Saltpeter and Iron Balls
There was a force in the Central Plains known as the Blood Heaven Sect.
It was a cult raised to worship the Blood Heaven God—a deity whose name and land were somewhat foreign to the people of the Central Plains. For their alien customs and uncanny sorcery, they had been branded heretics and subjected to endless persecution and long humiliation.
That history had filled their hearts with hatred and a thirst for vengeance, until they came to regard the entire Central Plains as their enemy.
"But when our god descends upon this earth, every page of that persecution and shame will be repaid in glory…"
Beyond a red canopy, the sect's master—the Hyeolgyoju—was murmuring something like a prophecy.
The Central Plains overflowed with suffering poor and displaced commoners. The people gathered here had once groaned under a court and a Murim that deceived and exploited the world. Yet by following the grace of the Blood Heaven God, each of them had found their own salvation.
"Hyeolgyoju, it took some time, but we finally recovered Left Blood Law's body."
A Blood Sect operative who had infiltrated the Murim Alliance as a spy bowed his head and reported before a corpse. The Hyeolgyoju drew back the red curtains with a soft rustle and looked with his own eyes upon the returned body of Left Blood Law.
On the face that was revealed, a faint grief and rage had seeped in. He had scolded the man harshly more than once for botching jobs, but he had never meant to lose him so emptily as this.
"And traces of blood arts remain on the body."
Right Blood Law spoke in a voice sunk very low. The blood arts were a sorcerous language the cultists carved into their own flesh. When blood was sprinkled over the arm, three names rose up as clear as if no time had passed at all.
"Heavenly Killing Star — Moyong Cheonghye"
"Interferer — Jo Harang"
"Dan Mujin"
Left Blood Law had carved those names before he ever learned the truth of the Heavenly Killing Star.
"That Moyong Cheonghye is a vessel meant to receive the divine grace, I understand. But why this name, Dan Mujin, keeps circling my ears is something I simply cannot grasp."
A Transcendent Realm master of the sect they had trusted had come home as a corpse. From where, exactly, had everything begun to twist? By this point, not only the cultists but even the Hyeolgyoju who had been watching in silence were beyond incredulous.
"Dan Mujin. Why does this man keep seizing our ankles?"
It had been the same during the raid on the Murim Alliance with thunder bombs and blood arts. The same again on the cliffs of Liaoning when they tried to abduct the Heavenly Killing Star. And the same with the jiangshi of the Jinju Yan household this time. Wherever the Blood Sect's hand reached, this man appeared and overturned everything—as if he held some personal grudge against them.
"Why in the world does he keep getting tangled up in the great work of the sect?"
The Hyeolgyoju was asking the very question Dan Mujin himself would have liked to ask. Beyond the canopy he squeezed his eyes shut and offered an earnest prayer toward a blood-filled jar.
O Blood Heaven God, I strive to follow Your prophecy, yet the road ahead of the sect is far too unclear.
All they needed was the Heavenly Killing Star as a vessel—and yet every time they pursued the prophecy, they became hopelessly entangled with some strange troubleshooter.
…
But even to the cult master's desperate question, the blood in the jar reflected no future at all. In the silence of the Blood Heaven God, the Hyeolgyoju quietly ground his teeth.
"Hyeolgyoju, what shall we do with Left Blood Law's body?"
Right Blood Law asked, looking down at the corpse of the man who, in life, had attained the Transcendent Realm.
"Prepare the Great Rite. He will be reborn and serve the Blood Sect once more."
The three names he had carved while he still lived. Vengeance would be had—not by another's hand, but by his own.
"Rise, Left Blood Law."
In the Blood Sect, death was not an end but only another beginning. In a secret sanctuary, the secret arts and blood techniques that had once bewitched so many began to unfold once more.
If you live long enough, there comes a moment when life seems to go your way.
Most people get drunk on that sweet success and decide the moment will last forever. The truth is, that's when you should be most on guard. Luck always has two faces, and it has a habit of showing up with disaster in tow.
I didn't know that once, and I got a knife in the gut for it.
"S-sorry, Mujin! I'm just a wildcat of Mount Song now…!"
Jo Harang burst through the office door with a bang, flung that ominous line at me, and fled like she was running for her life. She was gone before I could press her for anything, flogging herself the whole way out.
"What the hell."
This was the woman who'd stuffed "tiger" into both her epithet and the name of her greatsaber out of sheer pride—and now she was calling herself a wildcat? An uneasy feeling crawled up from somewhere in my chest.
"Suddenly I feel seriously anxious."
