“The tribute is pathetic.”
“It was like this last time too.”
“Hmm, have we been too generous? They’ve lost all sincerity, haven’t they?”
“It was like this the time before last too!”
“Haah, this is why they say you should never raise black-haired beasts. Why do mortals fail to come to their senses when spoken to nicely?”
“It’ll probably be like this next time too.”
“Good. It seems we’ve let them off too much until now. We should punish them once around here, shouldn’t we? Master will permit it too.”
“Punish them! Punish them!”
The office of the Pyeong Family of Giyang County.
A boy and girl with snow-white hair sat in the seats of honor.
The two wore long blue robes, and on their heads, they had wrapped black scholar’s caps embroidered with gold patterns.
Their appearances and their clothing alike.
The boy and girl were extraordinary and mysterious beyond measure.
Before them.
A middle-aged man prostrated himself flat like a criminal, trembling as he barely managed to open his mouth.
“M-my son, who was in charge of preparing the tribute, suddenly disappeared, so the supply of tribute we had to prepare was delayed by several days. Even so, if you give us ten days of grace! Sufficient tribute will be prepared, so I humbly ask the Immortals to understand with generous hearts!”
Pyeong Mun-hwa, the Family Head of the Pyeong Family, pleaded with a face filled with terror in the office.
But the boy and girl still opened their mouths with sullen faces.
“Don’t tell me you’re asking us to wait ten days? Do we look idle to you?”
“Do we look idle?”
When the girl spoke, the somewhat expressionless boy repeated her words like a parrot.
And when the girl frowned, the boy also frowned slightly at the same time.
At a glance, it was a sight that might have seemed cute.
But for some reason, Pyeong Mun-hwa remained utterly frozen as he continued stammering.
“W-we have sent out the family’s warriors and are quickly securing one hundred young boys and girls. We have already filled nearly half the number, so in ten days, we will be able to fill the rest. So please, grant us time…….”
“No. We can’t give you time. You’ve already broken your promise.”
“Broken it!”
After the girl finished speaking.
She abruptly took a small bell from her sleeve.
At the sight of it, vivid fear appeared on Pyeong Mun-hwa’s face.
“Immortal! Please have mercy!”
“Pyeong Mun-hwa, Family Head of the Pyeong Family. What was given to you must now be taken back.”
“You cannot! I truly did my best! Even now, the family is using all its strength to secure the children!”
“Enough. Your excuses end there.”
The girl snorted, then lightly shook the bell in her hand and said.
JINGLE—
“As acting Enforcement Envoy of the Mansi Sect, I command you. Cease and return to your original form.”
“No!”
The bell shook once more.
And Pyeong Mun-hwa, who had desperately tried to stretch out his hand while still prostrated on the floor.
Remained exactly in that position.
As if his soul had left his body, his eyes turned a murky gray, and his body temperature rapidly cooled.
He had turned into a Jiangshi in an instant.
“Si-u.”
“Yes, yes! Big Sister!”
“He’s a toy. But since he’s old, he may break quickly, so you have to treat him carefully, all right?”
“Got it!”
The expressionless white-haired boy clapped his palms together and hopped in place.
The white-haired girl watched her younger brother, stroked his head once, then smiled in satisfaction and said.
“When the other ones return to the family later, I’ll make them into toys too, so wait just a little longer.”
“Yes, yes!”
In that way, the white-haired girl and boy dispatched from the Mansi Sect.
Turned most of the Pyeong Family’s experts into Jiangshi.
This was an incident that occurred in only half a day.
***
After creating the 1st Circle in his heart, Il-hyang became noticeably more cheerful.
‘There’s a pleasure to building this up from scratch.’
A path he had walked once long ago.
He was walking that path again.
But far from being tiresome, it was unexpectedly enjoyable.
Moreover, now that he had already created the 1st Circle, reaching the 3rd Circle would not take long.
Thus, with a face brimming with confidence, Il-hyang visited the Vagabond Association.
And.
“A kidnapping case of young boys and girls…….”
Il-hyang narrowed his eyes as he examined the noticeboard where the request list was written.
The young boys and girls kidnapping case.
This was the incident he had heard about from the Server yesterday.
In truth, he had only roughly listened and let it pass then.
But seeing it formally added to the Vagabond Association’s request list like this, it seemed the scale of the incident was quite large.
Even the request amount was fairly substantial.
‘A request worth five hundred taels of silver?’
This was certainly an astonishingly large sum.
Moreover, there were no particular restrictions, so it was a public bounty request in which even a Wooden Plaque-grade wanderer could participate.
One surprising thing was that the client was none other than the County Magistrate of Giyang County.
In any world, officials were notoriously slow to act.
Yet such an official had stepped to the forefront and commissioned a request?
Il-hyang sensed circumstances behind it that could not be spoken of publicly.
“They say more than a hundred children have disappeared so far.”
“Whew, I heard it too. And they say only children around ten years old are being kidnapped?”
“From what I hear, they’re kidnapping them and offering them as human sacrifices somewhere.”
“Really? But I heard the County Magistrate’s hidden son was kidnapped this time. Is that true?”
“Ha! You mean that son he had from fooling around with his concubine? No wonder that old coot spent big money for once.”
Just as Il-hyang was eavesdropping on the wanderers gathering and whispering among themselves.
