Chapter 22

The moment Jun-gyeong grasped Mukhwa, countless memories came flooding into his heart.
They were his memories, the memories of Kang Jun-gyeong.

Memories of the past, worn away by a thousand years of battle in Avici Hell.
His beloved Seol-hui handing him the sword, the faces of the generals who had entrusted their backs and lives to him as they crossed battlefields together, the enemy commanders who had crossed blades with him seeking one another’s lives, and even the martial arts he had ingrained into his body since childhood.

“Ah…”

His internal energy stirred.
The martial arts he had forgotten as though they had eroded away slammed back into his mind.
The change began with the most basic things.
The harmony and timing between exhalation and inhalation.
How to regulate the flow of internal Qi that carried his internal energy into his moving limbs.
Habits that a thousand years ago had been as natural to his body as breathing.
Tiny, almost imperceptible changes within.
Just as the flutter of a butterfly’s wings could begin a mighty storm, those minute changes inside him brought about an enormous change outside.

THUD-!

The Jiangshi advanced with such heavy steps that the reinforced-glass floor seemed ready to crack beneath them.

THUD- THUD- THUD-!

The faintest hint of a smile appeared on Jun-gyeong’s face.

“Where do insignificant barbarians like you get the nerve to run rampant before me?”

The low growl had barely left his lips when Jun-gyeong moved.
As though melting into the spotlight falling from above, his body vanished in an instant, leaving only an afterimage behind. He reappeared in the middle of the charging Jiangshi.

Jun-gyeong’s gaze was even calmer and more detached than usual.
There was neither excitement nor emotion in those crimson eyes.

Whoosh-

The tip of his sword rose toward the sky.
Then the sword dance began.
It was the same sword dance he performed each morning in the rooftop courtyard after finishing his run up and down the steep hill leading home.

Shhk- Shk-

Mukhwa moved like a flowing river, neither fast nor slow.
His long body and limbs unfurled as he turned and spun.
His movements formed an ink-wash painting, a wistful image spreading like ink bleeding across rice paper.

A flowing line followed his graceful movements like a brush painting an ink wash.
And at the very peak of that line stood the sword, Mukhwa.

SHHAAK-! FWOOM-!

The internal energy condensed within Mukhwa blossomed at its tip and burst outward.
They were black flower petals.
Each petal held rich gradations of shade, fading from pale white within to black along the outer edge.
The petals drifted free from the sword tip and fluttered through the air.
They were peach-blossom petals, delicate like cherry blossoms.

“Beautiful…”

The VIPs watching the sword dance forgot their own predicament and became captivated by Jun-gyeong’s otherworldly figure.
And it was not merely the beauty of his movements that drew them in.

“Peaches?”
“You’re right. There’s a faint peach fragrance.”

As Jun-gyeong’s sword dance gradually quickened and more petals filled the air, the fragrance grew stronger.

The rich fragrance of peach blossoms.
Though the petals were black rather than pink or white, they carried a fragrance as though they were real flowers.

Yet it was a sword and Jun-gyeong’s internal energy that made them bloom.

Shk- Shashk-

The petals fluttered, and the Jiangshi’s skin and limbs began splitting apart.
More precisely, wherever the drifting petals touched, skin split and limbs and heads began falling away.

THUD-!

All twenty Jiangshi were on the floor in an instant.
Not merely fallen, but scattered across it with arms, legs, and heads severed from their bodies.
Only after every last one had fallen did the petals spiral inward around Jun-gyeong.

Shhk- Tshhk-

As though placing the final period on a sentence, Jun-gyeong raised his sword toward the sky and brought the sword dance to an end.
Only then did the peach blossoms settle to the floor.

“Wh… Grrk… What… Grrrk… is this…?”

Wang Jo-young, who had summoned the Jiangshi and injected himself with the virus to control them, stared at Jun-gyeong as his green eyes rolled wildly.
He had played every card he possessed, and now fear trembled in his eyes.

“What… Kgh… are… you? Grrk…”

Jun-gyeong looked impassively at Wang Jo-young, whose skin had already turned deathly pale as he transformed into a Jiangshi.
Then he slowly began walking toward him.
His steps were slow and unhurried, yet each one carried undeniable majesty.
With every step Jun-gyeong took forward, Wang Jo-young retreated.

Tap-

Eventually his back met the glass wall at the far edge, and he slid to the floor, trembling uncontrollably.

He didn’t dare attack.
Normally, Wang Jo-young, transformed into a Jiangshi by the virus, should have lost his reason and thrown himself at Jun-gyeong.
But the animal instinct engraved into his mind and heart prevented him from doing so.
Still making guttural animal noises, he stared up at Jun-gyeong in terror.

