The Lure

A day passed, and the head of the Shandong Escort Bureau arrived at the Yang manor.

“Welcome, Bureau Head.”

I gave him a cupped-fist salute. He had brought an old man along with him, and I took the old man’s measure out of the corner of my eye.

For a man his age he was tall and powerfully built, but the air about him was ordinary. He might have been any old man passing along the market street.

But of course he was nothing of the kind. With his son taken, the bureau head would never have brought along an old man with no power in him.

Jo Mansik, head of the Shandong Escort Bureau, came up and took my hand.

“Young hero Yang, I thank you sincerely. Thanks to you I have had word of my son.”

His face was thinner and more drawn than when I had seen him not long ago. By the haggard look of him, he had been eating his heart out.

I bowed my head modestly.

“Not at all. I have only done what anyone ought.”
“I shall not forget this kindness. And to see this matter settled, I have brought a gentleman with me.”

The bureau head gestured to the old man beside him and made the introduction.

“Make your greeting. This is Elder Hwangbo Mueul of the Hwangbo Clan.”

A big fish, just as I had expected.

I gave a cupped-fist salute at once and bowed politely from the waist.

“I am Yang Mujin, Young Master of the Yang manor. It is an honor to meet you, Elder.”
“Hoho. This young fellow has a fine bearing about him.”

Hwangbo Mueul accepted the greeting with a benevolent smile, then came to his point.

“Young hero Yang, I shall ask you a few things.”
“Ask as much as you please.”
“You say the Great Saber Gang took the son of the head of the Shandong Escort Bureau — is that true? Unless the men have lost their minds, there is no reason on earth for them to touch the Shandong Escort Bureau of all houses.”

His doubt was fair enough. For some petty unorthodox sect to lay hands on the bureau that represented the whole of Shandong province was as good as suicide, and it was common knowledge that the bureau, rooted in Jinan, kept close ties with the Hwangbo Clan. That they should touch it anyway, without a trace of fear, was bound to make no sense to him.

“I cannot say myself why they committed anything so senseless. But if the escort from the Shandong Escort Bureau who escaped them is telling the truth, then it is the Great Saber Gang’s doing.”
“Hmm… And where is this escort?”
“I have already sent for him. Ah — here he comes now.”

No sooner had I finished speaking than the bureau’s escort, Yi Sungwon, came toward us. He dropped to his knees in front of Jo Mansik and put his head to the ground.

“Bureau Head, I deserve to die! I left the young bureau head behind and fled alone!”
“Get up. Is it not a mercy that you at least lived to bring us word?”

Jo Mansik took hold of him and raised him to his feet, then put his question.

“Escort Yi, tell me. Is it truly the Great Saber Gang’s men who took my son?”

Yi Sungwon answered without hesitation.

“It is. I heard clearly what the men who took the young bureau head said to one another. They spoke of their Boss, and said he had killed the manager of Tugeum Hall and beaten him to a pulp. When I looked into it, Tugeum Hall proved to be the Great Saber Gang’s gambling house, and the rumor that its manager had lately died at the hand of the leader of the Great Saber Gang was all over Qingzhou.”
“Thank you for confirming it…”

The bureau head clapped Yi Sungwon on the shoulder, and Hwangbo Mueul stroked his beard and nodded. The culprits behind the young bureau head’s kidnapping had been narrowed to the Great Saber Gang.

I stepped forward to drive the last nail home.

“From what I have looked into, people have been going missing in Qingzhou a great deal of late. What I found was that the leader of the Great Saber Gang had ordered his men to seize anyone they could lay hands on. Putting all of these circumstances together, the party that took the young bureau head is the Great Saber Gang.”

As I finished, the blood rose in Jo Mansik’s face.

“That they should dare…!”

His face burned red, then purple, and he looked ready to charge off that very instant. I held him back.

“Bureau Head, be calm. From what I have found, the leader of the Great Saber Gang is not at his home base at present. Nor are the people they have taken.”
“Then — do you know where they are?”
“Yes. Fortunately I have found out where the place is. So let your anger settle a little.”

Jo Mansik let out a great breath. Mastering himself that fast was the mark of the man who led the foremost escort bureau in Shandong. He gave me a cupped-fist salute.

“Thank you. Thanks to young hero Yang my reason has come back to me. It being my son, I let myself get carried away.”
“Not at all. Had my own family been taken, I would have been just as you are, Bureau Head. Shall we go to where they are?”

Jo Mansik nodded, then bowed his head to Hwangbo Mueul standing beside him.

“Elder, I place it in your hands.”
“Hoho. Have no worry. This old man will smash them to pieces and bring your son back to you.”

The boast eased Jo Mansik’s face a little. I moved out in front of them.

“I will show you to the place. Follow me.”

On a low hill on the outskirts of Qingzhou stood a fairly respectable encampment, several temporary buildings inside a palisade that ran the whole way around. The watch on it was strict, and all of it was there to guard the cave at the back, where the gang kept the people it had taken.

Two underlings of the Great Saber Gang guarding the mouth of the cave were joking and chattering together.

“Hey. If the Boss pulls off a big haul this time, he’ll see us right, won’t he?”
“Course he will. They say selling off that lot in the cave leaves an enormous profit. Even the crumbs off it would come to dozens of taels of silver, wouldn’t they?”
“I’m looking forward to it already.”

