Let's Raise the Stakes
After about ten minutes, Yeop Pung's fury had finally begun to ebb. He sat down across from Heukgu at last and began a serious discussion of the rat's soul-control ability.
"Alright. Tell me — what kind of souls can you actually control?"
Yeop Pung's face was a blank mask.
Tap-tap-tap. Heukgu pointed at the ant still waving its tiny antennae on the bed.
"Don't tell me you can only control ants. What about something a little bigger — mosquitoes, flies, that sort of thing?"
Heukgu shook his head with frantic vigor.
ZZZT!
Electricity began crackling through Yeop Pung's body once more.
"Master, please calm down!"
Heukgu slammed his head into the mattress again.
Stay calm… I have to stay calm…
Yeop Pung drew a long breath and tried again.
"Then what about numbers? How many can you control at once?"
Hope flickered back into Heukgu's eyes. He immediately stretched out both front paws and spread eight toes for Yeop Pung to see.
"Really?"
Heukgu thought for a moment, then hesitantly tucked one toe back in.
Damn it. Only seven?!
Yeop Pung genuinely wanted to cry. He had poured so much effort into raising a Rat King who would one day rule Mount Tianyun — and what he had gotten was an Ant King. An Ant King with a grand total of seven subordinates. Was Heaven mocking him?
"Master, please don't lose heart. I can feel it — this ability can grow. Right now I can only control ants, but in the future I'll definitely be able to command far more powerful things."
"Oh? Is that so?"
A hint of color finally returned to Yeop Pung's face.
"How does it grow?"
"I don't know!"
ZZZT!
Golden lightning flashed through the room once more.
Out in the courtyard, Maeng Chang-haeng and Bone had nearly stripped their roast rabbit to the bone.
"Whoa — there it is again! Here it comes again!"
The old man looked thoroughly startled.
"Who knew this kid could be that terrifying!"
"Hey. You not eating any more of that rabbit leg?"
Bone did not appear to care in the slightest what Yeop Pung was doing indoors.
"Get your paws off my rabbit leg, you bastard!"
"Woof!"
Stay calm. I have to stay calm.
Yeop Pung was now convinced that Heaven had some personal grievance against him. Fine, grant him a rare opportunity — but then saddle him with Geumban, that ice-cold relic that had not spoken a single word in half a day? He finally obtains a spiritual beast, and the thing drives him up the wall. Heaven had sent the two of them specifically to torment him, hadn't it?
Across from him, Heukgu was still trailing smoke from his fur. Two electric shocks had jolted the rat's wits back into working order, and he had privately resolved not to go anywhere near the ticking bomb that was Yeop Pung for a while.
Yeop Pung let out a deep sigh and forced himself to think the matter through. Whatever else could be said, Heukgu clearly possessed Spirit Realm-tier strength. The real question was how powerful the little beast might yet become. And that peculiar soul-control ability, useless as it looked, was bound to have some application of its own. Even a worthless tool had its uses, if you knew how to wield it.
He sat frowning for a long while. Then, all at once, he rose from his seat and headed for the door.
"Master!!"
Heukgu still seemed to have more he wanted to say.
"Copy the Thousand Character Classic three times tonight."
Yeop Pung's expression was ice. He reached under the pillow and drew out the Qiankun Ring he had hidden away on account of the time travel, pulled a brush and ink from inside it, and set them in front of Heukgu. He scrawled something across a sheet of paper himself, pressed the brush into Heukgu's paw, and strode out.
"It was definitely once just a minute ago!!"
Heukgu clutched the brush and began to have serious doubts about his entire career as a rat. If he had known it would come to this, he might have been better off never waking up at all.
Outside, Yeop Pung found Maeng Chang-haeng and Bone locked in a heated dispute over who would get the last remaining rabbit head. The moment the old man spotted Yeop Pung striding toward them, he flinched — and in that split second, Bone snatched the rabbit head and bolted.
