he went under Jang Hyeon-nam. If Hyeon-nam has Yu Seong with him, he'd grow wings — and Yu Seong could use the Heavenly Killing Star's energy the right way.
If he told them to take Yu Seong to the Jang Family Clan Estate while Sanho-ong was still perfectly healthy, they would surely push back. Hak Yu would suspect his motives, and if the old man vanished into hiding because of it, the connection with Yu Seong would be severed forever. That was why Seo Joo-cheon couldn't bring himself to tell Hak Yu to go to the Jang Clan.
The Shaanxi Four Chivalrous Heroes were shown to the guest quarters of Hwang Manor.
"We'll just have a cup of tea and be on our way."
That was Seo Joo-cheon's answer when asked if they would stay for a meal.
Now that we've entered Hwang Manor, the Karma Mission to bring Yu Seong here is complete. The reward will come naturally on its own. But it said the reward was connections — I have no idea what connections it means.
He still hadn't met a single person he recognized at Hwang Manor.
"Hero Po, I'll step out for a moment."
Hak Yu took Yu Seong and went outside. It looked as though he had received some kind of sound transmission from beyond the walls, but Seo Joo-cheon had no way of knowing what it said.
"Is it true?"
Hak Yu stared at the lord of Hwang Manor standing before him, his face stunned.
"Yes. We found them a month before you arrived, Master, and placed them in the underground stone chamber."
"And you didn't contact me at once?"
"It wasn't easy to move. We weren't the only ones who found them. The Slaughter King's men showed themselves in our village as well, so we stopped coming and going entirely."
"If the Slaughter King's men came here, that means they were tracking that object's trail?"
"Yes. We found it a few days ahead of them. We did our best to erase the traces, but it seems a few things slipped through."
Hak Yu nodded.
"So that's it. The Slaughter King's men weren't hunting me solely because of Yu Seong. They believed its whereabouts were connected to me."
He had always known that one day the Slaughter King would come looking for him, to claim the descendant of the Heavenly Killing Star. He had simply thought it would be later than this.
"If the Slaughter King's men have already come this far, it's only a matter of time before this place is exposed as well."
"I know. That's why I've been scouting another safe house. I meant to discuss it with you once you arrived, Master — and for now, moving would only draw their eyes, so we've been keeping quiet."
"This is bad. This place is already compromised."
Having heard the whole account, Hak Yu muttered through a grimace.
"What? What do you mean?"
"On our way here, I didn't catch so much as a glimpse of the Slaughter King's men. I thought they had withdrawn."
"You said one of your companions killed them. Perhaps their line of contact was simply cut."
"No. They already knew where I was going."
Hak Yu swept his gaze across the grounds.
"They'll be gathering here. From this moment, get your family and Yu Seong to a safe place, and have everyone who can fight prepare for battle."
"Don't worry overmuch. They appeared in the village for a time — that doesn't mean they found our stronghold."
"No. They'll attack before long. Yu Seong is here, and so is the object they've been hunting. With both prizes in one place, do you think they'll simply walk away? They'll strike before we can get out. Today, even — no. Right now."
Hak Yu spoke as if sighing.
"Ah, I never should have come here. You should have ignored me entirely — taken that object and moved to another safe house at once."
Watching Hak Yu worry himself into a knot, Manor Lord Hwang Seok frowned.
The Master has grown old, and with age he's grown nothing but anxious. I seem to have troubled him with a story I never should have told.
Hoping to turn Hak Yu's mind elsewhere, Hwang Seok said, "Would you like to see the objects?"
"No. That can wait. Have them take up battle positions now."
"What?"
Hwang Seok started to argue with the stubborn old man, then flinched.
"Too late. We're too late."
Hak Yu murmured, his eyes on the main gate of Hwang Manor.
"Get Yu Seong and your family out of here this instant, and gather every child who can fight. Quickly. Yu Seong and your people need to be hidden somewhere those men will never find."
He said it because he feared for Yu Seong more than for Hwang Seok's family. Only then did Hwang Seok feel the killing intent seeping in over the walls — and because that killing intent was familiar, tension seized him of its own accord.
