Chapter 305: Chapter 305

Upper Gate Gang.

I looked at the nameplate and said,

“Hey, can’t you guys even read? That says ‘Upper.’ Not ‘Ass.'”

“Grrkh!”

The hulking man tried to throw a punch at me, but the lackeys held him back.

Then one whispered to him,

“Just hold out a little longer. We’ve already come this far, after all. Once we’re inside, if we wipe them all out together… “

You little shit, I can hear everything.

Can’t even gauge the gap in our inner arts?

In any case, it wasn’t as if I hadn’t expected a situation like this.

In times like these, it was better to go in making a scene.

I gave the door a solid kick.

There should’ve been a satisfying BANG as it blew open and sent the people inside scrambling, but—

CRACK.

“……”

The planks were so flimsy that my foot punched straight through the kicked section and got stuck inside.

“Hey, you guys—…… never mind.”

I gathered Great Yang Palm in both hands and blasted it forward. Finally, the sound I’d been waiting for rang out.

CRASH—!

The door splintered apart and scattered in all directions.

The wood was so cheap that sawdust sprayed everywhere. Seriously, how bargain-bin was that timber?

And then, right on cue, the shouting I’d expected came from inside.

“Who goes there!”

“Do you know where you are!”

“How dare you barge into the Upper Gate Gang!”

So every last one of them here was dim. They couldn’t even get their own gang’s name right.

The Black Path thugs who’d been bristling with weapons at the ready spotted the hulking man and frowned.

“Huh? Killing Fist? Killing Fist! What the hell happened!”

“Go geth the Gang Chieth!”

“What? What the hell is that moron saying!”

“Go geth! The Gang Chieth!”

“What the fuck is this idiot……”

In the end, a lackey stepped forward and reported.

“Captain! The Gang Chief, the Gang Chief needs to come……!”

“What?”

“Jin So-un…… it’s the Black Flame Dragon! The Black Flame Dragon!”

“Black Flame Dragon? The Black Path Rising Star, the Black Flame Dragon?”

“Yes!”

The moment my alias came up, the surroundings went dead silent.

My fame really was something, apparently.

After a brief pause, the Black Path thug flew into a rage.

“These worthless pieces of shit got their asses kicked by some brat and now they’re calling for the Gang Chief?!”

Judging by the long scar across his lip, he must’ve earned that running his mouth.

I watched the Black Path thugs storming toward me with weapons drawn and asked the hulking man,

“Hey, is your name Killing Fist?”

“Yeah……”

“What a name.”

“……I will definithely kill you.”

I dodged a great saber swung at my head as if to split it and drove a fist into the man’s gut.

BOOM—!

The thug rocketed toward the wall like a cannonball.

Next, I caught a spear tip thrusting at my heart, pulled him toward me with a Lotus grip, swept his leg, and dropped him.

“KGHK!”

Then came an axe swinging at my neck.

These bastards didn’t even have the decency to standardize their weapons.

CLAP!

“HEEK!”

The axe-wielder nearly jumped out of his skin when I caught the blade bare-handed.

I wrenched the axe away, flipped it to grab the handle, and brought it down on his head.

“N-no!”

This bastard had no hesitation splitting other people’s skulls, yet—

Total double standard.

But I was a chivalrous hero among chivalrous heroes who didn’t kill recklessly.

So I flipped the axe around and just adjusted his head a little.

THWACK!

Hm…… was that a bit rough?

The Black Path thug collapsed unconscious, blood streaming.

Well, at least when he woke up, he’d be able to read his own gang’s name properly.

Next, a sword-wielding one came charging…… Huh?

Why the fuck was he carrying a Mount Hua Sect sword?

Seriously, was he insane?

“You…… need a major lesson.”

“Die, you bastard!”

I fired the Flying Dragon Claw to bind his hand and yanked him forward while kicking his body out from under him.

Examining the confiscated sword, it really was a genuine Mount Hua Sect blade.

“You’re a complete halfwit. Hey, dumbass—you get caught walking around with this by Mount Hua Sect and you’re dead.”

I snapped the blade in half for his own good, and his pupils shook violently.

Still hadn’t grasped the situation, apparently.

“Hey, I just saved your life.”

“Wh……at.”

“The least you can do is say thank you for saving you, right?”

“Th-thank y—”

“Don’t bother, you piece of shit!”

The fist-launched body smashed through the building’s door and tumbled inside.

I looked down at my fist anew.

‘I’m actually pretty strong, aren’t I?’

Having spent all my time fighting inhuman opponents, my standard for “strong” must’ve gotten way too inflated.

Then again, even the Murim Academy students were the ultimate weapons each sect had poured their hearts into training. It was only natural my eyes had been raised.

Black Path thugs I’d have been too intimidated to even make eye contact with in my past life now felt like children.

After staring at my fist for a moment, I turned to the lip-scarred thug and asked.

“Hey, don’t I kind of look like…… a chivalrous hero?”

“……The fuck is this lunatic on about!”

A quick saber? But it’s slow, though.

THWACK!

One kick and Lip-Scar crumpled.

