The White-Headed Eagle’s Warning
Back when the Taeho Sect was given the order to mobilize its hounds, there was someone else who got that same warning too.
"Oh, shit."
That someone was Geom Mujin.
- The Daoist has arrived.
The moment I saw those four words, alarms started blaring in my head.
Emergency! Emergency!! Eeeeemergency-!!!
“The Daoist has arrived” might not sound that dangerous at first, but it was dangerous precisely because the Daoist in question was the problem.
I looked southeast.
At the far end of that direction lay a sect in Shaanxi Province.
Mount Mui Sect.
Mount Mui Sect was a Taoist sect built on the foundation of Daoism. So every disciple there was a Daoist, a priest, a wandering holy man—call them whatever you wanted.
And among all those Daoists, there was only one person coming after me, no, coming to kill me.
Seriously? It’s her?
The Plum Fragrance Sword Empress was on her way here.
She must be absolutely seething after missing me in her own backyard.
The moment I ran into her, the odds of Gangneung turning into Ground Zero were pretty damn high.
That day, it would become [Gangneung: The Final Day].
I’d rather fight the Heavenly Demon again.
...If I could help it, I never wanted to fight her to the death.
F-first, get out of here... No. Calm down.
For a moment I was panicking at the news that she was coming, but then my mind returned to its usual glass-clear state.
In situations like this, the first people to die were the ones who couldn’t keep their heads.
She’s not going to arrive this instant. Shaanxi and Jiangxi are a long way apart.
Even if she didn’t run into bandits or wild beasts along the way, it was a trip that would easily take a full month.
And that was before you added in the Han River and the Yangtze River between us, which would stretch the journey even longer.
Sure, if it were her, she could shave off time by crossing rivers with Dengpingduoshui or Chaoshangfei, but even then it would still take time.
And at the end, she’d probably stop to recover her strength for a while, too.
Accounting for everything, my estimate was that it would take at most two weeks for her to arrive.
No, given her current condition, maybe even faster.
I couldn’t exactly say I had much time to work with.
So this day has finally come.
After the righteous-demonic war, I’d kept a very low profile and lived quietly for years, but somehow she’d caught my tail.
I could guess where I’d slipped up.
I really did make too much noise at Mount Mui.
Originally the plan had been to subdue the child, but things escalated and the battle grew far larger than intended.
As a result, the traces of the fight had been left all over the place.
I would’ve liked to erase them, but time had been too short.
He probably thought I was dead, but it looks like that squad leader bastard survived without being killed, too.
If the Taeho Sect wasn’t a pack of morons, then with the testimony that an entire squad had been subdued by a black-haired foreigner and the visible traces of battle, they’d have arrived at the conclusion that it was me.
The deduction would’ve become a rumor in no time.
Sodam.
- Kkiiik!
You called, Master!
At my call, Sodam, who’d been resting in a nearby mountain, answered immediately like a soldier on standby.
Have you seen any carrier pigeons flying around Gangneung recently?
- Kkiiik!
Sodam answered yes.
It said it had seen more than a dozen carrier pigeons fly by about a week ago.
Yep.
As expected.
I stroked my chin.
I spread eyes and ears all over Murim.
Like I said before, Shaanxi and Jiangxi were far apart.
The fact that rumors from Jiangxi had reached Shaanxi meant someone had been relaying them quickly.
The carrier pigeons Sodam had seen were probably the method.
Carrier pigeons weren’t exactly cheap, either, so if someone was sending that many, it was definitely serious.
She must’ve heard the rumor they carried and was already heading to Gangneung.
Even if she wasn’t completely certain I had informants of my own, just suspecting that I might be there would be reason enough for her to move.
No matter how quietly I traveled, unless I was holed up on some remote mountain, I knew this day would eventually come when I’d get caught in her radar.
She probably thought the same thing and had been waiting with a net cast wide.
There was just one thing she’d overlooked.
I’ve got eyes and ears too.
I looked down at the note in my hand.
