Chapter 491

“Hey, Captain. You haven’t slept—?”

Hyuk Mujin entered my temporary tent in the dim light before dawn, then fell silent as if he’d seen a ghost.

“Why?”

“Uh, well…”

“Say it.”

“It’s nothing. You just look unusually tired today.”

“…Hoo.”

Tired? Tired. Was that all I could call this?

I glared at the bronze basin of wash water. My hair was a mess, and my eyes were bloodshot. When I looked up, I saw that the entire tent was in shambles.

Hyuk Mujin belatedly noticed the same thing, and his pupils began quaking.

“What in the world happened here?”

“Yeah. Something happened.”

My voice sounded so unfamiliar it might have belonged to someone else. I rubbed my haggard face and muttered, “That fucking assassin…”

I’d said it quietly, but not quietly enough. Mujin jumped at the word assassin.

“Pardon? An assassin?”

“What?”

“You just said ‘assassin.’ I heard you.”

“You heard wrong.”

“I heard it with my own ears.”

“I said you heard wrong.”

Of course, it was true.

Some vicious assassin bastard had installed a dozen or so hidden weapons inside the tent, and I had managed to trigger every single one of them. With a one-hundred-percent success rate, I had been reduced to a bloody rag.

The maddening part was that I couldn’t tell anyone.

“C-Captain…”

“I said you heard wrong!”

“That’s not it. You’re bleeding from your butt.”

“……!”

Fuck. No wonder my ass had felt warm.

As I cursed silently and pressed a hand to the wound, Mujin gave me a dubious look.

“I still think it was an assassin.”

“I got hurt training.”

“Really?”

I nodded weakly.

This counted as training. I had no idea what kind of training involved staying awake all night doing nothing but detoxifying poison, but it counted.

“It really was training. I swear on both your balls.”

“As I’ve told you repeatedly, please don’t swear on my balls. And if an assassin is threatening you right now, blink twice.”

“…Mujin. If you’re going to ask me that, shouldn’t you at least use Sound Transmission?”

“I can’t use Sound Transmission yet.”

“Then write it down.”

“Oh. Right.”

“Are you insane?”

Then again, this was Hyuk Mujin. What had I expected?

I let out a long sigh and looked him up and down. He’d dressed neatly in his martial robes and come to see me this early, so he clearly wanted something.

“Anyway, what’s going on?”

“Ah, Sir Zhuge is looking for you. Everyone’s gathered.”

“Everyone? Why?”

“You know.”

Mujin glanced around for no reason, then mouthed a few words before finally lowering his voice to a whisper meant only for me.

“The imugi¹. The dead one.”

“Ah.”

“Only a handful of us are going, and we’re keeping it quiet. Perfected Being Hyeongong of Wudang is waiting too.”

“Even Perfected Being Hyeongong? Ah, of course.”

He was the only Supreme Peak master involved in this incident who had remained at Donghu Stronghold.

He was also the Wudang Sect Leader’s Junior Brother and a respected elder of the Murim. He was more than qualified to attend as Wudang’s representative. However closely we guarded the Water God Dragon’s existence, we couldn’t keep it secret from Wudang.

Though for something this important, wouldn’t the Sect Leader himself come? Why Hyeongong?

The question occurred to me, then vanished as I thought of someone else.

“Hey, is anyone else going with us—”

I was about to finish the question, half hoping I was wrong, when a quiet voice came from outside the tent.

“Young Master Jin. Everyone is waiting.”

“……!”

“If you’re ready, please come out.”

The presence outside receded as soon as the words ended. Mujin tilted his head at the sight of me standing frozen.

“What’s wrong?”

“Why is he going?”

“Who? Oh, Mungyeong? He is the Divine Physician’s disciple, after all. He should be able to help with the imugi’s anatomy and such. But why?”

Why? Because I had no idea what that lunatic might do.

I swallowed the words rising in my throat and started toward the exit. Then I stopped and turned back to Mujin.

“Mujin.”

“Yes?”

“Go first. I’ll follow right behind you.”

“Pardon?”

I could almost hear a System notification ringing in my ears.

System

• You have acquired Meat Shield!

When I boarded the small vessel waiting for us, I found several familiar faces.

Perfected Being Hyeongong, dressed in a heavily patched Daoist robe with an old Pine-Pattern Ancient Sword at his waist, greeted me with a gentle smile.

“A young fellow Daoist has arrived. It is good to see you again.”

“Greetings, Perfected Being Hyeongong.”

I gave a fist-and-palm salute, now fairly convincing as a martial artist. Beside him, Zhuge Feng waved his folded fan and cut in.

“But your face…”

“Nothing happened.”

“You don’t look well for someone to whom nothing happened. Don’t you agree, Perfected Being?”

“I agree with Family Head Zhuge. You look as though an assassin tormented you all night.”

“An assassin? Perfected Being, you do make jokes. Ha ha.”

“Ho ho ho.”

“……”

Don’t laugh. Don’t even show me your teeth.

Without the Myriad-Poison Ring, I doubted I’d be standing right now.

I had been soaked in so much poison that I had seriously considered whether I should change my sobriquet from the Blazing Flame Divine Dragon to something like Poisoned Pickle.

Look at him, sitting there shamelessly.

I glared at Mungyeong, who had already claimed a seat on the swift ship.

The boy noticed my piercing gaze and slowly turned his head.

—Lower your eyes.

“……”

If he said lower them, I lowered them.

I quietly looked away, and another Sound Transmission followed.

—Judging by your condition, you must have fallen for every trap from the first day. How pathetic. If you hadn’t had the Myriad-Poison Ring and Scorching Yang Qi, you would have been dead by now.