Surely she hadn't gotten her identity as the Purple Micro Star found out. After all that talk out of her own mouth about how she had to keep it buried tight. Somehow I had the distinct feeling that if I went to the Eunseong Merchant Group's training grounds for practice right now, something terrible would happen.
"What is this, seriously."
My good mood had been doused with cold water, and worry was already swirling. Then Ilhong, back from a short errand, brought me news of a certain old man's movements—something she'd overheard.
"Boss, Master seemed to be looking for you."
"…"
The moment I heard that, a sense of crisis shot up through my skull. So Hwang Geolgae had finally figured it out. Acting on that certainty, I seized Ilhong's hand.
"Ilhong."
"Yes?"
"Let's lie low at the office for a while."
"Ehh…? But business is going so well."
Ilhong looked like she couldn't make sense of it. Sure, the number of clients coming in had jumped lately. But living long enough teaches you there's something more important than money and customers.
Namely, your life.
"It's been a while—want to grab a meal with me?"
Closing shop in broad daylight to go eat something good brightened Ilhong's face at once.
"Just… the two of us?"
"No? We'll pick up Jo Harang on the way. She's office people too."
Leaving one person out when there's food involved is a special kind of cruelty. And I had a few things I wanted to grill her about anyway.
"…Ah. Right. Whatever you say."
Her mood went from sunny to wilted in a blink. Emotions swinging all over the place—a girl at a complicated age in more ways than one.
"Alright then, we'll just grab dumplings and some noodles at a nearby inn…"
I had my hand on the latch, ready to step out—then an ominous presence outside the door made me slam the lock shut on the spot.
Click.
Ilhong stared at me with a look that said, What are you doing…? I had sensed that distinctive footwork sliding toward us like a ghost from far down the street. Get beaten with that technique for a few years and you develop this kind of unbelievable detection ability.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
A fist pounded the door as if ordering it opened at once. Maybe I'd developed superpowers. Even without a word, I knew exactly who owned the shadow cast beyond the wood.
"Sorry, but we're closed for the day. Not taking any more clients."
"Quit the bullshit and open the door, you deranged disciple of mine."
Of course.
I glared in the direction Jo Harang had vanished and silently spat every curse I knew.
"If you don't come out, I'm breaking in."
"Hey now, that's an expensive door. You smash it, you pay for it. And you're a beggar—you don't have that kind of money."
"Hmph. This scrap of wood? Expensive, my ass."
I felt the qi of the natural world being drawn somewhere—he was raising Gang Qi beyond the door. Ready to shatter the panel and storm inside.
"Want me to tip off the Beggar Sect disciples? Tell them Master's right here—and while I'm at it, your usual routes, the places you like to drink, every spot you loaf around in. I spill all of it, yeah?"
"…"
The one thing that utterly indifferent old man still cared about was the beggars and Beggar Sect disciples of Beijing. Ever since free passage into the Beggar Sect had become possible for him, he'd spent his days dodging them. The moment they saw him they grabbed his pant legs and pestered him to come back as Dragon Head Sect Leader.
"…This brat is blackmailing his master? I'll settle this with you later."
And so, out of pure will to live, I used them to repel Hwang Geolgae. The presence outside the door melted away with a soft glide. It felt a little like exorcising an evil spirit.
That ought to keep him from storming the office for a while.
"I don't know what that was about… but you survived, Boss?"
"No. I just postponed dying."
Ilhong snorted a laugh at that.
"From the looks of it, you went and did the one thing he told you not to do again, didn't you?"
Three years of hanging around a schoolhouse and even a dog recites poetry, as they say. She hit the bull's-eye so cleanly I had nothing to say.
"I'm just a powerless duckweed floating on the great river of fate."
It hadn't been intentional. In every situation I'd made what seemed like the best call at the time, and somehow it had led here. No matter how I looked at it, I hadn't done anything wrong.
"Want me to come along and take the scolding with you? If I'm standing next to you, he holds back a little at least…"
Ilhong scratched her cheek and offered, worried. What a promising kid.
"Kh—Ilhong."
I had raised one subordinate right, at least. Overwhelmed, I threw my arms around her shoulders.
"Eep—!"
She made a strange little sound and startled. She used to not say much about this kind of thing; now she was a proper young lady, I guess.
"Th-this is banned."
Her ears went red as she thumped me.
In the busy streets of Beijing there was a stretch where all the skilled inns clustered together—the so-called food alley. We were walking that way when, along the route, we found one wilted wildcat who had lost all her confidence, and we added her to the party.
