Episode 9
"Aaaagh! Aaaagh!!"
A gaunt, middle-aged man let out a grief-stricken howl.
Half out of his mind, he hurled whatever came to hand.
Smack—!
The writing brush he flung struck the head of the captain of the rear escort.
"Why...! Why did our Chusan have to come back dead!!"
Bang Dupil collapsed onto the floor and wailed over the body of his son, whose head had been severed clean off.
He’d found a son late in life and loved him with the kind of devotion that was, by ordinary standards, a little excessive, so the pain of this loss was just as overwhelming.
As a result, the boy had grown into a proper little thug, but that was a minor issue as far as Bang Dupil was concerned.
"We’re terribly sorry, Chief. This was our failing."
"Failing? You useless bastards!! You should’ve protected him even if it meant dying in his place!"
"....."
The harsh abuse came pouring down, but they said nothing.
Was it because they felt responsible for the chief of the escort bureau and his son, and were expressing their remorse?
Not a chance.
To most of them, Bang Dupil and Bang Chusan were no more than the man who paid their wages and his bratty son.
The only ones who might truly feel sorry were the inner aides.
The reason the escort men endured this treatment had nothing to do with respect or loyalty.
"Who killed my son!!"
The rage of a father who had lost his child surged into force, filling the office to the brim.
The qi pouring off him was so fierce it felt like needles pricking the skin.
Crack—!
When he clenched the floorboards beneath his hand, the wood didn’t merely splinter; it crumbled to dust.
It was a display of the martial prowess Bang Dupil had made his name with in his youth, a skill called Bakwaksurana.
If those hands ever closed around a person’s neck, the bones would snap as easily as twigs.
"...Mobilize the entire escort bureau and hunt down the culprit."
"Pardon? But isn’t it more urgent to recapture the Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle right now?"
At the captain’s words, Bang Dupil shouted, "That damned bird isn’t important! Find the bastard who did this!"
Seeing him on the verge of completely losing himself, the captain spoke carefully.
"...Actually, we’ve already found the culprit to some extent."
"What!?"
His eyes flew wide open.
He had told them to find the killer, but he hadn’t expected to hear something like that this fast.
"....."
"...Everyone out, except Captain Ma."
At the rear captain’s gesture, Ma Sung, Bang Dupil sent the other escorts away.
"There’s something the chief needs to see."
With those words, Ma Sung handed over a wooden casket he had brought separately.
"This is... don’t tell me..."
Bang Dupil opened the casket with trembling hands. It was just about the right size to hold a watermelon.
Inside was not a sacrificial pig’s head... but Bang Chusan’s severed head.
"Ghh...! Chusan!"
Bang Dupil clutched his son’s head and burst into tears.
"Don’t worry. Your enemy will definitely be—"
As he wept, something caught his eye near the forehead.
He pushed aside the hair matted and scattered by the severed neck, revealing the forehead beneath.
"Th-This...!?"
His eyes went so wide they made his earlier reaction look tame by comparison.
[Heavenly Demon Divine Cult].
Neo-Heavenly Demon Cult.
Those four characters had been written in blood across his son’s forehead.
He rubbed his eyes as if he’d misread it, but nothing changed.
"I found it first and secured it separately. No one except me and the escort who checked it has seen it."
Bang Dupil understood why Ma Sung had told the others to leave.
The Demonic-Justice War had ended with the righteous sects’ victory, but in the martial world, the demonic cult was still a highly sensitive matter.
And for an escort bureau that had become the cult’s dog, it was especially so.
Only a tiny handful of inner aides—people like himself, Woo Ha-sik, and Ma Sung—knew this fact.
"...So the demonic cult bastards killed Chusan."
"At present, that’s the only conclusion we can draw."
Bang Dupil, the blood draining from his head, spoke with a coldness that seemed to wash his fury away.
The possibility that someone was impersonating the demonic cult was slim.
Martial artists didn’t call the demonic cult the Neo-Heavenly Demon Cult.
Only the cult’s own followers called themselves that.
Swish—!
Bang Dupil pulled back the cloth covering Bang Chusan’s body.
"......"
Clenching his teeth, he examined the corpse.
