The Border Region
The forests of Sipmandaesan stretched endlessly dense.
We pushed through waist-high undergrowth and treacherous rocky paths, advancing into the very heart of the Demonic Sect.
A full week of walking like that was more than enough time to get a proper read on people.
And this girl, Namgung Sohye—she seemed the type whose mouth ran a little wild whenever she got nervous.
Even as we headed straight into a deathtrap, she kept chattering about this and that, and whenever the conversation turned to her older brother Namgung Jin, her eyes sparkled like stars.
"Isn't my brother just more amazing the longer you look at him? A martial artist who had already mastered the Boundless Azure Firmament Sword Art by the age of ten and reached Peak Realm at nineteen—you really won't find another one like him, will you?"
A peerless genius, a once-in-a-generation martial prodigy, the shining star of Anhui Province—her gaze demanded our agreement as she heaped praise without end. The rest of us exchanged awkward glances as we walked.
"And on top of that, his devotion to the orthodox Murim, his mature character, his path as a righteous chivalrous warrior, and the reputation that already has the heroes of the jianghu looking to him as a future Alliance Leader… Ah, isn't he just perfect?"
I had only mentioned Namgung Jin offhandedly, knowing he was somewhere in enemy territory, and the captain of the Righteous Justice Unit wore a look of pure regret.
When her praise started brushing off every other martial artist as somehow lesser, Jo Harang finally couldn't take it anymore and stepped in.
"Our Mujin is insanely amazing too."
Why did she have to drag me into this of all people.
I had been minding my own business and now turned toward them with the face of a man struck by lightning out of a clear sky.
"He's walked the path of a chivalrous hero since he was little, he's got outstanding talent, and he's saved my life more times than I can count."
Jo Harang refused to lose and put me front and center as she squared off against the other girl.
Namgung Sohye, who had been laying out her brother's virtues at full volume, now looked me up and down with a slow once-over.
"Hmm, not bad, I guess… but he still feels a step below my brother in every way? Especially the face—that feels two steps below."
Even being generous, I was the budget version. And when it came to looks, the guy was so handsome there was nothing I could say in my own defense.
"Mujin, sorry. I can't think of a comeback for the face part."
"…Why are you the one apologizing to me."
That only made the whole thing feel weirder.
Anyway, Namgung Jin—this era's perfect man with not a single weak spot. But even he couldn't escape family trouble, it seemed.
With the most reliable, most admirable role model living right under the same roof, his little sister had graduated from simple pride into something close to full-blown worship.
"And do you know how kind he is to me? He grants every single request I make—he's the best older brother anyone could ask for. Hehe."
She puffed out her chest and spoke with pure pride.
Namgung Jin, this is what happens when you spoil your only little sister rotten.
Though, to be fair, her endless chatter was at least dulling the edge of the dread that came with marching into a death zone.
"You could scour the entire Central Plains and never find another man like him. The more I think about it, the more he's the greatest husband material in the whole land."
That was when the captain of the Righteous Justice Unit, who had been listening quietly, suddenly struck at the heart of the matter.
"What good is being the greatest husband material when he's your own blood and you can never marry him?"
"…"
In the end, wasn't she just doing free advertising for some other woman? At that pointed question, Namgung Sohye's head drooped.
In that moment every scrap of fear toward the Demonic Sect vanished; she lifted her face with a razor-sharp aura rising around her and declared,
"My brother is never getting married for the rest of his life."
There was absolutely no chance some fox-spirit of a woman would come along and snatch her precious brother away.
Aigoo, Namgung Jin. You're in deep trouble, buddy.
Whoever ended up with him was going to have a sister-in-law problem for the ages.
Namgung Sohye walked on, then suddenly slumped her head as if all hope had left her.
"Haa… Why in the world did Heaven make my brother my brother, and make me his little sister?"
She even started railing at the sky itself, lamenting her fate.
As someone born under the Heavenly Killing Star and cast out by my own family, the whole performance left me equal parts speechless and exasperated.
"Mujin, it's a fork in the road?"
Just then Jo Harang pointed ahead at the two branching paths.
One side looked relatively flat and easy; the other was, at a single glance, a steep, overgrown mountain track that screamed pure suffering.
