Chapter 1011

Suspecting someone was hardly a good thing.

But in a time of war, suspicion was another word for caution.

The longer and more closely you looked, the clearer the truth became—and the closer you came to victory.

That was the main reason Ma Junggeol and the other six members of the Seven Masters of Baekma Bang had joined our party.

Or, to be precise, the Fire Dragon Pavilion I led.

Though I was the one who volunteered to take them.

They were originally supposed to be placed under Sima Gong’s watch. But when I pointed out that he already had a sizable force to command, the decision came quickly.

They would be assigned to the Fire Dragon Pavilion.

Time was so short that no one raised any further objections. Still, I saw it clearly.

The moment the decision about the Seven Masters of Baekma Bang was made, Sima Gong’s eyes sank deeper than before.

Am I imagining it? Or…

I let the thought trail off and glanced at Ma Junggeol.

He’d been grumbling about how rude it was to ignore someone standing right in front of you, but at some point he’d gone quiet.

Or so it seemed.

Thud-thud-thud!

Hooves thundered beneath us. A fierce wind wrapped around my body and rushed past.

And through it all…

Wooooong.

A faint ripple reached me, almost hidden by the noise.

This is…

I knew it instinctively. It was a flow of qi only someone who had reached a profound realm could sense.

Buried beneath the pounding hooves and rushing wind, that faint ripple carried a voice I had never heard before.

Ssshhh.

I hadn’t reasoned it out. This was an instinct I’d forgotten for a moment.

Like a child just discovering he could stand on two feet, I sent my qi toward the ripple emanating from Ma Junggeol.

It touched, mingled with, and became one with the ripple.

So naturally that even Ma Junggeol, its source, didn’t notice.

The same went for the ripples his six sworn brothers were exchanging nearby.

“…long do we have to be dragged along like this?”

The faint ripple—no, the Sound Transmission—rang clearly in my ears at last.

Ding.

System

Hidden achievement A Bug in My Ear achieved! You can now detect and eavesdrop on nearby Sound Transmissions! This is another ability granted to those who reach a great realm. But don’t get too excited. The Sound Transmissions you can eavesdrop on are limited by the levels of both the target and the user!

…So I can do this now.

I blinked in a daze, then focused on the Sound Transmissions reaching my ears.

Let’s hear what they’re plotting.

“Honestly, how long do we have to be dragged along like this?”

“Exactly. What are we, hostages?”

“Whew, Father. I miss you so much today.”

“Huh? Didn’t your father pass away more than twenty years ago?”

“That’s why I miss him even more.”

“Oh.”

Ma Junggeol answered his younger brothers’ grumbling Sound Transmissions sternly.

“Now, now. Why are you all complaining? We expected this from the start.”

The second brother, who fled faster than anyone in an emergency but worshipped the Chief like the heavens the rest of the time, nodded.

“Enough! The Chief is a hundred, a thousand times right, so all of you shut up. If he hadn’t foreseen this from the beginning, would he have dragged us into such a deathtrap?”

That was the second brother for you.

There was a reason people said no younger brother could outdo his older brother.

Ma Junggeol smiled with satisfaction as the little man gently put the others in their place.

“Didn’t you hear what the Chief said earlier?”

The third brother, who always had to stick his foot in, broke in. The second blinked.

“Earlier? When?”

“Right before we left. He went off by himself, supposedly to check a perfectly good saddle, and started muttering under his breath. I listened, and…”

“And?”

“No, there’s nothing to hear. It was nothing, so don’t worry about it.”

Ma Junggeol remembered what had happened half a shichen¹ earlier and hurried to cut him off. But the third brother’s Sound Transmission was already riding the wind.

“We’re fucked. What do we do now?”

“……”

“……”

A wind colder than the bitter north wind swept through the group.

In the heavy silence, six pairs of eyes bored mercilessly into the back of Ma Junggeol’s head. His gaze darkened.

“Chief…”

“Third Brother, is that true?”

“It’s not, is it? It isn’t, right?”

“If that’s true, then seriously…”

“E-enough! There’s no way the Chief would say that.”

“What do you mean, ‘there’s no way’? I heard him with my own ears.”

At a loss for words, Ma Junggeol’s eyes darted back and forth.

How was he supposed to answer? He’d never dreamed anyone would hear the words he’d let slip—least of all the third brother.

“That, well…”

Unable to stay silent forever, he sent a hesitant reply.

His six quick-witted brothers groaned at once.

“So it’s true.”

“It really is.”

“Ah, Mother. I want to see you so badly today.”

“Sometimes it’s like that. When someone passed away long ago, you miss them all the more.”

“Are you crazy? She’s still perfectly healthy. Why are you killing her off?”

“Oh.”

“Enough…!”

“Chief, what are we actually going to do? At this rate, they’ll drag us all the way to the front and use us to catch swords, won’t they?”

Unlike the others, who had descended into confusion, the third brother was at least facing reality. Ma Junggeol gave the faintest shake of his head.

“Don’t worry. Things are going a little—just a little—worse than I expected, but they won’t use us to catch swords like you said.”

“If it’s not swords, it’ll be arrows. Thanks, Chief. You’ve ruined all our lives.”

“Now, now. I said that won’t happen!”

“What makes you so sure? Let’s be blunt. If they give us an order, we’re in no position to refuse.”

“Well…”

“Look around. There are already several Supreme Peak masters here—people you’d be lucky to see once in your life. If those monsters start prodding us in the back and giving us the look, what choice do guys like us have except to run out and fight like hell?”

