Chapter 1
Chapter 1
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Drunkenly Joining the War
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In the year 932 of the Martial Era, the Demonic Cult seized the opportunity of chaos in the early days of the founding of the nation to launch a surprise occupation of Shandong Province. They slaughtered the officials, drove out the armies, and crushed the martial sects. No force, whether governmental or from the martial world, that resisted them survived.
They went further, drawing borders eastward at Mount Taihang, westward at the sea, and southward at the Yellow River, before proclaiming the founding of their own nation. It was the birth of a divine kingdom ruled by a single absolute sovereign.
The emperor in the south, who was embroiled in war with the powerful clans of Jiangnan, had no time to worry about the Demonic Cult's rise.
But the martial world was different. Fearing the growing power of the Demonic Cult, the martial artists of the Central Plains transcended regions and sects to form a single alliance. Thus, the Righteous Alliance was born.
Deeply moved, the southern emperor bestowed the title of Subjugation Army General—a first-grade official rank—upon Sword Sage Yeop Jeong-cho, the Alliance Leader of the Righteous Alliance and Sect Leader of the Wudang Sect. He also publicly promised that anyone who contributed to subjugating the Demonic Cult would be granted high office, regardless of their region or status.
In the autumn of 954 in the Martial Era, finally, 10,000 martial artists dispatched from 127 sects, along with 20,000 hot-blooded men from across the Central Plains eager to earn merit, crossed the Yellow River in full armor.
No one knew back then that the war, later called the Righteous-Demonic Great War, would drag on for a full ten years...
* * *
"Must you really go this far?"
Those were my master's words on the morning I set off for the battlefield.
Honestly, I hesitated. I couldn't imagine this hand, which had only ever turned the pages of books, striking down a person.
But I had to go. There's a saying about not backing down after stepping into the mud, and besides, I'd already given my word.
I was the senior disciple at White Deer Academy, located on the eastern coast of Shandong Province. My master was a renowned Confucian scholar, but his unyielding personality kept him from ever holding office.
Those in high places wanted obedient dogs to listen well and grow their wealth, not truly exceptional men.
When he reached the age of seventy, my master proudly boasted that he'd boldly abandoned his dreams of glory. I couldn't understand why he'd clung to ambitions of office even at that age. Then again, there's a saying that the most useless things in the world are scholars who never passed the exams and dogs that don't bark...
In any case, under this scholarly master who excelled in learning but never held office, I devoted myself to my studies as befitted a Confucian disciple. And like any scholar, I breathed easy every three days with bouts of drinking and gambling, living a leisurely life.
That is, until three days ago.
'Those idiots, why'd they have to go into town?'
It started when three of my junior brothers went into town to buy ink and paper and ran into trouble on their way back.
As they led their donkey onto a narrow path at the foot of the mountain, a retreating Demonic Cult straggler knocked over a woman carrying a water jar and tried to have his way with her. As disciples versed in the teachings of Confucius and Mencius, they couldn't just walk by. Fearlessly, they approached the bastard and lectured him on humanity and morality.
'You brainless fools. You were suicidal. You should've smashed his head with a rock and run, not stood there bleating like goats shitting pellets!'
Enraged, the Demonic Cult straggler sliced my second junior brother on the spot and broke the arms and legs of the third and fourth. We rushed them to a physician, but the second brother ultimately lost his life. He was also my master's only blood kin.
I came home dead drunk from the tavern and learned of it too late. Then I vowed revenge. Or so they say. Here's how the third brother described it, speaking for him:
"You clutched second brother's corpse and wailed in grief. Then suddenly, you demanded his clothes and bit your finger to write a blood oath right there. I'd resented you plenty for drowning in booze and gambling. After all, it was supposed to be your errand that day, wasn't it? Seeing you bite your finger, I realized my own foolishness. It was truly moving."
But I remembered none of it. The scar on my little finger suggested it was true, but I couldn't very well back out now by claiming it was just the booze talking.
And now, here I was at the academy gate, gathered with my master and brothers for a farewell.
I could see my third brother, his limbs wrapped in bandages, holding the deceased second brother's clothes. Written on them in red blood were these words:
'I, Heuk Do-san, swear before heaven and earth that I will not return until I find the Demonic Cultist with a scorpion tattoo on his ass, rip open his belly, pull out his guts, and chew them to bits. - Spring, year 955 of the Martial Era, from White Deer Academy amid scattering cherry blossoms. Heuk Do-san'
'Crazy bastard. Wrote a novel on there.'
Of course, I grieved the second brother's death beyond words. Rage against the Demonic Cultists burned fiercely within me. But I couldn't just go around asking every Cultist I met, "Hey buddy, drop your pants and show me your ass."
Fine, let's say I find the culprit by the odds of a sparrow getting struck by lightning. The guy who slew our famously skilled second brother in one stroke is clearly a monster. How the hell was I supposed to rip open his belly and chew his guts?
For the record, I don't even eat tripe.
'No matter how I think about it, this is wrong.'
Let's take a few days and think it over slowly.
If revenge must be had, make a proper plan. They say there are professionals in the jianghu who handle this sort of thing for hire, so I could just pay them.
Come to think of it, every winter, promising young experts from various martial sects visit the academy, stay in the annex for months to hear master's lectures, and leave.
'If I ask them, they might introduce me to a skilled hitman for cheap.'
Am I a coward with shriveled balls?
