The Ghost Sea Gang
Ja Gangcheon followed their instructions.
He simply had not made up his mind yet.
“Haul him up!”
They bound him with rope, and he let them. He remained still.
At this level, I can free myself whenever I want.
He felt no threat, so he stayed quiet.
“Haul him up!”
Ja Gangcheon’s body rose, tethered by the great ship’s ropes. Only after he cleared the railing did the deck’s full scene come into view.
Those who carried weapons and those who did not. The distinction was sharp and unmistakable.
The armed men stood tall and at ease; the unarmed ones shrank into themselves, watching every face for cues. Among them was the boy who had shouted the warning. Clutching a small bucket, iron shackles around his ankles, the boy met Ja Gangcheon’s gaze with open distaste, then quickly looked away.
That one must be the captain.
The man barking orders was an unusually tall figure in his late forties, thick with knotted muscle. He had the copper skin of a lifelong sailor and piercing eyes that made his rough, cruel nature plain on his face.
“Who the hell are you? Why were you drifting alone at sea?”
“I left an uninhabited island by boat.”
“By yourself?”
“Yes. My parents were shipwrecked.”
The captain found the boy’s manner oddly unsettling.
Why is he so composed?
Even as a captive, the boy answered in a voice without the slightest tremor.
“A few days without food will take the strength out of him.”
The captain turned to the bald man who had hauled the boy aboard.
“Lock him in the lower hold. Not a single drop of water.”
“Yes, Captain.”
The bald man shoved Ja Gangcheon roughly by the shoulder and dragged him below. Stairs led down into the reeking belly of the ship—a space thick with mixed stenches where despairing people huddled against the walls.
They’re bound.
Up close it was clear they were not merely leaning; they had been lashed to the pillars. Unable to reach a latrine, they had fouled themselves where they sat, bodies caked in filth.
So this is what they mean by a prison.
The ship’s hold was being run exactly like one.
Thud.
The bald man shoved Ja Gangcheon hard from behind, twisted both arms behind his back the way he had done to the others, and lashed him to a pillar.
“Hey. Can’t you read the situation? Too scared to think?”
Slap. Slap.
The bald man toyed with him, cuffing the cheeks of the boy who sat with his back to the post. When there was still no reaction, the third blow came hard and full.
Crack!
“You little bastard…”
Ja Gangcheon’s expression still held no fear as he stared straight at the man. Something in those eyes stirred an uneasy recognition; the bald man ground his teeth.
“I’ll be back soon. When I am, the way you look at me will be different.”
He turned and shouted toward the side.
“Cheongu! Give this bastard nothing. If I catch you slipping him anything, I’ll throw you to the sharks myself!”
After the bald man left with his threat hanging in the air, someone stepped in front of Ja Gangcheon.
“I warned you they were pirates.”
It was the boy from the railing.
“Why are you angry?”
“They got what they wanted, didn’t they?”
At that, Ja Gangcheon smiled.
“Are you insane?”
“No. I’m not insane.”
“Then how can you laugh?”
“I wanted to meet you. I was wondering how I’d find you—so this is lucky.”
Ja Gangcheon held out a hand. The boy they called Cheongu started in shock.
“H-how did you free that hand?”
“Ah. This?”
When Ja Gangcheon brought both hands forward, the severed chains clattered to the floor.
“More importantly, I have a question. Why did you help me?”
Cheongu was still reeling from the situation, but he did not hide his true feelings.
“Just because I’m in hell doesn’t mean I have to drag someone else down with me.”
“You’re like my father.”
“What?”
“A warm person. Ah—that doesn’t mean my mother’s cold, though.”
Cheongu thought, He really is crazy.
The problem was that the crazy boy was strong enough to snap iron chains. And now, with an innocent face, he asked:
“Who’s the strongest among the pirates?”
“Why do you want to know? You’re not planning to fight them, are you?”
“If I can win, I’ll fight. If I can’t, I’ll think of another way.”
Cheongu glanced again at the chains on the floor. They looked as if someone had twisted and torn them like vines. Neither he nor any of the pirates seemed to possess that kind of strength.
“The captain’s the strongest. That’s why the other crew never dare challenge him.”
