Blood Oath at the Wedding Feast
The uproar stirred by Namgung Sang, second young master of the Namgung Clan, was settled in a single stroke.
The provincial governor of Anhui had only to see that the culprits’ faces matched Namgung Sang’s own before he understood everything at once.
The moment Namgung Sang regained his senses, Clan Lord Namgung Shin himself journeyed to the Moyong Clan, offered a formal apology, and proposed a marriage alliance.
For a house as famously proud as the Namgung Clan, the gesture was almost unbelievable.
Anhui’s idle tongues wagged without rest.
“Could the Moyong Clan have something on the Namgung?”
“Rumor says the second young master is afflicted with madness—that’s why the clan lord is swallowing his pride like this.”
“Giving a daughter to a madman for a son-in-law? The Moyong Clan has guts, I’ll give them that!”
Whether the gossip mattered or not, the wedding between the Namgung and Moyong Clans raced forward without pause.
Every street in Anhui Province vanished beneath swaths of red cloth. From the great gates of the Namgung residence all the way to the Grand Martial Arena where the ceremony would be held, a carpet of crimson silk unfurled like a river of blood.
Oblivious to his father’s turmoil, the bridegroom Namgung Sang grinned from ear to ear. Bride Moyong Ran flushed pink, one hand resting lightly on the gentle swell of her belly.
Clad in blue robes and a sash of red silk, Namgung Shin spoke quietly to Yeong-hwa, who waited behind him.
“Truly… will this be enough?”
“Trust me, Clan Lord. You have already given the order to the Azure Palace Corps, the Flying Swallow Corps, and the Azure Heaven Corps, have you not?”
“That the Moyong will launch a surprise attack, that we are to defend only and take no lives.”
“Exactly. That is how the scheme reaches completion.”
Yeong-hwa turned to Hyeonsong at his side.
“Sect Leader, please aid the Namgung Clan Lord in subduing the Moyong Clan Lord.”
“Understood. Do not worry.”
Hyeonsong glanced about, uneasy at Hagun’s absence.
“And where is Hagun?”
One corner of Yeong-hwa’s mouth curved upward.
“He has hidden himself for the sake of the mission.”
At that very moment a maidservant hurried in to announce that the ceremony was beginning.
Namgung Shin looked to Yeong-hwa and Hyeonsong.
“Shall we?”
The wedding was as magnificent as the Namgung name demanded. Banners of azure silk and violet silk framed a central cascade of crimson, lending the rites an air of solemn grandeur.
From the side draped in the Moyong Clan’s violet silk, bride Moyong Ran entered. From the blue-silk side of the Namgung Clan came groom Namgung Sang. Beneath the blessings of guests from Anhui and Jiangsu, the couple exchanged cups of wine.
All the while, Wi So-yeon—wife of Clan Lord Moyong Cheon—watched in silence. At last she beckoned a Namgung maidservant standing behind her. The girl promptly handed over a wine jar.
Though first wife, Wi So-yeon had been forced to the lowest seat, pushed aside by the others. Now she approached Moyong Cheon. The maidservant followed a few paces behind.
“My lord, on this auspicious day allow this humble wife to offer you a cup.”
Already pleasantly drunk, Moyong Cheon answered with a laugh.
“What is this, my lady? You have always treated Ran so coldly because she is not your own daughter.”
“Even if she was born of another womb, are they not all the children of my lord and this wife?”
“Hahaha! Hearing you say so gladdens me indeed.”
Wi So-yeon next turned to the second and third wives seated beside him.
“I have been far too neglectful until now.”
“Not at all, elder sister.”
“Elder sister, please do not say such things. It shames us to hear them.”
She poured for them as well, then lowered the jar and raised her own cup. Moyong Cheon drained his in one delighted gulp.
“At last our first lady has come to her senses!”
The other wives followed suit, drinking deeply.
Wi So-yeon wore a smile no one could read as she glanced toward the empty chair she had just left. To the warrior waiting behind her seat she said quietly,
“Begin.”
Sssskrrreeeek—
At the word, the warrior seized his own face and tore. The human-skin mask peeled away, revealing an old man’s countenance blistered and hideous from old burns.
