The Fox Borrows The Tiger's Might

Two days later, at noon.

I made my way to a private room at Chwiseon Pavilion, the foremost pleasure house in Qingzhou. I opened the door on an empty room and took a seat. I had not been waiting long before Jo Mansik, head of the Shandong Escort Bureau, came in.

I got to my feet, made the cupped-fist salute, and paid my respects.

“Thank you for taking the trouble to come, Bureau Head.”
“When young hero Yang asks, how could I not come?”
“It was an unreasonable request, and you agreed to it so readily. Thank you.”
“Compared to the help my son and I have had from young hero Yang, a request this size is nothing at all.”

Bureau Head Jo answered with a chuckle.

We were still making small talk when I felt someone outside the door.

— Scrape.

The door opened and two men showed themselves. In front walked a man in black martial robes, his eyes long and narrow like a snake’s; behind him came a seven-foot figure in a red robe. They were the leaders of the Black Water Gang and the Blood Wind Gang.

The two of them took the empty chairs at the round table. Neither wore a pleasant expression.

Of course they don’t. They’ve been called out to a table set by a greenhorn beneath them.

Their guts must have been twisting badly. The look they turned on me was murderous, and had Bureau Head Jo not been sitting there, trouble might have broken out on the spot.

But there was nothing they could do. On the face of it this was a gathering the Bureau Head had invited us all to, and making a scene here would have amounted to spitting on the Shandong Escort Bureau. By now they would have heard how Black Leopard died, so they could hardly afford to move carelessly either.

Bureau Head Jo spoke first.

“Thank you both for coming while you are so busy.”
“Not at all. When the Bureau Head calls, how could we not come?”
“Thank you for the invitation.”

The two gang leaders let their stiff faces relax and answered with smiles. The mood loosened a little, and Bureau Head Jo went on.

“It was a sudden request, and you have both answered it so readily that my mind is at ease. I made this gathering today at the request of young hero Yang Mujin here. He said he wished to pay his respects to the two Bosses, so I acted as the bridge.”
“A junior of the murim world, still green in his learning, offers his respects to the two Bosses. I am Yang Mujin, who brought down the Great Saber Gang and became the leader of the Red Headband Gang.”

I rose, made the cupped-fist salute to the two of them, and bowed my head.

“Aherm.”
“Hmm.”

The two gang leaders cleared their throats and traded a glance. Their eyes and the sound of those coughs carried their distaste plainly. A natural enough reaction. To them, the Red Headband Gang and I were nothing but a tasty-looking piece of prey.

Must be a bitter taste in their mouths.

They would love to chew and tear and taste the Red Headband Gang and me this very moment, but a great tiger, the head of the Shandong Escort Bureau, was planted at my back.

I went on calmly, as though I noticed nothing.

“There is much that I lack, so I ask the two Bosses for your guidance and correction.”
“Ate the Great Saber Gang up in a few days, I hear?”

The leader of the Blood Wind Gang spoke, staring at me openly.

“Black Leopard may have been out of the picture, but that’s fine work all the same. Rumor said you had no martial talent and stayed shut up in your room. All bullshit, then.”
“You praise me too far. I was only lucky.”
“You ate the Great Saber Gang on luck, did you? Mighty luck, that.”

He burst into a hollow laugh, as though he could hardly credit it, while the leader of the Black Water Gang only went on watching me without a word. As the mood began to turn ugly, Bureau Head Jo stepped in to smooth it over.

“Hoho. I have brought the Bosses all this way and not sent a single cup round. Come, allow me.”

With Bureau Head Jo pressing the wine on them himself, neither man could go on glaring at me. Once every cup was full, he came to the point.

“I asked to see the two Bosses because I have one request. I would ask that the two Bosses not attack the Red Headband Gang for the coming half year.”

“…!”
“…!”

The two gang leaders’ brows drew together. The leader of the Blood Wind Gang could not hold it in and snapped back in a surly voice.

“Bureau Head Jo, is this not crossing a line? Even the Shandong Escort Bureau cannot involve itself this deeply without causing trouble. We have a position of our own to think of.”

The leader of the Black Water Gang, who had been listening quietly, joined in.

“Qingzhou is the Great Sail Gang’s jurisdiction. An escort bureau has no business involving itself in a dispute between gangs.”

The pushback was fierce, as expected. I had Bureau Head Jo’s name behind me, but these were men who had clawed their way up from the gutter, and they were not so easily handled.

But it was fine. I had expected this already.

I looked from one gang leader to the other. Their eyes were brimming with greed, and I could see how badly they itched to eat me alive by whatever means came to hand.

If they want to eat that badly, I’ll have to throw them some bait.

I stood and spoke.

“The two of you are right. If the Shandong Escort Bureau steps into a dispute, there could well be friction with the Great Sail Gang. But I am not asking on a bare mouth either.¹”

I pulled a map from my robes and spread it on the table. A boundary line had been drawn across the middle of it, dividing the ground into territories: the northwest belonging to the Black Water Gang, the northeast to the Blood Wind Gang, the south to the Red Headband Gang.

“If the two Bosses will give me your word not to attack the Red Headband Gang for half a year.”

I paused, dipped a finger in the wine, and drew lines around the districts that bordered each gang.

“I will hand over part of the Red Headband Gang’s territory in exchange.”

“What?”
“Mm.”

