After being treated with ridiculous courtesy, Yeomhwa left the Guard Corps.
He came home with this completely lost, dazed look on his face.
By the time he got there, I was already waiting.
“Young master?”
“You were locked up in the Guard Corps cell, right? You went through a lot.”
“No, sir.”
His expression darkened.
“Why the long face?”
“Because it’s unfair. I don’t know why I have to live this hard.”
“Why do you think your life is hard?”
“...Because there’s nobody around me. When things get hard, there’s nowhere to lean, nobody I can ask for help. In this whole world... it’s just me.”
“Lean on me.”
At my words, Yeomhwa jerked his head up with a startled face and stared at me.
“Young master...”
“I’ll show you. What kind of existence the person who’ll be your solid fence really is.”
How am I going to show him?
Even so, he looked pleased.
It was a first for him.
No one had ever said something like that to him before.
“Even just hearing you say it, ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) I’m grateful. Young master, you’re the only one who’s ever said something like that to me.”
“It’s not just words. I haven’t known you for long, but all this time you’ve been getting ignored here, right? No connections, so you keep failing your promotion exams.”
Yeomhwa bit down hard on his lip.
“I saw your talent. You’re a man who’s going to become the greatest artisan in the Central Plains.”
“Young master...”
The greatest artisan in the Central Plains?
And he believes that?
My eyes were full of certainty.
From what Yeomhwa had seen, I was the one who’d gone beyond the human realm as an artisan.
And a craftsman like that had just evaluated him that way.
What praise could beat that?
“So use that talent for me. In return, I’ll be your fence.”
At my words, Yeomhwa dropped to his knees in front of me.
“Kh...! Young master! I, I will... for you... no... I will use my talent only for my lord!”
Greatest Smith of All Ages, Flame-Iron Star Lord Yeomhwa.
I had just taken the legendary artisan whom people would one day call that under my command.
*****
That evening, the day I took Yeomhwa as my subordinate.
Dong Gwang showed up with three Process Overseers, including his younger brother Dong Pyeong.
“Big brother! Why did you drag me here? Don’t tell me you’re going to make me apologize to that bastard, right?”
Ignoring his brother’s words like they were nothing, Dong Gwang spoke to me.
“I brought them.”
“Leave them there and get out.”
“I’ve got urgent business, so just educate them however you see fit.”
“You’re fine with that?”
“Of course.”
A young man who spoke to him casually, and the Guard Corps Captain of Heavenly Martial Castle taking that for granted.
From the Process Overseers’ point of view, this situation was insane.
“Big brother? That punk is talking down to you. You should be mad. He’s disrespecting you!”
“So what?”
“I mean, the thing you hate most in the world is being disrespected.”
Dong Gwang looked at Dong Pyeong for a moment, then simply ignored him again.
If he kept looking, he was going to hit him.
He couldn’t hit him right now.
He had to endure.
The best move was to just remove himself.
“I’m busy, so I’ll be going.”
When I nodded, Dong Gwang hurried out of there.
The Process Overseers watched him go with bewildered faces.
That was when they heard me mutter.
“Murky night stretches across the heavens, benightedness sealed and bound, myriad worlds fall silent.”
Using the Five-Element Mantra Method, I cast the Void-Sealing Formation.
Feeling something was off, the Process Overseers rushed to open the door and get out of there, but the door wouldn’t budge.
They tried throwing their weight into it, even kicking it, but it was useless.
“Stop wasting your time and get over here.”
At my words, the three Process Overseers charged at me with furious faces.
“You little brat!”
“You think we’re pushovers just because all we usually do is paperwork? We’ll show you.”
“I may look like this, but I’ve learned martial arts! Ha-at! Dragon-Claw Hand!”
Watching the moths fling themselves at the flame, I let out a small laugh.
CRACKLE—.
A flash like starlight, and the next instant all three were lying flat on the floor.
They didn’t even remember what had just happened.
“What the...? Why are we on the floor?”
The three stared at me with dazed faces.
Then Dong Pyeong started huffing in outrage.
“You... d-do you know who my father is?”
If the big brother card didn’t work, now he was pulling out Dad.
“And who’s that?”
“The High Marshal of Arms is my father!”
So that’s why I’d wondered how someone like Dong Gwang had become captain of the Guard Corps with that level of ability.
Looked like I was going to have to straighten out the whole Dong bloodline in one go.
“Who else is there? Tell me everything.”
Thinking I’d gotten scared, Dong Pyeong happily started listing everyone.
Not realizing he was shoving his parents and siblings into hell with his own mouth.
“So? That’s the kind of family we are. It’s not too late. Kneel and beg right now and I’ll pretend none of this ever happened.”
I asked, looking at him like I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“Why do you think your brother brought you to me?”
“What?”
“Right? Why do you think he didn’t say a word when I kept talking to you however I wanted?”
“T-that’s...”
The more he thought about it, the stranger it was.
“It ever occur to you that I might be the kind of person even your brother can’t do anything about?”
Dong Pyeong’s pupils trembled violently.
“You can figure that out later. See my subordinate over there?”
Yeomhwa was standing there.
“Apologize.”
All they had to do was apologize and it would be over.
If they apologized cleanly, I intended to give them a moderate beating and end it there.
But their pride was stronger than I’d expected.
“H-he’s under me! And not just a little, either! He’s way below me! Why the hell should I apologize?”
“Yeah. If you apologized that easily, it wouldn’t be any fun.”
I turned to Yeomhwa.
