The Sword Family Stronghold
Hong Dok-jiju rose from his seat and spoke.
“The Emei Sect has drawn the Dali Duan Family into an alliance in order to keep the Sichuan Tang Family in check.”
The Fourth Young Master nodded.
“The wife of the Governor of Chengdu is of the Dali Duan Family.”
At those words Yeom Baek-ha slapped her palm down.
“So that was it! The reason the Governor of Chengdu cannot stop the Emei Sect’s open tyranny against Daseonrang, the merchant group his daughter Sang-gwan Nan-hwa founded with her friends…!”
“Precisely. The very fact that the Governor of Chengdu rose to that post in the first place was thanks to his wife and the Dali Duan Family.”
Yeon Ha-eung’s expression turned bitter at that.
“So the Dali Duan Family’s strategy is to nurture the Emei Sect and leave them to check the Tang Family. To leave their own daughter under such pressure for that reason… the Governor’s wife must be a frightening woman.”
“It is not so rare a temperament.”
“Especially among the high-born.”
“Haa…”
Yeom Baek-ha cut off the digression with a question.
“Then what of the rest of Daseonrang?”
“Their families are wealthy, yet every foundation of their businesses lies within Emei territory.”
The Fourth Young Master crossed his arms and sighed.
“In effect they are holding the families hostage.”
Elder Yu nodded.
“And the remaining members of Daseonrang are themselves hostages binding Sang-gwan Nan-hwa in place.”
At the safe point nearly within reach of the Luoyang Yeon Family, Elder Yeom and his troops took their leave of the investment delegation.
They would head first to a nearby outer barracks of the Luoyang Yeon Family to rest and reorganize, then return to the War Department.
Everyone exchanged brief farewells, yet the window of the Emei Sect’s carriage never opened.
Elder Yeom paid the Emei Sect no mind either.
Thus the investment procession began climbing the hill along the main road of the Luoyang Yeon Family.
“This way.”
And when they had nearly arrived at the Luoyang Yeon Family itself, the window of the Emei carriage opened.
A wrinkled hand emerged and beckoned; the nun attending the Emei Abbess promptly guided her horse alongside the carriage.
“Yes, Grand Abbess.”
From the darkness within the carriage came the Emei Abbess’s low voice.
“From this moment on, see that the children show not the slightest sign of agitation. Warn them thoroughly.”
The nun bowed her head in acknowledgment and cast a sound transmission to the Emei personnel.
[All of you. By the Grand Abbess’s command, take the utmost care never to look about or let your minds wander.]
No sooner had the transmission ended than exclamations burst from the procession riding ahead.
“Ohh!”
The members of the investment delegation, without exception, began to clamor.
“So that is the main house of the Luoyang Yeon Family!”
“Hey, move your head out of the way!”
“Why blame me because your neck is short?”
At the noisy racket the Emei Abbess clicked her tongue and slammed the window shut with force.
Whether she did or not, the investment party leaned out from their carriages climbing the gentle slope and raised a din over the vista unfolding before their eyes.
To the stiff-necked folk of the imperial capital, or to the Luoyang residents who so prized their dignity, it would have seemed a thoroughly undignified spectacle.
Seated atop a carriage roof, Yeon Ha-eung smiled wryly to himself.
But that is precisely the cheerful nature of Sichuan folk.
Just as he thought.
The one most excited by the first glimpse of the Luoyang Yeon Family appearing beyond the hill was none other than the head of the investment delegation, the Sage of the Tang Clan, Tang Go-gyu.
Sitting beside Yeon Ha-eung, he clapped his hands and delighted like a child.
Yeon Ha-eung smiled and asked,
“Has not the Sage Tang visited several times in the past?”
Tang Go-gyu grinned and nodded.
“Indeed I have. Indeed. Yet each time I see it I cannot help but marvel.”
Then once more a wave of gasps rose from the investment party.
