Wudang Sacred Scriptures

Sa Gwirang, First Kill of Hidden Moon Forest, sensed the shadow wavering before her and laboriously opened her eyes.

“Cave Hermit Taoist?”

Kwak Yeon nodded.

“That is correct.”

“Good. You made it before it was too late. Cough! Ptui!”

Sa Gwirang spat a clump of blood onto the floor.

Kwak saw fragments of organs mixed into the dark-red mass. The old woman did not have much life left in her.

“Why did you cling so desperately to life just to see me?”

The old woman had used an emergency measure, expelling clogged blood to force her true qi back up. She was in a state where death could come at any moment.

Kwak had no choice but to get straight to the point.

“I have a deal to make.”

Perhaps because she had forced her true qi upward, Sa Gwirang’s eyes were far clearer than before.

“A deal...?”

To Kwak, this old woman was merely a dying assassin whose commission had failed. Worse, she had tried to massacre countless commoners. He felt no human sympathy for her.

“I have no particular desire to make a deal with you.”

“......!”

At Kwak’s flat refusal, Sa Gwirang’s wart-covered face twisted.

Kwak continued evenly.

“To be honest, are you in any position to ask me for a deal? Especially in your present condition.”

In other words, a person about to die was in no position to bargain. She ought to be asking for a favor—no, begging for one.

“Cave Hermit Taoist, I know my own condition better than anyone. I do not need you to point it out.”

Sa Gwirang nodded, then glared at Kwak.

“I have never asked anyone for pity in my entire life. Naturally, I intend to pay the price for any deal I make with you as well.”

Kwak felt hatred for the world in the old woman’s eyes. It was so vicious that the Honwonmusang qi inside him responded with a faint tremor.

Still, now that she clung to this deal strongly enough to mention payment, Kwak had no choice but to ask.

“What can you offer as payment?”

“This body of mine.”

“......?”

Kwak tilted his head, utterly baffled.

“No matter how I look at it, that sounds more like baggage than payment. What use would I have for an old woman’s corpse besides arranging a funeral?”

At Kwak’s perfectly reasonable question, Sa Gwirang curled one corner of her mouth upward.

“Do you truly think Sa Gwirang, First Kill of Hidden Moon Forest, would ask for something as trivial as a funeral?”

“......!”

Kwak could not answer at once.

Assassins who lived on the border between life and death did not concern themselves with what happened after their own deaths. The very thought was absurd.

“Cave Hermit Taoist, once you promise me this deal, you will need this body of mine. So do not worry about that.”

“......?”

Since the old woman was so obsessed with the bargain that she had offered up even her own corpse as payment, Kwak decided to hear her out.

“Tell me what you have to say.”

“I have information on someone tied to the people you are looking for.”

For the first time since entering Dragon King Hall, Kwak flinched.

She had not spoken of the people trying to kill him.

She had spoken of the people he was trying to find.

“How do you know that I am looking for someone?”

“So you are interested at last.”

Sa Gwirang raised the corner of her mouth as though mocking him.

“The Aju Unbinding Operation ordered by the lord of Hidden Moon Forest this time was to kill the Cave Hermit Taoist, no matter what. That was why we even used the Blue-Scale True-Flame Demon Blossom in the market streets. It was reckless enough to make all of Hidden Moon Forest enemies of the martial world and put us on the run from government troops as well. Could that truly be worth one million gold?”

Kwak did not hesitate to answer the judgment of a woman who had spent her life as an assassin.

“Even I thought it was abnormal.”

One million gold was an enormous sum, but not enough to covet at the cost of putting an entire sect in danger.

Sa Gwirang nodded.

“I thought the mission was strange as well, but it was the lord of Hidden Moon Forest’s command. I had no choice but to obey. Then, when I saw that collaborator in Aju County City, I realized something was terribly wrong.”

“......!”

Kwak’s eyes gleamed at her mention of a collaborator.

He had vaguely suspected as much from the moment she proposed the deal. Now it was confirmed.

“The lord of Hidden Moon Forest did not issue this mission as a simple commission. There was another purpose. My conclusion was that killing you, Cave Hermit Taoist, was the lord’s real objective. The one million gold was nothing but a pretext.”

“There are only two reasons an assassin sect would risk its own survival to make certain a target dies.”

“......”

“Either that target is already a mortal enemy, or someone certain to become one.”

Sa Gwirang paused before continuing.

“Hidden Moon Forest has never held such a grudge against you, Cave Hermit Taoist. Had this affair not happened, there would have been no chance of it happening in the future, either. Which means the lord of Hidden Moon Forest broke an inviolable rule of an assassin sect, colluded with some outside faction, and drove his own people toward death.”

—Crunch!

Sa Gwirang ground her teeth.

“I thought long and hard about why some outside faction that had joined hands with the lord of Hidden Moon Forest would consider you someone certain to become a mortal enemy. Nothing came to mind except this: you were tracking them, they felt threatened, and they wanted to eradicate you root and branch.”

“......!”

“You confirmed it just now, so I did not waste my time thinking.”

“You did not earn your place as First Kill of Hidden Moon Forest for nothing.”

Kwak nodded and asked,

“Anyway, your trump card is the identity of that collaborator in Aju County City. What do you want from me?”

“......”

“Ah, for the record, I have no ability to save people. And even if some impossible chance did grant me such an ability, I would have no intention of saving you.”

