Chapter 14: Chapter 14
“Anyway, they say the proprietress here is breathtaking. But getting a glimpse of her face is proving impossible. Can’t buy her with money, and for a courtesan, her network is remarkably vast. How about… the Seventh Young Master puts in a word for us?”
At the absurd request, Mao finally turned his head back.
“What word?”
Vengeful eyes fixated on him like bats.
“We have to be mindful of our families, so we can’t exactly cause scenes… but the Seventh Young Master? Who’s going to say anything if you cause trouble? That’s what you do every day. Besides, there’s no one left to punish you.”
“So what kind of trouble? Explain clearly, step by step.”
“Heh heh. Ah, come on… do I really have to spell it out? We’re saying, let’s have some fun with the proprietress tonight. It’s getting dark. Nice and quiet. Right? Snuff the candles. Gather around cozy. Sounds like a good time?”
“If it’s dark, you go home. Why sit around again? And by the way, this hasn’t been fun from the start. ‘Nice and quiet’? What, do you like ghost stories? Go try the Seventh Small Palace outhouse. That’ll refresh your memory.”
“No, I mean! Ugh, this shit…! Just… you’ve eaten enough years, try acting your age. Still can’t understand a damn thing, same as always.”
“What, you bastard?”
Mao stood up, and Jin-gu flipped the table with a crash and rose to match. Tension crackled between them, ready to escalate to blows. The companions exchanged nervous glances, wondering if this had gone too far.
But Jin-gu was already swimming in liquid courage. He had no fear left.
“Fuck. A bastard born of a servant becomes Seventh Young Master and suddenly talks back. Hey! You know who I am? I’m Ma Jin-gu!”
“So what. I’m the Seventh Young Master. You Ninth Grade Ghost piece of trash.”
He had a point. As the companions subtly took Jin-gu’s side, Jin-gu’s pride took a visible hit. His lower lip trembled as he spoke.
“Hah. You’ve grown, bastard. You think you can handle this? Even if Brother I-sin showed up, you’d stand there with your head held high, looking down at me? How about it. Should I go call him right now? Want me to?”
I-sin. I-sin. Always I-sin. Call him. Go ahead and call him, you bastard!
Mao clenched his fist so hard his knuckles went white, his entire body shaking.
But the words he wanted to scream dozens of times over remained trapped in his throat.
Because he knew.
The moment Jin-gu ran to Ma I-sin and tattled, innocent corpses would be floating on Moonlight Lake by morning.
So he couldn’t say it.
Shlk. The fire in Mao’s sharp eyes guttered out. He looked away.
“Heh heh. That’s right. That’s how it should be. Know your place.”
Pat. Jin-gu tapped Mao’s chest. The man stood a full head shorter than Mao. Pat. Pat. Pat. Then he tilted his chin up with a contemptuous sneer.
“Watch yourself, Seventh Young Master. Before I call my brother. Understood?”
Utterly humiliating. But fine. In a few days, drowned in drink, this would be nothing.
Just as Mao was sealing his heart and comforting himself with that thought.
“Call him. I’m curious.”
“Hm?”
An unfamiliar voice from outside the door. Then CRACK! The sliding door splintered. FWING! A flying dagger trailing a steel wire shot through with a sharp ring.
“Inhale!”
In a flash, the dagger grazed Jin-gu’s cheek, looped behind his head, and whipped around his throat. Click. The blade caught on the wire.
“Kgheh?!”
The wire drew taut. Jin-gu’s eyes rolled back, his mouth forced open. He sank to his knees, strength gone.
Mao and the young talents stared, eyes round. What was happening? An assassin?
At that moment, the door shattered completely, and the man revealed himself.
“Y-you’re…”
THUD! He stomped on the head of the wheezing, drooling Jin-gu, yanked the wire taut, and smiled.
“I’m late.”
The man who, as of today, had become the Seventh Young Master’s one and only confidant.
No. The Hidden Pavilion’s finest operative, here to make him Young Cult Leader.
“Adjutant Jang I-seo.”
He had arrived.
*
“Gah, kgheh! A-air!”
Slap, slap, slap! Jin-gu pounded the floor repeatedly, his face turning as red as a ripe persimmon. A wire around his throat, a foot on his head. That was all he could manage. A desperate cry for survival.
But Jang I-seo, absurdly relaxed, laughed cheerfully and stomped the back of Jin-gu’s head even harder.
“Wait, no. Hey.”
Mao was more flustered than anyone. It felt satisfying, yes, but what kind of lunatic bursts in and does this? Collateral was still Ma family blood, branch family or not.
“S-s-Seventh Young Master! Tell this man to stop! He’s going to kill me!”
“Kghaaahaeae.”
Jin-gu emitted a strange whine. His chin was soaked in drool. His eyes had rolled back ages ago. If this kept up, someone would actually die.
“Hey, Jang I-su! Let go! Actually, choke him a little more. Then let go!”
Mao squeezed his eyes shut and barked. Slither. The wire, which had drawn even tighter, released. Jin-gu hacked out the breath he’d been holding, coughing relentlessly.
Tears, snot, spit. A spectacular mess.
“You, you bastard… you… what are you?!”
Jin-gu barely steadied his breathing and SHRING! Drew the blade he’d set beside the folding screen. Jang I-seo examined the sword with detached eyes and calculated.
‘Two hundred fifty nyang of silver.’
A scabbard shaped with a goblin motif, a resonant ring to the metal. The blade bore a small engraved smith’s signature. A respectable famous blade.
