Chapter 147

Chapter 147

A moment later.

“So.”

Jang Il, who had been listening silently to Seohwa’s story with his arms crossed, opened his mouth to summarize.

“Let me organize your claim.”

“Yes.”

“You want me to break through that wall of yokai and scout outside. To see if there’s a way to escape, and to check for any unusual circumstances?”

“Exactly that.”

“Are you crazy? You want me to go out there and die?”

“Won’t you do it?”

Watching Jang Il spit out curses, Seohwa pursed her lips and sighed. It was certainly an unreasonable request.

“You can avoid the yokai’s attention.”

Night was lengthening, and yokai ‘appeared’ at night.

The one who first observed this phenomenon and informed the group was none other than Jang Il. He hadn’t been ordered by anyone to investigate; he’d discovered this fact while investigating out of personal curiosity.

That meant avoiding the yokai’s attention wasn’t difficult for Jang Il. Any experienced murim person wouldn’t try to weigh their curiosity against their own life.

“Right now, you’re the only one who can go outside. You’re the only one here who witnessed the Baekgwi directly with your own eyes and survived.”

“Not an incorrect opinion. But I refuse.”

Jang Il spat out the dog grass he’d been chewing and shrugged his shoulders at Seohwa’s reasoning.

“In the end, that’s only assuming I can move around undetected among the yokai. Isn’t that right, young miss?”

“Yes.”

“If I can avoid the yokai, why would I need to risk danger investigating? I could just run away and be done with it.”

“If you were going to run, you would have done so already. When you saw the warning signs. The reason you’re still in this village is because you have unfinished business here, isn’t it? Or perhaps you’re attached to the village itself.”

“That’s… true.”

“I can’t force you, but if you’re going to help anyway, I’d appreciate it if you helped more thoroughly. If you need support, we’ll provide it as much as we can.”

“……Hmm.”

A moment of silence.

At Seohwa’s earnest request, Jang Il let out a contemplative sound, closed his eyes to think for a moment, then scratched his head vigorously. Then came his answer.

“Fine.”

“Does that mean.”

“I’ll help with the investigation. As you said, I still have business left in this village.”

“However, I have conditions.”

After a brief pause, Jang Il continued.

“The first condition is simple. Trust me.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Exactly what I said. Can you properly trust an assassin you only met yesterday? Someone who ambushes and kills people?”

“But if we don’t trust each other, we can’t work together, can we? That’s the basic premise. I won’t ask you to trust blindly, but at least don’t distrust me.”

It was a natural condition from someone being asked for help. Seohwa nodded in agreement and watched as Jang Il raised his second finger.

“The second condition is to keep silent.”

“Keep silent about what?”

“I may not look it, but I’m being pursued.”

Jang Il glanced around and scratched his neck.

“If things wrap up well, you can talk about what happened here, but don’t leak information about me to anyone. My appearance and features. My voice. The martial arts I use. My build. And even my name must not be revealed to others. That goes for that Sect Leader you all trust and follow. Hide everything about me.”

“Sect Leader-nim wouldn’t spread information to others…….”

“Who knows. That Sect Leader might be the very person pursuing me, or he might spread it to those he trusts, just like you.”

After all, doesn’t a secret stop being a secret the moment more than three people know it?

“I can’t trust the people here either, but at least since they promised in front of me, I can expect some effect. Will you accept?”

After thinking for a moment, Seohwa looked around and nodded. It was uncomfortable to have something to hide from Baek Riyun, but wasn’t it an unavoidable situation?

“Alright.”

“Good, you’re quick to decide. Flexible. Then the last condition.”

“What is it?”

“It’s simple.”

Jang Il nodded and raised his third finger. And at the words that followed, Seohwa’s eyes widened.

“The young miss must accompany me.”

“……Excuse me?”

Why would she accompany him?

At Seohwa looking at him with such eyes, Jang Il wore a bitter smile. It wasn’t an incomprehensible reaction.

