Chapter 647

The banquet was being held in a large training ground inside the Inner Palace.

The place was large enough to accommodate more than a thousand warriors. Every kind of delicacy had been laid out, and the grounds were packed with people, including the tribal chieftains.

And at the most honored seat in the training ground, someone was waiting for me.

“You’ve arrived.”

The Beast Miao King spotted me from his high-backed chair adorned with tiger skin and beckoned me over.

“Come sit. I had a place prepared for you.”

The seat assigned to me was directly beside the Beast Miao King, on his left.

It was exceptional treatment for an outsider, but given my status and what I’d done the previous night, it wasn’t all that strange.

That didn’t mean every member of the Fire Dragon Pavilion was getting the same treatment, of course.

“I’ve prepared places for all of you at this banquet as well. Eat, drink, and enjoy your—”

“Taishan! Meat!”

Grab! Chomp, chomp, chomp!

Taishan swept up the meat on the table in front of him. The Beast Miao King stared at me, baffled.

“……What in the world is that fellow?”

“…He’s just insane. Don’t pay him too much attention.”

At a glance from me, Taishan’s mom—no, Sama Pyo—let out a long sigh, grabbed Taishan, and dragged him away. Namho, who’d been watching for an opening like an assassin, snatched up a nearby wine bottle and smashed it against the top of Taishan’s head.

Crash!

Water Style without any water…?

He’d really put his back into that one.

But Taishan drank from the fountain of wine bursting over his head and cried out happily.

“Namho! Thank you! Taishan was thirsty!”

“Die. Please, just die…!”

The Beast Miao King watched them, then turned an uneasy look on me.

“Hmm. Your subordinates get along well.”

“They do. So well that one could die and the other wouldn’t notice.”

“Is that why you didn’t send them?”

I paused before answering. “You heard about that? News travels fast.”

“I don’t involve myself in every matter, but I hear about them all. That is the position of Palace Lord of the Nanman Beast Palace.”

He had a point. Since outsiders had joined the scouts, it wouldn’t have been strange for a report to have already reached him through the great chieftains.

I thought of the three people who should be heading somewhere northeast by now and muttered inwardly.

Will they be all right?

After a great deal of thought, I’d chosen three people: Ju Hwaran, Song Ilseom, and Hyuk Mujin.

Regardless of my concerns, Ju Hwaran possessed exceptional martial prowess and experience compared to other young prodigies. Song Ilseom needed no explanation, and the last member, Hyuk Mujin, was……

Whatever else you could say about him, the man has the survival instincts of a cockroach.

Despite how he looked, Hyuk Mujin had survived countless battlefields alongside me, from Shanxi Province to the present day, escaping death at every turn.

He was so good at wriggling his way out of danger that Jeok Cheongang had once said,

How has someone so weak and cowardly survived this long?

I’d answered:

Because he’s weak and cowardly.

It was true that Hyuk Mujin’s martial arts fell short of the others’. Calling him cowardly wasn’t wrong, either.

But you could also call it caution.

He has an uncanny knack for avoiding the worst danger. And when he can’t avoid it, he fights for his life.

No wonder he always came back alive. I might as well change his nickname to Hyukroach.

“They’ll do well. No matter what happens.”

I muttered that with a personal wish behind it, then glanced over the Beast Miao King’s shoulder.

“By the way, there are a lot of empty seats for a banquet that’s already started.”

“They’ll be here soon.”

He said it casually, but the Beast Miao King’s eyes had grown heavy and dark. This was especially true whenever he looked at the empty seat directly to his right.

Baeksang.

The chieftains who had left the main hall following him were already seated, but Baeksang, Yohi, and Heugung had yet to return.

The Beast Miao King stared at their empty seats for a while before silently tilting the wine bottle.

Drip.

The sun had long since set behind the western mountains, yet the Nanman Beast Palace glowed against the darkness. Festivities were taking place everywhere.

The Tribal Grand Council, held only once a year, was also an occasion for unity, and the countless tribespeople who had poured into the streets were laughing and talking with bright faces as they enjoyed themselves.

Or, at least, they probably were. I couldn’t see them from here, but the cheers and firecracker explosions drifting over from the Outer Palace were more than enough to tell me.

Whoosh! Boom!

Waaaaaaah!

If I only listened to the noise, I would have thought it was at least a Samba Festival.

“So, um…… Is this really okay?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know. Everyone seems to have amnesia. They all know what happened at Ailao Mountain barely a day ago.”

He didn’t seem concerned. “They do. That’s why the festival is even grander.”

“Because of that?”

“Yes. Every one of them was a brave warrior who fought and died for Nanman. So they believe that each of them has returned to the arms of the god their tribe worships. Though they died in this world, they believe they were reborn as warriors of their god.”

“…”

I’d heard something like that before.

It brought to mind the Middle Eastern terrorist group I’d beaten up before logging in.

They aren’t Crusaders or ancient Vikings.

All kinds of superstitions ran rampant in the Central Plains as well, but Nanman was clearly different. Perhaps it was because so many indigenous faiths existed here.

As someone born and raised in the twenty-first century, though, I couldn’t understand it.

