Play Nice
“Ugh…….”
When Hwangbo Jeong opened his eyes after being struck unconscious at the back of the head, it was deep into the night.
His mind still felt as though it were choked with thick fog, yet his body’s senses woke one by one against his will, forcing him to take in his surroundings.
“Kh.”
He tried to push himself up from where he had toppled onto his side—and the first thing he felt was the chains clamping down on him.
He threw every ounce of strength he had into it, but the shackles binding his hands and feet did not budge an inch.
“They won’t come free. If you put force into them, they only tighten further, so you’d be better off staying still.”
“You are…….”
“Gu Donggu. I used to serve the Third Young Master.”
Two men lay thrown into the warehouse, hands and feet bound.
“I’ll tell you this in advance—don’t even think about escaping. The moment you get anywhere near the door, they notice as if they were ghosts.”
Hwangbo Jeong did not want to hear Gu Donggu’s explanations.
It was already a humiliation that someone was seeing him in this state; that the someone was Gu Donggu made it worse still.
“People from the Hwangbo Clan will be here soon. We only need to endure until then.”
“Yes, Merchant Lord. I think so as well.”
Gu Donggu held no grudge against the Hwangbo Clan.
This is my last chance to get out of here.
He already carried wounds that would never fully heal for the rest of his life, yet he was still watching for any opening to escape.
Once the conflict with the Hwangbo Clan is settled one way or another, I become useless.
The only reason the manor kept him alive was as a witness who could prove the Hwangbo Clan’s filthy deeds. So Hwangbo Jeong was, in effect, his final chance.
But there was something he had overlooked.
After a stretch of silence, Hwangbo Jeong—his eyes now adjusted to the dark—looked toward Gu Donggu and spoke.
“You must have suffered a great deal.”
“Ah…….”
The sudden words of comfort drew a soft sound from Gu Donggu.
As if it was comfortable, you bastard.
He swallowed that thought down.
“I’d like to take your hand at least, but I can’t see a thing.”
“Ah—I-I’ll come to you.”
Having been here longer, Gu Donggu could just make out Hwangbo Jeong’s shape.
He moved his cracked arm and dragged his broken foot, approaching his one and only hope—when it happened.
“I offer my loyalt—kuh!”
Hwangbo Jeong’s chained hand clamped around his throat.
“A dog that should have died long ago still doesn’t know its place and starts yapping. Do you have any idea how thoroughly you ruined everything? You’re lower than a worm.”
Killing Gu Donggu was nothing to him.
“Ghk…….”
He could not even beg for his life; his consciousness was already growing distant—when suddenly:
Clank!
The warehouse door opened and someone stepped inside.
“Why are the captives fighting each other?”
Tap.
With one light gesture, the force crushing Gu Donggu’s throat vanished.
“Keuhhk! Cough! Cough!”
Rolling on the floor and heaving ragged breaths, Gu Donggu looked at Hwangbo Jeong in the light spilling through the open door.
His pressure points sealed, the man had frozen like a stone statue. Beside him, Ja Gangcheon spoke as if delivering a mild scolding.
“Play nice.”
Leaving those words behind, Ja Gangcheon walked out of the warehouse.
Darkness returned.
“Keuhk. Keuhk.”
Having just escaped death, Gu Donggu still stared at Hwangbo Jeong.
The savior who was supposed to pull him free had lowered not a lifeline, but a hangman’s rope.
These people will never save me.
He understood that now.
If another chance came, Hwangbo Jeong would try to kill him again.
“You sons of bitches…….”
Gu Donggu pushed his upper body upright. Groping across the floor, his hand closed around a wooden shaft.
It had once been the handle of a farming hoe; gripped in one hand, it made an excellent club.
Then it came.
—Don’t kill him.
A voice drilled into his ear. He whipped around, scanning the dark, but nothing met his eyes.
That’s clearly permission.
Confidence surged. Gu Donggu ground his teeth and spoke.
“If you won’t be my lifeline…….”
Using the club as a crutch, he crawled forward on his knees until he reached Hwangbo Jeong, who still could not move a muscle with his pressure points sealed.
“Then I’ll have to wag my tail for a new master. I’ll survive even like that.”