In other words, the kind of road that automatically summoned thoughts of absolute misery.
"Demonic Sect people are still people. They'll take the comfortable path."
The captain of the Righteous Justice Unit muttered it, and since everyone was already worn down in body and mind from the long trek, we all found ourselves nodding along without thinking.
This was Demonic Sect territory. The Murim Alliance's intelligence only gave rough directions and big-picture landmarks, so the finer details required improvisation on the spot.
But right then Salsung suddenly rose up and waggled a finger left and right.
This path… a trap to lure outsiders…
These borderlands still carried the scars of the old Orthodox-Demonic War, she said. Stepping carelessly would get you killed. That was why we had to take the brutal, rugged trail that the Demonic Sect and the Dark Spirit Unit actually used—the opinion of a former cultist herself.
"Nothing about this is ever easy, is it."
Still, in enemy territory where solid information was scarce, having a guide at all was something to be grateful for.
Apparently she didn't fancy dying at the hands of her old comrades alongside me, because Salsung was being unusually cooperative about pointing out routes that would keep us from running into them.
"This is the old border region where the Orthodox-Demonic War was fought. Even if it's harder, we should take the rugged path."
At my murmur the whole party turned to look at me.
"Mujin's instincts are ridiculously good."
Jo Harang backed me up, reminding everyone that my sharp instincts had once sniffed out murderers and villains before.
"Hmm. Easy roads exist for a reason, is that it? There's sense in that."
The captain of the Righteous Justice Unit nodded, while Namgung Sohye still looked half-stunned from the whole brother conversation.
And so, guided by the former Holy Maiden of the Demonic Sect, we began climbing the steep mountain ridges toward the cult's heart.
Before anyone realized it, the corners of Sipmandaesan were stained with blood and steel.
Clang-clang-clang!
Swords crashed against swords and sparks flew wild. The Myeolmade and Namgung Jin fought desperately to punch through the Dark Spirit Unit's pursuit and break free of the tightening encirclement.
The moment their feet slowed even a little, the Demonic Sect's noose would only cinch tighter around them.
Black-clad figures kept erupting from between the trees and underbrush, launching attack after attack, yet Moyong Cheonghye's party never had a second to rest.
"Vengeance for the Ming Cult—!"
A Dark Spirit Unit warrior charged with blades thickly coated in poison, eyes gleaming with murderous light.
Slash!
Moyong Cheonghye's sword qi flashed, and the heads of several zealots went flying.
But no sooner had one group been cut down than another flooded in without pause—that was the nature of this battlefield.
"We're going to die at this rate!"
Dang Yeohye, who had just torn out a Demonic Sect martial artist's throat with her razor-sharp footwork, shouted in despair at the endless numbers pouring toward them.
It was exactly like kicking a hornet's nest—enemies multiplying from every direction.
They had even disguised themselves as a family and moved in absolute secrecy just to reach the border region without this exact nightmare happening.
Whoosh!
Namgung Jin's Boundless Azure Firmament Sword Art embroidered the air in brilliant blue.
He flicked aside the oncoming blades as if brushing them away and reaped blood and flesh with every cutting note of his sword.
"Gyaaaaah!"
His eyes flashed amid the spray of blood, and five or six of the Demonic Sect warriors simply vanished from the ranks as if they had been erased.
The brief breathing room let him shout toward Dang Yeohye.
"If you have breath to talk, use it to cut down one more! Like the Evil-Slaying Divine Maiden over there!"
He pointed at the woman on the front line who was sweeping enemies aside like a broom with terrifying force—Moyong Cheonghye.
She unleashed every scrap of the martial skill she had honed by dropping countless villains' heads, enough that one might almost mistake her for the Heavenly Killing Star herself.
That was the Moyong Clan's Heaven and Earth Wave Flash Sword, the technique said to split even lightning.
A killing wave that carved blood-spray and flesh alike surged from the Vice Leader's fingertips. Bodies and screams were reaped; the path ahead opened as enemies were swept away in a crashing tide.
"Whoa. You can mess with just about anyone else, but you do not mess with that woman."
