I Wish They Would All Die. (2)

“T-These bastards?”

Bang Hwi involuntarily took a step back.

“H-How dare you lay a hand on the Eastern Depot’s men! Are you truly intent on becoming traitors?”

“…Wasn’t he just talking about flaying us a moment ago?”

“I guess that doesn’t quite count as treating us like traitors.”

“Then what happens if we are treated as traitors?”

“Do all our relatives get flayed along with us?”

“Wow.”

Cold sweat began to run down Bang Hwi’s back.

‘How?’

Those who had just been slammed into the building across from them were the elite troops the Eastern Depot prided itself on. Wasn’t their skill proven simply by the fact that they were escorting none other than the Ceremonial Affairs Head?

And yet those elite troops had been taken down with a single strike?

‘Just what kind of monsters are these guys?’

Judging by their builds and voices, they clearly were not particularly old. So how in the world did they possess such absurd skill?

“W-Who exactly are you people?”

Baek Cheon sighed and pressed a hand to his forehead.

“…No. Do you really think they’ll answer just because you ask that, in this situation?”

“I told you earlier, didn’t I? He’s a little slow.”

“……”

Faced with the culprits’ unruffled attitude from beginning to end, Bang Hwi’s face twisted sharply.

“You bastards… You’re no ordinary people.”

“What an obvious thing to say…”

“And people like you dare target the head Eunuch?”

“Uh…”

“You people have ties to the martial world, don’t you?”

Baek Cheon sighed. Exactly. Who would answer just because you asked it like that…?

“Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha.”

Everyone’s eyes turned toward Chung Myung.

“No…”

“I. Have. No. Idea. What. You’re. Talking. About. What. Is. The. Martial. World?”

“…Stop.”

It was catastrophic.

Watching Chung Myung creakily shake his head like a wooden puppet brought back memories of being hung upside down from a tree and beaten on the butt by Jin Geum-Ryong after wetting the bed at the age of five. The level of humiliation felt almost equivalent…

“…So you are martial artists after all.”

“I told you we’re not!”

“…It’s too late, you idiot. So just keep your mouth shut.”

At a response that was essentially an admission, Bang Hwi’s confidence swelled.

“How dare martial artists interfere in the affairs of the imperial court? You bastards! You’ve grown far too bold! I will see that you pay for this!”

“……”

“Do not think this will end with you. I do not know what sect you belong to, but not one foundation stone of it will remain. I will make you pay the price for this.”

“……”

“Ha-ha! You look a little frightened now, don’t you? But it’s already too late. I’ll make you pay dearly for the crimes of spying on the Head Eunuch and laying hands on the Eastern Depot’s men!”

“……”

Confusion crossed Bang Hwi’s face as he continued his triumphant tirade.

“…Why are they reacting like this?”

He had realized something. With every word he uttered, these men seemed to grow frightened.

What was strange about that, you ask? The strange part was that he did not seem to be the one they were afraid of.

“What are you looking at?”

Everyone was looking at one person standing behind them. He rested a hand on his chin, appearing to ponder something deeply, then lightly nodded.

“Hmm. I suppose there’s no other way.”

“Um, well…”

“It seems we’ve been found out anyway… And this fact hasn’t reached anyone else yet.”

The corner of the masked man’s mouth twitched. It looked as though he was smiling faintly…

“Since things have come to this, we can silence them by killing them all…”

“Get that bastard!”

“Good grief, please come to your senses!”

“Let go of me for a second! I’ve thought this through!”

“That’s exactly the problem, you idiot!”

Jo Gul desperately clung to Yoon Jong, who had lost his head at the danger facing Mount Hua.

“I’m telling you, there’s no other way!”

“They don’t know who we are! We just have to make sure they never find out!”

“Our opponent is the Eastern Depot, the Eastern Depot! There’s no way we can keep it hidden forever.”

“That doesn’t mean we can kill people!”

Just then, as Jo Gul and Yoon Jong wrestled with each other.

“Enough!”

Baek Cheon’s furious voice rang loudly through the surroundings.

Baek Cheon glared at them all, his anger plainly visible even through his mask.

“What shameful behavior is this!”

“We’re sorry.”

“We have no excuse.”

“To make such a fuss over something as trivial as the possibility of the sect’s name being exposed!”

Bang!

Baek Cheon stamped the ground and shouted boldly.

“Is that how our Southern Edge Sect taught you?!”

“Wow…”

“Whoa…”

He’s a demon. A damn demon.

How did Southern Edge Sect ever give birth to something like that?

“But listen carefully. We neither hide nor flee.”

“Um, sasuk. Maybe that’s enough…”

“Take this! Snow Flower Thirty-Six Swords!”

The Snow Flower Thirty-Six Swords unleashed by Baek Cheon… No, at least the forms looked convincing enough as the Snow Flower Thirty-Six Swords embroidered the sky.

As the Mount Hua disciples stared blankly at the sight, Chung Myung’s dazed voice reached their ears.

“He’s seriously insane. That guy…”

“……”

“You lost them?”

“…Please kill me.”

Do-Hyeon frowned as he looked at Bang Hwi prostrated before him.

“You could not find their trail?”

“We succeeded in pursuing them, but we were outmatched.”

Do-Hyeon narrowed his eyes further.

“Outmatched?”

“Yes.”

“You have quite the nerve to say such a thing, for someone who calls himself a chief.”

Bang Hwi lowered his head even further.

“I’m sorry.”

“Hm.”

A strange displeasure clouded Do-Hyeon’s eyes.

These men were not truly formidable experts. The Eastern Depot was an organization for surveillance, not for bringing people down. Even so, for men who could be called the Eastern Depot’s elite to encounter an enemy and still let them escape…

“Explain.”

