Plague Mosquitoes
A deathly hush fell over the training ground. Not a soul present that day had so much as imagined that something like this could unfold.
It had been barely five days since Nowoon Peak was reduced to a dung-soaked wasteland. And yet these damned Cheonbong Army bastards had once again tried — and failed — to humiliate the Cheonun Sect disciples on the training ground. Deung Chung had even had a finger sliced clean off. It was a farce.
The truly staggering part was that the farce was far from over. On one side, Deung Chung writhed across the dirt, screaming. On the other, Jo Bi and his companions crawled about on all fours, howling like animals.
"What in the world—?!"
"Goddammit!"
The Cheonbong Army warriors were beside themselves. Sa Cheonseong's entire party looked as though they had been possessed.
It wasn't one or two of them, either — how had every last one of them ended up in a state like that?
That was when Noe Bun exploded.
"AAARGH! I can't take it anymore!"
Golden Profound Qi burst from every inch of his body in a pair of wet, cracking detonations, white smoke jetting from his nostrils. He tore across the training ground like a bull run amok in the ring, gouging and smashing whatever lay in his path.
"I have to kill someone!"
"Run!"
This time, everyone snapped to their senses. Who in their right mind could stand against a monster like Noe Bun? His forearms were as thick as an ordinary man's thighs. A glancing brush from that body looked enough to snap bone.
"Fall back! Everyone, fall back!"
Wang Maeng herded the Cheonun disciples toward the edge of the training ground, while Yeop Pung stepped in front of them, his expression ice-cold, and planted himself there as their shield.
On the Cheonbong Army's side, Jo Bi rolled across the dirt, begging.
"Save… save me!"
But who would dare step forward? It was like a plague. Anyone who so much as laid a hand on them would die. In a heartbeat, the entire crowd had fallen back more than a hundred paces.
A strange atmosphere settled over the training ground. Across that wide expanse, only a handful remained: Deung Chung, writhing and howling on the ground; Jo Bi and Sa Cheonseong, still clinging to the last shreds of their reason; and Noe Bun, who had already lost his mind completely.
"I'll kill them… all of them…"
Noe Bun swept his bloodshot gaze around the grounds, hunting for a suitable target, and found none. Then his eyes slid, sly and ugly, toward the man standing closest to him — Sa Cheonseong.
I'm done for.
Sa Cheonseong had held onto his sanity until now, as befit a six-meridian expert. The moment his eyes met Noe Bun's, his whole body began to shake.
"No! Stay away! Please!"
Before every watching eye, Noe Bun's massive frame launched itself at Sa Cheonseong.
What followed was too hideous to look at with open eyes. The crowd stood frozen in horror, staring blankly at the two figures tangled together on the ground.
The fight between them was not a thing of men.
Time crawled forward, one second after another.
The spectacle unfolding inside the training ground was almost too savage to witness. Sa Cheonseong's wretched screams, crushed beneath Noe Bun's assault, rang out without end.
A great many Cheonun disciples could not tear their eyes away. It was hardly a pleasant sight — but watching the look on Sa Cheonseong's face, a look that said he wanted to die, was simply too satisfying.
Just then, a shadow streaked down from the sky. It was Ban Imjung, general of the Cheonbong Army.
"What do you think you're doing?! Stop this at once!"
Ban Imjung's thunderous roar came down with a palm strike loaded with Profound Qi. A booming crash followed, and both Noe Bun and Sa Cheonseong went limp. At last, the nightmare of a scene was over.
Ban Imjung landed with a heavy thud. He took in Jo Bi, still rolling on the ground, and Deung Chung, still screaming, then shut his eyes and let out a long, deep sigh. It was a sight no man should have to see.
"Is anyone here?! Drag these beasts away this instant!"
"G-General…"
The Cheonbong Army warriors standing nearby still did not dare approach. They were terrified that the same hideous affliction might take them too.
"What are you waiting for?!"
