As I stepped inside Bongchuam, both sides of the path were lined with lush bamboo groves, and the road was thickly blanketed with dry leaves. Judging by the layer of fallen leaves, it seemed no one had been here recently.
The very perfection of the leaf-strewn path made it seem impenetrable. It felt like a road I dared not tread upon.
“They did something interesting here.”
I admired it. From here on, it was Jinbeop. If I hadn’t had a taste of Jegal-hyeon’s Jinbeop at Cheon Gi Go, I might have gotten lost.
Jegal-hyeon’s Jinbeop appeared to be truly outstanding. It subtly made you change your steps. This was the way to win without fighting. I’d never used Jinbeop like this before, so it felt quite novel.
It didn’t nudge a person’s conscious mind, but rather guided them unconsciously. It was a highly sophisticated technique.
I reached out my hand to the sky. I could feel the gentle caress of the breeze. The scent of bamboo lingered at the tip of my nose.
Within the Jinbeop, the qi did not flow smoothly. It merely circulated in a fixed pattern. From the stagnant qi, it seemed that no intruders had been here recently.
“So that’s why they didn’t bother to set up any guards.”
At first, I was a little uneasy to find only Jinbeop here and no guards, but that wasn’t the case.
To set up guards amid such a natural Jinbeop would actually make it less natural. Indeed, the art of “hiding a tree by hiding a forest” was well-executed here.
Of course, no matter how natural a Jinbeop was, as long as I knew this was a Jinbeop and followed the flow of qi with Sangdanjeon, breaking through it wasn’t hard.
Each path led to a living gate. There were countless forks in the road, and I took in the scenery as I went. Baepungdae, where Zhuge Liang once prayed for a southeast wind, and the Wuhou Palace, the shrine enshrining him.
Behind Wuhou Palace was a sunken basin. At the bottom of the basin was a small house surrounded by a low wall. The house, shaped like a square, had buildings on all four sides and a courtyard in the center.
In the courtyard, there was a small wooden platform, and someone was lying there. I knew exactly who that was.
I approached the house. Up close, it felt out of place. Wuhou Palace, Baepungdae, and Bongchuam all bore the marks of time and decay, but this place was as clean as a newly built house.
There was a Hyeonpan above the main gate, but no words were inscribed on it. I paused there for a brief bow.
“Father, I’ve come.”
Then I opened the door and walked straight to the platform in the center of the courtyard without hesitation.
My father was lying there. Even without any special verification, his face contained features shared by me and my brothers.
“Gwisik Daebeop.”
As I’d expected, Father was under the effects of Gwisik Daebeop. By pressing certain points, one could deliberately slow the blood flow and heart rate to reduce metabolism.
A martial artist could do this to themselves by pressing their own acupoints, but since Father wasn’t a martial artist, someone else must have done it for him.
His face was so pale that blue veins showed through, and when I lifted his clothes, there were purple blotches near his Hadanjeon. The symptoms perfectly matched what I knew of Mujeongji.
— But what’s the point of seeing your father suffering from Mujeongji? There’s nothing you can do, even if you come here.
— I just wanted to see Father.
— …I see. There’s no reason needed to want to see family.
That’s what the Lord of the Alliance said to me in our final conversation. Jongri Un looked at me kindly as he spoke those words, as if I were a child who’d lost his father.
But unlike what I’d said to Jongri Un, I didn’t come just to see Father’s face.
Around the time I was tied up—so, from now, about ten years in the future—one of the unsolved mysteries of the Kangho was finally revealed. The true nature of Mujeongji.
Tasteless, odorless, and formless, what exactly was Mujeongji made from?
The truth was, it was a martial art passed down by Dokma, one of the Magyo Palma. That art was called Simdok Singong. Even though the name had ‘poison’ in it, it wasn’t actually poison, but martial arts. The reason Mujeongji had remained an enigma was because people only approached it as a poison, not as martial arts.
Once that secret came to light, it caused quite a stir, and Sacheon Dangmun ended up closing its doors for three years to take responsibility.
That’s something from my past life, but for now, it’s still a distant future.
That’s why I decided to come immediately. Mujeongji wasn’t a poison, but Sagi.
And Sagi was pure negative qi, the exact opposite of the qi contained in my Taeul Heavenly Origin Divine Art.
