Chapter 175
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 175
Chapter Title: There's No Such Thing as an Unsolvable Problem (5)
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Whistling as he tied the knot, Seo Ryang looked quite content.
“……”
“……”
Too shocked to move, Yeo Ganghwi, his expression frozen, rubbed his face with both hands. But that did little to quell his astonishment.
Dazed, he looked back at Ma Dongpil.
Ma Dongpil also seemed quite surprised, though not as much as Yeo Ganghwi. He even muttered, “Not a bad method.”
“Guard Ma.”
“Yes?”
“...Is this really okay?”
It wasn't a question one would normally ask the quiet guard. But he figured Ma Dongpil had to be more sensible than Seo Ryang.
Ma Dongpil cleared his throat.
“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, as they say.”
“But this is too dangerous! Not just one or two, but kidnapping all the heirs of the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace?!”
“...Because we don't know which heir the Palace Lord favors most.”
What kind of nonsense was that?
Yeo Ganghwi quickly approached Seo Ryang.
“Third Young Master.”
“Hm? What is it?”
“Please, please release them.”
Seo Ryang scowled.
“Why wastefully release the fish I've caught?”
He called them fish. Yeo Ganghwi felt like he was about to faint.
“Are you planning to start a war with the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace?!”
“There won't be a war. With all their heirs in our hands, what can they possibly do?”
“They can do plenty! What if they draw their swords without thinking...?!”
“Your sister would be done for, too.”
“That’s exactly my point!”
“But that won't happen.”
“How can you possibly know that, Third Young Master?!”
Seo Ryang grinned.
“Is the Palace Lord an idiot? Would he abandon all his own heirs for some kid who's merely the enemy's flesh and blood?”
“...!”
“If you were the one captured, he might have growled a few times. It would be heir versus heir. But the one they're holding is just the Ice Palace Lord's daughter, not the heir, right?”
Squeeze!
The six unconscious men and women twitched. He had tied the ropes so tightly that their circulation was being cut off.
“I hear the Palace Lord is over seventy. His martial arts are so strong he'll live to be a hundred, but is he going to take on new disciples and raise them at his age? Would he even want to?”
He wasn't wrong. But Yeo Ganghwi was still anxious. It was only natural, given that his sister had been kidnapped.
“You speak of the Palace Lord’s age. But I wish to discuss his temperament. What if he does something rash? From that moment on...”
“It’ll be a catastrophe.”
“……”
“And to avoid that very catastrophe, he can't possibly make a reckless move.”
With him putting it like that, Yeo Ganghwi had nothing more to say. Regardless of his anxiety, Seo Ryang wasn't wrong.
Seo Ryang dusted off his hands and stretched.
“Well, even without all that, the Palace Lord can’t do anything foolish.”
“Why do you think so?”
Seo Ryang smiled.
“You'll see.”
A short while later, the group was once again racing along in the carriage.
The six men and women, bound tightly, were loaded onto the roof like cargo. The added weight slowed the carriage, but its ride was still stable.
“Is it alright to leave them tied up on the roof like that?”
“Don't worry. I've sealed their energy centers and struck their vital points, so they won't cause any trouble. Just think of them as crates.”
He said to think of people as crates. He said it so matter-of-factly that Yeo Ganghwi almost nodded in agreement.
‘He truly is an overwhelming person to deal with.’
The journey with Seo Ryang was a series of surprises.
He hadn't displayed world-shaking martial prowess, nor had he declared he would outwit his enemies with godlike strategies. In some ways, his methods were reckless, yet when he explained them, they were impossible to refute.
‘His thought process is different from an ordinary person's. It's far removed from common sense. Yet, he handles matters without a hitch. It's truly fascinating.’
Perhaps this man's most frightening aspect wasn't his unparalleled martial arts or his status, but his radical wisdom that shattered common sense.
How long had they been traveling?
Ma Dongpil, who was looking out the window, had a deep look in his eyes.
“Young Master.”
“Hm?”
“Sir, are we perhaps heading toward Aenoe Mountain right now?”
“We are.”
“Understood.”
Ma Dongpil took it in stride, but Yeo Ganghwi could not.
“Heading to Aenoe Mountain? Not the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace?”
Seo Ryang answered nonchalantly.
“Why would we go to the Beast Palace?”
“But didn't you say we were heading to the Beast Palace when we first set out?”
“I did.”
“Then why?”
“Now that we've captured all the heirs, what do you expect me to do by going to the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace?”
Not even two hours had passed since he said the Palace Lord wouldn't do anything rash!
“I'm going to summon them.”
“What do you mean by that? Summon them? The Palace Lord?”
“And your sister, too.”
“...!”
“If we hadn't kidnapped the heirs, it would be a different story. But we're holding the much stronger hand, so why should we take the risk of going all the way there to beg? We're the ones holding the leash.”
“Ah...”
“This is no time to show weakness. Especially when dealing with guys like that.”
If slapped, he repays with a sword. This was Seo Ryang's way of solving problems—responding to a strong move with an even stronger one.
Indeed, there was no such thing as an unsolvable problem.
“To make them bow their heads on their own, you have to push them relentlessly. That's my way of dealing with morons who just imitate beasts.”
Of course, that wasn't all there was to it.
* * *
“...!”
Cheonho's eyes were bloodshot.
“Is this true?”
“……”
“I asked if it’s true!”
His high-pitched voice sounded like the roar of a beast.
Yageuk, the leader of the Nighthawks, trembled. This letter, received while he was investigating the disappearance of the Ice Palace's young mistress, contained shocking news.
“The probability is...”
Yageuk, who was about to say it was over ninety percent, swallowed his words. An uncertain answer to the enraged Cheonho would get his head torn off.
“It is true.”
Crash!
A fist filled with rage slammed into the ground, leaving a deep crater.
