Jade Dragon Hero Hyeok Gi-rin -1
A week slipped by in the blink of an eye. Every so often I fed the bait and the inner cores, trained under Heukmyo’s guidance, fished for fire carp while mastering the control of the Qi Thread Bracelet, or simply soaked in the water with her.
Aside from the awkward moments when Heukmyo’s wariness completely vanished and she wandered around half-naked, it had been the perfect summer retreat.
Now it was time to gut the fire carp.
A week of bait delivered on a steady schedule had reduced the carp’s caution to nearly nothing. I cast the bait linked to the Qi Thread Bracelet.
Whiiing!
“Whoa!”
The weight that hit the line drew a gasp of pure admiration. I had expected it to grow large, but it nearly yanked me straight into the water. I shifted my stance, dropped my center of gravity, and worked the Qi Thread Bracelet. Sheer strength alone would never haul this one in.
“Hap! Chat! Hyap!”
A week of hard practice with the bracelet finally shone. When the fire carp pulled hard I eased the line just enough to break its momentum, then reeled in with a sharp tug. As I kept bleeding off its power, the force gradually weakened.
This was the moment. One clean pull and I could land it. The experience of catching countless fire carp over the past week whispered the truth to me.
I poured internal energy into the Qi Thread Bracelet and hauled with everything I had.
Chwaaaah!!
A massive fire carp that looked a full seven cheok long came thrashing onto the bank. Even its flopping was on another level. The power in its fins was so fierce that every thrash sent it leaping the height of a grown man.
Heukmyo’s fishing rod slammed down and pinned the thrashing beast before it could fling itself into another pool.
“In just one week it grew this big… incredible.”
“You’re telling me.”
Doubling in size in a mere seven days. Even knowing the result in advance, seeing it with my own eyes left me stunned. So this was a spiritual beast.
I hurried a little as I slit the carp’s belly open. My last survey of the underwater cave had shown the water nearly to the ceiling. If we wanted to get out safely we needed to move fast.
“Oh…”
The inner core had grown dramatically. Twenty cores no bigger than a pinky nail had fused into something roughly the size of a table-tennis ball.
With that, the water-attribute spiritual medicine was secured. It was called a fire carp only because its scales looked like flames; born and raised entirely in water, of course it was water-attribute.
“The way back’s going to be tight, so ditch anything useless.”
“Mmm… still, I’m keeping this iron fishing rod as a souvenir!”
“Fine.”
The water in the cave had risen to a dangerous level—roughly ninety-seven percent full. One more day and we might never have gotten out.
“Puhah…!”
Even the Minjiang River, which had barely deserved the name of river before, had swollen dramatically. The two of us swam free of the current and drew long, grateful breaths.
“Ahh~ that was fun. The weather’s gotten a lot more bearable too.”
The brutal heat had clearly broken. It was still summer, still hot, but the worst of it had passed. All in all, a thoroughly satisfying vacation. Heukmyo had finally escaped human eyes long enough to enjoy a real summer retreat, complete with fishing and swimming to her heart’s content.
I had gotten my fill of scenery, obtained a spiritual medicine, and escaped the heat in style. Perfect.
We returned to Sichuan City wearing broad smiles—
“…What the hell happened here.”
Sichuan City was dead.
The atmosphere in Sichuan City was wrong. The number of people in the markets had dropped by more than half. The stalls that used to overflow with goods stood empty, and every face was heavy with worry.
One glance was enough to know something serious had happened.
“Senior, I’m going to stop somewhere else first and gather information, then head to the inn.”
“Got it. I’ll wait at the inn.”
Heukmyo vanished, probably to contact the Wolbok Hall for news. I was just as unsettled. Had there ever been an event like this in Sichuan City?
When I reached the Wanderer Inn I finally learned why the city felt so broken.
“Bandits?”
“You been holed up in some temple for a week? Four of the Green Forest Seventy-Two Strongholds joined forces, seized Jeongnam Mountain on the Nanjing Road, and they’re stripping every traveler they can catch.”
Yu Sa-yeon was away, so we had no choice but to get the current state of Sichuan from Jeong Sam.
I almost doubted my ears. Jeongnam Mountain on the Nanjing Road was only three days’ walk from Sichuan City for an ordinary person—half a day at most for a high-level expert using lightness skill.
“Four Super-Peak experts, and they’ve mustered five hundred men who are strong for bandits. That’s more than the sects of Sichuan can handle.”
“Hah…”
A hollow laugh escaped me. Sichuan City hosted many sects, yet only three Super-Peak experts lived here. Even if you shook the entire city down, we still fell short in numbers.