“Exactly as I said. I’m, well, excellent at stealth techniques but my head isn’t particularly good. Even if I see something strange, I’m unlikely to notice. So someone with keen observation needs to go…….”

“From what I can roughly tell, you seem to be the center of judgment in this group, young miss. Then wouldn’t it look best if you came with me?”

“……What.”

Baek Risan, angered by Jang Il’s smooth talk, frowned and opened his mouth to object. But Seohwa shook her head at him.

“It’s fine.”

“What’s fine? You can’t escape in an emergency……!”

“If something goes wrong in there, the others won’t be able to escape either.”

Even without looking, she could tell through her qi sense and the drifting yokai energy. What lurked in the forest was at least several hundred, perhaps even over a thousand yokai.

Baek Risan’s Jinyeombaekhwa Gyeol, which showed outstanding power in chaotic battles, couldn’t display its might against such numbers. The white flames wouldn’t illuminate the darkness and would fizzle out, and Seonwoo Gang’s golden sword qi would also lose its brilliance.

“We just need to not get caught. Right?”

“But…….”

“We’re short one pair of hands.”

The time for reinforcements had already passed. The yokai’s invasion was gradually intensifying.

“Right now, I’m not someone who needs to be protected.”

“I’m not doing this because I can. I’m doing this because I must.”

Jang Il would cover the lack of insight. Seohwa would handle the observation.

“I have to go. Because there’s nothing else I can do here.”

Having clearly stated her opinion, Seohwa finished speaking and looked at Jang Il. Eyes coldly settled.

“I trust you’re not leading me to my death. Is there anything I need to prepare?”

“……Young miss, you’re quite cold-blooded. Decisive.”

What to prepare?

Jang Il, who burst into a chuckle, looked over Seohwa’s appearance and nodded slowly.

“First, let’s cover you in dirt. We need to erase your scent.”

Yuknachar originally knew no fear.

—M-most exalted one. Please withdraw your anger.

Nachar was a title given only to the Blood Cult Leader’s disciples.

Even in the Blood Cult with tens of thousands of followers, above Yuknachar there were at most only about twenty people. Therefore, Yuknachar couldn’t know fear while staying in the Blood Cult.

—This one seems quite useful.

The first fear he knew was when he first met his master, the Blood Cult Leader.

The fear of an unapproachable master was carved deep into his bones. While having his blood vessels opened and his constitution fundamentally changed through the great method, Yuknachar became unable to defy the Blood Cult Leader.

Yet he didn’t find it strange. Wasn’t it natural for a disciple to fear, respect, and revere their master? Feeling fear toward the supreme Blood Cult Leader wasn’t strange.

He consoled himself that way. Thinking the Blood Cult Leader would be the end.

He was wrong.

—Hmm. So you’re my new junior disciple? You look cute.

When meeting Ilnachar, Yuknachar felt another kind of fear. Fear as if a giant snake was coiled around him.

If the fear felt before the Blood Cult Leader was fear felt toward a tiger doing nothing, then Ilnachar’s fear was fear of a snake’s tongue vividly licking his throat. Fear that made him give up resistance the moment they met, fear that squeezed his heart.

They were those who had transcended humanity.

Everyone called the Blood Cult Leader and Ilnachar that. That they must never be angered. That their temperament was different from ordinary people from the start.

He thought it was fear he wouldn’t feel again. He sided with them out of fear. He would die if told to die, go if told to go, so there was no need for him to feel that fear.

He thought so, and it was actually so. Having made the objects of fear his allies, Yuknachar didn’t need to feel that fear.

‘Why…….’

Why?

Why were those memories resurfacing now?

“Huk. Heok. Huk……!”

Qinggong that seemed to slip on blood.

Breathing roughly while displaying the Blood Cult’s qinggong to its utmost, Yuknachar wrapped around a tree and changed direction. His left arm dangling loosely and breath rising to his chin.

‘Must escape…….’

Must escape. To survive, he had to get away from here.

Get away and return. To tell them there’s a monster here, a monster who could completely overturn the great plan. He had to convey that.

