On the Road
The dissolution of the Martial Alliance of the Righteous Path was widely held to have been inevitable once its sworn enemy, the Demonic Cult—whose main headquarters were known as the Hundred Thousand Great Mountains—finally collapsed.
An alliance that had once encompassed the entire Central Plains nation, they said, was bound to crumble once it no longer faced so formidable a foe.
But that was merely the common view.
Those who truly understood the times saw it differently.
With the advancement of the age came the sophistication of capital. And so those who had once been called the Great Clans surged forward, driven by economic power.
The change was too swift, too precise. As a result, the mainstays of the Martial Alliance—once known as the Nine Great Sects—mostly drowned in the glory of the past.
The times had changed. Those who could not keep pace were left behind.
The fall of the Martial Alliance was a story both that simple and that complex.
As many families came to wield not only political power and martial force but economic power as well, they grew steadily more enormous. Logistics and transport were handled in-house through the merchant houses and caravans the families themselves owned.
Escort agencies.
For that reason, many scholars predicted that escort agencies were an industry destined to vanish without fail. In practice, rather than simply going bankrupt, most chose to sell their shares to merchant groups or trading houses and allow themselves to be absorbed.
But as is so often the case with the predictions of scholars—and with the ways of the world itself—words like “inevitably,” “unconditionally,” and “absolutely” miss the mark more often than not.
On a lonely mountain path on the outskirts of Luoyang, far from any traffic, the escort agencies that had refused subordination and fought desperately to survive had chosen a different path: specialization.
[A troublesome situation. Of all things, someone had to witness the transport.]
One of the escorts toyed with the hilt of his blade and sent a sound transmission to the head escort.
[Chief. What should we do?]
“……”
The head escort frowned as he looked down at the figures kneeling before him.
“Please! Spare us!”
“We didn’t see anything!”
They were an old couple who scraped by gathering medicinal herbs and mountain greens. Of all nights for people to be out… The moment their eyes had met, the escorts had seized them and forced them to their knees. Now they begged until their hands were raw.
Their clothes were in tatters. Tears and sweat ran down faces that had not been properly washed in who knew how long, leaving dark, muddy streaks.
“Just this once…!”
“We won’t tell a soul what we saw tonight!”
At least they had some sense. The weak and the slow-witted had already been killed.
[Chief.]
The head escort’s hesitation did not last long.
[What are you waiting for?]
One of the warriors the client had attached to them sent a sound transmission of his own.
[Do you intend to leave witnesses?]
The expertise the escort agency had cultivated could not be called into question. Their reliability could not be allowed to waver. What the client wanted from them was transport that was swift, precise, and left no witnesses behind.
The head escort had seen the client only once before, but the man had clearly borne the surname Yeon. Anyone who lived and did business in Luoyang knew better than to offend the Yeon bloodline. That was why they had brought no ordinary laborers; the tight-lipped escorts themselves carried and hauled the cargo.
[…Kill them.]
With those words the head escort turned his back.
“Oh, thank you!”
“Thank you so much!”
The old couple, misunderstanding the gesture, slammed their foreheads to the dirt in gratitude.
Behind them the escorts spat on the ground and drew their blades without a sound. This was hardly the first or second time they had done such work. The high wages they earned scaled precisely with how dirty their hands became.
[Sever the windpipes in one stroke.]
The blades flashed as they swept toward the old couple’s necks from behind—and at almost the same instant the escorts’ wrists snapped and the swords hung spinning in midair.
“Ghk!”
“Kh…!”
A thunderous rebuke rolled through the mountain path.
“Truly lawless curs!”
The owner of the voice seemed to be using some peculiar sonic art; the sound echoed from every direction at once.
“You would slaughter innocent commoners like beasts—do you truly believe such a crime can be forgiven?!”
The escorts drew their blades as one and moved with perfect coordination.
[What the hell were the sentries doing?!]
[Ambush defense! Form the ambush-defense formation!]
[Pinpoint the voice!]
Sound transmissions flew faster than the escorts themselves moved. Through their ranks the head escort walked slowly forward, drawing his own sword.
“From the sound of it, you’re some chivalrous hero who couldn’t stand by and watch injustice. Why don’t we talk face-to-face?”
