The Corpse and the Oath
Everyone from the Namgung side and the Iron Blood Castle turned their eyes on me and began to radiate a sharp, bristling killing intent. I ignored it completely and tipped my chin toward the signboard.
"From today on, this inn is Baek-ga Inn. It's had its grand reopening, so make good use of it."
At my words, Namgung Gyeom stared at me as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing, while Won Woo-hyeop let the corners of his mouth curl into a slow smile.
"You nameless little punk really are an interesting one. No, wait. Are you just insane? You know this inn sits in neutral ground between the Orthodox and Unorthodox factions, and you're still pulling something like this?"
"Neutral ground... That's a really funny way to put it."
"Funny? Is this situation funny to you?"
"Of course it is. You expect me not to laugh when I see people trying to call an inn with an owner 'neutral ground'? If you don't understand, I'll spell it out for you. This is Baek family's territory."
"You sure do talk freely for someone with such a wide-open mouth."
"Gangseo has always been a mixed region, Orthodox and Unorthodox both. I don't know why you're all acting like this is some new revelation."
The one who answered me was not Won Woo-hyeop but Namgung Gyeom. He pressed a hand to his temple as though his head hurt, let out a light sigh, then spoke slowly.
"Young sir. This is no time for jokes. I'll take responsibility for everything up to now and bury it all quietly, so hand over ownership of this inn and leave everything to Namgung."
At his words, I tilted my head. This time, my expression was probably the sort you wear when you're looking at a madman.
"What the hell are you talking about? Didn't I say it already? This inn belongs to Baek-ga from today on."
"Haa... Young sir. I can no longer indulge your prank."
"A prank? That works out nicely, actually. Since you've brought it up, I'll say something as the owner of this inn. From today on, no one can stay here without ordering food at Baek-ga Inn. If you aren't going to order, then all of you should leave your seats."
At my words, the warriors from both factions snorted. It was as if they had already decided to mock me to my face.
"Did you hear that, Iron Blood? He says he'll throw us out if we don't order food."
"I heard."
"Where are we?"
"At the unbreakable Iron Blood Castle!"
"So he says?"
Won Woo-hyeop gave me a sidelong smile. But what I had to say did not change.
"You heard me right. If you don't place an order, you'll be kicked out."
When I answered again, Won Woo-hyeop burst out laughing. He clutched his stomach as though the whole situation was too entertaining to bear.
"Fine. If you're at an inn, you should eat."
"Is the boss treating us today?"
"Yeah. What dishes do we have at your Baek-ga Inn?"
I raised my arm and held up one finger.
"Cold noodles. The only food served at Baek-ga Inn is cold noodles, one and only."
"Kahaha! Cold noodles? Just that one thing? This inn will go under in no time. Fine, bring out the noodles. The Namgung lot doesn't seem to be saying a word, so I guess they're short on money. Add theirs to the order and pile the table high!"
Namgung Gyeom frowned and seemed about to speak, but I got there first.
"Baek-ga Inn operates on advance payment."
"Heh. You think Iron Blood would ever stiff you on the bill?"
"It's better to be sure."
"Fair enough. Sure is better."
Won Woo-hyeop pulled out a silver coin and flicked it at me. I caught it and stared straight at him.
"What is this?"
"Well, that's way too much for a bowl of cold noodles. You don't need to return the rest."
"Customer. With this much, I can only prepare one bowl of noodles."
"What?"
At my words, the inn fell silent in an instant. As if not a single bug remained alive in the place.
"Our cold noodles cost one silver coin per bowl."
Bang!
"What kind of inn charges a silver coin for one bowl of cold noodles?"
"This one. Baek-ga Inn."
I tossed the silver coin back to Won Woo-hyeop.
"So if you don't have money, would you mind leaving? From my inn?"
Won Woo-hyeop and all the warriors from Iron Blood Castle got to their feet. Then Won Woo-hyeop stepped toward me.
"I'm Won Woo-hyeop of Iron Blood Castle."