Jang I-seo pulled his right hand back. Whirl! The flying dagger and wire coiled around his wrist as if sucked in.
Then, ignoring Jin-gu entirely, he called out.
“Seventh Young Master.”
“Huh? Yeah.”
“Are you injured anywhere?”
“Me? He’s the one who’s hurt, isn’t he?”
Mao pointed at Jin-gu in disbelief. The angry red ligature mark around his throat looked painful. The young talents all nodded in sympathy.
But Jang I-seo shook his head.
“That man intended to harm the Seventh Young Master. Yet you worry for him. I’m awed by your boundless mercy.”
“Hey, you psycho! When did I ever try to hurt this bastard… I mean, when did I try to harm the Seventh Young Master!”
“Merely laying hands on his person is lese majeste of the highest order. Moreover, didn’t you strike his chest with your fist earlier? Four times, to be precise.”
Huh. At Jang I-seo’s brazen stretch, every young talent’s jaw dropped.
‘That actually tracks?’
The only one nodding along was Mao, eyebrows raised.
“That’s… Shit! What are you? What gives you the right to meddle in Ma family business?”
“Adjutant Jang I-seo.”
“Adjutant…? Kgh… Hah! Seventh Young Master. Did I mishear? I distinctly recall you said you’d thrown the adjutant out. What is this?”
Jin-gu shifted direction, blade in hand, toward Mao.
In that instant. Pitter-patter! Jang I-seo dashed forward, knocked the sword from Jin-gu’s arm with a lateral strike, drove his elbow into the man’s chest, and shoved him against the wall.
“Kgh!”
THUD! The moment his back hit the wall, shlk. A short sword materialized from his waist and rested against Jin-gu’s throat in the blink of an eye.
Movement fast as lightning.
“Y-you bastard…”
Jin-gu’s blood ran cold. He stammered, stealing a sidelong glance at the blade beneath his chin.
If this had been real combat, he’d already be dead.
Drunk or not, being bested not once but twice.
‘This guy! They said he was a former Seventh Grade Ghost… I underestimated him! His movement is extraordinary. Could the Third Young Lady have sent him with ulterior motives?’
Jin-gu might hold no official rank, a mere Ninth Grade Ghost, but he bore the Ma family bloodline. His skill was undeniably a cut above common riffraff.
Yet he’d been subdued this easily.
But when did a golden spoon’s arsenal stop at martial prowess? True power flowed from family backing. Jin-gu’s eyes blazed green as he snarled.
“Seventh Young Master… can you really handle this? Can you withstand the Ma family’s wrath?”
Mao’s expression hardened coldly. Jin-gu caught the shift and swelled with confidence.
But.
“How dare you?”
Jang I-seo’s eyes didn’t waver. They grew fiercer, more venomous.
“A mere family. Discussing consequences with the esteemed adopted son of His Supreme Holiness, a First Grade Ghost? Would you say that before the Cult Leader himself?”
One sentence drained all color from Jin-gu and every young talent’s face.
Their opponent’s backing was the Ma family. This side had heaven itself.
“N-no… I mean…”
“Amusing. The family head is nothing more than Second Grade Ghost First Elder Ma Il-seong.”
Excuse me, that’s my father you’re talking about. Mao whispered from behind, but Jang I-seo didn’t hear him.
“Yet you dare threaten the Young Master with consequences? This can only be interpreted as the Ma family’s seditious declaration of rebellion.”
“R-rebellion?!”
The word was far too terrifying for a punk not yet twenty. Jin-gu shook his head frantically, eyes wide with terror.
“N-no! That’s not what I meant!”
“Then why speak that way?”
“It was a mistake! I misspoke!”
“Your mistakes are remarkably simple. Then I should make one of my own. The mistake of punching a hole in your throat.”
“AAAAGH! W-wait!”
Jang I-seo pressed the dagger’s tip into Jin-gu’s Adam’s apple. Jin-gu screamed with everything he had. This bastard was serious. Not a threat. Not a joke. He’d actually stab him.
Jin-gu turned pleading eyes toward Mao, on the verge of tears.
“S-s-Seventh Young Master! Save me! I misspoke! I was drunk! Please… just let me live first. M-Mao… please…!”
Hah, you idiot. Mao scratched the back of his head. When family backing failed, it was straight to clutching at pant legs and sobbing. Nothing had changed.
A sigh escaped him. Enough was enough. He’d won the verbal battle, but reality was on Jin-gu’s side.
What good was being Seventh Young Master when tomorrow’s consequences were already suffocating?
“Put it away.”
Mao turned his head toward the window and ordered the blade removed.
Then.
CRASH!
“AAAAAAAGH!”
Jin-gu shattered through the window and plummeted outside. Mao and the young talents’ eyes bulged.
This was the fifth floor?!
“M-Ma Jin-gu!”
Mao and the others rushed to the window and peered down. Below lay Jin-gu, crumpled and unconscious, surrounded by a crowd of screaming onlookers.
Mao whipped his head back, eyes demanding an explanation. Jang I-seo replied.
“You said to put him away.”
“No, fuck! I said put the knife away, not throw the bastard out!”
“Did you?”
“‘Did you?’ You crazy son of a bitch?!”
Mao’s eyes looked ready to pop out of his skull. But Jang I-seo just smirked, turned, and herded the stunned young talents toward the door.
“The Seventh Young Master appears exhausted today. The drinking session ends here. Everyone, please go home.”
The young talents bowed repeatedly, heaping on every polite farewell they could muster before fleeing in a panic.
Only after confirming everyone had left did Jang I-seo turn back.