The Sichuan Tang Family (1)
Golden Manor was turned on its head.
The death of Geon-pyeong, the Golden Heavenly Hero, the man everyone had named as closest to the next lordship, rang through the place in a way my own death—quietly smothered and left to fade—never had. His corpse was hurried into a funeral procession, and Madam Dae's order fell at once: seize every last person tied to the matter.
Geum Sa-yeop, called Geumgangsaheun, took the Gold Scale Squadron, Golden Manor's finest elites, and opened the investigation ahead of the rest. In the meantime every fighting force but the manor lord's personal guard was called up. The combat battalions of the Chief Steward's Office, the Iron Mirror Bureau, the Golden Flower Bureau, and Manjeonbang assembled, and even the Golden Ten Pavilions—the auxiliary hands that propped the gang up—were dragged into the muster.
Nearly two thousand fighters gathered in a breath. It was a sudden massing of strength enough to raise the clouds of war over Chengdu. Word would reach the merchant companies, escort agencies, martial halls, and sects rooted in the city before long, and the smaller powers, fearing a stray spark, would not so much as set foot near Golden Manor.
Dawn broke. Noon came.
Golden Tablet Hall.
Aside from two empty golden seats, the principal figures of Golden Manor sat packed to left and right. Madam Dae took one of the vacant places. At the same moment Geum Sa-yeop announced his return, and tension drew tight through the hall.
"Have you uncovered the truth?"
"Yes. The first young master's death has been confirmed to involve an assassin's ambush."
A murmur ran through the assembly.
"Have you identified the assassin?"
Madam Dae pressed on, and Geum Sa-yeop nodded.
"Yes."
"Who? The arrogant wretch who cast aside the way of the martial world and bared his enmity toward this manor."
Every eye fixed on him. I, seated in that same hall, was curious myself.
None of this was chance. Because I had stepped in, something that should never have happened was happening now. Had time run its original course, Geon-pyeong's death made no sense at all. He was a man who ought to have lived a very long while—married Ju Yeo-ran, divorced her, and stumbled through one disaster after another. And yet he had died out of nowhere, on the road back from amusing himself at a pleasure house.
What kind of coincidence was that?
So at first I had suspected two people. Cheon Yu-wol. And Dang Mu-gi, the hornless dragon who would one day swallow Golden Manor whole.
But if it had been Cheon Yu-wol, the pieces refused to fit. She was not the sort to raise a storm over a matter of this scale. She was a far greater figure. Later she might well drive me into a deeper crisis with some move I had not foreseen, but she would never stir up a thing this profitless so early.
Then Dang Mu-gi. That was plausible enough. The venture he had been forcing forward had collapsed, and Geon-hyu would have told him I might stand at the center of it, so killing Geon-pyeong as revenge against Golden Manor was entirely possible. Dang Mu-gi was a man of considerable ambition. There was nothing he would not do.
And yet something was off. I had thought he would have Geon-hyu kidnap me, or strike at those around me. Geon-pyeong was too abrupt.
Wait. Don't tell me this is—
"It was the work of the Gold Dragon Squadron, under the manor lord."
Madam Dae shot up from the golden seat, blood threading her eyes.
"This instant—drive every battalion, secure the manor lord's person and confine him, and seize the entire Gold Dragon Squadron!"
Rebellion, plain and simple. Madam Dae, who had put her hand to a venture the manor lord knew nothing of, meant to crush him before he could strike her. Cleaning up the mess that involved me would come after. She had killed Geon-pyeong—the weakest of them, and the one most sunk in carelessness—and made his death her pretext.
My eyes met hers as she looked down at me. A strangely twisted smile sat on her face, as if to say that I was next.
"The moment the manor lord returns for the funeral, he will be bound."
Her proclamation followed.
While nearly two thousand warriors waited only for the manor lord's return, Madam Dae kept no one in the great hall but me and Geon-hyu.
"Where did you go last night?"
The questioning aimed at me began.
"I made the rounds of the gambling dens I manage."
"They say you wiped out Flower Tiger Hall to the last man. And after that you vanished at your leisure, without another move?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
The moment her words ended, Geon-hyu bore down on me, suspicion and hostility staining his eyes.
"Speak honestly. This is no trifling matter one can simply let pass."
Madam Dae did not bother to restrain him. She only stared straight at me. I let out a short laugh.
