Chapter 114
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 114
Chapter Title: The Owner (4)
The Iron Ball Faction supplies the assassin squads with gear.
They evaluate the newly inducted prisoners, teach them martial arts, and fit them with weapons.
Of course, martial arts pieced together like that can't possibly be strong.
The Iron Ball Faction isn't in the business of forging mighty warriors. They just equip them with whatever weapons they'll need for immediate kills.
This reveals the Heavenly Annihilation Division's mindset.
They don't see the assassin squads as lifelong companions. They're tools to be used once or twice and discarded.
Those from the Martial Camp are different.
They were selected by the Heavenly Annihilation Division itself and trained professionally in the Martial Camp.
They can't help but differ from the ones hailing from the Nineteen Hells.
For the assassin squads from the Martial Camp, places like the Three Nests serve only as rest stops. They're comfortable spots to seek out when injured or just needing a breather.
To those from the Nineteen Hells, they're massive supply hubs.
Rest stops like the Three Nests are stocked with martial arts manuals. You can take any of the secret techniques or scrolls prepared there. Weapons abound too. If there's one you like, you can grab as many as you want.
In the depths of winter... who might be holed up in these remote mountains battered by brutal cold?
Unexpectedly, it's Vanguard. Hanbi's there, and Jaja too. Fox shows his face as well.
It's surprising they're all still alive.
Hanbi and Jaja are locked in ferocious sparring against each other. From morning till evening, they press each other relentlessly, without a moment to catch their breath. Like people desperate to kill one another.
Fox is tinkering with something.
The acrid smell of gunpowder wafting far and wide suggests he's messing with explosives.
The real shocker is Vanguard.
He never lingers at rest stops. Once he drops off an assassin squad, he heads out to meet up with the main force.
He's the one who gets the least rest in the squad.
Yet here he is, sprawled out lazily in the sunlight. Lying stock-still on a long bench.
They're all rejects. And nothing's changed—they've been abandoned by the Heavenly Annihilation Division again. Clean-up crews will come soon enough, and this time, they'll die without putting up a fight like before.
They aren't struggling to survive.
The reason they're training so fiercely, obsessing over gunpowder, and refusing to wake from their naps... it's because they've given up on life. Or maybe to forget their fear of death.
Four Thousand Four lay in a cozy spot, watching the Three Nests.
He's at home in the wilds. He finds sleeping on the ground more comfortable than a soft bed.
The Nineteen Hells had been terribly inconvenient. All you had for a bed was the icy stone floor. But it hadn't bothered Four Thousand Four one bit. It was far better than huddling in a damp burrow, enduring moisture seeping into your bones on uneven earth.
He dug a small pit and lay down.
His body and mind both relaxed completely. It felt like he'd found the coziest nest in the world.
The Three Nests were peaceful too.
The Iron Ball Faction outpost looked just as it always had.
Even the Twelve Stems Formation that had tested him first time around remained unchanged. Of course, the assassins guarding the outpost would be fresh faces. They protected the Iron Ball Faction from all twelve directions.
If guiding tormented souls to the afterlife wasn't possible, then the next most precious thing was an elder.
To save the elder, he had to infiltrate the Heavenly Annihilation Division.
Or perhaps the elder had already been executed by now. Being captured by them meant losing freedom... it meant his life was in their hands... and after the way he'd resisted, he must have surely lost it.
Even so, he would enter the Heavenly Annihilation Division.
If the elder was dead, he'd at least carry out the body.
He harbored no thoughts of revenge against the Heavenly Annihilation Division. Nor any intent to hunt down whoever killed the elder.
Death comes to everyone.
The elder had killed a great many people. At least from the world's perspective.
Four Thousand Four had slain countless, but the elder's tally was beyond reckoning. Compared to him, Four Thousand Four's hands were barely bloodied.
The elder was someone who could die content, no matter who took him down.
To the eyes of the world, he was a demon who deserved to be beaten to death on the spot.
That's why revenge never crossed his mind.
If the elder lived, he'd rescue him. If not, he'd retrieve the corpse.
That's the sole reason he was tailing the Heavenly Annihilation Division.
And one more thing... this kind of pursuit wasn't so bad either.
Death was out of sight. Mingling with no one meant no tormented souls came into view.
No need to kill anyone.
Of course, the elder had told him otherwise. He'd taught him to seek out those tormented souls. The world was full of suffering people, he'd said—they needed caring for.
But... killing was still killing.
No matter how tormented the soul, guiding it to the afterlife wasn't ever easy.
Boom!
A small explosion rocked the Three Nests.
Fox must have botched something. Not a big one... just enough to blow away a house?
Fox crawled out, his face smeared black with soot.
"Heh heh!"
Four Thousand Four chuckled despite himself.
From his hiding spot, the Three Nests were in plain view. No—his eyesight had sharpened remarkably. The landscape, the people, everything looked twice as clear as before.
Flap flap flap!
A messenger pigeon took flight from the Three Nests.