"Damn it, that's my rabbit head!"
"Martial Grand-Uncle, I have a favor to ask."
"My rabbit head… Fine. What is it?"
Maeng Chang-haeng slanted a look at him, as if Yeop Pung really ought to compensate him for the stolen head.
"I'd like you to go to the Herb Garden and fetch me some spiritual herbs."
"You've already got a plot of spiritual herbs of your own. What, that isn't enough?"
"It's not for cultivation."
Yeop Pung handed over the prescription he had written a few moments earlier. Maeng Chang-haeng scanned it, and a knowing smile spread across his face.
"Oho. Yeop Pung, don't tell me you know the formula for Tongcheonsan?"
"You know it too, Martial Grand-Uncle?"
Yeop Pung was genuinely surprised. Tongcheonsan was a secret recipe he had stumbled across in a tattered old volume in the Herb Garden — something no ordinary person should have recognized. And yet the old man had identified it at a glance.
"Hahaha. I used it a few times in my younger days…"
Maeng Chang-haeng started to go on, then his expression suddenly hardened.
"But Yeop Pung. If you're planning to use this, are you trying to make this a very big incident?"
Yeop Pung made no attempt to hide his intentions.
"Tomorrow, I don't want to watch those bastards torment Wang Maeng for even one more day."
"But… you'd still need a way to get the medicine into them."
"I have one."
Yeop Pung smiled faintly.
"All I need from you, Martial Grand-Uncle, is the spiritual herbs."
"Haha! Good! I trust you!"
Maeng Chang-haeng shot off toward the Herb Garden like an arrow, as if he could already smell some highly entertaining trouble on the wind.
Left alone, Yeop Pung gazed out at the darkened forest in the distance, a smile on his face that belonged on a demon. In his mind, he turned over the passage on Tongcheonsan from that old book.
Tongcheonsan. Effective at purging the filth from the bowels of Profound Realm cultivators. Effects manifest four to six hours after consumption.
The medicinal potency, however, is extremely violent. Use with the utmost caution. Never overdose.
Take heed. Take heed again.
Heh. Tongcheonsan. Such a respectable name — when in truth, it was nothing more than the most powerful laxative in existence.
Who said ants couldn't make a man's life hell? It all depended on whose hand they were in. Yeop Pung fully expected tomorrow to put on one hell of a show.
The next morning, the sky had only just begun to pale.
Smoke was already rising from the dining hall on Nowoon Peak that had been set aside for the disciples of Cheonun Sect. Not a single Cheonun disciple was inside, however. The place was swarming with Cheonbong Army cooks, bustling about with grim efficiency.
Martial artists who cultivated Profound Qi no longer needed ordinary food to survive, but habits accumulated over a lifetime still drove them to eat on schedule whenever circumstances allowed. Medicinal cuisine in particular — dishes laced with spiritual herbs and spirit-beast meat — remained wildly popular among them.
This morning, the Cheonbong Army's breakfast was nutritional porridge: a rich brew of assorted spiritual herbs simmered in concentrated beast-bone broth, as beneficial to cultivation as it was delicious. Since every ingredient in the kitchen belonged to Cheonun Sect anyway, the army cooks felt no need to be frugal. They had started the porridge before dawn, and the thick, savory aroma was already drifting a long way off. All that remained was to wait for the officers and soldiers to arrive for the meal.
That was when Yeop Pung quietly led Heukgu a short distance away from the dining hall. They were not permitted to approach any closer. The Cheonbong Army was extremely cautious, and nowhere more so than with its food. Every kitchen was staffed exclusively by army cooks, and no Cheonun Sect disciple was allowed anywhere near them — all to guarantee that every last soldier ate in safety.
Today, however, was different. Yeop Pung crouched behind a small building some distance away and hung a little pouch around Heukgu.
"This is your job, Heukgu. Pull this off today, and tonight you'll only have to copy the Thousand Character Classic once."
