Chapter 15: Chapter 15

Riding a horse and sprinting with lightness art produce similar speeds, but there is a distinct difference.

Among the few differences, the biggest one is that unlike horseback riding where riding long makes your hips and back hurt a bit, sprinting with lightness art across your whole body just makes your whole body tired. It made one wonder if this was why long-distance lightness art had not developed. Even Jang Geon himself wouldn’t do long-distance running so painfully if he could ride a horse.

Controlling his breath that was threatening to turn rough, Jang Geon circulated his internal energy. The internal energy that swept through his whole body and washed away fatigue was finally spewed from his toes, pushing him far forward. He looked like a low-flying bird.

Sprinting like that for a long while, he paused briefly to find traces of Ju Yeo-rang and Jojo. Quickly finding horse hooves to confirm the direction, he sprang forward again. Before he knew it, the sun stood in the middle of the sky, looking down at him.

“Jojo, you bastard…”

Because he wasn’t a normal slick fellow, Jang Geon didn’t feel worried. He was a fellow who would probably manage cunningly and live well wherever else he went. However, Jang Geon didn’t want to change horses yet. Jojo was still a young and sturdy fellow, and could be ridden for more than ten years to come. Finding such a smart fellow was a difficult task as well.

Sprinting through the forest while pondering how to punish the fellow once he caught him, the moment Jang Geon stepped on a small rock and leaped up, a white streak of light swaying like a snake flew aiming for Jang Geon’s head.

Although it was a sudden attack that would fluster anyone, Jang Geon kicked the empty air beside him strongly, rotating his body with the momentum of muscle and internal energy. It was a feat so great that to a mistaken eye, it looked as if he had stepped on thin air to rotate his direction. The streak of light that brushed past him struck a pine tree beyond him. A deep scar was carved into the pine tree, splitting nearly half its trunk.

Spinning around in midair, Jang Geon adjusted his posture and landed on the ground. Looking in the direction the streak of light had flown from, a man wearing a white martial robe held a long whip with an expression of disbelief that he had missed.

The streak of light just now seemed to have been a whip. Considering the power that split the pine tree and the location it aimed for, he intended to kill Jang Geon. Jang Geon grabbed the sword hilt strapped to his back. His body, heated up by lightness art, prepared to move fiercely once again.

“Wait!”

At that moment, Ju Yeo-rang’s voice halted the movements of the white-robed man and Jang Geon. Emerging from behind a tree, she let out a sigh, looked back and forth between the white-robed man and Jang Geon, then matched her gaze with Jang Geon.

“…How did you follow us? I even took the horse so you wouldn’t come.”

“Because I’m a bit fast at running.”

Ju Yeo-rang let out a chuckle in absurdity.

“Then why did you ride a horse all this time?”

“Because running is tiring.”

“…That actually makes sense too.”

At that moment, the white-robed man holding the whip opened his mouth.

“Is this guy the idiot written in the carrier pigeon note?”

Ju Yeo-rang’s expression hardened slightly at his shrill voice. Rather than a problem with the question itself, the man himself felt uncomfortable.

“Yes, I met him when colliding with Je Un-seong two days ago, and he also helped deal with the Je Clan’s assassins that night.”

“And in return you promised to give him Imperial Army martial arts?”

“Since he didn’t appear to belong to a noble clan or the Martial Alliance, I judged he would be greedy for martial arts.”

“Then why is he still alive?”

Ju Yeo-rang stole a glance at Jang Geon at the man’s question.

“…Je Un-seong’s pursuit was looser than thought. After confirming his skill through the Je Clan’s warriors on the first day, there were no further attacks. It seems that since his martial arts were no small matter, rather than dealing with him together with me, he thought waiting for the two of us to separate would be better. Added to that, seeing his lukewarm attitude, it doesn’t seem my scheme has been completely uncovered yet, ”

“So you just dropped him and came? Because there was no need to deal with him?”

“…Yes. I thought if I led the horse away, he wouldn’t be able to follow.”