A middle-aged man who had craned his head far out of a carriage, face flushed with excitement, shouted toward Tang Go-gyu.
“Sage Tang! Sage Tang! Is that the famous Sword Family rampart?!”
As they climbed the slope the red walls had suddenly reared up into view, and none could suppress their awe.
It was not merely painted by the sunset; the walls themselves were truly red.
“How consistent the reaction always is!”
At the question Tang Go-gyu threw back his head with a hearty laugh and shook it.
“Everyone asks that the first time they visit the Sword Family, yet no! Not so!”
Yeon Ha-eung, taking over for the laughing Tang Go-gyu, called out loudly in explanation.
“That is merely an earthen rampart! The main house excavated and restored the ruins of an ancient dynasty and refined them a little!”
The reddish cast came from the fact that it was earthenwork.
Yet as Tang Go-gyu said, the unvarying reaction stemmed from the sheer scale of that earthen fortification.
As the procession followed the well-paved carriage road toward the earthen gate, the reconstructed gateway entrance of the Luoyang Yeon Family came into view.
“That there is the first gate leading into the Sword Family!”
Indeed, as he said, the entrance of the earthen walls had been built into the form of a complex wooden fortress.
Once the carriages that had arrived earlier and waited their turn slowly filed through, Yeon Ha-eung dismounted from his carriage.
“Heya! Hard at work!”
His usual buoyant greeting was answered with a smile by the gate commander.
“Well now, if it isn’t Advisor Yeon.”
Given the nature of outer-yard duties, the gate commander could hardly fail to recognize Yeon Ha-eung, who came and went as freely as across his own threshold.
“Even Advisor Yeon must observe inspection procedure, you understand?”
“Of course, of course.”
Yeon Ha-eung drew from his breast his identity tablet, the Luoyang Yeon Family entry pass, and the Fourth Young Master’s invitation for the investment procession, and handed them to the gate commander.
“Please wait a moment.”
In the interval a guard approached and wiped Yeon Ha-eung’s face with a medicated cotton swab.
“Human-skin mask and disguise check complete. Thank you for your cooperation.”
The gate commander entered a small office and verified the authenticity of the tablet and entry pass.
Only after meticulously cross-checking them against the Fourth Young Master’s prior request for entry assistance for the investment party and the invitation itself did he emerge again.
“Sorry to have kept you waiting.”
“Not at all. Haha.”
Returning Yeon Ha-eung’s articles, the gate commander waved a signal to his subordinates.
“Pass!”
Thereupon the guards cleared away the wooden barricades and opened the path.
The repeating crossbows that had been leveled at the procession from atop the earthen walls also turned aside, and the gazes of the guards who had kept hands on their quivers everywhere shifted toward the next approaching carriage.
“Right, we move again!”
The barricades were gone and the investment procession began to advance once more, yet they could not race ahead as before.
It was because of the zigzag interior structure of the gate.
“….”
Those who had been leaning out to gawk fell silent.
The sight of the troops stationed above the zigzag passages, ready at any moment to pour down a crossfire, was simply too threatening.
Even so, not a soul pulled their head back inside a carriage.
They were all too eager to see what landscape would unfold the instant the gate ended.
“Ooooh!”
At last the stone ramparts of the Luoyang Yeon Family revealed their majestic grandeur exactly as they had hoped.
A height that no mere ladder could hope to scale.
A length that stretched beyond the reach of human sight.
A scale so vast one could scarcely believe a single family had raised it.
Wonder.
“….”
Even the investment folk who had been chattering so busily closed their mouths.
Or else stood gaping, unable to form a single word.
That such a colossal fortress should stand in the heart of Luoyang—land where foreign invasion was almost unimaginable—filled the beholders with a profound sense of incongruity.
At their reactions Yeon Ha-eung smiled wryly to himself.
Even I, who travel this road constantly, still lose my words every time I see it…
Then Tang Go-gyu spoke to Yeon Ha-eung in a low voice.
