Master and Disciples (1)
“I am the lord of the finest escort agency under heaven, and my elder brother is the greatest man in the world and its finest chef. How is he the greatest, you ask? Every master of the jianghu and murim acknowledges it, so believe it and move on. My brother wasn't born the greatest man in the world or the greatest chef, of course. He began weak, but in the end he climbed to the very summit and looked down upon all the world. And the reason he was able to become the greatest? That was entirely because I stood at his side, helping him with money and with wisdom. Hmm.......... So think of it this way: the credit belongs to Master and me in equal parts—or more. If I had met Master before my brother did, then the greatest man in the world wouldn't be my brother. It would be me.......... A little regrettable, honestly. When my brother and Master first met, it was the dead of winter, a blizzard howling. Ah............ wait, no. Wasn't it midsummer, when the mosquitoes were at their worst?............... Anyway. They met.”
Kkalkkalkkal......!
Keuhahahaha..............!
Hoarse laughter rolled over the compound walls and echoed down the road.
Yet the street, which should have been bustling with passersby, was steeped in a hush of dread.
Between the occasional roars of men's laughter, a handsome young man stepped out onto the road.
Without a moment's hesitation, he walked straight toward the manor from which the laughter poured.
The compound didn't even have gate guards to repel an intruder.
Stopping in his tracks, the young man stared at the half-open main gate. Once he crossed that threshold, he would take his first life. Not just one—he would have to end a great many lives.
But there was no fear of that first kill. No—rather, the killing intent he had suppressed for so long now began to smolder and rise.
The young man resumed his steps and approached the manor.
Ten years of ascetic training had better not have been for nothing.
If his master's bragging had been nothing but hot air, then that manor would become his grave.
Creeeak....
Pushing through the half-open gate, he saw the bandits inside. They lounged about in loose clusters on the ground, drinking or tearing at meat.
“She was a fine piece of work. Shame she died so early.”
“Well, at least you got a taste before she went.”
The bandits spewing their filth had eyes that gleamed a feral, vicious red.
Heh heh heh.........
Hahahaha.......!
In a far corner of the laughter-filled courtyard, corpses lay strewn about. Some were men; naked women were mixed among them. And among those naked women lay the body of a little girl who looked to be not yet ten years old.
The moment his gaze found the child's corpse, the young man's eyes narrowed, trembling thin.
The compound that had rung with lewd talk and laughter fell silent in an instant.
The bandits, too, had recognized the arrival of an unwelcome guest.
Seizing up their weapons, they rose warily to their feet.
“Who the hell is this?”
“You've got some nerve, barging in here.”
Their voices were loose and lazy, but their eyes brimmed with wariness. In the jianghu, anyone who wished to live out their years learned never to relax, no matter how harmless an opponent might look. Surviving long in this treacherous world meant you had accumulated that much cunning.
“Is a man called Buk Yeomra here?”
A voice both sonorous and faintly gloomy flowed from the young man's lips.
The men of the jianghu exchanged glances. Buk Yeomra—the Northern King of Hell—was the favored title of the very master they served. He had only revealed himself in the jianghu four months ago, yet with monstrous martial arts and sheer ferocity, he had been expanding his dominion day by day.
The instant the title left the young man's mouth, a young bandit whipped out his blade.
Clang...
“You dare speak our sovereign's sacred name with your filthy tongue? I'll carve off your head and offer it to him myself..!”
Enraged, the young bandit moved his footwork at once.
Fwoosh...
He closed the seven or eight zhang of distance in a blink—his martial arts had clearly reached a considerable level. But to the young man's eyes, it all approached far, far too slowly.
Reaching within a single zhang, the young bandit thrust his sword tip straight into the young man's chest.
Thud..
The blade pierced the young man's chest. No—it only seemed to.
Shhk..
The moment the young bandit sensed something had gone wrong, his head was already tumbling toward the ground.
Puhak... thud..
Blood spurted skyward from the headless neck, and the body crumpled onto the cold earth.
“Kill him...!”
At once, the bandits who had been watching for their chance all rushed in together. The young man plunged into their midst without a flicker of hesitation.
Swack...... shff........
Every time the sword-light flashed, a head leapt skyward or a chest split open.
Kkeok...!
Kkeueuk...
The bandits collapsed to the ground with anguished, final screams. The young man swung his sword to strike away a blade that was boring toward his neck.
Clang.....!
The instant sword and blade collided, the blade, unable to bear the shock, was knocked flying. Shff..
The young man beheaded another bandit, shifted his footwork, and cleaved open a third's belly in the same motion.
Kkeuaaak..............!
“STOP.........!”
Just then, with a thunderous roar, a middle-aged giant came charging out from a hall at the rear. His voice carried such concentrated inner power that it rattled the very roof tiles.
Shff..... swack...
But the young man, as if he hadn't heard the shout, went on severing limbs and cleaving necks.
“You impudent.........!”
The giant, beside himself with rage, launched his footwork instantly.
Shuaaak........
His massive blade fell from the heavens, cleaving the air and sending out ripples of sword qi.
KWAKWAKWAM..........!
The great blade split not only the young man's body but the very earth beneath it in two.
Afterimage?
Landing back on the ground, the middle-aged giant whirled his enormous blade and slashed through the space on his left. At that instant, the sword qi that had been boring into him met the great blade head-on.
KWAKAM..........!
No matter how lofty one's martial arts, a first taste of real combat was bound to fluster anyone. But the young man showed not the slightest trace of it. No—on the contrary, he seemed to feel an intense thrill, even a savage exhilaration.