“AAARGH! I’ll kill you!”

For some reason, not a single one of them had a unified martial art or weapon.

Grabbing random warriors off the street and throwing them together would’ve been more coordinated than this bunch.

On top of that, these little punks had more guts than sense—they kept getting up no matter how many times they got knocked down.

‘Anyone with proper training would’ve recognized the difference in martial prowess by now.’

But no problem.

“URGK!”

When Killing Fist finally moved and threw a punch, I blocked it and grabbed him by the collar.

“See, I’m also a Sojeong Squad alumnus.”

“Huh?”

And brought my forehead crashing down.

THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!

They keep getting up no matter what?

The solution was simple.

THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!

Beat them until they can’t.

“Guhhhrk.”

Killing Fist spat out a few more kernels of corn along with blood from his mouth.

His days of tearing into meat were over for good. I genuinely felt sorry for him, tsk.

I steadied my breath, then bellowed using abdominal breathing.

“Come at me, you bastards! Come on, come on!”

Thugs who lived by sheer guts wouldn’t stop until they realized their opponent was a madman.

So.

I needed to show them just how beautifully insane I was.

I tore through the oncoming thugs—cracking skulls, snapping legs, and wrenching arm joints out of their sockets—rampaging in every direction.

By the time every last Black Path lackey lay sprawled on the ground—

“……Wh-what in the hell is going on here!!!”

The Gang Chief of the Asshole Gate appeared.

***

“Jin…… So-un? The Black Flame Dragon, Jin So-un!”

“That’s right.”

The Gang Chief of the Asshole Gate could barely contain his fury at the scene before him.

“What is the meaning of this?!”

His killing intent prickled my skin, sharp enough to numb.

“Boss, let’s chop off his limbs first and talk after.”

“Yeah, Boss! Black Path punks think the whole world is theirs the second their name gets a little known—they need a reality check.”

“You’ve gotta teach a kid like that how scary the world really is……!”

The men lined up beside him unleashed killing intent as well.

At least among all the Asshole Gate members I’d seen, these four had the most refined qi.

‘Hm, the Gang Chief is…… about Captain level…… His brothers are…… Unit Captain level?’

While I was gauging their level, the Gang Chief ground his teeth.

“Cut off his arms and legs one by one and bring them to me. Leave the tongue! I need to hear the reason!”

“Sir!”

At the Gang Chief’s command, four men moved simultaneously.

The way they seized four positions and assembled a formation—that wasn’t amateur work.

‘Four Directions Jade Lock Formation.’

One of the most basic sword formations, but the most effective for fighting many against one.

“You…… must’ve made quite a name for yourself in the Black Thought Alliance.”

“Today we’ll fix that attitude of yours.”

“Of course, you’ll never hold a sword again.”

“HYAAAH!”

But it wasn’t very effective.

A sword formation requires mutual trust as its foundation.

You had to be willing to give your life in place of the person beside you—that was the resolve needed to execute a sword formation.

And yet—

‘Sloppy.’

The formation these men executed was inferior in both skill and resolve to what the Gold-Silver-Copper kids could do.

THWACK! THWACK!

I caved in the face of the one charging at the front with Ten Thousand Transformations Invincible Fist, then lashed out with a kick at the one swinging his sword.

Right about now, the one replacing the swordsman should’ve stepped forward to tie up my leg—but these men didn’t have that kind of resolve.

This was nothing more than a formation built for efficiently ganging up on someone.

THWACK! CRACK, CRACK!

I struck his solar plexus while simultaneously snapping the sword hand, then headbutted his teeth clean out.

This one wouldn’t be eating meat either, just like Killing Fist. Shame.

“KGHK!”

I grabbed the collar of the one about to topple and drove my forehead down again.

Having been reassured by losing just his teeth, the second impact on his nose made his eyes roll back.

I turned to look at the remaining two.

“W-wait!”

“Wait, my ass!”

I closed in on the one right next to me without hesitation, snapped his shin, then drove my fist into his face.

His nose vanished.

From now on, he’d have to breathe through his mouth only.

I swept his legs out, dropped him, then kicked him in the head to finish him off.

One left.

I slowly turned my head.

“HEEK! Y-you lunatic!”

Finally, the certification had been issued from their own mouths.

Now, sir, it’d hurt my feelings if you just ran.

WHIRRRR!

The Flying Dragon Claw shot out and seized his clothing, and with the sound of wire reeling in, his body came flying toward me.

The instant he arrived before my eyes—

THWACK!

One punch to the face sent the fourth brother spinning twice in midair before crashing down.

Having demolished the Four Directions Jade Lock Formation in short order, I flashed the Asshole Gate’s Gang Chief a bright smile.

“Want me to come to you? Or you coming to me? Oh, and don’t even think about running.”

***

The Upper Gate Gang’s chief was a man who’d weathered the Black Path murim for many years.

For some twenty years, he’d roamed the murim with his four brothers. Tired of sleeping rough and scraping together other people’s pocket change, he and his brothers pooled their resolve to found a sect.

