That Would Be Deeply Inappropriate
It was highly inappropriate.
A lazy afternoon in Yichang. Jin Seongun, having just wrapped up the lunch rush, stepped out onto the street to catch his breath.
"It's the Guest Dragon!"
"......"
The words drifted toward him from all directions.
Jin Seongun let out a quiet sigh and quickened his pace slightly. The one small mercy was that everyone here was a Yichang local. Perhaps, he thought as he walked on, all this Guest Dragon business would blow over in time.
Then, from far down the street, a familiar elderly face appeared, waving as he approached.
"Elder Shinmok."
"Good timing, meeting you here. The shops beside the inn are all cleared out as of today. We can start construction soon enough."
Jin Seongun bowed his head in thanks. After all, for Shinmok — one of the Three Great Master Craftsmen of the world — to take such personal interest in the inn was a stroke of fortune no innkeeper could hope for twice.
"Thank you, Elder. Roughly how long will the construction take?"
It was no small undertaking. The grand plan called for demolishing five or six entire shops and folding the land into the grounds of Seongun Inn.
"I'll be bringing every apprentice I ever taught here to Yichang. That should take about a fortnight. Though they're scattered all across the Central Plains, so it'll take some time for them to make the journey."
"......That's all it will take?"
"You think they call me Godly Wood for nothing?"
Shinmok squared his shoulders with rare pride, and Jin Seongun nodded, struck anew by the old man's reputation.
"By the way, Elder — what manner of men are the other two of the Three Great Master Craftsmen?"
"I hate that question."
"......Why is that?"
"The two fools I get lumped in with are not right in the head. The physician is, for all practical purposes, a drunken quack, and the blacksmith is a outright swindler."
It was a scathing assessment, to say the least. Something told Jin Seongun the other two probably had similarly unflattering things to say about Elder Shinmok.
He decided against pressing further and simply bowed again.
"I'm in your hands, Elder."
Since the last of the martial artists had cleared out, Seongun Inn had returned to its former self. Local merchants, pack peddlers, families with children — the everyday people of ordinary life had begun coming through its doors again as guests.
Jin Seongun liked the sight of it. The inn he had envisioned was never meant to be a hideout for martial artists or a hall for sect politics.
Then it happened.
Suddenly, everyone inside the inn turned their heads toward the entrance.
A woman stood there.
Every soul mid-meal went still, lost to the sight of her. Even Seomun Ak, who'd been hauling a jug of liquor, froze mid-step and simply stared. The husbands who had come dining with their wives had to be jabbed in the ribs with chopsticks to snap out of it.
The woman's crimson hair lent her an air of mystery, and together with skin white as polished jade and an ornate palace skirt embroidered with trumpet creepers, she positively radiated nobility.
Before long, she spoke to Jin Seongun.
"We meet again?"
"?"
Jin Seongun looked at her blankly, eyes utterly devoid of recognition. Seomun Ak and Seo Yugyeom turned to him.
"You knew a woman like that and never mentioned it?"
"This guy's past is shady as hell, I'm telling you."
Jin Seongun, for his part, was still studying her with a bewildered expression. Gradually, the smile on her face stiffened — until at last it was swallowed whole by shock.
"You don't recognize me?"
At that, Seomun Ak and Seo Yugyeom let out twin groans.
"What a bastard."
"You rotten piece of—"
Jin Seongun put on an aggrieved face, and the woman pressed on.
"I've paid my debt in full."
Only then did Jin Seongun's eyes go wide. Those were the words he'd spoken to the thief — if you commit a crime, then serve your punishment.
"Good grief — did you perform the Face Transformation Art or something?"
He was not exaggerating. She was a completely different person from the midnight intruder who'd been caught red-handed. It wasn't merely that her complexion had improved, her hair was done, her clothes were finer. As far as Jin Seongun could tell, her very features looked different.
"People are only as beautiful as they care to make themselves, you know. Men included. Shall I fix you up?"
"......No, thank you."
"Walk with me. We need to talk."
She demanded it outright. Jin Seongun, naturally, couldn't have cared less.
"Do we still have things to discuss?"
The memory of the morning his inn's signboard vanished was still vivid enough to sting. And while he was busy remembering, Seomun Ak nudged him from the side.