“Huh? That spiky-bearded uncle from earlier? He’s the strongest?”
When Cheongu nodded, Ja Gangcheon tilted his head.
“He didn’t look all that strong. Then what about the bald uncle who slapped my face just now?”
“That bastard isn’t particularly strong. He’s just the cruelest. He kills people for fun…”
Cheongu’s body trembled as an ugly memory surfaced. In that moment Ja Gangcheon gently lifted the edge of Cheongu’s clothes. A torn wound marked the boy’s side—poorly treated, leaving an ugly scar.
“So the captain uncle is the strongest, then?”
“You’re really going to fight?”
“Meeting you made me certain. Those people deserve to die.”
Ja Gangcheon spoke of murder with the same innocent tone and expression as before.
“You’re not actually crazy, right?”
“I’m not.”
“Then be careful. The Ghost Sea Gang doesn’t go easy just because someone’s young.”
The Ghost Sea Gang—so named because they drifted the oceans like ghosts.
Even after hearing the name, Ja Gangcheon only smiled.
At the same time, boxes and objects wrapped in leaves lay scattered across the deck.
“What is all this?”
A surprising amount of cargo had come out of the half-wrecked, crude little boat.
“Huh? Captain! These are promissory notes!”
At the word “notes,” the captain’s face lit up.
The elegant boxes, lacquered with jade, had been sealed hard with packed earth. As if that were not enough, carefully leaf-wrapped bundles of paper emerged from inside.
“How much is all this worth?”
The smallest started at a hundred taels; some reached as high as ten thousand.
“I thought we’d just picked up a coin on the road—looks like a fortune rolled right to us.”
Then a strange thought struck him.
“If these are notes, what about the other things?”
Items he had dismissed as worthless cargo suddenly rose in value.
“Now that I look, the boxes themselves are high quality.”
“Captain—isn’t this a Demonic Cult mark?”
“What kind of nonsense is that?”
One man recognized the pattern on a box, only to draw the others’ sneers.
“You’re saying this is some Demonic Cult treasure?”
The captain snorted coldly and opened a box.
Inside lay ten books, wrapped every bit as carefully as the notes he had just seen.
This feels ominous somehow.
He peeled away the topmost leaf. A single set of characters stood out with perfect clarity.
The ultimate demonic martial arts manual of the Heavenly Demon
The captain was so startled he stumbled backward, landed hard on his backside, and dropped the book.
It was a name no man who lived by the blade could fail to know—the martial art that symbolized the Heavenly Demon himself.
“What in the world is this…”
Just then the first mate, who had opened another box, shouted.
“C-Captain. Look at this.”
He unwrapped a long object bound in leaves. What emerged was a single sword—its engraved patterns and the feel of the blade anything but ordinary. Above all, the characters carved clearly into the hilt caught the eye.
“Isn’t this the personal sword of the Namgung Clan’s head?”
Things had taken a very strange turn.
The Blood Net Sutra and the Moon Fang Sword.
These were not names a pack of sea-roving pirates who preyed on merchant ships could afford to hold.
The captain soon recovered his reason.
“Fakes, no doubt.”
If they were finely crafted forgeries, it all made sense.
“Are they the kind who sell fakes into the murim? That would explain the notes, at least.”
Yet his instincts sounded a warning.
“That face and those eyes don’t belong to a swindler.”
“Then what do we do?”
“G-grab that bastard! Right now!”
He meant to question the boy himself. There was no need.
“You already opened them?”
The boy who should have been bound in the hold had walked out onto the deck.
Thud!
Moreover, he casually tossed aside a grown man larger than himself—the sentry who had been standing watch at the hold. The subordinate who had loved the stench enough to make a perfect hold-keeper now had his neck twisted the wrong way.
In truth, Ja Gangcheon had wrestled with a serious question only moments earlier.
There must always be a just reason when you take a life. Indiscriminate killing always comes back to you.
Never leave a future threat. People of the murim never forget debts of gratitude or grudges—especially grudges. You’ll meet them again someday.
His father and mother had given opposite advice. He had wanted, if possible, an action that satisfied both.
This should count as the just reason Father spoke of.
Having decided, he snapped the neck of the man guarding the hold. Even so, an unpleasant sensation lingered at his fingertips.
