Recyclable
There is an old saying: a dagger hidden behind a smile.
A chilling blade concealed behind a kindly face.
I pointed at the village chief as he edged closer with that oily grin and shrieked at the top of my lungs.
That bastard was going to kill us all.
"……?"
Cheon Su-gong's face said what the hell are you babbling about.
The village chief, on the other hand, looked like a man whose plan had just gone up in smoke. He moved fast.
"Die!"
With a sharp pung!, a storm of needles sprayed out like a cloudburst. Murderous steel darts painted the air with crimson trails until the whole field of vision was red.
Tadatadatadang—!
Sparks exploded dozens of times in midair. Cheon Su-gong's blade flashed out like lightning and swatted every last needle aside.
It was swordsmanship on the level of a thunderclap. His edge flickered with sword-light, carving the air dozens of times in a single breath.
"Whoa. Absolute monster."
I couldn't help the gasp that slipped out at that peerless swordplay.
That uncle was a eunuch, and his bladework still looked like art. Just who the hell was he? One of those Eastern Depot types you only ever read about in the old wuxia books?
"Guess I should tone down the clowning a little from now on."
I watched Cheon Su-gong casually bat away the short sword that came in right after the needles, and the thought settled in.
I had gotten a little too comfortable under the Princess's protection.
"……Is 'not clowning' even an option for you?"
Ilhong, who had been staring blankly at the fight, tossed the line out like a stone.
"Not really."
Dan Mujin, man of steel. I had grown up trading punches with every punk who mocked an orphan. I learned early that shrinking from contempt and insults only made the bullying worse, so I had walked the tyrant's road from the start.
Well—unless the person in front of me was a paying client. Then I could manage a little restraint.
"Number Six! Number Seven! Get in here—now!"
The middle-aged killer's voice strained under the pressure.
Two more assassins who had been posing as Baekyang Village locals burst out and joined the fray, flinging hidden weapons and short blades.
Chachachang—!
Steel met steel in a frenzy, then fell away trailing sparks.
The moment all three assassins launched at once, Cheon Su-gong's body shot upward. He planted a foot on Number Six's shoulder and spun a full circle through the air.
Shwik—!
In the middle of that spin, a blue arc of sword-qi traced itself twice through space. Tiny threads of blood rose. An assassin's earlobe and several fingers went flying.
Not one of them made a sound. Bloodshot eyes locked back on target as they pressed the assault again.
Crimson trails tangled and knotted through the empty air. The movement was so fast the eye could barely follow. Even at three against one, Cheon Su-gong held his ground and matched them blow for blow.
"Boss, should we jump in?"
"Don't. You'll get your shell crushed."
You do not stick a shrimp between two thrashing whales.
A man who knows his place keeps his life a little longer.
Unfortunately, this place seemed packed with mayflies who only ever looked straight ahead—my advice might as well have been wind.
"What the hell is going on?"
"They said they were Slaughter Shadow Gate killers. Said there'd be a fat cut for showing up, so we came, and now…"
"That damn brat wrecked the whole score!"
"Shit. If I'd known it'd be like this, I never would have left the mountain fort."
The rest of the "villagers."
More precisely: the fake residents of Baekyang Village, now surging forward with bloodstained blades and clubs in hand.
A foul stench rolled off them. Not chemical. The particular reek of people who had spent their lives stacking murder and malice. The same smell you got from that cannibal-bandit who used to butcher men and women for sport.
"……Looks like there never were any real villagers here at all."
"Yeah."
I had sensed something off from the moment we stepped through the gate. They must have scraped together bandits, mountain raiders, and murderers from the surrounding hills and dressed them up as townsfolk.
At least not every last one of them was a trained assassin. Small mercies.
"What happened to the real people of Baekyang Village?"
"Dead, most likely. At these bastards' hands."
The Heavenly Killing Star inside me, and some wordless dread, whispered the same answer.
Goddamn Murim. A neighborhood that never grows on you.
Human life here was cheaper than an ant's.
"Fuck it. After all this, I'm not walking away empty-handed."
"They said if this job landed, it'd be a whole lump of gold."
"Fewer heads to split it with ain't half bad either…"
Everywhere you go, there are always men already standing at the edge of their lives.
The idea that life is one big score had beaten out fear; their eyes glittered with naked greed.
The qi I felt off them was third-class at best, and that was being generous. But throw that many bodies into a fight this evenly matched, and who knew how the scales would tip.
"Pretty little thing, aren't you. Looks like I get to hear another sweet scream."
The lead killer grinned, pointing a short sword still sticky with someone else's blood straight at us.
From the way he talked, he had stacked up a mountain of evil over the years.