-Don’t kill him.

Ok-hee’s voice reached him.

-Don’t kill that man.

Jun-gyeong looked down at Wang Jo-young.
He understood why she was telling him not to kill the man.
A man who had injected himself and turned into a monster.
He himself had called it a biological weapon.
Which meant it could potentially be mass-produced.
China might be carrying out something far larger behind the scenes.
If so, it would be too large a matter for Jun-gyeong to handle alone.
His role was to deal with monsters that crossed the line and corrupted humans.
But a nation possessing an artificially created virus like this had to be dealt with by another nation.
An incident that had grown this large needed to be left to the government.

“Down.”

At Jun-gyeong’s quiet command, Wang Jo-young immediately flattened himself against the floor.

“Stay.”

Leaving him with that single word, Jun-gyeong raised his head toward the ceiling.
The ceiling had shattered open.
Now fulfilling its original purpose once more, it revealed bright stars glittering overhead.

“The helicopters are gone.”

The helicopters that had been hovering overhead had disappeared some time ago.

“Do you know where the helicopters went?”
-Yes. I’m tracking them. They’re still in the air. And the police will be there soon.
“Understood.”

Jun-gyeong glanced back to make sure Wang Jo-young was still plastered obediently against the floor, then headed toward Seung-ho.
As he approached, the crowd parted to either side and opened a path for him.

“Are you all right?”
“Yes. I’m fine.”
“Good.”

Yang Seung-ho smiled brightly as he looked at Mukhwa.

“It found its owner.”

Jun-gyeong’s gaze shifted to Mukhwa as well.

“Is it really all right for me to simply take this?”

In response, Seung-ho deliberately raised his voice.

“Of course. Who’s going to complain? If it weren’t for that sword, everyone here would have lost their lives.”

At Seung-ho’s words, the VIPs began raising their hands one after another like eager children.

“Twenty billion won? I’ll pay it.”
“That’s right! If anyone asks for payment, I’ll cover it!”
“No, I will! I’ll pay for it, so don’t worry.”
“I’ll do it. Money’s about the only thing I have. Let me pay.”

The people who had parted to let Jun-gyeong through now crowded around him, clamoring over one another to pay.
Seung-ho grinned and lightly nudged Jun-gyeong.
Then he lowered his voice.

“See? Nothing to worry about.”
“They really must have a lot of money.”
“Of course. The people here easily make more than South Korea’s entire annual budget. Don’t worry about money.”

Jun-gyeong had no idea how large an annual national budget was, but these were individuals wealthy enough to earn sums greater than what it cost to run a country for an entire year.
Jun-gyeong nodded as he looked around, while every eye remained fixed on him.

Jun-gyeong sat on the edge of the wooden platform in the rooftop courtyard.

Seung-ho had made a great fuss about the Hidden Presidential Suite at Samo Hotel being vacant, but right now Jun-gyeong needed the quiet of this place more than any such luxury.
Below him, the sleepless nightscape of Seoul glittered as though strewn with jewels, but his gaze remained fixed solely on the black blade resting across his knees.

Mukhwa remained cold and quiet despite having just swept through a brutal battlefield.
Jun-gyeong raised his calloused fingers and slowly, very carefully, stroked the blade.
His touch was tender, as though caressing a fragile flower petal.
Two characters were clearly engraved into the blade.

“Mukhwa.”

Jun-gyeong’s eyes trembled.
The air from the day those characters had been engraved a thousand years ago, the ring of hammering, and her face smiling silently beside him all came rushing back in a dizzying flood.

“You’ve been through a lot.”

At the quiet words, Mukhwa trembled faintly and let out a low hum.
It was a plaintive resonance, as though the sword were complaining to the master who had left it waiting so long, or perhaps thanking him for finally returning.

A faint smile touched Jun-gyeong’s lips, only to sink into bitterness moments later.

“Now that you’re back…”

His voice grew damp at the edges.
Thick tendons stood out across the back of the hand gripping the sword, but even that could not hide its trembling.

“Now all that’s left is to find her.”

Jun-gyeong closed his eyes.
The cold texture of metal beneath his fingertips.
Yet deep within his chest, a burning mass of heat surged upward.

A thousand years.
There had been only one reason he managed to retain his sanity while swinging a sword through Avici Hell.
In life, he had failed to protect her and chosen death for himself. In Hell, he had tried to protect her grave.
And there was her final voice, telling him to come back alive when he left for war.

