Throwing a Monkey Wrench
The Grand Assembly of Murim. Every key figure of the Nine Sects and One Gang, and of the Five Great Clans—save only the Sichuan Tang Clan—had gathered at the Namgung Clan Estate.
The official opening was still some time away, so they had not all assembled in one hall to exchange clasped-fist salutes. On the surface, they seemed only to be seeking out old acquaintances and trading reminiscences. But not a soul among them was unaware that a fierce, unseen struggle was already underway beneath the waterline.
The Namgung Clan itself had already made contact with friendly sects and was attempting covert dealings with hostile ones—and every last one of the Nine Sects and One Gang and the Five Great Clans was doing the same. In the end, for all the lofty pretext of a grand assembly of the entire orthodox world, this was a gathering that would proceed solely according to the tastes of those great powers. Had it not been for a sudden, unforeseen variable, that is precisely what would have happened.
"I am Sip-pal-gong. Inadequate though I may be, I have the honor of serving as Lord of the Heroic Society."
"The Heroic Society, is it…"
The elders of the Jongnam Sect and the Beggars' Sect exchanged a glance. The look that flicked across Sip-pal-gong was brief, and heavy with meaning.
Wang Ju-dae, Elder of the Beggars' Sect, cleared his throat and answered.
"We have heard of you. A place where fine men of purpose from the jianghu have gathered their will as one, or so they say."
"Since an elder of the Beggars' Sect is present, I shall spare you the petty explanations and come to the point. I trust that is acceptable?"
Sip-pal-gong's bearing was unshaken. Wang Ju-dae slid a glance toward the man seated beside him—Pyeong Ji-dal, Elder of the Jongnam Sect. Pyeong Ji-dal returned a look equally charged with significance.
Two elders of the Nine Sects and One Gang. And yet Sip-pal-gong, who was merely First-class, sat before them as if he belonged there.
Wang Ju-dae turned over in his mind the intelligence the beggars had brought him.
The Heroic Society. We'd been watching them—a few reasonably respectable sects had thrown in together. But for their so-called lord to only be this strong… You'd think they'd want to put forward someone powerful. There's something more to this.
At the very least, the great sects assembled at the Namgung Clan Estate were watching the Heroic Society's every move through a dozen different lenses. Wariness. Curiosity. Whether they might become allies. What kind of variable they might prove to be. A thicket of assessing eyes.
"As you are all aware, the Heroic Society was formed so that the voices of the minor and mid-sized sects might reach the center, here at this Grand Assembly of Murim."
"You make it sound as though we have deliberately shut them out."
"Has the Wulin Alliance ever treated the lesser sects as anything more than wells from which to draw martial artists?"
"…"
At Sip-pal-gong's cutting tone, the faces around the table took on a curious cast. A faint gleam kindled in Wang Ju-dae's eyes. It was not offense at the sudden bluntness. If anything, the look was one of curiosity—of genuine interest.
Sip-pal-gong met that gaze without flinching.
"The elders may not know this, but those of us who stand far down the ranks of the jianghu fear it by instinct. We suspect the Pan-Orthodox Alliance will simply become another Wulin Alliance."
"And so you joined your wills to avoid such unjust treatment?"
"Precisely."
"Then what brings the Society Lord to us?"
"The Heroic Society wishes to be recognized by the Pan-Orthodox Alliance."
"Hrm. You strike me as a man of considerable discernment, and there are no other ears here, so I shall speak plainly. Is that truly all?"
"…"
"The Five Great Clans have banded tightly together among themselves. What they will not share—what they cannot share—is interest. Who among them would acknowledge the Heroic Society taking a seat at that table?"
"Justification."
"Justification?"
"The justification that runs through the very idea of a Pan-Orthodox Alliance. The effort to break from the old Wulin Alliance and hear even the smallest voices of the entire orthodox world."
"On a pretext that thin?"
Pyeong Ji-dal's brow furrowed.
"No one disputes that justification matters. It is half the reason no one could stop the Namgung Clan from hosting this Grand Assembly in the first place. But a pretext used to scrape up some petty gain is worse than no pretext at all. You end up bound by it—swept along by the very words you spoke."
The tone was barren, edged with disappointment. Sip-pal-gong did not wilt.
"And if it were a justification that delivered practical benefit?"
