Chapter 42: Chapter 42

The corpses were neatly laid out in one place. It was an orderly sight, as if cargo had been stacked up. Jin Gyeon’s face noticeably hardened. Even at a rough glance, the dead exceeded ten in number.

Jang Geon dismounted from atop Jojo and examined those corpses. And he couldn’t help but marvel slightly.

“Most of them ended in a single move. He snapped their necks or crushed their heads.”

As he examined the corpses, he soon began scanning the traces around them as well.

“Looking at it, he seems to have noticed that the enemy pursuit party split into three and ambushed them first. He hid his horse on that slight mound over there, waited, and attacked from here. After taking out ten-odd people, he fled again before being surrounded.”

Squatting down, he slightly lifted the cloth covering the corpses’ faces.

“It seems these fellows couldn’t bring themselves to pursue right away. They collected the corpses and organized them like this before departing again. They probably plan to collect the corpses when they return.”

Jin Gyeon asked with a somber tone.

“…Does there appear to be no hesitation in Jin Jo’s handiwork?”

“Dismount and examine it yourself. You learned martial arts from the same temple, so you should know better.”

At Jang Geon’s answer, he shook his head.

“I have never learned how to deduce martial arts by tracing the marks on the dead. Our temple is a monastery; it is not a place that teaches methods for investigating murder cases.”

At Jin Gyeon’s slightly sharp answer, Jang Geon shrugged his shoulders lightly.

“At least it seems he had no intention of leaving them alive.”

At that answer, Jin Gyeon tightly gripped his horse’s reins and closed his eyes.

“…How could he forget the cultivation of great mercy and compassion learned at our temple and commit such slaughter? Shaolin’s martial arts are not for slaughter and destruction…”

Jang Geon quietly looked at Jin Gyeon, who was muttering like that, with calm eyes, then stood up from his spot and mounted Jojo again.

“It doesn’t seem like the distance has widened much. Jin Won-sang seems to be launching counterattacks in his own way in this open wilderness.”

“…The word counterattack is not correct. The ones who attacked first were the Sword Dragon Sect, and Jin Jo is simply unable to handle his own worldly afflictions.”

Jang Geon chuckled at Jin Gyeon’s words.

“Well. I don’t think it matters who was at fault first in this place anymore.”

Speaking like that, he dashed forward again. Jin Gyeon looked at him with somber eyes, then turned his gaze to the dead.

“…Namo Amitabha Buddha. May you proceed to the Pure Land.”

Folding his hands together in prayer, he then kicked the side of his horse and followed behind Jang Geon. In the place he left, a salty wind blowing from the salt lake in the distance fluttered the hems of the corpses’ clothes. Those who had already breathed their last did not budge even when that wind tickled their noses.

Jin Gyeon increased the horse’s speed and pulled up close to Jang Geon. Without fear of biting his tongue, he shouted while riding the horse.

“When will we be able to meet the pursuit party or Jin Jo!”

Jang Geon glanced at Jin Gyeon, turned his gaze back to the front, and answered.

“If Jin Won-sang isn’t blindly fleeing, it won’t be that far! There’s a high possibility that he and the pursuit party split into three are chasing each other’s tails and tearing up this area!”

It was just as he said. Not long after, Jang Geon and Jin Gyeon were able to discover corpses once again. They were less orderly than the previous ones, and several horses were dead as well. And Jin Won-sang’s traces had become rougher.

Brains crushed by punches, bodies turned inside out by claws… Looking at the scattered corpses, Jin Gyeon repeatedly chanted prayers with a face as dark as a rain cloud.

“How could this be… how could this be…”

His voice trembled slightly. Jang Geon silently turned his gaze away from such a Jin Gyeon and examined the ground. The horse tracks were entangled in a mess, but soon a long track separated in one direction again.

“Warrior Jang, we must quickly pursue the next trace. Before Jin Jo truly crosses a point of no return.”

“Hmm.”

Now Jang Geon’s complexion was also beginning to grow serious. Of course, the reason his face grew serious was not because he worried that Jin Won-sang might kill all the Sword Dragon Sect pursuers, but rather because it was gradually getting dark. Once night fell, it would become difficult to find traces, but the situation did not allow them to stop.