Ban Imjung's eyes flew wide as he bellowed.
"Raise your Profound Qi barriers, all of you! The investigation has determined that this illness is caused by the bite of a strange mosquito. Plenty of people have already fallen victim at Nowoon Peak! Move them with care!"
"What?"
"Mosquitoes? You're saying mosquitoes did this?"
Everyone stood there, baffled.
What kind of mosquito was that terrifying? A bite that turned a man into a murderer?
Fear ran through the crowd on instinct. People glanced around, wary of being bitten by those dreadful insects.
Only Wang Maeng looked at Yeop Pung, his eyes shining with admiration.
Incredible. Yeop Pung, you really are something else.
Wang Maeng had no idea how Yeop Pung had used mosquitoes to torment these people. What he did understand was that Yeop Pung had handled the whole affair with surgical precision.
Before the training even began, Yeop Pung had arranged for a handful of patients to appear at Nowoon Peak, making the whole thing look like a mosquito-borne epidemic. For the time being, not a soul would think to suspect the Cheonun 1st Unit.
Elegant. What a brilliant piece of work.
Ban Imjung, still seething, had Sa Cheonseong's party dragged away.
And with that, a single realization settled over everyone present.
The Cheonbong Army's brutal training was over.
The Cheonbong Army was thrown into an uproar all over again.
An unidentified epidemic swept through Nowoon Peak, where they were garrisoned, and spread to the other peaks of Cheonun Sect. The worst of the damage, however, fell on none other than the Nowoon Peak disciples who had betrayed the sect, and on the Cheonun Army itself.
From that morning on, everyone recoiled at the mere sight of a mosquito, as if the tiny insects they had once swatted without a second thought had become the most terrifying venomous bugs in the world.
Mugwort smoke began to rise from every room, and every physician in the Cheonbong Army was chained to overnight rounds.
The Cheonbong warriors who had gone berserk were bound tight, doused in ice-cold water, and flung into steaming tubs. The once-orderly barracks transformed in an instant into a public bathhouse. Through a haze of smoke, nothing could be heard but the howling of beasts.
The most wretched of all were the officers responsible for the Cheonun 1st Unit. Deung Chung went without saying — but Sa Cheonseong, hailed as the greatest genius in the Cheonbong Army, had suffered the worst of anyone in this affair.
Rumor had it that once he came to his senses, Sa Cheonseong shut himself in his room, seeing no one and saying not a word. Even Commander Naeng Chu went to him in person to offer consolation, and it did no good at all.
Someone passing his door late at night claimed to have heard a howl from inside — a raw, broken weeping that seemed to hold every sorrow in the world.
Worse still, from the third day of the outbreak, the shape of the epidemic changed. People bitten by ants began showing the exact same symptoms.
Nowoon Peak descended into utter pandemonium. Fortunately, the hideous plague did not take lives. If the patients could just get through the stretch of running wild like beasts in heat, the only aftereffect was an all-over itch.
Even so, the Cheonbong Army that had been throwing its weight around Cheonun Sect until only days ago had completely tucked its tail. Word even spread through their ranks that they ought to withdraw from Cheonun Sect entirely — never mind continuing the patrols.
They could no longer remain here.
Peace returned to Cheonun Sect for the first time in a long while.
The Cheonbong Army, by contrast, was completely spent. Naeng Chu had led his Spirit Realm generals through two straight days of grinding labor before he finally managed to get the situation under control. No new patients appeared.
When night fell, Naeng Chu took a party of men and headed for Wangcheon Hall, which Han Buri administered.
Bang!
Naeng Chu kicked the great doors of Wangcheon Hall open with his boot.
"Han Buri! I will have answers out of you today!"
Naeng Chu's rage-soaked voice shook the entire hall.
"Your Excellency, please — compose yourself!"
Han Buri came scurrying out, bowing and scraping.
