What On Earth Is This Guy? (5)

Jo Gul watched the front with tense eyes.

“Sahyung…”

“Shh.”

But no sooner had his mouth opened than Yoon Jong cut him off.

Yoon Jong, silently surveying the scene visible through the dense undergrowth, hardened his expression.

A painfully narrow gorge.

On a narrow path more aptly described as a split cliff than a gorge, countless people had set up camp.

Their momentum seemed to carry all the way to this distant spot.

“…Let’s go back.”

“Yes.”

Yoon Jong and Jo Gul carefully turned their bodies.

The bushes rustled every time their bodies brushed past.

A faint sound, but grating as if someone were scraping their ears.

Bending low to avoid touching the foliage as much as possible, the two moved cautiously, then sprang forward the moment they reached the mountain’s rear side.

After sprinting for a long while, they entered the deep woods at the mountain’s entrance.

Entering the deep forest where sunlight barely reached, a murderous aura poured from ahead.

“It’s me!”

When Jo Gul shouted, the murderous intent that had been descending vanished as if washed away.

Leaping over waist-high undergrowth, Jo Gul glanced at the people sitting before him.

Southern Island’s disciples were sitting here and there, resting.

‘…They’ve thinned out considerably.’

Jo Gul’s expression darkened slightly.

Having stepped away briefly and returned, the situation looked more objectively clear.

Their numbers had decreased compared to when they first arrived at the coast.

It wasn’t just a reduction in thousands.

A bigger change was the aura they radiated.

Occasionally, the gazes of Southern Island’s sword disciples that pierced Jo Gul carried a chilling murderous intent.

They weren’t showing outright hostility toward Jo Gul.

Even after resting here for some time, the nerves and killer instinct rattled by earlier battles did not easily fade.

Clothes soaked with sweat and filth so their original color was hard to tell, faces crusted with dried blood and dust.

Their lips were parched and cracked, and the shadows under their hollow eyes made their faces look even heavier.

They looked less like martial artists and more like soldiers exhausted from battle.

Jo Gul suddenly realized just how much they’d changed.

If he hadn’t come here with them, Jo Gul wouldn’t have believed that the people he saw at Southern Island and those now collapsed here from exhaustion were the same.

‘It was only a few days.’

Of course, Jo Gul wasn’t incapable of understanding them.

What they’d been through in these few days surpassed the hardships most people would endure over years.

Had Jo Gul been thrust suddenly into the battlefield like them instead of growing slowly under Chung Myung, he’d likely look similar.

No, he might have been in even worse shape than them.

Or he might not have survived to reach even this state.

Because he might not have lived this far.

Deep in thought as he walked, Jo Gul flinched at a sensation under his foot.

He hurriedly pulled his foot back.

“Ah… I’m sorry!”

What he had stepped on was a sword a Southern Island disciple had set down on the ground.

Rather than ‘set down,’ it was more fitting to say it had been tossed or abandoned.

But in any case, touching someone else’s beloved weapon is extremely rude.

Carelessly touching another’s cherished blade often leads to slicing and bloodshed.

And he had even stepped on it with his foot…

Yet the Southern Island Sect’s disciple said nothing even upon seeing his sword stepped on.

He only glanced at Jo Gul, then silently dragged the stepped-on sword over and roughly tossed it in front of him.

He didn’t even think to brush the mud from Jo Gul’s shoe off the blade.

At that moment, Yoon Jong quietly approached and urged him on.

“Let’s go.”

“Yes, sahyung.”

Jo Gul nodded and followed behind Yoon Jong.

The scene he’d just seen lingered unpleasantly in his mind.

‘Still, it’s his sword.’

Jo Gul, a disciple of Mount Hua, had also been taught to cherish his sword like his life.

Teaching is like ink slowly seeping into white cloth; hearing the same words for a long time makes you follow them unconsciously in life.

The prestigious Southern Island probably received even stricter training than Mount Hua.

Yet a Southern Island disciple was treating his sword like a discarded piece of wood.

Were they so exhausted that they handled a life-important sword that carelessly?

Or did it mean that even life itself was that trivial here?

Jo Gul shook his head and cleared his mind.

All meaningless thoughts and delusions.

The two only stopped when they reached where the Heavenly Friends Alliance members were gathered.

“Sasuk.”

At Yoon Jong’s call, Baek Cheon, who had been discussing something with Im So-Byeong, looked up.

“Have you returned?”

“Yes, sasuk.”

“What’s the situation?”

“It’s not good.”

Yoon Jong explained with a hard expression.

“The gorge ahead is much narrower than we thought.”

“How does it compare to that place where the Black Dragon war was last time?”

“It seems even narrower than that place.”

Baek Cheon’s face darkened slightly.

The valley leading into the Black Dragon valley was also tall and steep, making defense from above difficult.

If it’s even narrower than that, there’d be nowhere to dodge, making it more dangerous.

“The enemies?”

“They’re blocking it without a gap. Because the gorge is narrow, they didn’t look numerous from outside, but they could be lined up much farther back. And if we assume they also have a wide camp near the exit, their number would be at least five hundred.”

“…Five hundred.”

Baek Cheon repeated it calmly.

Despite the calm voice, he was inwardly uneasy.

‘It never ends.’

The number of people they’ve slain on the way here is uncountable.

They’d killed more in these recent days than in their entire lives before.

Yet the number of reinforcements exceeds the enemies being depleted.

It had moved beyond gloom into outright despair.

“Instead of passing through the gorge, how about climbing the mountain?”

“The mountain terrain is very steep. Even if we can manage it, will Southern Island’s disciples be able to keep up…?”