Four Thousand Four glanced indifferently at it.
The Heavenly Annihilation Division sent pigeons without meaning often. Probably on a schedule, or maybe irregular dates prearranged.
He didn't follow it.
He could track a pigeon, but one failure was enough. Without knowing which ones headed to the main force, chasing them was pointless.
'Gotta tail the people.'
He waited calmly.
The folks at the Three Nests weren't ordinary farmers. They were martial artists, Heavenly Annihilation Division members.
Even in midwinter, people climbed the mountains.
Some felled trees. Made sense—they needed firewood. Nothing odd there.
Some gathered herbs.
Winter made it tough, but with nothing better to do, foraging herbs passed the time. Who knew—maybe someone at home was truly ill.
Gathering herbs was fine too.
Some just hiked for exercise.
That was okay. They stuck to familiar paths, stretched long at the summit, then headed back down.
The mountains around the Three Nests weren't tall.
All of it... was actually surveillance. Constantly watching for strangers in the area.
Their watch didn't rely on eyes alone.
Markers dotted the village perimeter, one every ten paces—it wasn't an exaggeration. Anyone brushing one carelessly would be spotted immediately.
Villagers didn't climb for the view.
They went up to check the markers, scrutinizing each one meticulously.
Four Thousand Four didn't know what the markers were.
Sometimes a stone, other times the direction a branch was snapped.
Only the marker-maker understood them.
But one thing... the Three Nests villagers slipped up sometimes.
When no anomalies showed on the markers, they raised a hand high entering the village.
Of course, someone always greeted them from across the way.
Sometimes a woman, sometimes a child... family, probably.
Raising a hand to them was perfectly normal.
But considering they're Heavenly Annihilation Division... that common gesture signaled one thing.
Checked it out—no issues.
Today too, they raised their right hands high.
"Keh! Planning to stick around forever?"
The Iron Ball Faction leader muttered to himself.
"Until he shows."
"That's... not stubbornness or anything... Everyone else says he's dead, but you're the only one insisting he survived. What's that about?"
"Papa, don't tease me."
A voice cold as ice—colder than midwinter—whispered softly through the room.
The Iron Ball Faction leader shut his mouth.
The man stared at a small wooden box.
Inside writhed red ants. Strangely, they never ventured out.
They reacted to Four Thousand Four.
The Heavenly Annihilation Division implanted white ants in the assassin squad members. That's how they tracked them even in hellish hideouts. But once the white ants were depleted...
That was the situation now.
All the white ants pursuing Four Thousand Four were gone. Most dead, some taken by him.
So they'd deployed the red ants.
Red ants were the natural predators of white ants.
This swarm matched the white ants in number—and equaled the assassin squad's headcount.
Vanguard, Jaja, Fox... even the Iron Ball Faction leader guiding the Three Nests... none were free of white ants. And back at main HQ, they had predators for those white ants too.
The man had brought the red ants.
They'd react instantly to white ants. If one entered within ten li, they'd swarm out of the box.
For now, they stayed put.
Four Thousand Four hadn't come within ten li.
"Senior Brother, let's really ask. What makes you so sure Four Thousand Four survived?"
The Iron Ball Faction leader called the man "Senior Brother."
The man looked barely forty. Just stepping into middle age. Yet the faction leader treated this middle-aged man with profound respect.
The middle-aged man pointed at the box.
"If he's dead, these die too."
"Th-that means!"
The Iron Ball Faction leader peered into the box in shock.
It meant the Heavenly Annihilation Division leadership could tell, from HQ, who in the squads lived or died. No reports needed—just watch the red ants.
"Heh heh! These are alive... so Four Thousand Four's definitely alive. And heading this way."
"Then the one who killed Ilgwang Yusu..."
"That was him."
The man spoke with utter conviction.
The Iron Ball Faction leader asked no more.
Vanguard was in the village. Hanbi, Jaja, Fox too. All marked as purge targets.
Purge targets... people who had to die.
The ones handling purges were the Minor Execution Squad. And leading them stood the Execution Captain.
This man was the Minor Execution Captain.
If he willed it, he could slaughter them all right now.
They were purge targets anyway.
Vanguard didn't know. They didn't even know the Execution Captain was at the Three Nests.
The Execution Captain never left the faction leader's room.
They never poked around the faction leader's room either.
The Execution Captain observed them each in detail. But they couldn't spot him.
The day Four Thousand Four appeared, they'd all be purged.
The middle-aged man muttered.
"Strange, isn't it? He's already here. But these aren't stirring. Why?"
"Senior Brother, if no one's outside..."
"You believe those fools' reports? Heh heh! You're slipping too, Papa. You used to have sharp instincts."
Papa fell silent.
Senior Brother... Execution Captain... this man was terrifying. Even Papa trembled in fear.
"Why aren't you moving? Tell me. He's already here. So why no reaction?"
The Execution Captain murmured to the red ants. As if speaking to people.