He tugged down the cloth covering his face, glanced around with a smile, and said, “Seems there’s been a misunderstanding. No need for bloodshed—why not settle this with words?”
Of course it was a lie. These days, working escort jobs meant dealing with self-styled heroes who stuck their noses in at every turn. He had long since memorized every method of handling them—and put those methods into practice countless times.
“A man who understands honor would show himself without shame, wouldn’t he?”
Sure enough, after a brief pause the voice returned.
“…Coming out now.”
Figures stepped from concealment on every side. Their clothes varied, but every one of them wore a cloth mask that hid the face.
[Not just one or two.]
Five had revealed themselves, but more might still be hidden.
[On my signal, rush them all at once.]
The escorts who received the order showed no change of expression. The snipers rolled their eyes to count the arrows in their quivers; those carrying hidden weapons quietly slipped hands into their robes. Professionals.
“Five of you, is it?”
The head escort stepped forward another pace, smiling as if in friendly greeting so the newcomers would not notice his men’s preparations.
“Judging by that upright bearing and that blazing spirit, you must be renowned heroes of the jianghu. Might I hear your aliases?”
“We are…!”
The one who met the head escort’s eyes started to shout boldly, then faltered. His gaze slid sideways to a companion.
“…Uh, that is…”
The next man trailed off and looked to yet another. In the end the last one to receive the looks sighed and spoke.
“We are…”
He scratched the back of his head with the hand not holding a hand-axe. His voice was oddly timid, as if he wanted to crawl into a hole.
“The Highway Bandit Gang.”
For a moment the entire mountain path fell silent.
One of the masked “Highway Bandits” cleared his throat and shouted awkwardly, “S-so if you value your lives, abandon that cargo right now and withdraw!”
“Your cargo is ours now!” another chimed in.
“That’s right! And you will apologize properly to that old couple of commoners!”
What kind of absurd situation was this?
“……”
While the head escort stood frozen by the sheer ridiculousness of it, someone brushed past his shoulder.
“Truly, what a pack of fools.”
The man approaching the highway bandits was one of the Sword Family warriors the client had attached to the escort. The head escort snapped out of his daze and hurriedly sent a sound transmission.
[W-wait! By contract all responses are to be handled by our agency…!]
“……”
No reply came. The warrior simply raised his sword and closed the distance on the bandit with the hand-axe. The chilling edge of a blade still in its scabbard answered for him.
Well…
The head escort decided to relax. A Sword Family warrior was a being of an entirely different caliber from the ordinary martial artists who wandered the jianghu.
[Prepare. The moment their blades cross, we strike first.]
The instant the order ended, the warrior’s body seemed to sink into the earth and vanish.
Drawing Sword Form
He took a long, low step; his body dropped; the sword shot from its scabbard as if fired, flashing in a perfect arc. The drawing technique was so refined that even the head escort felt a flicker of admiration. Every eye locked onto the beautiful trajectory of the blade.
But—
“…!”
The draw never finished. The hand that had launched the sword was caught with almost insulting ease by the highway bandit.
Crash!
Using a capturing-hand technique, the bandit seized the warrior’s arm and slammed his own skull straight into the man’s face. Crude as it looked, the Iron Head Skill had clearly been tempered to a respectable level.
“Kh?!”
The warrior’s nose and orbital bones collapsed under the terrifying force. Yet he was still a Sword Family warrior. Even then his free hand caught the sword that had fallen from the trapped arm.
Swift Sword Form — Secret Art: Fine Slice Sharp Edge
A seasoned swordsman was said to make no distinction between left and right. But the refined blade never even fully unfolded. Once more the overwhelming Iron Head Skill cut it short.
Crash!
This time the face the warrior had protected with internal energy caved in completely. Before he could attempt any further response, his head flew skyward.
“…!”
So unexpected was the sight that the head escort and his men forgot they had been about to spring their ambush and simply stood with mouths open.
“If you’re skilled enough to use the secret art of Sword Heart Sword Cry, you should have opened with it.”
The chivalrous man—no, the highway bandit—flicked the blood from his hand-axe with a sharp snap and clicked his tongue, shrugging.
“Sorry. Lately I’ve been fighting the Sword Family’s basic sword arts until I’m sick of them.”
