Wolves
It was so ridiculous I almost laughed out loud.
But instead of arguing with my second brother, I obediently followed his lead. I had no desire to imitate a woman’s voice the way he had, simply because I felt the urge to push back.
However, the moment I stepped forward without saying a word and showed the red elixir in my hand, the female cultivator abruptly seized my wrist.
“Where did you get this? It doesn’t look like something you lot would have.”
As expected, she was skilled enough to recognize the true value of the red pill even without Danro’s help. The problem was that such a capable person was now demanding to know where my elixir had come from.
“Daoist! Trade conducted in Dark Dust Market doesn’t ask after the source of the goods! If you break the rules here, everyone present will regard you as our enemy!”
Even after the white-masked host of Dark Dust Market stepped in to stop her, she kept hold of my hand and went on speaking.
“What, there are tigers in this world who fear a flock of rabbits? If you truly have that kind of courage, then come and show us.”
Like a cultivator driven by nothing but greed, she must have decided that once she judged the others here weaker than herself, she might as well seize the pill by force. By then, I could no longer stand by and watch the situation unfold.
So just as I was about to move my hand, someone else spoke a beat faster than I did.
“Even if our strength falls short of yours, one hand cannot stop ten! If you do not release that young lady at once, I shall be the first to attack you!”
Among everyone here, the black-masked cultivator had the weakest cultivation, and yet he was also the one who had paid the most attention to decorating his mask. And now he had boldly stepped forward.
He was exactly the sort of talent the so-called righteous hypocrites should have taken as their model—the kind of people who only ever invoked “righteousness” when it suited them.
Yet the rest of the cultivators still kept their mouths shut. There was no one else willing to gather the courage to defend another. Of course, that left out the other person who also could not possibly retreat.
“We’re all disciples of Hyeondo Sect here, so Daoist, I’m sure you have no intention of causing a needless scene, do you? I can’t speak of where that item came from, but I can guarantee it was obtained lawfully. So if you are willing to offer a suitable number of Clear Harmony Pills, I will gladly hand it over to you.”
This time, it was my second brother who spoke up, trying to resolve things through dialogue and negotiation if at all possible. That was when I, who had been silent until then, stepped in as well. Using a light grasping technique, I tried to shake off the woman’s hand from my wrist.
Tap. Tap!
I drove my arm toward her hand and, in the same breath, struck down on her forearm with my elbow. That was half a breath. Then, rotating my freed hand in a full circle to slip completely out of her grasp took another half breath.
In the span of a single breath—no more than a blink—I had reclaimed full freedom of my arm. The woman, perhaps caught off guard by losing her grip on me, immediately let her eyes flash and spoke again.
“So you’ve learned a rather interesting bit of handwork. Then let’s see you escape this as well.”
Perhaps because I had slipped out of her grasp so easily, a stubborn streak had risen in her.
But this time, the black mask moved to block the hand she was thrusting toward me.
“Daoist! Enough!”
Since I had shrugged off her grasp so effortlessly, he must have thought she was easy to handle too.
But unlike his bold words, his hand struck the sleeve that had suddenly bulged outward and was sent bouncing back at once.
Bang!!
The gold bracelet hidden inside her sleeve instantly expanded in size, and with a head that twisted into the shape of a living serpent, it lunged for my throat.
But in that very instant, I evaded the ambush with the rapid steps of Buddha’s Shadow Flying Steps.
As a result, the sound made by the golden snake head as it bit at empty air was downright ferocious.
Hissss~
And then, all of a sudden, my second brother drew out a talisman.
“Enough!! If you do not stop now, I will use this talisman as well!”
Truthfully, the talismans my brother carried were nothing extraordinary.
And yet, the woman who had looked as though she would never give up, even if everyone here rushed her at once, came to a sudden halt at his words.
“So you’ve drawn out a Resonant Ash Talisman. You’re a clever one, aren’t you? At a time like this, it really would be the perfect moment for the wailing of ghosts from a Resonant Ash Talisman to spread through every corner of the market. Fine. The source of the item doesn’t matter after all. You said you wanted to settle its price with Clear Harmony Pills, didn’t you? Do you know what value this True Flame Ghost Essence, made from the heart of a Flying Fire Precious Eagle, is actually worth in terms of Clear Harmony Pills?”
Fortunately, my brother’s talisman had worked as intended. He had always been more interested in other things than in dedicating himself to cultivation, but this time at least he had properly proven his usefulness.
