Not Like We'd Actually Die
“As if we'd die.”
When the Merchant King opened with such grandeur, the other Martial Gods pricked up their ears, doing a poor job of pretending not to listen.
Sword Immortal in particular, who was losing at baduk, suddenly turned his whole body around, acting as though he had important business to attend to.
“You really ought to finish the game you started.”
Daji spoke gently to him, but Sword Immortal did not so much as pretend to hear. Even that seemed to amuse Daji, and she simply smiled.
The Merchant King continued, not forgetting to maintain his dignity by propping his broadsword upright against the floor with unnecessary ceremony.
“If the Hwaun Merchant Group is one of the Ten Great Merchant Groups of this era, then they are far beyond what a single Black Dao gang could handle on its own. No doubt they've joined hands like a pack of wolves and are strong-arming the merchant group together.”
“Understood.”
“But Black Dao types are naturally treacherous and think of nothing but their own profit. That is why they're called the Black Dao in the first place. Sow division among them. A wheel that has once started to come apart will tear itself to pieces on its own.”
Having said this, the Merchant King gazed at the distant sky with strangely wistful eyes before adding,
“And do not trust people. Merchants above all, you must never trust.”
It was a peculiar feeling, hearing those words from a man whose very epithet was Merchant King. Having offered his advice on the broader strategy, the Merchant King went on to dispense smaller pointers as well.
Jin Seongun nodded, listening to the Merchant King's words with renewed attention.
Just as he finished his farewells and was about to leave—
Shintu, who had been catching his breath longer than the Merchant King, abruptly stopped Jin Seongun in his tracks.
“Hey, before you go, I've got something to show you.”
“I'm all ears.”
Shintu stared intently into Jin Seongun's eyes.
A staring contest broke out between the two of them without warning.
Jin Seongun had no idea what it was about and was inwardly bewildered. And in that moment—
Tap.
Someone placed a hand on Jin Seongun's shoulder from behind. He turned in surprise to find Shintu there.
Jin Seongun looked forward again. The Shintu standing before him was already gone.
Jin Seongun blinked rapidly.
This was no mere matter of swift lightness skill and mystifying footwork. It looked as though a man had simply teleported through space.
When Jin Seongun's face went slack with awe, Shintu broke into a grin of pure, unadulterated satisfaction.
“Hahaha! Now that's the face. None of the folks here are ever surprised by anything.”
“And are we the sort to be startled by such a crude footwork art?”
“So you're saying Seongun here, who just got surprised by a crude footwork art, is an even cruder fellow?”
It was the Merchant King and Shintu, bickering at every available opportunity.
When the Merchant King cleared his throat, Shintu pressed on with a quiet sense of victory.
“What you just saw was your eyes being fooled. Seongun, what would you do if a sword qi came flying at you from behind without warning?”
“If it were within the level I could sense, I could dodge it without even looking.”
“Right. Once martial artists reach a certain level, they feel energy without seeing it. That sense reacts faster and more keenly than any other. So you turn that against them.”
The principle was simple.
You ignite a surge of energy shaped like a human figure in your original position. Simultaneously, you unfold your footwork and move.
Because the energy sense reacts faster and more sharply than vision, that hair's-breadth difference makes it appear as though the person has relocated through space itself.
Of course, it was a technique only possible through the combination of exquisitely fine qi control and sublime footwork.
“You've already learned the Shadowless Steps, so this should be well within your reach. People call this footwork art Body-Shifting Transposition.”
Jin Seongun had heard the term before.
Iihyeonhwanwi — a phrase used to describe lightness skill so fast that it seemed to move through space itself.
He had always taken it as mere lavish praise for lightfoot techniques. To think it was an actual, existing art.
“Of course, even you won't master it right away. Keep refining it on the road to this Hwaun Merchant Group or whatever it's called. Even if you only ever manage half the level I just showed you, it will save your life someday, so…”
Shintu's voice trailed off. The Jin Seongun he had been looking at dead-on had appeared two steps to the side.
“…I can't tell if I did it right.”
Jin Seongun said, scratching his head as if unsure of himself.
At the sight, Shintu burst into an awkward laugh.
Unlike Shintu, who could span ten paces at most with the art, Jin Seongun had managed a mere two — but at this rate of progress, it seemed he might soon reach ten paces, or perhaps even beyond.
Shintu was greatly flustered, but hid it as best he could outwardly and said,
“…Truly my disciple, after all.”
At that, the listening Martial Gods bristled.
The Merchant King in particular, who had taught Jin Seongun more than anyone apart from martial arts proper, visibly twisted his face.
“Why, exactly, is Seongun your disciple?”
“I taught him my signature Shadowless Steps and now the Body-Shifting Transposition too, so naturally he's my disciple.”
“Hmm. Can you really call that teaching? The way I see it, Seongun simply picked it up on his own after watching you perform it. If anything, I'd say I, who taught him the most, am his true master.”