“Hoo.”
I stirred Taeul Heavenly Origin Divine Art and pressed my hand to Father’s Hadanjeon.
Immediately, an unpleasant energy enveloped my body. A cold yet foul sensation. The reason I could feel it so keenly was because I had cultivated Taeul Heavenly Origin Divine Art.
“…Ugh.”
A purple energy crept up to my wrist with a stinging pain. Even though I practiced Taeul Heavenly Origin Divine Art, which was the polar opposite of Sagi, it was still difficult to deal with.
After all, this was a venomous martial art planted by one of the Magyo Palma. Palma were masters standing between the Three Flowers Gathering and the Five Qi Gathering. That kind of master’s venom was not easy to remove.
At the tip of the blue energy swirling outside my body, a white energy began to emerge. It was the most intense qi I could muster.
I began to infuse my pure qi, starting from Father’s Hadanjeon, where the Sagi was pooled. My whole body blazed white.
Just then, the Songro at my waist trembled briefly. But that was all. I still couldn’t wield Songro as if it were truly mine.
***
“…Uh.”
Father, who had been lying down, twitched and groaned. It had taken three whole days of me pressing his Hadanjeon before this happened. My body was so exhausted, I could hardly get up from the ground.
The resistance from the Sagi was far worse than I’d expected, so I couldn’t let go even for a moment. If I did, the Sagi that burst from the Hadanjeon would spread through all the Sammaek.
Soon, Father blinked open his eyes. I immediately withdrew my hand from his Hadanjeon.
“Are you awake?”
“Who are you…?”
Father’s eyes and voice were filled with wariness. Even before I could explain myself, Father’s eyes widened in surprise.
“Are you, Mokhwan?”
“Yes.”
“How… how could… truly…”
Strangely enough, Father recognized me. Well, I also recognized Father, so maybe it wasn’t that strange.
Father couldn’t finish his sentence. Suddenly, he pinched his own cheek, looked around, and clenched and opened his hands.
I watched quietly as he did so. Then Father cupped my cheeks in his hands. I thought he might push me away, but instead, he sat up and hugged me, weeping.
Father had only seen me for two years at most. Even so, was he sad?
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…”
Father kept repeating apologies over my shoulder.
When I was first chained up in that cave, there were many days I blamed Father. Why was I born in this family, why did he make things this way? I wanted to hold him responsible. Yes, it was probably similar to what my brothers are feeling now.
But after my return, I felt nothing in particular toward Father. The feelings from my previous life had faded, and I didn’t have many memories of Father to begin with.
Yet, despite my thoughts, I couldn’t remain completely unmoved. Something twitched inside me. Not knowing what that feeling was, I just let it happen.
After we’d both cried for a while and Father let go of me, his eyes were swollen.
“Have you calmed down a bit?”
“Yes. I’m sorry.”
Father replied, sitting on the platform and glancing at me. Now that he’d cried, he seemed embarrassed and avoided my eyes. He patted the spot beside him.
“Don’t just stand there, come sit.”
“Yes.”
I sat beside him as he said. Father just stared vacantly at my face. I didn’t say anything. Whether he realized it or not, it had been ten years since he’d gone missing. I needed to give him time to accept the situation. Soon, Father spoke.
“How old are you this year?”
“Twelve.”
“Twelve… That’s exactly ten years.”
Hearing my answer, Father nodded and started smiling at my face. It was completely different from his earlier tears.
I wondered if his state had been worsened by Sagi, but apparently not.
“It’s a good day, even if it’s a dream.”
“It’s not a dream.”
I answered firmly. It would be troublesome if he thought this was just a dream. Father had many things to tell me.
Once Father seemed to have gotten his bearings, I began to speak. I told him what had happened to the family, the current situation, and the path I’d taken to find him.
I tried to summarize as much as possible, but even so, it took almost half a jin.
Of course, there were things I couldn’t explain.
“…But I was definitely poisoned with Mujeongji. How did that happen? My body feels so light now.”
“Hmm.”
I paused. I couldn’t talk about Taeul Heavenly Origin Divine Art. Nor could I mention Sangdanjeon.
“Yak Seon prepared a special medicine for you.”
“…So you had that kind of connection? For someone so elusive… Still, if it was Yak Seon, then it makes sense. To think even Mujeongji could be cured.”
