The Cult Leader's Great Enlightenment
Yeo Chang-dong asked with the utmost caution.
“Do you know… why the Cult Leader decided to make that man your betrothed?”
Having already chosen to speak, Sa Yeo-un seemed to feel there was nothing left to hide. She answered as if it were nothing of great importance.
“He did explain it, but honestly I couldn’t make sense of it at all. You remember two years ago, when Dad went out and the moment he came back he shut himself away in closed-door cultivation, right?”
“Yes. After that, the Cult Leader ascended to the supreme realm.”
“According to Dad, he met Eunhyeon then and gained some kind of enlightenment. That’s why he went into seclusion based on it.”
Yeo Chang-dong’s eyebrows twitched ever so slightly. Lost in thought for a moment, he finally opened his mouth as though he could scarcely believe what he had heard.
“Enlightenment, you say? That can’t be…”
He muttered the words low after hearing Sa Yeo-un’s account. A transcendent master of Sa Unsik’s caliber had already spent decades polishing his martial path and refining his own realm. For someone of that stature, a new enlightenment was not the sort of thing that could be casually obtained from a single chance encounter.
Moreover, an enlightenment profound enough to drive him into closed-door cultivation would not be a mere harvest of insight—it would have to be something close to a great awakening that shook the very foundations of the martial way. That was why Yeo Chang-dong’s expression grew steadily more solemn.
“I don’t know. He said he gained enlightenment from watching him farm… That’s why he’s been like this for the past two years. But enlightenment? Please. Everyone knows they’re only going along with it reluctantly. I acknowledge Dad’s ability, but this time he clearly picked the wrong direction.”
At her words Yeo Chang-dong suddenly fell silent. In that instant the image of Yoo Eunhyeon, silently tilling the chili fields not long ago, flashed vividly through his mind.
Peerless—no, even the word elegant felt insufficient for the dignity he had radiated. That strange, overwhelming presence for which no other description would serve. As the scene rose again with perfect clarity, the emotion he had felt then returned like a thrill racing through every inch of his body.
His eyes flashed, and a great laugh burst from him.
“Hahaha! There certainly is a possibility! If he possesses martial arts of that level yet still chose to hide himself… and if his true skill runs even deeper than what was shown!”
The moment he recalled that Yoo Eunhyeon had thoroughly concealed his martial prowess, a quiet shiver ran down Yeo Chang-dong’s spine. If what had been revealed was not the full measure of his ability but merely a deliberately hidden fragment, then everything changed. If the realm visible on the surface was not the whole, and a far deeper, far higher realm lay concealed behind it—that would be a domain ordinary people could never hope to fathom.
In that case, the claim that Sa Unsik had gained enlightenment from their meeting was no longer an empty tale.
“What’s gotten into you all of a sudden? Have you actually lost your mind…”
“Not at all, Young Lady. Congratulations.”
“Congratulations for what? Don’t mock me. You’re not seriously buying that nonsense about learning farming making someone’s martial arts stronger, are you?”
“Of course it wouldn’t work for just anyone, and I can’t say how far it might go—but at the very least, the possibility cannot be denied.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
One person saying such a thing might only raise suspicion, but when two people spoke the same words, trust rose with startling speed. Sa Yeo-un narrowed her eyes. Yeo Chang-dong smiled as he continued.
“Yeo Geumhyeon… no, Brother Hyeon is truly an outstanding talent. We absolutely must not let him slip away.”
“Brother Hyeon? Since when have you two been so close? Suddenly talking so familiarly is suspicious.”
“I consider us close enough. Close enough that he would entrust me with liquor this important.”
Looking thoroughly amused, Yeo Chang-dong lifted the Doyakju for her to see. Sa Yeo-un snatched it away at once, opened the lid, and took a single sniff of the aroma.
“Wow. It really does have a sweet peach scent. So why did he entrust this important liquor to you, Big Brother? What exactly does he want to do with it?”
“He offered various reasons, but thinking about it now, his true purpose seems to have been delivering this to the Cult Leader.”
“Dad liked this quite a bit, so he brought it as a gift, I suppose. But why not deliver it himself? Why sneak in here and go through such a complicated method?”
“Probably because information about Brother Hyeon is not known within our cult, so he feared being suspected for no good reason. In truth, if someone suddenly announced they had come to seek an audience with the Cult Leader, anyone would grow suspicious.”
Especially now, when every eye needed to remain fixed on the movements of the Orthodox Path. Anyone even slightly dubious would be seized and beaten first—that was the prevailing mood, so the caution made perfect sense.
“Nonsense. He doesn’t even know what he’s carrying.”
“What is he carrying?”
“He has the Mukhryongju.”
“The Mukhryongju? When was that given to him? After all that talk of killing him or not, it seems she didn’t completely lack feelings after all?”
“What are you talking about? When I met him I didn’t even know Eunhyeon’s identity. Looking at how he deliberately hid it, he seemed to know… but…”
Sa Yeo-un frowned as she recalled their encounter. She could not deny that the brief conversation had been enjoyable, yet the thought of having been deceived by Yoo Eunhyeon still rankled.
“The Mukhryongju isn’t something just anyone can hand out, is it?”