"Ilhong. Busting open trash like that—that counts as a good deed, right?"
"……Probably?"
"There's no 'probably.' It's a good deed."
My chest was already shouting the answer.
This was virtue among virtues.
Beasts wearing human skins—line up quietly and become this body's internal energy.
Stars align as one… Heaven and earth, body and shadow, honor…
Pure anti-demonic power roared through every meridian in my body.
A red haze rose along my skin in answer to the enemy's killing intent—then scattered with a strangled kieek! as the method crushed it flat.
I snapped both eyes open, white light flaring in my gaze.
Chachachang!
Behind me, four high-level fighters were still locked in a storm of blades and killing intent, their qi waves slamming the air.
In front of me: a dozen third-class thugs charging in with yellow teeth bared.
High-level fighters belong with high-level fighters. Low-level trash belongs with low-level trash. That is when a fight looks its best.
Therefore—
"Second-division season's open, you bastards."
Taat—!
I kicked off the ground and shot forward.
"Coming to die on your own two feet! Stupid little brat!"
It was always like this.
Anyone who faced me took one look at my face and dropped their guard.
Had they all forgotten the Murim proverb? Beware the child and the old man.
Tatak!
My control of internal energy had grown smooth enough by now. Right in front of his nose I unfolded Seonpungbo and snuffed my presence out of existence.
His broadsword howled through empty air with a heavy buung!
He had swung for me. When nothing caught on the blade, his eyes flew wide.
In that gap I took his back and drove a single fist loaded with the principles of Baekgyeol Singwon straight into him.
Peoeok!
"Ghk!"
The sound of a spine collapsing. He crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut.
The man freezing up behind him got the next gift: I spun like a windmill and planted a full-hip kick into his side.
Bbak—!
A dull burst. His face caved. He bounced away spraying blood and teeth.
"What the fuck!"
Next up: a thickset thug two paces out, still gaping.
I closed the distance with footwork in a blink and buried a heavy palm-strike in the wide plain of his gut.
"Uweeeek!"
He put on a full demonstration of everything he had eaten for lunch, then rolled through the dirt in a cloud of dust.
Three strikes in a single flowing chain, smooth as a gust of wind.
The Baekgyeol Singwon that Hwang Geolgae had rebuilt to suit his own tastes had evolved into a comprehensive man-and-horse slaughtering art—fists, kicks, finger strikes, and palm techniques poured out without pause.
"Son of a bitch—that kid was an expert too…!"
"Damn it!"
I had put three of them down in the space of an "uh-oh," and the pack of murderers rocked with shock.
They were calling me an expert. All those beatings from Hwang Geolgae while I trained had finally paid off.
My shoulders wanted to square themselves without permission.
"Don't freeze, you fucks! He's still just one damn kid!"
"Yeah! If we all rush him at once, what's a little shit like him gonna do!"
I had heard that line in a lot of alleys.
And deep in my dantian, a strange little itch had started up.
Three pieces of trash down. Merit stacking, no question. How much internal energy would this convert into?
I was already looking forward to the next circulation session.
"Rush him!"
"Uwaaaaah!"
They came in a mass, blades and clubs thrust out front.
A whole crowd of grown men piling onto one child. Beautiful.
"Central Plains trash! Every last one of you is getting recycled into internal energy…!"
I roared back just as loud and charged to meet them.
"What the hell is he saying!"
"We're fucked!"
A dozen red trajectories dazzled the eyes. Sharp, long weapons split the wind from every direction.
Clubs and blades closed in on my face. I tried the same little foot trick Cheon Su-gong had used earlier.
I gathered internal energy and kicked the ground with a sharp tak! My body shot upward. Below me came the clatter of weapons tangling and colliding, their targets suddenly gone.
"Kh, you useless idiots!"
"What the hell are you doing!"
A proper combined formation was not something this random scrap-heap of thugs could pull off on short notice.
While their movements snarled together, I used the air to smash shoulders and skulls.
Peopeopeok—!
A heel loaded with internal energy drove into a shoulder. I twisted, pulled centrifugal force into a spinning kick, and clubbed the side of a head. For the one reaching up after me from below, I dropped my full weight into a dropkick.
Something in his chest cracked. He hit the dirt again, choking.
I used the rebound of the kick to flip once more through the air and slipped clear of the encirclement.
Every odd, elastic motion in that sequence was the fruit of thrashing around for years trying not to die under Hwang Geolgae's fists.
"You little rat bastard…!"
I had beaten them one-sidedly and then slid out of their grip like oil. Outrage erupted through the pack.
"Nice! That's our Boss Mujin!"