The white-robed man let out a smirk. Because of his fiercely slit eyes and thin lips, that smile had a chilling aspect.

“You’re too soft, Yeo-rang. You should have kept dragging him along. If he couldn’t be dealt with by your own hands, wouldn’t it just be a matter of us helping?”

Saying so, he lightly flicked his wrist. Then the long whip held in his hand wriggled as if alive, leaving a deep trace on the ground. Ju Yeo-rang stole another glance at Jang Geon. She saw Jang Geon maintaining a low posture with one hand touching the ground and the other holding his sword. His eyes were merely calm as before.

“…Since he didn’t know much about me, nor did he know anything about the operation, I judged it would be fine, ”

The whip wriggled again and struck the ground. Ju Yeo-rang flinched and closed her mouth.

“Your independent judgment is excessive, Yeo-rang. Although fast action on the field is important, you made a mistake here. Once we return to the clan, you will be disciplined.”

“…Yes, understood.”

At that moment, Jang Geon slowly stood up. As he stood upright, the white-robed man spoke to him.

“Ah, what was your name? Jang Gon? Jang Gun?”

“Jang Geon.”

The white-robed man let out a smirk at that low and short answer.

“Right, you drove away Je Un-seong without even clashing swords? Though that friend originally lacked martial arts skill, it’s still impressive. Especially when you haven’t learned the martial arts of the Imperial Army or noble clans.”

Jang Geon began to unbind the sword tied to his back with slow movements.

“Because I’m a bit of a genius.”

At that answer, the white-robed man smiled again as if somewhat flabbergasted.

“An amusing friend. Had we not met like this, I would have invited you as a retainer of the clan. Ah, I am called Yeon Yang-jeok. A warrior of the Yeon Clan. You roughly understand what kind of affair you’ve been caught up in, right?”

The Yeon Clan of Hebei. An ancient noble clan like the Je Clan. As far as Jang Geon knew, unlike the Je Clan that was pushed out to the New Continent, it was a clan firmly rooted in the Central Plains. And that meant Jang Geon had been absurdly caught between the sinister underhanded feud of two clans spanning the New Continent and the Central Plains.

Jang Geon slowly strapped the unbound sword to his waist again and looked at Ju Yeo-rang.

“Did you think I would die along the way?”

Seeing that look and hearing those words, Ju Yeo-rang, who had a hardened face, let out a deep sigh.

“…Je Un-seong isn’t well known outside, but among noble clans, he is a man famous for his ability to gather information, infer situations, and find answers rather than his martial arts. Of course, that lacking martial art of his is above average, but even so, it was hard to think of you as some supreme expert. How impressive could the skill of a knight-errant met on the road really be?”

Ju Yeo-rang glanced at Yeon Yang-jeok. However, he had no intention of stopping the conversation between the two, massaging his chin and sneering. Ju Yeo-rang matched her eyes with Jang Geon again and spoke.

“Yet whether that Je Un-seong figured out something with that famous reasoning ability of his, after the first time he didn’t attack at all.”

“You must have been flustered.”

“Naturally. Because there was no Imperial Army martial art to give you in the first place.”

Organizing his belt, Jang Geon asked.

“What about that story of Young Master Je? Was that a lie too?”

“…That was my operation. Seducing that brat to steal the Je Clan’s secret documents, and making him commit suicide by making him realize what he had done. Honestly, I thought suicide would be difficult, but the kid was more naive than expected and feared his father, so it worked out well.”

“Then what that fiancée named Seom Ji-young said was correct.”

Ju Yeo-rang smiled bitterly.

“I’ve done similar tasks a few times, but I didn’t expect to get caught by a seventeen-year-old girl. She was a girl with good intuition. Or maybe it’s time I slowly retired.”

Jang Geon tied his organized belt cord tightly and grabbed the scabbard with his left hand. And Yeon Yang-jeok, who had only been watching that, opened his mouth.

“Do you know why Yeo-rang is letting you hear all of this now, Jang Geon?”

“Well. It seems like creating a justification to kill me.”

Yeon Yang-jeok’s smile deepened.