Jang Geon peeked at Jin Gyeon’s complexion. Jang Geon himself and Jojo were originally accustomed to wandering day and night, so night roads were not unfamiliar. But would that Shaolin monk be the same? If the horse Jin Gyeon was riding happened to break an ankle, it would become quite bothersome.

But looking at his hardened expression, he did not have a face that would listen if told to stop at night. Organizing his thoughts, Jang Geon shrugged his shoulders once by himself and mounted Jojo’s saddle again. And he began to ride, following the remaining traces. Jin Gyeon, who had chanted prayers while watching the dead, quickly caught up behind him.

Before them stretched a flat wilderness where it grew increasingly difficult to find hills. And the sparse grass and short trees diminished further from a certain point. The ground felt as though it was gradually growing moist, yet plants decreased, giving an eerie feeling. On top of that, the sun was setting, and such flat land stretched before their eyes that, were it not for the horizon seen far away and the mountain ranges rising abruptly and hazily above it, it was difficult to gauge the distance ahead and behind.

Just then, Jang Geon once again discovered people far away who were presumed to be corpses. But this time, it was different from the previous two cases. The corpses were not organized.

The corpses with crushed heads and shattered arms and legs rolled around at random, bleeding. Counting the number, Jang Geon could guess that one of the three pursuit parties had been annihilated here.

Not only Jang Geon, but this time Jin Gyeon also dismounted from his horse and examined the corpses.

“Amitabha… Jin Jo… how could you…”

The corpses of the Sword Dragon Sect martial artists scattered on the ground all had their heads smashed. In the previous two fights, Jin Won-sang had inflicted minimal attacks on each person, but this time he seemed to have poured more than a fair amount of internal energy into most of the martial artists. There were even martial artists and horses that seemed to have died while fleeing.

Jang Geon stopped in front of one of the corpses. It was a man lying flat on his back facing the sky, and a tall wooden staff was stuck upright into his chest. He had impaled the martial artist with that staff and pinned him to the ground as he was.

“Umm…”

What was terrible was that the martial artist’s corpse was quite gruesomely damaged. Both eyes were gouged out, his nose was torn off, and there was no tongue inside his wide-open mouth. His limbs were twisted several times, even turning limp as if he were a soft-bodied creature, and the internal organs that came out of his split belly were messily scattered around him. Although he had not known Jin Won-sang for long, Jang Geon, who had not expected him to do such a terrible thing, let out a low groan.

Examining another spot, Jin Gyeon heard that groan and came over, then confirmed the corpse, let out a hollow sigh, and looked up at the sky.

“Ah… Jin Jo… You have fallen into demonic deviation. Far from casting aside your worldly afflictions, you have covered yourself in them…”

“What on earth happened? He didn’t seem like a fellow who would do such a thing.”

Jin Gyeon’s eyes looking up at the sky were filled with sorrow and regret.

“…Qi deviation. Having lost his former love and killed so many people in that fury, it is perhaps a matter of course. Afflictions and demonic energy are warping Jin Jo’s inner self and turning him into a monster. If we do not stop that fellow quickly, he will truly become a demonic practitioner… We must hurry and follow his traces.”

At those words, Jang Geon, who had been groaning, suddenly turned his head. In his field of vision, people were seen riding horses from afar.

“Another problem came faster. It’s a pursuit party. What will you do?”

The distance to them was still considerable. It was a distance where they could avoid meeting if they wished. But upon discovering them at Jang Geon’s words, Jin Gyeon spoke in a firm tone.

“Their pursuit will no longer have any meaning. Even if they meet Jin Jo, it will only increase meaningless deaths. We must stop them.”

“…They won’t be willing to listen to reason easily?”

Jin Gyeon raised a fist as solid as flint.

“If necessary, we may also discipline them.”

Speaking like that, he stepped forward with steady strides and waited for them to approach. Intending to watch what he would do, Jang Geon stood behind with arms crossed.

A moment later, around thirty Sword Dragon Sect martial artists came riding horses in a rush and stopped at a distance. Looking at Jin Gyeon and Jang Geon with bewildered eyes, their complexions hardened as they discovered their dead comrades lying behind them.

Among them, a middle-aged man drew his sword and led his horse forward.