A man came up to the pair as they were snickering.

It was Duho.

Duho raised a hand to them in greeting.

“An-hyung, Uk-hyung. Hard work, this.”
“Ah, hell, I thought you were the boss. You gave me a fright.”

Duho walked up to them with a brazen grin.

“Not tired?”
“Don’t even ask. I’m dying for sleep.”
“I’ll take over for you, so go in and get your head down a while.”
“That’d suit us fine.”
“It would. We’ve been in your debt these last few days as it is.”

Duho gave a good-natured laugh at that.

“It’s nothing, nothing at all. Just stand me a proper round when you come into your cut this time. All right?”
“You’re on! I’ll treat you handsomely!”
“Don’t forget you said it.”
“Thanks. Right, we’ll head in, then.”

The two underlings went off cackling, with the look of men who had struck it lucky. Duho watched them go and sneered. He waited at the entrance a while, made sure there was nobody about, and then went into the cave.

Duho passed the ordinary folk who had been taken and made for a corner. There, gathered apart from the rest, were the Shandong Escort Bureau’s escorts and escort runners and the young bureau head, every one of them sprawled out without so much as a sound.

He went over to them, drew a pouch from inside his robe, and opened it. Inside were the pills Yang Mujin had given him, a drug that put a man so deep under he would not know it if someone carried him off on their back.

Damn, that’s good stuff.

He had been dosing them on the hour, and not one of them had woken so much as once. He pried the bureau men’s mouths open and forced the medicine in, and with the last of them done he came back outside.

Just then one of his trusted men, who had followed him since the Red Headband Hall days, came over.

“Boss, word is the head of the Shandong Escort Bureau has reached the Yang manor.”
“Yeah? That was quick. Right, then, we start our own work. Round up the lads.”
“Understood.”

Once the man had gone, Duho looked toward the largest tent in the middle of the camp. Inside it, Black Leopard, the leader of the Great Saber Gang, was enjoying his drink and his food.

Enjoy it while you can.

From here on he would not get the chance, however much he wanted it.

The corner of Duho’s mouth went up.

While Duho was going about his work, Black Leopard sat inside his tent tipping his cup and lost in pleasant imaginings.

Heh heh heh heh.

The people packed into that cave all looked like money to him. Once he disposed of that lot, a colossal sum was set to come in, and even after the tribute money was covered, a considerable amount would be left over. With that money he would swell his forces, and if he drew his ties to the higher-ups tighter still… perhaps that personage might even teach him a new martial art.

And then Qingzhou — no, the whole of Shandong province could come into the palm of my hand.

The foremost unorthodox sect in Shandong, and himself its master. The mere thought of it set him laughing.

“Boss, I’ve brought the wine.”
“Right, set it down there. Ah — and how many have you brought in?”
“Forty-four. More will arrive overnight, so we’ll clear fifty easily.”
“Good. Very good!”

Black Leopard laughed out loud and threw the drink back. The wine was sweet.

Sure enough, a man is never left without a way out.

When the treasure storehouse burned and Tugeum Hall was cleaned out, it had felt as though the sky were coming down on him. Instead the whole thing had turned into an opportunity. A blessing in disguise. There was no phrase that fit his situation better. Had it not been for those incidents, he would never have grown his trafficking in human beings this boldly.

Fortune has come knocking in my later years.
At last I’ll get to live like a lord myself.

He was sure the road ahead of him would be roses all the way. Still congratulating himself, he reached to fill his cup again.

— BOOM!

“Grraaagh!”
“Enemy! We’re under attack!”

Behind the roar came screams begging for their lives.

“What’s going on!”

Black Leopard flung his cup down and bolted out of the tent.

A scene out of hell lay before him. One side of the palisade had been blown clean away, and around the gaping hole his men lay strewn about, beaten to a bloody pulp. The drink went out of him in a heartbeat.

Bewildered, with no idea what had happened, he caught sight of figures walking in through the breach in the palisade. The sight of one of them took the strength out of his legs, and he all but sank to the ground.

Standing there was Hwangbo Mueul, elder of the Hwangbo Clan. Every coin of the tribute money he had struggled so hard to pay had gone to this man, the backer he had tied himself to.

Black Leopard knew him at once, and his face went the color of death.

Why is that man here…?

A man who had no business being there had walked into his camp, and it threw him badly. He knew by instinct what it meant. It had all gone wrong.

This was the very thing he had been guarding against when he told his men to bring in only the ones who would cause no trouble, orphans and beggars and the like… Damned fools. Was hauling in a few beggar brats really so hard?

Black Leopard was still cursing his men inwardly when his eyes met Hwangbo Mueul’s. The look in them chilled him to the core.

I have to bolt!

His instinct was warning him that if he did not run this instant, he would die.

The one mercy in it was that Hwangbo Mueul seemed to have no intention of killing him. Their eyes had met and still the old man made no particular move to seize him. Perhaps all that tribute money he had been paying was showing its worth at last.

Black Leopard ducked his head in a bow, turned, and ran. Behind him his men went on screaming, and he did not care in the least. If anything, he felt good. Underlings could be replaced by the score, so long as he had money.

So long as I get out alive.
Then I can build the Great Saber Gang up all over again.

Black Leopard turned his back on his men, live or die, and fled.