"The new hall master running the dens under Flower Tiger Hall overstepped himself with me, so I made an example of him. The rest were following him, not me. Is that a problem?"
"And after that, where did you go? I know you did not return straight to the family. You will name every place you passed through and every place you stayed. Otherwise I will start with that guard you cherish and tear his limbs off."
She came out vicious from the first. Well, a massive investment she had pushed forward without so much as a word to the manor lord had vanished without a trace. It was enough to shake anyone's reason. I did not know how long the venture had been running, but it was a place whose worth was hard to measure—the inner core of the Green Flame Hornless Dragon, and the Ice Crystal Jade, designed by gathering together things that held a powerful yin-cold qi.
There was a reason I had reached the realm of the Three Phases in a single stroke, a height that ought to have taken a long time. Every condition required to temper the Three Phases had already been in place.
I smiled, teeth showing.
"I followed the slush funds of the Golden Flower Bureau and the Iron Mirror Bureau to see where they went. The conclusion was rather amusing."
Geon-hyu snarled.
"So it was you!"
"But looking at it today, it seems a fair amount of Mother's own money went into that place as well, beyond those funds. Did you have the manor lord's permission? Of course you didn't."
Killing intent settled into Madam Dae's eyes.
"So you wish to die. Only the other day you said you would not shrink even from a war of flesh and blood, if it was for my sake."
"I did not take the manor lord's side. Believe me or not, I had no idea Mother's funds were being poured in there."
"......"
"I simply thought it was a force Geon-hyu had raised while he prepared a war among kin. Wasn't it a venture you carried out by using him, without a word to me?"
In truth I had meant to linger in Golden Manor a while longer and keep moving, but this affair made me think I would have to drag that timetable forward.
"This is your fault! Do you have any idea what losses this manor must swallow because of your rash conduct!"
Geon-hyu had lost even his usual composure. His whole bearing said he might draw his sword on me at any instant.
"You fear Dang Mu-gi of the Sichuan Tang Family, yet you don't seem to fear this elder brother at all."
At my sneer, Geon-hyu's eyes shivered in fine tremors. A strange light passed through Madam Dae's as well. Both of them were startled that I knew Dang Mu-gi existed.
"I knew you'd changed, but I didn't know you'd changed enough to strike the back of my head this calmly. What you've done isn't only a blow to me—you've shaken our Golden Manor!"
"I've changed about as much as you have, playing errand boy for the Sichuan Tang Family. I wasn't simply idling."
"......"
"Fool. A mere outer disciple—not even a disciple of the Qingcheng Sect's inner mountain—and you play lackey to the Sichuan Tang. This happened in the first place because you siphoned off slush funds behind my back, and our eldest brother's."
"Th-this was done according to Mother's will!"
"So you're going to blame Mother?"
"You bastard! Mother, I'll cut his throat this instant. His head will settle all of this!"
The ease that had still clung to Geon-hyu's face after his return was gone without a trace. Everything had favored him, and now that the ground had shifted beneath him he bared his violent nature in a fit. It had come suddenly, but from where I stood there was nothing about it that was bad.
Then Madam Dae drew out another thread of suspicion.
"Why, of all things, did you bring down and destroy the Green Flame Hornless Dragon and the Ice Crystal Jade? Those were astronomical assets, beyond anything you could measure."
"I judged they would become poison to this manor. Clutch them in hand and they would only turn into targets for greedy powers. If we cannot keep them, better to destroy them."
Crash!
Madam Dae brought her hand down on the arm of the chair and smashed it.
"There is nothing this body cannot bear!"
Geon-hyu pressed her.
"Only give the word! I'll kill him at once! If we're at the point of cutting down even the manor lord, what's to stop us cutting him!"
Watching Geon-hyu, who for the sake of ambition already spoke of his own father as if the man were a stranger, I let out an empty laugh. Then Madam Dae swept me from head to toe with a sharp gaze.
"You are no match for A-seong. However bound and weakened the Green Flame Hornless Dragon may have been, he has become a master who can destroy it alone. He even collapsed that famed arcane formation of the Sichuan Tang Family."
"I, too, have striven without rest!"
Madam Dae snorted at Geon-hyu's protest.
"Could you, alone, cut down every Juseong Family master and every wanderer who was guarding that place? Even the Green Flame Hornless Dragon?"
"I..."
Geon-hyu could not easily get the words out. He only glared at me.
"I'll make a proposal."
"Let's hear it."
