Chapter 53: Dispatch-3
Chapter 53: Dispatch-3
Hyu Ja-seung, squad leader of the Shadow Unit's Eighth Squad under the Murim Alliance, gritted his teeth in unbearable rage.
"Pigs and dogs? You dare...."
Those who obeyed orders from above without any judgment of right or wrong—could there be any insult that condemned the Shadow Unit more accurately than that?
It was enough to make him wonder if the man knew something and was mocking them deliberately.
How much time had it taken to turn away from that self-loathing?
He had thought he could finally carry out his missions without any emotion at all, yet a single Flying Dragon squad member had gouged that wound wide open again.
After chewing on his rage for a long while, Hyu Ja-seung eventually let out a hollow laugh.
Yes, the man was right.
His current self was no different from a pig or a dog.
But what choice did he have?
If he could not escape his pig-and-dog existence, then there was no choice but to become an even more faithful dog.
Hyu Ja-seung gave the order to his subordinates.
"Summon the Seventh and Eighth Squads immediately. Inform them that approximately thirty Flying Dragon squad members attempting to leave the front line must be slain."
"Yes, squad leader!"
In the end, he decided to deal with them according to his own emotions.
Since he was going to be a pig or a dog anyway, was it not permissible to dispose of irritants as he pleased?
The Shadow Unit had been granted the authority to act first and report later against martial artists attempting to leave the front line, so there was nothing to hold him back.
Hyu Ja-seung smiled a bitter, bloody smile, telling himself that if those men considered it payment for tearing open his wounds, dying would not feel so unjust.
***
Jeon Sang-gu, squad leader of the Shadow Unit's Seventh Squad, raced through the forest like a swift tiger alongside his squad members and shouted.
"Hurry! We must reach the target point and lie in ambush first!"
"Yes, squad leader!"
Jeon Sang-gu felt a fluttering in his chest for the first time in ages.
It was a rare opportunity for slaughter.
In his assigned zone lately, there had been no targets requiring elimination for some time, and he had been passing tedious days.
But suddenly an opportunity to kill thirty-odd people had arisen, and there was absolutely no way he would miss it.
If possible, he wanted to handle them all himself.
Jeon Sang-gu enjoyed killing.
He had even come to think that without the stimulation murder provided in this dreary Shadow Unit life, he could never have endured.
Of course, there had been a time, in the beginning, when he too had felt repulsion at slaying martial artists of the orthodox faction.
But were not humans called creatures of adaptation?
Now he had cast aside all guilt and reached a state where he could purely enjoy killing.
And within the Shadow Unit, there existed a considerable number of other martial artists who had come to enjoy killing just like him.
They were racing through the forest like the wind when it happened.
Abruptly, a single human figure standing ahead caught his eye.
Black martial attire and a deeply pulled-down bamboo hat—the very uniform of a Shadow Unit member.
Seeing this, Jeon Sang-gu shouted toward his squad members.
"Halt! Everyone halt for a moment!"
Then he himself descended first before the black-clad man.
"Are you a squad member from the Eighth Squad?!"
But the man, who tilted his bamboo hat slightly to reveal his face, did not answer and instead asked Jeon Sang-gu in return.
"Are you Jeon Sang-gu, squad leader of the Seventh Squad?"
Jeon Sang-gu, recognizing the face, asked back with a startled expression.
"You are Squad Leader Sak Mu-heun of the Fourth Squad?! Why is the Fourth Squad here?"
That was the moment.
Suddenly, screams of his squad members rang out from behind.
"Keurgh!"
"Kreeugh!"
"Eugh!"
Startled, he turned to look back and saw three men and women who had appeared from nowhere ambushing and slaughtering his squad members.
They must have been concealed.
"Who are you bastards?!"
He drew his sword and was about to charge at them.
Puh-ook!
A sword pierced through Jeon Sang-gu's back, its tip emerging from the front of his chest.
"Kuh-heok!"
He could not comprehend it.
