Chapter 621

“Come. Wherever you’re headed, I’ll lead the way.”

I looked at Namho, the elderly Hidden Shadow Pavilion agent, with admiration. Even at his age, his resolve was firm.

“You’d lead us even down the road to the afterlife. I don’t know how to thank you for such devotion, Elder Namho.”

“I didn’t say I’d go as far as the afterlife…”

“Your joints must ache these days, and I’m sure your memory isn’t what it used to be. Thank you for stepping forward anyway. You’ll be a great help to us.”

“…How very kind of you. Listening to you, I can feel strength and enthusiasm welling up through this old body of mine.”

“You’re welcome. No need to thank me.”

Namho stared at me sourly, then spoke.

“Where do you intend to go? I may have other ideas, but first I’d like to hear your destination.”

Our destination. Instead of answering, I glanced into the empty air.

There was nothing there, of course. But as had happened countless times before, I could read information in that empty space that no one else here could see.

System

Quest

Nanman Beast Palace

The Nanman Beast Palace is one of the great powers of the Outer Lands. It lies in the deepest, most secluded part of Nanman, a land that is itself fiercely closed off.

The Murim of the Central Plains needs its help for the Great War to come. The time has come to awaken the beast that has long slept in the jungle.

Or perhaps… to save it from a danger that has yet to reveal itself.

Grade: Supreme Peak

Restriction: Jin Taekyung and Fire Dragon Pavilion members

Mission: Arrive at the Nanman Beast Palace (Incomplete)

Reward: Chain Quest

???

Failure: ???

The Chain Quest had updated right after we met Namho. It pointed in the same direction as my own thoughts.

“The Nanman Beast Palace. That’s where we’re going.”

At my belated answer, Namho nodded, his gaze deep and somber.

Nanman was vast and rugged beyond belief.

It covered less ground than Sichuan, but traveling through it took far more effort than traveling through the Central Plains.

“The Pavilion Master once told me that ten li¹ in Nanman is like a hundred li in the Central Plains.”

Anyone who didn’t understand Namho’s words had never set foot in Nanman. In just half a day, the Fire Dragon Pavilion and I had learned exactly how shitty this place was.

Bzzzz. Smack!

“Mujin, what was that?”

“Nothing. Just a mosquito. Something stung the back of my neck, that’s all.”

“Oh, really? Be careful anyway. You never know. Want me to ask Elder Namho about it?”

“Come on, Captain. I’m not a child. Hyuk Mujin, a battle-hardened warrior who has fought countless fierce battles at the right hand of the Blazing Flame Divine Dragon! That’s me.”

Exactly one shichen² later, the battle-hardened warrior Hyuk Mujin collapsed, vomiting.

“Bleeaagh!”

“Gasp, Mujin!”

“What happened?”

“Elder Namho! Mujin’s collapsed!”

“I may be old, but I can see that. Was he bitten by a mosquito?”

“Cough. Yes. About one shichen² ago. It had blue stripes…”

“Blue stripes? And that was a shichen² ago? An antidote! Bring an antidote, quickly!”

Fortunately, getting the battle-hardened warrior back on his feet wasn’t too difficult. I had the Myriad-Poison Ring, a divine artifact of the Sichuan Tang Clan, and fifty antidotes I’d received as Quest rewards.

But that was no reason to relax.

“They usually travel in swarms of dozens and even hunt predators. Another shichen², and he’d be dead.”

We set off again with Namho’s stern warning in mind, heading deeper into secluded country to avoid the non-Han peoples who would charge at Han Chinese on sight.

Which meant heading somewhere even more dangerous.

“Taishan! Taishan’s stomach hurts! Feels like it’s tearing apart!”

“Elder Namho!”

“What did you eat this time?”

“Taishan was hungry. Picked red mushrooms off a tree and ate them.”

“What kind of dog and pig bastard are you? After all the warnings I gave you, you ate blood-feeding fungus that even a tiger couldn’t withstand just because you were hungry? Antidotes won’t work on this!”

Namho flew into a rage, but his anger soon gave way to bewilderment. Taishan went into the brush to do his business and came back looking perfectly fine, despite eating a fungus that could kill a tiger.

“Taishan. Feels better after taking a dump. Fine now.”

“…Is he even human?”

Sama Pyo considered Namho’s earnest question for a moment before answering without much confidence.

“Probably.”

“Taishan’s stomach is empty again. Taishan is hungry.”

“I swear by heaven and earth, if you ever eat another mushroom, you’ll never have to worry about being hungry again.”

“Oh. Taishan. Tempting.”

“…I regret not learning martial arts. If I had, I’d have killed him with a single palm strike by now.”

We left the old Hidden Shadow Pavilion agent to his lament and kept walking.

At every turn, dense jungle and humid, sweltering heat awaited us. In the thick brush and swamps, the eyes of lurking predators glowed bright yellow.

Did we come to Nanman, or did we end up in the Amazon?

What a dogshit place.

There were more tigers than stray cats around a university neighborhood full of studio apartments, and crocodiles swarmed like tadpoles in Cheonggyecheon.

Even those were nothing compared to the strange poisonous flowers and plants that could do you in with their scent alone, or the bees with stingers bigger than their own bodies. At least the predators were large enough to spot.

There was a reason Hyuk Mujin had started complaining within a day or two of leaving Yeongin.

“To hell with the Nanman Beast Palace. I think I’ll be dead by the day after tomorrow.”

