Chapter 328
Chapter 328
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 328
>Chapter Title: Shadow (3)
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Dreams and reality. Crossing back and forth between illusion and darkness, chasing hope for so long.
Seo Wan-pyeong's prey passed through Gwangju's pleasure quarters, which lit up the night like a city that never slept, circled around inside Gwangju proper, and soon left the city behind, heading toward a forest path.
‘Heh heh heh heh.’
Feeling grateful for his prey heading to such a secluded spot on its own two feet, Seo Wan-pyeong suddenly accelerated into an ambush.
Flash!
“!?”
Only then did the black-clad man sense Seo Wan-pyeong's presence and twist his body in haste.
“When!?”
That was when his eyes finally met Seo Wan-pyeong's. The man's pupils, hidden behind black cloth that covered everywhere else, were filled with bewilderment.
Seo Wan-pyeong locked eyes with him and in an instant drew his sword and swung it.
Seo Wan-pyeong's sharp and swift Shadowless Fourteen Hands exerted even greater power in the deep night with scarcely any moonlight.
The black-clad man, who had lost the initiative from the start, was instantly pushed into a defensive position.
“Keuheheh. It's all because of you!!”
Clang!
“Because of you, do you know what humiliation I've suffered!”
Clang!
The fact that he hadn't died yet was simply because Seo Wan-pyeong wasn't trying to kill him, but subdue him.
At Seo Wan-pyeong's successive mutterings, his eyes bloodshot to the whites, the black-clad man said in a terrified gaze.
“Y-You know who I am and dare swing a sword at me!”
“How would I know who you are!”
“!?”
While the black-clad man was flustered by the madman's nonsensical ravings that didn't make sense.
Thud!
Seo Wan-pyeong's scabbard, thrust out with his left hand, struck the man's vital acupoint.
“Guh….”
He had distracted the foe with a follow-up strike using the sword gripped in his right hand, then swung the scabbard employing the intricacies of the Shadowless Fourteen Hands to maximize the element of surprise.
Having successfully subdued the black-clad man, Seo Wan-pyeong flicked his fingers repeatedly just in case.
He swiftly sealed the pressure points, then peeled off the mask covering the man's face.
The black-clad man was a middle-aged fellow with a sleazy beard that made him look like a rat.
Seo Wan-pyeong had no interest in the man's face, so he pried open his mouth with his hand and shoved in his fingers.
Sure enough, the man's teeth had a poison capsule wedged in.
Seo Wan-pyeong quickly extracted the poison capsule in a flash, then rummaged through the man's body here and there to check for any poisons or hidden weapons concealed in his clothes.
And soon, he realized a very important fact.
“You. You're from the Eastern Depot.”
The man lacked something that any man ought to have.
* * *
Seo Wan-pyeong returned to the front hall that the Shadow Pavilion was using as a sort of branch base, bringing the Eastern Depot scum with him, and continued the interrogation.
Exhausted from over a month of sleep deprivation and fatigue, he wanted nothing more than to collapse right then and there, but Seo Wan-pyeong gritted his teeth and endured.
Was it the remaining fatigue? The anxiety wouldn't fade.
The worry that while he slept, if he left it to the other Shadow Pavilion warriors, something might go wrong.
The black-clad man's identity was fanning those anxieties even more.
Eastern Depot.
The filthy hunting dogs raised by the Han Emperor, eunuchs who had the one thing every man should have cut off.
Of course, he couldn't be certain it was the Eastern Depot just because it was missing there. Other eunuchs who weren't from the Eastern Depot were missing it too.
But there was no reason for a eunuch not from the Eastern Depot to have cultivated martial arts to this level.
On top of that.
“You bastard! Do you know who I am to torment me like this! Aren't you afraid of His Majesty's wrath!”
Just looking at the way he barked as if backed by the Emperor left no room for doubt.
Crack!
Of course, Seo Wan-pyeong wasn't one to tremble in fear just because the opponent was the Emperor's dog.
What he feared most was disappointing his master and senior brothers. Even death held no terror for him.
He sliced off bits of skin and flesh bit by bit, then sprinkled salt on them, drove nails between fingernails and toenails, sealed acupoints to employ the Dividing Muscles and Misaligning Bones technique, and so on.