“So. What do you say? You want to try it yourself?”
Yeomhwa looked completely lost.
“Sir? Try what...?”
“Educating them.”
Education?
Why had “education” suddenly come up here?
Was I telling him to teach them smithing?
“Ah, you’re not going to get it if I put it like that. Fine. I’ll demonstrate.”
Since I’d said I’d show him a demonstration, he focused.
SMACK—.
Dong Pyeong’s head snapped to one side.
SMACK—.
Then it snapped the other way.
SMACK—.
And back again.
I just kept slapping him left and right in turn.
After a while—
THUD—.
Foaming at the mouth, Dong Pyeong collapsed in a faint, and I ignored him lightly as I spoke to Yeomhwa.
“That’s all there is to it. See? Easy.”
“Y-you want me to hit them like that?”
“No, it’s not hitting. It’s education.”
When Yeomhwa hesitated, I sighed and went for the next one.
“N-no! I don’t want to get hit!”
I grabbed the Process Overseer who tried to run and slapped him just like I had Dong Pyeong.
Another faint.
Only one left now.
“That one’s yours.”
“I-I can’t.”
“Haah. This is all part of your studies, you know.”
“N-no. The only thing I can hit is iron.”
Watching him refuse to the end, I couldn’t help but let out a small laugh.
He was a good person.
Seeing people like that put me in a good mood.
“Fine.”
THUD—.
The last one went down in a single blow.
Then Yeomhwa spoke up carefully.
“Um, why did you knock that one out in one shot?”
“Hm?”
“Shouldn’t you treat him the same as the others if you want it to be fair?”
“Then I’ll wake him up. You want to do it yourself?”
“N-no. Putting him to sleep in one shot seems best.”
I shook my head.
“You’re right. The others took multiple slaps before they passed out, but this guy got to go out easy. Good point.”
He suddenly had the feeling he’d said the wrong thing.
When I muttered something, the last Process Overseer’s eyes flew open.
“Gah!”
He bolted upright in a panic.
SMACK—.
And the slapping started.
By the time I was done, the last Process Overseer’s face was just as swollen as the others, and he passed out again.
*****
“We were wrong!”
“Please forgive us!”
“We’ll return the swords immediately!”
The three Process Overseers were begging in front of me.
“I told you, apologize to Yeomhwa, not to me. Why is it so hard to follow simple instructions? You’re getting on my nerves.”
As my expression stiffened and I frowned, the Process Overseers flinched and scrambled to rush over and throw themselves at Yeomhwa’s feet.
“S-sorry!”
“We were wrong! Please forgive us!”
Staring at the three Process Overseers begging him for forgiveness, Yeomhwa looked utterly stunned.
He had never once imagined something like this would happen in his life.
And yet that impossible thing had just happened today.
“Hey.”
At my call, the three froze mid-plea.
They tensed up and focused on what I was about to say.
“You left out what you did wrong. You going to half-ass this, or do you want to go back to the start and get educated again?”
They panicked and threw themselves down in front of Yeomhwa again.
Then they started vomiting up every last wrong they’d committed.
The content was something else.
The reason he hadn’t been able to get promoted, just like I’d thought, was that they’d been taking bribes and conspiring to fail him on purpose.
After hearing all three out, I clicked my tongue.
“tsk tsk. You’ve really done a number. The people who should be the most fair taking bribes and pulling crap like that. Do you bastards even get to call yourselves part of Heavenly Martial Castle?”
They all had their heads bowed as low as they could go.
So it was rotten all the way down at the bottom.
Then how rotten was the top going to be?
Did Grandfather know any of this?
I’d come to see his face.
And now I didn’t even have time to actually see him.
How was I supposed to track down the rest of this corruption?
My eyes landed on Dong Pyeong.
First I fix the Main Artisan Court and Heavenly Fire Road, get them back to normal. Then I move on to the Guard Corps.
What kind of man was the High Marshal of Arms, who led the Guard Corps?
Was he rotten too?
One thing at a time. Handle what was in front of me.
Grandfather, you’re going to owe me something really expensive and really tasty.
I grinned.
To get Heavenly Fire Road back to normal, I first had to straighten out the Main Artisan Court.
The structure of the Main Artisan Court was roughly this: Process Overseers in charge of personnel matters for the artisans, the Treasury Office in charge of materials and budget, and the Inspection Office, which inspected the products made in Heavenly Forge.
From what I heard, the materials and budget side was more likely to be riddled with embezzlement and breach of trust than with bribery, and product inspection was tied directly to promotion, so they were going to be neck-deep in bribes.
The one who’d provided the fertile ground for all this was the head of Heavenly Forge, Master Smith Cheon.
All this had blown up while he’d been indifferent to everything but iron.
Irresponsible.
If all he wanted to do was the work he liked, he should have secluded himself somewhere and done it alone.
Why plant himself in Heavenly Martial Castle and create this kind of mess?
If he had just done his job properly, the Main Artisan Court wouldn’t even be necessary.
The people of the Main Artisan Court looked down on the people of Heavenly Forge.
They didn’t even seem to know why they existed.
The Main Artisan Court had been created to support Heavenly Forge.
Strictly speaking, that meant the Main Artisan Court was beneath Heavenly Forge.
Over time, that nature had warped. That was the problem.
What did I need to do to fix this?
I had to grab Master Smith Cheon.
And to do that, I needed something he’d made.
The thing an artisan hates most in this world is when a work they poured their heart and soul into gets devalued.
For Master Smith Cheon, it would be even worse.