“You understand well. In the carrier pigeon note she called you a knight-errant so I wondered what kind of dumbass you were, but it seems your head isn’t completely stiffened.”

Jang Geon did not answer. With movements as slow as when he unbacked and bound his sword, he put on the bamboo hat resting on his neck onto his head. Half his face was covered, showing only his beard-covered chin. Noticing that this stance was the one right before exchanging a single blow, Yeon Yang-jeok clicked his tongue.

“Aren’t you being too arrogant just because you drove away Je Un-seong? How dare a vagrant of the wilderness think to test martial arts with a warrior of the Yeon Clan.”

“Do I have any other way?”

Yeon Yang-jeok shouted loudly.

“Naturally there is! Namely, offering your neck without resistance while being grateful that you can experience the martial arts of our Hebei Yeon Clan even if briefly!”

“…Bullshit.”

Flabbergasted, Jang Geon let out a chuckle and adjusted the scabbard in his left hand. He intended to defeat the guy and ask Ju Yeo-rang where she had put Jojo. However, he was forced to come to a sudden halt. From behind him, another man wearing a white martial robe had appeared.

Holding a short spear about his own height, he wore a smile similar to Yeon Yang-jeok’s.

“It’s useless even if you resist, Jang Geon. Just think of it as the price of foolishly playing knight-errant and go quietly.”

Realizing he was surrounded front and back, Jang Geon felt the corners of his lips curling up unwittingly. Two ancient clan warriors incomparable to bandits. A situation where both front and back were occupied. In a world of martial arts where victory or defeat was decided in a single blow, the current situation was like stepping on a dead stone. Even if he could defeat one, he wouldn’t be able to block another coming from a completely different direction. It was a crisis.

“…Are you so great that you fight in joint attack?”

“No, that’s not it. What we are doing right now is an execution, not a test of martial arts. Je Un-seong following our traces will only discover your corpse with its head severed. Then he will rack his brain until it breaks to infer the situation based on that, buying us more time.”

Flicking his whip to strike the ground, Yeon Yang-jeok spoke.

“Not only bringing Yeo-rang safely, but even tying down Je Un-seong’s feet. Representing the clan, I convey our gratitude. Thank you, Jang Geon. Good work.”

Jang Geon decided to make sure that damn face got distorted and turned his eyes to Ju Yeo-rang. She stood with a somewhat gloomy face, then smiled apologetically at Jang Geon’s gaze.

“I’m truly sorry it came to this. That’s why I even stole the horse so you wouldn’t follow… It’s unfortunate things turned out like this.”

“I see. It has become unfortunate.”

At Jang Geon’s answer, she hesitated as if not knowing what more to say, then simply turned her head away.

Jang Geon raised his head and looked up at the sky. Just in time, a cumulus cloud stealthily blocked the sun, casting a large shadow. As the sun was blocked, the forest they stood in became far darker than a moment ago, and a somewhat cool wind circled around.

Had they been broad-leafed trees, even at that light wind they would have rustled noisily, making the sound of the forest. However, the pointed conifers merely trembled minutely as they let the wind pass through their slender leaves, making no sound as if holding their breath.

Holding their breath was the same for the four people standing in that spot. Yeon Yang-jeok and the other warrior, who had been wearing sinister smiles until just now, had become expressionless before anyone knew it, leaning all their senses toward Jang Geon. While even Ju Yeo-rang watched Jang Geon with a complicated face, Jang Geon himself remained in the exact posture looking up at the sky.

He parted his lips.

“As expected… being reincarnated as a cloud would have been better.”

The cloud blocking the sun returned the sunlight at a speed as slow as when it blocked it. Just as the sun was about to shine down again in the somberly shadowed forest.

Yeon Yang-jeok’s white whip turned into a single ray of sunlight like the first time, extending straight toward Jang Geon’s head. Simultaneously, the warrior behind his back kicked the ground and turned into a flash of light, thrusting at Jang Geon’s back. The warrior’s speed was so fast that the moment the whip met Jang Geon, it seemed it would thrust into his back simultaneously.