“Looking at their faces, I feel the rice cakes that upset my stomach on my fifth birthday have finally gone down.”
“Is that so…?”
At the words Yeon Ha-eung glanced back.
The reactions among the Emei personnel were varied.
A nun who stared blankly at the ramparts’ majesty and guided her horse the wrong way.
A nun who pretended to look elsewhere while stealing glances at the equipment of a light-armored cavalry patrol.
A nun whose face remained blank yet had gone somewhat pale.
The splendid monastic robes and luxurious ornaments the nuns wore seemed to lose all luster in an instant.
“So this truly is the greatest family under heaven…”
“The claim that they stand above all beneath the imperial house is no exaggeration.”
“Not even on a frontier, but a citadel-city right in the heart of the Central Plains. Is it to flaunt the Sword Family’s power?”
“If so, the effect is certain. That a single family accomplished all this—my legs tremble.”
“Heh heh. One look at this sight and any enemy of the Luoyang Yeon Family must feel their knees go weak, no?”
At the murmuring talk that began to rise Yeon Ha-eung muttered,
“Is that truly so…?”
Tang Go-gyu, who had been absorbed in the walls, asked,
“I was distracted and missed it. What did you say?”
Yeon Ha-eung waved a hand.
“Nothing. It was nothing.”
Tang Go-gyu regarded him curiously a moment, then returned to looking about and was soon lost again in the sights.
No matter how high one raises the walls, no matter how thick one builds them, there will always be those who covet another’s possessions and seek to seize them.
Yeon Ha-eung looked up at the ramparts drawing steadily nearer, so tall one had to tip one’s head back merely to glimpse their crest.
The more one possesses, the more one fears losing even more; the more one gains, the more one covets what belongs to others.
Behold this tower of vanity and ostentation raised by the Luoyang Yeon Family.
Behold this wall that seems the very embodiment of iron-fisted rule and iron-fisted sanction.
Behold the history piled high with blood and corpses of friend and foe alike.
Behold those who willingly hate the Luoyang Yeon Family.
The white-haired poisonous old ghost of the Emei Sect.
Without needing to confirm it, he knew the old woman was glaring at the ramparts of the Luoyang Yeon Family with burning eyes from within the dark carriage.
When the era of the Murim Alliance ended, the Emei Sect had followed the successful examples of the great families and enjoyed success incomparable to the past.
As the times changed and many other sects fell into ruin, the old woman successfully revived the Emei Sect.
Yet still the old woman hated the Luoyang Yeon Family.
Simply because they stood above her, she envied the Luoyang Yeon Family.
What would that old woman not do to catch up to the Luoyang Yeon Family?
The Luoyang Yeon Family that ceaselessly piled its walls higher was a hungry ghost, and those who coveted its place were hungry ghosts as well.
The world was a battlefield of hungry ghosts.
Though I am hardly in a position to say such things.
Yeon Ha-eung mocked himself.
Was he not himself a man seeking to seize the Gaebong Yeon family?
Was he not a man who a hundred times a day pondered how to take the family into his hands—or else burn it all to ash?
How could such a man point a finger at others?
His gaze turned toward the carriage carrying Daseonrang.
They too had their heads out the windows, utterly absorbed in the never-before-seen scenery of the Luoyang Yeon Family.
Which side will those women choose, I wonder.
Hungry ghosts intent on devouring them alive were already closing in.
Were they prepared to survive this scramble of hungry ghosts?
Were they ready to become hungry ghosts themselves, to eat and be eaten?
“So the inside of these walls is that famous citadel-city?”
At the question Tang Go-gyu again burst into laughter and answered.
“I knew that question would come! Hahaha!”
Yeon Ha-eung swallowed another wry smile and called out loudly in reply.
“These walls are only the outer ramparts! Past the outer residential districts lies the inner citadel!”
Indeed.
The citadel-city of the Luoyang Yeon Family was a double fortress.