Shff..
The moment the young man cut down another bandit's neck, the enormous blade drove toward his waist.
KWAKAM.......!
Sword met blade, and the middle-aged giant sprang nimbly backward. The shock transmitted through his blade told him everything—that young man was no ordinary foe.
In the instant he retreated, the young man cut down yet more of the bandits, opening chests and severing necks.
Shff..
The giant who had fallen back readjusted his grip on the great blade.
How can someone so young be so seasoned? Could that Moyong Se fellow actually be this man?
The way he took his men's heads was so economical, so clean, that it raised gooseflesh. The only person in the murim who could display such martial prowess at so young an age was Moyong Se, the first disciple of the Murim Alliance's leader. But Moyong Se was in his mid-twenties, and that young man had the unformed face of someone not yet twenty.
Keuaak.........!
Kkeuk..!
At this rate, my precious men will all be dead.
The middle-aged giant, watching for his opening, swiftly shifted into his footwork. It was called the Hundred Illusions Step, and mastered to its extreme, it could split one man into a dozen or more in the blink of an eye.
Shuaaak.......
The dozens of duplicated giants hurled their blades at the young man all at once. The blades packed the air so densely that it seemed the young man's body would be torn into a thousand ragged pieces.
But the young man's sword, too, split into dozens.
KWAKWAKWAM....................!
The descending blades met the sword and scattered, knocked away in every direction.
Swsssss...
The middle-aged giant moved his footwork to the right.
It ends here, boy.
Having found an opening, he closed the distance in an instant and drove his blade into the young man's waist. But the great blade passed clean through the young man's body.
Startled out of his wits, the giant swept his blade rapidly left and right. Yet nothing caught on the steel.
Shhk..
The giant, spreading his footwork to retreat, suddenly felt the world tilt. No—the world truly was tilting.
Thud..
Only after he had crashed into the ground did the pain come—agonizing, like a knife gouging out his flesh—rising up from his legs.
Uuaaaak............................!
The middle-aged giant vomited out a scream as if cursing heaven itself. At that scream, the surviving bandits scattered and fled in every direction.
“Buk Yeomra has fallen..........!”
“Run.........!”
But not one of them made it over the compound walls. The young man chased them down, driving his sword through their backs and lopping off heads.
Kkeok..!
Kkeuk....!
Those whose backs had been pierced rolled across the ground, moaning in torment, until their breath ran out.
The young man turned his footwork back toward Buk Yeomra. As he walked, he glanced down at the front of his robe—slit open in a long gash. Apparently that Buk Yeomra's blade edge had cleaved it during the melee.
“That master of mine and his nonsense. Every day it's 'no rival could touch me in the jianghu' this and 'none in all the world' that—and look, a precious robe gets ruined by a weakling's blade.”
His master had bragged, several times a day, that his martial arts were the finest under heaven. But now his clothes had been torn even by a weakling's blade, so his master's claims were starting to look like sheer delusion.
Just then, Buk Yeomra hurled the blade in his hand with every last scrap of strength.
Swaaaak.........
Clang...............!
The young man swung his sword, and with an ear-splitting shriek of steel, the blade went spinning away.
Batting the blade aside, he looked up at the sky and grinned.
“That went far.”
Buk Yeomra, who had thrown away his last chance, lay flat on the ground. Blood still flowed from his severed legs.
“Spare... me. Please, great hero—spare my life. If you let me live, I will give you every last treasure I possess.”
“I could just kill you and take it all. More importantly—where would you rank in the jianghu?”
Buk Yeomra couldn't immediately grasp the young man's words.
“I... I don't follow.........”
The young man's face soured.
“How strong are you?”
Only then catching the meaning, Buk Yeomra blurted out an answer at once.
“I am... I am terribly weak. So please...... spare my life, I beg you.”
When he had first emerged into the jianghu, he had proudly believed he could count his equals on one hand. But now, with his legs hacked off, he understood that it had all been arrogance and empty vanity.
At that answer, the young man's face twisted with undisguised disgust.
“Just as I thought......... Master really was a liar.”
Buk Yeomra didn't hear the young man's grumbling. The only thing that mattered now was saving his own skin.
“Please spare me........... Great Hero Moyong.”
At that, the young man's face contorted even more savagely.
“Why the hell am I a 'Moyong'? You little—! My name is Jiang Zhou!”
Shff.....
With that roar of fury, the young man severed Buk Yeomra's head.
Fwiiiing......... fwiii.........
The distant scenery rushed up before his eyes and slid away behind his back. Two more days of travel, and he would be home.
I wonder if Master's been skipping meals while I've been gone.
Worried about the master who waited alone at home, Jiang Zhou quickened his pace further.
Keuueueu........
How long had he been running? From the forest looming ahead came the sound of a human groaning.
Jiang Zhou cut off his lightness skill and made his way toward the trees.
Deep in the forest, a strikingly handsome, youthful man lay writhing on the ground. His face was so beautiful that it seemed to glow even drained of color. He clutched a sword in one hand, and his whole body was mottled with blood.
Looks like he's about to die.
Jiang Zhou saw at a glance how dire the young man's condition was.
He turned to leave the forest—then stopped, caught in a moment of indecision. Handsome or not, the man could be a vicious criminal.
“Save him? Or don't?”
After long agonizing, Jiang Zhou turned back toward the young man.
“Eh. If he stabs me in the back, I'll just kill him again.”