Talisman Treasure (2)
After hearing the full details from Seo Seol-ryeong, Cheon Woo-jin returned to the 1st Layer.
Before heading into the eastern district, he glanced into Jo Hyu's shop and found only a young girl sitting alone, munching on a snack.
He wondered for a moment what grandfather would leave his granddaughter all alone in such a rough corner of the city, but looking more closely, he saw that several talismans had been laid out around her. If anyone came close with ill intent, the talismans would activate on their own and teach the fool a lesson they wouldn't forget.
"Are you here to see Grandfather?"
The girl looked up at Cheon Woo-jin. Her manners were better than he'd expected. Perhaps Jo Hyu had raised her well.
"I only came by to say hello. I was just passing through."
"Grandfather will be back in about four days."
"Then I'll greet him next time."
"Wait a moment."
The girl reached out and picked up a piece of pastry.
"Have a mahwa."
"……"
Mahwa was a snack made by twisting strips of flour dough into a shape like a braid.
In some regions, it was eaten as a ward against misfortune—a snack meant to drive off stray ghosts and bad luck. Just as a twisted cord or a three-strand rope was traditionally a symbol that kept away evil, the twisted shape of mahwa carried a similar meaning.
"It's tasty."
The girl stretched her hand just past the edge of the talismans' effective range and held out a piece of mahwa. Cheon Woo-jin gave a small nod of thanks.
"Much appreciated. I'll enjoy it."
Once outside the shop, Cheon Woo-jin walked toward the eastern district, biting into the mahwa as he went. Unlike the twisted bread he used to eat back in Korea, it was a hard, brittle snack. He crunched his way through it as he wandered down the back alleys, and the piece of mahwa was gone before he knew it.
"A child treated me to a snack."
Cheon Woo-jin murmured to himself as he stepped into the eastern district.
"Next time, I should buy her something in return."
Even in a world of bloodless, heartless cultivators, one could not take a treat from a little girl and wipe one's mouth clean of it as if nothing had happened.
Four days later.
Cheon Woo-jin finished his preparations and left the eastern district. As he walked through the alleys, he spotted neatly dressed men carrying surveying instruments, moving about with purpose. The Dongnyu Merchant Group, planning to raze and rebuild this area, appeared to be conducting a land survey. Quite a few residents watched them with uneasy expressions, and among the onlookers he glimpsed Jo Hyu and his granddaughter.
Cheon Woo-jin gave no sign of recognition and moved on.
"……"
Through the tangle of winding streets he climbed to the 2nd Layer, then made his way toward a ruin tucked away in a forgotten corner. Passing between the pitifully shattered remains of what had once been grand halls, he ascended until he reached an area shrouded in thick gray mist. This was the 3rd Layer—the zone open only to those at the Great Circle of Qi Condensation and above.
The air here is heavy.
Cheon Woo-jin circulated his spirit qi to purify the poison steeped in the fog. Without it, he felt certain he would double over vomiting blood within moments. Still, as he grew accustomed to it, the air became bearable—more than bearable, in fact. With every breath he took, he could almost feel his insides settling into a warm fullness.
Air this acrid was also air this dense with concentrated energy. If the toxins could be filtered out and the rest absorbed into the body, it would greatly accelerate the accumulation of spiritual power. This was one of the reasons cultivators sought to live on the highest layers they could reach. Cultivating in the fresh air and clean water of a mountain retreat had its virtues, to be sure, but training in a harsh environment was an undeniably effective method as well.
Half of them are Great Circle Qi Condensation... and the other half, Foundation Establishment?
On the 1st and 2nd Layers one could still find cultivators dressed like beggars, but up here such figures had all but vanished. From the 3rd Layer onward, only those with genuine strength could ascend at all.
"You came early."
Just then, a voice drifted down from above Cheon Woo-jin's head. A black cat sat perched on the roof of a ruined building nearby, and it was the cat that had spoken.
"Keep walking as though nothing is wrong. Only you can hear my voice."
"……"
Cheon Woo-jin gave a small nod and began to walk. The cat followed, balancing along the top of a fence.
"I'm sure the woman already told you, but allow me to explain the current situation."