"Just go talk to her."
"......Someone has to watch the inn."
"I'll do it, you idiot."
When Jin Seongun still looked reluctant, Seo Yugyeom chimed in as well.
"Could be something seriously important. Go on, be quick about it. Business's about to be dead slow anyway."
Soon even the diners still eating began piling on, urging him out the door. Jin Seongun looked around in disbelief. He was the owner of this inn, and not one person was taking his side.
"......Fine. I suppose I'll go."
Half-dragged by the protests of his friends and customers, Jin Seongun left the inn behind.
Jin Seongun and Chae Seoryeong walked side by side down the main street, and every passerby stole a glance at them. Jin Seongun was hardly invisible himself, but Chae Seoryeong drew far more attention, what with that crimson hair.
Jin Seongun's brow creased slightly.
"Let's go somewhere quieter."
With that, he kicked off into lightfoot art and started sprinting away.
Chae Seoryeong stared at his receding back in open disbelief.
"Seriously? I got all dressed up for this and he just — runs?"
But the sight of him vanishing into the distance lit a familiar fire in her chest. Fine — she might lose a fight, but running was another matter. This was, after all, the woman who until a few days ago had been called the Great Thief.
She took off after him at full tilt.
And it didn't take her long to reconsider that decision.
Why is he so fast......?
This was no longer a contest. She had the sinking feeling that if she lost sight of him, he'd simply be gone, so she poured everything she had into the chase.
Some time later, the two of them arrived at a quiet lakeshore. Chae Seoryeong braced a hand against a tree and dry-heaved for a moment.
Unbothered, Jin Seongun spoke in his usual placid tone.
"What did you want to say?"
Having caught her breath, she studied him for a moment as if he were some strange creature, then finally spoke.
"First — I'm sorry. I'm sorry I put you in danger like that because of me. And for the signboard too."
"You didn't borrow it. You stole it."
"I was planning to return it."
"Calling a stolen thing borrowed doesn't make it a loan."
"......You're sharp, aren't you. Anyway, that's what I came to say — sorry. So that's the real business done."
Jin Seongun tilted his head.
"There's more?"
And then she smiled — a bright, easy grin.
"Want to steal something with me?"
"?"
Only then did Jin Seongun understand: habits die hard.
"Let's go."
"Wait — really?"
"To the Martial Alliance."
"Whoa, whoa, hold on!"
Chae Seoryeong waved her hands frantically. The chill of the Martial Alliance's dungeon floor against her skin was still far too vivid in her memory.
"Not that kind of stealing! This time it's a theft that truly has to happen. Absolutely must."
"There's no such thing as a theft that 'must' happen. I'm not interested, so go home. And don't come back."
Jin Seongun turned away with utter finality.
Chae Seoryeong hung her head. Figures.
Then it happened.
Jin Seongun, striding away with all the resolve in the world, abruptly stopped in his tracks and let out a long, deep sigh.
A moment later, he turned back to face her.
Chae Seoryeong lifted her head, eyes suddenly bright with hope — and Jin Seongun held his hand out toward her.
And there, resting in his palm—
"My pendant?"
She frantically patted down her clothes. The pendant that had hung from her palace skirt was gone.
"Wh-when did you—"
"Habit. Nothing more."
The truth was that thanks to Shintu's recent special training and a few days of fieldwork, Jin Seongun had developed some rather odd habits of late.
Chae Seoryeong's eyes went wide.
"I knew it. Who are you? Are you really the Divine Thief's disciple?"
On the road home from the Martial Alliance, she had told her mother Chae Gahwi about the thief who far outclassed her. Chae Gahwi had brushed it off, saying, 'I suppose he really must be a disciple of Elder Shintu.'
It had been nothing but a passing remark — but it lodged itself in Chae Seoryeong's mind like a nail. Because why else? In her eyes, only a true disciple of Shintu could possibly have overwhelmed her.
Jin Seongun, rarely flustered, stammered.
"Wh-what are you talking about?"
Then he kicked off into lightfoot art and fled — fled, in the most literal sense of the word.
The Divine Thief's disciple, of all things. What an absurdly accurate and mortifying guess.
"It's Chae Seoryeong! My name! Chae Seoryeong of Nakhwajeong!"