To my surprise, Madam Dae took the offer without resistance.
"I've grasped, roughly, that this was a venture of considerable scale, with a great many powers tied to it. I smashed a honey jar that was overflowing."
"And so?"
"Cover my fault."
"Wouldn't it profit us far more to cut your throat by whatever means and deliver it to them?"
"I don't think so. They still won't have properly grasped who did this. Isn't that why you asked after my movements, Mother?"
"And so?"
"Deny it outright. However this is handled, Dang Mu-gi has no pretext with which to pressure us over it. He carried the thing out in secret to avoid the eyes of the world; he does not know who ruined it; and you, Mother, made use of Golden Manor's slush funds."
Madam Dae's expression grew stranger by degrees. At the same time unease clouded Geon-hyu's eyes. I went on without a pause.
"Then what remains is pressing us with force and authority—but wasn't it Dang Mu-gi who set this in motion to begin with?"
"Are you saying you'll kill Dang Mu-gi?"
"No. Because of this, he is already under considerable pressure from the head of the Sichuan Tang Family, or from some high figure who knows of the matter. If time simply slips by with no solution, what do you think he'll do?"
"He'll bare his fangs and try to bite my throat, and Golden Manor's with it."
"Then we may see the bastard son of the Sichuan Tang Family lunge at Golden Manor with no pretext at all. Force without justification. He stains the Sichuan Tang Family's honor and makes himself an enemy of the martial world. Perfect, isn't it."
"But your plan has a flaw."
"What is it?"
"The Sichuan Tang Family is not the only party in this. An elder of the Qingcheng Sect—that child's master—is involved. It was Guihyeon Jin'in who found the Green Flame Hornless Dragon's habitat, and who, on that child's suggestion, secretly handed the beast to the Sichuan Tang Family behind the Qingcheng Sect Leader's back."
"They have no pretext either. It's the same."
"If Dang Mu-gi, Guihyeon Jin'in, and the disciples of Cheongbaek Palace come for my life without scheming toward another day, how do you mean to stop them?"
"Are you thinking of emptying out everything you own because you fear an ambush without pretext, and playing their dog? Will you hand the golden tower you raised with the manor lord over to someone else's mouth, in a single swallow?"
I deliberately stirred her greed. No—I was letting her hear what she in fact wanted to hear.
"......"
While Madam Dae sank into thought, Geon-hyu hurried to shout at her.
"You must not be played by that wicked tongue! Guihyeon Jin'in and Dang Mu-gi will split Golden Manor apart and destroy it! We have no power to stop them. Mother!"
Then she asked me, "Then there is only one way to strip them of their pretext."
I stared at Geon-hyu without a word.
"Yes. You'll have to tidy away everything connected to this matter."
Sensing that something had gone wrong, Geon-hyu hastily gripped his sword hilt. At the same moment Madam Dae opened her mouth, her gaze indifferent.
As expected. This greedy, beautiful widow's choice was obvious.
"You can't kill me. How could a worthless thing like you kill me!"
"The fact that you keep barking," I added, facing him where he stood opposite me, "means you're afraid."
Geon-hyu was the first to kick off the ground. Sword-qi rose as he unleashed the martial art of the Qingcheng Sect.
"Fine, then—try and kill me!"
The sword art of the Qingcheng Sect unfurled in a single rising stroke.
I had once taken even a Qingcheng elder's sword on a ferocious battlefield. Geon-hyu's blade could leave no impression on me. I advanced half a step and broke his balance, then drove another half step in deep and severed his sword-path. He snatched the blade back in a rush, meaning to counter.
"Too late."
At a single stroke of mine the sword snapped, and Geon-hyu's wrist went with it.
"Gyaaah!"
Screaming with his throat bared, he never saw the kick coming. The toe of my foot, laden with the strength of a thousand catties, shattered his shin.
The words Geon-hyu had once thrown at me, mocking the lot I was in, flickered past.
"Yes. That's how it should be."
My sword punched through his chest, again and again. Thuk. Thuk. I looked down at him as he sank to his knees without strength.
"A death that suits you."
Trash.
I turned toward Madam Dae as if nothing at all had happened. Now every son who had stood at her side was dead, and only I remained—the one who had been her enemy. And yet I felt no particular stir.
Golden Manor, as an enemy, had never been more than a foothold to me. That foothold was simply wearing thin, and the time to cast it aside was drawing near.