“W-We’re here......!”
Cho Myeong murmured, overcome with emotion.
How much had happened during the months he had spent visiting the Demon Alliance as head of the envoy delegation?
Those few months had felt like decades.
“Is it because we’re home? Hall Master Cho, your face has really brightened up.”
Cho Myeong clenched both fists as the man approached him after dismounting, slung a friendly arm around his shoulders, and spoke.
The Martial Alliance was not even his home.......
As for stating the truth that he was happy not because they had returned to the Martial Alliance, but because he finally would not have to look at that face anymore, that was another matter.
Cho Myeong valued his small, humble life far too dearly.
“If that is how it looked, then I suppose that must be it. Ha. Ha. Ha.”
As he spoke, he removed Martial Wheel’s arm and subtly widened the distance between them.
It was not simply because Martial Wheel was difficult to deal with.
If even the great Demon Alliance Leader himself had gone to such trouble to win Cho Myeong over and make him a spy!
Should they not at least make some effort to conceal the connection between him and the Demon Alliance?
Yet what in the world was this supposed to accomplish?
‘At this rate, Martial Wheel Ga Jeong-hak, one of the Demon Alliance’s Four Wheels, and I will look like childhood friends who were separated when we were young, only to reunite across the divide between the righteous and demonic paths and share a heartrending reunion!’
Cho Myeong fumed, unaware that he had attached a strangely elaborate explanation to the situation.
He had never dreamed that being chosen as a spy was merely his own delusion, so he was dumbfounded by a Demon Alliance operation that showed not the slightest trace of discretion.
‘It must be because they place such importance on the hegemonic path. I should tell the Alliance Leader later that they must be more careful about things like this.’
Cho Myeong widened his eyes with a sense of responsibility.
“Hm? Hall Master Cho, why are you glaring out of the corner of your eye like that?”
Seeing Martial Wheel bare his teeth innocently and bump Cho Myeong’s shoulder without reserve made him feel even more stifled.
Why was he, a newly recruited Demon Alliance spy, worrying more about the Demon Alliance’s future than someone who actually came from it?
Even as he sighed, Cho Myeong was about to warn Martial Wheel about the things he needed to watch out for in the Martial Alliance.
“It is a pleasure to meet you.”
The people who had come out to welcome them before the Martial Alliance’s main gate had already drawn near.
“C-Clan Head Dang?”
Cho Myeong muttered without thinking when he saw a man standing opposite them who seemed far too dogmatic and arrogant for such a role.
Without sparing Cho Myeong a glance, Dang Si-jeong swept his gaze over the Demon Alliance envoys.
His eyes gleamed as though searching for prey, then fixed upon one spot.
‘I am Oh Chi-yeong, Wood Banner Captain and head of the Demon Alliance envoy delegation.’
When the old-fashioned-looking man first introduced himself, Dang Si-jeong had been certain everything would go exactly as he wished.
These days, whenever two or three people gathered in the Martial Alliance, they all talked about the same thing.
“Did you hear?”
“What? Ah......!”
It was the story everyone knew without needing any explanation.
“Didn’t Clan Head Dang go running past with his face pale again just a little while ago?”
“What was it this time?”
“Apparently, the demonic fiends from the Demon Alliance tried to use the training ground near the Floating Cloud Pavilion where they’re staying, and they got into a quarrel with the Martial Alliance’s senior martial artists guarding the pavilion.”
“Was there anything worth quarreling over?”
The Demon Alliance’s demonic fiends were demonic fiends in name only.
Aside from their rough appearances and fierce bearing, they were actually more well behaved than the Martial Alliance’s younger-generation talents and senior martial artists, who ran wild without restraint.
“Did the senior martial artists perhaps object to them using the training ground?”
When another listener casually joined in, the junior martial artist who had begun the story nodded.
“They said it was a problem that the Demon Alliance people moved without permission more than ten jang away from the Floating Cloud Pavilion, and that because dangerous situations could arise on a training ground, they should have obtained permission before using weapons?”
“What bullshit.”
“You think so too, right? That training ground is a little far away because there was nowhere suitable to build it, but it was made for guests staying at the Floating Cloud Pavilion. And as for using weapons—yes, if nowhere else, is that not naturally permitted inside a training ground?”