"Benefit, you say…"
A faint smile touched Wang Ju-dae's mouth. Unlike Pyeong Ji-dal of the Jongnam Sect, the Beggars' Sect elder knew the deeper currents.
"I hear that among the men of purpose gathered in the Heroic Society, a great many harbor grudges against the Namgung…"
"They harbor grudges, yes. But before that, they are, every one of them, the heads or senior officers of their own sects."
"Not so shortsighted, then, as to draw steel and call it vengeance."
"And yet not so spineless as to sit quietly and watch the Namgung prosper."
Only then did understanding dawn on Pyeong Ji-dal's face.
"You mean to check the Namgung."
"Check the Namgung, and you check the Five Great Clans entire."
"And the Heroic Society is capable of checking the Namgung?"
"The Pan-Orthodox Alliance is an undertaking whose stated purpose is to gather the will of every orthodox faction as one. The Namgung themselves proclaimed as much when they took the role of host. The Heroic Society is another justification still: that even the voices of the orthodox world's forgotten little heroes will be heard."
"Oh-ho."
"What is more, the people in this Heroic Society who grind their teeth at the mention of the Namgung are not one or two. It overflows with those who will do whatever they can to obstruct them."
"It does not look well from the outside, the Nine Sects openly checking the Namgung."
"But if one plays the Heroic Society as the card…"
"And having been given a seat at the table, would the Heroic Society forget that favor?"
"Hrm!"
Had the two of them failed to grasp Sip-pal-gong's meaning, they would never have risen to the eldership of great sects in the first place. A solid justification. A check upon the Namgung Clan. And, beyond that, a rubber stamp for the Nine Sects and One Gang.
"More precisely, we would be in a position to act as the instruments of you two elders' will."
"Hah."
Pyeong Ji-dal and Wang Ju-dae let out dry laughs.
The Nine Sects and One Gang were not, after all, a single sect. They were nine different houses. They closed ranks readily enough when a common interest was at stake, but in the quieter rooms they checked one another without fail. Sip-pal-gong was offering to reach into that seam and lay a ripe fruit in their hands.
"I did wonder why, among the sects in the Heroic Society—some of them no slouches—an unknown from Geumgeom Manor, and a First-class martial artist at that, had been made Society Lord. So there was a reason after all."
Sip-pal-gong grinned and bowed his head low.
"I look forward to working with you. Honored elders."
Watching the back of his head, Pyeong Ji-dal and Wang Ju-dae traded glances and smiled, well satisfied.
"You talk a good game."
"…You were listening?"
At the sudden, familiar voice, Sip-pal-gong's eyes flew wide. He snapped his head left and right, scanning the surroundings.
Until moments ago he had been in a place of extreme secrecy: a safehouse of the Beggars' Sect. He had been led there with both eyes covered. What was more, beggars who were unmistakably disciples of the Sect had been keeping a sharp, unspoken watch on every approach. Eavesdropping should have been all but impossible.
A Beggars' Sect safehouse was built to keep people out. There were no walls or structures to hide behind, and whatever cover remained still sat squarely in some beggar's line of sight. The Beggars' Sect had not become one of the Nine Sects and One Gang by accident.
Sun Wukong smiled, turning the expression this way and that.
"Quite the silver tongue. Especially that bit about how it would profit Jongnam and the Beggars' Sect more than the Nine Sects as a whole—I never told you to say that. You handled it well."
"H-how…"
Sip-pal-gong's eyelids trembled. A chill crawled over his skin. He understood now that the claim of having heard every word spoken inside was no idle probe.
Sun Wukong's smile turned playful.
"What, did you start getting ideas?"
"I-I would never."
"It's fine, it's fine. You're allowed to get ideas."
Sip-pal-gong's body went rigid.
Sun Wukong was still smiling. Not a shred of malice or hostility showed on that face. There was even something of a child's pure mischief in the curve of it—but Sip-pal-gong, who had glimpsed even a fraction of what lay behind that smile, was not so easily taken in.
Die, or cooperate.
Sun Wukong had offered those two choices with this same smile on his face. An expression utterly empty of killing intent. And that was precisely why it was terrifying. Sip-pal-gong knew this man could end a life without the smile ever leaving his mouth.
No. It had not felt like simple killing.
A judge delivering a sentence.
Not murder—punishment. A will as stern and absolute as a magistrate's gavel. Had he faced some vicious martial artist bristling with bloodlust, Sip-pal-gong would have slipped the noose the way he always did. But Sun Wukong, that day, had been something else.
