The Thief’s Treasury
The Jin Sword Sect’s plot, or rather Jin Myeong-o’s scheme, had been neatly tied up once the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Guard returned.
But from the Baek Clan’s point of view, that was when the real headache began.
They detained Jin Myeong-o and Jin Paecheon, the culprits behind the affair. Then, one after another, they tried to pry from them the full story of the incident and the villain standing behind them. Yet every time those questions were raised, the two complained of splitting headaches, and in the end they lost all reason and began drooling like lunatics. It was as if they had been bewitched by some black art.
That meant there was no information to be had from either of them. Still, the harvest was not entirely barren. The Baek Clan absorbed the Jin Sword Sect’s power and influence. Of course, that also meant cleaning up everything damaged by the two of them.
“You’ve all got your hands full.”
I murmured to myself as I passed by the Hall of the Clan Head. I had to say it. Through the open doors, I could see Father and Baek Cheonhwang.
They met daily with clan heads from other families who came to see them, and on top of that they had to go through the flood of documents piling up in front of them. There was so much work that shadows seemed to deepen under both their eyes by the day.
I pitied them, but the first thought that came to me when I saw them was how fortunate I was not to be the young clan head.
“Hang in there.”
With that, I left the Hall of the Clan Head behind and made my way to my grandfather’s room.
I had gone in and out of that room every day for a month, but it felt different now. The sharp medicinal smell was gone, and so was the old man who had lain there like a corpse on the bed.
“Mugeuk?”
“Yes, Grandfather.”
“Come in.”
I carefully opened the door at his words. He was sitting there in white robes, sipping tea.
“How are you feeling?”
“Much better.”
“So it seems. You were laid up like that, and yet somehow you look sturdier than your grandson.”
Thwack!
At my words, Grandfather smiled faintly and gave my forehead a light smack.
Light, sure. But if an ordinary person had seen it, they might not even have realized it was a strike. That’s how fast it was.
“Ow! Grandfather! Have you forgotten that you’re one of the top hundred masters in the world? You can’t go around using force so carelessly!”
“Your mouth is as lively as ever.”
Rubbing my forehead as though I were in pain, I sat down across from him. Since the incident had been settled, Grandfather had devoted himself to circulating his qi and recovering his body. And it seemed the recovery was going better than expected.
“Aren’t you going to pour me some tea?”
“You’ve gotten very shameless. Mugeuk, have you changed a bit?”
“Have I? I feel the same to me.”
“You’re the one who used to find everything tedious.”
In truth, my memories of Grandfather were not especially clear. I had spent most of my time avoiding him whenever he said he was going to teach me martial arts himself.
“That was all in the past.”
“Time really does pass quickly. More to the point…”
Grandfather lifted his teacup, drank the tea in a single sip, and set the cup down on the table. Then he looked at me for a moment and sharply raised his presence.
He was injured, but he was still one of the top hundred masters in the world. His aura was fierce, and I could feel it pressing down on my body.
“Baek Mugeuk. Didn’t you say you wanted to show me the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art?”
His expression had turned cold. It was like a swordsman looking at an enemy with his blade already drawn.
“Yes. I said I would, and I did. I showed you my Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.”
But I wasn’t about to shrink from that. Not even if the man in front of me had been the greatest master in the world, let alone one of the top hundred.
“What I saw looked like the Plum Blossom Sword Art. Was my eye mistaken?”
“The Plum Blossom Sword Art… yes. And the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art as well.”
“What are you saying?”
“When I was young and learning the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art, you said something so often I could hear it ringing in my ears.”
I paused for a moment, as though remembering the past.
“Stay true to the fundamentals. Everything begins with the basics.”
“And?”
“The truth is, I found the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art boring while I was learning it. The version I learned was a martial art without any advanced techniques or brilliant mysteries to it.”
“……”
Grandfather said nothing.
Slowly, I continued.
“And then, while learning the Plum Blossom Sword Art at Mount Hwa, I realized something.”
“What was that?”
“That the Plum Blossom Sword Art of Mount Hwa is too similar to one of the forms in the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.”