“…There’ll be ambushes too.”

“There will. I felt a passing murderous intent.”

Baek Cheon nodded.

Even if it might be different for Jo Gul, once Yoon Jong confirmed it, it was certain.

Enemies ambushing from cliffs are nothing to Mount Hua’s disciples.

It might even be easier than dealing with foes lying in wait on flat ground.

But not everyone here is a Mount Hua disciple.

Needless to discuss Southern Island, right now even Namgung Do-Wei or Tang Pae would be unable to use half their skill on a cliff.

Maybe someone like Im So-Byeong, who traverses mountains like his home, would be different.

Baek Cheon looked at one person with renewed interest.

Chung Myung was leaning against a tree stump with his eyes closed.

Baek Cheon’s eyebrow twitched for a moment.

When that guy hung Mount Hua’s disciples from cliffs and dunked them into water, Baek Cheon had thought he was merely seeking efficient ways to torment them.

But here, several times, he felt anew.

That all those trainings had meaning.

Of course, in a peaceful world those trainings might have been meaningless.

But in a war where life and death are at stake, all that experience could save lives.

‘Did that guy foresee all this?’

He didn’t know. And he couldn’t ask.

Since entering this battle, Chung Myung had extremely reduced his speech.

And when he rested, he would close his eyes like now and focus solely on recovering his stamina.

As if to be able to fight even one moment longer.

Baek Cheon knew it too; that was the right thing to do.

Half the conversations meant to be meetings were meaningless.

They might be endlessly exchanging conversations that only consume stamina to reassure themselves they weren’t on the wrong path, to suppress the rising unease in their hearts.

But Chung Myung mechanically did only what needed to be done, as if emotion did not exist.

At times, he even doubted whether this guy was really the Chung Myung he knew.

“Sasuk?”

Baek Cheon exhaled deeply and turned his gaze elsewhere.

“Green Forest King.”

“Yes.”

“What do you think?”

Im So-Byeong scratched his head with the tip of his fan as if out of habit and spoke.

“Detouring would be the wisest, but… in war you can’t always follow only correct judgments.”

Baek Cheon nodded.

A detour only prolongs fleeing.

As long as enemies are reinforced faster than they are defeated, the longer they wait, the more opponents they’ll have to face.

“What about the rear…”

“I recommend not thinking about it.”

Im So-Byeong shrugged his shoulders and cracked a grin.

“Well, thinking doesn’t always yield answers. For now, we should only think about moving forward.”

He had a point.

But as Im So-Byeong had said earlier, sometimes knowing what’s right doesn’t make it easy to act on.

No matter how hard they tried to erase it from their minds, they kept thinking about the Ten Thousand People Clan following from behind.

‘They’ve probably reached nearby by now.’

How far are they? Four hours? Or one hour?

Since they’d stalled here, the enemy had at least closed to within one hour of reaching this spot.

“So in the end, it means we have to break through.”

Baek Cheon looked at Southern Island’s disciples who were sitting exhausted.

So spent as they were, could they endure the fierce battle about to come?

From yesterday to today they’d only had a brief moment of rest.

Time too short even to close their eyes, insufficient even for energy cultivation.

Even in training they’d be pushed to the limit, but for days they had to withstand life-threatening conditions.

Could such people withstand this battle?

“…Let’s also consider detouring.”

“Acting Sect Leader.”

“It’s not about avoiding. We must think realistically. Yoon Jong, how do the enemies look in skill?”

Yoon Jong answered calmly with a hard face.

“I can’t be sure, but it looked like some from the Four Sects Alliance were present. Occasionally I felt an eerie aura.”

Baek Cheon repeated to Im So-Byeong.

“Even if we break through there, it’s meaningless if the losses are too great. And even if losses aren’t great, if we exhaust everything there, we’ll be left only with the path of being hunted down to death.”

“Hmm.”

“You have to avoid the falling rain. Passing only that spot isn’t the end, is it?”

There was sense in Baek Cheon’s words.

Im So-Byeong’s face hardened as he entered thought.

Then, abruptly, another voice cut in.

“Go through the gorge.”

Baek Cheon snapped his gaze around.

Chung Myung had opened his eyes and was approaching with his sword at his waist.

“Chung Myung.”

“We just have to get past that spot.”

“…Chung Myung. That may be you, but those others…”

“Sasuk.”

Baek Cheon fell silent.

“We just have to get past that spot.”

Baek Cheon, hesitating over what answer to give, finally nodded.

When Chung Myung spoke like that, there was always a reason.

Wasn’t Chung Myung the one who originally chose this escape route?

Baek Cheon said.

“Let’s do that. But remember: if the losses become too great, breaking through will be meaningless.”

“Losses?”

Chung Myung chuckled softly as if finding it amusing.

The stark white of his revealed teeth made him look oddly chilling.

“You need to see the situation clearly, you desk-bound fools.”

“…What are you talking about?”

“Even if there’s a detour, I’d go through there.”

Baek Cheon looked puzzled, and Chung Myung spat out his words.

“In a narrow path you won’t be surrounded. You just deal with the enemies in front of you, right?”

Baek Cheon’s hand trembled slightly for an instant.

But Chung Myung, whether aware of it or not, just smiled coldly.

“A place where cutting a hundred or a thousand opens the way. Where could there be a better path?”

Baek Cheon forced himself to ignore the chill crawling up his spine and sighed.

“…When do we start?”

“Now.”

A grimness settled into Chung Myung’s eyes.

“But warn them to brace themselves. It’ll be more horrible than they imagine.”

Everyone nodded solemnly.