Chapter 175: Black Wolf on the Waves
Villagers began gathering one by one.
It was because Jin Seong-un had faintly infused his inner arts into the words as he read out the contents of the contract.
As people gathered, the village headman’s face turned a deep shade of bewilderment.
“What on earth is the meaning of this?”
“Village headman, that’s not true, is it? There’s no way it could be!”
The villagers began demanding answers from the headman. Especially the parents who had already sent away their children through him had eyes blazing red with fury.
“M-Misunderstanding! Isn’t this better than letting the children starve to death?”
“……”
The headman pointed at the unorthodox man whose wrist Seomun Ak had broken and who was enduring the pain, and continued speaking.
“In any case, would they really mistreat children they paid money for? What I did was truly for your sake, the children’s sake, and the sake of this village!”
“Your tongue is getting longer.”
Lee Seowon said in a low voice.
From his experience in the upper district, not a single person whose tongue grew hurriedly long had ever spoken the truth.
The villagers also did not seem to believe the headman’s excuses.
Above all, even though Seong-un Inn had promised to donate a large sum of money, the headman had tricked illiterate parents into selling their children.
And moreover, he had pocketed an extra silver coin for each transaction. No words could excuse such deeds.
Thud—!
A fist-sized stone flew from somewhere and struck the headman’s forehead with force.
His head snapped back for a moment, blood trickling down from his skull.
That was the beginning.
The villagers began picking up stones one by one and throwing them at the headman.
“Ee-agh!”
The headman wrapped his head with both hands, bent over, and tried to shield his body. The number of stones raining down from every direction only grew.
His excuses and angry outbursts soon fell silent.
If the stoning continued, the headman would surely die. Yet Jin Seong-un’s group did not stop the villagers.
Leaving them behind, Jin Seong-un approached the unorthodox man held by Seo Yu-gyeom and Seomun Ak, and asked,
“Where are the children who have already been taken?”
The unorthodox man clamped his mouth shut.
From his instincts, he had already realized that his opponents were masters of a level far beyond his.
Clicking his tongue lowly, Seo Yu-gyeom drew the Heaven-Slaying Dagger and said,
“Since it looks like you won’t speak anyway, let’s cut off that useless tongue first.”
Seo Yu-gyeom roughly grabbed the man’s jaw, twisting it, and stared straight into his eyes.
The emotionless eyes unique to an assassin calmly bore down on him, and the man was instantly seized by terror.
He instinctively knew this was no idle threat.
Just as the Heaven-Slaying Dagger aimed for his mouth—
“…They’re still in the base.”
“Where is this base?”
The words flowed out of the man’s mouth smoothly.
A mere unorthodox martial artist of third or maybe second-rate caliber would never have been trained for such situations.
When it was revealed that the purchased children were still alive, the villagers who had killed the headman by stoning erupted in a commotion.
“Le-Let’s go get the children back right now!”
Someone shouted, and many voices echoed in agreement.
People were already bringing out shovels, pickaxes, and bamboo spears, looking ready to storm the unorthodox den immediately.
Such was the terror of mob frenzy. No matter how many villagers there were, if commoners who knew nothing of martial arts rushed into the stronghold of unorthodox martial artists, the outcome was obvious.
Lee Seowon’s face turned troubled as he thought furiously. Stopping a mob already gripped by madness was no easy task.
But he could not simply let them all go to their deaths.
‘Reasoning won’t work in this state. Better to…’
Just then.
Jin Seong-un looked at the crowd for a moment, then deliberately stirred his inner arts as he spoke.
“The enemy are martial artists. We will go instead, so everyone calm yourselves.”
Jin Seong-un’s qi gently pressed down over the crowd.
It wasn’t meant to frighten them. It was merely to suppress their frenzy with sheer overwhelming strength.
His words allowed the villagers to regain at least a fragment of their reason.
“……”
Lee Seowon stared blankly at the sight. Weren’t martial arts meant, at their core, for striking and killing people?
To use presence to instead clear people’s minds—he had never even imagined such a thing.
The surprise lasted only a moment before Lee Seowon remembered his duty as General Manager.
“Of course, with your children in mind, it won’t be easy to simply wait. While these young heroes are gone, please search out the money and contracts the late headman obtained. Since we’re not from this village, it’s hard for us to guess where or how he might have hidden them.”