The moment they moved, Jang Geon moved as well. Rotating his body like lightning, he threw his bamboo hat at the warrior holding the spear and threw his body toward Yeon Yang-jeok’s whip.

The warrior attempted to shred the flying bamboo hat with the force of his thrust. However, the moment the spear tip met that bamboo hat, he was forced to hesitate at a powerful force felt from it.

In that gap, Jang Geon drew his sword infused with internal energy. The blue-glowing blade lightly chopped off the tip of the flying white whip. However, the moment Yeon Yang-jeok twisted his wrist, the whip wriggled like a snake and wrapped around Jang Geon’s sword. Smirking, Yeon Yang-jeok pulled the whip with force. The moment Jang Geon held on so as not to lose his sword, the spear behind his back would pierce through him.

However, Yeon Yang-jeok froze in an instant, startled by a tingling sensation penetrating through the whip handle, raising his internal energy to hold out.

Simultaneously, Jang Geon, who had already drawn close to him, struck his chest with his left palm.

“Kuh!”

The struck spot was fine, but a popping sound resounded, and the clothes on his back burst open.

Striking a single blow like that, Jang Geon immediately spun his body and swung his sword. The Yeon Clan warrior, having cleared the force of the bamboo hat, was thrusting at his heart. Jang Geon intended to parry that spear.

He couldn’t. It was too fast. Before he could completely parry it away, the spear blade penetrated his right shoulder. Immediately after, Jang Geon’s left fist struck the warrior’s jaw. His neck spinning around, the warrior flew out, spinning half a circle.

Only after that did late sunlight stealthily illuminate Jang Geon’s head.

In the middle of the slowly brightening forest, Jang Geon stood catching his breath with a spear impaled in his shoulder and his fist extended, while the warrior whose neck had turned showed no sign of twitching. Hit in the chest, Yeon Yang-jeok sat kneeling on the ground. He vomited blood forcefully.

“…Quaking Sky Palm? No, similar but different. Rougher. Stronger. A magnificent martial art.”

Listening to Yeon Yang-jeok’s muttering, Jang Geon pulled out the impaled spear and blocked his blood points to stop the bleeding. Feeling that whenever he tried to apply force to his arm, his entire right upper body hurt starting from his shoulder, he let out a short curse. Kneeling, Yeon Yang-jeok looked up at Jang Geon.

“It doesn’t seem like you learned demonic arts. Incredible, Jang Geon. A martial prowess unsuitable for your age. Do you have a sect?”

“I do. Countless seniors who could create martial arts only through imagination.”

“…A peculiar sect. Well, it doesn’t matter…”

Muttering, Yeon Yang-jeok dropped his head as he was. His breathing stopped just like that. Looking at him for a moment, Jang Geon turned his body and looked at Ju Yeo-rang. Forgetting the complexity until now, she had become a calm face, looking at him.

In Jang Geon’s eyes, the medium-length straight sword she held was visible. Looking into Ju Yeo-rang’s eyes, he asked.

“Are you confident?”

“No. I’m not.”

Ju Yeo-rang smiled brightly, said so, kicked the ground and charged, drawing a single blue streak of light. The next moment, she brushed past Jang Geon and stood showing her back in a posture extending her sword.

And then she slumped down.

“…An expert is indeed different.”

Her flank quickly dyed red. She let out a deep sigh once again.

“…It was only two days, but it was fun. No, counting from the first meeting, is it three days?”

Jang Geon did not answer, but she smiled faintly and continued speaking.

“…You said there was an eye inside you watching you, right? I think I had something similar in the past too. When I executed my first mission, when I killed the assassination target I seduced that night as he was. There was an eye watching me then.”

The moist red that spread on her flank quickly soaked the pants she was sitting in.

“That eye wasn’t one. Four. Four pairs. Pure eyes shining brightly. My brothers and sisters. The children I loved most in the world… I killed those children who were alive inside me with my own hands back then.”

She slowly raised her head and looked at the sky. The bright sun and faint clouds were slowly flowing past.