Thanks to repeating such brutal tortures, the Eastern Depot scum finally quieted down.
But that didn't mean all problems were solved just because the man had quieted.
“I-It’s true. I-I was just acting on orders from L-Lord Chief Eunuch.”
The captured eunuch claimed he was merely a messenger carrying letters.
When Seo Wan-pyeong opened the letter the man had brought, it was filled with trivial daily nonsense.
It had to be a ciphered secret message.
“How do you decode it?”
“I d-don’t know.”
Even after more torture on the man who claimed ignorance of everything, nothing came out.
“Huuu….”
Seo Wan-pyeong gazed down at the eunuch, whose eyes were completely unfocused, foaming blood at the mouth, for a moment.
“That'll do.”
The Shadow Pavilion Master, who had arrived without anyone noticing, placed a hand on Seo Wan-pyeong's blood-soaked shoulder and spoke.
Flick.
Only then did Seo Wan-pyeong sense the Pavilion Master's presence and whip his head around, making the Pavilion Master flinch despite himself.
‘L-Look at those eyes.’
Those eyes gleaming with madness, bloodshot red from excessive fatigue, exuded an even more terrifying aura.
The red gleam of madness in his eyes contrasted with the dark shadows under them, and his pallid skin contrasted again, giving off an unmistakable "I'm a madman" vibe at a glance.
“Ahem. No matter how I look at it, this one knows nothing more, so that'll do.”
“It’s not over yet, Pavilion Master. He may not know anything, but at least he spat out the next destination with his own mouth, didn’t he?”
Since the eunuch was a messenger, he at least knew where to deliver this letter next.
“So that’s enough, I say. The rest of us Pavilion members and I will go there. You head back to the Main Headquarters.”
“The Main Headquarters?”
“Indeed. We haven’t gotten the core intel yet, but we’ve at least uncovered that the Imperial Palace is involved in this. So we need to report this to our lord.”
It was a valid point, but really just an excuse.
‘Our lord will see right through Third Young Master's condition.’
It was to send Seo Wan-pyeong back to the Heavenly Demon and force him to rest.
“Oh no!”
The Pavilion Master suddenly made a startled face as he looked at the eunuch undergoing interrogation and shouted.
Seo Wan-pyeong, flustered, quickly turned his head to look, but the eunuch was still just lying there with unfocused eyes, foaming blood.
“???”
Seo Wan-pyeong wore a puzzled expression for a very brief moment.
Plop.
With the sensation of something touching his body, Seo Wan-pyeong collapsed like a puppet with cut strings.
The Pavilion Master had deliberately drawn his attention, then ambushed him by sealing his blood flow.
* * *
When Seo Wan-pyeong woke from sleep, three full days had passed.
His body was loaded in a carriage. Perhaps out of consideration for him, the spacious interior had multiple layers of blankets laid out, and Seo Wan-pyeong had been deep in slumber atop them.
Realizing he had long since left Gwangju, Seo Wan-pyeong accepted reality and headed to the Main Headquarters with Shadow Pavilion warriors.
The distance between Gwangju in Guangdong Province and the Main Headquarters in Xinjiang was immense, so it took him nearly a month to return.
“Eastern Depot, you say?”
At Seo Wan-pyeong's report, the Heavenly Demon unusually furrowed his brow and asked again.
“Yes, Master.”
“Hoo….”
Lost in deep thought, the Heavenly Demon closed his mouth for a moment and stroked his beard.
The Eastern Depot moving meant this incident was connected to the Imperial Palace after all.
‘Deng Bi. To think that bastard was a spy sent from the palace….’
He had served the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult loyally for at least fifty years, so the Heavenly Demon had never even imagined he was a spy.
‘So that’s why those bastards stayed quiet.’
Hyeok-ryeon Il-hwi. From the time he had fully mastered the Heavenly Demon Divine Art and been acknowledged as the Heavenly Demon rather than just the Cult Leader, the Imperial Army had no longer eyed Xinjiang.
Naturally, the Heavenly Demon had thought the Imperial Family had backed off to avoid pointless troop losses.
Xinjiang was mostly wasteland anyway, not worth crossing the massive obstacle that was the Heavenly Demon.