Even now, whenever he closed his eyes, he could see Seol-hui from behind, quietly combing her hair as she waited for him.
The night he had driven this sword into the stone lion’s head in place of her gravestone amid the burning palace hall and made his vow remained as vivid as yesterday.

‘Seol-hui.’

The name he couldn’t bring himself to speak caught in his throat and burned there.
The longing that had sustained him for a thousand years had become a chronic pain gnawing away at his heart.
The world had changed.
People’s clothes had changed. Their language had changed. Yet Jun-gyeong’s own time remained frozen in the flames that had taken her from him.

Jun-gyeong rested his forehead against Mukhwa’s hilt.
Beyond the scent of metal and blood, he could almost smell, ever so faintly, the fragrance of peach blossoms that had clung to her collar a thousand years ago.

“…I’m here too.”

An indescribable longing pooled in his eyes, reflecting the city lights.
More than the joy of recovering Mukhwa, it was the relief of being able to touch something she had left behind that was breaking him apart.
A man whom neither Avici Hell at the very bottom of the underworld nor Heavenly King Chiwoo, ruler of Hell, had managed to break.

Each time the night wind brushed past him, Jun-gyeong gripped Mukhwa a little tighter.
Like a frightened child afraid that even this sword might vanish like a mirage.

Soft moonlight fell over him.
As though comforting him, telling him that it was all right now. That it was truly all right.

“My lord…”

White moonlight poured through the gap in the curtains.
A woman with skin as pale as that moonlight suddenly opened her eyes and sat upright.
A voice calling to her. A hand that seemed almost within reach yet never quite touched her. An aching longing that suddenly came flooding in.
A tear slipped from her eye as she woke from the dream.

“Haah… What am I even saying?”

She raised a slender hand and wiped away the tear, but she couldn’t wipe away the strange longing burrowing into her chest.
Still lying in bed, she turned her head toward the window.
The night sky was achingly clear.
The moon hanging in the cloudless sky looked unusually white and cold.
She frowned and clutched the upper part of her chest, which had begun throbbing for no apparent reason.

“It’s not even raining. Why is this acting up again?”

The pain felt as though a sharp blade had once swept across the spot, or a searing flame had lingered there.
It was phantom pain whose cause even doctors had been unable to find.
She had simply learned to live with it as one of those unpleasant things that happened for no apparent reason.

She turned her head toward the small mini fridge.
She had only just fallen asleep, but that strange dream had driven every trace of drowsiness away.

“Ah, screw it.”

She got out of bed, filled a small pot with water, and set it on the gas stove.

Rustle, rustle-

She wasn’t hungry, but if she was going to drink soju, she needed something to eat with it.
And when it came to late-night drinking food, nothing beat ramen.
The aluminum pot rattled as the water came to a boil.
She set the ramen and a cold bottle of soju from the fridge on the small table.
She didn’t touch the television or smartphone that most people living alone would have switched on out of habit.
In the room filled with nothing but silence, she poured herself a glass with a soft trickle.

“Kh… Bitter.”

The words, spoken like a monologue to herself, dissolved into the empty air.
Instead of picking up her chopsticks, she raised her head and looked at the moon again.
The alcohol hadn’t even begun to take effect, yet somehow the moonlight that night was piercingly cold and strangely delicious enough to drink with.
Then she lowered her gaze to the ramen sitting on the little table.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have made it.”

She was filling her second glass when it happened.
Another tear rolled down her cheek and fell into the glass. Startled, she roughly scrubbed at her eyes with her sleeve.

“I must be losing it. Seriously, what is wrong with me tonight?!”

Trickle- Another glass. Trickle- Another.
Without touching the soggy ramen, she emptied an entire bottle of soju with only the moonlight for company.
Normally, she could drink three bottles of soju without so much as blinking.
Among her friends, she was known as ‘Steel Liver’ and had never once lost her composure, yet tonight a single bottle was enough to make her fall apart.

No, she was not drunk.
She simply needed the excuse of being drunk.
She drew her knees up to her chest, wrapped her arms around them, and buried her face between them.
Then, as though overwhelmed by some grief she couldn’t name, her shoulders shook and she burst into tears like a child.
Though she didn’t understand it, what she felt was longing.
Longing for someone.
Some part of her seemed to know that.
Just as in her dream, words slipped from her lips without conscious intent.

“Where are you… Why aren’t you coming…?”

The resentful murmur that had escaped her unconsciously faded into silence.
After crying for a long time, she dragged her exhausted body back to bed and collapsed onto it.

Moonlight quietly illuminated the untouched pot of ramen and the empty bottle of soju she had left behind.