He turned his head to look behind him and saw the face of Squad Leader Sak Mu-heun of the Fourth Squad.
Why him, against his own...?
"Why...?"
By the time Jeon Sang-gu breathed his last on those words, Sak Mu-heun had already withdrawn his sword and was descending upon another squad member.
"Squad Leader Sak?!"
The Second of the Seventh Squad, a peak-level martial artist alongside Squad Leader Jeon Sang-gu, frantically swung his sword to defend himself.
But it was too much to withstand the sword of Sak Mu-heun, acknowledged as the finest among all Shadow Unit members.
Chae-chae-chae-chaeng!
After only a few clashes, his sword was deflected to the side against his will. And then, through his wide-open chest, Sak Mu-heun's sword passed lightly, as if slicing through air.
Shaak!
It was a slash so swift and natural that he felt not even pain.
By the time Sak Mu-heun had left him and descended upon another squad member, blood spurted from his chest, which split open a beat late with a tearing sound.
Pu-haaak!
"Kuoooogh!"
The First, also at the peak realm like Squad Leader Jeon Sang-gu and the Second, could not turn his eyes to that place even knowing his squad members were dying.
A man with steel tiger claws fitted on both hands was descending upon him as though passing through uncontested ground.
It was Seol Pung.
Around the path he swept through, three squad members were being flung aside, spraying blood as if caught in a storm.
Pu-haaaak!
"Kyaaaak!"
"Heuaak!"
"Aaaaak!"
Though his build was not especially large, in the First's eyes, he looked like a massive fierce tiger charging at him.
It was overwhelming momentum.
Feeling as though he would be crushed by the force and unable to resist at this rate, the First forced out a martial shout and thrust his sword at the incoming Seol Pung.
"Uwaaaaaap!"
Shu-aak!
A yellow sword qi pierced through space like a spear tip.
It was a thrust delivered with all his desperate strength.
At the very instant that swift thrust was about to pierce Seol Pung's head, Seol Pung let out a martial shout and struck with his Fierce Tiger Claws.
"Ha-ap!"
Ka-aaaang!
"Keuk?!"
Along with an immense force, his sword lost its direction and was deflected sideways.
It was power the First could not possibly control.
And simultaneously, four steel claws like rays of light raked across from the opposite hand.
The brilliant red energetic force coalesced upon them was the final sight the First beheld.
Pu-hwaak!
Seonwoo Jin, alongside Hae Cheong-yeon and Seol Pung, had lain in concealment and struck first, killing two in the initial ambush.
The Heavenly Killing Secret Technique's stealth art that Seonwoo Jin had cultivated had now reached a certain level of mastery, and even the Shadow Unit members could not sense his presence at all until the moment just before death.
When Seonwoo Jin's sword, rising slowly from the shadows, simply drew a line across the world, their consciousness faded as naturally as breathing.
Shaak!
"!"
"!"
After that, Seonwoo Jin immediately leaped toward another Shadow Unit member together with Hae Cheong-yeon and Seol Pung.
When the Divine Eagle Flight of the Seonwoo Thirteen Swords unfurled its magnificent wings before a Shadow Unit member's eyes, the bewildered opponent swung his sword chaotically, attempting to deflect it.
"Eueuk?!"
Chae-chae-chae-chaeng!
In that moment, a single ray of light shot from the center of the wings and pierced through his chest.
Puh-ook!
"Kuh-heok?"
An ultimate-speed thrust to which he could not even react—it was the One Strike of the Four Sun Sword Technique, now complete in its heart-method application as well.
Satisfied with the natural transition between the Seonwoo Thirteen Swords and the Four Sun Sword Technique, Seonwoo Jin grinned.
Having killed the third man and surveyed his surroundings, he saw Hae Cheong-yeon beside him finishing off one more with the Stellar Net Sword Art.
Seonwoo Jin then shook the blood from his sword and leisurely looked around.
It seemed they no longer needed to move.
