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Mo Yeom-bi, serving as the temporary leader of the Dispersing Lotus Union, went to the guesthouse by Namsa Lake at dawn after receiving a summons.
This had been a long night for him.
He’d been woken by a report that a blaze had broken out at the Night Water Clan the previous night.
Mo Yeom-bi had spent the hours awake, trying desperately to calm his anxious heart.
Surely not—this soon?
No, right? It must be an accident.
He hadn’t expected trouble so quickly. Mo Yeom-bi prayed inwardly.
Please get through it. Please get through it. Please…
As he fretted and waited, a message arrived: a summons saying business for the temporary leaders would be discussed at an old guesthouse on the outskirts.
Mo Yeom-bi tried to look composed and arrived at the guesthouse first.
“Am I the first to arrive?”
He looked around the empty guesthouse and asked.
The lamps were unlit and the place felt bleak.
“Servant! Servant! Bring me a cup of tea. Is there really no one here?”
Only silence answered.
Lighting the single lamp on the table, Mo Yeom-bi called out again.
A man with a tired face stood watching him from a corner of the guesthouse.
It was Yeon Mujin.
“No one else is here. I was about to leave.”
“Damn, you scared me! You could’ve at least said you were here!”
Yeon Mujin smelled sharply of smoke.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
Somewhere a slow drip could be heard.
Mo Yeom-bi felt an inexplicable rising fear.
To steady himself, he forced his mouth open.
“It’s hot. When are the other leaders coming?”
“They’re all here.”
“All here?”
“The only one I called was the Dispersing War Union—you.”
Mo Yeom-bi swallowed.
“Not War Union. Dispersing Lotus Union.”
“Damn, why are there so many confusing names?”
“Why did you call me?”
Yeon Mujin did not answer immediately; he stayed silent.
Mo Yeom-bi’s eyes fell on the old iron sword propped beside him.
“Is this about that ten-thousand coins promise? Even if you demand ten thousand now, we can’t pay. Because of the Night Water Clan bastards, our Dispersing Lotus Union isn’t well off. Besides, asking for ten thousand coins upfront doesn’t make sense. The promise was clear: come find the clan leader and then the money will be given. Don’t forget the promise.”
Yeon Mujin’s eyebrow twitched.
“You put that oddly.”
“What’s odd?”
“Everyone else thinks the missing clan leader is dead, but you alone speak of ‘finding’ them.”
…!
Mo Yeom-bi nearly let his startled expression show.
He’d been rattled by the mood and slipped.
It was the atmosphere—a feeling that if he said nothing, the other might draw a blade at any moment.
Mo Yeom-bi calmed himself and, irritation masking his fear, answered.
“You were the one who promised to come find them, not us! Don’t treat people like a joke.”
“Right, that’s it. I’m here to keep that promise.”
“What promise do you intend to keep in this shabby guesthouse?”
Yeon Mujin rested his elbows on his knees, bowed his head, and asked,
“Where did you hide the missing clan leader?”
Cough! Cough!
Mo Yeom-bi let out a dry cough and forced a few more, as if choked. He needed time; otherwise his pounding heart would betray him.
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“The one who kidnapped the clan leader was a great thief named Gu Ma-cheon. He backed the Night Water Clan. Do you know where he is now?”
“…Where?”
“At the bottom of Namsa Lake.”
…
Mo Yeom-bi rolled the information around in his head, then realized Yeon Mujin’s words had nothing to do with the Dispersing Lotus Union.
“Then why did you come ask me about it?”
“Because when Gu Ma-cheon died, he said who had ordered him to do it.”
“And that was our Dispersing Lotus Union?”
Yeon Mujin silently affirmed.
Mo Yeom-bi was troubled. Was he being tested now?
Gu Ma-cheon wasn’t some common third-rate old man. The man before him claimed to have defeated such a figure—hard to believe.
But dismissing it nagged at him because of the acrid smell on Yeon Mujin’s clothes.
And a blaze had erupted at the Night Water Clan today.
“Preposterous. Do you have any proof?”
“There is no proof.”
Mo Yeom-bi felt relief.
