How to Trust - 2
Cheon Il-hwa's explanation was a simple one.
For the past several days, people had been disappearing from Yangwi Fortress. His subordinates had looked into it, but no worthwhile clues had surfaced. So, just in case, he'd cast the net wider — and it turned out similar incidents had occurred in other castles nearby.
"Have you investigated the back alleys?"
Where light is great, darkness grows great in equal measure. No matter how determined the Lord of Yangwi Fortress might be about keeping the peace, that darkness was never small. Of course, it couldn't operate in the open — but even so.
"Mm. We did look into the Jin Fist Hall, which rules the back alleys here... but they're currently beside themselves with rage."
The Jin Fist Hall. One of the heterodox sects — the very faction that had once clashed with Sa Yun. Later, its hall master took a liking to her and went on to help her out in all sorts of ways.
"So even the Jin Fist Hall master's own daughter has vanished. They, of all people, must be desperate to solve these disappearances."
"I'd imagine so. O Chil, master of the Jin Fist Hall, dotes on that daughter of his."
"Hmm. Spoken like yourself, Master Yu. That's right. O Chil loved his late wife with all his heart. The daughter she bore him is a treasure he would yield to nothing in this world."
It had been the same in Cheonsang Myeongwol. Clear this event, and the Jin Fist Hall master would come to offer his gratitude — and with him came additional rewards from the hall. His daughter had been on the very brink of death back then, if I recalled correctly. He was reacting to having her saved, so his response wasn't hard to understand. There was one more linked event chained to it as well, but that wasn't what mattered now, so I let it pass.
From there, Cheon Il-hwa calmly continued his account of the missing.
"Can they be found?"
"Well... if the Empire committed itself fully to the search, they'd be found faster than I could manage."
"Ha ha ha..."
Cheon Il-hwa laughed, looking somewhat awkward. If the Imperial intelligence service moved as I'd suggested, the missing would be found quickly enough — but the military and the intelligence bureau were hardly on the best of terms, so he apparently disliked begging them for help.
"Even so, if this one inadequate hand of mine can spare the Empire needless trouble, then lend it I must."
"I'm sorry to lean on you every time. I'll be counting on you, as ever."
Beside me, Chae Jin watched me anxiously, as if to ask whether I could really manage it — but there was little cause for worry. I knew who the culprit was, and what purpose the abductions served.
Stripped to its conclusion, the culprit was a crone named Yang Myeong — the Soul-Lost Monster.
True to that name, the mad old woman created Soul-Lost Humans: beings whose souls were frozen solid, stripping them of all reason and leaving them to obey nothing but their maker's commands.
First she had taken animals, then corpses — and now, the living. She was gathering them all together to forge Soul-Lost Humans.
With nothing left to discuss, I rose from my seat and stepped out of the room. Outside, Gi Cha-jo was waiting with a warm, good-natured smile.
"Master Yu. Did you meet with the Guild Master?"
"Yes, Old Man Gi. I mean to lend what meager strength I have."
"I see! Ha ha! As expected of you, Master Yu. Should you need help, you need only say the word. This old body is well past its prime, but for you, I'll gladly pitch in."
"Oh, come now. With Old Man Gi himself at my side, what would there be to fear?"
"Heh heh heh heh! Oh, you flatterer!"
"Ha ha ha ha ha!"
Gi Cha-jo roared with laughter, and I laughed along. Beside him, Wi Yeol snorted as if to say the old man was spouting nonsense again, but the mood was a pleasant one.
"The Moonlight Blade will be going with him, so please don't worry yourself."
"Mm, mm. I see. Do look after yourself out there."
With that, I bid him farewell and stepped outside. Truthfully, having Gi Cha-jo or Wi Yeol along would have set my mind at ease. They were masters of the imperial military, after all.
The problem was that if I asked them for help with this affair, I couldn't claim the credit for it entirely as my own. They were assets to be cherished and hoarded until the moment I truly needed them — for now, I had no choice but to go trusting Chae Jin alone.
"Innkeeper."
"What is it?"
I'd bought two bottles of liquor on the way out of Cheonghoeru, and as we walked along with them in hand, Chae Jin — quiet for quite some time — finally spoke. I glanced back to find her fiddling with her long hair, and she asked cautiously:
"Honestly, for work like this, more hands would be better... It could be dangerous, so perhaps we ought to bring more masters along..."
She wasn't wrong. Investigations like this do get solved faster the more heads you put on them.
Besides, Yang Myeong's location had been randomized even during the event, so I would have to track her down myself. But there were any number of ways to learn where she was — why waste precious points dragging that old man along? And besides, the one person capable of fighting Yang Myeong was already at my side.
I looked her over from head to toe, taking in the firm, solid figure that showed through her skintight Moon Lotus Pavilion uniform, and asked point-blank:
"Not confident?"
"It's not that."
"If I didn't trust you, who would I trust? Had I not, I'd never have asked you to come along in the first place."
Chae Jin said nothing again. She only stared at me with eyes gone a little wider — then promptly burst into her signature haughty laugh.