"I heard that already."
"...There's a limit to how much of this kind of prank I can tolerate."
"So?"
"If words won't work, then we'll have to use another method."
"Ah. You mean force."
"We are Unorthodox, after all."
"Then I suppose I should use the methods available to an innkeeper."
"As an innkeeper?"
I smiled faintly, then turned toward the door.
"A martial artist is causing trouble in an inn. Where should that go?"
"...?"
"Obviously to the magistrate's office."
"Heh heh heh. No matter how green you are, you don't know about the law of Government and Murim do not interfere?"
"If I were just a martial artist, then sure, there'd be no issue because of Government and Murim do not interfere. But here's the thing. I'm not standing here as a martial artist. I'm standing here as the owner of this inn."
At my words, the smile vanished from Won Woo-hyeop's face. Trouble in an inn was the sort of thing that happened all the time all over Zhongyuan. But even so, the local authorities didn't move every single time. Because of Government and Murim do not interfere? Ridiculous. The real reason was simpler.
Because innkeepers were usually ordinary commoners. If they reported to the authorities, there would absolutely be retaliation, so they could not report.
"What you're saying is pure sophistry. Surely not even you would..."
Creak.
The moment Won Woo-hyeop finished saying it was sophistry, the inn door opened. And the sight outside came into view.
They were the bailiffs from the magistrate's office.
"You bastard. You're actually the kind of martial artist who reported this to the magistrate?"
For one brief moment, Won Woo-hyeop's eyes widened before he muttered in disbelief.
"I'm leaving now, Young sir."
...
The moment the bailiffs appeared, the Namgung warriors were the first to get up and leave the inn. Won Woo-hyeop too clenched his fist hard, then stormed out as well.
But my questions were only just beginning, because I had not called the bailiffs. One bailiff, who seemed to be their captain, came up to me.
"Are you the owner of this inn?"
"I am. What brings you here?"
"A murder took place nearby."
"So?"
"The one who died was apparently the man who ran this inn until yesterday."
At the bailiff's words, I frowned. The innkeeper had sold this inn to me yesterday. And then he was killed almost immediately. That was why the magistrate's office had come here first.
In other words:
"You think I'm the most likely suspect."
"Indeed. He died after trading the inn to you."
The bailiff asked me for my name, my background, and the reason I had come to Zhejiang. Then, leaving behind a request that I visit the magistrate's office soon, he vanished.
Once they were gone, I turned and swept a look over the inn.
He died because of this inn. The thought left a bad taste in my mouth. Not guilt, exactly, but a heavy knot of questions.
Why was he killed?
He had died on the very day he sold the inn to me. That meant his death was unquestionably tied to the inn. There were three people with a reason to covet this place.
Namgung Gyeom of Namgung, Won Woo-hyeop of Iron Blood, and the Mosan Sect.
Let me look into it first.
I left the inn and went around greeting the shops nearby.
"Hello. Baek-ga Inn has had its grand reopening as of today!"
"Baek-ga Inn! Grand reopening! Please support us in the future!"
I spent a long while walking around like that, greeting the merchants. There weren't many who welcomed me. The rumor that the previous innkeeper had been murdered had already spread, and they knew that martial artists were coming and going from the inn I was running.
"Still, it wasn't a complete loss, so I should count myself lucky."
That was right. They doubted me and distrusted me, but even so I had gathered some information. There were those who said the innkeeper had already been thinking of selling the place before I came, and some even said someone had actually made him an offer. Of course, since he hadn't revealed who was trying to buy it, I still couldn't tell who it was.
"The sun's already going down."
By the time I'd circled around and looked up again, the day was slanting toward evening. Information I could gather during the day had its limits. Which meant I had to move now and collect what could only be found at night.
Haa... Lately, I've been doing this kind of thing a lot.
I went back to the inn, waited for the sun to set, changed into my dark traveling clothes, and headed for the magistrate's office.