“Dressed like that, you appear to be a monk, but what are you doing here right now? And those corpses behind you appear to be our Sword Dragon Sect disciples!”

Holding a hardened face, Jin Gyeon folded his hands together in prayer and spoke.

“I am Jin Gyeon of Shaolin. I pray that you calm down and listen to my story.”

A profound, deeply resonating voice rang out across the wilderness and into the ears of the Sword Dragon Sect martial artists. Feeling internal energy and the power to calm the mind in that voice, Jang Geon realized it was a form of modified Lion’s Roar. Experiencing the Great Return Pill’s energy earlier and now Shaolin’s Lion’s Roar, Jang Geon felt he could let out a real Lion’s Roar right now.

“The one you patrons are pursuing currently stands on the boundary of the demonic path. He is in a state that ordinary martial artists cannot handle. The corpses behind show the power and ability he currently possesses. Perhaps the wound he received at the Sword Dragon Sect in the past will no longer be a shackle to him either.”

The Sword Dragon Sect martial artist who had stepped forward swallowed hard at Jin Gyeon’s softly resonating voice.

“…How could a Shaolin warrior monk be in such a remote frontier…”

“I truly have no face to show, but it is because the one you patrons are pursuing is a disciple of Shaolin. Therefore, I will first stop him and escort him to Shaolin, then I myself will bring our temple’s apology and return to the Sword Dragon Sect.”

The Sword Dragon Sect martial artists bustled in commotion.

“That lunatic was a warrior monk of Shaolin Temple?”

“No wonder a fucking strong guy shaved his head clean…”

The middle-aged martial artist who had stepped forward with a dazed expression snapped out of it at that whispering. He asked in a slightly bewildered tone.

“Well, excuse me. So what are you trying to say? That you’ll help us catch that assassin?”

“I am asking you to return. I shall handle his capture myself.”

At those words, the middle-aged martial artist’s face twisted in fury. He roared with a flushed face.

“Shit! Do you think that makes any sense? That bastard assassinated our Sect Leader! Yet you tell us to just back off because we can’t handle him! Where is there such nonsense! Are you saying you can do alone what a hundred of our pursuit party couldn’t do? No matter how great Central Plains’ Shaolin Temple is, to say such arrogant words, ”

Just then, with a sharp wind-ripping sound, followed immediately by a metallic clang, the sword held forward by the middle-aged martial artist snapped right off. Looking at his sword with two-thirds of it missing, the middle-aged martial artist wore a foolish expression. Then he slowly turned his eyes toward the source of the flash of light he had vaguely seen.

Over there stood Jang Geon, looking blank with his left hand resting on his scabbard and his naturally lowered right hand slowly rolling something inside. In the middle-aged martial artist’s eyes, that object appeared to be a coin.

Looking at the eyes facing him, Jang Geon said.

“He is not alone. There are two.”

The noisy Sword Dragon Sect martial artists quieted down. The middle-aged martial artist who had stepped forward was the senior martial artist of the Sword Dragon Sect striking force. Among their pursuit party split into three, he was the most senior, and at the same time the top master. A master who could snap a martial artist’s sword, an iron sword, with a single flick of a coin was a terrifying level even to them.

Swallowing hard, the middle-aged martial artist looked back and forth between Jin Gyeon and Jang Geon with trembling eyes. The Sword Dragon Sect was a formal member of the Martial Alliance and tasked with maintaining order in this area, so their martial artists’ skill and pride were considerable.

But a master of the level who could flick a coin to break a sword, iron, was a frightening level even to them. Would the Martial Alliance striking force or patrol squad be at such a level? No, in the first place, martial artists who mastered hidden weapon techniques were extremely rare. Martial artists who mastered hidden weapon techniques faster than a sword were even rarer. He couldn’t even guess how fast Jang Geon would be if he picked up a sword.

Trembling violently, the middle-aged martial artist eventually quietly sheathed his broken sword. Seeing his appearance and the quieted martial artists, Jin Gyeon felt they had no will to fight and slowly bowed at the waist with his hands still in prayer.

“Thank you for stepping back. After escorting Jin Jo, I will definitely return to offer an apology and appropriate compensation.”