In the brief span while Seonwoo Jin and Hae Cheong-yeon had each killed one, Seol Pung had dealt with four, and Sak Mu-heun had dispatched three, including the Shadow Unit squad leader.
Seonwoo Jin sheathed his sword and spoke to Hae Cheong-yeon.
"It was so easy, it almost feels hollow."
"It was an ambush, after all. It was only possible because Sak orabeoni was with us—otherwise, it wouldn't have been this easy."
"Indeed, that's true too."
Seonwoo Jin watched Sak Mu-heun, who had just finished off three men and was sheathing his sword, with a pleased smile.
He could not even measure how much easier things had become with him here.
Before departing for the Alliance, the Sword Saint Hae Un-baek had asked Sak Mu-heun, who had become his unnamed disciple, to serve as Hae Cheong-yeon's hidden escort.
Sak Mu-heun had readily accepted, of course, and thanks to him, the Seventh Squad had effectively become an overwhelmingly powerful squad with four peak-level masters.
'And not just any four at the initial stage of peak—four that include two masters with over seventy years of internal energy. Now it's not just one squad; you could say we're nearly on par with the core fighting strength of any typical Flying Dragon unit.'
Since then, Hae Cheong-yeon had been entrusting various covert tasks to him.
In fact, even being able to find the Hao Sect branch in Seonwi with such familiarity on their first visit had been thanks to Sak Mu-heun.
This time as well, after provoking the Shadow Unit members, Seonwoo Jin had asked Sak Mu-heun to trail them.
The reasoning was that since he had provoked them, there would be some kind of reaction one way or another.
And indeed, Sak Mu-heun, the strongest among the Shadow Unit members, had secretly followed them and discovered their subsequent course of action.
The best of the possible outcomes Seonwoo Jin had anticipated was that they would contact the Alliance and not interfere with them any further.
'If possible, I hoped they would choose that....'
Given that they numbered close to thirty and had no particular justification to force them back to the front line, he had thought they might simply decide to leave them be.
But even if they contacted the Alliance and then came to persuade them again, he felt he could understand.
It would mean that, though they could not disobey orders from above, they were at least making an effort to avoid a clash.
The worst-case scenario I had envisioned was them deciding to kill themselves.
Because then, with no other choice, we would have to kill them too.
'But that... I never imagined they would choose a decision even worse than that.'
The decision Sak Mu-heun uncovered was nothing short of astonishing.
They had resolved to kill without even notifying the Alliance, based solely on their own judgment.
So there was no longer any need to spare them.
In fact, their failure to report to the Alliance made things even easier.
That was why Seol Pung, Seonwoo Jin, and Hae Cheongyeon first decided to move together with Sak Mu-heun.
Since they had already scouted the plan for three squads to converge and ambush them, and knew which direction the other squads would approach from, there was no need to wait around.
The result was the current situation.
The Shadow Unit's Seventh Squad had instead been defeated piecemeal by a surprise attack.
As the head of Seventh Squad's Number One was finally split into five pieces by Seol Pung's Fierce Tiger Claw, Sak Mu-heun spoke.
"Clean up the bodies simply and move. I'd hoped to take down all three squads piecemeal, but due to time, the rest seems impossible."
But despite the easy battle, Sak Mu-heun's face as he spoke looked extremely dark.
It seemed killing fellow Shadow Unit members who were in the same situation with his own hands did not sit well with him.
At his complicated expression, the group secretly exchanged glances. Seol Pung spoke as their representative.
"Sak hyeongnim, if you're unwilling, we can handle it ourselves."
"That's right, Sak orabeoni. You don't have to push yourself too hard."
"Yes, just scouting them for us is more than enough."
But Sak Mu-heun shook his head with a bitter smile.
"No, it's not that. It's just... I think I can guess why they made this kind of choice. There are quite a few, you see. Once some people enter the Shadow Unit and start killing martial artists, at some point they begin to enjoy it. Most squad members who carry out summary execution without reporting even when it's not urgent were like that."