The cat whispered in a voice pitched for Cheon Woo-jin's ears alone.
"Three days from now, the Dongnyu Merchant Group will meet the sect master of the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect to sign an accord."
The Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect. A dark-faction power operating inside Ghost Head City. Unlike the Poison Sword Sect, which walked the single blade of the sword above all else, it was a sect specializing in arts and crafts—talismanry, refinement arts, and the like. Word had it that a third of all the talismans and pills circulating through the lower layers of Ghost Head City came out of the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect. A power that influential, and now it was about to join hands with the Dongnyu Merchant Group.
"With the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect's blessing, the Dongnyu Merchant Group will be free to do business however it pleases in the lower layers of Ghost Head City. And since Dongnyu is a merchant group operating under the influence of the Taiyi Inverse Principle Sect, this amounts to indirect support for that sect's expansion into the city."
"……"
"That is not an acceptable outcome."
Weight gathered in the cat's voice.
"Which is why the accord must be scuttled. By destroying the talisman treasure that the Dongnyu Merchant Group has prepared as a gift for the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect."
The merchant group had prepared a talisman treasure that stored the power of the Crimson Sea True Fire Spear, a formidable law treasure. Once it was gone, the Hwangju Neungryeong Sect would have no reason to tolerate Dongnyu's entry into Ghost Head City.
"I don't care how you do it. Destroy the talisman treasure. Succeed, and I will provide you with a Foundation Establishment spirit item."
"……"
Cheon Woo-jin let his gaze drift for a moment and stared at the cat on the fence. A status window hung above its head.
The cat was a Foundation Establishment cultivator of the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect in transformed form. Which meant that a man of the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect was begging an outsider to destroy the very gift meant for his own sect.
So what was going on here?
The Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect has two factions, that's what.
One faction wanted to accept the talisman treasure and permit the merchant group's expansion. The other held that the Dongnyu Merchant Group must never be allowed in. At present, the faction favoring permission appeared to hold the upper hand. Song Pyo belonged to the opposition, but they had already lost control of the sect's direction. His desperate last resort, then, was to make the talisman treasure disappear.
There was a catch, of course. If Song Pyo acted directly, or even through his own subordinates, he risked leaving traces that could be traced back to him. So he had decided to hire an outsider—and through Seo Seol-ryeong, that outsider had become Cheon Woo-jin.
Even if I fail tonight, Song Pyo won't step in himself. He'll find someone new and send them instead.
Having finished his explanation, the cat sprang up onto the roof of a nearby building and swished its tail invitingly, as if to say follow me. Cheon Woo-jin trailed after it, feigning an aimless stroll.
Descending into a deserted back alley, the cat slipped down into the underground waterway through a collapsed hole in the ground. Once Cheon Woo-jin had confirmed no one else was about, he dove down after it.
"This way."
The cat led the way, guiding him through the dark. In that underground passage where rats scurried to and fro, the briefing resumed.
"The Dongnyu Merchant Group's negotiators are currently staying in an establishment called Changhwaru, which they've rented out in its entirety. The talks with the Hwangju Neungnyeong Sect are to be held there as well."
"……"
"And our target—the talisman treasure—is inside Changhwaru too."
The cat stopped walking. Looking up, Cheon Woo-jin saw a large opening above them, water dripping from its edges one drop at a time.
"It connects to the interior of Changhwaru. Go up through there and you can slip inside without troubling yourself with the guards outside."
"……"
"The talisman treasure is on the 3rd floor. Where exactly on the 3rd floor, you'll have to find out for yourself."
After explaining all this while gazing up at the hole, the cat looked back at Cheon Woo-jin.
"But there is one man you must be careful of."
When Cheon Woo-jin's eyes silently asked who, the cat answered in a hard voice.
"A Foundation Establishment cultivator who can use the shapeshifting art, just as I can."
"……"
"They say he serves as the merchant group's fixer, and that his resourcefulness is exceptional. Stabbing his targets in the blind spot with the shapeshifting art is said to be his particular specialty."
Even at that, Cheon Woo-jin's expression barely changed. The cat cocked its head.
