The Half-Moon Face in the Cave
A short while later, once the commotion had settled, the village of the Nanman Beast Palace grew quiet.
"Is this everything? Nothing else weird stashed on me?"
Before I could forget, I confiscated Ilhong's thyme tracker first thing.
Privacy was a thing, after all. Sneaking tracking devices onto people like that? As the boss, I was not having it.
"…Of course not."
Ilhong answered while staring off at a distant mountain, carefully avoiding my eyes.
I fixed her with a deeply skeptical look.
"Why pull something like this in the first place?"
The gifted heir of Haomu Gate, using an expensive tracking tool obtained through Yin-Yang Gu poison just to secretly follow a guy like me… I genuinely could not figure out her reasoning.
"Because you keep getting seduced…"
Apparently she'd caught my muttering, because she mumbled something under her breath in a crawling little voice.
"What was that?"
"Lady Dang, Ju Wolay too… Anyway, it's the boss's fault."
Suddenly she was scolding me like I was somehow partly to blame.
I was still standing there baffled by that nonsense when Dang Yeohye poked me in the arm from the side.
"Hey. Hey. People keep staring at us."
Four unfamiliar outsiders showing up at once must have been a novelty. The people of the Nanman Beast Palace were peeking out of every house, openly studying us.
"Is it because our skin's so pale?"
"Maybe it's because you're short."
Thwack.
I took a hit to the backside as payment for the joke. Unlike before, though, there was no real force behind it — it barely even hurt. At some point, that distinctive poison edge of hers had completely drained away whenever she aimed it at me.
"Anyway, so… you got here first, made contact with the Palace Lord, and explained the situation, right?"
When I told her waiting here would be fine, Dang Yeohye stuffed the crumpled map into her robes and asked again.
"Yes. Once I said we were here to eradicate the Human-Faced Spider, they offered full cooperation. Looks like there's some kind of grudge."
"…Nice work. The bridge marked on the map was out, and after careening down that river we completely lost the trail. You just saved us a lot of hassle."
Praise from her was a rare sight.
"On a job, you've got to move sharp. I am a troubleshooter, you know."
"Well, you're better than those unorthodox thugs who only think about fleecing people for money."
"Whoa, you can't go lumping me in with that kind of trash."
Five hundred percent client satisfaction. Kindness and service that kept them coming back. Putting the Dan Mujin Agency on the same level as some unorthodox lowlifes? Absolutely unthinkable. Linguistic absurdity.
"To think I'd see a daughter of the Dang Clan here in Nanman. Live long enough and you really do see everything."
At that moment, Palace Lord Maeng Hogon approached us astride a massive wolf, with guides and Beast Palace martial artists trailing behind him.
"That's Palace Lord Maeng Hogon."
His entrance was pure wild ferocity. At my introduction, the rest of the party offered him a clean martial salute.
"This palace has suffered enough at the hands of Poison Valley that we normally loathe any martial artist who deals in toxins. However."
Maeng Hogon's piercing gaze swept over Dang Yeohye.
"Our goals align, so for today, you are more than welcome."
There was a peculiar undercurrent of anticipation in his tone — something heavier than simply pulling a long-rotted tooth, a deep and long-held feeling.
"Sounds like there's a personal grudge involved."
"…There is. With this chance, I ought to at least soothe the children's mother's grievance, don't you think?"
Ah. So that was why, in this tightly knit community, those kids alone had no mother in sight. The Palace Lord went on to explain that she had gone missing in the creature's territory and there had been no word of her since.
"We'll catch it for sure."
"Of course."
The people of the Nanman Beast Palace wore grim, resolute faces. The Human-Faced Spider Extermination Unit had just doubled in size.
The road toward the Human-Faced Spider's lair.
Having lost the convenient option of a bridge, we were forced to climb Mount Akgui by a far more brutal path than before. We scaled places that weren't roads at all, slipping again and again on the steep terrain, continuing a precarious ascent. Still, with experts who knew this mountain cold leading the way, we somehow managed — through sheer grit and stubbornness — to climb into the thickening fog.
Two days of mountain travel later, as we drew near the creature's den, we paused to rest and conserve our strength before the final battle.
Chomp chomp. Slurp. Gulp.
The sound of someone wolfing down a mountain of food piled in front of him. Preserved rations the Nanman Beast Palace people had pressed on us with orders to win no matter what, plus fresh meat the guides had hunted nearby.
"Boss, are you going to be able to move after eating like that?"
"Normally people fast before a fight to keep their bodies light… He's weird."
Obviously I was packing my stomach full of nutrients in advance, because I fully expected the deadly poison to have me dancing on the edge of life and death a few more times. The women from the Central Plains just shook their heads, unable to understand.
"Whoa, big brother's amazing!"
"It just keeps going in. The more you look, the more he looks like Hyeol-ungmyo."
And then there were the little ones, staring at me from either side with mystical awe as I vacuumed down food like a human black hole.
I'd wondered why they'd brought kids on such a dangerous road, but Palace Lord Maeng Hogon had explained that as heirs of the Nanman Beast Palace, they had to be present at the place where vengeance was carried out. And of course, wherever those children went, the palace mascot Hyeol-ungmyo came with them.
"Why is a giant panda here instead of in Sichuan…?"
Dang Yeohye muttered, looking completely dumbfounded at the towering beast standing right in front of her, as if its sheer unreality had finally hit her.
"She's not just a regular panda. More like something else wearing a panda's shape."
Having spent a few more days around the creature than she had, I offered that explanation. A spirit beast that had absorbed the energy of heaven and earth for so long it had developed the same kind of uncanny spiritual nature as the Human-Faced Spider itself.