In the same instant Moyong Cheon clutched his throat.
“Ghhhhaaaak—”
Thud. Thud.
The two wives slumped forward, heads striking the wine table as consciousness fled. The old man snatched a pouch from his waist and flung it into the air.
Fwoooosh—
Blood-red powder billowed out, settling over the Moyong warriors arrayed at the rear.
“Uuuuugh…”
“Gaaaaah…”
Eyes that had been clear a heartbeat earlier glazed over with madness.
Shing—
The old man drew a short dagger from his robes and sliced open his own palm. Without hesitation he strode to Moyong Cheon and forced the dripping blood into the choking clan lord’s open mouth.
Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip.
Then he approached Wi So-yeon and bowed low.
“It is done. Now unleash your grudge to your heart’s content, my lady.”
“Give me the dagger.”
He offered it with both hands. Wi So-yeon seized the second wife by the hair and wrenched her head upward.
“What in heaven’s name is this!”
Clan Lord Namgung Shin shot to his feet, voice ringing across the arena.
“Do you remember, Shin?”
Wi So-yeon’s smile was ice and madness.
“The vow we made has never been finished.”
She pressed the dagger’s edge to the woman’s throat.
“From this day, Shin, the bond that was severed between us begins anew.”
Just as the blade was about to draw blood—
Shiiing—
The maidservant who had trailed Wi So-yeon all day whipped a sword free from beneath her skirts.
Clang!
The flat of the blade smashed down across Wi So-yeon’s knuckles.
“Aaaagh!”
The dagger spun away; Wi So-yeon staggered backward. In one fluid motion the maidservant caught the second and third wives about the waists and vaulted toward the Namgung ranks.
The moment she landed she tore free the carefully coiled hair, letting it cascade down her back.
Hyeonsong’s voice cracked with astonishment.
“Hagun!”
“Sect Leader, Young Master Yeong-hwa begged me so earnestly I had no choice.”
“No—you did well. Very well.”
BOOM!
The great doors of the arena exploded inward. Every fighting force of the Namgung Clan poured through.
Exactly as Yeong-hwa had instructed before the ceremony, Clan Lord Namgung Shin drew his sword.
“Subdue every Moyong warrior! Do not kill them!”
Dismay flickered across the old man’s ruined face. Wi So-yeon, however, never looked away from Namgung Shin.
He first moved the stunned Namgung Sang and Moyong Ran to safety. Then the arena erupted into open battle.
The Moyong Clan’s Purple Radiance Corps, stripped of reason, raged like beasts.
“Grrraaaah—”
Clan Lord Moyong Cheon, having drunk the old man’s blood, lurched upright and tore free his own blade. The Azure Palace Corps—his personal guard—ringed him at once.
“Stand aside.”
With those two quiet words Hyeonsong drew steel; Namgung Shin rejoined him an instant later. Together they faced Moyong Cheon. The man’s eyes were bloodshot, murderous light coiling around him like smoke.
Clang—clang—clang!
The two masters launched a ferocious joint assault, driving Moyong Cheon back step by step.
Steel sang. Warriors roared. Amid the chaos Yeong-hwa walked steadily across the crimson silk, gaze locked on the old man.
The old man advanced to meet him, a grotesque smile twisting his lips.
Yeong-hwa’s voice was cold with fury.
“How dare you toy with the gods using such cheap tricks…”
His eyes turned feral.
“Was it you who set them against each other and created this disaster?”
“Cheap tricks? Cheap tricks, you say… Kuhahahahaha!”
The old man threw back his head and howled with mad laughter.
“I have spent my entire life in the martial world, yet you little whelp do not even know how high the heavens reach!”
“Have you never heard of the Heaven Beyond Heaven? How pitiful.”
At Yeong-hwa’s mockery the laughter died on the old man’s lips.
“The one who will kill you bears the name Hyeolhokmyeongseon. Consider it a parting gift on your road to the underworld.”
Yeong-hwa dug a finger into his ear with a look of pure distaste.
“You talk too much. Do the sorcerers of the Central Plains feed themselves with their mouths rather than divine power?”
“You insolent brat!”
The old man flung blood from his wounded hand and began to chant.
