Pulling Off the Impossible
How many times in a man's life does he get the chance to cave in an Embroidered Guard master's skull?
And while out investigating a client's adultery, no less.
Thwack!
Yet here I was, pulling off that impossible feat.
Twice, even.
"Hah... hah..."
Breath and the metallic taste of blood rose all the way to my chin. Blood dripped steadily from the gash a blade had drawn across my forehead, clouding my vision.
Staff qi coiled around my staff until it blazed pure white. The inner energy I wrung from myself rose like fine threads, weaving a staff-silk almost identical to sword-silk.
And at the end of that vicious bloodbath, two Embroidered Guardsmen lay sprawled on the ground, their bowls cracked open and leaking thick red soup.
"What kind of monster..."
The last remaining Embroidered Guard muttered in a voice thick with shock. For the first time, the sight of me rising again and again like a weighted doll—no matter how madly he stabbed and slashed—had shaken him.
True to the secret police of the Imperial Court, he had swung his sword in grim silence until now. But when I stood up even after taking fatal wounds, he finally couldn't hold it in.
"Boss... are you... okay...?"
Ilhong asked in a voice that had gone past worry into something faintly appalled.
The longsword buried to the hilt in my upper body was clearly bothering her.
"I-I'm fine..."
It was so hard to get even one word out that I just waved a hand as if to say it was nothing.
"No, you're not fine... People usually die from that..."
"Hah... Not dying... Probably..."
The red haze flickering over my whole body—I brushed it off by claiming the major organs had been spared.
She looked at me like that made no sense at all, then clamped her mouth shut as if remembering the regeneration she'd seen before.
Still, I must have lost too much blood. Another surge of it welled up, and my body swayed of its own accord.
My eyes kept wanting to close. My mind was growing hazy.
"Ha! So you are human after all!"
At the sight, the Embroidered Guard who had been staring at me like a monster flashed his sword again and split the air.
Whish!
Blood-soaked vision. Blue sword-qi carved a vicious arc past my neck.
A spray of blood flicked into the air. I dodged by a hair's breadth, but there was no time to feel relief—another savage slash came rolling in like a wave.
Blades tore the air and shredded the silence. I swung my staff desperately, barely managing to intercept the storm of sword-qi.
"The lives of Embroidered Guardsmen...! Your head alone won't cover the debt!"
The Peak master of the Embroidered Guard roared that he would tear me into pieces so fine not even a corpse would remain.
"Yes, die! Just die already!"
That damned eunuch was hopping around behind him, screaming for me to die. What a perfect pair of bastards.
Clang! Clang!
The white staff and blue blade collided endlessly in the dark alley, their presence chilling. Sparks of sword-qi and staff-qi flashed with every impact, sharp energy waves scouring the alley mouth.
"Kh..."
And with every clash I felt my heels being driven farther back.
The dantian energy that had held up against two Peak masters was finally hitting its limit against this last one.
I realized the staff-qi that had once wrapped my weapon so sharply was growing faint.
The bottom of my dantian—something I had never seen since reaching the Peak Realm—was slowly being scraped bare by three Peak martial artists at once.
"You monster! Finally running out of internal energy, are you!"
The Embroidered Guard master, who had forced a war of attrition only to lose two comrades in absurd fashion, shouted as if he couldn't believe it.
He charged with murderous sword-qi, determined not to miss the opening.
Slash!
A wide cut sweeping in from the front. The motion was oddly large, easy to dodge—yet that had been the setup. He twisted his waist and split the air again with the follow-up blade.
A continuous slash that spun like a dance.
"Kh...!"
I tried to avoid it, but my right thigh betrayed me. The deep wound the second Guardsman had left before falling still hadn't fully regenerated.
In the abrupt movement I felt the muscle twist under my loose clothes. Balance gone, the sharp tip of the sword punched into my shoulder.
Shunk!
The sickening sensation of steel carving through flesh. Red sprayed out. Strength left my hand and the staff slipped from my grip.
Wang Jin-gong crowed in triumph at the sight of me stumbling back unarmed, while the Embroidered Guard master smiled a thin, cold smile.
"Let's see if you can stand back up after your head goes flying!"
It was the absolute brink. As if sensing it, the Heavenly Killing Star stirred, urging me to do something—anything.
...Damn it!
Just as the Embroidered Guard's blade prepared to cut the air once more—
Clang!
Another blade suddenly shot out, scattering sparks as it blocked the attack.
"Who—!"
Eyes wide at the unexpected rebound force, the Embroidered Guard master searched for the assassin.
