Chapter 33: Chapter 33
At the Sword King’s question, Cheon Woo-jin fell into a brief contemplation.
What was his identity?
Cheon Woo-jin had also had such thoughts himself before.
‘What is my identity?’
He had no family. Instead, there were two masters whom he could call family.
Cheon Woo-jin also knew. That he was a little different from others.
When he first held a sword was when he was barely three years old. Master White Elder had tried to teach only academics until he turned eight, but Master Black Elder had persistently thrust a sword into his hand.
It was from then on. That his masters’ greed began to show in their eyes.
Learning martial arts was easy. As long as he did as his masters taught him, no matter how late, he would completely master it before that night ended.
In the year he turned fifteen, Master White Elder said he had nothing more to teach, and from the year he turned eighteen, he could no longer have one-on-one sparring matches with his masters.
In the end, he could not win in a sparring match against the two masters. If he had only had about five more years, he would have been able to beat the two masters, which was regrettable.
Having scanned through his life with his masters in his memories once, Cheon Woo-jin returned to the essence of the question again.
“I do not know either.”
How would he know what his identity was?
Cheon Woo-jin himself did not know, and his two masters did not know either.
Black Elder said that Cheon Woo-jin had the makings of becoming the foremost villain under the heavens, but White Elder said on the contrary that he possessed the temperament to beat down every manner of villain in the world.
What neither he himself nor the two people closest to him knew was Cheon Woo-jin’s identity.
At the ambiguous answer, the Sword King narrowed his eyes.
“If you do not know, who knows?”
“Then what is your identity, Senior?”
At Cheon Woo-jin’s question, everyone in the area gaped open-mouthed. In particular, Namgung Jin, who thought of the Sword King as a god, felt as though he had been struck on the back of his head.
Around the time everyone was watching the Sword King’s reaction.
The Sword King, whose eyes opened wide and round, soon burst into hearty laughter.
“Hahaha! What a brazen fellow you are. I am Namgung Byeok. The Patriarch of the Namgung Clan, a man called the Sword King. Also, the father of this pathetic fellow.”
Cheon Woo-jin tilted his head. Was that identity? In Cheon Woo-jin’s thought, only a modifier meaningful even if dropped alone on a deserted island could become his essential identity.
If left alone in the world, what on earth would things like Sword King or Namgung Clan Patriarch signify?
That Cheon Woo-jin had come to have such thoughts was largely influenced by the two masters. They did not want Cheon Woo-jin to grow into a man with narrow vision.
They thought the path Cheon Woo-jin had to push through would be far more perilous than the path the two of them had walked. In the first place, they had picked up Cheon Woo-jin and raised him to make him accomplish what the two of them could not accomplish.
Therefore, they wanted him to see the essence of people. There was nothing more laughable than shrinking before an opponent’s hollow fame or background and failing to display one’s own capability.
It was also the reason why White Elder cast away the moniker of White Flower Sword Immortal, the most renowned in the world.
At Cheon Woo-jin’s reaction, the Sword King pondered deeply and spoke.
“Because I am a martial artist of the Righteous Path, my goal is to strike and kill every unorthodox evil and deviant, and in the end, become a man capable of founding a sect with the sword like the ancestors of Namgung.”
The Sword King abruptly declared his goal. Everyone was puzzled, but Cheon Woo-jin alone was extremely satisfied with that answer.
Cheon Woo-jin nodded his head and clasped his fists toward the Sword King. It was a courtesy that should rightly be shown to a man standing in the same place and looking in the same direction as Master White Elder.
“I am Cheon Woo-jin. Because I am merely curious about the world, I have no particular goal.”
Like Cheon Woo-jin having heard the Sword King’s goal, the Sword King also nodded his head as if pleased with Cheon Woo-jin’s answer.
In the end, he could not know where and from whom that brazen young generation talent had learned martial arts. If the person himself would not speak, there was also no way to force him to speak.
However, having learned with what mindset that bastard lived was far more important to the Sword King than learning his martial sect or background.
“Whatever the case, as long as you are part of the Martial Alliance, you can be said to be my junior. It is truly a gratifying thing.”