The third brother’s Sound Transmission poured out with pent-up anger. His sworn brothers joined in.

“There are those Zhongnan Sect Daoist punks treating us like outright bandits, the Black Night King himself, the Fire King, and that young Disciple of his who looks half-mad.”

“Especially that Jin Taekyung right in front of the Chief. He’s not right in the head. Have you forgotten how we nearly crossed the Sanzu River² before we’d even made it through the gate?”

“Damn it, is this why we quit being mounted bandits? I’ll admit our past wasn’t exactly something to brag about, but we quit before we’d even gotten to rob anyone! We spent all day, every day sharpening our swords and never even got to draw them.”

“Enough! Now that I think about it, this is downright unfair. Have we robbed anyone? Killed any innocent civilians? We’d only just made up our minds to pull off one good score when we met Great Sir and turned over a new leaf. We’re trying to live decent lives, and this is what we get?”

“Second Brother’s right. Sure, we look like this, but if we’d gone around doing only the most vicious things like everyone else, do you think Great Sir would’ve left us alone? Isn’t that right?”

Their Sound Transmissions were full of wounded indignation. Listening to them, Ma Junggeol felt a pang in his own heart.

They were right. What had they done wrong?

He couldn’t deny that they used to be mounted bandits. But he could swear to heaven that they’d never done anything deserving punishment.

If we had, at least this treatment wouldn’t feel so unfair.

Robbing civilians?

Even when they steeled themselves and rode out to attack, they couldn’t bring themselves to do it.

What could they take from people other mounted bandits had already stripped bare? Countless times, they’d given food instead to families holding newborns too hungry to cry.

And that wasn’t all.

They might have looked like fiends, but Ma Junggeol and his six sworn brothers were timid by nature.

Robbing or killing civilians had been impossible for them from the start. And even when they occasionally came across a gutsy merchant caravan traveling to Ningxia Province, they just collected a toll and let it pass.

Why?

Simple.

Because they were scared.

Who would travel through a lawless place like Ningxia Province without a proper escort?

It was only natural for an Escort Bureau or merchant caravan to bring at least several dozen armed men. In that tense standoff, Ma Junggeol just had to put on his vicious face and say:

“So, you mean to shed blood after all?”

A face to rival any fiend’s, paired with a stern voice, made an excellent way to talk things over.

Whether the other party was an Escort Bureau, a merchant caravan, or a mounted-bandit group so practiced at killing that they were nearly ready to ascend to immortality.

That was how Ma Junggeol and his six sworn brothers had survived as mounted bandits back when their martial arts were still rudimentary.

Until the man they called Great Sir appeared.

Even now, Ma Junggeol firmly believed in Great Sir, who had led them onto the right path.

“Enough, all of you!”

At his forceful Sound Transmission, the complaints streaming from behind him stopped at once.

Ma Junggeol seized the brief opening.

“There’s nothing to worry about. Set me aside—surely Great Sir anticipated a situation like this?”

“Hmm.”

“That’s true.”

“The Chief might not have, but Great Sir is different.”

“Right. We can’t trust the Chief, but we can trust Great Sir.”

“Now that you mention it, that makes sense.”

“For once, you’re saying something right.”

The answers only made him feel stranger the longer he thought about them, but Ma Junggeol continued his Sound Transmission with a vague sense of unease.

“I sent a few men back on the pretext of relaying news to Ningxia, so Great Sir will hear about this. Until then, don’t do anything rash. Understood?”

The third brother, the one with the bulbous nose, cut in.

“But that’s only if Great Sir’s in his right mind.”

“What?”

“Well, isn’t it? You know as well as anyone how he can be a little… all over the place.”

Ma Junggeol blinked a few times, then stammered out a reply.

“H-he’ll be fine. Probably.”

Even without his uncertain answer, his sworn brothers knew no one could be sure of that.

“Damn. Now that Third Brother’s said it, I’ve got a bad feeling.”

“But hasn’t Great Sir been more or less all right lately? That’s why he’s been telling us where to go from here and all that.”

“He has. But with him, you never know when he’ll snap.”

“Great Sir was strange from the first time we met him. His hair was a tangled mess, and his face was so black with grime you’d think he hadn’t washed in days. He looked like a beggar. Still does.”

“This is bad. If Great Sir’s out of it right now, sending the men to him won’t do any good, will it?”

As his sworn brothers’ worry deepened, Ma Junggeol scrunched up his already ugly face and thought hard. At last, he spoke.

“We have no choice. One of us should go in person. Maybe seeing a familiar face will help him come to his senses sooner.”

“One of us? Who?”

“Hard to say. We’ll have to decide now.”

“And once we do, how are you going to send him? That’ll be difficult right now.”

“As the Chief, I’ll take care of that, so don’t worry—wait a minute.”

Ma Junggeol abruptly stopped his Sound Transmission and frowned.

“You’ve been awfully casual with me for a while now. Did you lose half your tongue or something? Which insolent bastard is it? Huh?”

At that very moment, an actual voice he hadn’t expected reached his ears.

“Me.”

“…?”

“It’s me.”

No. Impossible. Surely not.

Muttering to himself, Ma Junggeol slowly raised his head. He’d been keeping it slightly lowered to hide his moving lips.

There, facing him, was that insolent bastard, smiling menacingly.

“Uh, uhh.”

Ma Junggeol shuddered as if possessed by a ghost. Jin Taekyung smiled warmly at him.

“Looks like there’s a lot you need to tell me. Isn’t that right?”