Thanks to that, it seemed the other party would now agree to trade willingly. The problem was that we had no idea how much the red pill was actually worth, or how many Clear Harmony Pills we should exchange it for.
Judging solely by the qi it contained, it seemed worth at least eight Clear Harmony Pills—but was it truly only worth that much?
Trusting that my resourceful second brother would handle the matter well, I looked at him.
But he looked back at me and spoke instead.
“You’re the original owner of the item, so you decide.”
Just as when he had thrust the pill into my hands a moment ago, my second brother seemed unwilling to take the lead whenever things became difficult.
I watched the black mask, who had all but been forgotten by everyone for a moment, getting back to his feet and dusting off his clothes on the dirt floor, and then I set the price for the item.
Five fingers held open.
Watching the black mask busily brush the dirt from his robes, I decided that if I expressed the value of the red pill with my fingers, that would be enough.
Yet in response to my silent answer, she reacted far more strongly than I expected.
“Fifty Clear Harmony Pills, then… Of course, if it’s True Flame Ghost Essence, it could easily be worth that much. Especially in a time like this, it can’t be easy to obtain such a fire-attribute elixir. But even I don’t carry fifty Clear Harmony Pills around with me. I can give you only twenty Clear Harmony Pills. For the remaining thirty, I’ll substitute something of equal value. What if I give you Ghost Wood Human Illusion Method, the technique used to create puppets?”
For cultivators, it was much the same as for martial artists: people often carried around a few manuals on martial arts.
It wasn’t because they hadn’t learned the techniques inside them yet, but because books like that made for convenient currency in special transactions. Whether martial arts texts or cultivation manuals, there were always people searching for worthwhile things.
As for whether that cultivation art, supposedly containing the secret to making puppets, would suit me… I needed to think about that.
“Good! That’s enough!”
I looked at my second brother, who was calling out with such confidence, and thought to myself:
From now on, I will never go to a market with my second brother again.
Of course, I didn’t keep that thought to myself.
“I thought I was the one supposed to decide the price.”
After the other side had already taken the red pill away, I leaned close to my second brother’s ear as he kept grinning while examining the Clear Harmony Pills and the jade slip containing the puppet art. Then I spoke quietly.
My second brother immediately reacted.
“Honestly, this is enough, isn’t it? If we get greedy now, they’ll definitely come after us.”
Given the greed the woman had just shown, his words certainly weren’t without merit.
But I was not someone who liked being swayed by another person’s decisions.
“That was for me to judge, not for you.”
When I finished speaking and looked him straight in the eye, my brother, who had been distracted by the strange treasures before us, finally met my gaze again.
The awkward air that seeped through the hard wooden masks wrapped around us. Fortunately, it seemed my brother now understood what he had done wrong.
But before he could offer any excuse, the white mask who hosted Dark Dust Market suddenly raised his voice.
“When dawn comes, darkness disappears as well! The next Dark Dust Market will be held here again in ten days!”
Because we had just completed such a massive trade, the cultivators’ interest in the lesser goods had faded sharply, and he seemed to have decided there was no point continuing any further.
Yet even after he finished speaking, no one moved. Everyone was only watching the female cultivator, who was believed to be the strongest person here.
Noticing that, she gave a faint laugh and spoke.
“Seems like none of you are busy. If you have so much time, you’d better spend it diligently on cultivation! Time is the most important thing a cultivator has.”
Then she stamped one foot down onto the ground, and the hard earth swallowed her whole as though it had turned into a soft, boggy marsh.
“Earth Escape Art! So she really was in the Blue-Robe rank!”
When someone blurted out the inference of her cultivation level from the secret art she had used, the others, who had been groaning under their breath for a moment, hurriedly began to flee. It was as though they were terrified of being entangled with her.
In truth, most of the people here were still initiation disciples whose ranks had not even been formally set, so when they realized she was a Blue-Robe rank cultivator on the same tier as our master, Cheong-ui Seonin, they panicked and ran.
After all, most of the goods traded in Dark Dust Market had come into existence by violating the rules of the sect. It was only natural to fear the consequences.
We, however, had nothing to be ashamed of. At the very least, the red pill we had traded for had not been stolen in secret from Hyeondo Sect. That did not mean we intended to keep standing around either.
Since the conversation with my second brother could just as easily continue once we were back in our eastern quarters, I shot him a look that meant we should leave at once.
But just as we were about to depart, the black-masked cultivator suddenly reached out a hand.