From the blue heavens of Samsanbanrak—
Tiger-mountain ghosts who once traded there!
On the ferry of Yabanrakseon—
Straight-death ghosts who came and went!
In the white-heron pool of Wisu Jungbun—
Water-killing ghosts who drowned in the deep!
Behind Hyeolhokmyeongseon a feeble Ghost Gate cracked open; every manner of lesser spirit came spilling out.
Yeong-hwa’s mouth curved in a thin smile.
“Commanding a hundred ghosts… at least you did not learn half-measures.”
He pressed his palms together and answered with a chant of his own.
In the East, the Azure Emperor God.
In the South, the Crimson Emperor God.
In the West, the White Emperor God.
In the North, the Black Emperor God.
In the Center, the Yellow Emperor God.
The Xuanwu mark on the back of Yeong-hwa’s hand flared with black light. One of the old man’s brows lifted.
“Impossible—Xuanwu itself? How can a whelp like you—!”
KRAAAAAANG—
A colossal tortoise, its entire body wreathed in black serpents, materialized before Yeong-hwa. The Black Tortoise unleashed the snakes in every direction; they fell upon the swarm of lesser ghosts and devoured them whole.
Blood trickled from Hyeolhokmyeongseon’s nose as the spirits bound to him were annihilated. He managed a weak, rattling laugh.
“Kh… heh, heh, heh, heh…”
“What? Only now feeling the gap in strength?”
“Do you know why this body spent ten years as a servant of the Moyong Clan?”
Hyeolhokmyeongseon fixed his gaze on Wi So-yeon.
“At last the hour has come to fulfill the lady’s dream!”
Wi So-yeon’s hands trembled as she snatched the fallen dagger from the floor. Still locked in combat with Moyong Cheon, Namgung Shin saw her and cried out,
“So-yeon, no more! You must not!”
The old man only raised his voice louder.
“Do you not wish to remain forever in the heart of the man you have loved your entire life?”
Wi So-yeon gripped the dagger, torn by indecision.
“I shall paint the Namgung Clan—who made you miserable all these years—in blood, and grant that wish!”
At his roar the long years flashed before her eyes like a lantern show: the day she was married into the Moyong Clan; the years of scorn for failing to bear a child; the second wife, then the third, brought into the household; and through it all, Namgung Shin living happily with his new wife as though he had never known her, even siring children of his own.
She had believed that if she were unhappy, he would be unhappy too. Yet the man she had watched for so long seemed to have forgotten her completely.
That resentment, that bitter grudge, tore open her heart. A single tear traced down her cheek.
“You must keep the vow.”
“I will keep it. Of course I will!”
Thuck—
Wi So-yeon drove the dagger into her own breast. The lily pendant hanging at her throat flushed scarlet and erupted with blood-qi.
Hyeolhokmyeongseon threw back his head and roared with laughter.
“It is done!”
Fwooooom—
He stretched out a hand and drank in the blood-qi pouring from the necklace. Yeong-hwa’s eyes went wide.
“You… you can’t mean—!”
The old man pressed his palms together. The tiny Ghost Gate ballooned into a yawning maw.
“At last this body opens a true Ghost Gate.”
KUUUUUUNG—
A titanic shockwave hurled the Black Tortoise backward. Then came a strange, ululating cry—
Rrrrooo-rrrooo-rrrooo—
A colossal beast in the shape of a wolf clamped its jaws around the Black Tortoise’s neck.
Cheongu—the Heavenly Dog. The wolf-god said to swallow both sun and moon had descended.
Its white mane whipped through the air like a storm. Tortoise and dog tore at each other with murderous frenzy. Black serpents swarmed the Heavenly Dog from every side; the beast answered with blasts of fire and ice that incinerated them. Lesser ghosts piled onto the Black Tortoise, driving it into a corner.
Now blood streamed from Yeong-hwa’s own nose, the price of the bond with Xuanwu. Hyeolhokmyeongseon watched him with open delight.
“Do you know what it feels like to be born a sorcerer and command the gods themselves?!”
Veins stood out on Yeong-hwa’s forehead. His brow furrowed tight.
“I wouldn’t know about that…”
His eyes blazed.
“But you can start chanting that you’re already dead!”