Boy Detective Dan Mujin
"Whoa… so this is what they mean by a real feast."
"The meat—look at all that juice running everywhere!"
"Boss, I'm digging in!"
The kids, who had spent every day choking down dry, flavorless zhangjia rice, went wide-eyed the moment real cooking was set in front of them.
"Go on. Eat as much as you want."
Meat fried in oil, marinated and braised until it fell apart, plus every kind of seafood. The boys shoved food into their mouths the second it hit the table. In the space of a few startled blinks the dishes vanished as if a crab had closed its eyes, and Ilhong, watching from the side, looked faintly panicked.
"They must've been starving."
I'd eaten that same zhangjia rice when I was little. I knew exactly how they felt. Zero flavor, roughly on par with a meatless stew and nothing more.
"Hey, try this duck! It just melts in your mouth!"
"This sweet-and-sour pork is chewy and seriously good!"
"So rich people get to eat stuff like this every day…"
They sat there beaming, bragging about whatever they'd just stuffed into their faces. The old saying went, earn like a dog, spend like a minister—and back in the day, whenever the detective agency paid out, I used to treat the kids at the orphanage to a big meal. Even the director, who usually never stopped scolding me, would smile and praise me for it.
And right now, the Seongun Simbeop seemed to be filling that same role.
There's a weird feeling near my dantian.
Something warm and faintly ticklish, packed in tight. That was the sensation of merit stacking up. Suddenly, spending the money felt twice as rewarding. A world where good deeds came with a built-in payoff—if that was how it worked, who needed to commit crimes at all? Aside from the Heavenly Killing Star squirming in pure dissatisfaction, it was basically a complete happy ending for everyone.
"Lucky me."
Just as Hwang Geolgae had said before, the Seongun Simbeop really was a peerless heart method. I was almost embarrassed I'd doubted it at first.
"So, kids—any trouble at work?"
Feeling even more generous, I asked about their hardships. With their mouths still stuffed full, they launched into a round of life updates.
"The work's hard, but at least nobody beats us or starves us like before. It's doable."
"And the merchant group people look out for us a lot."
"It's the first time anyone's ever taken care of us like this… everyone's still kind of dazed about it."
I had asked Manager Jin through the merchant group to treat these brats well. From the sound of it, he'd actually followed through. Hard labor or not, they now had real jobs and a future they could plan around—and they were saying life was finally livable.
"Also, Ohchil hyung says he wants to become a martial artist like the Boss, so he's been training whenever he can."
I turned to look at Ohchil. Embarrassed, he scratched the back of his neck and spoke up.
"Well, uh… one of the escorts said I've got good stamina and a solid frame, so I should look into escort work."
"Hmm. Is that so?"
From everything I'd seen, martial arts was a field that ran entirely on talent. Ohchil had always been bigger than the other kids his age. So what about his bone structure and meridians?
I started carefully kneading along his limbs, checking his muscles and channels.
"Boss, don't tell me that old man rubbed off on you and now you've got a hobby of groping people?"
"I'm checking your bone structure. Don't talk nonsense."
So this was how Hwang Geolgae used to feel. I let a thin thread of internal energy flow through and examined his acupoints and meridians. No congenital defects, nothing that would block martial practice.
"You've got decent potential. Depending on how hard you work, you might actually shine."
Ohchil's face lit up at once.
"So I can become a martial artist like you, Boss?"
"No. Stay away from that. Being a martial artist like me is too dangerous."
I'd walked a path that would burn through several lives and still not be enough. Wandering swordsmen and troubleshooters threw themselves into incidents for a living—trouble was the job description. Better for him to settle into something safer, like a proper escort.
Bandits showed up now and then, sure, but nobody could fight the entire Green Forest Eighteen Forts on a regular day. Usually you negotiated a toll and moved on.
"I'll put in a word with the chief escort. Go train under them. Learning anything at all will help."
The elders around me had always said the same thing: learn a skill. Even second-class or third-class martial arts like the escort techniques—once you fully mastered them, you stood on a completely different level from ordinary people.
"Boss… no—Hyungnim Dan Mujin! Thank you! From today on, you're the hyungnim of my heart!"
Like some peach-tree oath out of the old stories, Ohchil choked up and declared we were brothers for life.
"Enough. Just train hard. That's what actually counts."
We'd walked through hard times together. In my past life I'd been endlessly soft on kids from the orphanage, too—even if I was ice-cold with everyone else.
"Ha… if I hadn't tried to snatch your begging money that day, I wonder what I'd be doing now…"
"Brat. That almost sounds like you're glad you did it."
"Ahem. That is not what I meant."
He'd gone from half-delinquent to something resembling a person. He had a decent job now and was starting to pull his own weight. He'd be fine from here on out.
"Boss, here—eat this."
Just then, Ilhong somehow salvaged a single piece of Dongpo pork from the kids' feeding frenzy and set it carefully on top of my still-warm rice.
Oh. That was… actually kind of moving. Men really did fall for little gestures like that.
"You weren't eating much, so…"
"Yeah. Thanks."
Still, the kid was so kind I worried he'd do the same in front of other people. This felt somehow even bolder than peeling a perilla leaf for someone.
"Hwang, you old bastard. Because of you I had to take the scenic route just to eat this one piece."
A chunk of meat that had been braised for hours in a sweet, rich sauce. It was so tender that the moment my chopsticks touched it, the meat split cleanly along the grain. So this was authentic mainland Dongpo pork. I was about to bite into it with a blissful look on my face when—
Crash!
A tremendous racket overhead, and something came pouring down from above. A human-shaped mass hit the floor with a heavy thud. Dirt and splinters of wood floated across the deep, fragrant Dongpo pork broth.
"…Son of a bitch."