From Ilhong's side came pure praise for the four or five I had dropped in moments.
The murderers twisted their faces and charged again.
Perfect.
I picked up a long club someone had dropped, without a word.
Decent grip. Decent weight. Decent length.
I tried to copy the little trick Cheon Su-gong had used to bat away the needles.
Tadatadatadak—!
Wood cracked against steel. I gave ground while batting and sweeping aside the attacks that poured in.
Enemies rushed me from every side, all of them trying to kill me. That pressure made my body move on its own—the same way it had when I stole footwork and techniques from the escort warriors.
Tadak! Seogeok!
But there is a limit to something you copy after one look. Now and then a blade slipped through the defense and carved a line of flesh.
Giving flesh to take bone had always been this body's specialty, though.
I slipped into the opening left by a wild swing and smashed the attacker's face with a clean bbak!
"Ghk!"
Heavenly Killing Star strength, internal energy loaded into the blow. The face of a man who had spent his life stabbing other people caved in like rotten fruit.
Tadak! Peoeok!
A dull burst. This time our clubs met each other cleanly across our skulls.
Except one of us had a head tempered by absurd durability and nuclear knuckles to the temple—so only one skull was breaking.
"Y-you rock-headed little— ghrk."
He passed out mid-shock at my durability. He was not wrong, and somehow that made it worse.
"Boss's head is rock-solid too! So cool!"
And behind me, Ilhong's ongoing voice buff refused to quit.
Tadak! Tadatadadak!
Sweep. Deflect. Coil and rebound. Anyone who dove in too boldly got his skull split for the trouble.
The club whipped in every direction like it had a spirit of its own.
Enemy attack paths dyed themselves red as if I were reading the future. Layer that on top of the principles I had stolen over Cheon Su-gong's shoulder, and a single club was enough to tear through their ranks at will.
"Fuck! Even all at once we can't take him!"
"Which idiot said to rush him together!"
"That brat—don't tell me he's already reached First-class…?"
The speaker flinched at his own words and started rolling his eyes in a hurry.
I had stolen a master's technique and used it to scare the bottom-feeders stiff.
If there had been a real expert among them, they would have seen through my rootless club work in a heartbeat. Lucky for me, there wasn't.
"……Shit. This job is completely fucked."
Their morale dropped in plain sight.
They hesitated. Traded looks. Started edging backward, ready to slip away.
That little sign snapped me wide awake.
"You bastards—where do you think you're going!"
A precious bundle of internal energy growing legs and running off? Absolutely not.
I unfolded Seonpungbo at once and drove straight into the middle of them.
Weapons lashed out from every side in answer to the reckless charge.
I decided I would take whatever I had to take—and collect their skulls in return.
Bbababak—!
The sound of heads splitting came one after another. At the same time, the itch of accumulating merit tickled my dantian like applause.
"One more handful of internal energy!"
These were the kind of scum who butchered an entire village for a few coins.
Every time I cracked a skull, something stacked up inside me. So this was why the old righteous sages used to grind people into power.
"Fuck! D-don't come any closer, you crazy bastard!"
The murderers screamed as my ghost-eyed club work made it clear I was not leaving a single one behind.
"No!"
I grazed past blades or slipped them entirely, methodically wrecking them one by one.
Red trajectories carved the air without pause. Shrill screams rang out as bodies went flying.
And just as the pack of killers was driven to the brink of annihilation by a single child—
Ilhong's terrified voice cut in from behind me.
"……B-Boss."
I glanced back. A middle-aged man stood there, covered in blood.
A blade was resting against Ilhong's white throat.
I had beaten my way forward carefully for exactly this reason.
I must have held back a little too much trying to avoid unnecessary killing. One of the ones I had dropped had woken up late.
"D-drop the club!"
I let the bloodied club fall with a dull thud.
I had already beaten almost everyone worth beating. I was a fist fighter by trade. The club was meaningless now.
"You little shit. You've been running your mouth this whole time… The second you move, this kid's throat gets opened. Remember that."
He pressed the edge a little deeper into Ilhong's neck as he threatened me.
The few survivors of the club work finally thought they had the upper hand. They started snickering.
"I'm gonna make you beg me to kill y— ghk!"
A blade tip punched straight out through the center of the hostage-taker's face with a wet puk!
Thud.
He hit the ground, bubbling blood from his throat, empty and done.
"……."
While everyone stood frozen, a middle-aged man calmly recovered his bloodied sword and wiped it clean with a single stroke.
"Hmph. Saved your hide. You've got the makings of a proper free-lance, at least."
Cheon Su-gong—who had, at some point, finished off all three assassins—looked us over with a thoroughly satisfied smile.