—…How do you know whether I would have died or survived?

—Want me to tell you?

—I misspoke.

He wasn’t wrong. Every hidden weapon he’d set was coated with powerful poison.

I had once heard that medicine and poison shared the same source. I didn’t know who had said it, but they had been completely right. Somehow, every poison I suffered came with the adjective potent attached to it.

Only the Myriad-Poison Ring’s absurd effectiveness and my Scorching Yang Qi—a natural counter to poison—had kept me from suffering anything worse than a few puncture wounds.

Without those two things… Just thinking about it made my blood run cold.

Medical apprentice, my ass. What kind of Divine Physician is that? He’s a Poison Physician.

—I know you just insulted me.

“Ghk.”

I sucked in a startled breath before I could stop myself. Kindhearted Hyeongong looked at me with concern.

“What’s wrong, young friend?”

“Ah, nothing. It’s just a habit.”

“That’s a relief. For a moment, I thought an assassin really was threatening you. Didn’t you, Family Head Zhuge?”

“Ha ha ha! You’ll have me splitting my sides, Perfected Being!”

“Ho ho ho.”

“……”

I was tempted to tear Zhuge Feng’s navel right out.

While I glared at his stomach, the vessel slipped through the calm water. The departure was so smooth that I noticed it a beat too late.

“Wait. The Old Master—no, my Master isn’t here.”

Zhuge Feng looked puzzled by my sudden objection.

“Hm? Didn’t you hear?”

“Hear what?”

“Senior Jeok decided not to come. He also said not to look for him for the time being, until everything is finished.”

“…Is that so?”

“You didn’t know? That explains why he didn’t pass the message along through his Disciple.”

This was the first I’d heard of it.

Whatever his reason, it stung a little that he hadn’t said a word to me. At the same time, I thought I understood how he felt.

He must have a lot on his mind.

I’d never raised a Disciple, but if I found myself in his position someday, I thought I might feel the same way.

Perhaps it was like entrusting a beloved pet—one you’d cared for with love and devotion, almost like family—to someone else.

“……”

No, scratch that. That made me Jeok Cheongang’s pet dog.

His son. Right, let’s go with son.

While I was settling that with myself, Cheongpung came over with a bright smile and thrust something toward me.

“What’s this?”

“Candy, Benefactor.”

“……I can see that. Where do you keep finding it?”

There were only two possibilities.

Either Cheongpung was a System user with ten metric tons² of candy in his Inventory, or there was a tree nearby that grew the stuff.

“Either way, thanks.”

Normally I wouldn’t have given it a second glance, but with so much on my mind, I could use the sugar. I bit into the candy and asked, “Finding candy at a time like this takes some skill. Did you buy it on your last visit to the Zhuge Clan?”

“No. I ate all of that already.”

“Hm? Then where did this come from?”

“Slaugh—no, Mungyeong gave it to me. He told me to give this one specially to you, Benefactor. He’s a really good person!”

“…Who?”

The answer came from somewhere else.

Beep.

System

• You have been poisoned by Potent Energy-Dispersing Poison!
• Energy-Dispersing Poison temporarily prevents you from using internal energy.
• Your internal energy is slowly dissipating! Immediate action is required!

“……”

Fuck. No wonder the candy had tasted unusually sweet.

I quietly took out the Myriad-Poison Ring.

They say people leave their names behind when they die, while beasts leave their hides.

The same was true of the spirit creature that had ruled Dongting Lake and the Yangtze for five hundred years.

The Water God Dragon’s spirit had already left its body, but the body remained where it had last lain, retaining all the majesty and beauty it had possessed in life.

“…Hoo.”

Even Perfected Being Hyeongong, an old Daoist of profound insight and enlightenment, was lost for words. All he could manage was a single exclamation.

The sight of the Water God Dragon’s body was that overwhelming.

Even Gung Gibang, who had seen it before, stood with his mouth hanging open and kept exclaiming in awe.

“It’s incredible even the second time around. Don’t you think?”

I answered as politely as I could.

“It is. So is your breath. Could you get lost? I think it’s stronger than the Energy-Dispersing Poison.”

“Hm. Easily done. On one condition.”

“What?”

“Of the ten silver nyang³ you promised me yesterday, I still haven’t received five. I knew you were shameless, but I never thought you’d go so far as to prey on a beggar.”

“I’ll pay you. Just keep it short. I’m starting to see things.”

I could hardly tell whether that was his mouth or a sewer.

Gung Gibang finally got the other five silver nyang³ out of me, then grumbled.

“Stop exaggerating. And if you mean hallucinations, I’ve had more than enough of those myself. I’ve been having strange dreams for the past few days.”

“Dreams?”

“Yes. Dreams.”

Gung Gibang gave a quiet laugh and pointed at Mungyeong.

“I dreamed Mungyeong was fighting that imugi. Sword Force was flying everywhere, and he kept vanishing and reappearing like a ghost… If someone had told me he was the Slaughter Saint, the greatest assassin of all time, I’d have believed them.”

“……”

He is the Slaughter Saint.

I continued staring at the Water God Dragon’s body, doing my best to ignore Gung Gibang’s endless chatter.

From head to tail, its enormous body stretched for more than a hundred ja⁴. Its scales, once stained black, now scattered dazzling silver light, while countless wounds were carved across its body.

I ran my hand over one of the gaping wounds and apologized silently.

I’m sorry.

Of course I knew the battle had been unavoidable. I had no reason to apologize. If anything, the Water God Dragon had been grateful to us for stopping it, even if this was what it had taken.

But I was apologizing because I couldn’t bury its body as it was.

The corpse.

The raid was over. It was time to dispose of the corpse.