It was a task that was a task yet not.
The villagers nodded repeatedly and began naming places where the headman might have hidden the money and contracts.
As Lee Seowon so deftly diverted their focus, Jin Seong-un, Seo Yu-gyeom, and Seomun Ak gave him a thumbs up.
Soon after, Seo Yu-gyeom lightly tapped the unorthodox man’s neck with the Heaven-Slaying Dagger and said,
“Guide us if you want to live.”
“I-I will do so.”
The unorthodox martial artist had no other choice.
Just as he was about to lead the way,
Jin Seong-un spoke to Lee Seowon.
“General Manager, wait here with Elder Shinui. We don’t know what kind of martial artists are there.”
“Yes, understood.”
Lee Seowon answered without a moment’s hesitation.
Since he couldn’t even properly swing a Straight Saber, it was only natural for him to think that way.
“Why? Let’s take him along.”
Seo Yu-gyeom spoke.
Seomun Ak, standing beside him, also nodded.
“Yeah, let’s take him. If he sees actual combat, maybe he’ll realize something.”
The two hoped Lee Seowon would awaken to martial arts.
The reason was simple.
Since a smart guy had joined the inn, their lives had unexpectedly grown much easier.
Thus, the two wanted Lee Seowon to live long.
In this harsh world, especially at Seong-un Inn, martial arts were practically a necessity for survival.
“No, what could I possibly realize? I’d only be a burden, not any help…”
“Then let’s put it to a vote.”
“Pardon?”
When Seomun Ak suggested a vote, Lee Seowon made a dumbfounded expression.
But Seo Yu-gyeom nodded at Seomun Ak with a face that said, ‘Are you a genius?’
Then Seomun Ak said,
“All those in favor of bringing him along, raise your hand.”
Swoosh.
Seomun Ak and Seo Yu-gyeom raised their hands.
Jin Seong-un was still hesitating, so he raised his hand halfway.
Seeing that, Seomun Ak said, “Two and a half of you four have agreed, so there’s nothing we can do. Let’s go.”
“…….”
Thus Lee Seowon also joined the Black Path purge.
The Black Path martial artist who led Jin Seong-un’s party to their stronghold spoke in a very cautious tone.
“G- Great Masters. May I take my leave now?”
He was the sort of man who, when told to choose between obeying and dying, chose to obey.
Therefore he had assumed they would let him go once the guide’s job was done.
At that instant, the blade qi Seo Yu-gyeom had unleashed split the man’s waist in two.
While Lee Seowon retched, Jin Seong-un, Seo Yu-gyeom, and Seomun Ak calmly headed toward the manor.
“Let us go.”
The manor the Black Path used as their base did not even have a gatekeeper.
Jin Seong-un and Seo Yu-gyeom spread their qi-sense to gauge the number and martial strength of the men inside the manor.
Meanwhile, Seomun Ak opened the door and walked in as if it were his own house.
Jin Seong-un, Seo Yu-gyeom, and Seomun Ak stood for a moment and took in the scene inside the manor.
“Huh.”
Seomun Ak exhaled.
Here and there in the courtyard, Black Path men lay on their backs, bellies exposed. Some gambled, others drank with women at their sides.
It was outrageous that men who had torn children from their parents were enjoying themselves at one side of the manor.
Soon the children came into view.
The group’s atmosphere grew even heavier.
The children’s faces and bodies were bruised and swollen all over. Some boys wore barely patched clothes.
On one side, a grotesque sight unfolded.
Children were straining until their faces went red, trying to lift rocks as large as their torsos.
There was no way such thin limbs could hoist those stones.
On another side, children stood on one leg on stakes driven deep into the ground, trembling as they tried to keep their balance.
Their bodies shook, tear stains crusted across their faces, but the Black Path men who watched with clubs from behind drove them onward with glances.
What distinguished children from adults was whether they could refuse unpleasant orders.
And yet the children acted with such desperation.
‘They must have seen someone beaten to death or almost beaten to death earlier.’
Jin Seong-un’s gaze sank even lower.
Seo Yu-gyeom and Seomun Ak reacted the same.
The three of them at least had a decent knowledge of Murim affairs. Because of that, they knew unimaginable horrors were occurring across the land.