With the Black Thought Alliance having just formed as a force to oppose the Murim Alliance, he’d figured he no longer had to worry about the Murim Alliance launching one-sided Black Path suppression campaigns. He’d planned to spend the rest of his days building the Upper Gate Gang and living out a quiet retirement.

‘This crazy…… what the fuck kind of shit is this……’

The Upper Gate Gang he’d worked so hard to establish had been demolished in a single day.

By some brat barely past his coming-of-age, no less.

GULP.

Burning fury surged from his core, but he clamped down and endured.

The instinct honed over twenty years of surviving in the murim was screaming a warning.

‘He’s on a different level.’

In martial arts, obviously—but the real problem was this bastard’s mental state.

‘He’s a different level…… of lunatic.’

This wasn’t some hypocrite who’d come to mete out punishment for evil deeds.

If that were the case, he’d have drawn his sword long ago.

And every member of the Upper Gate Gang would’ve had their heads lopped off.

The thing in front of him was concealing his fury, channeling it into toying with his opponents.

The kind of sense you could only develop after decades in the Black Path murim, seeing every type there was.

‘……He’s truly insane.’

Why this lunatic had come all the way here to raise hell—the Gang Chief had to know.

“……What do you want?”

“Hm?”

“I’m asking what you want, doing this!”

“Hmm…… wouldn’t it be better to talk after we fight?”

The way he lazily beckoned with his fingers made the Gang Chief’s eyelid twitch.

But you must not provoke a madman further.

Swallowing his rage once more, he asked.

“I want to hear what happened from the beginning.”

“From the beginning…… All right. So I was at an inn eating with my guild’s people, right……”

Having heard the story, the Gang Chief could only crinkle his nose.

“You did all this over a measly ten silver taels?”

“……A mea.sly. ten. sil.ver. taels?”

The madman’s neck twitched side to side.

Unblinking eyes boring straight into him.

Seeing the madness in those eyes, the Gang Chief became certain.

‘So the rumors were true?’

The rumor that this lunatic was the Joint Successor of the Black Path murim’s absolute masters.

He’d dismissed it as tavern gossip…… but now he was sure.

There had to be some hidden reason—officially, the bastard was posing as a disciple of an Orthodox Path sect—but he was undoubtedly the Joint Successor of Black Path masters.

The madman’s voice reached him again.

“A. Mea.sly. Ten. Sil.ver. Taels.”

That realization drained the strength from his entire body.

Everything about the bastard that had seemed impressive now came flooding back, terrifyingly so.

If he truly was the successor of the Black Path masters he knew……

‘There’s no way I can win……!’

Watching the mad—no, the Joint Successor close in on him, the Gang Chief involuntarily stumbled backward and fell.

“W-wait! Wait! It-it was a mistake!”

“Mistake?! You’re saying you did that by mistake?”

“W-we’re friends, aren’t we! We’re in the same boat! If the Black Flame Dragon does this to us, you’re only doing the righteous bastards a favor!”

STOP—

Did his desperate words actually work?

What if his identity was supposed to stay hidden and this blew his cover—would he slaughter them all?

Pessimistic thoughts flooded his mind.

Then, the crazed gleam in Jin So-un’s eyes suddenly reverted to normal.

“Hmm…… right, we’re friends, aren’t we?”

D-did it work?

At Jin So-un’s question, the Gang Chief nodded frantically.

“R-right. We’re friends, aren’t we!”

“Yeah, yeah. We’re friends. Then isn’t it wrong to extort money from a friend?”

“I-I’ll return it. I’ll return everything!”

“But there’s a wound left in my heart.”

Fuck, you lunatic! What about the wounds on our guys……!

The words rose to his throat, but he forced them back down.

If the Black Path masters had secretly raised a successor and covertly planted him in the Orthodox Path—

Then messing with Taeul Sect’s Great Heaven Merchant Guild meant……

He’d touched a grand operation run by the Black Path masters.

That was unambiguously his own fault.

“I-I’ll return triple what we took.”

“Good. Oh, and about going forward.”

“You mean Great Heaven Merchant Guild, run by Taeul Sect? I’ll order everyone never to collect protection fees from them again.”

“Hmm, that’s not quite it.”

At Jin So-un shaking his head, the Gang Chief broke into a cold sweat.

He couldn’t begin to guess what this lunatic would demand next.

“Since a friend is running the guild, shouldn’t you keep an eye out in case some other punks mess with it? Watch over it, protect it?”

“P-protect?”

“Yeah.”

“……Without collecting protection fees?”

“Obviously! Fuck, aren’t we friends?”

Was it his imagination, or did the Black Flame Dragon’s grip on his neck just tighten?

The Gang Chief swallowed the groan trying to escape through the pain and plastered on a forced smile.

“O-of course. From now on, whenever Great Heaven Merchant Guild passes through this area, we’ll volunteer to escort them!”

“Good, good. Very good. Then I trust you. Take care of things from here on out.”

Watching Jin So-un beam and offer a handshake as if nothing had happened, the Gang Chief thought—

As expected of the Black Path’s Joint Successor, he’d clearly inherited every last drop of their madness.