While we had been off on a summer retreat, this mess had exploded.
I pieced the situation together through Jeong Sam’s mouth. The local sects felt the crisis and were trying to pool their strength, but things were not going smoothly. Expecting Sichuan’s own sects alone to drive the bandits out was pure fantasy.
“Any word from the great sects of Sichuan?”
“They’ll move once enough time passes… but not right this second.”
That made sense. Even if news of the bandits had spread quickly from Sichuan City, it had only just reached the Hwangbo Clan, Jeomchang, Emei, Qingcheng, and Zhongnan. They would send disciples first to confirm the facts, then decide.
Besides, great sects on the level of the Nine Great Sects or the Five Great Clans needed a proper justification before they moved. That obsession with justification was both the strength and the weakness of the orthodox path.
Without a righteous cause, an orthodox martial artist must not draw his sword. Why do people trust the orthodox and keep their distance from the unorthodox? Because the unorthodox use power however it suits them and harm people freely, while the orthodox weigh justification and refuse to swing their strength without one.
The Five Great Clans and Nine Great Sects, as the pillars of orthodoxy, were even more particular about justification than lesser sects.
Sichuan City was the domain of Sichuan’s own sects. No matter how many bandits appeared, charging in the moment they showed up and launching a full-scale purge would be overstepping their authority.
At the absolute minimum, the great sects would need another week before they acted.
I was still listening to Jeong Sam list the damages when Heukmyo reappeared.
“Mm… Senior. We’ve got a problem.”
“What kind?”
“The spiritual medicine. There was a merchant group called Cheonyu that was supposed to sell us the wood-attribute medicine… looks like the bandits hit them.”
“Hah…”
I let out another helpless laugh, jammed my bamboo hat on, and stood. I wanted to check on my medicine, and rather than keep fishing for secondhand news from Jeong Sam I decided to meet a victim who had actually faced the bandits.
“So they took every last piece of cargo?”
“That’s right… sigh. Until you heroes drive the bandits out, trade will be impossible.”
Yu Chan’s face was as pale as a man on the verge of death. Having had his life threatened and every possession stripped by bandits, the look was understandable.
“But… if the bandits realize it’s a spiritual medicine, won’t they just swallow it?”
“With all the dangers that fill the world, who carries a spiritual medicine looking like a spiritual medicine? I kept it in a double-layered cosmetics case, so there’s a fair chance the goods are still intact. Of course… they might have found it.”
I wanted more details on the bandits, but Yu Chan no longer had the strength to keep talking. We could not keep tormenting a man who had just lost a fortune, so Heukmyo and I finally left, clicking our tongues in regret.
“Shame.”
“It really is.”
Chances to obtain spiritual medicine this easily were rare… a real pity. And then bandits appear out of nowhere.
Only one cause came to mind. Yeo Il-ye.
“Think this is because Mak Yeo-bu got caught?”
“Possible. Either way, the bandits showed up in Sichuan because she cut down a chieftain of one of the Seventy-Two Strongholds.”
Why would they come all the way to Sichuan and raise hell just because Yeo Il-ye took Mak Yeo-bu? Because they were bandits.
They lacked the strength or courage for a full war with the Jeomchang Sect, yet they still needed revenge, so they chose the method of plundering innocent people. Truly appalling characters.
They could not touch Yeo Il-ye or Jeomchang, so they seized other innocents and turned them into hostages. A threat that said: if you keep coming after us, even more innocent people will suffer—so stop.
If they caused trouble too far away the message would never reach its target; if they did it right in front of Jeomchang they would be wiped out in an instant. So they came to soft, convenient Sichuan City and raised hell.
A chieftain of the Green Forest Seventy-Two Strongholds was only Super-Peak at best. The reason such a bandit alliance still survived was precisely this kind of retaliatory measure whenever someone touched them carelessly.
“I never expected them to move this aggressively.”
She had not even wiped out an entire stronghold. The vice-chieftain was wounded, but the rest of the bandits were fine and the stronghold itself remained intact.
It had been a clear statement that her business was with “Mak Yeo-bu,” not with “Dog King Stronghold.” Even the most lawless of the Green Forest Seventy-Two Strongholds rarely interfered in personal grudges. Bandits, after all, were walking bundles of grudges themselves.
That the strongholds would still move even after Yeo Il-ye had made her identity as a Jeomchang disciple and her intentions so clear was already unusual. On top of that, four of them had united and blocked the roads into Sichuan City.
It was more reasonable to assume some unknown backer was involved than to believe the bandits had simply flown into an abnormal rage and banded together.