"Did you not understand what I said? If the man happens to have transformed himself into a courtesan and ambushes you—"
"It doesn't matter."
Cheon Woo-jin spoke for the first time.
"However capriciously he changes his shape, his essence does not change with it."
"……!"
Cheon Woo-jin possessed the ability to read status windows. However that Foundation Establishment cultivator disguised himself, he would recognize him at a glance.
"Is that all the information?"
"W-well. Yes, that's everything."
"Understood."
If they kept talking here much longer, the echo of their voices might carry and alert the enemy. Cheon Woo-jin made ready to ascend at once.
"G-good luck, then!"
With the cat's last words fading behind him, Cheon Woo-jin shot upward.
The hole opened into the kitchen of Changhwaru's first floor. It was, in other words, a drain—a hole through which all manner of refuse was dumped straight into the underground waterway. Whoever had designed the place had given not a moment's thought to water pollution, but thanks to that carelessness, penetrating Changhwaru's interior had proven laughably easy.
The Concealment Talisman is working properly.
Cheon Woo-jin was currently using a talisman. One of the talismans stored in the storage pouch he had taken from Gu Yang-gyeol—a Concealment Talisman that hid the body just as a stealth art would.
Naturally, this was nothing like the flimsy concealment talismans sold in the markets of the 1st and 2nd Layers. This one performed well enough that a Core Formation cultivator like Gu Yang-gyeol had carried it on his person—Qi Condensation cultivators would never see through it.
"More food to carry up to the 2nd floor?"
"Yes. They're saying there isn't enough to go with the drinks."
In the kitchen, the cooks were chatting among themselves. Cheon Woo-jin slipped right past them. Not one of them noticed a thing.
Out of the kitchen and into the corridor, he caught sight of a man fawning shamelessly over a courtesan. As it happened, every courtesan here had mastered a dual-cultivation method that drew power through the union of yin and yang. One careless night, and a man could find his spiritual essence siphoned away entirely—yet the fellow seemed determined to seduce her anyway, and the sheer earnestness of it was almost impressive.
Cheon Woo-jin pressed himself flat against the wall and moved so as not to brush against them. As he passed, he checked their status windows; the courtesan held the higher realm. That man would likely have everything sucked out of him until nothing remained but an empty husk. Even intimacy between men and women was a wager of one's life, in this world of immortal cultivators.
"……"
Leaving them behind, Cheon Woo-jin made for the staircase. Getting up to the 2nd floor presented no trouble at all.
A sweep of the 2nd floor revealed laughter ringing out from every direction. The cooks in the kitchen had mentioned sending more food up here, after all. The merchant group's cultivators appeared to be holding a drinking party.
Peaceful. Are they that confident in their outside guard?
From the 3rd floor onward, however, things would be different.
Cheon Woo-jin set his foot on the staircase and looked up. Halfway up the steps to the 3rd floor stood a solidly built cultivator.
Eyes wide open, spine perfectly straight. Every line of the man radiated a resolve that nothing would pass before him. Slipping quietly past a man like that would be no simple matter.
"……"
Gripping the railing, Cheon Woo-jin climbed the steps one at a time. He had ascended perhaps a third of the way when the guard's eyes flew open wide.
Something was there.
The man noticed it and leaned his head forward, sharpening his gaze, focusing on the space ahead of him to pin down what exactly it was.
The very next instant.
Sshk!
A blade of black steel, stretching out from the shadow beneath the stair railing, pierced through the side of the man's neck.
"U—ah…"
He tried, by sheer force of will, to force sound from his throat and alert his comrades to the emergency. But his vocal cords had already been run through, and his voice was swallowed whole by the laughter booming up from the 2nd floor, reaching no one at all. In the end, he crumpled where he stood.
"……"
Cheon Woo-jin drew out a second talisman. This one was of rather poor quality. Still, it was more than enough to briefly conceal a corpse that would be lying perfectly still. Affixing it to the body, he continued up the stairs.
And the moment he set foot on the 3rd floor, unmolested by anyone—
A torrential wave of energy, furious as a erupting volcano, surged toward him from up ahead.