Both gang leaders let out a sound at the same moment. The lines I had drawn took in no small stretch of ground. They came to a third of the Red Headband Gang’s whole territory.

The two of them looked at each other. The offer sat so far outside anything they had expected that their bewilderment showed plainly.

They’d never have seen it coming.

Ordinarily a man scrabbled for so much as a hand’s breadth more ground, so what madman gave away territory he had taken the hard way? Small wonder they were dumbfounded to hear someone offer to carve off his own land.

“Are you serious? The territory you’re handing the two of us looks like a third of the whole thing.”

The leader of the Blood Wind Gang asked, suspicion in his eyes.

“I am. With the strength the Red Headband Gang has at present, holding every district is beyond us. So I have made up my mind to pass the territory to the two Bosses and buy safety with it. No more and no less — give me just half a year.”

The two gang leaders fell silent and sank into thought. They were weighing profit against loss. Land now, in exchange for leaving me alone half a year; or an attack forced through, and bad terms with the Shandong Escort Bureau at the end of it. Their deliberation did not last long.

“Ahem. Boss Yang thinks big for his years, and I like it. I’ll take the offer.”
“I’ll take it as well.”

Both gang leaders nodded. Bureau Head Jo, who had been watching, stepped forward.

“I will stand surety for today’s bargain. For half a year there is to be no dispute among the gangs of Qingzhou. Should anyone break it, I will take it to mean he intends to make an enemy of the Shandong Escort Bureau.”

“Understood. I give my promise on the name of So Ilsan, leader of the Blood Wind Gang.”
“The Black Water Gang says the same.”

Both of them answered readily. Bureau Head Jo smiled as though satisfied and raised his cup.

“The bargain has closed well, so let us drink to the peace of Qingzhou.”
“Gladly!”

We knocked our cups together.

A mealtime later.

The two gang leaders went home well and truly drunk, and pleased with themselves. That left only Bureau Head Jo and me in the room.

“Thank you sincerely for your efforts on today’s bargain.”
“What did I do beyond arranging the gathering? Young hero Yang did all of it. Ah — should I be calling you Boss Yang now?”
“Call me however you please. It was the Bureau Head making the gathering that let me get what I wanted. My thanks again.”

Bureau Head Jo smiled benignly and waved me to a seat.

“All the same, young hero Yang’s tongue is a remarkable thing. I did not think you would turn the two gang leaders around so easily. To tell the truth, I was a little skeptical. I never dreamed you would play a move as bold as cutting off your own flesh and handing it over.”
“Carving the territory away looks like a loss for the moment, but what the Red Headband Gang needs right now is time to build its strength. Reckoned as the price of buying that time, it came cheap.”

That answer drew open admiration from Jo Mansik.

“So young hero Yang had it all planned out. With my surety on it, the Black Water Gang and the Blood Wind Gang will not be able to try anything foolish.”
“Thank you truly, Bureau Head. Thanks to you I have come through a serious crisis.”

I bowed my head, and I meant it. Without Bureau Head Jo this bargain would never have come off. Never mind a bargain; they would plainly have come at us by force.

“Next to what young hero Yang did for our Yeonggwang, it is a small thing. The goods you asked for will go to the Yang manor as soon as they are ready. Well then, I will take my leave first.”
“Go safely.”

I saw Bureau Head Jo off and stepped out of the pleasure house. I was watching the carriage draw away when Duho came up behind me.

“So? Did it go all right?”
“It did. We’ve bought half a year.”
“Doesn’t it sting, though? Is it all right to carve off land like that? The takings must’ve been pretty good.”
“Nothing to sting over. With the numbers we’ve got, we couldn’t hold it anyway.”

I laid the situation out coolly.

The Red Headband Gang’s strength had shrunk badly. When Hwangbo Mueul appeared, a great many men died, Black Leopard among them, and plenty more were hurt while I was taking real control.

Force the food down and all you get is indigestion. Better to throw it out as bait and buy time with it.

“And in any case, that land is bait.”
“Bait? What’s that supposed to mean now? What is it? Have you cooked up another plan? Don’t keep it to yourself, let me in on it.”

Duho badgered me until I explained the plan I had put together.

“Ooh— that’s mad. You handed them the land already seeing that far ahead? Is our Young Master a genius or something?”
“Genius nothing. Anybody could think of a plan like this.”

Anybody who had come back to the past, that is.

This plan too was something I had heard about in the future.

“Here I was thinking we’d get a bit of rest, and the road just keeps going.”
“That’s right. For half a year we run without a breath to spare.”
“I might end up croaking somewhere in the middle of the run.”

Duho grumbled.

“So what am I doing next?”
“From here we put the territory in order all over again.”
“But going by the Young Master’s plan, doesn’t that mean tearing all of it down?”
“That’s right. New wine has to go into a new wineskin. First, gather up every last person doing business in the places I named.”
“All of them?”

Duho let out a hollow laugh at that, as though the thought turned his stomach.

“That’ll be a hell of a slog. Enough to drive a man mad, seriously. Not a day off, not one.”

He always did this when he meant to do the whole of it anyway. Then again, if he agreed the first time round he would not be Duho. I gave a short laugh at his grumbling.

Half a year bought.

In that time I had to build strength somehow and remake the territory. For that I needed the cooperation of the people living on it.

I hope it all runs as smoothly as the bargain just now.

Because if it does not, in the end I will have to take a hand in it myself again.