He had not felt human. In the face of a fear that came from the unknown, Sip-pal-gong had had no choice but to yield. Wukong had not even used martial arts. He had not so much as raised that monstrous iron staff. And still Sip-pal-gong had bent at the waist.
Sun Wukong had been smiling then, too.
"A little self-interest is fine, I said. Fame and power—wasn't that what our dear Society Lord wanted?"
"Th-that's right."
Sip-pal-gong found himself short of words. Lies did not come easily in front of Sun Wukong. Those eyes looked through him as if they already knew everything. The golden pupils, washed with a faint red light, were transparent and fierce enough to see through to the soul.
"A respectable seat was what you were after, wasn't it?"
"Well…"
"If you think about it, I'm the one who helped you get it."
Sip-pal-gong's gaze wavered for an instant.
"That scheme you laid out when you went to those two—you just parroted what I told you to say."
"That's true."
From the start, a private meeting between Sip-pal-gong and the elders of the Beggars' Sect and the Jongnam Sect, in a safehouse no less, should have been impossible. In their eyes the Heroic Society was just another of the countless associations that bloomed and withered across the jianghu, and Sip-pal-gong himself had been even less than that. That the meeting had happened at all was entirely Sun Wukong's doing.
"Dangle a plausible story in the air and people start to get curious. That's how it works."
"Then… the rumors were Teacher Sun's doing?"
"What, you think rumors just spring up on their own?"
The rumor of the Heroic Society. On its face, it was nothing more than a social club of middling sects. The jianghu was full of such gatherings. And yet from a certain point—more precisely, from the moment Sip-pal-gong had bowed his head to Sun Wukong—it had become a genuine topic of conversation. A few people had begun to speak the Heroic Society's name. Flesh had grown on those bones, until at last the talk reached the ears of the Beggars' Sect and drew the interest of the Nine Sects and One Gang themselves.
It was no ordinary rumor. Sip-pal-gong knew perfectly well that word could not spread that far, that fast, by accident. His eyelids trembled again.
Come to think of it, this was the same man who came looking for me as if he already knew everything.
The power to steer public talk across an entire region. The reach to catch even the finest tremor of movement. Sip-pal-gong swallowed dryly. Sun Wukong's face, still full of mischief, was more frightening than any savage scowl.
"So enjoy a reasonable share of power and fame. That much is fine. But the work I give you—do it properly. Yeah?"
"I-I understand."
"And keep the Heroic Society in hand. Rein in the ones with grudges against the Namgung. Moderately."
"You intend to leave them be?"
"They make up more than half the Society. If I don't leave them be, how does the Heroic Society hold together as a force?"
"But whether they will actually follow what I say…"
"Why? You think they'll follow someone else?"
"There is one suspicious man. A fellow named Sima. He is the one who, in effect, gathered all of them to our side."
"I'll handle that one. Don't worry about it."
"…!"
"Don't try to smother their discontent. Let them run a little wild. Just don't let them cross the line."
"In that case, they may well do the Namgung harm."
Sun Wukong gave a short laugh.
"You think a handful of that lot, bunched together, could put a scratch on the Namgung?"
"I know the Namgung Clan is strong, of course, but—"
"When this Great Sage, Teacher Sun, is right here?"
"…Ah. Yes. Of course."
"Managing their grievances—steering them, keeping them in check—that's your job."
"Mm."
"Do it well. If you want to enjoy anything, you've got to put in the work to match."
"Then… why offer this kind of help at all?"
Sun Wukong shrugged.
"First reason: the world's crawling with people who hold grudges, and there's no telling what they'll try. Easier to sweep them into one place, watch them, and manage them."
"Ah."
"Second: if the Heroic Society earns itself a seat that can actually speak in the Pan-Orthodox Alliance, that's no loss for me either."
"What do you mean by that?"
"The Heroic Society can't slip out of my palm, can it?"
Sip-pal-gong's body gave a faint shudder. It was true. So long as he sat in the Society Lord's seat, he would never be free of Sun Wukong. The certainty of it settled in his bones.
"Which means the Pan-Orthodox Alliance will have a chess piece inside it that does as I say. That's not a bad thing either."
"…!"
"And more than anything else—the most important reason."
Sun Wukong's smile turned wicked with delight.
Messing with people—making them drink the water—was the thing Sun Wukong loved most in the world.