Huff, huff.
Footsteps climbed the steep mountain slope without a word, while clouds of white breath billowed here and there.
The Great Snow Mountain was as cold as midwinter all year round, and the air was thin. It spared no one—not even those who had come to defend this land.
If anything, these conditions might be harder on our side.
“Cough. Haa…”
Was it the altitude?
Or was Namho’s body simply getting old?
He kept coughing and struggling to catch his breath. I was about to give an order when someone reached his side ahead of me.
“Steady your breathing. Relax.”
Tap.
A hand pressed his Mingmen acupoint as a calm voice spoke. Faint qi stirred around Namho.
Whoosh.
The pallor creeping across his face eased, and his complexion regained some color. With the internal energy sent through the Mingmen acupoint, Namho looked as if nothing had happened and went back to grumbling as usual.
“Damn it. Getting old’s a crime. Anyway, thanks for the help…”
His words trailed off.
Namho had just turned to thank him when his voice faltered despite himself. Standing behind him, Sama Pyo asked with an impassive face,
“What is it? Is something wrong?”
Namho’s surprise lasted only an instant. The old Hidden Shadow Pavilion agent recovered quickly.
“Hm? No, nothing’s wrong. Thought I saw something move over there.”
“Over there?”
As Sama Pyo turned to look where Namho was pointing, a small shadow sprang out from behind a dry tree and darted across the snow.
“A mountain hare. No need to worry.”
“Is that so? Well, it’s not like they could’ve snuck all the way up here. Getting old just gives you more to worry about.”
Namho replied nonchalantly, then looked at me and smacked his lips.
“Getting this winded from a little climb? I must be getting old. If I were just ten years younger—no more, no less—I’d be leading the charge. Wouldn’t you say?”
The more someone knew, the easier it was for their reaction to give them away. Namho had hidden his well enough, though. I answered evenly.
“Have you gone senile? You wouldn’t be leading the charge even if you were thirty years younger.”
I wasn’t just saying that to help us move past the moment. All around us, people were panting as they climbed the Great Snow Mountain.
Can’t be helped. We chose quantity over quality.
Gansu Province was vast, but it was still only one province. We’d managed to gather a staggering thirty thousand people by taking in all manner of riffraff.
There were boys whose upper lips had only just begun to darken, and Third Rate swordsmen who’d spent their whole lives in back alleys before growing old. Everywhere I looked, I saw people who might never have had their lives threatened—let alone killed anyone.
In the vast sea of Murim, they were small fry. Prey for the other predators.
I didn’t look down on them. I had neither the right nor the inclination. I’d been weak once myself. Even now, there were people who would consider me weak.
What worried me was that we had to face Dark Heaven’s forces with an army whose numbers had been inflated without adding much strength.
And besides…
More than half of them are from the unorthodox faction.
Someone once said it didn’t matter whether a cat was white or black, as long as it caught mice. I agreed. History had already proved the point.
The Great Faction War had been the decisive turning point that united Murim under one banner. And during the Great Cataclysm in the modern era, even the infamous Mexican drug cartels had joined the government forces to fight the monsters.
An outside enemy could turn yesterday’s foe into today’s ally.
But right now, what mattered was who had put bells on all those black cats—and what he truly intended.
The Black Night King, Sima Gong.
The biggest, strongest black cat to survive the Great Faction War. Another Alliance Leader, ruling the unorthodox Murim of today.
If he already had other plans, the crushing defeat at Dunhuang and the fall of the Kongtong Sect might be nothing more than steps in a course set long ago. At the end of it, a new Heaven called Dark Heaven would be waiting for us all.
I have to stop that. No matter what it takes.
I muttered the words inwardly and glanced behind me.
Sama Pyo, walking along in silence, caught my brief look and gave me a small nod.
He looked no different from usual. Yet just then, it felt as if a huge boulder were pressing down on one corner of my chest.
Rustle.
Dozens of jang1 away, the bare trees shivered all at once. A group emerged among them, hundreds of silver arrowheads glinting between the branches.
My brief alarm eased at a shout.
“Lower your bows! They’re our brothers from Gansu Murim!”
Not everyone relaxed.
“Stand by! No one lowers their guard until I give the order!”
The voice boomed. Its owner wore rough armor and had pulled his helmet low over his face. He was heavily armed.
One thought flashed through my mind.
The military.
Step, step.
Despite his heavy armor, he moved with easy grace. He covered the dozen or so jang1 between us at a measured pace. Sima Gong, who was leading our group, opened his mouth.
Or rather, he tried to.
The man passed Sima Gong as smoothly as water flowing downstream, fixed his gaze on me, and asked,
“May I ask your name, sir?”
“Have you no manners? Do you even know who this man is, to demand an answer from him?”
Naturally, I wasn’t the one who said that.
Before I could speak, Hyuk Mujin stepped forward, putting on airs as he raised the silver tablet in his hand—wait. When had he taken that?