“Killing people doesn’t feel very good.”
He wiped his hands on his clothes and checked the open boxes.
“They said even one of these would set a bloody storm loose across the murim.”
“Y-you… what the hell are you?”
The captain shouted in panic, but Ja Gangcheon gave no answer. Instead he moved.
Crack!
Ja Gangcheon’s foot smashed into the captain’s knee. The motion was so fast the man only grasped reality after the joint had been completely shattered.
“I’ll answer later.”
“Gaaah! What are you standing around for?! Kill this bastard!”
At the captain’s order the crew charged as one.
Slow.
Even completely surrounded, Ja Gangcheon felt no threat. There was no reason to savor the moment, so he counterattacked at once.
Crack!
Boom!
One strike, one man down. Some died; others collapsed with limbs or bodies broken. In the blink of an eye he had dealt with ten of them.
“Behind you!”
At the sharp cry, the man who had been creeping low toward Ja Gangcheon’s back jerked in surprise. It was the bald man who had slapped him in the hold.
I already knew.
Ja Gangcheon did not bother saying so. He simply caught the bald man’s arm as it came from behind. When the hand gripping the axe froze in midair, the bald man stabbed at Ja Gangcheon’s stomach with his free hand. He held a rusted iron spike, its tip filed sharp.
Boom!
Ja Gangcheon made no attempt to block the spike. Before it could reach him he drove a fist into the man’s chest.
Ribs caved in. The bald man flew a long way, hit the deck, and jerked two or three times before lying still.
“Why did you come out? I told you to stay in the hold.”
Ja Gangcheon waved Cheongu—who had just shouted the warning—back inside.
“Behind! Behind! Focus!”
Ja Gangcheon dodged the sword aimed at the back of his head as if he had seen it coming, then smashed the attacker’s skull as the man stumbled past off-balance. The pirate’s head cracked open and he dropped. From then on, following Cheongu’s calls, Ja Gangcheon poured his full attention into the fight.
Every pirate fell. A single ke of time was enough. The gap in power was that absolute.
“Can you check the numbers for me? Make sure no one’s left.”
Cheongu, who had been standing dazed, hurried over.
“Why did you leave those ones alive?”
“Someone has to sail the ship.”
“There are people from the merchant convoy.”
“Merchant convoy?”
“The ones locked up down there used to crew a trading ship. They ran into these bastards at sea, lost the ship, and got locked up.”
Their story mattered less than the fact that they could handle a vessel.
“Then we don’t need these people?”
“Yeah. That’s right.”
“Got it. I’ll take care of them.”
Ja Gangcheon walked first toward the captain.
“Wait!”
“Why?”
“C-can I be the one to kill that bastard?”
Cheongu trembled as he looked at the captain.
“Guildmaster Bu was my benefactor. He took me in when I was an orphan and gave me work with the convoy. That man killed him. He deliberately left him alive and threw him into the sea—so he’d die in more pain.”
“Why would he do that?”
“For fun, he said.”
Hearing this, Ja Gangcheon picked up a sword lying on the deck and held it out to Cheongu.
“Can you do it? I just tried it for the first time myself. Honestly, it’s not a good experience.”
Cheongu wondered, First time?—but did not show it.
“Thank you.”
Sword in hand, Cheongu hardened his eyes and ran at the captain. His grip was clumsy, but both eyes burned with pure venom.
Thrust!
In the end Cheongu drove the blade into the captain’s neck. The tip caught on bone and did not pass clean through, but it was enough to take a life.
“Ghh…”
The captain wheezed, glaring at Cheongu with resentful eyes. When their gazes met, Cheongu looked at his own blood-smeared hands, swallowed dryly, and stepped back.
Even with resolve, taking a life was never an easy thing.
Thud.
Backing away, Cheongu bumped into something, startled, and spun around.
“It’s all right.”
Ja Gangcheon tapped Cheongu’s shoulder, then confirmed the captain was dead.
“You said he threw Guildmaster Bu into the sea while he was still alive?”
Looking over the remaining crew who still drew breath, Ja Gangcheon asked.
“Then we can return the favor the same way.”
Making no distinction between the living and the dead, Ja Gangcheon threw the entire pirate crew into the sea.