“So you’re saying the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art was created by imitating Mount Hwa’s swordsmanship?”
The aura bearing down on me grew even heavier, as if warning me to answer carefully. Grandfather stared at me with an even more imperious expression.
“Imitating Mount Hwa’s swordsmanship… perhaps. But what I felt was a little different. Rather…”
“Rather?”
“Rather, I felt that the Plum Blossom Sword Art had branched off from the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art. Because the Seven-Sword Art felt more primordial, more faithful to the basics.”
“……”
At my words, Grandfather lowered his head and stayed silent for a long while.
What I told him was mostly true. Not that it had been something I realized in this life.
In my past life, while scouring every martial art in the Central Plains to defeat Tiger Mask, I had learned something. Among the countless martial arts of the Central Plains, there were those that shared the same origin as the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.
If those martial arts had been nothing special, I would have dismissed them too. But every one of the arts that shared a root with the Seven-Sword Art was capable of overturning the Central Plains.
So I arrived at one conclusion.
There was some kind of secret hidden within the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.
“That is why I showed you. My Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.”
BANG!
Grandfather, looking irritated, slammed his fist onto the table. The tabletop cracked down the middle with a sharp sound.
“And now you’re saying it was right to mix the clan’s secret art with the martial arts of other sects?”
“Yes. That’s right. And I will create it. My own Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.”
Grandfather slowly rose to his feet. Then he looked down at me and raised a hand.
“Ho ho. You’ve come up with an interesting theory.”
His hand brushed over my hair. At the same time, the overwhelming pressure that had been crushing me vanished in an instant.
“Mugeuk.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t you think what you’re saying is nonsense?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Is that so?”
He sat back down and spoke again.
“Do you know who founded the Baek Clan?”
“Wasn’t it my great-grandfather, Baek Jagang?”
“Yes. Good. You know that much.”
In a clan, not knowing the founder was simply absurd. Anyone born into one would know the name of their family’s founder as a matter of course.
“Then who do you think created the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art?”
“Obviously—”
The question was who had created the clan’s martial art. Naturally, it should have been Great-Grandfather Baek Jagang. But I couldn’t say it easily.
If Baek Jagang had created that art, then it would mean he had known the origins of all the other martial arts as well.
“You can’t say it easily. That’s right. As you’ve guessed, the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art was not created by my father, Baek Jagang.”
Grandfather lifted his head and looked up at the ceiling. Then he continued slowly.
“My father was just a mediocre martial artist running a small dojo in Jiangxi. But then, one day, he disappeared. Naturally, Mother and I thought Father had died. But he returned. On the day it had been ten years since his disappearance.”
“……”
“Father had clearly only just reached the second rate. But when he came back to the dojo, he had reached the pinnacle.”
“A second-rate martial artist reaching the pinnacle in ten years?”
“It’s hard to believe, but it’s true.”
As Grandfather said, it was hard to believe. An adult martial artist going from second rate to the pinnacle in ten years? Without some miraculous encounter, it was impossible.
“Father said there had been an incident of some kind, and that he found a martial manual there without any name written on it.”
“Was that the Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art and Baek Cheongong?”
“That’s right. Father immediately turned the dojo into the Baek Clan. And I, too, received the transmission of the Seven-Sword Art and became one of the top hundred masters in the world.”
Grandfather’s words plunged me into thought. I had suspected there was a secret to the Seven-Sword Art, but in the end there was no secret to verify.
“I see. Grandfather, is there anyone else who knows this?”
“Even the clan head does not know this story.”
“I see.”
“More importantly, you seem to have a considerable talent for martial arts.”
“Me? I do?”
“Yes. I once had the same thought. But that was only after I had grown old and reached the pinnacle.”
“I do have a decent eye for things.”
At Grandfather’s words, I puffed up a little and stood. To think that even I, who had once been the strongest in the world, might have some talent for martial arts. It was a strange feeling.
“I’ll take my leave for now. Next time, show me your Baek Clan’s Seven-Sword Art.”
“I’m prepared even now.”