The Mukhryongju was originally a token that proved the identity of Sa Unsik’s bloodline; without their permission it could never leave their hands for an outsider.
“It’s true that I told her to give it to him. After daring to do something like that, did he really think he could just keep hiding? I heard where his house was, so I figured if he stayed there he would come eventually. Dad also seemed to be stirring things up in that direction, so the excuse was convenient too.”
“Indeed. So to whom?”
“Granny Yeong.”
“Elder Cho?!”
Yeo Chang-dong knew Cho-yeong well.
She was a master of the demonic path who had once dominated an era decades ago; there was no way he would not know of her. He was also well aware that she cherished Sa Yeo-un almost as if the girl were her own granddaughter.
She must have… no. She must have suffered a great deal.
At the same time he could not suppress his astonishment. Receiving the Mukhryongju meant that Yoo Eunhyeon had ultimately passed Cho-yeong’s test.
Cho-yeong was strict when evaluating people. She never judged solely on potential. She placed the highest priority on the abilities and value a person currently possessed. And if that evaluation concerned a candidate for Sa Yeo-un’s husband, it would be stricter than any other—yet he had passed it.
I thought he was hiding about thirty percent, but more than fifty? He grows more astonishing by the moment.
Yeo Chang-dong found himself regarding Yoo Eunhyeon with even greater respect. Whether she sensed his thoughts or not, Sa Yeo-un grumbled on.
“When she came back she just tossed out that she had given him the Mukhryongju and invited him to our cult.”
“If she put it that way, it is the highest praise.”
Of course Sa Yeo-un knew Cho-yeong’s temperament at least as well as Yeo Chang-dong did, if not better, so she could not disagree.
“But why is he going through all this even while carrying the Mukhryongju?”
“Well… I can’t say for certain, but perhaps it is to avoid drawing attention. Taking out the Mukhryongju would make entering the cult easy, yet it would also attract enormous notice.”
“What’s wrong with that? And of course he should be prepared to endure that much.”
Sa Yeo-un, for whom drawing every eye was simply daily life, wore an expression of pure incomprehension. Yeo Chang-dong, who had watched Yoo Eunhyeon farm, felt he understood to some degree. There were people who loved standing before others and basking in attention—and there were those who were the opposite. The Yoo Eunhyeon he had seen belonged firmly to the latter.
“Or perhaps he was simply afraid.”
“Afraid? With the Mukhryongju? Of what?”
Instead of answering, Yeo Chang-dong simply looked at her steadily. Realizing the meaning behind that gaze, Sa Yeo-un’s eyes flew wide and she fired off questions in mild fluster.
“Why would I be scary? Am I going to eat him or something?”
“I wouldn’t eat him, but you did try to kill him, didn’t you?”
“That was when I knew nothing. We’re not complete strangers now, and I wouldn’t just try to kill him out of the blue anymore.”
“The other party might not see it that way. Even I wouldn’t particularly want to meet someone who had declared right in front of me that they would kill me.”
Yeo Chang-dong explained it with perfect logic, yet Sa Yeo-un still crossed her arms and wore a sulky look—the contradictory expression of someone who understood yet could not quite accept.
“In the first place his business is with Dad, so he prepared this liquor because he wants to meet him directly. That’s it, isn’t it?”
“We should see it that way, shouldn’t we?”
“So he’s trying to get this delivered to Dad.”
“Shall I not deliver it?”
“Even if I tell you not to, you’ll deliver it anyway.”
“If Young Lady says not to, then of course I must not.”
He said the words, but both of them knew the events of this day would be reported to Sa Unsik without delay. Sa Yeo-un understood perfectly well that Yeo Chang-dong concealing such a matter from the Cult Leader was simply impossible.
“No. Forget it. Do as you like. I don’t care about liquor like that anymore. I have my own business to attend to.”
“And what exactly do you intend to do?”
“It seems he doesn’t want to meet me over there—but I very, very much want to meet him. So I’ll go fetch him myself. Quite grandly, at that.”
Watching Sa Yeo-un smile with wicked delight as she spoke, Yeo Chang-dong allowed himself an inward bitter smile.
The reason Sa Yeo-un’s notoriety rang so loudly throughout the Demonic Cult was partly her complete disregard for reading the room—but the greatest cause was her drive to turn even small matters into grand affairs and the sheer force of will with which she carried them out.
One needed only look at how she had tried to kill her newly decided betrothed on the spot, and how she had even tried to drag her escorts into the chaos.
Perhaps that is exactly why Brother Hyeon has been trying so hard to avoid her. But it is a pity. As a farmer, Brother Hyeon should know well enough—disasters are disasters precisely because no amount of preparation can let you escape them.
Still, he had no desire to be swept into that particular storm. Yeo Chang-dong quietly bowed his head and murmured as though offering a silent prayer.
“May fortune favor the young master’s path ahead.”
Yet the moment passed quickly. Yeo Chang-dong gathered up the Doyakju and rose from his seat.
Shall I return to the cult after so long?
Gazing at Mount Daesan rising in the distance, he muttered to himself. Truly, having devoted himself solely to farming, he had not set foot back in the cult for more than two years.
But now clear results had finally appeared. The time had come to return and make his report.