At that very moment, Sword Immortal cut in.
“It seems you have all forgotten that Seongun already became heir to the Quanzhen Sect.”
“Wasn't that just forced into place because the Wudang elder kept raising doubts?”
To the Merchant King's rebuttal, Sword Immortal shook his head firmly.
“The name of Quanzhen is not so light a thing. Whatever the circumstances, he inherited the name of Quanzhen, so if one must nitpick, he may be regarded as my disciple. Since the matter has come up, let your disciple Jin Seongun pay his respects to this master of his.”
In truth, Sword Immortal had no intention of pressing a master-disciple bond on Jin Seongun. But watching the Merchant King and Shintu squabble over whose disciple he was had inexplicably put him in a mischievous mood.
How could a swordsman who had inherited both the Quanzhen lineage and the sword teachings of the Sword Immortal become the disciple of a merchant and a thief?
With even Sword Immortal entering the fray, the atmosphere turned strange.
The Martial Gods' eyes turned toward Daji.
Daji, who had been gathering the baduk stones, spoke in a tone as natural as a passing breeze.
“Does it truly matter whose disciple he is?”
At her words, Sword Immortal, Shintu, and the Merchant King felt a flicker of shame.
And then Daji continued.
“After all, every martial art Seongun performs will trace back to my Yeowol Mind Art.”
“?”
The three-way quarrel promptly became a four-way one.
Only the Blood Demon, the sole one seemingly indifferent, kept gazing up at the sky.
Just as Jin Seongun was making a helpless face at the four Martial Gods—
“Behold.”
Came the Blood Demon's voice, like scraping iron. He was holding his palm open toward the sky.
Suddenly, blood began to seep out from the Blood Demon's palm. The blood swiftly took the shape of a tiny sphere.
The blood orb, no larger than a fingernail at a glance, began rising endlessly into the sky, and just as it finally vanished from sight—
KWAAOOOOOM—!
The entire heavens were drenched in blood-red. Just as when the tide formed of blood had come surging before, a colossal tremor of force and a sinister aura seized hold of the space itself.
Had that blood orb been aimed not at the sky but at something else, the outcome was easy to imagine.
The Blood Demon, having unveiled this staggering spectacle, spoke with his gaze still fixed on the heavens.
“Remember this.”
Only two words.
Watch, and remember.
Yet they carried a force far more intense than any elaborate reasoning or argument could. The Martial Gods, mid-quarrel, all felt a chill of danger at the same instant.
The thought of Jin Seongun, who had mastered all of their signature arts, becoming the Blood Demon's disciple was enough to make them shudder merely to imagine.
“He is all of our disciple and, at the same time, no one's disciple. Isn't that right?”
the quick-witted Merchant King suddenly declared. The other three nodded along in urgent agreement.
Thus, thanks to the Blood Demon's intervention, the Martial Gods' dispute was neatly brought to an end.
“…Travel safe. Stay well. Always watch out for people and for water. And don't go eating just any food you come across.”
“I'll keep it all in mind.”
The Merchant King offered his counsel like a father sending off a young child, and the other Martial Gods each added a word of their own.
With that, Jin Seongun bowed his head and stepped out of the Martial God Realm.
Two men tore down a forest path.
Jin Seongun and Seo Yugyeom had decided to forgo a carriage entirely and simply run on lightfoot technique.
Both hated feeling cooped up, and besides, the situation at the Hwaun Merchant Group did not seem to allow for leisurely travel.
They crossed rivers and scaled mountains.
Whenever a sheer cliff loomed before them, the two would pause, peer down, and deliberate.
“If we fall while climbing down, would we die?”
“Probably.”
“But it'd be fun, though?”
“Likely so.”
Generally, the two men chose the dangerous option.
First, because the dangerous path was usually the fast one, and second, because they had the confidence that surely it wouldn't kill them.
And surely has a way of catching people out.
“GWAAAAAAAH!”
Seo Yugyeom, who had been sliding down the cliff face, missed his footing. His long scream stretched out like pulled taffy.
Jin Seongun turned his head to look at him. Even as he fell, Seo Yugyeom was shooting him a look that clearly demanded he do something about this.
Jin Seongun drew his sword in an instant and poured sword qi down toward the base of the cliff.
It was a colossal burst of pure-white blade energy. Ordinarily he kept its size restrained, since he usually ended up fighting in the middle of his own inn — but right now, there was no need for restraint.
BOOOM—!
A deafening roar erupted, and a tremendous wind gushed out in all directions. Thanks to it, the speed of their fall slowed slightly. Just before hitting the ground, Seo Yugyeom somehow kicked off the cliff face and steadied himself.
Before long, Seo Yugyeom landed on the ground with impeccable style. It was half by sheer accident, but the result looked magnificent all the same.
“…We lived, right?”
At the words Seo Yugyeom let slip without thinking, Jin Seongun broke into a snort of laughter.