The Sword Dragon Sect martial artists couldn’t say anything and only scanned each other’s expressions. But Jin Gyeon did not wait for their answer. Finishing his words, he immediately turned around, mounted his horse, and looked at Jang Geon. Jang Geon, who was rolling a coin in his hand, chuckled and mounted Jojo’s back. And after scanning the hesitating Sword Dragon Sect martial artists, he sprinted following Jin Won-sang’s traces leading east. Jin Gyeon caught up right behind him.

When Jang Geon peeked back, he saw the Sword Dragon Sect martial artists, who had been staring dazedly at their backs, quietly approaching the corpses to clean them up.

“Your skill is magnificent. Did you learn hidden weapon techniques?”

Jin Gyeon pulled up beside him and asked. Jang Geon turned his head forward again and answered.

“No. I just watched someone use it over their shoulder.”

“…That is quite something for over-the-shoulder learning.”

Jang Geon only smiled faintly and did not answer. When he did not answer, Jin Gyeon did not ask further. The two rode their horses into the plain that was growing darker.

* * *

“…Amitabha.”

Jin Gyeon wore a surprised expression with slightly tired eyes.

Having galloped east all night with the dim moon and twinkling starlight as their lamps, they were now sprinting across a plain made of white sand and salt. The morning sunlight that had risen before they knew it reflected white on that salt plain, making them close their eyes naturally.

“The New Continent is… a marvelous place.”

Even while pursuing his assassin junior brother, Jin Gyeon could not hide his admiration at the sight unfolding before his eyes. Jang Geon was also seeing such a salt plain for the first time, so he fixed his gaze and did not answer. Looking around in all directions, there was only white salt and sand, making it feel as if they had fallen into another world. It was a landscape that someone would call beautiful for its endless white plain, while another would fear for its stark vastness.

Just then, Jin Gyeon’s horse let out a labored snort and came to a stop. Having walked and run all night, it seemed unable to endure any longer. Seeing that, Jojo also pretended to snort as if he too was exhausted, and flopped down to sit. Jin Gyeon dismounted from his horse with a somber face.

“Amitabha… Riding the horse any further will be difficult. But we have not found my junior brother yet…”

Jang Geon, who chuckled at Jojo flopping down after watching his chance, slapped his rump hard while sitting in the saddle and said.

“You punk, just stand up for a second. I won’t bother you after that.”

The fellow, who shook his head as if suspicious of Jang Geon, nevertheless slowly stood up again. Jang Geon roughly patted his neck, stepped on the saddle, and stood upright on it. And shade-making his eyes with both hands, he began to look around the salt plain.

“…Even if this place is a plain, doing that…”

“Found them. We’ve almost caught up.”

Scanning the plain, Jang Geon spoke like that and jumped lightly down from Jojo’s saddle. Stepping on the salt ground, he adjusted the sword at his waist and said.

“And it seems the last pursuit party and that friend are currently fighting. The horses are too exhausted to run. It seems we must run on foot from now on.”

Jin Gyeon opened his eyes wide at those words and asked.

“Which direction?”

“That way.”

He immediately looked in the direction Jang Geon gestured with his chin. Indeed, knowing what to look for, something tiny could be seen wriggling. Confirming it, he immediately sprinted out.

Jang Geon untied the bamboo hat he had shifted behind his back, tied it to Jojo’s saddle, and watched that scene. The way Jin Gyeon ran was unrefined, but it clearly looked similar to the qinggong he used. Sure enough, having several hundred years of history seemed to count for something.

Having tied his bamboo hat, Jang Geon tapped Jojo’s cheek and said.

“Take good care of your friend.”

Jojo looked at Jin Gyeon’s horse sitting beside him and snorted as if asking why that fellow was his friend. Chuckling, Jang Geon ran after Jin Gyeon. Jin Gyeon, who had set off first and moved far ahead, quickly drew close.

Across the stark white plain without a single structure or obstacle, the two men sprinted. The hardened salt and sand touched by their toes crumbled, raising faint dust.

Sprinting through that landscape where the sense of distance seemed broken, Jin Gyeon gasped. It was around the time he could distinguish Jin Won-sang and the pursuit party being slaughtered at his hands in the distance.

Resonating long and deep as if ringing a huge bell, Jin Gyeon’s voice echoed across the plain.

“Jin-Jo,!”