Thwack! Thwack!
“You! You bastards! What did I ever do so wrong?!”
Thwack! Thwack!
“I only wanted to live! Just let me live, damn you! Let me live!”
Thwack! Thwack!
Even so, he obeyed the order and never struck the head. That did not mean there was no pain.
With his pressure points already sealed and the flow of his qi blocked, Hwangbo Jeong could not even raise his protective aura.
He could not defend with internal energy; he had to take every blow raw.
S-stop!
No matter how desperately he screamed it inside, Gu Donggu did not stop.
“Hah. Hah. Filthy bastards…….”
When exhaustion finally forced Gu Donggu to cease the beating, tears spilled from Hwangbo Jeong’s eyes for the first time in twenty years.
It had not happened since the day he renounced the seat of clan head of the Hwangbo Clan.
“Mother. So you’re saying the younger brother of the Hwangbo Clan’s head is in that warehouse over there?”
“That’s right.”
“And that he was beaten by Gu Donggu and spent the whole night in tears.”
“Whether it was from the pain or from despair at his own situation, I couldn’t say. Either way, the fact remains that he cried.”
Han Pilseng stared steadily at his mother as she said it.
“What is it?”
“You don’t seem to be taking it very seriously.”
“Does it look that way?”
“Yes. If anything, you almost seem to be looking forward to something.”
Song Jain moved to help her son—who was walking with a cane instead of crutches—into his wheeled chair.
“Rest a moment.”
“I’ll rest on that platform over there.”
“It’s rather far.”
“I can manage.”
Han Pilseng wanted to keep the time he spent in the wheeled chair to a minimum.
With every bit of strength he had, he made his way to the platform and finally let out a comfortable breath once he was seated there.
Proud of the sight, Song Jain sat beside him and began to massage his legs.
“You must have a reason for not worrying, Mother.”
“I intend to protect him.”
“From the Hwangbo Clan? You can’t do it alone.”
“Against the Hwangbo Clan, I just might manage.”
“So there is a reason. Is it a secret you can’t even tell your own son?”
“Why is it that you seem to know me better than I know you?”
“For every way you looked after me, I grew up watching your every expression.”
At those words Song Jain’s face began to cloud with sorrow; Han Pilseng quickly added:
“It’s a story we can tell with a smile now.”
“Yes. That doesn’t mean I’ll share my secret. I haven’t received the Lord’s permission yet.”
“So he ordered you to keep it quiet.”
“No. He said nothing at all. Even so, I received something great enough that the secret must be kept.”
“Then I won’t ask any further.”
“Truly my son—so wise.”
“I take after Father a great deal, don’t I?”
“You do. He was warm and gentle. Just don’t take after his recklessness.”
“Was Father reckless?”
“He loved me, didn’t he?”
Now and then the thought of her dead husband still rose unbidden.
“Father was wise after all. I really do think I take after him.”
“That sly tongue of yours is definitely his.”
Song Jain and Han Pilseng both laughed brightly.
After seeing her son to his room, Song Jain made her way to the open ground behind Bing-okgo.
There, a rather interesting spar was underway.
A six-foot giant gripped a heavy iron staff, while a slender young man barely half his height held a plain, unadorned sword angled downward in a diagonal guard.
Clang!
Even to Song Jain’s eyes, it was a fierce contest.
Overwhelming power against dazzling footwork.
Destructive staff arts against endlessly shifting swordplay.
Between the fierce outer force that whipped the air around them, the slender youth wove like a flickering shadow, slipping past by the narrowest of margins.
Excellent.
It was a pleasure to watch. Especially since obtaining the secret manuals, their skill had been advancing day by day.
So this is the joy of raising disciples.
In Poison Valley, nurturing the next generation had never been enjoyable at all. Now she found herself researching what more she could teach them.
Hm.
As the fight grew more intense, Song Jain drew closer and raised her internal energy.
It’s getting dangerous.
They wielded weapons of such formidable power that even a slight impact could kill.
“Hoo.”
She drew a steadying breath, ready to intervene at any moment.
But she was not the only one thinking that way.
Uneasy at the sight of his friends sparring with real weapons, Ja Gangcheon stood not far from Song Jain, fully prepared himself.
