The Tang Clan Descends
It was still early, while the duel between Tang Do-gyeong and Ho Cheon-an was underway.
“What the hell is going on?”
The nangin who had finished their morning training and were preparing for the day suddenly heard a Six Harmonies Voice Transmission ringing through the inn. One by one they pressed their black hats firmly onto their heads and headed outside.
What greeted them were six martial artists of the Tang Clan, caked head to toe in dust and sweat.
The moment the nangin recognized the Tang Clan’s colors, they let out low, uneasy murmurs. From Tang Dok-gi, who had poured every scrap of energy into light-foot techniques save for the bare minimum needed to circulate his qi, to the rest of the Tang Clan party who had not rested once since leaving the Jeomchang Sect, every one of them had run straight through to Sichuan without pause. Ghost-light flickered in their eyes.
Every last one of the Tang Clan warriors was a true expert; it would not have been strange for the nangin to feel overwhelmed. What kept them silent now, however, was the raw, seething fury rolling off the Tang Clan men.
“It’s been a while, Uncle.”
“You little bastard! Tang Do-gyeong! How much more disgrace do you intend to heap on the Tang name?! I swear before heaven and earth—today, no matter what it takes, I will bind you and drag you back to the main house!”
Even under Tang Dok-gi’s rage, Tang Do-gyeong’s expression remained utterly calm.
“Didn’t you say you would strike my name from the Tang Clan’s family register?”
“How dare you speak those words! You ought to be on your knees begging, yet you still dare utter such insolence? You still haven’t come to your senses!”
Tang Dok-gi raised a hand. The six martial artists standing behind him drew their whips in perfect unison and let them uncoil.
Watching them, Ho Cheon-an thought:
So these are proper elites.
What were the Tang Clan’s secret arts? Hidden weapons and poison techniques. Everyone under heaven knew it, yet as an orthodox house the Tang Clan could not simply fling darts and toxins at people in broad daylight. That was why their disciples also trained in whip techniques or fist-palm-leg methods.
That, too, was a hallmark of the Tang Clan.
Hidden weapons were consumables. Poisons were consumables. The higher one climbed, the rarer and more precious the weapons and toxins required, so even the Tang Clan could only supply limited quantities to its martial artists.
Special poisons and superior hidden weapons went first to those with exceptional talent—the true elites who would inherit the clan’s hidden-weapon and poison arts. Those who devoted themselves solely to those two paths still trained with the whip for the day they might be unable to use either.
Long reach, fine control, and the ability to layer feints and power—whip techniques shared a natural kinship with hidden-weapon arts.
That did not mean these men were whip masters. It simply meant that, among the weapons commonly used across the Central Plains, the whip was the one whose nature most closely matched hidden weapons, and so they used it out of necessity.
Most of the Tang Clan’s branch families preferred fist-palm-leg methods over the whip. The fact that every one of these men had drawn a whip was itself proof that they were true Tang Clan elites who had poured everything into hidden weapons and poison.
“I already told you, Uncle. Before I am a son of the Tang Clan, I am a man. Once I have set my will, I will not casually break it. If I achieve results that satisfy me, I will return. Even if I am expelled in the meantime, so be it.”
“Still clinging to that pitiful pride and that insolent mouth of yours!”
Crack!
Tang Dok-gi’s whip struck the ground.
“Subdue him!”
The Tang Clan experts were just about to lash out with their whips when a single nangin stepped in front of Tang Dok-gi.
It was Half-Moon Blade Jeong Sam.
“Aigoo…”
Ho Cheon-an let out a long sigh. He had already decided that if something like this ever happened, the first thing he would do was smack Jeong Sam across the back of the head—but of all times, it had to be right in the middle of a yabawi game.
By the time he cleared the table and came down from the third floor, every nangin who had sensed the commotion had already poured outside. Walking out under every eye alongside Tang Do-gyeong, Ho Cheon-an never got the chance to quietly deal with Jeong Sam.
Why, of all the hours in a day, did they have to show up right then?
The moment Jeong Sam moved, the Comrades Faction nangin began lining up beside Tang Do-gyeong as well. Fire flared in Tang Dok-gi’s eyes.
“Stand down! Do you dare interfere with the Great Tang Clan’s affairs? Do you think those cheap black hats will hide your identities while you step forward like this?!”
The Tang Clan experts’ killing intent exploded outward with his words. Against Tang Do-gyeong they had intended only careful restraint—he was family, after all—but their attitude toward the nangin was entirely different. Unrestrained killing intent and the tidal pressure of Super-Peak Realm masters made the nangin tremble.
“We may be nangin, but we are the Comrades Faction who swore to share joy and hardship with Hero Tang! No matter that this is Tang Clan business—when the man himself has cut the bond, how can dragging him away by force against his will still be called family business?!”