“Daoist! Wait! Please wait a moment!”
Although he had stepped forward to help me, I was not about to let a man at such a poor level seize my wrist.
Whoosh!
With a light flick of my hand, he stumbled from the missed grab.
“Huff!”
A cultivator who had learned cultivation arts, and yet couldn’t even keep his own balance properly as he staggered…
I was left speechless by the pitiful sight, and as I watched his embarrassment in silence, my second brother casually hooked a hand into the man’s sleeve and spoke.
“Clear Harmony Pills are something we need as well. Daoist, you’d best give up and return.”
But after regaining his balance with my brother’s help, the black mask offered an unexpected answer.
“It’s not because of the Clear Harmony Pills! I simply! I simply… wanted to know the young ladies’ names.”
His words, as though he had been utterly captivated by our disguises, were shocking enough to silence even my second brother, who normally wore his shamelessness like armor.
And what came next was even more shocking.
Tap.
After clutching at his black mask for a moment as though hesitating, he finally took it off and spoke.
“I am Yang Jeon!”
Ah… I remembered him too. He was the one who had once come looking for me directly after learning I had entered through a connection, because he had heard I was a special initiation disciple.
That made his earlier behavior somewhat understandable. The way he had tried to block our path despite clearly lacking the strength was much like the way he had once come after us in anger.
Then, as though amused by this unexpected turn of events from someone who was not exactly on good terms with our brothers, my second brother checked to make sure no cultivators remained nearby and smiled before speaking.
“Oh-ho, I’ve heard of you too, Brother Yang Jeon. Isn’t it true you possess the rare and precious Two Spiritual Roots?”
Clearly intending to tease him properly, my brother continued to play the woman to the end, his voice syrupy and fake. The foolish Yang Jeon answered brightly.
“It’s nothing special, just a minor talent. If you know of me, then might I also have the honor of learning your names?”
And then, unable to hold back any longer, my second brother peeled off his mask and burst out laughing.
“Puhaha! Yang Jeon! Don’t tell me you’ve fallen for me?”
But even after hearing my second brother’s voice, Yang Jeon only blinked in disbelief, as if he still couldn’t accept what was happening, and slowly opened his mouth.
“Then the young lady over here is…”
So I removed the mask I had been wearing as well. I wanted to show him that I was indeed the person he thought I was, but the situation suddenly took a strange turn.
The moment he saw my face, Yang Jeon’s face—and even the back of his neck—flushed bright red, and he immediately averted his gaze from mine. This was clearly not merely the embarrassment of having made an absurd mistake.
“Young lady… I don’t know what Neung Jeon said about me, but I am not such a worthless man. As Neung Jeon said, I do possess Two Spiritual Roots, and my master has acknowledged me as well, so I am steadily advancing in my cultivation. It’s only a matter of time before I pass beyond Qi Refining, early stage and reach the middle stage….”
Seeing him muttering on and on without even daring to meet my eyes, it was obvious he still thought I was a woman, even after seeing my bare face.
But instead of mocking him like my second brother, I decided to reveal my identity once more. No matter how absurd his behavior was, I had not forgotten that he had bravely stepped forward to defend us just a moment ago.
“It’s been a while.”
The problem was that after hearing my words, he flushed even redder and began spouting nonsense all over again.
“So I must have met you before, young lady. There’s no way I’d forget someone like you, so this is truly strange. Perhaps we met briefly before in a place with many people, like an assignment hall. From now on, no matter where we meet, I will never forget your face.”
Even though I answered in a fairly deep male voice, he still seemed unable to accept reality. As I clicked my tongue at the poor fellow, someone else suddenly emerged from one side of the thicket where the cultivators had scattered.
“Now that I look, you all seem like fairly familiar junior brothers. That makes things a little easier.”
The other man also seemed to be a cultivator who had not yet moved beyond Qi Refining, early stage, but since he was addressing us as junior brothers, it appeared his initiation had at least come quickly.
But he was not the last to appear.
“My, my, my—was I the only one who thought such a precious item was too good for our little junior brothers to keep?”
From a different direction than the first man, another cultivator stepped out into view. The qi he gave off was that of Qi Refining, middle stage.
He was already a rather difficult opponent for us, since we were still stuck at the early stage. The problem was that even he was not the end of it; now others were beginning to emerge one after another as well.
Cultivators consumed by greed.
Having forgotten that we were people from the same sect as themselves, they were gathering like a pack of wolves that had caught the scent of blood.