The sword wounds that had sliced through the tendons and muscles of the limbs all shared a common trait.
Mangled, torn flesh.
It didn’t look like it had been cut by a blade so much as savaged by a beast’s teeth.
Bang Dupil had seen a sword style that left such distinctive wounds before.
"...The Eight Fiend Serpent-Fang Sword."
"Pardon? But that’s clearly..."
"Yeah. One of the demonic cult’s demonic arts."
Though he was now effectively one of the cult’s lackeys, Bang Dupil had been a martial artist who once fought at the forefront of the Demonic-Justice War.
He had encountered many demonic arts, and the Eight Fiend Serpent-Fang Sword was one of them.
As far as he knew, it wasn’t some third-rate trick; it was a proper high-grade art.
In other words, unless you were a demonic cultist, you couldn’t even imitate it.
Suspicion was hardening into certainty.
"But I still don’t understand why the cult bastards would do this."
Bang Dupil had been following them not out of loyalty, but because they held something over him. Still, until now, he had behaved obediently enough.
So why kill the son of someone like that?
"...A warning, and a punishment."
Bang Dupil’s fist tightened.
"Even if a dog listens well, if it’s useless, it’s no good to anyone."
"Don’t tell me this is about the Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle..."
The Baekmun Escort Bureau had failed to secure the Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle they had been ordered to bring in.
They had struggled to clean up the mess, but with little to show for it, the people above them had delivered a warning and punishment to their dog.
"They’re saying if we disappoint them any further, next time it’ll be our turn."
"Even so, this goes too far."
It was normal for a higher organization to chew out a subordinate one, but killing a child crossed a line.
"When you beat a dog, do you stop to consider the dog’s side of the story?"
"......"
"And have you forgotten who those people are?"
Considering the other side’s circumstances was something people did among people.
The other side was a sly demon, a spawn of heretical evil who had strayed from the proper path, while he himself was a mangy dog with a leash around his neck.
There was no person in either of those roles.
"Still, this is treating me, Bang Dupil, like some total sucker."
His skill and vitality had been declining with age.
Competitor escort bureaus had been closing in on him, one step from biting his heels.
Anxiety and pressure had gnawed at him until he had succumbed to the devil’s whisper.
The sweet power of Jamsungdan had turned danger into opportunity.
But the price had been a leash around his own neck and those of his inner circle.
He had entrusted his son with work so the boy could gain experience while he and his men played lapdogs for the cult, and the brat had caused a spectacular disaster.
He had ordered the search in the name of taking responsibility and seeing the matter through himself, only to lose both his son and one of his inner aides instead.
There wasn’t a single step in the chain of events that hadn’t been his responsibility in some way.
Knock, knock.
"Chief, it’s Chief Clerk Jeong."
"Come in."
At that moment, a middle-aged man carrying a letter in one hand opened the door and came in.
Bang Dupil and Ma Sung hadn’t bothered to clean up the scene.
He was one of the inner aides who already knew the escort bureau’s current situation.
"What is it?"
"...A letter has arrived for you, Chief."
Chief Clerk Jeong glanced at Bang Chusan’s severed head and corpse, then carefully held out the letter.
"Ha!"
Ma Ryeong
Snatching the letter away, Bang Dupil snorted when he saw the sender’s name.
If the chief clerk had brought it to him personally like this, there was no need to even look inside.
"They dare send me another demand letter?"
As if the ridiculous demand letter he’d already received hadn’t been enough.
"Chief Clerk Jeong."
"Yes, sir."
"From this moment on, go beyond Wuhan—no, beyond Hubei Province if you must. Quietly, and as discreetly as possible, put out the word for a physician skilled in detoxification."
"!?"
"Chief!"
Ma Sung and Chief Clerk Jeong both looked shocked.
To seek out a physician skilled in detoxification.
There was only one meaning behind those words.
He had tried something similar before to deal with the side effects of Jamsungdan, but he had failed because he couldn’t endure the withdrawal symptoms.
But this time would be different.
"Ma Sung, you continue the search as before, and give that sculptor Chusan said he hired—the one called Lia-rudol—a commission to carve a Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle."
"Understood."
"I obey."
Riiip—! Rip—!