Even Dang Yeohye, who routinely heard herself called a complete lunatic back in the Central Plains, found herself taking a step back before the Evil-Slaying Divine Maiden.
Wherever Moyong Cheonghye passed, corpses crumpled and piled one after another.
"Unbelievable. This is the same unit member who never stops mouthing off to her own captain!"
Captain Jeok Unyeop, who had just split a charging Demonic Sect warrior from crown to crotch, shouted in pure disbelief.
Still, even he had to admit it: as a mid-tier sect man, he couldn't freely defy Moyong Cheonghye of a great noble clan whose martial arts also outstripped his own.
"Die, you dogs of the Murim Alliance…!"
"We'll put your corpses on display through every village just like those beggar bastards!"
But the Myeolmade party no longer had the luxury of banter. The encirclement was tightening for good; enemy numbers kept swelling with every passing moment.
"Follow the Vice Leader and break through!"
They raced through the blood path Moyong Cheonghye had carved. Her lightning-fast blade harvested heads like a sickle mowing a field, yet their advance kept slowing under the constant impact of fresh assaults.
Their escape had become so bogged down that "ankles caught" was the only fitting description.
Then, right in the middle of the Demonic Sect ranks, a martial artist erupted with an extraordinary aura that flooded every direction.
"You little rats of the Murim Alliance… you've run quite a long way."
He was the leader of the Dark Spirit Unit, Jeok Gwang—the man who had lost far too many subordinates today.
He cast a brief, sorrowful glance over the corpses littering the ground, then tore off his black hood and glared at the Myeolmade party with pure killing intent.
"But that thrashing ends here. You four… I'll tear you apart until you beg me to kill you, then scatter the pieces of your corpses across the entire Murim Alliance."
Especially the body parts, he promised, would be delivered to each of their sects in the most grotesque condition imaginable.
Fuel for the next Orthodox-Demonic War that might soon erupt, no doubt.
"You filthy Demonic Sect bastard—your methods are as foul as ever!"
Jeok Unyeop ground his teeth and roared at the threat of desecrating the dead.
The Dark Spirit Unit leader gave a short, incredulous snort of laughter.
"You lot, who cut down over a hundred innocent Ming Cult people, have no right to say that…!"
Two forces with zero room for negotiation snarled and locked eyes.
The bloody chase was clearly finished. Numbers and power overwhelmingly favored the enemy; this place was looking more and more like a grave. Dang Yeohye muttered quietly among her companions.
"If we fight them head-on and die bravely… the Sichuan Tang Clan and everyone in the Central Plains will remember what we did here, right?"
She was asking, in their final moment, whether they could at least die with honor. Namgung Jin, who had never been good at reading other people's emotions, answered in his usual stiff tone.
"I'm sorry, but the very fact we came here is a secret, Heroine Dang. No one will ever know of our deeds."
Most people would have lied and said the entire Central Plains would sing of them forever. But he seemed to believe even that sort of comforting falsehood was unworthy of a chivalrous hero, so he delivered the cold truth instead.
"Argh, damn it, then that means we die like dogs!"
"Not entirely like dogs. We did manage to cut down a fair number of Demonic Sect lackeys."
"That's the same thing! Aah, seriously! I am not dying like this!"
"…Saying you don't want to die doesn't actually make it happen, you know."
Namgung Jin said something further, but it no longer reached Dang Yeohye's ears.
"Aah, shit! A girl in the prime of her youth, told to die a dog's death?! I refuse! I'm getting out of here alive and—hey!—I'm going to live all lovey-dovey with Mujin!"
At that, Moyong Cheonghye, who had been listening in silence up front, uncharacteristically whipped her head around.
"Who said you could get married? I never gave permission."
"…So what the hell has the Vice Leader been talking about this whole time?!"
The Dark Spirit Unit leader listened to their internal squabble for a moment, then decided enough was enough and raised his hand high.
"What a lot of pointless noise. All of you—tear them to pieces and kill them!"
Hundreds of warriors prepared to rip apart the four Murim Alliance martial artists trapped in the net—when a familiar voice rang out from far away.
"Noona—!"
The two women who each considered themselves that "noona" both flinched and reacted at once.
"M-Mujin?"
"What are you doing here?!"