“Once you’ve fully recovered and are in perfect condition, then! If I beat you now, you’ll just say it was because you were injured.”
“Heh. Do you think I’d lose to you, brat?”
“Probably?”
“You’re a hundred years too early.”
“Whether it’s early or late, you won’t know until you try!”
At my words, Grandfather laughed lightly. His expression was that of an old man enjoying the antics of his grandson.
“Ah! Grandfather. More to the point, how did a martial artist like you end up being taken down by someone like Jin Myeong-o?”
The kind smile on Grandfather’s face twisted in an instant.
“Jin Myeong-o? You think I lost to some worthless lout like that? It wasn’t that sort of man. That fellow was…”
His eyelids twitched faintly, as if he were dragging up something he very much did not want to remember.
“A man I had never seen before. But his killing intent was so vicious that I knew at once he was aiming for me. That man was strong.”
“Strong enough to overwhelm you?”
“Overwhelm? You punk! We were one move apart.”
“Is that so?”
When I spoke teasingly, Grandfather gave a thin smile too. But his eyes were still trembling. From the look of it, he had clearly been subdued without much trouble.
“Did you notice anything else? A technique he used, the way he looked, anything like that.”
“It was a palm technique I’d never seen before. It writhed like a snake. And as for what he looked like, I can’t describe it.”
“Did he look ordinary?”
“No. He was wearing a mask. A golden snake mask.”
“……!”
At Grandfather’s words, I lost my voice.
Grandfather must have noticed something was wrong with my expression, because he slowly asked, “Do you know who he is?”
“...No. I’m just surprised there was someone ridiculous enough to wear a mask like that and still take you down.”
I lowered my head lightly and left the room. Then I returned straight to my own room.
Golden snake mask.
The one who subdued Grandfather was connected to Tiger Mask.
Maybe even before I ever met Tiger Mask, that bastard had already been active around the edges of my life.
Only I hadn’t known it.
“Snake mask, huh…”
That snake-mask bastard was certainly the first clue to Tiger Mask’s forces revealing themselves. What’s more, he had been here until quite recently.
Of course, even if I had been here at the time, I wouldn’t have been able to do anything about him. Still, it was frustrating. If I had caught him, it would have opened a path that could have brought me closer to Tiger Mask much faster.
Smack.
I raised a hand and slapped my own cheek hard.
“I don’t have time to waste on this sort of thing.”
That was right. Frustration was frustration, but I didn’t have the luxury of getting caught up in useless thoughts. I had to become stronger. Stronger than I had been in my previous life, when I had been able to contend for the strongest of all time.
I sat down at the table and spread out a map. It was a map marked with the major powers of the Central Plains.
Scratch. Scratch.
I began writing notes beside the powers marked on the map. They were records of incidents that had caused a stir in the martial world over the last ten years.
Some had sparked wars between the orthodox and unorthodox factions. Some had provided the trigger for the Demonic Cult’s invasion of the Central Plains. And some had ended with divine weapons or secret manuals being discovered, leaving entire regions ravaged to the ground.
I set down my brush and studied the map closely.
“Too many.”
The map on which I had written all that information was so crowded with ink that it was hard to make out the boundaries between regions.
The Central Plains was a place where major and minor incidents happened without end. So there was no reason to be surprised by events like these. But for such enormous incidents to occur in succession over the span of ten years was nearly impossible.
“Could this be their doing too?”
I folded my arms and looked up.
If, and only if, these incidents had all been arranged by those bastards?
If they had weakened the orthodox, unorthodox, and demonic factions through this?
Once that thought began, it refused to end, dragging me toward a darker conclusion. It made sense. In my past life, I had tried countless paths, and every one of them had ended in defeat.
I picked up the brush and drew a circle around Zhejiang.
“Zhejiang. The Treasury of the Divine Thief.”
I couldn’t stop everything with a single body. The scale of the incidents was simply too vast for that. Then I would take everything I needed from among them.
Starting with the Treasury of the Divine Thief.
“I’ll take it all. Until I’m stronger than you!”