Chapter 501

“When is it?”

On the way back after parting with Zhuge Feng, I asked the question out of the blue. Jin Wikyung answered quietly.

“In a month. Mount Song, Henan Province.”

“Mount Song…”

The very place where Shaolin Temple—the Mount Tai and Northern Dipper¹ of the Murim—stood.

Only three months ago, the Star-Array Grand Banquet, a grand gathering of the Murim under Heaven, had begun there. Dark Heaven had unleashed a storm of blood on that same ground. Now the New Murim Alliance would be born there.

Given the symbolism of Mount Song and Shaolin Temple, it was a fitting place for the Murim Alliance to begin again after more than fifty years.

But if there was only a month left…

“It had already been decided when you came to Sichuan, hadn’t it?”

Contrary to my expectations, Jin Wikyung gave a small shake of his head.

“It hadn’t?”

“Why do you think Wipeng happened to be in Henan at just the right time?”

“Then Great Hero Wipeng came because…”

“The Jin Dragon Squad is our family’s finest fighting force. As the Lesser Family Head, I would never summon half its members merely to serve as porters, even if they were carrying the Son of Heaven’s jade seal.²”

“So the date was moved up.”

“Dark Heaven moved more aggressively, and faster, than we expected. The Sichuan Blood Tragedy was decisive.”

To catch an enemy who was ahead of you, you had to run.

The storm of blood that had swept through Shaolin Temple had spread to Sichuan and now reached Hubei. The leaders in Henan had to make a choice.

“Bringing the Murim under Heaven together is no easy task. But it seems they have finally made up their minds.”

Muttering quietly, Jin Wikyung pulled a sealed dispatch from inside his robes and held it out to me.

“What’s this?”

“A letter Wipeng brought from Henan.”

“From Henan? Did the Murim Alliance send it?”

“You guessed.”

“I thought so. I saw you give one to Sir Zhuge earlier.”

Even at a glance, it looked nothing like an ordinary letter.

But what made it special were the three characters written across its face in a bold, soaring hand:

Murim Alliance.

“Read it yourself, youngest.”

“I’m already reading it, so stop talking. I can’t concentrate.”

“…Oh. Right.”

Leaving Jin Wikyung looking dejected, I unfolded the letter and skimmed it.

It began, To the Murim under Heaven, and was short and forceful. That made it easy to sum up in three lines.

1. Hey, let me tell you about Dark Heaven. These guys are seriously fucking crazy, so listen up.

2. You remember the Great Faction War PTSD? Let’s stop this by any means necessary.

3. Any dumbasses who don’t know where Mount Song is? Be there by the stated date. Anyone who doesn’t show up is Dark Heaven.

“…”

Put that way, it sounded pretty pathetic.

Of course, that was not what the letter actually said.

Some unknown calligrapher’s bold strokes flowed like clouds. Every sentence was solemn, charged with feeling, and deeply moving.

Personally, I almost wanted to show it to that bastard, the Lord of Heaven.

If he saw this, even the Lord of Heaven might join the Murim Alliance.

Everyone could have enjoyed a happy ending if the Lord of Heaven joined the Murim Alliance. It was simply unfortunate that the possibility of that happening was less than the amount of earwax in Hyuk Mujin’s ear.

“In any case, the Murim Alliance will be born soon.”

“In a month, the Murim under Heaven will gather beneath the Murim Alliance’s banner.”

After a moment’s thought, Jin Wikyung added, “Not the Murim under Heaven. I should say the orthodox Murim of the Central Plains.”

I knew what he meant.

Right… It’s a stretch to call the orthodox faction the whole Murim under Heaven.

The orthodox faction, led by the Nine Sects and One Gang and the Five Great Families, was unquestionably the dominant force in the Murim today.

But it had not been the only side to survive the Great Faction War and emerge victorious.

“The unorthodox faction.”

Jin Wikyung nodded at my mutter.

“Yes. We cannot leave them out.”

The fishbowl called the world held more than one color of fish.

The unorthodox faction was weak compared to the orthodox faction, but it had carved out territories of its own. It also included the dark-path figures who ruled the streets at night.

At first, I wondered why they had left those people alive while shouting about eliminating every demonic and heterodox element.

There was a reason for everything.

The unorthodox forces still around today had survived because they sided with the orthodox faction during the Great Faction War.