“Right. You know it, and I know it. Wouldn’t the Demon Alliance know it too?”
“No wonder Clan Head Dang went running off in such a panic.”
The shout of the man said to be in charge of the Demon Alliance envoy delegation rang clearly in everyone’s ears, as familiar now as a callus.
“Is that the Martial Alliance’s justice?!”
The closer Dang Si-jeong came to the Floating Cloud Pavilion, the drier his lips seemed to grow.
That cry in particular.
“Did I not ask whether that was the Martial Alliance’s justice?!”
When Oh Chi-yeong, head of the Demon Alliance envoy delegation, shouted once more, Dang Si-jeong felt ready to lose his mind.
F*ck! F*ck! F*ck!
Oh Chi-yeong had been like this since his first day at the Martial Alliance.
Dang Si-jeong had assigned third-class lodgings to the Demon Alliance envoy delegation, intending to break their spirit from the start.
Repeated droughts and upheaval in the martial world had increased the people’s suffering, he explained, so everyone in the Martial Alliance, beginning with its leadership, was trying to live frugally and simply, which inevitably affected how guests were received.......
He had smiled as he repeatedly emphasized that they were neither slighting nor neglecting the Demon Alliance.
From what he had heard, Oh Chi-yeong only needed to be presented with a proper justification.......
Then, if pressured with the possibility that his actions might disrupt the important conference, he would not dare utter a peep and would let Dang Si-jeong lead him around by the nose.
What had Oh Chi-yeong said to Dang Si-jeong, who had been waiting for him to agree?
Oh Chi-yeong had neither affirmed nor accepted it.
Nor had he become angry.
He had merely said that, if it were truly so, he would visit the lodgings of the Martial Alliance’s elders and Pavilion Masters and see for himself whether they truly lived just as austerely.
It was not because he distrusted the Martial Alliance’s conduct, he said, but because if this was how the Martial Alliance treated its guests, it was certain to become the subject of gossip later.......
He would dispel any misunderstanding in advance by personally confirming that the Martial Alliance’s intentions were sincere!
If the matter grew, the Demon Alliance envoy delegation would draw disapproving looks, but Dang Si-jeong, the man responsible for receiving them, would be placed in an even more difficult position.
In the end, Dang Si-jeong had no choice but to move them to the first-class Floating Cloud Pavilion.
Having lost face, Dang Si-jeong thought that would settle the matter, but it did not.
His ordeal had only begun then.
“Please, everyone, calm down.”
As he had done several times already, Dang Si-jeong stepped between the Martial Alliance’s martial artists and those of the Demon Alliance.
Oh Chi-yeong shook his head.
“We have never been angry. We merely pointed out that the Martial Alliance, which claims to champion justice, is acting unjustly.”
That was precisely Dang Si-jeong’s greatest difficulty.
‘Why does that demonic fiend never say anything wrong?’
When Oh Chi-yeong presented grounds and conclusions anyone could accept, whoever opposed him only ended up looking petty and narrow-minded.
Grinding his teeth, Dang Si-jeong turned his gaze toward the Martial Alliance’s senior martial artists.
Because he had failed to produce any useful results, other factions among the leadership also seemed to be making repeated attempts to prod the Demon Alliance envoy delegation.
“Who told you to act on your own?! I will summon you separately later, so disperse at once.”
Dang Si-jeong sent the Martial Alliance’s martial artists away and turned around.
“This arose because our positions differ. How about we settle matters here?”
Oh Chi-yeong’s eyes widened at Dang Si-jeong’s question.
“It is obvious who was at fault, yet you would sweep it under the rug like this? Is that the Martial Alliance’s......!”
That was a sucker?
If someone so venomous that even meeting his eyes was difficult was a sucker, did that make the Demon Alliance a hell on earth?
F*ck.
Dang Si-jeong let out a long sigh, struggling to suppress the urge to cover his ears.
***
“Again today?”
“So I hear.”
Se-jin gave a faint laugh at Namgung Min’s answer.
“How fascinating.”
Oh Chi-yeong, who had recently been raising hell in the Martial Alliance, seemed like a completely different person from the one his Elder Brother had described.
“When do you think the conference will begin?”
