CLS-Chapter 546

Chapter 546:

“……”

“……”

Sagan looked at Guwangqushen without saying a word. Guwangqushen also stared back at Sagan without much to say.

“Their, their personalities seem a bit strange, don’t they?”

“What do you mean?”

“The personalities you’re describing now seem a bit different from what I know about those people?”

“That’s all an act.”

“Pardon?”

Guwangqushen snickered.

“There’s no way those bastards have good personalities. If you rolled around with Wei Yan-ho for just three days, even Buddha would turn his back on you. How could guys who rolled around with Wei Yan-ho for such a long time maintain normal personalities? Those bastards are all personality-disordered.”

“……”

At that moment, a single word echoed in Sagan’s mind.

“Damn it.“

Damn it, damn it……

These were the words left behind by Shaolin’s Master Musan, called the friend of Radiant Martial Sovereign who saved the world and a living Buddha, as he fled the room as if running away from him.

Damn it from the mouth of a living Buddha……

If he hadn’t had that experience, he would have denied Jang-il’s words now, but since Sagan had experienced it directly, it had credibility.

“Their personalities are… bad?”

“Very bad. Actually, saying ‘bad’ is a bit strange too. ‘Bad’ is like this, you know. Even a child can do bad things, and even a good person who’s lived without committing a single sin can sometimes have bad thoughts. Right?”

“That’s, that’s true.”

“So the word ‘bad personality’ doesn’t suit those guys. Their personalities are ruined, their personalities are like hell, their personalities aren’t of this world…… something like that would be more fitting.”

“To that extent……”

Guwangqushen snickered.

“Do you know what that bald monk Musan was called during the war?”

“Well?”

“Blood Arhat. Blood Arhat.”

“……”

“The world is such a filthy place that…… that Blood Arhat guy, who was called more brutal than the demons of hell, got packaged over time and became what? Living Buddha? Living Buddhaaaaaa?”

“……”

Irritation appeared on Guwangqushen’s face.

“Did all the living Buddhas freeze to death? Living Buddha? Yeah, in some sense, he is indeed a living Buddha. What is Buddha? Isn’t it an existence that leads people to paradise?”

“……It’s a bit different though.”

“Anyway, leading to paradise is all the same, so he’s a Buddha. Whether you send them to paradise by preaching Buddhist law or by smashing their heads, isn’t it all the same? In that sense, that guy is indeed a Buddha. More than a few people went to paradise by his hands.”

Sagan couldn’t say anything.

“Then what about Hero Peng?”

Peng Dao-ji, called the Greatest Blade Under Heaven. Was even someone like this a lump of pretense?

“Ah, that bastard is a bit different.”

“As expected!”

Sagan stroked his chest as if relieved. It was already shocking that the living Buddha was Blood Arhat, but if even Peng Dao-ji, called the greatest righteous hero under heaven, had a different true nature, there would be no way to resolve this disappointment.

“He was naturally kind, and even in the midst of that harsh war, he didn’t lose his righteousness. It’s admirable. Even Wei Jeong-han acknowledged that bastard’s chivalry.”

Something was strange.

But why was Wei Jeong-han called “Hero” while Peng Dao-ji was called “that bastard”?

Simply saying it that way because they were friends seemed insufficient, as there was some inexplicable ill feeling in the tone.

Sure enough, Guwangqushen continued with a snicker.

“When he wasn’t holding a sword, that is.”

“……Pardon?”

“This is, how should I put it, a really strange thing…… Wei Yan-ho used to say like a habit. Chivalry and chivalrous deeds are worth less than dog shit without power.”

“……”

“Peng Dao-ji probably felt that fact to his bones. He wanted to carry out chivalry, but in reality, Wei Yan-ho was performing the chivalry. A powerful guy who treated chivalry like a passing dog could perform more chivalrous deeds than someone with the will for chivalry—that must have been a reality hard for that guy to accept.”

“……That would, that would be natural.”

Good intentions don’t solve everything. What turns good intentions into action is power. Whether that becomes martial force, political power, or violence.

“That obsession with power developed in a strange direction. There was someone next to that guy who could be called a symbol of power.”

“Are you referring to Radiant Martial Sovereign?”

“That’s right. Wei Yan-ho—that guy is normally stupid, dumb, and annoying as hell, but the moment he holds a sword, he becomes an incredibly eerie bastard.”

Sagan nodded. This was something he could understand sufficiently just from the stories Jang-il had told so far.

“It seems that way.”

“That seemed to make a deep impression on that guy. But he should have stopped there. Originally, guys who are a bit lacking don’t know where to stop. The kind who ruin the atmosphere by saying one more thing when they should stop. You know?”

“……”

“He went too far. Later, the personality when holding a sword and when not holding a sword became so different that I thought he had multiple personalities. When not holding a sword, he was full of chivalry and appropriately kind, but the moment he held a sword, he went wild like some executioner in a prison…… ugh, gives me goosebumps.”

What should he say?

Sagan couldn’t say anything. His impression of seeing the true faces of these heroes of the Great War was nothing but emptiness.

“Well, that doesn’t make their achievements disappear. They’re worth enough respect and deserve enough treatment. But that, well…… it pisses me off. What? Living Buddha? Chivalrous hero? Bleh!”