“But Gu Ma-cheon, who backed the Night Water Clan, is dead. If you go to the Night Water Clan leader and torture him, wouldn’t the name Dispersing Lotus Union come out?”
He couldn’t be certain.
His mouth went dry.
Yeon Mujin stared at Mo Yeom-bi for a long moment, then casually shook himself, stood, and said,
“Or how about doing it this way?”
“What do you mean?”
“No matter how you squeeze the Southern Four Alliance, I don’t think you’ll get forty thousand coins. How about returning this Namsa Lake to them as promised? Erase the traces of the Night Water Clan and compensate the dead clan leader. It will cost money and time. Even if forty thousand coins was promised verbally, when will you ever collect that sum? As you know, money is better to have plenty of at once, isn’t it?”
…
Yeon Mujin looked at Mo Yeom-bi and grinned.
“Is that really necessary?”
Mo Yeom-bi was taken aback. What was this man trying to imply?
“You mean…”
“Whether the one behind the Night Water Clan was Gu Ma-cheon or me, the powerless Southern Four Alliance would have no way of knowing. Besides, the area around Namsa Lake is more or less cleaned up now, isn’t it? There’s no need to disrupt this scene.”
Mo Yeom-bi glanced around.
There was not a single sign of life.
Lowering his voice, he asked again,
“Are you serious…?”
Yeon Mujin smiled and nodded.
“But the promise made to the leaders…”
“Aha. What do you think of our Bukgung Family?”
At first the remark sounded like a reproach—would the Bukgung Family not keep its promise? But beneath it lay the meaning: would a house like the Bukgung bother with something as petty as the Southern Four Alliance?
Mo Yeom-bi heard that and steeled himself.
“That’s right. What kind of place is the Bukgung Family that it would fuss over such trifles? But the fact you are saying this to me means…”
“The Bukgung hand is too large for small tasks.”
Yeon Mujin said that and stared intently at Mo Yeom-bi.
“What about you? Didn’t you have a role promised with Gu Ma-cheon?”
There was. Clearly.
Mo Yeom-bi inwardly rejoiced and bowed his head.
“Of course. Entrust it to me and I’ll do my best.”
“What about the Night Water Clan bastards?”
Yeon Mujin’s voice changed. At first it had been tired and slow, like a wanderer who’d finished a fight. A moment ago it was sly and serpent-like; now it turned stern and lordly.
“The head of the Night Water Clan is a straw man. The real plan is being handled by my father.”
“The real Dispersing Lotus Union leader? So he really is alive after all.”
“Yes. He’s likely receiving reports at a spot by Namsa Lake even now. He knew I was coming here.”
“I see.”
Yeon Mujin said, “So that’s it after all.”
“…Yes?”
At that moment, a creak! rang out and the guesthouse brightened.
People opened the upstairs doors and appeared holding lamps.
Mo Yeom-bi flinched as if seeing a ghost.
The leaders of the Southern Four Alliance—Ha Ho-baek, Noh Ja-gwang, and Yu Un-seok—were looking down at him.
“How!”
Mo Yeom-bi gasped and collapsed onto his seat.
He looked at Yeon Mujin.
“What is going on with this!”
Yeon Mujin sat on the table with a mocking smile, his mangy, annoying manner restored.
“What’s ‘what’s going on’—it’s you I’ve got inside out.”
Then Blue River Clan leader Yu Un-seok’s angry shout followed.
“Mo Yeom-bi, you bastard!”
Mo Yeom-bi couldn’t withstand the leaders’ interrogation and revealed the hideout.
Noh Ja-gwang of the Gold Radiance Sect showed particularly brutal hands.
“That’s enough. If you go on, he’ll die.”
Yeon Mujin, unable to watch, stopped him.
Mo Yeom-bi had been reduced to something like a rag, not a person.
The leaders’ anger at the betrayal was that great.
The previously missing leaders had been confined a short distance from Namsa Lake.
Ha Ho-baek, Noh Ja-gwang, and Yu Un-seok bowed to Yeon Mujin once more.
“Please. Rescue the leaders.”
“Please? Wasn’t that the promise in the first place?”
Yeon Mujin spoke as if it were nothing.