“I believe they originally intended to begin after taming the Demon Alliance envoy delegation and learning something of their true intentions. But with the situation going so poorly, I doubt they will delay much longer.”
“I see.”
When Se-jin continued to stare only through the open window after replying, Namgung Min tilted his head.
“Is there something outside?”
“The weather is fine, so I have a feeling a welcome guest will arrive.”
“Pardon?”
Namgung Min was flustered when Se-jin, who never spoke cryptically, said something so mysterious.
Se-jin told him it was nothing and ordered him to leave. Namgung Min tried to hold his ground to the end, but Moyong U caught him by the nape and dragged him out.
Once the office fell quiet, Se-jin rose from his seat and approached the window.
“You may come out now.”
At that, a hidden shadow suddenly surged upward and leaped through the window into the office.
“Am I a welcome guest?”
When Martial Wheel asked with shining eyes, Se-jin looked straight at him as though the answer were obvious.
“I heard you are my Elder Brother’s most cherished subordinate. Of course you are, are you not?”
Martial Wheel broke into a broad smile at Se-jin’s words.
***
Meanwhile, at the Demon Alliance.
“They must be enjoying themselves, right?”
Wi So-baek imagined what his beloved younger brother and favored subordinates might be scurrying around doing at the Martial Alliance.
“There are far too many nuisances over there. Tsk.”
Several faces flashed through Wi So-baek’s mind.
The one he remembered best was, of course, Mount Hua Sect Leader Ak Jin-gun, whom he had beaten.
Wi So-baek was probably not alone in that.
After the decisive battle on the Chang'an Plains had ended inconclusively, subordinates from the Demon Alliance had once come to ask him a question.
‘Did the Mount Hua Sect Leader truly launch an ambush against me while I was dueling the Martial Alliance Leader?’
When Wi So-baek stared at them as if to ask what kind of idiotic nonsense that was, they prostrated themselves and lowered their eyes, but.......
‘Th-That is... if the Mount Hua Sect Leader had dared interfere with the Alliance Leader’s undertaking in such a cowardly fashion, there is no way you would have left him alive, is there?’
‘Exactly! That is why we wondered whether the Alliance Leader had some profound intention unknown to us and spared his life, so we came to ask.’
They did not stop prattling.
Oh.
Where had they found that kind of courage?
Wi So-baek thought he must have been rather soft on them lately.
They could only behave like this because they did not know that when something soft burst, it exposed everything inside and became all the more grotesque.
Wi So-baek swept his gaze over his subordinates and smacked his lips, stopping only when their complexions turned so deathly pale they looked ready to expire.
Since their curiosity was not entirely without cause, he decided to answer them.
‘What matters is not whether the Mount Hua Sect Leader actually did it.’
As Wi So-baek’s words fell upon them, his subordinates raised their heads and looked up at their master.
Wi So-baek looked down at them and twisted one corner of his mouth upward.
‘It is who I want the culprit to be.’
Then, with his younger brother, he had suddenly returned to a time he had believed already gone.
When he had joined hands with his brother to ride that current and reduce the incongruities as much as possible.
He had seen countless martial artists of the righteous sects beyond his brother’s shoulder.
Choosing only one of them would have been far too difficult, even for Wi So-baek.
His brother hated speaking ill of others, making it hard to hear even a word or two of complaint from him, but Wi So-baek remembered clearly.
One bastard had looked down on his brother as a lowborn orphan, while another had mocked him as a puppet without anyone backing him.
Wi So-baek had promised every one of them a reckoning later.
And he had chosen Ak Jin-gun first, pounding him as though beating a vicious dog.
That was because Ak Jin-gun had caused not his brother, but his brother’s subordinates, to die.
His brother had looked saddest when he spoke of that.
“I heard Ak Jin-gun can hardly show his face around the Martial Alliance these days.”
He wondered whether that had eased his brother’s heart at all.
Of course, it was still not enough for Wi So-baek.
“After Ak Jin-gun, the next bastard who irritated me most was probably Dang Si-jeong, wasn’t it?”
I want to meet that bastard again soon.
Completely unaware that Oh Chi-yeong had already set off in an unexpected direction on his behalf and was making Dang Si-jeong suffer through an awkward predicament, Wi So-baek muttered to himself.