"O-ohohoho! If you trust me that much, then repaying that trust is only natural! Very well! I, Chae Jin, the Moonlight Blade and eldest disciple of the prestigious Moon Lotus Pavilion, shall aid you — so don't you worry about a single thing!"
"I wasn't worried in the slightest, so spare me the concern."
She fell silent and stared at me. I hadn't been lying, so I held her gaze evenly — and Chae Jin, her bluster burning itself out, slyly looked away.
"Well then. Let's be off."
"...Where exactly are we going?"
"I have someone to see."
"Who?"
"The branch head of Ha-O Gate in Yangwi Fortress."
We walked roads sunk in deep darkness. By any ordinary measure, no one would set foot in such a secluded alley at this hour. Proving the point, the moment we entered the back streets, stares came pouring down on us, sharp enough to sting. The reason none of those watchers dared step forward, though, was surely the killing intent Chae Jin had begun to radiate from the instant we set foot inside. The knowledge that one wrong move could cost you your head kept reckless bravado in check, and thanks to that, we slipped without difficulty into the deepest reaches of the back alleys — a place counted as a combat zone even in Cheonsang Myeongwol, and one to which Yangwi Fortress sent no soldiers to keep the peace. Hatong, the slums of Yangwi Fortress.
Liquor, violence, women. Hatong, where society's darkness gathered, was thick with men who dealt in all three — and most of them prided themselves on living close to death. I suppose men who stake their lives on their trade have little fear of killing intent.
Of course.
THWACK!!
"Gwark!"
That is — not until they took the hit and realized that such killing intent could very truly part a head from its shoulders.
The moment we entered Hatong, a hand had come shooting out toward me. I wasn't wearing anything particularly fine, and even by a mirror's honest measure I didn't look like easy pickings. Perhaps drink's strange magic had wound itself around him, lending him the strength of fool's courage.
Even so, that didn't make it permissible — least of all to Chae Jin, who had come along as my escort.
To the man knocked out cold with a single blow, Chae Jin spared not even a glance. She simply swept her incomparably frigid eyes over his stunned companions.
"...Do you have any idea where you are, causing a scene like that?"
Perhaps because it looked as though a fight might break out — a man who had been seated beside a shop hung with red lanterns rose slowly and came toward us. His face was a vicious one. As he approached, dragging a long blade even uglier than his scowl, Chae Jin didn't dignify him with so much as a snort.
Shff. A martial artist answers only with the blade. The instant a silver edge — drawn so fast no eye could mark when it had left its sheath — threaded through empty air and came to rest back at her hip, the man swallowed hard. The front of his robe shredded into pieces and fluttered down to the ground. Yet there was not so much as a scratch on his skin.
"We didn't come to fight. We've come only to see Ha-no."
The hulk deliberated. But only for a moment. Without a word telling us to follow, he walked on in silence — deeper into the alley than we had yet ventured.
How far did we go like that? Only when we reached a place reeking thickly of sour, fetid stench did he quietly step aside.
Pushing through an old hanging blanket, we found an old man sitting within, eyes closed. Arranged before him were the tools of a fortune-teller's trade.
Perhaps he had heard the blanket rustle. Eyes still shut, he turned his head toward us, hands groping until they found his divination sticks.
"Aigoo, what kept you?! Well, you're here all the same. One talisman, and..."
"Let's not run scams on people who already know each other. You can't so much as draw a talisman."
"Tsk. I heard a woman's footsteps and figured some sucker had come to buy a courtesan into his household. Fine, fine. Shall I read your fortune, then?"
As if he knew the first thing about reading one.
"F-fortune?"
"Eh? Was I wrong? This fellow never spares a single glance for the courtesans who cling to him, so when he turns up with a woman in tow, I just figured you two were... that sort of item."
Chae Jin's gaze bored into the side of my head. I did my best to ignore it, and the old man — who had been playing the blind, legless beggar — snapped his eyes wide open at the clink of the bottles I'd brought, hauled himself upright, and made a grab for the liquor.
"Good heavens. To think the miracle that opens a blind man's eyes and sets a cripple on his feet could be wrought with nothing more than two bottles of liquor."
It wasn't the miracle at the end of the line, after all.
"Ah, but liquor — liquor I can't resist."
Snickering, he accepted the bottle I held out. One sip — and his eyes went round as saucers. The liquor, it seemed, was rather good.
"Is this Cheonghoe brew? Ahh... I can see it now — the courtesans of Gaebong, the Imperial Capital, dancing before my eyes..."
Honestly, this old man was all mouth. Ha-no, having drained an entire bottle in the blink of an eye, beamed from ear to ear.
"I've come because I have questions. Do you happen to know anything about the disappearances that have struck Yangwi Fortress?"
"Of course I do. So — is this a commission from the Cheonghoe Merchant Guild?"
"Close enough."
"Tsk."
"There are personal reasons mixed in as well, so treat it as my own request and help me out."
He deliberated for a long while, but in the end held out his hand. I set my coin purse atop that grimy, grime-caked palm; taking it lightly, he spread open the wide leather sheet covering the wall behind him — revealing hundreds of little holes. He gave a firm pull on the cord connected to one of them, and a moment later a slip of white paper slid smoothly out.