For example, the Qinghai Iron Workshop, which made swords in gruesome ways, was one such case.
But Lee Seowon, who had been born under the shadow of the Myriad Gold Manor and had spent his whole life in the upper district, was genuinely horrified and enraged by the present scene.
“H- How! How could anyone wear the guise of a human…!”
If he had his way, he would have cut down those filthy Black Path scoundrels right then and there. He had never felt so furious at his own lack of martial skill.
As Jin Seong-un’s party took in the interior, a Black Path man scratched his belly and approached, eyeing them up and down.
“You’re not from around here?”
“It seems some people come periodically.”
Jin Seong-un replied, staring intently at the man. The man, sensing something strange, shouted.
“Intruders—!”
Before the words were finished,
Seomun Ak’s large fist moved first.
Swoooosh—!
With a sound like an explosion, his fist smashed into the Black Path man’s face.
The man flew a short distance, twitched several times on the ground, and then went limp.
Seomun Ak’s unusually large frame and physical strength combined with the Seomun clan’s external force techniques to produce a brutally powerful single strike.
Watching this, Lee Seowon whispered an admiring sound.
He had always seen Seomun Ak treated with scorn, contempt, ridicule, and oppression by Seo Yu-gyeom; if Seomun Ak was this strong, how much stronger, then, were the other two?
In Lee Seowon’s eyes, even Seomun Ak’s single strike just now seemed to have reached a realm beyond the world.
When a companion fell dead in the middle of the manor, the men who had been lying down finally sprang up.
The women accompanying them screamed, and the Black Path men inside the hall rushed out in a swarm.
They numbered, at a rough estimate, forty, so Lee Seowon said, “T- The numbers are too many, aren’t they?”
At his worried question, Seo Yu-gyeom replied as if incredulous.
“What did you take us for?”
“A Murim member and innkeeper, a cook, and an inn waiter?”
Indeed, that was an accurate observation.
Seo Yu-gyeom flicked the Heaven-Slaying Dagger toward the Black Path men and said, “They must have investigated us, right?”
“Well, obviously I don’t think such petty Black Path scum could get the better of us….”
Several pieces of information flashed through Lee Seowon’s mind.
Among them were details of adversaries Jin Seong-un had faced: the great demon leader Food Butcher, Saryeong-geuk the vice-leader of Sichuan’s Black Path, and Namheukryeonju, the hegemon of Hebei’s Black Path.
Those who trafficked humans like these Black Path scoundrels were no match for them.
But knowing something in one’s head and facing it in reality were different.
Confronted by dozens of armed men drawing blades and glaring at them, Lee Seowon felt an instinctive fear.
He, who still did not know Murim well, felt it especially keenly.
Thinking it had been wise to bring Lee Seowon, Seo Yu-gyeom briefly thought so, then grasped Lee Seowon’s face with both hands and made him look forward, saying,
“Look carefully. Remember the level you should aim for when you swing a sword.”
Seo Yu-gyeom turned Lee Seowon’s head slightly so he could look at Jin Seong-un.
Lee Seowon also studied Jin Seong-un’s back intently. After all, he needed to properly see what kind of person his new lord was.
Jin Seong-un calmly drew his Straight Saber. He had deliberately brought a saber rather than a sword.
Then the Black Path men advanced toward Jin Seong-un with bold steps.
Lee Seowon still found Jin Seong-un standing motionless puzzling.
‘Isn’t that dangerous?’
Just as he thought that,
Jin Seong-un drew the Straight Saber horizontally and slashed.
It was a light motion, neither very fast nor brutal.
Suddenly, a dense, black blade qi poured out along the path of the Straight Saber. The blade qi swelled as it moved forward.
Shaaak—!
A technique of the Black Wolf Saber Art, “Wave-Riding Black Wolf.”
As the name suggested, like black wolves riding waves, the ink-dark blade qi ran forward, cutting and cleaving everything in front of it.
Dozens of approaching men were gruesomely bisected.
The building behind them had its walls sliced away and began to collapse with a rumble.
All from a single slash.
“Uh… uh…”
Even the sharp-minded Lee Seowon temporarily lost the power of speech at the unreal sight before him.
For a moment he thought,
Who on earth had I been fighting before?
The thought of how he had once provoked such a man across a mere street made his head spin.