A Truly Diplomatic Fight
It was not that Namgung Jin had raised his internal energy to press Hwiyeom with formless qi.
A renowned master of the orthodox path—an adult intimidating a child in that fashion—would itself become an object of condemnation and mockery.
Yet every person carries an atmosphere, a presence of their own, do they not?
This was the oppressive aura of a man who, as Young Lord of the Namgung Family, had reigned over others for nearly thirty years.
An ordinary rising talent of the martial world would have found it difficult even to open his mouth under that pressure. Hwiyeom was different.
The reason was simple.
"Since the Young Lord of the Namgung Family has come in person, we have merely sent someone of matching stature. There is no other intent. Or…"
Hwiyeom's eyes curved gently, as if looking down with fond amusement upon a child's clumsy trick.
"Are you saying that your own stature is equal to that of our Family Head?"
If Namgung Jin's oppressive presence was the qi of one who had ruled from above for thirty years as Young Lord of the Namgung Family, then Hwiyeom had lived nearly thirty years after becoming CEO of the world's foremost corporation in his forties, and had already spent fifteen years as Young Lord of the Sichuan Dang Family as well.
It was the equivalent of a frog at the bottom of a well—one that had not even finished growing—trying to lecture a whale that swam the great ocean on the vastness of its well. How could any contest of presence even take place?
Namgung Jin felt Hwiyeom's clear gaze like that of a seasoned master chiding him, You're old enough to know better; stop with the childish contests of presence, and closed his mouth without realizing it.
What is this? A mere youth barely past twenty standing before me, not only uncowed… but rather…
He cleared his throat.
"Ahem! I did not say that. I merely meant that I have come with full authority as representative of the Great Namgung Family, so for smooth dialogue the other side ought likewise to send someone holding full authority."
"Then there is no problem. I, too, have come holding full authority."
"…Is that so."
The light probing exchange ended in Hwiyeom's technical victory. Namgung Jin reached for his teacup, then nodded slightly at the pitch-black Caffa filling it.
"So this is the rumored Caffa? I shall enjoy it."
"Yes. If it is a little bitter, adding a bit of the sugar and milk beside you is quite good."
"No need."
As if to display his own magnanimity, Namgung Jin drank the Caffa without hesitation.
Because the Sichuan Dang Family was known as the progenitor of poisons, guests visiting the family tended to shy away from the food for no good reason, and the jet-black appearance of the Caffa only made it look more suspicious still.
Just looking at it, one could not help thinking it was the perfect vehicle for poison, could one not?
That he drank it without showing the slightest reluctance was, as a guest, a reasonably courteous gesture. No doubt he meant for it to offset the earlier discourtesy about the Family Head and so forth. Hwiyeom smiled faintly.
"I would like to hear the purpose of your visit. If sightseeing is the goal, I will gladly show you somewhere pleasant."
In other words, let us not waste each other's time. Namgung Jin nodded at Hwiyeom's words.
"Beating around the bush does not suit my temperament, so I will speak plainly. Young Lord, the Sichuan Dang Family's rapid rise is something we of the Namgung Family, head of the Nine Great Noble Families, find most gratifying."
"I am grateful to hear it."
"However… why do you quietly treat our family—also one of the Nine Great Noble Families—as an adversary while drawing closer to Shaolin Temple of the Nine Sects and One Gang?"
Originally the Nine Sects and One Gang and the Nine Great Noble Families, though both orthodox and members of the Martial Alliance, competed with one another.
To call it competition was generous, given that the Nine Great Noble Families were somewhat weaker than the Nine Sects and One Gang…
In any case, the Sichuan Dang Family's recent course of action would, from the perspective of the Nine Great Noble Families, have looked rather like betrayal.
Using that as his pretext, Namgung Jin launched his attack. Hwiyeom smiled and counterattacked.
"That is a misunderstanding. Our family also wishes to remain close to the Namgung Family. However… circumstances keep getting tangled."
"Circumstances get tangled?"
"Yes. Under His Majesty the Emperor's command we are obliged to construct the Second State-run Ironworks along the Yangtze, yet the local magnates keep interfering, do they not? To resist their pressure we simply needed Shaolin Temple's help. While we are on the subject, the magnates of Anhui are truly vicious. Aigoo… they have money-poison running thick in their veins…"
"…"
To Namgung Jin's ears, Hwiyeom's words sounded like this:
[While we were building the State-run Ironworks, the little flies from your side swarmed in at once to obstruct us. So was I supposed to not pick up Shaolin's shield? You money-poisoned bastards throw the first punch and then come talking about the Nine Great Noble Families?]