"Well, she's blood-red like the Blood Night Boar… She looks strong enough that it's reassuring, at least."
"She is pretty imposing, yeah."
There was always that saying that red things looked three times faster and stronger than any other color. Still, though—
"Ahem. How can you say that about a lady… Watch your mouth. She's surprisingly delicate, you know."
I pointed at Hyeol-ungmyo, who was standing on two legs and running through some bizarre set of movements.
The Central Plains crowd stared at me like I was insane. Honestly, this whole Central Plains society was just cold and short on consideration.
Whoosh, thwack! Thwack!
Even while we were talking, the red panda was completely absorbed in whatever she was doing, extending claws and feet with focused intensity. I'd been quietly chewing on rabbit meat roasted over the campfire and watching, when something strange started to emerge the longer I looked.
A sense of wasted force being minimized, of every motion in her body being wrung out for maximum efficiency…
"Is that… martial arts?"
It was fluid yet packed with power, like the movements of an external arts master. Hyeol-ungmyo was unleashing systematic attacks that made her massive frame look almost elegant.
"Palace Lord, what did you teach her?"
"Ah, I taught her the martial arts of the Nanman Beast Palace. Modified them a bit to suit four-legged walking, of course."
"…"
Papapat!
After fiercely sweeping those giant claws, she dropped into an ambiguous four-legged stance that forced her imaginary opponent into a hard choice — two options, neither good. It was like watching a bear from some fighting game.
"Wow… Unbelievable."
So martial arts pandas actually existed. What were you even supposed to call that — Panda Divine Fist?
It was the most astonishing thing I'd seen since arriving in the Central Plains.
At last we arrived before a sizable cave, from which an ominous aura and thick miasma poison billowed out.
The sinister energy flowing from within was so unsettling that the Nanman Beast Palace martial artists had already fallen back and were pinching their noses shut. Even so, they didn't retreat the way they usually would — they all seemed to understand that this was their chance to wipe the creature out for good.
"From here on, there's nothing more we can do, Young Hero Dan Mujin."
Palace Lord Maeng Hogon said it with genuine regret in his voice. In his heart he wanted to charge in for his wife's revenge, but the children left behind weighed on him, and he clenched his teeth hard.
"It's not much of a substitute, but I'll send Hyeol-ungmyo with you. She's resistant to poison."
"Oh. Suddenly feeling a whole lot better about this."
I glanced over at Hyeol-ungmyo, who was chomping down the poison materials and treats the kids were tossing her. She seemed a little worked up ahead of the coming fight, and the children were gently soothing her.
"Big brother, big sisters — don't just stand there. Say something nice about our panda."
"Tell her she's beautiful, or that her fur is soft."
My party and I all tilted our heads at the sudden order to compliment the beast. We were supposed to call that blood-red, viciously clawed monster beautiful?
"Uh, why bother?"
"You have to praise her and imprint your faces before a fight."
"Otherwise when she gets excited, she can't tell friend from foe and shreds everything around her."
Right on cue, Hyeol-ungmyo finished her meal and rose onto two legs with a heavy thud, thud. The sunlight vanished as her enormous shadow fell over our heads.
"Ah, aigoo. How pretty…"
"Oh my, how c-cute she is!"
The slightly terrified group began desperately praising Hyeol-ungmyo's beauty.
"Kuheung."
Squelch, squelch.
The view ahead was dark and foreboding. We pressed deeper into the cave, stepping on rotting soil. A foul space where murderous energy and miasma poison seeped out in slow, crawling waves. The chosen warriors who had set foot here were only me, Dang Yeohye, and Hyeol-ungmyo.
"Mmph, whuh uh."
"You're fine for now. Take out the poison-repelling bead and talk."
Just in case, Dang Yeohye had already swallowed a detoxification pill and was holding a poison-repelling bead in her mouth, which made her produce some very strange sounds. She shifted the bead aside and tried again.
"What's that round thing?"
"Hmm. If I had to name it, a Super Mini Mini Thunderbolt Bomb."
"…?"
"Ilhong gave it to me at the entrance. Said it would help."
I thought back to that moment. Disguised as a man, she'd casually pulled yet another item from those baggy robes of hers. What came out in her hand was an iron sphere about the size of a small rock.
I'd asked her what it was.
'Black powder packed into a steel ball.'
The description sounded a lot like a Thunderbolt Bomb. The difference was just how tiny it was.
'The moment it shows itself, throw this right away.'
'Why? It's so small it doesn't look like it'd do much.'
If I had to guess, it might just about blow off the hand of whoever was holding it.
'Once you're inside, the first thing you'll see is a round white face that draws the eye. The Haomu Gate's Spirit Beast Compendium says that face bewitches people and steals their reason.'
Like an anglerfish's lure, reeling in its prey.
'So even if the blast is weak, the noise and explosion should shatter its bewitching technique.'
'You're a one-stop shop, aren't you.'
That was how I'd ended up with yet another of Ilhong's little tools. What exactly were the Imperial Palace people up to these days, leaking black powder all over the place like this? Well, they did seem busy beating each other up.
"Mujin. Something's moving."
The distinctive noise of a multi-legged arthropod — many legs skittering in rapid succession. Dang Yeohye, Hyeol-ungmyo, and I all raised our auras, bracing for the fight about to begin.
Chzzzt—
In the pitch-dark cave, my staff flared with qi bright as a torch. It was the one the kids had recovered for me when they'd pulled me out of the river.
"Hey. Hey."
Dang Yeohye urgently slapped at my arm. When I turned, her face had gone pale with shock as she pointed deeper into the cave.
"What is i—"
I sucked in a sharp breath and my words died.
In the thick darkness of the cave, a face like a half-moon floated silently in the air, watching us without a sound.