Goodbye, Everyone!
Yi Yeok stopped.
A cultivator's life came down, in the end, to the tempering of blood qi. Blood qi was the root of life itself, the wellspring that drove every change between heaven and earth. Reach the Divine Blood, and one attained ageless immortality. Reach the Sacred Blood, and one entered the realm of creation, where even the dead could be called back to life. Yet across the whole of the celestial realm, those who possessed so much as Divine Blood were vanishingly few. Sacred Blood was rarer still.
When he halted, the other three stopped with him.
"Why'd you stop?" Hwan Do asked.
"Heard something interesting," Yi Yeok said. "My new subordinate came through with a rather intriguing bit of information."
"What kind of story?" Hwan Rang asked, unable to hide his curiosity.
"The Sacred Blood Lotus Bodhi Seed."
None of Hwan Mong's company had ever heard the name. She studied him, wary.
"It could be a trap, couldn't it?"
"Doesn't matter. If it is, then the lot of us get to drink a rare tea—steeped from a Black Wood Old Demon who's been aging for a few thousand years."
Heukmok's heart lurched. He had learned of the Sacred Blood Lotus Bodhi Seed more than a century ago. Whether the thing was still where it had been, he could not say.
"I don't know much about it," Hwan Rang said, "but never having heard of something doesn't mean it isn't real. The Buddhist sects have more bodhi seeds than anyone can count. If Hwan Yeong's interested, it's worth a look."
Yi Yeok grinned.
"Heukmok. Point the way."
Heukmok indicated the northwest.
"About two thousand li from here, Master."
"Quite a distance," Hwan Mong said quietly. "Let's move."
Yi Yeok vanished like a gust of wind. The others traded a look, then followed without a word.
The Black Wood Old Demon dropped his voice at Yi Yeok's ear.
"Master, are you truly friends with them?"
Yi Yeok snorted.
"I don't do friends. Why?"
"Something about them is off. They're hiding their strength on purpose. And I've caught them watching you with wary eyes."
Yi Yeok smiled, faintly impressed.
"You picked up on all that?"
"This humble one has lived several thousand years. I can read a little of what people keep inside."
"Everyone has secrets. Learn to respect other people's, and life gets a lot less tiring."
Only then did Heukmok understand that Yi Yeok had known all of it long before he spoke.
A faint smile on his lips, Yi Yeok glanced back at the three coming along behind.
Fine. I'll play along. In the end, we'll see who comes out ahead.
On the road toward the Buddhist treasure, Yi Yeok had Heukmok tell him of the Buddhist sect. In this land of the Buddha's way, even common folk worshipped the Buddha and begged blessings of him, and those blessings ran from wealth and glory all the way down to an easy farrowing for a sow. Whether any of it worked hardly mattered. You prayed first and asked questions never.
To Yi Yeok it was nothing but a swindle—no different from holding rain rites for months or years on end, and then, once the sky finally broke, declaring the ritual a success because the rain had come.
Days later, Heukmok spoke with care.
"Master, I believe we've arrived."
They stood on barren ground. Before them a gorge opened, a good hundred yards across and every bit as deep, its floor choked with weeds.
Yi Yeok looked around.
"So. Where is it?"
Heukmok hesitated.
"It ought to be somewhere nearby... but the exact spot, even I don't know. We'll have to search a little more."
Yi Yeok closed his eyes and focused. His Hidden Soul Divine Spirit Art, honed far past what it had once been, missed not even the faint shiver of a single blade of grass. He felt nothing out of the ordinary.
He opened his eyes and let out a laugh that crawled up the spine.
"Heh heh heh heh..."
"Heukmok?"
"Master, I didn't lie. I really didn't."
Heukmok edged backward. He wanted to run. He knew perfectly well he wouldn't get the chance.
A killing gleam lit at the tip of Yi Yeok's finger.
"I'll let you pick how you die. Shall I brew you for tea, or steep you for wine?"
Heukmok's voice broke.
"Master, I wasn't lying. The place is right. I just don't know exactly where the thing is."
"That's fine. Next life, if you aren't sure, keep your mouth shut. Problem solved."
Hwan Mong turned her head and shouted.
"Hwan Yeong! Look down in the gorge!"
Yi Yeok stepped to the edge and looked. Weeds choked the canyon floor, but through them a blood-red vine crept along the ground.
"Vines usually climb the walls, don't they?"
Hwan Mong nodded.
"They do. A vine that long, lying flat along the bottom—that's wrong."
Yi Yeok nodded. Then he gave Heukmok, standing beside him, a light kick.
Heukmok dropped into the gorge with a pitiful scream.
"I'm giving you a chance!" Yi Yeok called down. "Find it, and fast!"
Hwan Mong stared, incredulous.
"And if he runs?"
"If he runs, he runs."
She gave a bitter smile.
Down in the gorge, Heukmok approached the red vine. Whether he was truly searching or only going through the motions, no one above could tell.
The next moment he cried out in panic.
"Master, dodge!"
Yi Yeok threw himself backward at once.
A blood-red vine shot up out of the gorge with a vicious hiss and came whipping toward them at a dreadful speed. The force behind it was such that a glancing blow would have left not even bone.
It struck like a living thing. The vine convulsed, huge as a beast, and cinched around the earth; every twist of it drove deep into the ground and split the land with enormous cracks. Coiling in a serpent's spiral, it pressed down on them with a weight that was suffocating all on its own.
They scattered, none of them daring a head-on clash. Even the shiver of air as the vine passed raked their skin. Worse, its movements grew more tangled by the moment, harder and harder to read. A single heartbeat too late, and it would be the end.
"I'm sure of it!" Hwan Rang shouted. "Where there's a demon beast, there's something precious!"
He wasn't wrong. A demon beast was precious in itself—prized as material for elixir pills and spiritual essence.
Hwan Rang wrapped himself in blood qi and transformed into a massive wolf.
The blood-red vine snatched him up in an instant. Before he could so much as react, he was bound tight.
Hwan Do lunged, gathering blood qi in both hands until twin sabers took shape, and brought them down on the vine with everything he had. The vine flung him far away.
"Idiots!" Hwan Mong shouted. "Don't be reckless!"
Yi Yeok watched them a moment, then nodded as though he'd made up his mind.
"Right. We're not finishing this the easy way."
He turned at once and ran.