Anger surged at being spoken to like that by a youth young enough to be his son, yet Namgung Jin coldly suppressed it and smiled as if he understood nothing.
"You have truly suffered. The grain merchants of Anhui Province are a tough lot, after all."
[Didn't you strike our grain merchants first and nibble away a great deal of our profit?]
"Dear me, you have had a hard time of it. When one leads a family that represents an entire province, all sorts of problems naturally arise."
[You fail to keep your underlings in line and then come whining?]
"Haha! Indeed. We too have been trying various means to keep them down, yet the effect seems to be dwindling, which worries me. It would not do for them to bring shame upon a state enterprise, would it?"
[If you keep going like this, we will set our minds to wrecking things. Can you handle it?]
"Quite so. There is much cause for concern. Yet human greed does not seem so easily suppressed. Still, with Shaolin Temple stepping forward as mediator, how could we not be grateful?"
[Go ahead and try. If you think you can take on Shaolin.]
The words that passed between them were gentle and their expressions mild, yet the hidden meanings within were utterly merciless. The conversation continued.
"It seems our family might be able to offer assistance instead."
[Hey, how about cutting off Shaolin's hand and taking ours instead?]
So that was the real point.
Hwiyeom smiled quietly.
"That is most kind of you, yet I fear the magnates' ill will might turn toward the Namgung Family."
[You used the magnates to pressure us and now you pretend not to know?]
The Namgung Family could not, of course, move the great provincial magnates. Lesser magnates and wealthy merchants, however, they could move easily enough, and those men were already throwing up obstacles in various of Hwiyeom's enterprises.
In truth a war without gunfire had already begun, and Hwiyeom was already holding Shaolin's hand. Severing that hand to take the Namgung Family's would be a foolish choice—both in terms of practical benefit and in terms of justification.
It had been the Dang Family that first sought a deal and requested help from Shaolin. For the Dang Family to cut that bond first was, in the martial world of Jianghu, simply not done.
At that moment Namgung Jin spoke as if he had been waiting for the opening.
"We are aware that the magnates' recent actions have gone too far. I hear that the Sichuan Dang Family's branch houses and their associates throughout Anhui Province and the surrounding provinces are meeting with rough treatment?"
Namgung Jin's eyes gleamed as he leaned his upper body forward.
"Before things grow worse, our family could step in and mediate for them."
Look at this bastard.
Hwiyeom smiled coldly.
Namgung Jin's words were nothing less than a veiled threat.
[If you do not cut ties with Shaolin, we will harm the Sichuan Dang Family's branch houses and their associates. Depending on how you behave, it may grow even worse.]
Hwiyeom was not so dense as to miss the meaning buried within.
Whether unorthodox or orthodox… well, the nature of interest groups is inevitably much the same…
No matter that the Sichuan Dang Family was a rising sun, there were natural limits to how well one could protect countless people beyond reach in Anhui Province, which was not their home ground.
Yet the moment they bowed in order to protect those people, they would inevitably fall under the Namgung Family's sway. That much was as clear as day.
Above all, to yield to such intimidation would not be the Sichuan Dang Family.
Wearing his characteristic smile, Hwiyeom looked straight into Namgung Jin's eyes.
"I appreciate the goodwill, yet such things can happen anywhere. They are hardly unique to our Dang Family, so there is no need for you to trouble yourself over them."
This time Namgung Jin's brows twitched.
Hwiyeom's words could be read in several ways.
Does he mean he will not yield even if we use the branch houses living abroad and their associates as hostages? Or…
Namgung Jin felt Hwiyeom's words lodge in his chest like a thorn.
[Such things can happen anywhere. They are hardly unique to our Dang Family.]
The phrase almost sounded like—
[The same can happen just as easily to the blood of your Namgung Family. Do you think we cannot?]
—a retaliatory threat of his own.
"A pity. It would be far more effective than borrowing Shaolin's hand… Speak up whenever you feel the lack."
"Yes. Should the Namgung Family ever find itself in need of our family's help, please contact us at any time. We will assist with all our heart."
"Hahaha! We shall do so."