"Now, let's see... Yang Myeong. Looks like she's been snatching people to make Soul-Lost Humans. Ah — you do know how to handle someone in the Soul-Lost state, don't you?"
"Is there anyone who doesn't?"
"Handle what, exactly?"
Well, there was one right here.
Ha-no and I both turned to Chae Jin, and her face went red in an instant. Desperate to bury her embarrassment, she hurriedly steered the conversation elsewhere.
"N-never mind that — you found her this easily?! Innkeeper, weren't the Cheonghoe Merchant Guild and the Jin Fist Hall both searching for her? And Ha-O Gate simply knows about it?"
"Ha-O Gate's intelligence network is second to none on the continent!!"
As Ha-no raised his bottle and preened, I gave the paper a couple of taps. Mm. Just as I thought. The location written there was a wild, barren hill not far from Yangwi Fortress.
"In any case, my thanks."
"Come again sometime. So long as you pay, I'll part with any information your heart desires."
Ha-no waved, his face folding into a map of wrinkles. I gave him a casual parting nod and stepped outside, and Chae Jin, walking along beside me, asked carefully:
"How did you ever come to know Ha-O Gate?"
"That, too, is a story as deep as the sea — I'll tell you some other time. It's a bit much to explain here. Wouldn't it be better to hear it back home over a drink?"
Whenever she grew bored, I used to tell her this and that between training sessions, and she'd always listened with relish — which was probably why she accepted so readily.
"Then what about this? Why couldn't the Cheonghoe Merchant Guild and the Jin Fist Hall simply buy the information from Ha-O Gate?"
That much I could explain easily enough.
"It was Ha-O Gate that once held the back alleys of Yangwi Fortress."
To establish itself in those alleys, the Jin Fist Hall had carved away much of Ha-O Gate's territory. Only a tiny handful of Ha-O Gate's places of business remained to this day. Granted, intelligence-gathering and its organization were separate matters — but even so, it was an undeniable fact that Ha-O Gate had fallen on hard times in Yangwi Fortress.
"Even so, Ha-O Gate would have sold the information for the right price — a steep one, granted. But could the Jin Fist Hall really trust them?"
"Well... fair point. Then what about the Cheonghoe Merchant Guild?"
"Ha-O Gate does not take commissions from the authorities."
"Why not?"
"A few years back, the authorities commissioned Ha-O Gate to investigate the Demonic Cult, and in the course of it, Ha-O Gate suffered heavy losses. And in return — they received nothing at all."
"Huh? Why? Can they even do that?"
"Because that couldn't be allowed to stand, one of Ha-O Gate's iron rules was born: never do business with the authorities."
"Oh... but wouldn't refusing cost them dearly?"
"Ha-O Gate is a gathering of those who have nothing. They believed that if they let themselves be squeezed that way, everything they had would be taken from them — so they drew their line resolved to die if they must. Even the Empire cannot renege on a contract with Ha-O Gate. I'd say that's about the gist of it."
"Wow... so what became of that official?"
"He profited handsomely from breaking the agreement, but afterward his political enemies dug up the corruption he'd buried and moved against him. In the end, I heard he was executed. I suspect it was Ha-O Gate who leaked that information — but the truth is something no one knows."
"That's terrifying."
"Things eased up somewhat after his death. A request passed along through a chain of personal acquaintance and trust, as mine was just now, they will accept — but officially, commissions from the authorities are refused. Had the authorities come knocking directly, I imagine they'd have shut the branch and fled on the spot."
"Ah..."
"In the end, it comes down to trust. It's only natural that you cannot work alongside those you cannot trust."
No more words passed between us after that. We simply walked in silence.
We made our way to the place Ha-O Gate's information had pointed to, and the moment we discovered a massive cave there, Chae Jin spoke up.
"...Then that means you trust me, doesn't it, Innkeeper? Seeing as we're working together like this."
"I told you already. I trust you."
She studied me for a moment, then snorted a laugh, whipped her head away, fixed her gaze somewhere else, and said:
"Hehe. Well, since you'll be learning from someone trustworthy, I'll be extending your training hours from now on. And since we'll be moving on to more advanced material, the tuition will be going up as well."
Wait, a drift?! Right here?! We were getting along so well just a second ago!
My trust in Chae Jin: slightly decreased.
"You don't like it? Fine, then, don't. But you know it's doing you good, don't you?"
She wasn't wrong. Training certainly came with its share of suffering, but as Geomseong had said, practicing Chae Family Tai Chi and the Five Animal Frolics had genuinely improved my health and let me move with far more vigor. It shielded my body, too.
"But is it really all right for just the two of us to go in? Shouldn't we at least call for reinforcements or something? Yang Myeong is still a fairly formidable master, you know?"
For all that she was raising the matter of reinforcements, Chae Jin's voice was remarkably light.
I caught on to the answer she was fishing for and replied offhandedly. Compliments cost nothing, after all.
"Someone like you could take down a Yang Myeong without breaking a sweat."
Apparently that was the right answer.
Pleased as could be, Chae Jin burst into her signature haughty smile, the brilliant moonlight at her back.