Looks like the beggar bastard has been doing his job.
At first I’d thought the beggars had lost their minds, but now I realized it had been sent by my little bell-ringer.
Once, I’d set up a backup plan—like tying a bell to a cat’s neck.
- You’re going to be my insurance.
- Insurance? What’s that supposed to mean...
- Just do what I tell you and don’t do what I tell you not to. Simple, right?
- Th-that’s not insurance, that’s just sla—
- Insurance... Are you talking back?
- ...What should I start with, then?
The two things I’d ordered were simple:
Tell me if she moves.
And don’t sell my information—especially anything about my location.
I hadn’t gotten much use out of him until now, so I’d almost forgotten about him, but it seemed he’d been working hard after all.
But if he’s warning me, that means he knows where I am right now.
Which meant he could, in theory, be selling me out in reverse.
Still, unless that bell-ringer bastard had gone completely insane, I doubted he’d do something like that.
I’d need to meet him at some point.
But first, I should get my business here wrapped up and leave.
Sure, I had some time, but there was no reason to dawdle.
Hoo. Another day saved, another day maintaining the peace of Murim.
Thinking that, I walked on—and before I knew it, I’d arrived at the butcher shop.
"Excuse me, sir. Do you happen to have any blood sausage—"
Kiiik—
Just as I opened the door and stepped inside.
"D-die...!"
A butcher’s cleaver came whipping down straight for my skull.
"What the hell."
Tap—
Geom Mujin caught the blade between his thumb and index finger without even blinking.
"Huh?"
The man gaped when Gongsu Nabaek, one of the expert feats of Sammye Jinhwa and Heogong Seopmul, exploded into action.
Crack—!
Then the cleaver’s blade split with a sharp fracture and shattered into pieces.
"W-wha...? Black hair?"
The man stared blankly back and forth between the weapon that had become scrap and Geom Mujin’s hair.
"Yeah, I’ve got black hair. What about it?"
"N-no, that’s not—keh!?"
Thud—!
A chopping hand slammed into the back of the man’s neck, and he collapsed unconscious to the floor.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Inside the shop, strips of ham and salami hung in thick rows from the ceiling.
The whole room was filled with the stench of blood.
Blood had pooled all over the floor.
On top of it lay a man with his eyes rolled back, sprawled out beside another man holding a deadly weapon—his own hand blade.
The scene looked like the aftermath of a murder.
Fortunately, there were no witnesses nearby.
I was the only living person in here right now, so if I just tossed the corpse into the Yangtze or some mountain ravine, I’d have the perfect crime—
No, no, that’s not it.
I hadn’t killed him. I’d just knocked him out.
Of course, if I hadn’t held back, his neck would’ve been sliced clean through.
"But who is this guy?"
I nudged the unconscious bastard with my toe.
He’d swung a knife at me the second I walked in, so my hand had acted first.
"Is he the owner here?"
He didn’t look like a butcher. His clothes were too fine, and his face had that slick, greasy look to it.
And with all this chaos, the real owner wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
......
My long years of experience sniffed it out.
This smelled like an incident. If I woke this guy up, I’d probably get dragged into something nasty.
Get a grip, Geom Mujin.
Because That Finger Which Spins Tales couldn’t wrap things up at a decent length and kept dragging the story into one absurd tangent after another, many Outer Gods had already walked away.
The sacred number was already hovering near the boundary, so now it was time to move on to the next phase as quickly as possible.
With this number, there was no way I’d ever make it into the One Hundred Seats of the Upper Heavens—huh? What the hell am I even talking about?
"...Forget it."
Having made my judgment, I nodded.
I was already busy as it was, and I had no intention of welcoming any extra trouble.
I didn’t know what his deal was, but if he woke up, he should solve his own problems himself.
Just as I turned to leave, something caught my eye.
It was a wooden plaque that had been knocked from the man’s bosom when he collapsed.
"Hm?"
Engraved on the plaque were the words Taeho Sect.
So this guy was a disciple of the Taeho Sect...