Guwangqushen snorted loudly and muttered.

“Damn it, I’m still a beggar though…… An old beggar, a fast beggar, a hero beggar…… If I’m reborn, I won’t even piss in the direction of beggars.”

“……”

He seemed to understand why Guwangqushen was angry.

“Anyway.”

Perhaps thinking he had gone too far, Guwangqushen coughed loudly.

“What happened to the Demonic Cult then……”

“……Isn’t the atmosphere completely wrong?”

“But we can’t just take a break and talk.”

“That’s true, but.”

Sagan smacked his lips.

Let’s forget. Let’s forget the story we just heard.

“Where did the bishops go?”

“Are you asking because you don’t know?”

“……”

“Why are you asking when you already know? They went to the Central Plains. You must know too. They made quite a spectacular show.”

“Then indeed at that time……”

“That’s right.”

Guwangqushen scratched his chin. When he recalled those thoughts, his whole body started itching. Like wounds that still hadn’t disappeared even after countless years had passed.

“We were complacent.”

“You were caught off guard.”

“We had fought a long war and knew each other too well. That became poison instead. Master Singi must have thought he now understood the Demonic Cult completely. He knew the enemy and knew himself, so now he wouldn’t be defeated. But…… in reality, he knew nothing.”

Sagan nodded in agreement.

“It’s not his fault.”

“That’s right. Unless you have clairvoyance, how could you know everything happening in the world? How could he have known what was happening in that distant Xinjiang land, in the most secret place there? Above all……”

Guwangqushen sighed as if feeling sorry.

“The fact that he didn’t appear in the previous war caused confusion. If someone of that caliber existed, there would have been no reason to hold back until now. If there had been even one more person equal to the Great Demon Emperor, not necessarily him, the war would have ended in the Demonic Cult’s victory. Would there be any need to conserve strength in a war that could be won? Anyone would naturally think so.”

“But it wasn’t the case.”

“That’s right, it wasn’t. We didn’t know. What kind of existence he was, why he dragged out that long time, and……”

Guwangqushen looked up at the ceiling. After staring at the ceiling of the crumbling hut for a while, Guwangqushen spoke in a slightly melancholy voice.

“Why did the Great Demon Emperor take such extreme action?”

“……”

“Actually, we should have known.”

Guwangqushen’s voice grew increasingly dark.

“Master Singi’s…… no, the Central Plains’ biggest mistake was that. In the past war, we saved our lives thanks to the Great Demon Emperor’s eccentric behavior. But we never thought about why such a thing happened. We were just busy attributing the Great Demon Emperor’s death to the Central Plains’ achievement and settling the situation. Now that I think about it…… it was too foolish.”

Sagan had to ask.

“Why was that?”

“Because he’s human.”

Guwangqushen’s answer was simple.

“Because Master Singi is also human. He probably didn’t want to think about it. The fatigue of the long war, the relief of returning alive from a war that should have been lost…… When all of that combines, people don’t want to think about the crisis again. Then they want to feel relieved for a while. And when time passed and they had enjoyed that relief sufficiently, it was already too late to find out the reason. Well, even if they had started investigating immediately at that time, what would have changed? It was that secretive of a matter.”

“I don’t really understand. I still don’t know why the Great Demon Emperor did that.”

“Hmm……”

“What is the reason?”

“Should I call it freedom, survival, or longing?”

It sounded like grasping at clouds. Sagan quietly waited for Guwangqushen’s next words. Just by looking at his slightly trembling face and shaking legs, he could tell how many thoughts Guwangqushen was having inside.

“All of that would be the reason. And all of that isn’t the reason. If I want to put it simply, there would be one reason. He wanted to live.”

“……”

“I also learned later why the Great Demon Emperor took such nonsensical action. If anyone had been in that situation, they would have had no choice but to make the same choice as the Great Demon Emperor.”

“Hmm……”

Sagan couldn’t understand everything Guwangqushen said. But he could tell that there had been some great misfortune.

“It must be an unfortunate matter.”

“Do you know what real misfortune is?”

“……Pardon?”

“The misfortune hasn’t ended yet. It was approaching as an even greater misfortune.”

“……”

“We should have been a bit calmer. We missed too many things. Everything around us was already pointing to one thing. The Demonic Cult that didn’t particularly chase us, the emptied cave, that sword…… and also……”

Guwangqushen closed his mouth.

The sight of Guwangqushen with his eyes closed—in that appearance, an indescribable turbulence of emotions could be felt.

“We should have known…… should have known a little earlier. But we didn’t know. That was the misfortune.”

Guwangqushen brought the bottle in his hand to his lips. After swallowing a mouthful of strong liquor down his throat, Guwangqushen wiped his lips and said.

“The price for not knowing what we should have known and not preventing what we should have prevented was enormous. But it wasn’t Wei Yan-ho’s fault. It wasn’t our fault either. The situation we were in was too urgent to think calmly and respond. Moreover……”

Guwangqushen’s voice trembled faintly.

“Could we have prevented it?”

“……”

“Even if we had known…… even if we had known, could we have prevented it? I don’t know. I don’t know.”

The hut began to be covered with heavy air.