Chapter 493
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 493
Chapter Title: Sophistry
Ha Mu-baek returned to the Wanderer's Inn.
The first-floor dining hall was bustling with noise and chatter.
He had already sensed who was there through his qi perception.
It was the Hocheon Corps.
These were different members from the ones who had come last time.
They must have heard stories from their comrades who had visited before, because the off-duty men were now eating and drinking with great enthusiasm.
With little alcohol left, it seemed Eun Cheong-seon and Gong Hae-bin had rushed out to buy more.
Upon spotting Ha Mu-baek, they merely exchanged brief nods before pretending not to know him.
It appeared they had already heard about him.
Ha Mu-baek ordered his final dinner at the inn from a corner seat and ate it quietly.
There was no alcohol today.
Was it because of everything he had witnessed while surveying Luoyang?
The thought of drink didn't even cross his mind.
Not even drowning his rising frustration in liquor felt permissible—it seemed like an extravagance.
He simply focused silently on his meal.
They were people who had given up on their own lives, to the point of wishing ruin upon others' as well.
Yet he pondered why they had been driven to such desperation.
No answer came to mind.
Ten people, ten colors.
Everyone possessed different natures and traits.
Some would desperately strive even in hopeless situations.
Others would simply surrender.
And some might wish not just for their own downfall, but for the entire world to crumble.
It was simply that each person had no choice but to live their own life.
That was when the Demonic Cult had wormed its way in.
They preyed on the desires of those who longed for the world's destruction, quietly building their power from the shadows.
Donning the bizarre guise of the Church of Detailed Compassion.
As Ha Mu-baek slowly ate, lost in thought, the Hocheon Corps grew even more boisterous in their revelry.
With them patronizing the place so generously, he figured he could give them enough travel funds, just as Dam Mu-hyeon had suggested.
After finishing his meal, Ha Mu-baek headed up to his room.
Thus passing his last night at the Wanderer's Inn.
The next day.
After a simple breakfast and bidding farewell to Gong Yeop-myeong, Eun Cheong-seon, Gong Hae-bin, and Gong Hae-jun, Ha Mu-baek departed.
His destination was a safehouse on the outskirts of Luoyang.
It was a place he had personally prepared, known to no one else.
Not even the Hocheon Corps or the Heavenly Eye Pavilion knew of it.
At least, Ha Mu-baek had moved with that level of secrecy when setting it up.
To any passersby unfamiliar with the area, it would seem like an abandoned ruin where no one lived.
In truth, its dilapidated state and the rumors of ghosts kept even beggars away.
When he first established it, vagrants and beggars would occasionally wander in and stay, but after Ha Mu-baek repeatedly subdued them and dumped them far away on some roadside, such incidents ceased.
That was how the rumor of it being a ghost house spread among the beggars.
Entering the deepest annex building.
A Demonic Cult messenger stood there, bound hand and foot, drooling profusely.
His eyes brimmed with exhaustion from a sleepless night.
And rightly so—he had a small spiked ball placed beneath him, like a chestnut burr, ensuring that the moment his head drooped in slumber, his forehead would prick against it and jolt him awake.
The spikes were coated with a pain-amplifying drug, forcing the messenger to keep his head up at all costs, leaving him without a wink of sleep all night.
"Still manageable?"
Ha Mu-baek smirked at the sight and asked.
"Ughhh."
The messenger muttered something incomprehensible.
But listening closely, it was that same incantation as before.
After checking the messenger's condition, Ha Mu-baek headed to the main building.
Dust blanketed everything, cobwebs draped the corners, and rats and insects scurried about.
Though unfit for human habitation, Ha Mu-baek sat cross-legged anywhere.
Immersing himself in meditation, he confronted the demon within.
The inner demon looked up at him.
Its eyes were filled with nothing but confusion.
The hatred and killing intent toward the Demonic Cult and Blood Cult remained, but now confusion mingled within it.