Warriors of the Third Young Master’s faction—the New Martial Alliance—who used the refined essence of the great orthodox sects, improved by Sword Family power. The infamous hunting dogs of the old Martial Alliance days, the Seeking Wolves. Fortunately they had never clashed with them, but there had also been the Shadow Unit, terror of Sichuan.
“Heh heh.”
The people they had faced had always carried names far heavier than their own.
“Even if we’ve been driven out of Luoyang for now, our names aren’t so light that theirs outshine us.”
For a moment the shame of the big talk he had once given Yeon So-hyeon was a little soothed.
“Do not lower your guard.”
The remaining warriors drew their swords.
“These are no ordinary men.”
At that voice the head escort recovered his wits and shouted, “A-attack!”
Arrows flew. Hidden weapons sliced the air. Escorts drew blades and charged. For a time the mountain valley rang with battle cries and death screams.
“Hup…!”
With a low shout the chivalrous man wrenched his hand-axe free from a corpse’s skull. Thick blood and brain matter glistened in the moonlight as they spilled from the shattered head.
[Ohhh, look at this.]
[Works of art.]
Sound transmissions of delight came from comrades examining the goods the escorts had been hauling on handcarts and A-frames.
[Look at this seal. There’s even work by a former patriarch of one of the Sixteen Great Houses of the Imperial Capital.]
[These look like celadons from the Kingdom of Haedong?]
There were more than five carts piled high with cargo, and more than ten A-frames loaded with crates.
[An incredible amount…]
One of the chivalrous men swallowed hard as he eyed the revealed goods.
[Just how much would all this be worth in gold?]
Another, wrapping a bandage around a comrade’s wound, snorted.
[It’s not our money anyway, so better not to care from the start, don’t you think?]
[True enough.]
The one who had asked shrugged and stepped back; the others withdrew just as casually.
[All right, all right—patch yourselves up roughly and let’s move to the rally point at once!]
Anyone overly greedy for wealth would never have joined the Spring of Luoyang in the first place. They knew how to enjoy the pleasures of the secular world, but they were not the sort to be ruled by them.
“P-please spare us!”
That was why the chivalrous men had kept up their sound transmissions: the old couple still trembled in a corner.
“Shh.”
The man facing them raised a finger to his lips. The quick-witted couple immediately clamped their mouths shut.
In a low voice from behind his mask he asked, “Do you understand how you should act from now on?”
He neither soothed nor reassured them. He had spent far too many years as a chivalrous man to behave like a green youth.
The old couple nodded frantically.
“We’ll leave this place at once!”
“We won’t speak a word to anyone!”
“That’s only natural.”
When he idly stroked the hilt of the sword in its scabbard, the couple’s thoughts raced even faster.
“We have relatives living together in a village in Hubei!”
“It’s a tiny place deep in the mountains—no one will ever find us!”
The chivalrous man was neither naïve nor soft.
“Is that so?”
He carefully opened a porcelain bottle from his robes and sprinkled its contents over them.
“C-cough!”
White powder billowed; the couple coughed hard.
“This is Tracking Fragrance.”
Tracking Fragrance left a distinctive scent that allowed the marked target to be followed.
“You’ve heard of it, I expect. It’s rather expensive, so I can find you two anytime, no matter how much time passes.”
His eyes glinted in the dark.
“Don’t even stop by your house. Head for Hubei at once.”
As the couple hastily helped each other up he added, “I’ll go all the way to Hubei myself later to check.”
Faces drained by terror, they nodded.
“Y-yes! We understand!”
“We’ll leave right away!”
He flicked his sword in a small gesture.
“Then get lost.”
He watched their backs as they stumbled through the undergrowth and let out a quiet sigh. This way they would flee far without any selfish idea of exploiting the secret they had stumbled upon.
“……”
A chivalrous man saves people and helps people, yet he must always understand human nature deeply and take its measure. A chivalrous man who simply loves people, trusts people, and believes people are good—
is a dead chivalrous man.
Once he confirmed the couple had gone far enough, he turned to his comrades.
“Everyone, help me erase that couple’s traces.”
They set about wiping away every footprint and sign so that any possible pursuer would not be led toward the old pair.
“Good work. You handled it well.”
An older chivalrous man approached and tossed him a porcelain bottle identical to the one he had used on the couple.
“Thank you.”
He opened it and sprinkled the powder on his own wounds. The bottle contained a hemostatic agent.