“If I may introduce him, he is the Third Young Master of the great Jin Family of Taiyuan, the hegemon of Shanxi Province; a Commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard who protects the Great Nation’s imperial family; and one personally appointed by His August Majesty the Emperor…”
“Hong Pyo, Deputy Thousand Captain of the Gansu Regional Military Commission!”
A roar swallowed Hyuk Mujin’s voice. The knees of the man, who had stood like an iron tower, bent.
Thud.
With a heavy sound, the man—Hong Pyo—knelt on one knee and gave me a crisp military salute.
“I pay my respects to the Marquis of Shangshan!”
“We pay our respects to the Marquis of Shangshan!”
Hundreds of voices rang across the cold snowfield. Only then did the soldiers lower their bows and weapons. They knelt with Hong Pyo and bowed low.
Hyuk Mujin began to tremble.
“Nngh. Ugh. Ahhh.”
“…What’s that weird noise?”
“Captain. I think I’m gonna burst.”
“…”
Burst, my ass. You lunatic.
I sighed and shook my head. Then I caught Sima Gong watching us with a peculiar look, and I smacked my lips.
“Mujin.”
“Yes?”
“Go ahead. Let it all out.”
Hyuk Mujin’s face turned stern.
“What do you mean, let it out? It’s just a figure of speech.”
“…”
“Don’t say embarrassing things like that in front of your subordinates. You need to maintain your dignity as a marquis. Otherwise, you’ll look vulgar.”
I really wanted to kill him.
Hong Pyo, the man with the lengthy title of Deputy Thousand Captain of the Gansu Regional Military Commission, was built like a bear.
To put it kindly, he was steadfast. To put it less kindly, he was so inflexible he didn’t know when to back down.
In a word…
An unlucky Jeong Hogun, maybe.
Thinking of Thousand Captain Jeong Hogun, whom we’d had no choice but to leave behind because we were in such a hurry, Hong Pyo reminded me of him, yet was unmistakably different.
And the biggest reason I could make such a firm judgment about Hong Pyo’s character, whom I’d only met today, was probably his attitude toward Sima Gong.
“So you’re the Deputy Thousand Captain everyone’s been talking about. They say no one in the world is more meticulous than you when it comes to carrying out official business.”
Sima Gong had already been ignored once, but he addressed Hong Pyo with a gentle smile. Hong Pyo stared at him blankly for a moment, then spoke.
“Identity tablet.”
“Pardon?”
“Present your identity tablet. I’ll verify who you are, as procedure requires.”
“…You’re asking me for my identity tablet?”
Hong Pyo nodded without hesitation.
“Yes.”
“Do you not know who I am?”
“I saw you once from a distance at the City Lord’s sixtieth-birthday banquet the year before last. I asked my superior, the Regional Military Commissioner, and he told me you were the Sect Leader of the Black Dragon Demon Gate.”
“I see. Then you know.”
“What does that have to do with anything? That was then. This is now. My duty is to guard this stretch of roughly three hundred jang1 and verify the identity of anyone passing through. Nothing more. The Marquis of Shangshan has already gone through the procedure.”
Hong Pyo frowned at Sima Gong as though he were looking at a particularly strange man.
“Don’t make me ask again. I can overlook you speaking so casually to me, since you’re clearly older. But if you keep refusing, old man, you won’t like what happens.”
“……!”
The air seemed to freeze, and not just because we were on the snow-covered Great Snow Mountain.
Who was Sima Gong?
He was the Sect Leader of the Black Dragon Demon Gate, a man with enormous influence over Gansu Murim. With his standing and power, he could sit at the City Lord’s table as an equal. He had strong ties to both Murim and the government.
Hong Pyo had demanded that man’s identity tablet and called him an old man.
That alone was enough to stun everyone. Then Hong Pyo went a step further.
Swish.
“I told you. I won’t ask twice.”
He drew the iron baton from his waist. Sima Gong and everyone around him fell silent.
“Ha! Hahahaha! Yes! That’s exactly right!”
Jeok Cheongang’s laughter rang out. Holding his stomach, he guffawed as he looked at Hong Pyo.
“A man ought to carry out the duty he’s been given. Now, what was your name?”
Hong Pyo answered Jeok Cheongang’s friendly question.
“Identity tablet.”
“…Hm?”
“Have yours ready too. You’re next, old man.”
“……!”
“And your travel pass. That bright red hair of yours looks suspicious from root to tip.”
Silence threatened to suffocate us all. Hyuk Mujin trembled and whispered so quietly I could barely hear him.
“Captain. I really think I’m gonna burst.”
But before I could answer, a sound echoed like a distant call from beyond the white ridge stretching far away.
Boom. Ba-boom. Booooom!
An urgent drumbeat.
The sound of the war drums shook the snow-covered mountain range.
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