Heukgu stared at him, utterly bewildered. If I do it well, shouldn't that mean a reward? Not a slightly smaller punishment?
"Hurry up. They'll be coming to eat any minute."
Heukgu sighed. Once was still better than three. Last night he had nearly broken his front paws just finishing the copies; with any luck, he might actually get a wink of sleep tonight.
With a flick, he was gone.
Heukgu was now a genuine Spirit Realm spiritual beast, and on top of that he possessed the field-rat clan's innate gift for concealing their aura. He was, in short, the perfect agent for an infiltration. An inconspicuous black shadow flickered through the faint dawn light and, in the space of a breath, arrived in the grass behind the dining hall. The miracle was about to begin.
Heukgu's little nose twitched as he sniffed the air. A short distance away, beneath a large tree, a few ants were crawling slowly along. His black eyes began to spin, and an unseen, mysterious force unfurled toward them.
In an instant, five black ants lined up before Heukgu, standing in a neat row, awaiting his command.
"Listen carefully, all of you…"
Had Yeop Pung been present to watch Heukgu striking a cool pose in front of a handful of ants, golden lightning would have made a third appearance on the spot. Heukgu, however, was having the time of his life.
"Today, This King shall assign you a mission of the utmost importance. Now — come here."
With a look of grave solemnity, Heukgu untied the bundle on his back. Inside was a prepared powder, white as snow: Tongcheonsan, the stuff so intense it would send a man's guts reaching all the way to heaven.
"Alright, little ones. In you go."
At his command, the ants swarmed in. They rolled and tumbled through the Tongcheonsan powder until they were coated from head to foot, then opened their mouths wide, swallowed a mouthful, and set off toward the dining hall at a dead sprint. Not a soul noticed five tiny ants squeezing through the cracks in the building and slipping inside.
It was as if five extra screens had been added inside Heukgu's mind. He tracked every ant's movement with perfect clarity and directed them accordingly. Their final objective was the great cauldrons of medicinal nutritional porridge, still giving off that rich, savory fragrance.
"Go!"
Heukgu had only just graduated from learning his letters, but when it came to getting a job done, he was surprisingly competent. The moment he confirmed the target, he sent the ants scrambling up the sides of the stove without a second's hesitation and charged them straight at the enormous cauldrons.
"Hm? What's an ant doing here?"
Success was right in front of them when a human voice dropped from above. Two enormous fingers reached down, flicked one ant aside, and casually crushed it. One of the screens in Heukgu's mind went dark on the spot.
Damn it! We've been spotted!
A chill raced down Heukgu's spine. The image of copying the Thousand Character Classic three times that night flashed through his mind, and cold sweat beaded on his forehead.
"Careful! Be careful!"
He urgently drove the remaining four ants to pick up speed and hurl themselves into the cauldrons.
"Hey? There's more of them?"
Another voice, a wet crunch — and three more screens vanished in an instant.
But one stubborn ant slipped past the cooks' eyes and plunged safely into a cauldron. It stirred the small quantity of Tongcheonsan it carried into the food.
Success.
"Master, it was a success!"
Heukgu hurried to report his achievement to Yeop Pung.
"How many made it?"
"Uh… I-I'll keep working on it."
Heukgu spun around at once and this time gathered seven ants in a flash. Drawing on the previous attempt, he revised the plan: hide them first in the cracks between the bricks along the side of the stove, then wait for the cooks to let their guard down and charge all at once.
Perfect.
On the second attempt, a full five ants succeeded in infiltrating the cauldrons. Heukgu was giddy with delight. Every time an ant made it, he muttered under his breath.
"That's one less copy… and another!"
"Hehe. At this rate, Master might even let me go out and play tonight!"
Heukgu put his brain to work with fierce dedication, all in the service of his own interests. By the time the sun was up, a full two-thirds of the great bag of Tongcheonsan had disappeared.
A dose that size could mean only one thing.
He had well and truly raised the stakes.