“There is something I would like to say…”

“Explain.”

Bang Hwi swallowed dryly and continued.

“It was not that we made any particular mistake. We simply could not withstand their martial power. You can tell from the fact that we returned alive… They did not show any particular intention of treating us as enemies. Even so…”

“You could not catch them?”

“Yes.”

Do-Hyeon chuckled at Bang Hwi’s concise answer.

“So they were not people we know. If they had been, there is no way you would have failed to recognize them.”

“That is correct.”

“Then make a guess. Who were they?”

Bang Hwi lightly bit his lip before speaking.

“First… they certainly appeared to be martial artists.”

When Do-Hyeon simply stared at him, Bang Hwi squeezed his eyes shut.

Don’t think about it. His role was merely to report what he knew. Do-Hyeon was the one who would do the thinking.

“And… the culprits claimed they came from the Southern Edge Sect.”

“The Southern Edge Sect?”

“Yes. It is a sect in Shaanxi. The ten strongest sects in the martial world are called the Nine Great Sects and One Union…”

“I am not asking because I do not know.”

“S-Sorry.”

Do-Hyeon looked down at Bang Hwi coldly for a moment, then gave a faint laugh.

“So, they said they were from the Southern Edge Sect.”

“Yes. Upon examining the swordsmanship used by one of them, it did indeed bear similarities to the Southern Edge Sect’s signature martial art, the Snow Flower Thirty-Six Swords.”

“What a masterpiece.”

The corner of Do-Hyeon’s mouth twitched faintly.

“He used his swordsmanship right in front of the Eastern Depot, as if to flaunt it. Yet he had no intention of taking our lives.”

“…Yes.”

“Does he take the Eastern Depot for a joke, or is his grudge so deep that he has no room left to consider the consequences?”

“Head Eunuch, then…”

“It is not even worth reasoning about.”

Do-Hyeon, the Eunuch Ceremonial Affairs Head, answered decisively.

“No matter how lawless those martial artists are, they cannot be unaware of the Eastern Depot’s reputation. They would not deliberately try to make an enemy of us. It must be a disguise. A clumsy one at that—so clumsy that calling it a disguise is almost laughable.”

Bang Hwi unconsciously breathed a sigh of relief. He too shared Chief Eunuch Do-Hyeon’s opinion. But if Do-Hyeon changed his mind even slightly, something terrible would befall the sect called Southern Edge Sect.

“Then we will exclude the Southern Edge Sect from the investigation.”

“Why?”

Bang Hwi almost questioned him in return, then hurriedly changed what he was about to say.

“You just said…”

“The Southern Edge Sect is certainly not the culprit. But that is no reason not to investigate the Southern Edge Sect.”

Do-Hyeon spoke as he indifferently stamped the documents on his desk with his official seal.

“The lawless men of the martial world sometimes forget that they are His Majesty’s servants. The stronger the sect, the more likely they are to forget.”

Bang Hwi nodded blankly.

“Then we should help them realize that fact, should we not?”

“…I failed to appreciate the Chief Eunuch’s deeper concerns.”

To Do-Hyeon, whether they were truly connected to the culprits was not particularly important. What mattered was that this provided an opportunity to pressure the martial artists.

Distinguishing truth from falsehood was difficult, but determining whether something could be done or could not be done was not so difficult. And making the impossible possible was the Eastern Depot’s work.

“Send people to Shaanxi. We will take this opportunity to look into this place called the Southern Edge Sect. It does not matter if they are a little rough.”

“Yes, Chief Eunuch.”

Bang Hwi quickly bowed his head. But there was still one problem remaining.

“As for the culprits who escaped…”

“Hmm.”

Do-Hyeon closed his eyes slightly and thought.

‘What a nuisance.’

If he set his mind to it, capturing them would not be impossible. He could mobilize a large number of people who specialized in tracking, or obtain the emperor’s permission to pressure the martial artists and force them to give up the culprits themselves. Neither would be particularly difficult.

Even without that, the result would be the same. If he roughed up a few innocent people appropriately, they would choose one of two options: turn themselves in or come to kill him. Most martial artists moved that way.

So bringing the matter to a conclusion would not be difficult. The problem was that, either way, he could not prevent the affair from growing larger.

The position of Chief Eunuch of Ceremonial Affairs was by no means a low one. No matter how reasonably he tried to explain things away, the mere fact that the Chief Eunuch had nearly been attacked would draw public attention.

If that happened, his political enemies would seize the opportunity to tie his hands. That was not what Do-Hyeon wanted.

“We have no choice but to leave them be.”

“Chief Eunuch, but…”

“Enough.”

Cutting him off, Do-Hyeon gave a faint smile.

“If they were truly nothing more than people caught up in this by coincidence, they will never appear before me again, and there will be no problem. But if they really were targeting me…”

The official seal in Do-Hyeon’s hand floated slightly into the air, then slowly drove down toward the desk.

Vwooom.

Having driven the seal into the rosewood desk without even touching it, Do Hyeon muttered in a toneless voice.

“They will show their faces before me again sooner or later. When they do… I will simply make them pay for this as well.”

“Yes, Chief Eunuch.”

“You may leave.”

Do-Hyeon watched Bang Hwi’s back as he immediately headed outside, then murmured softly.

“But I wonder…”

There was something oddly unsettling about it.

“Are they really martial artists?”

Who could say? In truth, martial artists had no reason to spy on him. He was not even interested in the martial world. Which meant…

“The Confucian scholars?”

A cold chill filled Do-Hyeon’s eyes.

“Even so, it will be of no use. You will never be able to stop me. That day will come soon—the day that changes everything.”

After a brief silence, Do-Hyeon picked up the documents with a familiar motion.

In the unnaturally cold room, the only sound that echoed was the turning of pages.