"Your Excellency, we are already investigating this incident with the utmost thoroughness. It appears to be an epidemic. The disease is so rare that we have had great difficulty finding any lead at all."
"An epidemic? Don't make me laugh."
Naeng Chu snorted.
"Those men were all poisoned with some unorthodox drug. What insect is born with the innate nature to bewitch a human being? And the truly vicious part is that they made it look like some filthy aphrodisiac."
"Bewitch a human being, you say?"
"That's right. It makes you want to ruin someone. To kill them."
Han Buri was baffled himself.
Who on earth had come up with an idea this ingenious? Using insects to drive everyone into a killing frenzy? He turned the thought over for a moment, and a chill ran down his spine. If it had gone that far — if entire families, if close martial brothers of the same sect, had ended up dead? He did not even want to imagine it.
"Your Excellency, I beg you to set aside your anger. That such vicious criminals would dare infiltrate Cheonun Sect is simply unthinkable. Please, grant me only a few more days. I will capture the culprit and see them punished without mercy!"
"Didn't you say the exact same thing last time?"
Only now did Naeng Chu see through Han Buri's game.
Han Buri had been stalling him from the very beginning. All he cared about was preserving his own seat as master of Cheonun Sect. As for the Cheonbong Army, he was hoping they would be wiped out completely.
And yet Naeng Chu had no real recourse. The orders he had received were only to keep watch over Cheonun Sect and to train the Cheonun Army.
And the results of that mission? Cheonun Sect obeyed every command without a fuss — but the Cheonun Army was still nothing but a rabble.
Damn it all. And the officers assigned to train them had been brought to their knees, every last one of them. How was he supposed to continue?
Naeng Chu glared at Han Buri, seething. Han Buri said nothing. He simply looked back at him.
How should you continue? However you carry out your mission is none of my concern. Just don't destroy my Cheonun Sect.
The whole visit had the air of Naeng Chu having come to hold Han Buri to account, only to leave empty-handed.
Then, all at once, a Cheonbong Army soldier came rushing in from outside. He clutched a letter in his fist, stepped up beside Naeng Chu, and whispered a few words in a low voice.
What?
Han Buri saw it clearly — Naeng Chu's face changed in an instant. Then came the sharp rip of an envelope being torn open, and Naeng Chu read through the short letter with trembling hands. A bolt of ice-cold light flashed through his eyes, shot through with a wild, bone-deep excitement.
What was this?
An ominous weight settled in Han Buri's chest. Something enormous was about to happen. He could feel it.
Naeng Chu's entire manner had transformed. Only moments ago he had worn the look of a man with no cards left to play. Now a murderous aura poured off him, as if he had set a naked blade against Han Buri's throat.
"I'm afraid I don't follow, Your Excellency."
"You don't follow?"
Naeng Chu lifted his chin in arrogant disdain. His gaze pressed down on Han Buri like a mountain.
By order of His Excellency the Governor:
On the fifteenth day of the ninth month, fifteen days hence, Cheonun Sect shall be officially renamed the Cheonwoon Martial Academy and placed under the direct authority of the Military Supply Bureau.
All resources within the sect are to be confiscated. One thousand warriors of the Cheonun Army are to deploy immediately to the Southern Wilderness front.
All of this is to be completed within fifteen days. Prepare accordingly.
What?
Han Buri froze where he stood, as if a thunderbolt had struck him from a clear sky.
So Governor Lee Mujin is finally making his move to swallow Cheonun Sect whole? Why? Why now, of all times? Could it be… that the one in the capital has… died?
While Han Buri stood there stunned, Naeng Chu added with a sneer,
"Ah, and His Excellency the Governor also said this: a martial tournament will be held at the opening ceremony of the Cheonwoon Martial Academy in fifteen days. The participants have already been decided. Sa Cheonseong of the Cheonbong Army will face your Yeop Pung. If Yeop Pung loses, we take back the Cheonbong Legion's Black Frost Sword!"