"I was a fool. How could I have been so blind."
"The opponent is the Slaughter King. How could you afford to be careless?"
A trace of reproach colored the old man's sigh.
"What are you standing around for? Move!"
"Yu Seong, come with me."
"Grandfather."
Sensing something wrong in the air, Yu Seong refused to leave his grandfather's side. Hak Yu soothed him.
"Nothing's going to happen. So you hide for a little while. You remember, don't you? What I taught you."
He meant the method of hiding so completely that even animals would never know you were there.
"Yes, Grandfather."
Cursing his own complacency, Hwang Seok snatched Yu Seong up and bolted inside.
Hak Yu looked toward the guest quarters.
I'm sorry to have dragged them into a fight that isn't theirs.
The Shaanxi Four Chivalrous Heroes had helped him all this way without asking a single thing in return. Now that they were about to be thrown into danger, he felt the weight of it. But if the rumors are true, they should be able to look after themselves.
He didn't even have time to warn them. Watching the silhouettes already coming over the walls, Hak Yu drew a dagger from his robes and flung it.
Seo Joo-cheon was midway through a sip of tea when he surged to his feet.
"Everyone, take up your weapons."
"What are you talking about all of a sudd—"
Kang Chu-mi started to retort, then heard the sounds rising from the estate and pulled out her whip.
Seo Joo-cheon stepped out of the guest quarters to find Hwang Manor's warriors locked in a savage fight. The people they were fighting, however, looked like anything but soldiers — farmers, merchants, scholars, old men, women, even children who appeared to be boys and girls. Taking in that motley assortment, Seo Joo-cheon understood at once.
"The Slaughter King's men."
Above all, they moved in four-man cells. From the thick of the fighting, shouts rang out here and there.
"Black!"
"Dark!"
"Death!"
"Shadow!"
The four-man cell was named Black-Dark-Death-Shadow. Seo Joo-cheon had devised their methods of attack himself; there was no chance he wouldn't recognize them.
Black meant to muddy the waters. The one who took the Black role drew the enemy's eyes, and so Black was always the strongest of the four. Dark excelled at lightness skills, closing in unseen to deliver a single killing blow, and used hidden weapons to scatter the opponent's attention. Shadow seized the enemy's rear and struck from behind — always attacking from the back, always a nuisance. Death was the role given to the weakest of the four. If Black and Dark failed to finish the target cleanly, Death charged in with mutual destruction as the goal. Ordinarily, if Black, Dark, and Shadow together couldn't handle someone, Death would have to step in — but that only happened against a master too difficult to put down.
Hwang Manor's warriors were answering in four-man cells of their own. If they had trained under Hak Yu, they would already know this system. But the gap in level between them and the Slaughter King's men was so vast that comparison was almost meaningless.
Four of the Slaughter King's men came toward the Shaanxi Four Chivalrous Heroes. They were attacking everyone on the estate without distinction. Seo Joo-cheon read their roles from the weapons in their hands.
"From this moment, we hold a triangular defensive formation. No matter what happens, you hold your position."
"Yes, Big Brother."
A hard shout burst from three throats at once.
"Second Brother, you take the one with the saber. Fourth Sister, the one with the daggers. Third Brother, the one with the short spear."
"Yes!"
Seo Joo-cheon's plan was to kill the Death-role fighter in a single stroke and collapse the Black-Dark-Death-Shadow formation at once. A burly man dressed as a marketplace porter was holding a sword in the Death role.
"Don't hold back. If you can kill them, kill them. A shred of mercy and we'll be the ones who fall."
"We'll keep that in mind. You heard Big Brother? Don't hold back — kill them!"
At Ham Cheon-yeong's words, Dokgo Ho-in and Kang Chu-mi let killing intent rise in their eyes for the first time in a long while. They had been playing at chivalry of late, and more often than not they had pulled their blows. It had been so long since they'd unleashed a killing technique that they could barely remember the last time.
"Hohoho. Shall we go back to being the Shaanxi Four Evils?"
