Chapter 46
The Supreme Leader of the Sado League, the Overlord Martial Emperor, Wiji Han.
Though I had never once laid eyes on him in person, I recognized him in a heartbeat.
Because his true face matched, to the letter, the Yongmo Pagi I had once seen.
'So he wasn't here after all.'
I had even discreetly scanned my surroundings, but there was no trace of Paeng Ga-heon, the Shanxi Branch Chief of the Murim Alliance. I had assumed he would at least be waiting nearby with the Alliance's Shanxi forces, so it was a disappointment.
'Tch.'
And to think I had placed my faith in him.
But then, as the old saying goes, a rabbit digs at least two burrows. I was hardly so careless a man as to stake the success of everything I'd planned on the presence of Paeng Ga-heon alone, so I moved straight on to the next scheme.
"I will step forward myself."
"That old man appears to have come looking for us."
"The Murim Alliance does not pass its burdens off to guests who have entered our domain."
This time, I had no intention of yielding either.
"...Very well. I leave it to you."
At my resolute tone, Han Baek-rim took a step back.
As if the dense killing intent of moments ago had been a mere illusion, I stood before Wiji Han, who now wore the leisurely air of a man entirely at ease.
"Supreme Leader of the Sado League — my, what brings you all the way here?"
At my words, Wiji Han's brow twitched. He had evidently never imagined that I would recognize him for who he was.
I could also feel the Ice Palace warriors stirring. They seemed taken aback by the old man's identity, which had exceeded all imagining. The Supreme Leader of the Sado League was, after all, a man whose fearsome name was known even in the far-off North Sea.
"You know me, do you?"
"I have some familiarity with the state of affairs in the murim of thejianghu."
It went without saying that the footsteps of the Supreme Leader of the Sado League could not belong to him alone. Such was the fate of any leader, was it not?
In truth, the fact that the savage beast who had slaughtered the Ice Palace's envoy was the Overlord Martial Emperor Wiji Han himself was a truth that had only surfaced much later, in the form of rumor. I could not entirely deny that I had nursed a faint hope — that if I recognized him, he might back down.
"Are you one of the Ice Palace's people as well?"
Wiji Han asked because my appearance was so markedly different from the Ice Palace delegation's.
"No."
"Tch."
At my answer, Wiji Han clicked his tongue, and I could well guess the meaning behind it.
"Well, since you know who I am, apologies, but I suppose you'll have to die too."
Sad premonitions are never wrong, it seems. I had hit upon the correct answer.
'Tch.'
Even with the right answer in hand, my mood was far from good.
But my contingency plan was not yet fully set in motion. I spoke slowly and deliberately, putting every ounce of strength into my voice.
"I am the second son of the Dancheon Sword Clan of Anhui, the finest late-blooming talent of my generation to earn the epithet of Sword Dragon."
"Oh?"
I was not boasting of my noble standing before the great Supreme Leader of the Sado League.
"If you harm me, you will find it very difficult to avoid a full-scale war between the righteous and the unorthodox."
That was what I had wanted to say. Right now, I was threatening the Supreme Leader of the Sado League himself.
"Hm."
My grand pronouncement seemed to give the Overlord Martial Emperor pause, for Wiji Han stroked his chin for a moment.
The Ice Palace's warriors were, in the end, people from beyond the pale of the Central Plains. But my position was quite different from theirs — I was the direct bloodline of the Dancheon Sword Clan, sworn to the Murim Alliance, after all.
The Sado League's leader slaughtering the warriors of the Ice Palace, and that same leader slaughtering the direct heir of a prestigious clan belonging to the Murim Alliance — those were matters of an entirely different weight.
Enough to fully ignite a war between the orthodox and unorthodox factions.
I could not call the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng a mere trinket, but surely it was not worth shouldering a continental war.
"I see. Then you are not a man I can kill."
On its face, that sounded positive — but I, who read the context buried within those words, knew it was no good news at all.
And I had no time to regret it, either.
FWOOM!
I never saw when the Supreme Leader of the Sado League moved.
In an instant, Wiji Han's footwork had seized the space behind me, and his kick drove into my back. Its artistry was anything but ordinary — even my martial attainment, which had reached the Harmony Realm, could offer no resistance at all.