Sa Gwirang twisted her mouth into a grin.

“Hey, Cave Hermit Taoist. Look closely at my face.”

Kwak looked at Sa Gwirang’s wart-covered face.

“This hideous mug. One arm is gone. Ah, and now I do not even have a chest left.”

“......!”

Kwak sensed black energy rising from the old woman—something similar to the black energy that had recently consumed him.

“And my temper is even more spectacular. You know that well, since you have experienced it yourself. Wouldn’t the world be better off if it never had to see this filthy mess again?”

Seeing the resentment filling the old woman’s eyes, Kwak understood that she had lived her whole life wrapped in black energy.

And hers was even darker than his had been.

It had clearly arisen from an emotion deeper than resentment or sorrow.

“Cave Hermit Taoist, what I want is for you to smash in the back of that bastard lord of Hidden Moon Forest’s head in my stead. It is not a difficult request for you, is it?”

Kwak realized that Sa Gwirang had proposed this deal because she wanted revenge on the lord of Hidden Moon Forest.

“It is not difficult. But why insist that I smash in the back of his head? You could simply ask me to kill him.”

“Because that is how I committed my first murder.”

“......?”

“The bastard saw it and brought me into Hidden Moon Forest, acting as though he had done me some great favor. I spent my entire life serving him through misery enough to kill a person. And in the end...”

She glanced down at the hole in her chest.

“This is what I got.”

Kwak understood where the old woman’s black energy had come from.

“All right. I have a debt to collect from the lord of Hidden Moon Forest as well. I see no reason to refuse.”

“If you have the time, I would like you to use a club to smash the back of his head.”

“A club? Was that your first murder weapon?”

“More precisely, it was a laundry paddle.”

“......”

Kwak watched the twisted smile at the corner of Sa Gwirang’s mouth and briefly wondered how deep a person’s bitterness could run.

Then he suddenly understood how immeasurably distant the wall of the seven emotions and five desires was—the wall one had to cross to reach the Ultimate Void.

“There should be one Corps Commander in the Martial Alliance who carries a bow. It is black, so it will stand out. Finding him will not be difficult.”

Sa Gwirang’s abrupt words jolted Kwak awake.

“......!”

He recalled the Black-Iron Strongbow hanging from the waist of Jwa Ye-geuk, Geoncheon Corps Commander of the Martial Alliance Outer Court.

“At some point, I will show you my arrows. Of course, should such an opportunity arise.”

Now that he thought about it, it had not been a mischievous joke.

It had been an open provocation.

The Geoncheon Corps Commander knew that I would end up fighting the Fire Dragon of the Jegal Family!

Right Military Strategist Baek Ri-gi naturally came to mind as an extension of that provocation.

The day Baek Ri-gi summoned him to the Right Military Strategist’s hall and then left his seat had not been a coincidence.

Seeing Kwak’s hardened expression, Sa Gwirang said,

“Cave Hermit Taoist, judging by your face, you already know who it is.”

“I do.”

The corner of Sa Gwirang’s mouth rose slightly.

“Then that is even better. Take this body of mine with you.”

“......?”

When Kwak simply looked at her, Sa Gwirang said,

“That Corps Commander shot a hole through my chest with that black bow. There is no more certain evidence than this body.”

Only then did Kwak understand why she had said that her body itself would be the price of their bargain.

The marks left by an arrow fired from the Black-Iron Strongbow remained plainly on her body.

“Heh-heh-heh!”

Sa Gwirang suddenly burst into mad laughter.

“For once, I do not resent this face of mine. Because of this ugly face, no one will be able to deny that this body belonged to Hidden Moon Forest’s First Kill. Heh-heh-heh! Cough!”

The old woman threw back her head and laughed, then suddenly spewed blood from her mouth.

A moment later, she went still.

Kwak looked at the old woman, who had severed her own heart meridian, with complicated feelings.

She had left the world with a savage laugh, but sadness remained in her fading eyes.

Unable to endure the disdain and contempt people had shown her because of her hideous appearance, she had exploded in a single instant. That moment had changed her entire life.

Afterward, an inner demon had consumed her, and she had spent the rest of her days in hell.

After watching her for a moment, Kwak lifted the lamp from the altar and set fire to the clutter around it.

He did not want people whispering about her appearance even after she was dead.

Giving me the identity of that collaborator is enough. I will keep my promise to you.

It was also repayment for the pain worse than death that she had endured to hold on until now.

—Whoosh!

Just as the flames truly began to spread through Dragon King Hall—

—Wheee!

A low, piercing whistle sounded from outside.

It was the signal from Kang Su, who was keeping watch around the hall.

*****

After gliding through the maze in the ceiling, Hidden Shadow stopped before the stone wall that served as the final exit from the hall.

As Hidden Shadow reached out to pull open a portion of the wall, Hidden Shadow paused.

The feather that had been wedged into a crack after entering the ceiling through the eaves and restoring the stone wall was gone.

It was something done from habit every time. It could not have been forgotten.

Someone came in!

Calculations raced through Hidden Shadow’s mind.

Less than half a quarter-hour has passed since I entered the Right Military Strategist’s hall. That person must have entered during that interval. In that case, there was not enough time to get outside.

A cold smile touched Hidden Shadow’s lips beneath the mask.

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