“Well, the bandits must have been eyeing Sichuan City for a while. It was bound to happen someday.”
Heukmyo’s point had merit.
Bandits changed territory often. Travelers deliberately avoided places rumored to have bandits. Unless they had nested in a truly prime location, the longer they stayed in one spot the thinner the profits became.
Being bandits at heart, perhaps they had simply wanted a convenient excuse to plant themselves in the golden land of Sichuan City.
Choosing the outskirts of Sichuan as a new nest would not have been strange at all.
Sichuan City was developing by the day; of course it made mouths water.
Still…
“Something feels missing.”
Yeo Il-ye touched Mak Yeo-bu, so the bandits went wild. Nothing odd about that story. I could even understand how this event had unfolded in Sichuan City. After all, if Heukmyo had never guided Yeo Il-ye to Jeongnam Mountain?
Yeo Il-ye would never have learned that Mak Yeo-bu possessed the Seven Treasure Jade Belt, and she would never have found the first thread of her revenge.
It made sense. It did… yet something important still felt left out.
I still lacked enough clues to draw a conclusion.
“Huu…”
I shook my head hard. The moment I became aware of my fatigue, my body grew heavy at once.
I had swum a long time just to escape the cave, then returned to Sichuan City under the summer heat for the first time in days. The instant I arrived I had started gathering information and meeting merchants without a moment to rest.
Maybe I had simply thought too hard while exhausted.
“For now… let’s go back to the inn, eat something, and talk with Yu Sa-yeon.”
“Okay.”
Back at the inn, a proper meal and a cup of hot tea slowly got my mind turning again.
“This… is a real crisis.”
Once food hit my stomach and nutrients reached my brain, the jumble of information stuffed into my head began to digest one piece at a time. As the facts melted together, genuine alarm finally set in.
The first conclusion that leapt out once the information finished processing was this:
The entire profession of Sichuan Nangin was facing an enormous crisis!
A job that was supposed to keep filling my martial experience even after I gathered the Dragon Balls and broke into the Peak Realm, a job that was also supposed to keep filling my wallet—was about to vanish!
Why did the sects hire Sichuan Nangin in the first place? Because in this clean, peaceful Sichuan City, almost no incidents ever occurred that would let a proper martial sect make a name for itself.
They hired the hated wandering warriors just so they could stage a little righteous display and scrape together a scrap of reputation.
Sichuan City had been that pure, and that peaceful.
Then a bandit alliance appeared. Real villains who plundered every merchant caravan entering or leaving the city and caused massive property damage.
Their actions must have delivered a tremendous shock to the people of Sichuan.
These were people who used to get worked up over Sichuan Nangin who at best kicked over a basket of chestnuts.
Of course they would be shaken by a genuine threat that endangered lives and stole fortunes.
How would the people of Sichuan, having tasted a real crisis instead of a staged one, treat the sect that solved this mess?
That sect would enjoy absolute popularity that would make even the once-peak Yeongji Gate look like nothing, and it would become the new hegemon of Sichuan City.
In short, the birth of the Invincible Public Gate.
The mid- and small-sized sects in Sichuan could never handle a four-stronghold alliance, so the great sects behind them would have to move. Which sect would take the front line, and how long the purge would take, would depend on whatever agreement the great sects reached.
But all five great sects would never charge out at once.
Even if they faced the entire Green Forest Seventy-Two Strongholds, the Nine Great Sects or Five Great Clans would only wrinkle their noses and say they were dealing with mere bandits. Sending four of the Nine Great Sects plus one of the Five Great Clans against a mere four-stronghold alliance was something their pride would never allow.
Most likely one sect would step forward as representative.
How the great sects divided the profits among themselves was none of my business.
My business was that the moment the Invincible Public Gate was born, a murderous depression would hit me as a Sichuan Nangin!
How much demand would there be for Nangin who only kicked over chestnut baskets once the new Sichuan City had been reorganized under the order of the Invincible Public Gate that had crushed the true great evil threatening Sichuan—four strongholds of the Green Forest Seventy-Two?
Under the new order of the Invincible Public Gate, every uncompetitive sect would lose its place and take down its signboard. Even the sects that survived would abandon the idea of hiring Sichuan Nangin for staged performances and simply hunker down until the aftershocks of the bandit purge faded.
The moment the Invincible Public Gate came into existence, the Sichuan Nangin would be exposed to a killing cold of indefinite duration.
“Tsk… and I’m already short on cash…”
In martial arts films and novels people sometimes hole up in mountain caves, eat wild animals, drink waterfall water, and do nothing but train. In this Murim Cheonha, training that way would send your efficiency straight to the floor in no time.