Jin Seongun genuinely enjoyed all of this.
He had spent his entire life working at the inn, so this was his first time traveling so far, his first time seeing great mountains, his first time seeing wide rivers and sheer cliffs.
Everything was new to him, and thanks to Seo Yugyeom — endlessly chattering and endlessly causing trouble — there was not a dull moment to be had.
And so the first day passed.
.
.
.
By the time four days had gone by, Jin Seongun realized something about himself.
He was, it turned out, a person of profoundly introverted disposition.
…I want to go home.
His body felt perfectly fine, but his mind was exhausted. It wasn't that he wasn't having fun — he simply missed his familiar, comfortable bed.
Unlike him, Seo Yugyeom seemed as energetic as ever, this time pointing at the wide lake stretching out before them.
“Race you — cross it in ten steps?”
“….”
Jin Seongun made a sour face.
But Seo Yugyeom, finding all of this somehow delightful, was already dashing off ahead before Jin Seongun could even answer.
With each passing day, more vigor gathered in Seo Yugyeom's eyes and voice.
How on earth had a man with that personality spent half his life living in the shadows? Jin Seongun simply could not understand Seo Yugyeom at all.
Sichuan Province, Deyang.
A mid-sized city where the Hwaun Merchant Group made its home.
With Chengdu lying to the south, traffic through the region bustled, and with Mianyang Lake to the north, tourism had flourished as well.
In a word, it was a region that smelled of money — the kind that drew anyone with a nose for profit. Sure enough, the Hwaun Merchant Group along with countless smaller merchant groups and Black Dao gangs had all clustered there.
This was possible because the Sichuan Tang Family, stationed just below in Chengdu, were unlike the other orthodox great families — so long as no one caused them harm, they could not care less whether you were a demonic cultivator or Black Dao scum.
And so into Deyang — where merchants of every stripe, the Black Dao, a handful of the orthodox, passing travelers, young people out for a good time, and elders spending their twilight years all mingled — the two men stepped.
Jin Seongun said with a thoroughly dazed face,
“We've finally arrived.”
“Kind of a shame, honestly.”
Seo Yugyeom burst into chuckles.
At the sight of him, a fervent resolve rose up in Jin Seongun: finish the job fast, and get home.
The two men strolled down the main street.
Jin Seongun took in the sight of Deyang, so different from Yichang.
Yichang sat in Hubei, the heart of the orthodox factions, and after the Prosperity Society had been crushed, there was hardly a Black Dao presence left, giving the town a very peaceful, quiet air.
Deyang's atmosphere was different. Men who were unmistakably unorthodox warriors swaggered through the streets, each flaunting a menacing air.
Even just crossing paths, the unorthodox warriors engaged in small battles of presence. The stronger would glare straight into the weaker's eyes, and the weaker would drop his gaze.
But whenever both believed themselves the stronger, a fight inevitably broke out.
“Next time I catch you, I'll gouge those eyes right out—!”
Jin Seongun took a moment to appreciate the victor's declaration. The loser, his face a bruised mess, kept his gaze fixed on the ground.
It was a truly instinctive, primal sight.
“What a fascinating place.”
At Jin Seongun's plain assessment, Seo Yugyeom snorted.
“Yichang's just too peaceful. There are plenty of places in the Central Plains far worse than this. The Black Dao bastards in Shaanxi, for one, are savage beyond anything in Hubei or here in Sichuan, and Qinghai, pressed right up against the Demonic Cult, goes without saying.”
“You've been to all those places?”
“Of course. The only places I haven't been are the North Sea and the Demonic Cult. Ask me anything you're curious about.”
“Oh…”
Seo Yugyeom squared his shoulders and put on a proud expression.
Jin Seongun regarded him with a gaze carrying a fair bit of admiration, then asked,
“First, I suppose we should find out what's been happening at the merchant group.”
“Easy. Just drag one or two of those Black Dao-looking bastards somewhere quiet and rough them up a bit — they'll spill everything.”
“Isn't that a bit extreme?”
“Deyang's always been that kind of place.”
Just then—
Someone wedged between the two men from behind and draped an arm over each of their shoulders, as if he had been their friend all along.
Seo Yugyeom's claim that Deyang was simply that kind of place was being proven in real time.
“Hey. Smile.”
the man warned in a threatening tone.
Of course, both Jin Seongun and Seo Yugyeom had already been well aware of the man's approach.
— Let's follow him. We needed at least one local to tell us the situation here anyway.
Seo Yugyeom proposed in a transmitted whisper.
Jin Seongun had intended to defer to Seo Yugyeom's judgment ever since arriving in Deyang, so he simply went along.
Jin Seongun turned his head only slightly to glimpse the man's face. He looked to be no older than twenty-five at most.
Beside him, he caught sight of Seo Yugyeom's face as well.
It bore an expression much like a child's on the eve of his birthday.