“Do you believe that too, Great Hero Yayul?”

At my question, the Beast Miao King, who had been about to raise his wine cup, let out a short laugh.

“Interesting.”

“What is?”

“Isn’t it only natural? You asked that question of an old Miao man born and raised in Nanman—and of the Palace Lord of the Nanman Beast Palace, at that.”

“Oh.”

“But that isn’t why I laughed. It reminded me that someone else asked me the same thing a very long time ago.”

I had a pretty good idea who. “My Old Master—no, my master?”

“Old Jeok? No. He had no interest in whether the local gods existed. He did tell me to call him if those Demonic Cult bastards ever set Nanman on fire. He said he’d gladly come help, at least once.”

“…”

That old man hated leaving home, yet he’d volunteered to travel here for some killing. His grudge over Mount Jiuhua must have gone right down to the bone.

I nodded reflexively. “Then who asked you?”

His answer was simple, clear, and baffling.

“God.”

“Sorry? What?”

As I stood there, momentarily dumbfounded by the incomprehensible answer, the Beast Miao King continued while stroking his full wine cup.

“The Martial God. Someone whose name, age, and even face are not properly known. A divine man who was born human and became something beyond humanity. That person asked me whether I truly believed my god existed.”

“…!”

“So I answered, ‘Honestly, I don’t know. But I think I’m looking at one right now.’”

The crescent moon reflected in his wine cup rippled. The Beast Miao King downed the wine and moon together, then burst into laughter.

“It was a foolish answer, but what else could I say? That day, the Martial God single-handedly defeated five fiends who had reached the Supreme Peak realm and five hundred members of the Blood Ghost Squad. When I first met him, he had a snow-white beard that fluttered like an immortal’s. At our second and final meeting, he looked like a young boy.”

“…”

“More than fifty years have passed, but I still remember that day as clearly as ever.”

I listened with my mouth hanging open, unable to speak.

The Blood Ghost Squad. I knew the name. It came up whenever Jeok Cheongang launched into one of his “back in my day” stories.

The Blood Ghost Squad had been the Demonic Cult’s premier strike force, sweeping across the Central Plains at the head of a hundred thousand demonic troops. Every single member was said to have been a Peak master.

Five hundred Peak masters. And five fiends at the Supreme Peak realm on top of that.

The Martial God had wiped out that entire force alone.

Even coming from the Beast Miao King, I would have dismissed the story as nonsense if not for those two words: Martial God.

…Just how powerful was he?

Jeok Cheongang. Mungyeong. Mae Jonghak. And others.

I had heard stories about the Martial God until my ears bled from people who deserved to be called giants in the long history of the Murim.

And yet I still didn’t know. What kind of realm had that master reached? No—was he even human at all?

And why had someone so extraordinary suddenly vanished without a trace? Where was he now, and what was he doing?

One thought led to another. Then, without warning, someone’s name came to mind.

…Wait.

The fingers tapping against the table stopped dead.

My eyes flew open, but they were not looking at the banquet hall before me. Nor were they looking at the Murim.

They were looking beyond the hot, heavy air blowing in from far away—beyond some unknown realm that could not be explained in words—to another world and the person who existed there.

Cheon Taemin.

The savior who’d rescued humanity from the Demon King Asmodeus. An immortal legend, called a living god by his followers.

A man who had one day been cut off from the world and fallen into a deep sleep.

I knew exactly why I’d thought of him.

He’s like the Martial God.

It could have been a coincidence, but they had too much in common to dismiss it so easily. The Martial God’s exploits in the Great Faction War and Cheon Taemin’s in the Great Cataclysm—even their actions immediately afterward.

No way. No. No, that’s impossible.

I couldn’t follow the thought any further. The musicians had stopped playing, the dancers had stopped moving, and every eye was on the man climbing the stairs.

“Welcome, little brother.”

Baeksang, flanked by great chieftains as though he were the Palace Lord himself, answered the Beast Miao King’s greeting.

“I’m late, Palace Lord.”

I came out of my thoughts and finally met his gaze, cold enough to freeze everything around him.

The banquet has begun.

Security in the Outer Palace has been reinforced.

About two hundred elite warriors from the Inner Palace are moving through the North Gate.

As the Sound Transmissions from her subordinates pierced the darkness one after another, someone buried in the shadows rose from her seat.

Final report. What is the target?

The Blood Monk of Guizhou. The targets are moving for reconnaissance and possible combat. At Jin Taekyung’s order, the group includes Ju Hwaran, the Young Bureau Head of the Yongbong Escort Bureau; Song Ilseom, the Soul-Chasing Guest; and Hyuk Mujin of the Jin Family of Taiyuan.

It would have been surprising for anyone to know Song Ilseom’s past, known to only a select few. Not for the shadow and her subordinates.

“Ha.”

After letting out a quiet laugh, the shadow turned around in one smooth motion.

Snap.

Fingers struck together in the darkness. A strand of flame sprang up, casting light around it.

Fwoosh.

The flame was a dark, ominous reddish brown. Watching it flicker, the Southern Heaven Demon Empress smiled.