Bang Dupil tore the letter to shreds.
His son had died while trying to take responsibility and see things through.
A parent should be a model for their child.
Crack—!
He crushed the Jamsungdan he had kept in his drawer.
"This father will also see things through, so watch over me!!"
Stroking his son’s severed head, Bang Dupil made his firm resolve.
But there were two things he didn’t know.
One was that his son hadn’t died for any noble reason like taking responsibility and seeing things through.
The other was that, about ten li away, one eagle was watching them.
Flap—!
The eagle peered inside through the narrow crack of a closed window, then flew off, and they never noticed a thing.
* * *
"Good... so it really is going that way."
Geom Mujin, seated cross-legged on a rock deep in the forest, opened his eyes.
"Kkiiieeek!"
After waiting a few minutes, the Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle returned, cutting through the night clouds.
"Good work."
Pat, pat—
I stroked the eagle’s head and tucked a peppermint candy into its beak.
After slipping away from the approaching rear escort, I’d given the eagle one order.
Keep your distance from them and keep watching.
The Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle had carried out that order perfectly.
I couldn’t hear their voices, of course, but reading their lips confirmed that the stone I’d thrown had driven a wedge between the Baekmun Escort Bureau and the remnants of the demonic cult.
Mujin Sword Style
Speech-Blaze Sword
Stirring up trouble.
Enemies didn’t have to be cut down with a sword.
He really does seem to care about his son more than I expected.
The chief of the Baekmun Escort Bureau would not keep following the demonic cult as before.
No, he’d probably go further than that and try to stab them in the back.
He didn’t seem to be under suspicion yet, so if he really did manage to detox, he might land a genuine blow.
Even if he fails, I’m not losing anything.
At worst, the cult’s pawn disappears when the bureau gets wiped out.
Still, if he succeeded, I’d rather he caused them at least a little damage.
"Mmm-hmm~ mm-hmm~"
"You enjoying yourself?"
I couldn’t help snorting when I saw the guy humming to himself and rolling the peppermint candy around inside his beak.
And that vision-sharing ability really is more useful than I thought.
I thought of the ability that had let me sit back comfortably and monitor the Baekmun Escort Bureau’s movements.
The Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle’s eyesight was far superior to that of an ordinary hawk, letting it see clearly in the night as if it were broad daylight.
On top of that, it could fly, so its field of view was naturally wide.
A well-raised—well, not raised by me at all—Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle was basically a high-performance drone.
"To think this Baekdu Heavenly Talon Eagle could be boiled and eaten—ah."
Then I remembered something I’d forgotten.
"I forgot to give you a name."
It was my spiritual beast, so calling it by its species name all the time was awkward and a little cold.
"!"
At the word name, the eagle’s eyes sparkled.
Flap, flap—
It shook its head from side to side, clearly excited.
"What should I call you..."
Under that expectant gaze, I studied the eagle.
White head feathers, a dark brown body, wing feathers...
Come to think of it, this thing does look a bit like an eagle...
Eagle... eagle...
Back on Earth, before I got possessed, eagles had symbolized the land of the free and the home of the weirdly overpowered.
And when you think of that country, there’s really only one name that comes to mind...
"Trump! How about Trump!?"
"Kwak!"
Geom Mujin asked with total confidence, but the reaction was not great.
That cry seemed to mean the sound itself was too damn ugly.
What’s wrong with Trump?
It was the name of a world-class big shot who could go toe-to-toe with the whole planet.
"You really hate it?"
"......"
Now it was staring at me with a dead-serious face.
"Fine. Fine, I get it. I’ll think of something else."
......
......
After a while, I opened my mouth again.
"Sodam."
I pointed at the feathers on its head.
"I took it from the color of your head feathers. Do you like it?"
"......"
I waited, a little tense, for its reaction.
"Brrr..."
Thankfully, it seemed to like this one. The bird—Sodam—rubbed its head against mine.
"Good. Then we’re done here, so let’s head to the next destination."
"Kki-e."
At first I’d planned to wander around aimlessly, but this mess had given me a place I needed to visit.
I’m going to Jiangxi.
Someone involved in the production of Jamsungdan in the original story was there.