Having spoken up to there, he let out a deep sigh and continued.
"Isn't it laughable? That those who joined the Murim Alliance in pursuit of righteousness and chivalry would come to enjoy killing the innocent before they know it, and even that such people would later enter the Alliance's official armed forces."
Muttering as if to himself, Sak Mu-heun soon shook his head, smiled, and said,
"We don't have time, and I've been speaking nonsense. Come, let's go quickly."
Then Hae Cheongyeon spoke to him.
"We can change it."
"Hm?"
To Sak Mu-heun, who looked at her with a puzzled expression at her words, Hae Cheongyeon spoke in a resolute tone.
"Trust my father, orabeoni. While what's already done can't be undone, at the very least he'll make sure it doesn't repeat going forward. And you'll be able to play a part in that as well, orabeoni."
After gazing at her with complicated eyes at her conviction-filled words, Sak Mu-heun eventually smiled and nodded.
"Yes. I, too, trust the elder, my teacher."
***
Hyu Ja-seung, leader of the Shadow Unit's Eighth Squad, frowned as he lay in ambush in the thicket.
He could see the extermination targets approaching the ambush point ahead.
But even though the targets had arrived, the Seventh Squad members still hadn't reached them.
Seventh Squad leader Jeon Sang-gu wasn't one to miss out on something like this.
It was strange.
Just then, Ninth Squad leader Yang Won-dang sent a telepathic transmission.
[- What shall we do? Do it ourselves?]
Hyu Ja-seung examined the approaching extermination targets once more.
The number was twenty-five. It was fewer than when first spotted, perhaps three having broken off, but it was still no easy number to face with just two squads of twenty-two.
Furthermore, wasn't the Twelfth Daeju of the Flying Dragon Twelve Units, the Jeungak Dogak Man Jong-im, a master with over eighty years of internal energy?
A single misstep seemed like it might cause casualties on their side as well.
Currently, the number of peak-level masters on their side was two in the Eighth Squad, two in the Ninth Squad. Four in total.
If the Seventh Squad, which alone had three peak masters, had joined them, that would've been seven, and there would've been no need to worry...
After mulling it over, Hyu Ja-seung decided to pass on this opportunity for now.
He thought it better to take a little longer and rejoin the Seventh Squad to seek another chance, rather than risk danger.
[- Let's just let them go this time. It would be better to regroup with the Seventh Squad and seek the next opportunity. Stay in Ghost Breath Great Art and relay to the Ninth Squad members to let them pass.]
[- Understood.]
After sending that telepathic transmission, Hyu Ja-seung also sent a transmission to his own squad members, ordering them to stay quietly hidden.
Then, concealed, he waited for Man Jong-im's group to pass by.
He wasn't worried about being discovered by the enemy.
After all, their stealth technique, mastered from the assassin's secret techniques of Pyeonbok Hyeolsal Jo Woo-son, was almost perfect.
Hyu Ja-seung was confident.
The probability of being detected while simply lying still and hidden, rather than attacking, was practically nonexistent — unless someone pretended to be insane and went rushing out at the enemy.
Yes, unless someone went rushing out at the enemy.
But that very thing happened.
It was when Man Jong-im's group was passing the spot where they hid.
Suddenly, one of the Shadow Unit members shouted in a loud voice.
"Attack!"
Then he was the first to rush out toward the enemy.
At that sight, a startled Hyu Ja-seung cried out.
"You fool?!"
Seeing as he wasn't one of his own squad members, it seemed one of the Ninth Squad members had failed to receive the message properly.
But he couldn't afford to stand there bewildered.
Chaeng!
"What scoundrel is this?!"
He saw the ambushing Shadow Unit member's sword blocked like lightning by a Flying Dragon squad member who drew his blade.
Hyu Ja-seung couldn't have known, but it was Bi Sa-yeong.
"What?!"
"It's an ambush!"