Cheon Woo-jin lightly bowed his head.
Of course, in that ambiguous conversation, the only people satisfied were Cheon Woo-jin and the Sword King. However, there was no one in this place, at least, who could cut in while the Sword King was nodding his head with satisfaction.
* * *
Headed by the Sword King, the martial artists of the Martial Alliance collected Giant Stone Monster’s corpse and then moved once more.
The Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader intended to return to the Martial Alliance immediately.
However, using the pretext that he had saved his son’s life, the Sword King invited the Alliance personnel to the Namgung Clan.
Normally, an invitation made the recipient’s intention important, but if the one who extended it was a man of the Sword King’s stature, the story changed.
For that reason, the Heavenly Tiger Squad and Black Tortoise Squad were moving helplessly to the Namgung Clan.
The Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader showed an anxious look like a person with obsessive-compulsive disorder. He was a man who had known nothing but missions his entire life.
Seeing this, Cheol Ji-ak laughed boisterously and thumped the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader on the back.
“Hahaha! Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader, relax your expression a little. Having finished the mission, we are entering the foremost clan of the Righteous Path with a warm reception, so why do you have an expression like someone who ate poison?”
“Ahem…”
The Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader cleared his throat.
In any case, the mission had ended faster than expected, and since the Namgung Clan was situated on the route back to the Alliance, staying for about a day did not matter much.
Around the time the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader was rationalizing while thinking so.
“S-Squad Leader!”
A Heavenly Tiger Squad member who was searching the surroundings approached urgently.
Quickly immersing himself in duty, the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader spoke with a stiffened face.
“What is it?”
Glancing secretly at the Sword King, who was walking some distance away, the Heavenly Tiger Squad member reported with a lowered voice.
“We have discovered Blood Immortal’s corpse.”
“What?”
Not to mention the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader, the expression of Cheol Ji-ak beside him also froze stiff.
At the same time, the Sword King and Cheon Woo-jin turned their heads and looked in the direction where they were.
No matter how much he lowered his voice, he could not deceive the ears of those two, of all people.
The Sword King approached.
“What do you mean by that?”
Hesitating to speak, the Heavenly Tiger Squad member looked at his squad leader’s reaction. In any case, his superior was the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader, not the Sword King.
When the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader nodded, only then did the report continue.
“We found Blood Immortal’s corpse at a spot twenty li to the west. There were no traces of battle around, but the corpse was heavily mutilated.”
The Sword King let out a lament. Why on earth was a bastard who had walked away perfectly fine dead without even getting far?
“Is there only Blood Immortal’s corpse?”
“Yes, from what we have grasped so far…”
“Let us go immediately.”
The Sword King moved his steps. Because the Sword Demon’s corpse had not been discovered, the Heavenly Tiger Squad members on guard around the area were somewhat in danger.
As the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader and Black Tortoise Squad Leader followed behind him without a word, about sixty Martial Alliance members headed toward that place all at once.
* * *
“Good grief…”
The Sword King let out a lament. The Heavenly Tiger Squad member’s report was accurate. There was not the slightest trace of battle around.
However, Blood Immortal’s two eyes were gouged out, and his heart was missing with his chest torn open.
Seeing this, the Heavenly Tiger Squad Leader called one squad member and spoke.
“You return to the Martial Alliance immediately and tell them to dispatch an investigator, and the remaining personnel will stay here in Hefei for the time being to grasp the movements.”
“I will provide quarters at the Namgung Clan.”
“…Would that be all right?”
The Sword King nodded his head. In any case, he was also minorly connected to this matter. After all, it was the Sword King who had let Blood Immortal leave alive.
It was then.
Instantly, the Sword King turned his head and glared somewhere.
An aura of truly tremendous magnitude was sensed.
Cheon Woo-jin was already looking there as well.
In that brief moment, Cheon Woo-jin’s and the Sword King’s gazes met.
Soon, without anyone needing to say who went first, the two flew forward and surged.
* * *
The World’s Twenty-Seven Revered Ones.
It was a term referring to the twenty-seven absolute experts who had achieved the Transformed Realm in the contemporary jianghu.