With Kang Chu-mi's words, daggers bloomed in the empty air.
Four blades stitched the sky with a piercing whistle.
The Dark-role fighter knocked aside three of the daggers — but failed to stop the fourth. It punched through his chest, and he went down in a heap.
"Huh?"
Kang Chu-mi had thrown the Four Flying Daggers Explosive Flash as a mere probe. She hadn't expected the enemy to drop so easily, and she was more startled than anyone.
"What? These are supposed to be the Slaughter King's men? Why are they so weak?"
Until now, everyone who had fallen to that technique had been a Second-Rate martial artist weaker than herself.
Dokgo Ho-in took the Shadow-role old man's arm off with ease. He, too, had meant the stroke as a probe — a flash of his fast sword — and the old man hadn't been able to stop it.
"Oh! Fast!"
Dokgo Ho-in realized his blade was quicker than he'd thought, and he marveled at himself.
The middle-aged man in the Black role fell back and demanded, "Who are you people?!"
He had never imagined two of his cell dying in an instant, without even a proper exchange of blows.
"You attacked us without even knowing who we are? Who knew the Slaughter King's men were this stupid. Looking at his subordinates, the Slaughter King must be an idiot himself."
Ham Cheon-yeong snorted a laugh as he needled the man, and the Black-role fighter charged.
"How dare you! Die!"
He could not stand by while someone insulted his lord. The saber came down with a roar of torn air, and from that sound alone Ham Cheon-yeong could read the man's level.
This one is strong!
Ham Cheon-yeong knew at once that his opponent was at least a cut above him, and he meant to evade. But then he thought of Dokgo Ho-in covering the rear, and instead of dodging he met the blow head-on. A reactive strike rarely overwhelmed an attack thrown first. Against someone of equal or greater skill, you were bound to be driven back. So Ham Cheon-yeong put power into his right foot, already bracing for the follow-up.
A splitting crack. Ham Cheon-yeong's saber sheared straight through the middle-aged man's blade and kept going, cleaving the skull in two. A wet, heavy sound. Having split a man's head, Ham Cheon-yeong stood there for a moment, stunned by a result he had not expected.
Seo Joo-cheon pulled his sword from the Death-role porter's chest and snapped, "Snap out of it!"
At Big Brother's bark, Ham Cheon-yeong wrenched his saber free of the ruined skull. Seo Joo-cheon was no less astonished. Death was the weakest role in Black-Dark-Death-Shadow, but he had killed the man without using the Time Dilation Authority even once.
We've gotten stronger. All of us. Thanks to the Thousand-Jin Weight Art and Yin-Yang Collision Cultivation.
It had lasted barely a second, but the Thousand-Jin weight behind the blow had shattered Black's saber outright. On top of that, they had been quietly storing the true qi of the Human-Form Snow Ginseng in their dantians through Yin-Yang Collision Cultivation, and their inner power had risen before they were even conscious of it. That was why Kang Chu-mi's Four Flying Daggers Explosive Flash had packed such force, and why Dokgo Ho-in's fast sword had grown sharp enough that the enemy couldn't block it.
The Shaanxi Four Chivalrous Heroes were already approaching First-Rate. They simply hadn't known it — they had set out on the road without a moment to take stock of their own martial arts.
The Slaughter King's Black-Dark-Death-Shadow cells were no easy opponents. Hwang Manor's warriors had already lost more than half their number to them. Seo Joo-cheon collected himself and spoke.
"Thanks to the Thousand-Jin Weight Art and Yin-Yang Collision Cultivation, we're stronger than we thought. So we switch from defense to offense. Today, we—"
His three younger siblings roared it with him.
The four of them abandoned the formation and plunged toward the Slaughter King's men fighting across the estate, throwing themselves in to save Hwang Manor's warriors, who were falling helplessly under the assault. Even if those warriors had trained in the Black-Dark-Death-Shadow formation under Hak Yu's instruction, they were a drop in the ocean compared to the Slaughter King's men. Hwang Manor's fighters were no pushovers — but against these opponents, they were simply outmatched.