Father seemed unconvinced by my rambling, but at the mention of Yak Seon, one of the Samsun, he seemed to believe me. To Jeongpa members, the Samsun were treated almost like gods.
Anyway, after hearing everything, Father’s eyes turned serious. A long silence of nearly an ilgang passed. For someone who had just grasped reality, it must have been a lot to take in.
While I thought so, Father finally spoke.
“Cheonjuseong, Hyeongsanpa, Jusampa. They’ve occupied our family’s home, you say. But Cheonjuseong and Jusampa… I’ve never heard of them before.”
I explained briefly about Cheonjuseong and Jusampa. Cheonjuseong was still little known, but was a mysterious gathering of Jeongpa masters, while Jusampa was a new power in Zhejiang that had appeared after crushing Botaam.
“So there have been major changes in the Jeongpa forces. I thought it might happen, but it was so fast,”
Father said.
“First, let me explain why I’m here.”
“I know you were infected by Mujeongji and requested protection from the Murim Alliance to stay alive.”
“That’s right. But I need to tell you why I was poisoned in the first place.”
Father continued.
“When I was inspecting the trading routes of the Central Plains, I discovered that unknown materials were being smuggled in from Xinjiang through nameless caravans.”
“Xinjiang? Then, the Majyo.”
“That’s the only explanation. I kept investigating what the cargo was. No matter how much they tried to hide it, there’s no place in the Central Plains with more eyes than ours. In the end, I found out what it was.”
I looked at Father. He paused for a moment.
“I don’t know if I should be telling you this. It’s the reason I ended up here, after all.”
“It’s all right. From the moment you were struck down, our future was probably no different from yours.”
“…You’re right. Well, the cargo was Godok eggs. There were at least several hundred.”
Godok. As soon as I heard the word, my previous life flashed before my eyes. That Godok, which mortgaged half my life. The feeling of Godok eating away at one’s brain was something only those who’d experienced it could know.
Godok was absolutely forbidden in the Central Plains. Only Majyo cultivated and used Godok. Just what was Majyo preparing, to be smuggling so many Godok into the Central Plains?
No matter how vast the Central Plains was, the moment Godok was discovered, the entire Jeongpa would rise up. For them, it was a dangerous and burdensome task. I tried to guess a few likely places where they might hide Godok.
Yugok, in Unnam Aenoesan, a den of criminals and all sorts of riffraff. Or Heukryeonggang, Gillym?
But the words that came from Father’s lips were nothing I’d expected.
“And that Godok was being supplied to Seomseo.”
“Seomseo?”
Even I couldn’t hide my shock at that. Seomseo, home to prestigious sects like Hwasan Sect and Jongnam Sect. It was the very heart of the Central Plains.
“Yes. At first, I found it hard to believe too. If Majyo was delivering Godok all the way to Seomseo, it meant they had infiltrated deep into the Central Plains. So I kept tracking those shipments…”
Father stopped there. I nodded, guessing the rest.
“And that’s when you were struck by Mujeongji.”
“They moved faster than I did. I just barely managed to inform the Murim Alliance that Godok was flowing into Seomseo before I disappeared into hiding here.”
I fell into deep thought. The Murim Alliance didn’t govern the entire Central Plains. To be precise, it oversaw the sects.
The regions were governed by the major sects present there. In Seomseo, that meant Hwasan and Jongnam. If the Godok made it that far, then it was no longer just those two I had to suspect. It meant there were more Majyo agents across the Central Plains than I knew.
…If that’s the case.
I had always thought that Majyo devoured our family either through luck or because of a secret pact with my second brother.
But what if we had been Majyo’s target from the beginning…? I needed to rethink everything from scratch. How exactly our family was infiltrated, and how Hyeongsanpa, Jusampa, and Cheonjuseong had moved in. If Majyo had been the ones to set them in motion, and the probability was high.
“Father. There’s something I want to ask.”
“Yes?”
I looked at Father. Now, it was time to reveal my purpose for coming here.
“The family’s seal. Where is the Geum In?”
“…Why are you suddenly asking that?”
Father’s voice was full of surprise. The Geum In was the symbol of the head of the family. Father knew what my question meant. He only asked again because he couldn’t believe it. But he’d understood me correctly.
“Because I have to become the head.”