Sichuan Journey - Deepening (16)
Sichuan Journey - Deepening (16)
"Welcome, welcome! The goods are cheap!"
"Look at that carved statue from the Southern Barbarians over there! Do you have any idea how hard it was to obtain this piece!"
"I'm selling a sword from the country of Wa! A very precious item made by the artisans of the island nation!"
The Chengdu marketplace was a chattering clamor, noisy as a nest of fledgling birds. I navigated the crowd, relying on the note from the Demonic Cult's Yeonrakchaek. The market was so chaotic that every time I glanced between the note and the path ahead, I bumped into someone, sparking needless irritation.
"Careful there."
"Ouch, my apologies."
I couldn't fathom why he insisted on meeting at the market; we could have simply taken a room at an inn. The note said to find a man in red clothes, a white cloth wrapped around his head, and a distinctive mustache. How the hell was I supposed to spot him in this crowd?
"Come on over! I've got plenty of expensive goods right here, brought all the way from the Potala Palace! I'm selling a curved blade studded with gems! Selling carpets too!"
Just as I thought that and raised my head, there he was. He wore a searing, fiery red coat, his head wrapped in white cloth like a critically injured patient, and sported an exotic mustache. The way he beamed brightly and hawked his wares at every passerby made me hesitate.
Come to think of it, I recalled a merchant from the Western Regions doing business in Chang'an too. Could that merchant also be Yeonrakchaek? Just how deep had the Demonic Cult infiltrated? And why reveal this face to me?
As I stood hesitating, the merchant stopped hawking, his broad smile still in place, and turned his gaze on me. The way his eyes swiveled while his smiling face stayed fixed felt almost reptilian, and I grimaced.
Tilting his head as if sizing up lunch, he stared at me intently, then raised his voice again, still smiling.
"Business is done for today! All done! I'm off to eat a meal with a friend!"
With a hearty laugh, the merchant threw an arm around my shoulders and steered us toward a high-class inn nearby.
*******
"You were later to the meeting than I expected."
As soon as we settled into the inner room, the merchant shed the clumsy speech he'd used outside. He still smiled, but his eyes weren't smiling, and I sensed a hint of pressure. I nodded.
"It wasn't a matter with a set deadline. Something happened in Sichuan concerning my wife, so I was a bit rushed."
The merchant shrugged and said,
"I heard about the Taiji Sect matter. As long as you handle things well, whatever you do is no concern of mine. Will it affect this job?"
"It won't."
Even if it did, that wasn't for a criminal like me to predict. I changed the subject.
"I heard you were investigating the Tang Clan in Sichuan. Did you find any decent information?"
The merchant nodded, unwound the cloth from his head, and pulled out a hefty volume. The head wrap served as a makeshift storage case. I took the volume and skimmed its contents.
The first pages contained the family tree of the Sichuan Tang Clan, with some names struck through in red.
"What are these names that are struck out?"
"Those are the individuals who were caught up in the Tang Clan's internal strife and died."
"Why did you even investigate the branch families? Do the branch families participate in these power struggles too?"
The family tree sprawled wide, listing relatives with unfamiliar titles. The sheer number made my head spin and ache at once. The merchant nodded.
"Of course. You think only a few in the branch families want to study poisons in the main family? Even without clear results, winning an internal power struggle lets a branch family member research all they want in the main family, so they're even more aggressive."
It sounded like absolute bedlam. A clan of poison researchers mad about power struggles? Killing each other off? I tilted my head.
"So they poison each other internally, scheme and kill? They'd implode at the slightest poke."
"No, usually it's the research competition overheating—people die from poisoning after testing substances on themselves. They're all poison experts; why fight each other with poison? I heard that if you develop a poison that could harm a Tang Clan member, you submit it to the council for a high score. It's more advantageous. I was told they're surprisingly harmonious."
That didn't seem to match the image of the white-painted research fanatics. I blinked.
"...Harmonious?"
"Last time, someone saw them on a family outing to a lake near Chengdu. To celebrate the younger sister's coming of age, they said. If there were any visible internal divisions, the Demonic Cult would have handled them long ago."
That was true. I'd brought down opponents using insider knowledge or overwhelming information, and the Demonic Cult already had that information. The fact they hadn't laid a finger on the Tang Clan meant there was no obvious opening.
"They're more straightforward than I thought. Still, isn't there any weakness?"
"A weakness, you say?"
"Something like illegally seizing people for live experimentation. Kidnapping martial artists and feeding them poison to observe the reactions. Do they do anything like that?"
"...They legally pay taxes to the government, receive convicted death-row criminals, and experiment on them."
"Cunning bastards. Not a single opening. Only using death-row inmates."
"....?"
The merchant looked at me with an ambiguous expression. I was just as annoyed. Especially since the Tang Clan was allying with the Murim Alliance, there had to be something shady behind the scenes, but no trace could be found.
If the objective were simply to wipe out the Tang Clan, there were many ways. They were lunatics handling hazardous materials right in the heart of Chengdu, Sichuan. I just had to locate the warehouse where they stockpiled poisons, dig a tunnel, stuff it full of explosives, and set it ablaze. If I pulled it off on a day when they were holding a family meeting, all the flammable substances and deadly poisons in the warehouse would trigger a chemical reaction and turn all of Chengdu into a hellscape.
Of course, I couldn't do that. Hong Ye lived in Chengdu, and doing such a thing wouldn't accomplish what the Demonic Cult wanted, nor what I wanted. So I had to find a weakness that would cause them to fracture.
I racked my brain and examined the other sections.
There was a map of merchants dealing with the Sichuan Tang Clan, and as I turned further, a section on the personal affairs of key figures appeared. The face drawings of the Tang Clan's Sect Leader, the elders, and the three young successor brothers were all lined up, but every face was painted white, making it impossible to tell them apart. I pointed at the portraits.
"Are there any drawings of their faces without the white paint?"
"They've never washed the paint off while outside, so there aren't any."
I clicked my tongue and scratched my head, then stared intently at the family tree again. Time was precious. Since we'd met, I wanted a productive exchange. But no matter how hard I stared, I saw nothing special. The merchant, puzzled by my endless scrutiny of the family tree, spoke listlessly.
"Well, it seems the great hero is not as great a man as I've heard."
I clicked my tongue. To get angry, I'd have to prove him wrong, but I couldn't grasp anything. I steadied my breath and looked again. Would I go back empty-handed? That might be better than forcing an insight out of desperation.
"By the way, where is the younger sister?"
Examining the family tree again, I noticed something strange. Neither the tree nor the volume on members mentioned the 'younger sister' the Tang Clan had spoken of. There was no younger sister in the family tree at all.
When I looked at the merchant, he nodded and said,
"She has never been outside. We don't know her appearance or her personality. She didn't even come out during the recent family outing for her coming of age."
"Why didn't she come out?"
"I don't know. They said she was unwell, but since we have no way to insert a person inside the Tang Clan, there's simply no information. We only know that she exists."
A coming-of-age celebration without the younger sister? Something was off. For bastards who shored up every weak point so thoroughly, if they cherished a woman this dearly, there had to be a secret.
"I'll continue investigating, but don't get your hopes up. I'll hand this volume over to you, so I'd appreciate it if you could conduct your own investigation."
I clicked my tongue and nodded.