How?

“Right leg.”

Pale light tearing through darkness.

At the intuition that came before the announcement, Yuknachar desperately tried to turn direction but rolled his body from the momentum. Yuknachar’s body swept across the ground.

“Heok. Heok…….”

Clutching his body that felt like it would break, Yuknachar barely used his sword as support to stand up. The appearance of the man who had appeared before him at some point.

“I announced I’d cut it but failed to cut it cleanly. I apologize. Blood Cultist.”

In the forest where darkness had descended, he alone emitted clear light. Lightning sparks continuously flying from around his eyes as if using some special eye technique.

Baek Riyun, holding formless lightning in his hand, aimed its tip at Yuknachar.

“Have you already given up on escaping?”

He wanted to escape. But he couldn’t escape.

Facing reality, Yuknachar coughed and gripped his sword tightly with his remaining hand. The sensation of the sword handle, which had only heat left from gripping too hard.

“Just who are you……! Who the hell are you……!”

Reading heavenly energy, adapting to it, and ultimately twisting it to reach heaven-defying heights.

The Blood Cult with such doctrine had grasped most of the Murim Alliance and Sado Alliance’s experts, and the old monsters secluded in deep mountains and remote valleys. To them, those with enough martial power to twist heavenly energy were no different from variables in the great plan.

The Sipcheon of the Central Plains. The Chilryun of the Demonic Cult. The Samgong of the wastelands.

Besides those, the experts grasped by the Blood Cult were countless. Those at the peak of murim and those approaching it. Or those who could become so. It would be strange not to keep them in mind.

And yet.

“Information about someone like you……!”

“Wouldn’t exist.”

Pajijik!

Baek Riyun, who burst into a chuckle, drew a sword path made of lightning in the air.

“I am Baek Riyun. Have you heard of me?”

“……Cheonra!”

The nightmare of the Muryeokdae. The Heavenly Net of the Murim Alliance.

Recognizing his opponent, Yuknachar’s grip trembled. It didn’t make sense.

“Our cult also has information about you. But it shouldn’t be this much……!”

The master of the Heavenly Net with no gaps.

That was the epithet enemies used to describe Baek Riyun. An opponent against whom schemes don’t work. Yet if you try to crush him with force, he somehow slips away—a ghostly fellow.

In other words, he was only to that extent. While his head was outstanding and his senses good, he didn’t greatly exceed the level of a Muryeokdae Commander.

At best, he might barely enter the bottom ranks of the Baekdae Masters. He naturally couldn’t reach the Sipcheon and was even overwhelmed by the Myeolakdae Commander. That would have been the evaluation of Cheonra.

But then what was this situation right now?

“Even the Myeolakdae Commander, the vanguard of the Murim Alliance, doesn’t show this level of divine might. You. You hid your power……!”

“Hid my power? No. That’s not it.”

Baek Riyun, who burst into a chuckle, tapped his sword tip.

“You simply failed to realize the gap, so is there any need to think complicatedly?”

Was Baek Riyun weaker than the Myeolakdae Commander?

That was true. In a normal sparring match, Baek Riyun ‘still’ couldn’t beat the Myeolakdae Commander. It would be strange if he could beat someone recommended as the next Sipcheon member.

“You seem to think you could have done something if Myeolak senior was here instead of me, but if it had been Myeolak senior, you’d already be cut in two before you could even run.”

When resolved to die.

“My martial arts are weak in sparring. Because they’re difficult to control.”

Baek Riyun was confident he could aim for mutual destruction with the Myeolakdae Commander.

Just as in the past, when he boldly declared he would cut off the Daesageom’s arm.

“Now, since we’ve exchanged information, shall we finish our business?”

Pajijijik!

He’s approaching.

“Uaaaaaak!”

Confirming the lightning sparking in pale white, Yuknachar desperately swung his sword. And.

The next moment.

“Right arm.”

With Baek Riyun’s declaration.

An iron thunderbolt struck Yuknachar.