Slash!
It was Cheon Su-gong's lightning-fast sword stroke—he who had only been watching until now.
A flash of steel. Before the Embroidered Guard could finish his words, his head separated from his body and flew through the air.
Thud.
In the dark alley, under everyone's stunned gazes, the headless corpse tumbled to the ground.
"Eek! Eeeek!"
Wang Jin-gong's already pale face turned pure white as he shrieked.
"Ugh... thought I was done for..."
I clutched the thigh whose regeneration had slowed under the repeated butchery and collapsed onto the spot.
Then Cheon Su-gong approached with heavy steps, flicking blood from his blade.
"What's this? Acting like you wouldn't help even if I died."
My whole body felt less like a wreck and more like a complete rag.
I had helped him a little back in Baekyang Village, yet this eunuch uncle had only extended a hand at the very end. I let the complaint out.
"Hmph. Did I not say I could help, you brat?"
Right—he had said he could help. Then slipped away and just watched me get wrecked.
"And this boy who looks nothing like a boy kept whining so much."
Cheon Su-gong jerked his chin toward Ilhong.
"I-I wasn't whining... I was simply explaining how capable the boss is and how useful he'd be if kept alive."
Apparently she had been busy behind the scenes trying to move Cheon Su-gong's heart.
"Something like that. Your manners, character, the way you talk—none of it sits well with me..."
"Hey, a bit harsh to say to my face after saving me."
Cheon Su-gong looked thoroughly displeased even while cutting me down.
I clung to my fading vision and reason, waiting for the rest.
"Still, it would be a waste to just let you die."
That was why he had chosen to intervene by taking the Embroidered Guard's head.
"Ah... I see..."
As we spoke, the crimson aura rose thicker than ever.
When I started swaying where I sat, I saw Ilhong hurriedly dig medicine from her robes in the distance.
"Cheon Su-gong."
"What."
My trembling fingertip somehow managed to point.
"That eunuch uncle over there... grab him for me..."
I asked him to seize Wang Jin-gong, who stood alone with a haggard face and no guards left.
"Ha, that word 'eunuch' again, really..."
Cheon Su-gong furrowed his brow deeply, as if no one had ever said it so bluntly to his face.
But what did it matter? I was about to pass out anyway.
"Gotta crack... his bowl..."
I left those words, swayed a little longer, then felt the exhaustion crash over me and closed my eyes.
"Haa... full of holes again."
Ilhong smeared wound salve and tipped some unknown pill into Dan Mujin's mouth with a pained expression.
Her healing hands moved with such practiced familiarity that Cheon Su-gong, who had bound Wang Jin-gong and was watching quietly, asked in a low voice,
"Does he do this often?"
Ilhong, who had already poured out more than half the emergency medicines obtained from the Tang Clan, nodded as if to say of course.
"Yes, well... it's basically an annual event now... Once when I got rescued I took a sword through the gut myself."
Besides that, he had gotten mixed up in major incidents involving the Murim Alliance and the Tang Clan and ended up a wreck more than once, she said.
He was greedy and money-obsessed, yet every so often he would play the chivalrous hero in ways that didn't suit him at all—and this was the result.
Ilhong murmured that he was a truly complicated, unfathomable human being.
"What a bizarre life thread. Still breathing after being stabbed like that."
Even Embroidered Guardsmen, who underwent training every bit as vicious as the Eastern Depot's, had called him a monster for that toughness.
Cheon Su-gong mixed admiration with bewilderment as he spoke.
"...I heard he mastered a very special external art."
"Oh? What sort of external art?"
"He says it's a sect secret, so he can't tell..."
A vitality that defied common sense—flesh and bone melting away only to revive again. Unable to explain the phenomenon that seemed as if Heaven itself refused to allow death, Ilhong kept deflecting.
"You know medicine as well? Your hands move without the slightest hitch."
Cheon Su-gong asked Ilhong, who was absorbed in treatment.
"I watched someone from the Tang Clan treat people over their shoulder."
"...Just from watching a few times, and you're that skilled?"
"I don't easily forget what I see, and I understand quickly."
Ilhong answered while ripping her own baggy clothes and wrapping them in place of bandages.
Cheon Su-gong nodded as if this one, unlike a certain someone, was very much to his liking.
She seemed the kind of sharp child who learned ten things when taught one.
For many reasons, she was the sort of talent he wanted to keep by Princess Dohwa's side and raise carefully.
Her Highness needs a companion of the same gender more than an old man like me, after all.