“Deploy the Hidden Leopards! Tell them to find those bastards and kill them immediately!”
The Hidden Leopard branch consisted of those who revered leopards and were skilled in covert assassination.
Watching Cheonho shout as if the matter was settled, Yageuk couldn't hide his alarm.
“M-My Lord.”
“Why aren't you moving?!”
Yageuk squeezed his eyes shut. His life was on the line, but he could not obey the Palace Lord's command.
His son would die.
“For now... please calm down.”
Grrrrr.
Behind Cheonho, a colossal beast rose to its feet.
It was like a mountain-sized boulder coming to life. The tiger that rose, its pair of red eyes glowing, was too immense to be described simply as a great tiger.
Thud. Thud.
The massive hall shook with each step it took.
It was far larger than any bear, with unusually prominent fangs that extended below its jaw. The movement of the clearly defined muscles in its forelegs was like a mountain range shifting.
That wasn't a metaphor; it likely weighed a thousand catties. Considering that a tiger weighing even five hundred catties was considered a rare great tiger, it was no exaggeration to call this a monster.
Yageuk's face turned pale.
‘The Tiger King!’
The demonic beast raised by Cheonho, the Lord of the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace.
The Tiger King was a monster, the culmination of the Beast Palace's arts, which had been developed over hundreds of years. The blades of peak masters couldn't even scratch it, and despite its size, it was faster and had more stamina than a horse.
And that killing intent.
Flash! Flash!
The vicious killing intent gleaming in its red eyes was overwhelming. Though it was merely the killing intent of a beast, Yageuk felt a pressure so intense he could barely breathe.
“Say that again.”
Cheonho's voice, thick with fury, made the Tiger King's killing intent even more menacing.
“The disciples I raised with my own hands have been captured by some unknown bastards! And you tell me to be patient?!”
“My Lord!”
“Is not one of them your own son?!”
Rumble!
The terrifying voice shook the great hall.
Yageuk gritted his teeth.
“That is why I say this. We don't know who the enemy is or why they've done this. If we move rashly, the hostages' lives will be...”
Wham!
“Ugh!”
Moving like lightning, Cheonho grabbed Yageuk's head and slammed it into the ground. His hand was so large and brutish it could engulf Yageuk's head.
“...Shut your mouth.”
His low, rumbling voice sounded like a tiger's growl.
“You dare talk back to me? Should I crush that blabbering mouth of yours that doesn't know its place?”
A chill ran down his spine.
The killing intent whispered in his ear was a hundred times more shocking than the pain of his cracked skull.
But Yageuk didn't stop. He feared for his own life, but if this continued, his son and all the other heirs of the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace could die.
If that happened, a civil war would erupt within the palace. Despite the abuse he was suffering, as a staunch supporter of the current Palace Lord, he did not want to see such chaos.
It was then.
“My Lord!”
“What is it?!”
The man who rushed into the great hall was an elderly man as large as Cheonho himself. It was Heuk-ung, who ruled the Dominating Bear branch.
“A letter has arrived from the Lower Five Gates! But...!”
“But what!”
Heuk-ung cautiously held out the letter. Even seeing his rival bleeding on the floor, he could feel no joy.
Rustle.
The Tiger King took the letter from Heuk-ung's hand. Despite being held between its massive fangs, the letter remained untorn.
Cheonho took the letter from the Tiger King and read it.
“What else could it possibly be... Hah!”
Cheonho's eyes wavered.
“I-Is this true?”
His reaction was completely different from when he had seen the letter about the heirs being kidnapped.
Heuk-ung swallowed hard.
“It is true. Not only the Lower Five Gates, but the Blue Owls have also confirmed this fact.”
Cheonho's mouth fell open in shock.
“...Why the hell are the Demonic Cult bastards...?!”
The letter contained information that the Demonic Cult's combat units, the Berserk Demon Unit and the True Demon Unit, along with three of the One Hundred and Eight Demonic Generals, were heading to Aenoe Mountain.
‘Why are the Demonic Cult bastards on the move at a time like this? Were they already stationed in Yunnan?’
When a massive power like the Demonic Cult decided to move its forces, it could do so without being detected by anyone.
But wasn't this too sudden? The timing was strange, and now, just as the heirs had been kidnapped, the Demonic Cult's forces were on the move. His mind was in turmoil.
Suddenly, a glint appeared in Cheonho's eyes.
“I see.”
“...Pardon?”
“I was wondering where that son of the Northern King had disappeared to, and he's gone and attached himself to the Demonic Cult!”
Thud!
Cheonho stomped his foot hard, his face twisting in a grimace.
“That shameless bastard! Did he have nowhere else to turn, so he joined hands with the Demonic Cultists?!”
This wasn't something he, who had allied with the Righteous Heaven Alliance, should be saying, but the reason he was so furious was due to the bloody history between the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace and the Divine Cult of the Heavenly Demon.
Hundreds of years ago, the Southern Barbarian Beast Palace, which had been coiled in Aenoe Mountain, could not withstand the overwhelming offensive of the Divine Cult of the Heavenly Demon and was driven all the way here. For them, hating the Divine Cult was only natural.
“Cough! My Lord.”
Cheonho looked down at Yageuk.
Bleeding profusely, Yageuk spoke.
“It's possible that the Demonic Cult was behind the kidnapping of the heirs.”
“...!”
“Furthermore, with the Demonic Cult's combat units moving toward Aenoe Mountain... it will cause problems with our dealings with the Tang Clan.”
“...You!”
“We must handle this without running into their people.”
Cheonho gnawed on his lip, then steadied his breathing.
“Bring the wench.”
Crash!
Cheonho blew the doors of the great hall away with a palm strike and moved out with the Tiger King.
“I will go myself, just as they demanded.”