Maybe not the day after tomorrow, but in four days his life might well be in danger. He’d been poisoned about four times on the first day alone, and over the past two days he’d become skin and bones.

Shanxi Province counted as a borderland by Central Plains standards, but Nanman was far beyond anything we’d expected.

“Can’t we take another route? The roads might be run-down and rough, but compared to this, they’d be a walk down a flower-lined path.”

It wasn’t as if Nanman had no roads at all.

It was badly underdeveloped compared to the Central Plains, but I’d heard that the dozens, perhaps hundreds, of non-Han peoples settled here each had their own territory. Travel between them wasn’t particularly rare, so long as it didn’t cause disputes.

Despite Mujin’s desperate plea, Namho was firm.

“Impossible. You know why.”

“If it’s because the locals are dying to kill us, I’d rather face them head-on. And if we can talk things out, all the better.”

“Talk?”

Namho blinked at Mujin’s hopeful answer.

“Are you serious?”

“Of course.”

“An entire village vanished. Some two hundred people welcomed Han Chinese in good faith and were slaughtered, young and old alike. Do you think they’ll want to talk?”

“…No. I wasn’t actually serious.”

“Now you’re being honest. Good. Then shut up and walk.”

“Yes, sir.”

Look at him change his tune faster than light.

But this time, Namho was right about everything.

Fighting the non-Han peoples who attacked us would amount to declaring war on all of Nanman. They might snarl at one another ordinarily, but when an outsider appeared, they united as if their quarrels had never existed.

No wonder even the Demonic Cult failed to conquer all of Nanman during the Great Faction War.

The Cult’s hundred thousand demonic soldiers had once swallowed half the world, yet all they managed here was to plant their flags on Nanman’s outskirts before withdrawing.

They knew that going any deeper into a jungle rife with brutal endemic diseases, treacherous terrain, predators, and venomous beasts would cost more than it gained them.

And we can’t exactly go around announcing who we are.

I doubted the non-Han peoples’ hatred of Han Chinese would ease just because we told them our names. More importantly, Dark Heaven was lurking somewhere in Nanman.

They’re definitely targeting Nanman. It’s only a matter of time before something happens.

I was almost certain. We hadn’t traveled like thieves in the night all the way from Henan, where the Murim Alliance headquarters stood, for nothing.

We’d had to reveal our identities to the bandits of Water Dragon Stronghold on our way here, but we’d made sure they kept quiet. It was also why we hadn’t contacted the Emei Sect, the Qingcheng Sect, or the Sichuan Tang Clan, despite the ties we’d made on our last trip to Sichuan.

If we revealed ourselves to the non-Han peoples now, all that effort would go to waste.

Dark Heaven would realize an unseen dagger had come right up to its nose and rush its plans forward. Then the rift would open, and with it the door to disaster.

We can’t reveal who we are until we reach the Nanman Beast Palace at the very least.

The Beast Miao King, lord of the Nanman Beast Palace, had fought in the Great Faction War. I’d also heard he was well disposed toward Jeok Cheongang and the Fire Gate Clan.

Given the importance of our business and his standing in Nanman, he was far more likely to listen than the other non-Han peoples, who were beside themselves with anger.

And thanks to those Heavenly Demon Escort Bureau bastards, we’re getting shit splashed on us too.

One squid makes the whole fish market look bad, as they say. We’d been bundled together with them in the same Han Chinese package, and the Fire Dragon Pavilion’s reputation—mine included—was shot.

I wasn’t even Han Chinese.

…Does this make me a fake Han Chinese or what?

It was unfair as hell, but there was nothing I could do. I could tell the locals, “Actually, I’m not Han Chinese. I’m Korean. South, not North,” and they wouldn’t understand a word.

Besides, when I’d gotten homesick during training at Mount Jiuhua and drawn the Korean flag, Jeok Cheongang had said just one thing.

“Wudang?”

“No.”

“It’s obviously taiji. What kind of bullshit are you talking? Taiji means Wudang.”

“Taiji means Korea.”

“What’s Korea?”

“That’s… Never mind. You don’t need to know, Old Master.”

“Add two hundred geun³ of iron balls.”

“…Two hundred geun³? Why?”

“You don’t need to know.”

Just remembering it brought tears to my eyes.

It felt like only yesterday I’d been suffering in this distant land of another dimension. The miserable part was that the suffering never stopped.

“Whew.”

At the sight of me sighing, Namho glared fiercely.

“What? Do you also want to go down there and settle things through conversation right now? Or would you rather throw down with the non-Han peoples?”

“…Where did that come from? I don’t want to do either.”

“That’s a relief.”

There had already been plenty of chances to throw down with someone, and there would be plenty more in the future. Even now, several predators were wandering around us, letting out their cries.

I scanned the dense jungle and swampland, then asked Namho, “How much farther?”

“Three days if we’re quick. Six if we’re not.”

“That’s a lot farther than I expected.”

“Given that we have to stay out of sight, even that’s quick.”

Namho, whose face had aged noticeably, patted his lower back before starting to walk again.

“Don’t slow down for a moment from here on. If we cross Ailao Mountain today, we can reach the Nanman Beast Palace in four days at the latest.”

He was right.

Exactly four days later, as we crossed a high mountain peak, we spotted a massive structure in the distance, shrouded in thick clouds and mist.

“The Nanman Beast Palace…”

The voice that slipped from someone’s lips spread on a wind that had blown in from somewhere.