But now it seemed they had chosen to erode the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult from within instead of attacking Xinjiang directly.
‘Because of those bastards' schemes, my disciples lost their lives. This old man lived on without even knowing. What Heavenly Demon? What divine being….’
As the Heavenly Demon sank into deep regret for a moment, he saw his disciple, still alive and well.
His third disciple, looking up at him with bloodshot eyes.
“Wan-pyeong.”
“Yes, Master.”
“You've returned safely. Truly fortunate. You've worked hard on this difficult mission.”
At the Heavenly Demon's sincere praise—something Seo Wan-pyeong had scarcely heard in his life—his eyes widened, a slight mist forming.
“I'm still woefully inadequate to be called Master's disciple.”
With that one word of praise, Seo Wan-pyeong felt his fatigue vanish completely.
After being forced into deep sleep by the Shadow Pavilion Master, he had raced toward the Main Headquarters as if his soles were on fire.
That was how he had arrived in just under a month.
Considering the distance from Gwangju to the Main Headquarters, traversing it in a month was unbelievable.
Knowing Seo Wan-pyeong would act this way, the Shadow Pavilion Master had forcibly put him to sleep, if only for a few days of rest.
And as the Pavilion Master hoped, the Heavenly Demon saw through Seo Wan-pyeong's condition at once.
“You must be greatly worn in body and mind from this mission, so stay at the Main Headquarters for a few days and visit the Divine Physician every day for treatment.”
“Master, this disciple has no injuries. I can still serve Master and the Divine Cult.”
“Tut. Worrying your parents is also unfilial. Do you intend to be unfilial to this master?”
“Never, Master.”
Startled, Seo Wan-pyeong bowed to the Heavenly Demon and left the Heavenly Demon Hall to meet the Divine Physician.
Right after Seo Wan-pyeong departed, the Heavenly Demon sent word to the Silver Shadow Pavilion Master.
“Tell the Divine Physician to tend to Wan-pyeong as the Tranquil Heart Pill Master. Demonic obsession has risen to his chin.”
“Understood!”
After the Silver Shadow Pavilion Master also left the Heavenly Demon Hall following Seo Wan-pyeong.
The Heavenly Demon stroked his beard again and sank into deep thought.
Why was this?
Even now, faced with an urgent matter, what came to mind first was his youngest disciple.
The letter sent by his youngest, who had left for the Western Frontier on a mission he himself had given, arriving just over a month ago.
Delivered using a messenger the Heavenly Demon himself might employ.
As thoughts of what his youngest was up to crossed his mind, a faint smile tugged at the Heavenly Demon's lips.
“Heh heh heh.”
For a moment, the shadow of regret lifted from his face.
* * *
Two months prior. The morning after clearing out the Potala Palace.
Having finished greetings with the maidservants who looked like they'd eaten something bad, Il-mok was conversing with Hyeok-ryeon Cheon-gang.
“With the Potala Palace gone too, wouldn't it be best for the family head to return to the Main Headquarters now?”
It was an overt request to leave, but Hyeok-ryeon Cheon-gang didn't seem particularly bothered.
“What do you plan to do? Stay here?”
“Master's order was to spread the Maitreya Divine Cult to the Western Frontier, so I plan to remain a bit longer. Besides, won't remnants of the Potala Palace still be around?”
There were surely Maitreya monks who had left the palace empty to drag in women.
Hyeok-ryeon Cheon-gang nodded in agreement with Il-mok's words, and Il-mok pulled a letter from his bosom and offered it to him.
“Then, if you go to the Main Headquarters, please deliver this letter to Master.”
“I'll leave it to my family's warriors.”
At Hyeok-ryeon Cheon-gang's reply, Il-mok shook his head.
“I hope only the family head returns to the Main Headquarters.”
“…What is that supposed to mean?”
“There are over a hundred women left here. We're already short on manpower, so if the Hyeok-ryeon Clan warriors leave too, how am I supposed to protect these women and govern the Western Frontier?”
“Hah…. So you're telling me to carry that letter back alone right now?”
“Yes.”
Hyeok-ryeon Cheon-gang let out a hollow laugh at the words of the youngest young master, who was trying to use him—the head of one of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult's Five Great Families—as a messenger.