"I'm confused too."
Muttering as much, Ha Mu-baek did not avert his gaze but stared directly at his inner demon.
Thus, they faced each other as a full day passed.
It was the day the family at the Wanderer's Inn handed over the inn and departed.
Ha Mu-baek checked the messenger's condition once more before heading back to the inn.
He worried the head of the Jeon Merchant Group might try something underhanded.
The transaction proceeded smoothly.
The Gong family received the proper payment in promissory notes and left the inn behind.
Ha Mu-baek gazed at Jeon Dok-u.
'Why would that one join the Demonic Cult...'
The world was full of people resentful of it, but what grudge could the head of Luoyang's premier merchant group possibly hold?
***
"Hoo."
Late at night.
Jeon Dok-u let out a deep sigh.
On his desk lay the land deed for the Wanderer's Inn.
It belonged to the Jeon Merchant Group—no, to him now.
All that remained was to demolish the inn and combine it with the surrounding land to build the manor as planned.
That manor would become a dagger aimed at the throat of the Righteous Heaven Alliance.
On that day.
The day promised by the Church would come.
"Until the day all the world's martial artists vanish..."
His murmur carried a torrent of emotions.
"And when all the world's martial artists are gone, what then? What do you plan to do?"
At the sudden question, Jeon Dok-u whipped his head around.
Ha Mu-baek sat casually at the table.
He looked utterly at ease, as if it were his own room.
"Who are you?"
Jeon Dok-u asked calmly, maintaining his composure.
"A martial artist."
Ha Mu-baek replied curtly.
"You're that one. A martial artist, huh?"
Jeon Dok-u quickly recalled Ha Mu-baek's face.
He pulled the memory from the inn out of his mind.
"Here to vent your spleen? Of course. You martial artists are all the same—trampling the weak just because you have power."
His words dripped with scorn.
Ha Mu-baek chuckled at Jeon Dok-u's remark.
"Not something a merchant who tramples the poor just because he has money should say."
"It was merely a legitimate contract."
"A cunning one, no doubt."
"They bear the responsibility for not reading the contract properly or understanding it."
"Is that why you joined the Demonic Cult, a collective of martial artists?"
Jeon Dok-u flinched at the mention of the Demonic Cult.
"The Church of Detailed Compassion. The exalted name of our great Church. Not something a lowly martial artist like you can sully with that crude abbreviation."
"Which is why I'm asking if that 'great Church' you speak of isn't just another group created by martial artists. Right now."
"To topple the world of martial artists, you need power on that level. It can't be helped."
"Sophistry."
Anger began to flicker in Jeon Dok-u's eyes at Ha Mu-baek's retort.
"Martial artists wield superhuman power through martial arts to bend the world to their whims! To punish them, you need even greater strength! That's the power of our great Church! What does a filthy martial artist like you know, daring to speak its exalted name?!"
It was a completely different demeanor from when he met the Church's messenger.
Even as Ha Mu-baek slowly emanated his aura, Jeon Dok-u showed no sign of intimidation.
"Hmph! Just like a filthy martial artist. You mean to crush me with force, as expected?"
Though he didn't know for sure, Jeon Dok-u sensed the pressure from Ha Mu-baek and spoke accordingly.
"You seem to harbor deep grudges against martial artists."
"Naturally. Not only did they seize my wealth by force under the pretext of war, but they killed my son and daughter who tried to stop them—all martial artists!"
His resentment poured forth like a stream.
"Because of that, my merchant group, which aimed for a seat among the Eight Great Merchants of the Realm, is stuck as merely Luoyang's top firm. Hmph, it doesn't matter anymore. With no heirs left, the business can rot for all I care. My sole goal is the extermination of every martial artist under heaven."
Jeon Dok-u's eyes gleamed maniacally.
"So, even if all the world's martial artists vanish, won't the Demonic Cult still have martial artists left? Aren't they martial artists too?"