Not at all. There's a saying: A gentleman avenges himself, and ten years is not too late. A true gentleman's revenge is never late, even after a decade. The issue is efficiency.
"Master, if you're so insistent..."
"I yield."
"...!"
"How could I bend your iron-willed stubbornness? But remember one thing. Killing isn't just about the sword. Starvation, cold, plague, straggling, injury... Those are the true terrors. Nine out of ten soldiers on the battlefield die that way."
Some things just won't happen, even if you die trying.
In desperation, I asked how to survive. After much thought, master replied.
"Follow the old soldiers."
And he added,
"Master the War Sword."
* * *
In conclusion, my master was wrong.
On the battlefield, "old soldiers" were mostly centurions and other officers. They commanded from the rear and survived to the end.
But the soldiers who bravely charged as they ordered died twice as fast as others. The centurions saw rookie soldiers as mere meat shields to buy time for the main force's assault.
Damn, I thought I was done for.
At first, I suspected my master resented me for the second brother's death in my place and wanted me to die for revenge.
Honestly, I cursed him plenty. In my head.
Revenge?
I couldn't even dream of it.
Among all those Demonic Cultists, who the hell knew which one had a scorpion tattoo on his ass?
In the end, I was just another soldier who'd drunkenly enlisted—nothing more, nothing less.
Unlike the others, though, I couldn't go home until the war ended. All I could do was avoid catching the eye of some old centurion and scrape by day by day.
Then one day, I met them.
Aging from their fifties to seventies, they were grizzled mercenaries who'd spent their lives on battlefields.
How much money did they make to choose the battlefield as their home? In truth, they earned only a bit more than regular soldiers. Their real income came from looting spoils from slain enemies.
Across history, battlefields have one unchanging rule.
The victors take all!
After battle, the winning soldiers burned enemy camps, raped women, and grabbed whatever spoils they could.
The commanders leading the soldiers were martial experts. For some reason, even they turned a blind eye to this.
Once, I grabbed a young commander my age and protested vehemently. Sitting on his saddle, he stared at me blankly and said,
"Too many thoughts, and your sword slows with them."
I wanted to bash his philtrum with a book corner and kill him!
The old mercenaries were different. While regular soldiers looted only after the fighting ended, they looted during battle itself—rifling through pockets the moment they cut down a foe.
They had a knack for sniffing out enemies worth plundering. Then, while comrades scrambled for spoils post-battle, they'd leisurely pick out pretty women to rape.
Outraged, I rammed my scabbard up the asshole of one busy throat-fucking a woman. That night, they dragged me to a nearby mountain, hung me upside down, and beat me with water-soaked clubs until dawn.
Even as the clubs stuck and tore my flesh, I cursed them with twenty years' worth of coastal Shandong vulgarity.
"You pasta-pulling leper assholes! You call yourselves human? Horny jackasses. Sons of bitches. Fucking goddamn bastards. Even trash has its limits! Argh! Yeah, kill me. Today it's my ass, tomorrow I'll gouge your eye sockets!"
"This guy's got a filthy mouth on him."
"Didn't he say he was a scholar?"
"That mouth once recited Confucius and Mencius?"
"Weakling's got some bark to him."
"Keep him around for errands?"
That's how I started following them.
We fought every kind of battle imaginable, from mountains to rivers. That's when I realized my master was right. I faced death countless times trailing those old mercenaries, but miraculously survived each one. In the process, I started resembling them.
Before I knew it, I'd become a monster myself.
* * *
Ten years after the Righteous-Demonic Great War broke out, the Righteous Alliance achieved victory after victory, finally driving the Demonic Cult out of the Shandong Peninsula.
But the war wasn't over. A thousand Demonic Cult suicide squad members had arrayed themselves in the midst of the sea overlooking Shandong Peninsula, deploying a massive Nine Gates Formation unprecedented in martial history. They'd even mobilized fifty treasure ships as their final bastion.
Rumors spread darkly among the soldiers: the formation was extremely dangerous, designed for mutual destruction with the Righteous Alliance.
I sensed it was time to quit this endless war game. In the final clash of tens of thousands, a few disappearances wouldn't be noticed. If the Alliance lost, no one would hunt deserters; if we won, they'd assume I drowned in the chaos at sea.
'Yeah, let's go.'
Back to the beloved academy.
I hadn't avenged him, but they'd understand after all this. No guarantee none of the Cultists I killed had a scorpion tattoo on their ass.
I told the old mercenaries my plan. They agreed it was time to bow out and joined in. Plus, they'd pull off one last big score for a fitting end.
"I heard there's a treasure ship."
"A treasure ship?"
"The Cult bastards took it from a temple as they retreated."
"How do we know which ship's the treasure one?"
"Where there's a will, there's a way."
"Done. That's our plan."
We'd seize the treasure ship, then slip south while everyone was distracted by battle. Perfect—until it happened.
Amid winds and waves, the Righteous Alliance and Demonic Cult waged their final, fate-deciding battle. Fighting raged day and night.
On the third day, as the sea turned to blood and hundreds of sharks gathered to devour corpses, a meteor shower suddenly poured from the sky. Mountainous waves rose, house-sized ships burned.
That day.
How to describe the scene when the energies of heaven and earth shook entirely? It felt like every star in the night sky was falling. And the ship carrying me and the old mercenaries vanished like a lie.
In a way no one could have foreseen.