"A minor sect leader?"
On the back of the plaque, the words Minor Sect Leader were also engraved.
The unconscious man wasn’t just some ordinary disciple.
Now that I looked closer, even the plaque itself was made of black wood—clearly a high-quality material.
Just then, I felt people outside the butcher shop.
Their presence was drawing closer and closer.
"This way—"
"He’s definitely around here—"
Listening to the voices outside, I could roughly guess the situation.
Well, shit.
I let out a sigh and grabbed the man by the back of his neck.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
By now, Geom Mujin had returned to Heo Injun’s inner chamber as naturally as if it were his own house, and tossed the man onto the floor.
Thud—!
"Lord Geom, what is this?"
"I picked it up on the way."
"Pardon?"
At that half-assed explanation, Heo Injun’s pupils trembled.
He’d gone out to buy something suitable for a child to eat, and instead of food or ingredients, he’d brought back a person.
A bad feeling slid through his mind.
"...Lord Geom, surely you’re not planning to feed that young man to the child, are you?"
At a glance, the man still seemed to be alive, but was he also trying to preserve freshness while he was at it?
"......"
At that, the child’s eyes suddenly brightened.
Chicken noodle soup might be impossible, but that was completely possible.
Gulp—
The child swallowed, his tiny Adam’s apple bobbing.
"Like hell I would. I really did just pick him up on the way."
"I-I see..."
Heo Injun didn’t sound entirely convinced.
"Tch. And you, kid, close your mouth before you bite through your own teeth."
"....."
At my warning, the child shut his mouth tight.
"Hm? This young man... He looks familiar. Could he be... the Taeho Sect’s minor sect leader?"
Heo Injun had once paid house calls to the Taeho Sect, so he recognized the man’s face.
"Seems that way."
I showed Heo Injun the plaque.
"The Taeho Sect’s minor sect leader, how did he end up like—"
"We can hear the rest once he wakes up."
I rolled my wrist and walked up to the bastard.
SMACK—!!
The sound of a drum bursting thundered through the room as Geom Mujin’s right hand vanished in a blur.
"!? Aghhh...!"
The man shot upright with a scream, clutching his cheek where the shock of impact had detonated.
It was a blow powerful enough to wake someone even if they were in a coma, and yet, astonishingly, there wasn’t a single mark left on his cheek.
"A sudden pain while sleeping... A slap that leaves no trace even after being hit... Why does this feel strangely familiar?"
"....."
Heo Injun, who had been watching closely, rubbed his own cheek and muttered to himself, and Geom Mujin did his best to pretend he hadn’t heard a thing.
"W-where... am I...?"
"Are you awake?"
I’ve been waking people up a lot lately.
"Y-you are!?"
The man sprang back the instant he saw me.
"That black hair! The one toying with me through sheer force! I wasn’t seeing things after all! Father Odin did not abandon me!"
"What?"
The man looked at me and suddenly erupted in emotional chaos.
Did I hit him too hard?
"I am Andongshin, the minor sect leader of the Great Taeho Sect! Three days ago, when the vice sect leader and his subordinates saw that my father—the sect leader—had taken to his sickbed, they launched a rebellion to seize the position!"
"I struggled desperately to protect my father and the sect, prepared to fight to the death, but in the end I was overwhelmed by superior numbers and forced to flee!"
"And now, while I was barely surviving after those traitors stole my father away despite his mind and body being unwell, I have the honor of meeting the Great Sword Hero!"
"Great Sword Hero, please! Lend me your strength so I can drive out these vile traitors of the Andong family!"
After firing off everything he wanted to say like a machine gun, Andongshin slammed his forehead to the floor in a full prostration.
BOOM—!!
The wooden floorboards shattered.
And then two people winced in misery.
"Ah—!"
One was Heo Injun, the owner of the room.
"......"
The other was the child, staring at Andongshin’s desperate plea from behind them.
"...Food..."
Grrrumble—
The child still hadn’t eaten a single meal.