Fortunately, neither of them had to step in. The match ended when Cheongu tapped the flat of his blade against Panseok’s back.
“Ah! I lost again!”
Even the good-natured Panseok wore a look of pure frustration in that moment. Yet the victor, Cheongu, did not look particularly pleased.
“We’re almost evenly matched now. I only won thanks to the forms of the Moonlight Sword Art.”
Cheongu was carrying on the true transmission of the Moonlight Swordsman, Pung Cheongseol.
The Moonlight Heart Method and the Moonlight Sword Art.
Aside from the footwork, they could be considered thoroughly orthodox.
He had finished the initial research on Guigokdo, but putting them into actual practice had proven difficult.
The one who had filled those gaps was Song Jain.
Cheongu’s tenacious nature combined with her experience had finally given the forms real power—power enough to beat Panseok every time, as he had today.
“My Lord. A guest has arrived.”
Jang Geon, once a shop assistant and now serving as head clerk overseeing the workers, approached those who had been training.
He was the one who assisted Chief Manager Cheongu the most, and he held the deep trust of everyone in the manor.
“Lord Cheono of Haomun has come to visit.”
“I’ll go.”
Yeonhui was waiting for Ja Gangcheon in the middle of the front courtyard, just as she always did.
“Why do you stand here every single day, Noona?”
“Because having nothing around me makes my beauty shine all the brighter.”
Displaying her trademark confidence, she smiled and bowed her head.
“My Lord. I trust you have been well?”
“I’m always fine. But you’re later than I expected, Noona. Did something else come up?”
Yeonhui’s role had been to keep the Hwangbo Clan from intervening while the escort agency business was handled.
Five days had already passed since that work ended, and only now had she appeared. The usual her would have rushed over at once if only to receive the merchant guild branch she had been promised.
“There was an incident with the Hwangbo Clan, so I looked into it a little before coming.”
“Is that so? What happened?”
“The Third Young Master went missing on his way to the clan. The whole household is in an uproar over it.”
When Ja Gangcheon showed no particular reaction, Yeonhui asked casually, as if in passing.
“My Lord has nothing to do with it, I assume?”
Ja Gangcheon merely shrugged, and Yeonhui did not press further. Instead she cast her gaze around the grounds.
More people than usual were coming and going through the manor.
Workers were permanently stationed at Bing-okgo and the medicine hall, but these were different faces.
With her sharp eye, Yeonhui was never going to miss it.
“You’re building a new pavilion, I see?”
“Personal training chambers.”
Yeonhui looked at Ja Gangcheon as though surprised.
“You told me without even being asked.”
“I’m telling you so you don’t waste your energy digging around.”
“Don’t be so cold. I stopped at the manor first on my way from Jinan. That’s how much I think of you, My Lord.”
There was a reason she had come without even shaking off the dust of the road.
“I never expected you to handle the Shandong Merchant Guild like that.”
It was hard to tell whether the tone was praise or reproach.
“While I was dealing with the escort agency, the merchant guild stuck its nose in. Their guild master made the first move.”
Plenty of people had witnessed the scene, so Yeonhui already knew.
“You didn’t kill him, I hope?”
“Of course not. He’s perfectly alive.”
“That’s good.”
Yeonhui stated the reason she had come.
“What matters is the negotiation still to come.”
“When do you think the Hwangbo Clan will make their move?”
“They’ll probably contact me.”
“Good. You handled things well, so I’ll give you a gift. Auntie prepared something excellent.”
“I wouldn’t want to put her to unnecessary trouble.”
Song Jain made her uneasy. But no sooner had the refusal left her lips than the very person in question appeared.
“If you refuse, I certainly won’t force it on you.”
“I pay my respects, Senior. It isn’t that I dislike it—I simply lack the face. I haven’t exactly shown you my prettiest side.”
“So today’s Gok-eun Tea has found the wrong owner. If you don’t want it, there’s nothing to be done.”
“Wait a moment!”
Gok-eun Tea—the Valley-Hidden Tea said to be coveted even by the emperor himself.
She’s openly acknowledging that she comes from Poison Valley.
Yeonhui changed her mind at once.