Does it even make sense to handle all your own food, clothing, and shelter while training? Think of the time that eats up. There’s a reason the full-time housewife exists as a profession. The effort and hours a person must spend just to eat, sleep, and drink are never small.
That is why money is indispensable in this Murim Cheonha.
Even pure training requires money—so you can buy your daily needs and devote yourself solely to cultivation.
You also need money for spiritual medicines that shorten training time and for martial arts suited to your realm.
Once the Sichuan bandit crisis was resolved I might still be able to buy the wood-attribute spiritual medicine. If I did? My entire fortune would be wiped clean.
“Ugh.”
Sichuan Nangin life gave me enough real combat experience all the way to the Peak Realm. I had planned to keep living as a Sichuan Nangin at least until I reached the late stage of Peak, so even if buying the medicine left my pockets empty I had not been especially worried.
The income of a Sichuan Nangin was that high.
“Ho-hoong~ That’s why you should gamble in moderation.”
Heukmyo grinned and teased me. If there was one Sichuan Nangin who was not taking this seriously, it was her. I did not believe every Sichuan Nangin could predict the future the way I could, but any human possessed an instinctive sense of crisis.
Sichuan City right now held only mid- and small-sized sects with no power to resolve the bandit crisis. In times like these, anyone who carelessly staged a Nangin performance risked who-knew-what, so commissions had dried up overnight.
The air had changed with the bandits’ arrival, and the Nangin could not help feeling uneasy.
“Senior~ don’t worry so much~ You can just freeload off me and train your martial arts~”
A kept man living off Heukmyo. I would become a living toy. Even if I had to go hunt the wood-attribute medicine myself, I needed to keep some money.
“Looks like there won’t be any commissions for a while, and the bandits will keep things noisy. Thinking of heading outside?”
I shook my head at Heukmyo’s suggestion.
The time I would have to invest to reach the end of First-rate and break into Peak was far longer than the time needed to obtain a spiritual medicine. The one thing that could dramatically shorten that process was continuing to work as a Sichuan Nangin.
No other job let me concentrate on training, earn high pay, and stack both sparring and real combat experience at the same time.
I could not give up this sweet job!
I would have to find my own methods and make sure the profession of Sichuan Nangin survived with as little damage as possible.
If the Sichuan Nangin collapsed, I would not be the only one in trouble.
Yu Sa-yeon, the other Nangin, the brokers—everyone would be in the same boat.
If we pooled our strength somehow, maybe a solution would appear.
I would have to put Heukmyo’s information network, Yu Sa-yeon’s influence, the Nangin, and the brokers all to work and somehow make it happen.
I turned my gaze toward Yu Sa-yeon’s private seat. The chair she always occupied whenever she was on the first floor stood empty.
The person who felt the greatest threat from this crisis was Yu Sa-yeon, so of course she was already running around.
Yes—rather than me, who had only just finished grasping the situation, Yu Sa-yeon, who was already moving diligently, was far more likely to have prepared some kind of solution. I would hear that solution first, then decide how to act.
I was sorting my thoughts and sipping tea to soothe my exhausted body and mind when—
Creak.
The door of the Wanderer Inn opened.
“Pardon the intrusion.”
The Wanderer Inn normally had no ordinary customers, and today the place was especially subdued and gloomy. No brokers happily counting money, no Nangin satisfied with good combat experience from a commission—only faces long with worry over the bandits.
At the clear, ringing voice that cut through the silence, every head turned toward the entrance.
The familiar Jeomchang Sect uniform, a red sable fur collar.
And a fair, refined face that matched the clear voice perfectly. A white headband pressed neatly over the hair. The classic image of a young nobleman wearing a bright smile.
An appearance so distinctive that anyone could tell at a glance this was a Jeomchang disciple, a member of the Ten Later Heroes, and the Jade Dragon Hero.
“I have come seeking the benefactor of my junior martial sister, Yeo Il-ye.”
Worried about exposing my identity, the Nangin stayed silent. In that silence Hyeok Gi-rin arched a long eyebrow, slowly surveyed the Wanderer Inn… and her gaze stopped on me.
Whether she had heard about me and Heukmyo from Yeo Il-ye or not, she smiled gently toward the two of us.
“Haha, it seems you were already waiting right here.”
Great Disciple of the Jeomchang Sect. Foremost of the Ten Later Heroes.
Also a woman cross-dressing as a man, and a princess of the direct imperial bloodline.
Jade Dragon Hero Hyeok Gi-rin had come looking for me.