The trouble was, they had not done it out of goodwill.

“Do you know why the unorthodox forces now active in the Central Plains sided with the orthodox Murim?”

“You haven’t forgotten who I’ve spent the past year with, have you?”

“Great Hero Jeok told you.”

“I picked up quite a bit.”

As the old saying went, green went with green, and crayfish took the crab’s side.

When the Demonic Cult crossed Qinghai and surged toward the Central Plains during the Great Faction War, the unorthodox faction quickly joined them while shouting, “Long live the Cult Leader!”

The Demonic Cult’s momentum was overwhelming, but the unorthodox faction also wanted people they saw as their own kind to rule the Murim under Heaven.

For unorthodox martial artists already living in the Central Plains, though, things were different.

If they don’t side with the orthodox faction, they’ll be hunted down before they can even leave the Central Plains. Those bastards wouldn’t dare refuse to join this side.

Jeok Cheongang had once said that with a snort. For the unorthodox martial artists of the Central Plains, it had been the plain truth.

“I heard they were practically eating dumplings through their tears.”

“I did not live through that era either, but what I found confirms it.”

“What you found?”

“After you left for Sichuan, I stayed in Henan and searched the old archives. There were countless records, including ones about the unorthodox faction.”

The Murim Alliance had disbanded when peace returned, but the memories of those who had lived through the Great Faction War—and records of what had happened—remained.

That made sense. In the long history of the Murim, fifty years was only half a century.

“What did the records say?”

“What do you think?”

“I can guess. I’ve heard a few stories.”

“I do not know exactly what Great Hero Jeok told you, but most of it was probably true.”

“…If that’s true, it’s pretty damn ridiculous.”

From the start of the Great Faction War well into its middle and later stages, the unorthodox martial artists who joined the orthodox faction betrayed them again and again.

Considering what Jeok Cheongang had said about the Murim Alliance’s leadership even discussing root-and-branch eradication to remove every unorthodox member from within the orthodox faction, the situation must have been serious.

“But I heard they fought hard later on.”

“Unlike at the beginning, neither side’s victory was certain. The Hidden Shadow Pavilion, led by Sir Song, the Thousand-Faced Fox, also kept them under close watch. And according to the records, the unorthodox martial artists sensed the leadership’s mood changing and began cutting off their own tails.”

Not everyone in the orthodox faction was righteous, and not everyone in the unorthodox faction was a monster.

But unlike the orthodox faction, the unorthodox faction possessed the decisiveness and cruelty to cut off its own tail without hesitation.

The instant someone was suspected of being a spy for the Demonic Cult, they slit his throat first and asked questions later.

“In the end, the body survived without its tail. By cooperating with the orthodox faction, it shared in the victory.”

The surviving unorthodox forces carried on in the shade of the great tree that was the orthodox faction. Naturally, they could no longer wield the influence they once had.

Their reputation had been bad enough to begin with, and there had been countless instances of them siding with the Demonic Cult.

Most people agreed that if the Murim Alliance’s leaders had not acknowledged at least some of their contributions and rights, hardline heroes calling for the extermination of demonic and heterodox elements would have dragged them out and torn them limb from limb.

The contempt directed at the unorthodox faction after the war had endured like an ancient tradition.

That alone was not a serious problem. What came next was.

“We need them to fight alongside us.”

“Yes. If they do not join the Murim Alliance, they will side with Dark Heaven.”

“I don’t like the thought of bringing them into the fold.”

“They are not people I would want to trust with my back on a battlefield. There is the precedent, and they must have spent decades resenting how honors and rewards were divided after the war.”

“What if we tell them to stay neutral?”

“Suppose the Murim Alliance looks certain to lose. What would you do if you were an unorthodox martial artist, youngest?”

“…Hmm.”

Put that bluntly, I had no answer. I smacked my lips before speaking.

“I hate to say it, but I’d side with Dark Heaven.”

“Why?”

“If the Murim Alliance wins, they break even. But as you said, the scales are already tilted, and Dark Heaven is on the verge of becoming the master of the Central Plains Murim.”

“Exactly.”

“And what kind of people are Dark Heaven? They wouldn’t leave the unorthodox faction alone. They wouldn’t praise them for staying neutral—they’d be furious they hadn’t helped when it mattered and kill every last one of them.”

“Precisely. That is why the unorthodox faction is a chicken rib.”