"They are holy messengers following the great Church's doctrines. Not barbaric martial artists."
"A merchant's money seems even more barbaric to the common folk than a martial artist's blade."
"Merchants act according to contracts."
"So you bribe them to keep customers away from other inns? Use ruffians to block guests from entering? Isn't the violence of those ruffians barbaric power?"
Ha Mu-baek asked.
"......"
Jeon Dok-u could not respond.
What he had done to the Wanderer's Inn wasn't according to any contract.
It was coercion that forced them into signing one with him.
"Even that swindle counts as a contract, does it?"
Ha Mu-baek's question carried a mocking tone.
"Shut your mouth! It was all for enacting the great will of the great Church!"
"For the Demonic Cult's vile ambitions, more like."
Jeon Dok-u trembled with rage at Ha Mu-baek's comeback.
"How do you even know whether it was the Demonic Cult, Blood Cult, or Righteous Heaven Alliance that killed your children? Your firm in Luoyang survived the last war unscathed under the Alliance's protection."
The two great wars of the martial world.
Luoyang was one of the few cities that escaped the flames, thanks to hosting the Righteous Heaven Alliance headquarters.
If his children had died to martial artists during that war, it must have been elsewhere, outside Luoyang.
In which case, Blood Cult or Demonic Cult were more likely than the righteous factions.
"It was orthodox martial arts!"
"The messenger from your 'great Church' who came to you used orthodox arts too."
"Ughhh..."
Jeon Dok-u had no rebuttal.
"Nothing more to say, then."
Ha Mu-baek rose from his chair and slowly approached Jeon Dok-u.
Jeon Dok-u glared at him with eyes full of fury.
Thwack.
A single light punch, and he lost consciousness.
Ha Mu-baek subdued him and carried him to the safehouse.
He roughly tossed Jeon Dok-u into another annex before seeking out the Demonic Cult messenger again.
Blood streamed from his forehead.
He must have dozed off and hit the spike just moments ago.
"How about it? Ready for a chat now?"
"U, ughhh..."
The groan was different from before.
No longer chanting incantations, it was a genuine sound of overwhelming drowsiness.
He was on the verge of losing consciousness in a half-dreaming haze.
Even if some spell bound him, it could no longer function properly.
The man couldn't distinguish whether he was awake or asleep, reality or dream.
"Where are you from?"
Ha Mu-baek didn't expect him to know the Demonic Cult's main base.
But someone who called himself a messenger should at least know the center of the Church of Detailed Compassion conspiracy, so he asked.
"Yu, yu, Yung..."
With that, his head drooped again, only to prick the spike.
He jerked his head up in alarm, but his eyes still swam with sleep.
"Yungzhong... Mountains..."
He answered thus, still dazed.
Ha Mu-baek frowned.
Because of the messenger's response.
Yungzhong Mountains.
A place Ha Mu-baek knew all too well.
It was where he had single-handedly defeated a hundred elite Blood Cult warriors, and home to the Jegal Clan, one of the Five Great Clans.
Those words had slipped from the messenger's lips.
Claiming he came from there.
That was why Ha Mu-baek frowned.
Yungzhong Mountains lay within the Jegal Clan's domain; hiding and raising such men under their watchful eyes was impossible.
"Not the whole clan, surely."
The moment he heard Yungzhong Mountains, Jegal Myeong came to mind.
Given what he had seen of him at the Dragon Training Pavilion, the entire Jegal Clan hadn't sided with the Demonic Cult.
Perhaps just a few retainers had.
Before, he wouldn't have understood why.
But now he did.
From yesterday's observations of the commoners sworn to the Church of Detailed Compassion, he could comprehend why some Jegal retainers might betray them.
They too must resent the clan and the world, wishing for its ruin, and thus allied with the Demonic Cult.
Of course, understanding their reasons for betrayal didn't mean he forgave or excused them.