By the time her shout died, Jin Seongun had vanished, leaving her standing alone on the lakeshore.
"Did I make things awkward again......"
She slapped her own mouth with her palm. She had been trying so hard to mind her tongue — but reining in one's nature entirely was easier said than done.
After gazing for a long moment at the spot where Jin Seongun had stood, she could only turn away, looking faintly wistful.
Back at the inn, Jin Seongun headed straight for the Realm of Martial Gods.
He had only one reason: he wanted to tell them about Chae Seoryeong mentioning the Divine Thief's disciple. Knowing Master Shintu's temperament, the old man would surely spend the next few days basking in the memory of it.
"So this is what happened."
When Jin Seongun finished his story, the Divine Thief's expression hardened — not at all the reaction he'd expected. The other Martial Gods were casting strange, sidelong glances at Shintu too.
Jin Seongun sensed something was off. Given Shintu's usual personality, this reaction was wildly out of character.
"Master? What's the matter?"
At his question, Shintu mumbled for a while before finally speaking.
"Chae Seoryeong, you say? Do you know her mother's name? Of course you don't."
"No, I don't know that much......"
"But she definitely said Nakhwajeong? You heard her right? It really was Nakhwajeong?"
"Yes."
Jin Seongun nodded, and Shintu murmured half to himself.
"Nakwha — falling fire — and a Chae of that family, it must be. No...... her descendants are still stealing?"
"Do you know her?"
At Jin Seongun's question, Shintu cleared his throat repeatedly, for some reason. His expression was deeply complicated, to say the least.
When Shintu kept dodging, the Merchant King stepped in beside him — and unlike the Divine Thief, a peculiar smile was playing across his face.
"Do you know what the one thing this old fool could never steal was?"
"There's such a thing?"
Jin Seongun asked, eyes wide. Chae Seoryeong alone had given the entire martial world headaches, so what could the master hailed as the greatest thief in all history possibly have failed to steal?
The Merchant King smiled slyly and went on.
"A woman's heart."
"...Pardon?"
Jin Seongun's face went blank. The Martial Gods had always felt half-divine to him, like beings apart from the mortal world — legends made flesh. Hearing a love story from beings like them felt utterly strange.
Well, I suppose even Master Shintu was young once.
Jin Seongun nodded along, then asked, "Surely not — Chae Seoryeong's mother?"
"No. Given the gap between Shintu's era and yours, it would be her grandmother, or great-grandmother. The Manor Lord of the Nakhwa Iron Pavilion — Divine Hammer Chae Okhyeon."
Hearing all this, Jin Seongun suddenly sensed something odd and tilted his head.
"But how are they both named Chae?"
Family names, by custom, passed down through the father. Yet by the Merchant King's account, the descendants had inherited the surname of this Chae Okhyeon woman, generation after generation.
Shintu, who had been silent all this while, finally spoke.
"The Nakhwa Iron Pavilion — now called Nakhwajeong — has always passed down the mother's family name. More than that: for generations, only a woman has held the position of Manor Lord and led the clan."
"Oh......"
It was a rare custom, and Jin Seongun nodded with genuine curiosity. Then Shintu's voice turned grave.
"Seongun. The time has come."
Jin Seongun grasped the meaning at once. The time — that is, the moment had arrived for him to fulfill one of Shintu's requests.
He remembered his first moments with the Martial Gods. It had been a bargain: they would teach him everything they knew, and in return he would grant their wishes, one by one. Back then, distrustful as he was, Shintu had promised he would never ask him to steal.
But if it's the one thing even he could never steal......
What deeper regret could the greatest thief in history possibly carry? A woman of Shintu's own generation would, regrettably, have long since passed away. Shintu's history, his temperament, his pride, his present circumstances, the timing of this request — Jin Seongun assembled every piece in his mind, and the picture that emerged—
Jin Seongun scratched his head, visibly uncomfortable.
"Master. Failing to steal a woman's heart and then trying to steal her descendant's heart instead would be deeply inappropriate."
"......"
"And I couldn't do such a thing anyway."
"......Are you out of your mind?"
Shintu stared at him, utterly dumbfounded. But Jin Seongun held firm, his face a mask of solemn disapproval — that sort of thinking was simply wrong.