The Flying Dragon squad members, startled by the ambush, drew their weapons and took up alert stances, and in the chaos, a few Shadow Unit members had already reluctantly rushed out following the first member.
Chae-chae-chaeng!
"Assassins!"
"Watch out!"
The Shadow Unit members who rushed out to ambush were actually flustered as only they had emerged, and didn't know what to do.
It was a total mess.
Gritting his teeth, Hyu Ja-seung shouted.
"Everyone attack! Strike all at once, then immediately withdraw!"
Then he too rushed out like a flying tiger, hurling throwing weapons at the Twelfth Daeju Man Jong-im.
Hwiriririk!
Even in that urgent situation, he thought someone had to keep Man Jong-im tied down.
But Man Jong-im, already alert on all sides, blocked the throwing weapons without difficulty.
Chae-chae-chaeng!
Then, just as his sword clashed with Hyu Ja-seung who flew in following the thrown weapons,
Chae-chaeng!
As other Shadow Unit members hurriedly rushed out after Hyu Ja-seung, trying to scatter their throwing weapons, three figures suddenly pounced like ghosts from behind them.
"Haaap!"
Puuuk!
"Keok?!"
It was Seol Pung.
Seol Pung's Fierce Tiger Claw had pierced the back of Ninth Squad leader Yang Won-dang's neck.
It was a surprise attack from the rear, something he could do nothing about.
It wasn't just Seol Pung.
On the other side, Seonwoo Jin's Seonwoo Thirteen Swords were sweeping away two Shadow Unit members with a fantastical sword stroke that seemed to spread giant wings.
Shu-haaak!
"Euk?!"
"Wha, what is this?!"
The moment the Shadow Unit members were thrown into confusion by the giant wings of light that pounced from the rear, those wings scattered into blade-shadows like rays of light and tore them apart.
Pu-hwa-aaak!
"Kuaaak!"
"Euaaak!"
The blood-soaked Shadow Unit members died and fell, plummeting.
It was the Linked Blade Technique leading from Divine Eagle Flight, Seonwoo Jin's most favored move, into Divine Eagle Spreading Wings.
Beside Seonwoo Jin, Hae Cheongyeon's Stellar Net Sword Art was unfurling.
Choosing speed over technique, Hae Cheongyeon's sword flew in like a shooting star, piercing through the backs of two others in an instant.
Shwiiik!
"Heo-eok!"
"Aaak!"
It was the swiftest thrust of the Stellar Net Sword Art, Comet Star Black, an attack so fast the Shadow Unit members could not even react.
Hyu Ja-seung, who was clashing swords with Man Jong-im, could only be thrown into bewilderment.
Even the other squad members, thrown off by the surprise rear attack, were collapsing.
Two were dying on the sword of the Jeomchang Sword Tiger Je Won-yeong, and another was breathing his last on the sword of First Squad leader Do Mu-gon of the Twelfth Unit.
Hyu Ja-seung's heart grew urgent.
This was serious. At this rate, they would be annihilated in an instant.
"Retreat! All forces retreat and break away!"
After shouting that, Hyu Ja-seung scattered all his remaining throwing weapons at Man Jong-im and immediately threw his body into flight.
Hwiriririk!
Chae-chae-chae-chaeng!
"Where do you think you're running?!"
Having knocked away the throwing weapons, Man Jong-im also tried to throw his body forward to follow.
But just then, someone shouted.
"Do not chase, Daeju-nim!"
"Huh?!"
The sight of Man Jong-im hesitating at that voice fleetingly entered Hyu Ja-seung's eyes.
In that interval, Hyu Ja-seung hurled his body into the forest with all his might. He didn't know why they'd been told not to chase, but it was nothing short of fortunate.
Once some distance from the enemy had been put, Hyu Ja-seung finally had the leisure to look around.
He could see a few Shadow Unit members following behind him. Eight in total. Including himself, only eight had managed to extract their bodies from there.
It was unbelievably absurd.