The finely crafted human-skin mask, the clothes stuffed with cotton, the carefully disguised voice—none of it could fool the eyes of the Eastern Depot, whose main duty was crushing every plot and assassination.
Especially seeing through human-skin masks that might allow assassins close was a specialty of Cheon Su-gong, who had weathered every scheme imaginable.
"Child, I asked last time as well—have you no interest in working in the Imperial Palace?"
Unlike with a certain someone, the voice came out gentle of its own accord.
Her Highness was confined to the cage-like palace to avoid sacrilege, yet she craved stories of the outside world more than anyone.
If this clever child entered as a confidant, warmth might finally return to the bleak palace life.
"...Hey, trying to poach my subordinate while I'm unconscious?"
Of all times, that was when Dan Mujin came to and pushed himself up.
"Tsk. You should have stayed out longer."
"Excuse me? For whose benefit? I'm completely awake now."
Cheon Su-gong had expected him to stay unconscious all day; the more he saw, the more inexplicable that durability became.
Is that some legendary physique only spoken of in legends? He let out a dry internal laugh.
"No, seriously, zero professional ethics. Come here, Ilhong."
"Okay."
Dan Mujin pulled Ilhong close as if he refused to lose her, and she let herself be drawn into the embrace with an expression that was not at all displeased.
Watching that subtle reaction, Cheon Su-gong clicked his tongue. Their bond ran deeper than he had thought.
"Tsk tsk. Talking about professional ethics when you can't even say thank you for a life-saving favor."
"Hey, I saved you from assassins last time too, remember? And you just stole the last hit and now you're taking credit."
The brat claimed that taking down two Peak masters and leaving the last one half-dead for the finishing blow had been his own work—nonsensical rambling.
Cheon Su-gong stared steadily, wondering what on earth he was talking about, until the other scratched his cheek and spoke again.
"Anyway... it was basically a last-hit steal, but thanks for saving me, I guess?"
Was this what they meant by receiving a bow while lying down?
To Cheon Su-gong, who had only ever seen the respectful attitudes of subordinates, the thanks was so fresh it crossed into absurdity.
"Anyway, that Wang Jin-gong bastard..."
The moment he rose, Dan Mujin searched with narrowed eyes for the pale face.
He found Wang Jin-gong tightly bound and laid out beside the Seo family head and his wife, then nodded in satisfaction.
As if intending to carry out the "bowl-cracking" he had mentioned earlier, he picked up his fallen staff and started walking over with heavy steps.
"Stop."
"Ah, what now."
The brat turned as if to say don't interfere.
Cheon Su-gong had felt it since Baekyang Village—capable, yet utterly lacking in manners.
"I will take that one with me. I have a use for him."
At those words the brat's eyebrows shot up crooked.
"In return I will pay a fitting price."
The eyebrows settled again.
Honest little bastard, at least.
"How much are you thinking of paying for him, valued customer?"
Dan Mujin rubbed his hands together like a sly merchant.
"The Princess's palace is not short of money. Just hand him over."
Remembering the gold pieces tossed his way during the missing-person search last time, he nodded and stepped aside without protest.
"But what are you going to use him for?"
"For something that benefits Princess Dohwa, of course."
Cheon Su-gong answered as if it were obvious.
"Ah, that beauty who wore a veil that time? Is the princess doing well?"
"...You brat, she is not someone you may mention so casually."
The way he spoke of her as lightly as a friend left Cheon Su-gong so speechless he smacked the back of the other's head.
Thwack!
"Ow, why do you keep banging on my skull? Do you even know what's inside?"
Dan Mujin scratched the spot as if it hurt.
"Tsk tsk. I was going to ask if you wanted to work by the princess's side, but as expected your personality is far too rotten."
Cheon Su-gong shook his head, saying that even at a similar age this one was completely different from Ilhong. Dan Mujin returned a look of pure disbelief.
"Hey, I never even said I would."
"...However, after watching the earlier fight, your martial prowess alone is outstanding."
It had not been mere Peak level.
To take down two Embroidered Guardsmen—men even the Eastern Depot preferred not to tangle with lightly—and hold his own against three...
Cheon Su-gong, who had been half in doubt, now made up his mind with certainty.
"Therefore you will work with me."
The child called Ilhong had said the office was quiet for lack of jobs, hadn't she?
Then he would provide work. From the Eastern Depot itself, no less.
"What is this guy saying, Ilhong?"
The brat poked Ilhong beside him.
And so, without quite realizing it, Dan Mujin secured a potential client in the Princess's palace.