“…As you said, those eyes didn’t vanish all at once. Slowly, as if saying it could still be undone, they vanished slowly. But unlike you, I didn’t protect those eyes.”

Standing back-to-back with her, looking at the forest over there, Jang Geon let out a light sigh and flicked his sword clean. And he attempted to put it into the scabbard.

“Don’t do that.”

Jang Geon’s hand stopped.

“It’s been too long since I faced those eyes. Hearing your story yesterday, I realized it. As those eyes vanished, I died too. This body breathes, but I’ve been dead for a long time.”

Ju Yeo-rang closed her eyes, feeling the sunlight filling her face.

“Let me meet my siblings now. I’m sorry for asking such a favor. Thank you, Jang Geon.”

Jang Geon looked at her with closed eyes. Though there was some bleeding, with his point-striking method he could stop that blood and save her. And he had attacked avoiding vital organs with that intention as well.

However, looking at her receiving sunlight while looking up at the sky, Jang Geon could not put away his sword.

She spoke.

“Finish it.”

Jang Geon did so.

Flicking clean the sword that flashed briefly once more, he put it into the scabbard. As iron met wood, it made a dry rustling sound, then finished with a clack.

Afterwards, Jang Geon looked down at the ground for a moment without saying anything.

“Ahem.”

At that moment, someone let out a dry cough. Looking at the place the sound came from, Jang Geon saw Je Un-seong dressed in black clothes with hands behind his back, looking at him with bitter eyes. Behind him, black-clothed masked men appeared with a rustle.

“…I didn’t expect it to end in this manner. Young Master Je Sang-cheon, who hanged himself at the main house, woke up. Thanks to that, we were able to confirm what that woman did and the Yeon Clan’s intrigue. And that you were merely a vagrant caught up while walking along the road.”

“Then what changes?”

At Jang Geon’s dry question, Je Un-seong blinked his lips for a moment, then continued speaking.

“Originally… I intended to capture that woman and all her contacts. That’s why I merely pursued. I planned to make you owe a debt by helping you the moment you fell into a crisis… but it all became useless acts.”

At that moment, from the sky, the Blood Plum Eagle flapped its wings and descended. Caught in the creature’s feet was a single carrier pigeon.

Je Un-seong raised his left arm to receive the creature and spoke.

“The wound looks severe. I have good medicine.”

Jang Geon let out a chuckle. And without answering, he blew a short whistle. Then from over the forest, Jojo appeared trotting, biting his own reins in his mouth.

“You damn bastard. If another thing like this happens again, know that I’ll just sell you off as a farm horse.”

Jojo snorted as if not knowing what he was talking about. Jang Geon stroked his neck and attempted to mount the saddle. However, his head suddenly spun, forcing him to stumble. Quickly standing straight to check, poison qi was circulating inside his body.

Jang Geon’s eyes turned toward the Yeon Clan warrior’s short spear.

“The Yeon Clan’s secret organization has no hesitation in using poison and hidden attacks. It seems you need help.”

However, Jang Geon let out a sigh, shook his head, and mounted Jojo’s back. And smiling faintly, he spoke to Je Un-seong.

“Take a good look at the pipa.”

And kicking Jojo’s waist, he slowly receded into the distance over the forest. Watching his back, a masked man asked Je Un-seong.

“…Shall we capture him? If he’s hit by poison, it will be easy. Or we can wait and capture him when he collapses.”

Je Un-seong let out a smirk.

“It doesn’t seem that friend will just die. Forget it, inspect the pipa.”

Inside the pipa rolling on the ground, a pile of secrets of the Je Clan stolen by Ju Yeo-rang were contained. Agreements with various factions, secrets of clan members, or secrets of other factions collected by them, etc. Jang Geon had simply handed it over without any compensation.

Searching for Jang Geon who was already far out of sight between trees, Je Un-seong muttered.

“…Will he ultimately break, or break through? I become curious about your future story.”

Small clouds blocked the sun, and colorful shadows settled over the forest.