Wham — crash.
My body, flung a good three full zhang through the air, crumpled to the ground in a shape that was truly a sight for sore eyes.
'So this is... the Profound Realm.'
The martial power of a man seated among the Ten Great Masters Under Heaven, the Supreme Leader of the Sado League, was soaring far beyond anything I had imagined.
This was the true summit of the murim of the present age.
I had thought myself sufficiently accustomed to unpredictable, flickering movements through my uncle Yeobae — and now I realized that had been nothing but arrogance.
"I held back my strength especially for you, so you won't die from that."
Wiji Han's calm voice rang in my ears.
'Damn it all, this life of mine.'
This was a development rather different from what I had anticipated. I would call it somewhat ruined.
No — perhaps it was quite thoroughly ruined.
Having been kicked flying by the Supreme Leader of the Sado League and yet survived — most upright martial artists living in thejianghu would never experience such a rare thing in all their lives.
And the good news did not end there.
My body, which had achieved the Diamond Body and reached the state of Adamantine Invulnerability, absorbed the full impact of that kick. I had cut a sorry figure against an unexpected, overpowering surprise attack, but there was no serious damage.
It helped, too, that Wiji Han — unable to fully read my realm thanks to the Reversal Returning Qi — had held back his hand.
And yet...
'What now?'
This was not a satisfying situation. In the end, things had careened straight into the worst case I had been dreading.
I resolved to simply observe for the moment, and stayed quiet. A masterstroke of reversal requires more information before it can even be attempted, after all.
Perhaps believing I had fainted, Wiji Han turned his gaze toward the Ice Palace delegation.
"Hand over the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng, and I will withdraw quietly."
So spoke the Overlord Martial Emperor, Wiji Han.
On reflection, that might have been the best possible outcome. The snow ginseng would have been a painful loss, but with the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Lingzhi in hand, it would not have been a complete failure.
But then—
"No, wait. Forgive me — I nearly made a mistake."
The moment that bad feeling stirred in my chest—
"I did make a promise, did I not, to slaughter every last one of you."
The giant retracted his own words.
"Everyone here will have to die."
The god of death had descended upon this place.
Utterly unlike his easygoing manner, the dense killing intent of an absolute master dominated the space in an instant.
'So that's how it was.'
My assumption had been wrong. In truth, there had always been something I couldn't explain about the total annihilation of the Ice Palace delegation. Surely there had been another way — hand over the snow ginseng and save their lives.
The man before us was no band of thieves; he was an absolute master who needed the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng.
I had papered over that missing link of information by assuming it happened because Bukgung Seol-ah had disregarded her own life — but on reflection, I judged that to be the wrong inference.
Bukgung Seol-ah stepped forward. Han Baek-rim tried to restrain her, but she shook him off with firm resolve.
"...Did Han-yu do this?"
Bukgung Seol-ah asked quietly, and the Supreme Leader's brow twitched. It seemed she, too, had known the true nature of the beast before her.
"You may assume so."
replied the Overlord Martial Emperor, Wiji Han.
A man of his discretion would not be loose-lipped, so I judged this to be a final gift offered to the dead.
"...I see."
In her answer, which on its face resembled resignation, I could read that she had long since pictured this very situation in her mind.
Bukgung Han-yu.
I had suspected as much, but he truly was a piece of garbage, I thought. A man who had wanted to seize his place even at the cost of his own siblings' lives — beside my brother Dancheon Hak, he was beyond comparison, and I judged him rightly to be a piece of trash beyond all salvation.
"Hup!"
I slapped both palms against the ground and sprang up in a single bound. I even made a point of the noise, so the eyes turning toward me were the natural result.
Feigning composure, I brushed the dust from my martial robes.
"You there — are you all right?"
the savage beast Wiji Han asked. There was something curious in his tone; he had seen something in me, the man who had failed to faint.
"Fit as a fiddle."
I whirled my arms about in exaggerated circles.
Just as Wiji Han seemed about to say something more to me—
"Run."
Bukgung Seol-ah's voice stole everyone's attention once more. I read her gaze and understood: she was speaking to me.