Naturally, the Sword King was also included among them.
Such a Sword King was swallowing astonishment continuously.
Even though he was deploying his lightness art at full strength, the young generation talent named Cheon Woo-jin was running on equal footing with him.
It was a speed so fast that the surrounding scenery changed each time they took a step, yet Cheon Woo-jin still seemed to have leeway.
The Sword King felt a slight regret.
‘Should I have asked his martial sect earlier?’
For a moment, intoxicated by style and atmosphere, he had nodded his head, but if the fellow was an expert of this caliber, the story changed a little.
Around the time such thoughts crept in faintly.
The two stopped simultaneously in an open vacant lot.
In a secluded forest where people’s footsteps were unlikely to reach, there was a small hut.
In the vacant yard, there were two burial mounds side by side, one of which was scattered as if beasts had dug it up.
It was an all too familiar place to Cheon Woo-jin.
Because it was none other than the place where he had lived serving his two masters.
Cheon Woo-jin approached Master Black Elder’s burial mound with calm steps. The mound was dug up into pieces, and inside was his master’s decomposed corpse.
Cheon Woo-jin’s eyebrows twitched.
The Sword King, who had approached, let out a lament.
“Were they done in by the same fellow?”
Just like Blood Immortal’s corpse, the chest was opened and the heart was empty. Unlike Blood Immortal, however, it seemed to have been dead for a long time and was quite decomposed, so the identity of the corpse could not be known.
Around the time the Sword King was deep in thought.
Cheon Woo-jin abruptly extended his hand toward the corpse.
The Sword King watched with surprised eyes, but Cheon Woo-jin laid Black Elder’s corpse comfortably, gathered the surrounding soil with his hands, and tidied up the burial mound once more.
Soon rising from his spot, Cheon Woo-jin let out a long sigh and bowed his head toward the burial mound.
At that sight, the Sword King asked.
“Is it someone you know?”
“He is my master.”
“W-What?”
Even the great Sword King could not help but be flustered. Having personally witnessed his master’s corpse desecrated to this extent, his heart must be utterly devastated.
The Sword King momentarily had many things he wanted to ask, but as proper human decency, he remained silent.
Soon Cheon Woo-jin turned his head and looked at a certain place.
‘He grew too distant.’
That aura, which had barely been sensed at the edge of his sensory perception, had already disappeared without a trace.
Even though the two had rushed immediately upon sensing the aura, for him to grow this distant in an instant meant he was definitely a formidable expert.
Well, that was probably why Blood Immortal ended up dying without even putting up any notable resistance.
Staring into the air for a moment, Cheon Woo-jin asked.
“How many people are there under the heavens who can kill Blood Immortal in an instant?”
“…Not many. At most, about two or three?”
Even he himself, called the Sword King, could not guarantee such a feat. In that case, it meant the heads of the other Five Great Clans and the Nine Great Sects and One Clan would also find it difficult.
Several figures surfaced in the Sword King’s mind.
The Cult Leader of the Heavenly Demon Cult, Alliance Leader Bukli Cheon, the Lord of the Black Overlord Castle.
Commonly called the Three Pillars of the World, if one of them carried out an ambush, it might be possible.
The problem was that none of the three had any justifiable cause to do so.
Of course, since Blood Immortal was a public enemy of the martial world, it would not be strange for him to die at the hands of Alliance Leader Bukli Cheon, but it was far too out of the blue.
“Among them, is there someone who holds a grudge against the Dark Emperor?”
At Cheon Woo-jin’s calm question, the Sword King opened his eyes wide and round. He did not expect the Dark Emperor’s name to emerge here.
However, Cheon Woo-jin’s doubt was natural. The only commonality between Blood Immortal and Black Elder was that they were disciples of the Dark Emperor.
Furthermore, someone had intentionally leaked information regarding Giant Stone Monster’s grave.
Cheon Woo-jin thought that it was in order to gather the disciples of the Dark Emperor in one place.
An expert who possessed a justification to target the disciples of the Dark Emperor, yet had the confidence to face them simultaneously…
At this moment, only a single person’s name was surfacing in Cheon Woo-jin’s mind.