“Wait at the Smoke and Cloud Union. I’ll bring those men back.”
When Yeon Mujin and the External Protection Troops rushed in, the warriors of the Dispersing Lotus Union couldn’t resist.
Yeon Mujin returned with the missing leaders at noon, under the high sun.
The leaders were weakened after their long confinement.
“Get the leaders inside quickly! Physician! Bring a physician!”
Doctors were urgently summoned, and the temporary leaders steadied their troubled hearts as they looked at their fathers who had lost consciousness.
“Their lives are not in danger.”
Only after the physician’s diagnosis did they finally regain composure.
However, not everything was over.
“Bring out the traitors!”
Dispersing Lotus Union’s Mo Yeom-bi and Clan leader Mo Cheol-jung—the punishments for the traitors still had to be decided.
“You filthy traitors.”
Mo Yeom-bi and Mo Cheol-jung were dragged into the courtyard, bound with ropes.
Mo Yeom-bi was battered and bloodied from Noh Ja-gwang’s torture; Mo Cheol-jung had been beaten by Yeon Mujin during the dragging.
The two knelt, glaring fiercely at the temporary leaders.
Yu Un-seok and Noh Ja-gwang glared angrily at Mo Cheol-jung.
“Dispersing Lotus Union leader, how could you do this?”
“How could you betray the alliance and our fathers?”
Mo Cheol-jung did not answer; he only glared.
“Was it planned from the start?”
“Since when did you betray us?”
“Say something!”
Unable to bear it, Mo Yeom-bi stepped forward and shouted,
“Arrogant wretches! How dare you raise your voice at an elder! Are you lowly scoundrels who know nothing of respect?”
Those words only inflamed them further.
Noh Ja-gwang, face flushed, drew his sword and shouted,
“All right then, let’s see the sword dance of a lowly wretch today. I’ll cut off you and your son’s heads!”
“Calm down, hyung No! Not until the leaders wake up!”
Ha Ho-baek rushed in and restrained Noh Ja-gwang.
“Let me speak for a moment.”
Ha Ho-baek approached Mo Cheol-jung closely.
“Uncle Cheol-jung. And Hyung Mo.”
Ha Ho-baek had been closely connected with the Dispersing Lotus Union since childhood. The young Ha Ho-baek had treated Mo Cheol-jung like an uncle, and Mo Cheol-jung had doted on him like a nephew. Even when the cynical Mo Yeom-bi clashed with his hyungs, it had always been the youngest Ha Ho-baek who held him back.
Mo Yeom-bi turned his head as if uncomfortable with Ha Ho-baek.
“Why did you do that?”
Mo Cheol-jung closed his eyes and tried not to listen.
Ha Ho-baek placed a hand on his shoulder and asked,
“Gold Radiance Sect, Dispersing Lotus Union, Blue River Clan and our Smoke and Cloud Union. I have lived considering the Southern Four Alliance my family. Haven’t you shared brotherly bonds with the other leaders for decades? Why on earth did you do this?”
Ha Ho-baek was neither angry nor resentful. He only lamented the situation.
But that single plea hit harder than a hundred words of anger.
Mo Cheol-jung opened his eyes and met Ha Ho-baek’s gaze. At last his mouth opened.
“It was not that I abandoned the Southern Four Alliance; the Southern Four Alliance abandoned me.”
“…Yes?”
“Family? Hyung? No way. While your Smoke and Cloud Union, Gold Radiance Sect, and Blue River Clan were making money, could Dispersing Lotus Union be allowed to crumble?”
Wham!
Mo Cheol-jung headbutted Ha Ho-baek’s face.
Ha Ho-baek fell back onto his butt; blood ran from his nose.
“Must I watch Dispersing Lotus Union perish under the name of the alliance? The ones who betrayed the alliance are not me but you!”
Tied with ropes, Mo Cheol-jung stood and lashed out at the young leaders.
Ha Ho-baek was shocked; Noh Ja-gwang and Yu Un-seok were bewildered.
Mo Yeom-bi sat beside his father, lips trembling as he suppressed his fury.
And…
Watching the entire farce, Yeon Mujin dismissed the situation with a single line.
“This is a damn mess.”
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