They parted with smiling faces and polite farewells, yet Namgung Jin's expression as he left the Dang Family was stiff and hard.
"Insolent brat. Does he think that just because we share the title of Young Lord we stand on the same level…"
Namgung Jin buried himself in the carriage and snorted.
"He struts about in some tiny corner of Bashu no better than the southern barbarians and fancies himself somebody. A frog in a well—exactly the phrase for a fellow like that."
Namgung Jin found it absurd.
What manner of family was the Namgung Family?
The foremost martial family under heaven, and the foremost sword family under heaven.
For centuries they had reigned as the overlords of Anhui, the very yolk of the Central Plains where the fiercest struggles of the continent were fought.
Generation after generation they had produced sword masters who defined their eras, and they had rendered great service in driving out the Yuan, earning from Emperor Gyeongtaejo Cheonmu the appraisal that they "truly possessed the qualifications to style themselves the Imperial Sword Family."
Martial artists who stuck arrogant words such as "emperor," "imperial," or "king" into their names had existed since ancient times, yet the Namgung Family alone had received official recognition from the imperial house.
And yet some country bumpkin—a whelp young enough to be his own son—dared crawl forward claiming the same title of Young Lord and spouted words that grew more outrageous the more one listened.
He ought to have admitted his past wrongs and begged with his tail between his legs to be allowed in even now. Instead, what? Go ahead and try? Let's see what happens?
"Driving out a few horse-riding barbarians has made his liver swell outside his belly. Our ancestors, with a single sword, plucked the heads of Yuan generals from among a million troops as easily as taking something from their pockets."
Well now—if there had truly been men who could face three hundred and thirty thousand cavalry with a single blade, why would the Song have fallen to the Yuan?
Pride in his ancestors and confidence in his family's martial arts had grown so excessive that they obscured the truth, yet the fault was not his alone.
It had always been said that eight-tenths of Jianghu rumor should be filtered out.
And the military feats the Sichuan Dang Family had achieved had been far too unrealistic.
What? Hundreds of men held off three hundred and thirty thousand cavalry without dying?
Ha, then I must be a master of the Realm of Profundity—kekeke.
That was the current view of martial artists who underestimated the Dang Family.
Ironically, it was the bureaucratic world outside the martial world that more accurately perceived and feared the Sichuan Dang Family's strength and potential.
In any case, Namgung Jin clicked his tongue.
"Tsk. Nothing for it. If a country bumpkin refuses the cup of honor to the end without knowing his place, one must pour the penalty cup instead. Slaughter some twenty households in a suitably brutal fashion and his thinking will change a little."
The words were so lawless they might have come from a demonic overlord of the unorthodox path… yet this was, originally, the true nature of the martial world.
"Hmm. Still, even this backwater has something to recommend it. A carriage with so little jostling… You there, coachman—where can one purchase a carriage like this?"
"Y-yes? Well… for the moment it is a luxury-model haenggeo belonging to Sacheon Haenggeo."
"Sacheon Haenggeo? What is that?"
"Ah, you may think of it as a sort of carriage company operated by the Sichuan Dang Family."
"Is that so?"
Namgung Jin's eyes narrowed for an instant, and a thin killing intent leaked out.
In other words, before a coachman who might well be a Dang Family agent, he had just spent the entire ride bad-mouthing the family and even letting slip that he intended to kill their branch houses.
Shall I kill him?
Namgung Jin considered it briefly, then looked at the coachman's vacant, dim-witted expression, snorted a laugh, and reined in his killing intent.
What would a lowly coachman know anyway.
"Hmm. I should buy a carriage on the way and return in it. Take me to that carriage company."
"Yes, my lord."
The coachman drove the haenggeo toward Sacheon Haenggeo headquarters.
And…
A short while later, Namgung Jin's careless words found their way onto Hwiyeom's desk in a report from Ye-eun.
As Hwiyeom quietly read the report and then smiled sweetly, Hwang Ji-su—currently serving as Second Secretary to fill the vacancy left by Lee Jinmyeong—standing beside him flinched and shuddered for some reason.
"At this level… even if we deal with them ruthlessly, it will not be our fault."
The other side had started it first.
And while Hwiyeom was not the sort who took pleasure in bloodshed, neither was he the sort who hesitated when the time came to spill blood.
Not long afterward, major incidents began to unfold in Anhui Province.
"What did you say…? Sudden death?"