Chapter 1047. I Was a Madman Too. (2)
Daepungru.
Once, this tavern in the center of Hangzhou must have been dazzling enough to deserve its grand name, but now half of it had collapsed, leaving its ugly skeleton exposed to the sky.
Only a week ago, it had been noisy with courtesans’ laughter, music, and the drunken boasting of revelers. Now, all that remained was a desolate silence.
On the highest floor of the still-standing ruin, a man sat by the window.
Trickle.
A translucent liquid, faintly tinted with red light, poured into the cup. The rich aroma of liquor spread softly in all directions.
Thud.
Dan Ja-gang set the bottle down and silently stared at the wine filling the white cup. After a long while, he reached out and lifted it.
The liquor flowed slowly into his mouth. He closed his eyes, savoring the faint fragrance lingering in the air. The sensation of the alcohol sliding down his throat was vivid. Dan Ja-gang quietly lowered the cup again.
“Hoo...”
A sigh escaped him. Was it because the alcohol displeased him? No—the opposite.
The scent seemed to soak into his entire body, not just his nose. Anyone who had tasted this liquor would come to a painful realization: alcohol was not merely something to drink until drunk, but something to be enjoyed for its true flavor and aroma.
Yes. Anyone who had tasted it, that was.
“...For us...”
Dan Ja-gang slowly looked up at the sky. Beyond the shattered ceiling, a half-tilted moon hung in view.
“We never had the chance.”
That thought left him hollow.
What truly gnawed at him was not the fact that the cultists could not enjoy such liquor. It was that they lived their lives never even knowing such a thing existed in the world.
Few people mourn the absence of what they never possessed. Regret comes only when something once held is lost. The cultists, never even knowing what had been denied them, were not permitted the luxury of sorrow.
Even now, countless followers of the Cult lived their lives treating cheap swill—too crude to even be called alcohol—as their only drink. They mourned and longed for that one lowly bottle.
What would they think if they tasted this here? What on earth would they say if they saw the banquet of fine liquor packed wall to wall and stored even in the warehouses?
“Haha...”
They might hate the infidels of the Central Plains all the more, those who casually enjoyed everything they themselves could never savor.
“Hahaha.”
Or perhaps they would resent the upper leadership of the Cult for never telling them such a thing existed.
“Ha... hahahat...”
And maybe... just maybe—
Dan Ja-gang froze for an instant and slowly shook his head. Blasphemous thoughts kept creeping into his mind.
His indifferent hand filled the cup again. Then he raised it and drained it in one go.
After repeating the same motion several times, Dan Ja-gang turned his empty stare toward the window. When he first arrived here, the city had shone so brightly with people and lantern light that it almost hurt to look at.
But now only darkness and bleakness remained.
Just like the world they lived in.
Only now... yes, only now had the people of this city and the cultists become equal. But...
If equality meant sharing in misery, then what did that leave the cultists with?
Relief that others now suffered the same pain? Or the petty thrill of dragging those who lived in high places down to their own level?
“Hahaha.”
It was all just ridiculous.
Perhaps soon the whole world would become like this place. Brilliant lights would vanish, fertile land would be stained with blood, and the streets that once overflowed with laughter would be filled only with death and silence.
And what would remain was simply...
“Heavenly Demon’s return, and the reverence of ten thousand demons...”
Dan Ja-gang closed his eyes.
Yes. What remained was not the cultists, but only that teaching. The Heavenly Demon would return, and all the demons of the world would bow to him.
“Heavenly Demon’s return, and the reverence of ten thousand demons.”
Their mantra. Their everything. The only truth they were meant to preserve.
And yet Dan Ja-gang wanted to ask. A sorrowful question he had never once dared to voice, but one he could no longer bear to leave unspoken kept stabbing at him.
“Heavenly Demon...”
Had his faith grown dim? No, it had not.
Even as he felt every contradiction to the marrow of his bones, his devotion to the Heavenly Demon did not waver in the slightest. Rather, precisely because of that, he could not help but ask this one question.
“This unworthy one dares to ask the Heavenly Demon...”
Heavenly Demon’s return, and the reverence of ten thousand demons. Heavenly Demon’s return, and the reverence of ten thousand demons.
“This filthy world will be purified as the Heavenly Demon desires. And soon, the glorious demonic heavens will arrive.”
This was a grand celebration for him. Also, a holy war for him.
But he wanted to ask.
After all of that was achieved, then what? What lay beyond that?
When the returning Heavenly Demon was welcomed, this world purified, and the demonic heavens opened at last, what kind of life were the cultists supposed to live?
No one ever spoke of what came after. No one ever discussed the next world. No one had ever wondered, because they had not even fulfilled the first command their Heavenly Demon had given them. They had no right to think about what came next.
Leaning back in his chair, Dan Ja-gang tipped his head against the rest. Emptiness settled in his eyes.
“...What is there, Heavenly Demon. What is...”
What are we enduring this long passage of time for? And what are we meant to fight for?
Even if all of this is glorious only for the Heavenly Demon, we would still walk that road gladly, smiling as we went. But... why does your mercy never turn toward us even once?
“Haha...”
How absurd. All of it. It was all just absurd.
Tap, tap, tap, tap.
Then quick footsteps sounded from the stairs leading down to the lower floor. Without bothering to turn his head, Dan Ja-gang received the visitor.
“Bishop.”
Jeokil climbed the stairs and immediately prostrated himself before Dan Ja-gang.