A chicken rib. That was a good way to put it.

It offered little benefit, but it was too wasteful to throw away. Fighting alongside them felt unpleasant, but if we discarded them, Dark Heaven would pick them up and throw them back at us.

No matter how soft a chicken bone was, it was still a bone. Getting hit by one would hurt quite a bit.

Which meant…

“Henan has already sent them a letter too, hasn’t it?”

Jin Wikyung gave a small nod.

“Without a doubt. If we must choose between the two, we need to draw the unorthodox Murim to our side.”

For a chicken rib, the unorthodox faction had plenty of meat on it.

Even the dark-path knife-men who wandered the back alleys after sunset belonged to the unorthodox faction. Weren’t we at a point where we would be grateful for a single Third Rate knife-man?

More importantly, it was better to keep them close and hold their leash than let them side with Dark Heaven. That would be far too great a loss…

Wait. Dark-path figures?

Something came back to me, and I frowned.

“What is it?”

“No, I just remembered something I heard recently. Regarding the Water God Dragon incident, didn’t we accuse the dark-path figures of Hubei Province of being the culprits and wipe them all out?”

“We did.”

“…Then the unorthodox faction might be upset. In the end, we accepted the government’s proposal and wiped out their own people.”

It was a bad look. They might even reject the Murim Alliance’s offer of membership over it.

Jin Wikyung, however, looked perfectly calm.

“Two things are wrong with that.”

“What?”

“First, the unorthodox Murim has been fractured since the war ended. Those people were rivals, not family. We used this opportunity to uproot the unusually numerous dark-path figures in Hubei. Other unorthodox forces will move into the space they left. For them, it is a new opportunity.”

“…!”

“We have given them enough to feed on. They will be satisfied. And when they hear what happened in Hubei, they will understand that it was also a warning.”

We had thrown them food and fastened a leash of fear around their necks.

That was how the Murim Alliance tamed the hunting dog known as the unorthodox Murim.

“And second. The government did not make the proposal and receive our acceptance.”

Jin Wikyung’s voice went dry.

“We did. No—I made the proposal first.”

“Oh.”

“The government merely accepted it. That distinction matters a great deal.”

“…The government agreed that easily?”

“The Provincial Administration Commissioner of Hubei holds a post that can sway an entire province. But people know only that the new commissioner formerly served as an Assistant Provincial Administrator in Shanxi Province. They do not know he is a secret loyal retainer of Prince Shangshan.”

A memory of when we had first arrived in Hubei suddenly flashed through my mind.

The hostile looks from the people. And Jin Wikyung questioning the official who had surrounded the ferry landing with government soldiers.

“By the way, do you know a man surnamed Yi whose given name is Hongcheon?”

“H-he was recently appointed Provincial Administration Commissioner. May I ask what your relationship with him is…?”

“I have met him a few times and shared a drink or two. I helped him when he needed it.”

Jin Wikyung looked straight at me. His gaze was gentle, but a cold blade lay behind it.

For an instant, I saw the strategist and politician in him. Then that look melted away.

“Do not worry. Everything will work out.”

Tap, tap.

I could feel the strength in the hand patting my shoulder. I gazed silently at Jin Wikyung, then suddenly spoke.

“What was the Family Head… No, what was Father like?”

The faint smile on Jin Wikyung’s lips vanished.

“No, the mood was so nice. Why bring up that bastard?”

“As you know, I hurt my head back then. I don’t remember him very well.”

“You don’t need to remember him! Just erase him from your mind! I’m your father!”

“…”

I knew he had grievances, but apparently there were more than I had realized.

Jin Wikyung’s fist trembled, as if he were remembering the paperwork hell of those days.

“But why do you ask?”

“No reason. I was just thinking how lucky it is that you took charge of the family after Father disappeared.”

“…Youngest. Please don’t cross the line.”

I shrugged and turned away.

Jin Wikyung asked where I thought I was going when hyung³ was talking to me, and whether my affection for him had cooled. Without turning around, I answered,

“You said it’s in a month. I’m going to get ready to leave.”

It was time to leave Hubei behind.

With the people who were by my side, and whom I wanted beside me in the days to come.

“I think I’ve given you enough time by now… Don’t you?”

The mutter that slipped between my lips vanished without a trace beneath the noise around us.

I scratched my chin and looked up at the dizzyingly high cliff.