With a guilty conscience, she'd been skulking around watching my face—until the moment she heard we were going to eat, and her expression lit right up. Figures. People who carry baleful stars get monstrous physical ability, but their gluttony scales up to match.
"Mujin, which inn are we going to?"
"Soso Inn."
"That place again? Can't we go somewhere nice once in a while?"
Jo Harang tried to pitch some high-class inn she'd scouted in advance.
"Once it's in your stomach it's all the same."
"…Cheapskate."
"None of your business."
I had a mountain of things I wanted to demand the second I saw her face, but looking at her all shriveled up, I couldn't bring myself to. Honestly, I'd always figured it would come out someday.
"Huh? Park Chil?"
As we walked, I spotted a Beggar Sect disciple hurrying somewhere. Park Chil—these days he came and went from the office so often you could practically call him staff, our contact window with the Beggar Sect. I'd leaned on him a lot lately for information of one kind or another, and I was about to wave him over and try to settle the debt cheap with a single meal—when Jo Harang tapped my shoulder.
"What."
"Hey. Look at Ilhong's face."
I glanced over. The moment she'd spotted Park Chil, Ilhong's expression had gone subtly dark, her lips working silently.
"There's no need for her to feel competitive."
"You have to show it for her to know. At least try comforting her."
Why would I do something that embarrassing? Even back at the orphanage, comfort and counseling had been the one thing I was hopeless at. Every attempt ended in disaster.
"Would my comfort even help?"
At that, Jo Harang looked at Ilhong with pity once, then gave me a look that said I was pathetic. What had I done to deserve that stare?
"What are you looking at, wildcat of Mount Song."
"…"
Only then did she clamp her mouth shut, as if she had nothing left to say. From the way her lips still twitched, though, there was still a part that felt unfair.
"You were so full of yourself—and he found out right away, huh?"
"I—I couldn't help it. He just popped up like a ghost."
That was Hwang Geolgae's specialty. I'd warned her multiple times not to come near the place. What was so important about that sparring match that she had to go crawling in?
"Right then, little wildcat. No more roaring around calling yourself a tiger."
"Grr…!"
Furious, Jo Harang stamped the ground several times with her foot. Anyway, thanks to this woman I now had to figure out how to smooth things over when I went back to Master.
"Quit whining and let's go eat."
And when your head starts hurting like this, the proper treatment is to dump something delicious into your stomach. We relocated to Soso Inn, the place we always stopped by after finishing a job.
The moment we stepped inside, a feast of cooking aromas hit our noses and made our mouths water.
"Dumplings as a base, plus sweet-and-sour pork and five-spice pork."
Jo Harang rattled off the menu the instant she sat down. Whether she'd forgotten she'd just been demoted to wildcat or not, her appetite was still pure tiger, hunting meat.
Honestly—ordering like that because it isn't her money.
"I'll just have noodles and one spring roll, please."
You have to save when you have it, and when you're earning a lot, if you want to last. Business has its ups and downs; a financial crisis always comes around sooner or later. So I picked only modest dishes and settled into my seat.
"Um, I'll have…"
And just as today's main character, Ilhong, was about to choose what she wanted—because of course this was a Murim inn—a fight erupted on the upper floor.
Crash!
The sound of crockery shattering and banister timber being smashed to pieces. Judging by the destructive power of the noise, this was no brawl between ordinary commoners. Definitely martial artists going at each other.
"Ugh, this damn Murim."
Who knew one peaceful meal could be this hard. Wherever you go, strong people are lurking, and every place turns into a fight floor. Next time I should just tip a waiter and have the food delivered to the office.
"Please stop! What do you think you're doing in an inn?!"
I only felt sorry for the innkeeper. If I ever went into business myself, I was never opening an inn. At least with a troubleshooter's office I wouldn't have things explode quite like this.
"I—I'll kill you!"
"Yeah? Try it, you bastard!"
Even as I bit into a hot spring roll, the appetite-killing fight seemed to keep going. I was going to ignore it and pick at whatever dishes came out—when a boy who'd been getting dogpiled came tumbling and rolling right up near us, then pulled a round iron sphere from his chest.
"You started it first…!"
With trembling hands he lit the fuse attached to the iron ball.
Hisss.
Something was burning down. The other people in the inn didn't know what it was and only tilted their heads in confusion—but Ilhong, Jo Harang, and I, who had lived through the Dragon-Phoenix Blood Incident, recognized the thing at once and froze in horror.
"G-get down!"
BOOOOM—!