“An army of infidels has breached the outskirts, and fighting has broken out.”
He swallowed hard and continued his report.
“There are more than five hundred of them.”
Dan Ja-gang showed no particular reaction. Normally, even the mere awareness of those filthy infidels would have made him tremble with rage.
“Five hundred...”
Instead, he murmured in a slack voice.
“So they’re after my head.”
“A most blasphemous act, but that is what it appears to be.”
“I see.”
Dan Ja-gang’s gaze drifted beyond the window.
No matter how far the outskirts of Hangzhou were from here, the fact that he had not noticed so many approaching men meant his mind was that distracted.
“My head...”
His eyes, fixed on the moon, were veiled in a hideous emptiness like mist. The old him would have rushed out the moment he heard the report and moved to punish them. But now, for some reason, he did not feel like it.
“What do you think should be done?”
At the question, Jeokil answered at once.
“The men are currently engaged by ordinary cultists patrolling the outskirts. The faithful demonic troops of the district are already moving to punish them, so there would be no need for the Bishop to intervene personally.”
“Is that so...”
Dan Ja-gang reached for the bottle again and began pouring more liquor into the cup.
Trickle.
The red-tinged liquor rose to the brim.
Jeokil’s face stiffened at that leisurely gesture. Even after reporting on those who opposed the Cult, Dan Ja-gang still gave no reaction.
But in that instant—
“...How dare they.”
The world began to tremble. The malevolent force bursting from Dan Ja-gang shook not only the air, but even this tavern itself.
Jeokil’s breath caught in his throat from that aura, and he slammed his forehead to the floor in a hurry.
“B-Bishop, please, restrain your anger...”
“Jeokil.”
“Yes! Bishop.”
A bloodthirsty voice leaked from Dan Ja-gang’s lips.
“They dare to oppose the Heavenly Demon. Tear into their flesh, grind their bones, and exact payment for their sins. Make this vile world understand exactly what price must be paid for disbelief.”
“Heavenly Demon’s return, and the reverence of ten thousand demons!”
Thud!
Jeokil smashed his head against the floor. Then he carefully got up and shot down the stairs like a gust of wind.
As his presence faded, Dan Ja-gang’s eyes sank darkly.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Amitabha!”
A mighty Buddhist chant rang out, and golden light surged forward.
BOOM!
A heavy explosion erupted. The charging Demonic Cultists were unable to withstand the power contained within the palm strike and were thrown back. But the instant their backs touched the ground, they sprang up again and rushed forward with shrill cries.
“Kuh!”
For the first time, a suppressed groan burst from Hye Yeon’s lips.
“Keep moving!”
But there was no time to stop and think. Cheong Myeong’s voice kept driving them onward.
Cheong Myeong and Mount Hua’s elite forces that he had led here.
Jang Il-so and the Red Dogs following behind him.
When Cheong Myeong first said they would leave the battlefield to the Black Ghost Fort and enter Hangzhou, most of them had not understood why that choice had to be made.
But now everyone understood what it meant.
‘Damn it!’
Baek Cheon clenched his teeth. There was no end in sight to the Demonic Cultists charging at them. What they had met outside Hangzhou had only been a tiny fraction of the whole, mere scouts.
The deeper they pushed in, the more intense the demonic energy became. The pressure of it alone made breathing difficult.
Whoosh!
Baek Cheon kicked off the ground and unleashed his sword at full power against the Demonic Cultists charging from the front line.
The crimson sword energy burst upward and scattered into dozens of afterimages, then mercilessly tore through the cultists’ bodies.
“Kaaaaugh!”
The cultists, their bodies riddled with holes, let out miserable screams. Yet even then, they kept swinging their unnaturally long claws with desperate ferocity.
“Aah!”
As Jo Geol rushed in to support Baek Cheon and block the attack—
Fwaaaang!
With a piercing shriek of air, a golden meteor-like strike shot in and smashed the heads of the cultists in front of Baek Cheon to pieces in an instant.
“You should be careful, little one.”
A warm voice rolled out thickly. Baek Cheon’s face twisted as he turned his head.
“Jang Il-so!”
“It’s no good to get too excited. Don’t exhaust yourself before the real work is done. You still have many things to do, after all.”
“Kuh!”
Baek Cheon bit down hard on his lip. The fact that he had been helped by Jang Il-so made the humiliation all the worse.
Then—
Fwaaaat!
Cheong Myeong’s sword flew in and severed the neck of the Demonic Cultist charging toward Jang Il-so.
“Don’t dawdle, idiot!”
“My, how kind of you.”
Jang Il-so smiled lopsidedly. Even now, Cheong Myeong’s eyes were rapidly sweeping the battlefield from side to side.
Where is it?
His senses spread outward in all directions.
There was no way to predict how a bishop would act. They were all too different. So trying to guess his location in this vast Hangzhou and find him that way was impossible.
But there was no need to do that.
He only had to find the place where the densest demonic energy was flowing within this suffocating sea of miasma. With senses far sharper than before, it should not be difficult.
A moment later, Cheong Myeong’s head snapped upward.
Hangzhou, where all the tall buildings had been reduced to rubble. On that flattened land stretching all the way to the horizon, only one pavilion still jutted up alone.
“Well now...”
Cheong Myeong bared his teeth in a grin.
“Looks like I’m not the only one who’s feeling friendly.”
A ferocious killing intent poured from Cheong Myeong’s eyes.