Fury shot straight to the top of my head. I seized my staff and shot to my feet. Now I understood why fights always broke out in the inns of martial arts novels. They said even a dog didn't bother a man while he was eating—so what kind of bastard had the nerve?
"Ghk… kuh…"
But the culprit who deserved a full interrogation was lying there with his face gone black, coughing up blood. If he'd fallen headfirst I might have understood—but it wasn't even that high. Why was he like this?
"Keuhk!"
With a final death rattle, he stopped breathing altogether.
"What the hell…"
They said when something was too absurd for words, the words simply wouldn't come. What kind of situation even was this?
Then the clue came from the floor above.
"P-poison! Someone put poison in the food and murdered Master Kang!"
That one shout turned the entire inn into pure chaos. People started frantically spitting out whatever they were chewing.
"Urgh—!"
Inns were places where people from all corners of the Central Plains gathered to eat and drink. And in a Murim full of people with broken personalities, whenever a crowd formed, incidents were practically guaranteed.
"Who would do something this vicious…!"
People shook with rage before the corpse, which had gone stiff and rigid in death.
"Master Jang! Was this you? Poisoning Master Kang!"
"What kind of garbage is that?! Why would I kill Master Kang?!"
"Because you were in love with the sect master's daughter! And Master Kang was her lover, so of course you hated him enough to want him dead!"
The men pouring down from the third floor and launching into a full-blown love triangle drama were the instructors and assistant instructors of the Ilpung Martial Hall, based at Beijing's west gate. They'd finished training the officials early today and come for a light drink—only to walk into this disaster.
"Nonsense! I let that go ages ago! How can you accuse me of this…!"
"Ha! Look at that—so you admit you did hold a grudge! And you were sitting right next to him, which made slipping the poison easy!"
"You little—!"
In the Murim, fists usually arrived before words. The two men, longtime rivals by the sound of it, traded shouts until something finally snapped. They didn't draw blades, but a ferocious brawl charged with internal energy erupted on the spot.
Crack! Smash! Crunch!
Tables and chairs shattered the moment they met a martial artist's hands. Dishes and food went flying, and the inn collapsed back into pandemonium.
"Aigo! No! My inn—my inn!"
And there was the innkeeper, watching it all and wailing in helpless despair.
"Stop! Both of you, withdraw your internal energy! Or neither of you will ever set foot in the hall again!"
At the sect master's thunderous warning, both instructors halted—eyes still bloodshot.
"It could have been an outsider. As you well know, we ruined four rival halls and made more than a few enemies."
At that, the people of Ilpung Martial Hall began scanning the diners around them with suspicious eyes. One instructor fixed on a waiter who looked a little too cocky.
"You—come to think of it, you were unusually slow bringing the food! Don't tell me you put the poison in!"
Their arrows swung toward the waiter, the last person who could have touched the dishes.
"W-what? N-no, sir! Absolutely not! What grudge would I have against great heroes of the jianghu…!"
Naturally the waiter nearly jumped out of his skin, denying everything. But men who had just lost a comrade to poison—the most despised method in the Murim—had no interest in hearing excuses from a mere waiter.
"We'll beat the truth out of him soon enough!"
"Aigo, please spare me! Great heroes!"
At this rate they were going to thrash the cook next. Through half-lidded eyes I looked deep into the waiter's inner nature. He was a rude little shit who treated people like beggars based on appearances alone—but he wasn't carrying the killing intent of a poisoner. That was something only I, as the Heavenly Killing Star, could see.
"Hold your hands, heroes. That waiter isn't the culprit."
Every member of Ilpung Martial Hall turned to stare at me.
"And who are you, to stick your nose in?"
Well. When people suddenly ask who you are, it's hard to know how to answer.
"I'm Dan Mujin. Troubleshooter."
I hadn't come here on a commission today. And introducing myself as a low-rank vagabond would only get me laughed at.
"Troubleshooter? Isn't that what they call those heretic street thugs who do anything for money?"
"I'm not like those people. My master is the Divine Wind Daoist, and the righteous qi of the orthodox Murim flows through my meridians."
"…What? The Divine Wind Daoist!"
When I also produced the Eunseong Merchant Group's silver token—proof that the mysterious master was staying with them—people finally looked at me with new eyes. Drawing sword qi in front of half of Beijing had at least earned me a little recognition. Still, I really needed a proper title of my own to back these claims up.
"So then, disciple of the Divine Wind Daoist—who do you think the culprit is? You wouldn't have stepped in without knowing, would you?"
The master of Ilpung Martial Hall swept the room with his gaze as he asked.
Actually? I had stepped in without knowing. I'd only intervened because I didn't like watching an innocent waiter get beaten. The inn was full of other martial artists, and most of them had piled up roughly the same amount of killing karma, so pinpointing anyone was hard.
But whether I liked it or not, every eye in the room locked onto the sudden interloper. I was awkwardly scratching my cheek, wondering how to handle this, when a surge of crimson energy suddenly flared up and shaped itself into a pointing finger.
"…?"
On a hunch, I looked deeper through half-lidded eyes—and only then felt the sheer scale and density of the killing karma. And the moment I claimed to know the culprit, the man quietly slipped a small bottle deeper into his robes.
"Well, I'll be damned."
Sitting there playing the calm, innocent victim, putting on a whole performance. Finding a wolf in a mask hiding among the sheep—that was exactly what this was.
Scarlet characters burned into the air.
The communication still came in broken fragments, but the rough translation was clear enough: kill that man and absorb the killing karma he'd piled up. I ignored the suggestion completely and decided to simply expose the culprit.
"That man is the killer!"
When I pointed him out without hesitation, people stared in shock. The master of Ilpung Martial Hall also widened his eyes in disbelief and asked me again.
"What… are you certain?"
I answered with absolute conviction.
"I swear it on my grandfather's name!"