When I arrived, the first thing I saw were the officials standing guard at the main gate. I quickly took stock of them, erased my presence, and moved behind the office before climbing over the wall.
I'd already mapped out the office's layout before coming here, so finding the autopsy room where the innkeeper's body was kept wasn't difficult.
What was strange, however, was that from the moment I entered the magistrate's office, I couldn't sense a single living presence. Even at this hour, a place like this should have some personnel inside, since it held prisoners.
Creak.
With that doubt in mind, I opened the door to the autopsy room. Spread out before me were several examination tables with corpses laid upon them. There was more than just the innkeeper's body; several others were there as well, and every one of them had been covered with white cloth.
I began by uncovering the corpses nearest me, one by one.
The first body was a man who seemed to have just passed the age of eighteen. A long slash across his waist suggested he had died while fighting, likely a martial artist.
The second body.
The third body.
The fourth body.
The fifth body.
By the fifth corpse, I had pulled back the cloth and checked them all. None of them was the innkeeper. But among those bodies, one shared a peculiar feature.
"Every wound has been sewn shut."
When someone dies, it isn't especially strange to repair the body before the funeral. You couldn't exactly hold burial rites with the innards spilled out.
But what I found odd was that the corpses, after being sutured, had simply been left here in this room.
If they were stitched up for burial, they'd have been moved straight to the mortuary after the autopsy. So why are they still here?
There was more than one strange thing about this place, but for now I decided to focus on why I had come.
The sixth body.
"Found you."
When I lifted the cloth, I found the reason I had come here.
The innkeeper...
I thought of the awkward smile he had worn. But there was no time to waste.
Thud. Thud.
Footsteps had begun to sound outside.
From the footsteps, two people. They'll be inside in about twenty seconds.
I counted in my head while scanning the innkeeper's body.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five......
The innkeeper's corpse was different from a normal body. His head had been severed from his neck, and the cut surface was ragged. That meant he had not died from a sword wound. And since the neck bones hadn't been broken, it wasn't a palm strike or a fist technique either.
Could it be a claw technique?
Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty.
The instant I became certain the cause of death was a claw technique, I heard the creak of a door opening.
Just before it opened, I slipped into the cloth covering the corpse by the narrowest margin. At the same time, I stopped breathing and erased every trace of my presence.
"It has been prepared as you asked."
"Open it."
Two voices reached my ears. One belonged to an old man, the other to someone who sounded middle-aged.
The sound of cloth being lifted came at regular intervals.
And that sound moved closer and closer to the corpse where I was hidden. I placed a hand on my sword, ready to burst out.
But before I could, the two of them stopped and continued speaking.
"Mm... This is excellent. Make sure these are moved back to the sect without any problems."
"Yes. Understood."
"Ah. What happened with that innkeeper?"
"We've recovered the body and plan to tidy everything up as quickly as possible."
"I see. Then there should be no pro..."
Suddenly, the middle-aged voice broke off.
At that very moment, the cloth right next to me was yanked up roughly.
For an instant, there was only the flutter of fabric, then a brief silence settled over the autopsy room.
"Sir. Is something the matter?"
"Mm... No. I think I'm just a bit on edge these days. Then I should be going now."
"I'll escort you to the door."
"Hold on."
Smack.
I heard the sound of something striking and the middle-aged man muttering softly.
...
"Let's go."
Creak.
With the sound of the door closing, the footsteps began to recede, and soon they vanished completely.
I slowly rose from the autopsy table and slipped out of the magistrate's office more carefully than I had entered. Unlike before, bailiffs were stationed all over the office.
As if they had deliberately cleared the way for someone.
I returned to the inn and replayed the night's events in my head.
The line about suturing the corpses and sending them back to the sect.
And the question about what had been done with the innkeeper.
In the end, it meant the group trying to move these corpses for some reason and the group that killed the innkeeper were one and the same.
And that final line.
That sound of something striking, no, the sound of a respectful clasped-hands salute, and the bastard's last words.
"Amitabha."