"What did you say?"
"Run. No one will blame you for it."
Bukgung Seol-ah repeated herself, as if to clasp her own resolve tight. Han Baek-rim's eyes, too, urged me toward escape.
Her gaze shifted back to Wiji Han.
"Kill only me. Spare the others."
After a moment's steadying breath, she drew something from the breast of her robes.
"I have the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng with me."
Her command to flee, it seemed, had not been meant for me alone. Han Baek-rim's wavering eyes proved it.
Wiji Han, who had held his silence for a while, opened his mouth. What was written across his face was unmistakably displeasure.
"And why, pray tell, would I do that?"
"..."
"Are you under some mistaken impression? I am not your brother's errand-hand."
Wiji Han's gaze swept over everyone.
"To me, they are nothing more than lives without any difference one from another."
To an absolute master of the unorthodox who had resolved to kill, these people were all nothing more than identical sacrificial lambs.
My position happened to be such that every Ice Palace warrior's face was engraved in my eyes.
Those faces. Those eyes.
A familiar sense of déjà vu washed over me. Their figures resembled the Murim Alliance's suicide squad, charging with a handful of men against the Demonic Cult's great army.
And, quite naturally, their future drew itself before me.
"Warriors of the Ice Palace — draw your swords."
Shing!
At Han Baek-rim's low voice, everyone responded. Dozens of blades left their sheaths in a single unified ring of steel.
"Stand down."
Bukgung Seol-ah said hurriedly — but there are times when defying one's lord is the truest loyalty of all.
"Forward."
Disregarding Bukgung Seol-ah's order, Han Baek-rim took a step ahead, and every Ice Palace warrior fell in behind him.
I could not say I agreed with Han Baek-rim's values, but at least I understood this much: he was a true gentleman whose words and deeds were one. He had drawn his sword openly before a master of the Profound Realm — a warrior possessed of the courage to fully accept his own death.
The same held for the others. Not a single Ice Palace warrior wavered in their stride, even walking a road that led to a duel of life and death.
Perhaps to those who had steeled their will, the enemy's strength no longer mattered.
"Young Lady, flee."
"Young Lady, survive."
"Young Lady, we will buy you time, so—"
Each warrior who passed Bukgung Seol-ah spoke a single line, and those lines wove together into a chorus of wishes for her life.
Every last one of them spoke not of their own safety, but of saving Bukgung Seol-ah.
Perhaps to the warriors of the Ice Palace, Bukgung Seol-ah's life truly mattered more than their own.
But someone moved even faster than they did.
Thud!
That someone was me.
Mimicking what Wiji Han had done to me, I aimed a burst of footwork at his back — and, regrettably, failed utterly. I darted back several paces and reset my breathing technique.
"...Do you wish to die as well?"
the Overlord Martial Emperor asked me, his face brimming with displeasure. In truth, that expression arose less from me than from the defiance of the Ice Palace warriors.
I know. I should have withdrawn at this point. Wasn't that the original plan?
One would say I have a duty to prevent the war between the orthodox and unorthodox, that I cannot stake my life in a place like this. I knew I ought to, from the moment my carefully laid contingency went awry.
But...
What was it I saw in Bukgung Seol-ah's face? My finger betrayed my own reason and fired off a taunting beckon anyway.
"Come at me, old man."
My thoughts and my actions ran on separate rails — a feeling at once absurdly strange and strangely exhilarating.
"I see."
Wiji Han nodded slowly.
"So this is how it ends."
Behind that mutter, so like a sigh of self-mockery...
"Every one of you will have to die. You included."
...came the death sentence of an absolute master.
"Then I shall become a devil."
So murmured the Overlord Martial Emperor, as if binding himself to it. He had, at last, resolved in earnest upon slaughter and ruin.
"That won't come easy."
I, too, bound myself to my resolve.
When you must begin an all-or-nothing gamble with your life on the table, nothing in this world ever comes easy. Fortunately, this time as well, I was not alone.
Zzip!
Dozens of silver-grey strands of hair flew through the air like arrows.
The first strike belonged to the warriors of the Ice Palace.