“That’s right! We will protect Hero Tang!”
The flow is…
Ho Cheon-an rapidly assessed the situation. Originally the Comrades Faction numbered fifteen. Of those, eight—including Half-Moon Blade Jeong Sam—had stepped forward.
He had expected the Tang Clan experts to take five days to arrive. He had only just begun to sour the Comrades Faction’s reputation, and already the Tang Clan was here…
That roughly half the group had peeled away was less the result of his schemes and more the crushing weight of the Tang Clan’s momentum—momentum that had burned everything in its path and far outstripped even his own predictions.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?! You lot who just stepped up—how exactly do you plan to handle the aftermath?! If you don’t back off right now, you’re permanently expelled!”
Yu Sa-yeon moved to suppress the chaos.
“Before we are Sichuan nangin, we are men—and this is something we cannot walk away from!”
“Even if I’m expelled and have to take off the black hat, I will not back down from this!”
“…You little bastards!”
Some, like Jeong Sam, had stepped forward on pure impulse. Most of those standing with Tang Do-gyeong, however, were nangin who had long felt the limits of self-taught martial arts and the walls of status. Men who, no matter how much money they had, could never find a proper master or true techniques without connections, and so had simply stopped where they stood.
They did not want to let the opportunity named Tang Do-gyeong slip away.
They had become Sichuan nangin precisely because the position made it easier to learn martial arts; standing before a chance to truly train, they felt no hesitation about casting off their black hats.
Tang Dok-gi, who had been watching the uproar, drove the final nail in.
“This is not a stage for the likes of you to interfere. I, Tang Dok-gi, stake my name on this: anyone who steps forward here today will have today’s grudge repaid tenfold.”
The nangin could not answer, yet none of them retreated. Tang Do-gyeong, looking thoroughly unsettled by the situation, kept glancing back and forth between the nangin and the Tang Clan men.
Ha, shit…
Ho Cheon-an heaved a deep sigh. After Tang Dok-gi’s declaration, the aura rolling off the Tang Clan experts shifted again. It had been murderous enough before; now the very nature of it was changing. Earlier, even if a fight broke out, they would have simply swung their whips with rough hands. Now, faced with nangin who refused to yield even after the Tang Clan’s grudges had been invoked, the killing intent grew steadily sharper.
If a clash happened now, some of the nangin might die—and how the rest would react to the sight of their own bleeding was something even Ho Cheon-an could not predict.
If every last nangin charged, the Tang Clan martial artists would not walk away unscathed either.
The Tang Clan experts were Super-Peak Realm; among the nangin, even Peak Realm fighters were few, and most were merely First-rate. But if a true slaughter began, the nangin would become more dangerous than any other martial artists under heaven. The life of a nangin—treated as the bottom of the martial world—was painted in danger and blood.
Ordinary rabble was one thing. The Sichuan nangin who had clawed their way up from the edge of life and death were genuine specialists in killing.
Even the Tang Clan experts might lose a few men, dead or maimed.
Tang Dok-gi knew that perfectly well. That was why, even with fury boiling to the top of his head, he had given the nangin one chance when they first stepped forward.
“The Tang Clan’s killing intent is getting a bit excessive.”
Yeo Jinsang’s mutter reached Ho Cheon-an’s ear.
“What do you plan to do? Even for the Tang Clan, this pressure feels over the line.”
“If blood is drawn, we step in. They’re still our people, after all.”
The situation had changed.
Watching the Tang Clan men freely pour out killing intent, the neutral nangin and the Treasure Road Faction began, little by little, to release their own. Faces hardened.
Some took a single step forward. Others rested hands on sword hilts.
The Tang Clan martial artists’ faces twisted as well.
The killing intent of nangin who lived through real combat as casually as eating meals was on an entirely different level. The pressure itself was small, yet the sheer edge of the intent they raised was enough to surpass the Tang Clan experts.
The air was a single spark away from exploding.
“Wait!”
Ho Cheon-an’s hand shot up.
In that hand was the Blood Jade Token.
“The Blood Jade Token…!”
“It’s him!”
Every gaze—Tang Clan and Sichuan nangin alike—snapped to Ho Cheon-an in an instant. He let out a long breath, pushed through the martial artists, and came to a stop in front of Tang Do-gyeong.
“Hero Tang. All this chaos is happening because of you, yet you haven’t said a single word.”
“…I—”
“What do you intend to do? The trial to become a Sichuan nangin is still underway, and so is our yabawi wager. But as far as I’m concerned, I don’t know if either of those is worth paying the price of standing against your own family.”
“Hey, hyung…”
“A wager is just a wager. And if you still want to become a Sichuan nangin, you can always come back later, can’t you? I’ll keep the Blood Jade Token safe and unused. Finish your family business first, and leave the rest for another day. How does that sound?”