Someone sat in a corner and gazed steadily at Il-hyang.
And.
“That little kid is the one, right?”
“That’s right, Great Hero Hak.”
“A little strange. Looking at his clothes, he’s a Young Master. So why is he working as a wanderer?”
“Big Brother Hak. We don’t need to know that much, do we? We just have to get paid, don’t we?”
“……That’s true.”
There were four wanderers seated in the corner.
Each of them wore different clothing.
Among them, the wanderer wearing blue silk clothes.
A wanderer whose attire was quite neat despite his fierce appearance was looking Il-hyang up and down, nodding repeatedly.
“He perfectly matches the conditions.”
“Then are we going according to plan, Big Brother Hak?”
“Yes.”
“But from what I hear, that little kid brought back a request completion stamp from that madman Pyeong So-byeok. Contrary to how he looks, he seems to have some guts. Will Layman Yu be able to persuade him?”
At that, the middle-aged man dressed as a literary man, who had been squatting in the corner seat and merely sipping tea until then, scratched his cheek and answered.
“What else can I do? I will have to persuade him and bring him over.”
The wanderer called Layman Yu.
A middle-aged man of small build, wearing a black scholar’s headcloth on his head.
He toyed awkwardly with his sleeve once, took one deep breath, and sprang up from his seat.
Then he slowly approached Il-hyang.
Il-hyang had already overheard their small whispers.
But he pretended not to know anything.
He was in the middle of acting as if he were focusing on examining the request noticeboard.
The middle-aged man dressed as a literary man approached that Il-hyang and carefully spoke to him.
“Ahem. Young Hero. Are you perhaps very busy right now?”
“Mm?”
The wanderer dressed as a literary man, called Layman Yu.
For some reason, he seemed extremely shy.
He did not meet Il-hyang’s eyes, and instead tried to converse while looking somewhere in the air.
“What is the matter?”
When Il-hyang asked, the wanderer opened his mouth with a somewhat awkward expression.
“Ah, that is…… I am a man called Yu Jeong-ui.”
“You are Great Hero Yu, then. I am Il-hyang. But what brings you to me?”
“Young Hero Il. If you have time, would you go over there and share a cup of tea?”
Yu Jeong-ui spoke to him with an embarrassed face from beginning to end, as if he was unused to this sort of conversation.
When Il-hyang turned his head in the direction he indicated, he saw wanderers who, like Yu Jeong-ui, wore somewhat awkward expressions.
“In truth, we are thinking of doing a joint request this time, and I wondered whether Young Hero Il might be willing to have a conversation with us…….”
Yu Jeong-ui.
The middle-aged man dressed as a literary man maintained a cautious attitude throughout the conversation.
Il-hyang did not know whether this was because he was extremely shy.
Or because there was some other reason.
In any case, this person’s voice was small, and he did not meet Il-hyang’s eyes, so for no reason, he did not inspire trust.
However.
“Well, it does not cost money just to talk. Should I go over there?”
“Mm! That is correct. This way.”
In that manner, Il-hyang moved toward the table where Yu Jeong-ui and his companions were seated.
And.
‘Ah! I understand why this fellow came as the representative.’
After sitting at the table.
Il-hyang could roughly guess why the timid Yu Jeong-ui had come as the representative.
Excluding this fellow, Yu Jeong-ui.
The man in blue silk clothes seated in the highest seat was missing one eye.
The fellow beside him, who wore a long red robe and looked like a mountain bandit, was missing several fingers on his left hand.
The remaining fellow had a long sword scar on his face.
And on top of that, that fellow was missing his left ear.
‘All of them have a defect somewhere.’
In addition, all three of them had exceedingly fierce impressions.
When Il-hyang’s gaze scanned across them once.
The one-eyed man, a hairy fellow dressed in blue silk clothes, opened his mouth first.
“I am Hak In-bo, a Bronze Plaque wanderer.”
“It is a pleasure. I am Il-hyang.”
After Il-hyang sat on an empty chair and simply gave his name.
The one-eared man beside him immediately smiled and spoke.
“I’m Go An-jeok, a Bronze Plaque wanderer. Nice to meet you.”
“Yes. It is a pleasure, Great Hero Go.”
Last of all, the large man who looked like a mountain bandit and was missing two fingers on his left hand answered.
“I am Gyeong Hap-gi. Like them, I am a Bronze Plaque wanderer.”
This was something he came to know only after arriving here.
The middle-aged man dressed as a literary man who had first come looking for him and appeared timid, Yu Jeong-ui, was also, surprisingly, a Bronze Plaque wanderer.
‘All four of them are Bronze Plaque wanderers?’
As far as Il-hyang knew, Bronze Plaque wanderers were all First-Rate Experts.
If one was a First-Rate Expert, then in this world, one was at a level where one could go anywhere and walk with some swagger.
“We gathered this time to try resolving the young boys and girls kidnapping case.”
One-eyed.
The matter at hand immediately emerged from the mouth of Hak In-bo, who wore blue silk clothes.
This was roughly as Il-hyang had guessed.
It seemed they had gathered to resolve a request worth no less than five hundred taels of silver.
However.
“Will I be of help?”
There were no fewer than four First-Rate Experts.
With that level of martial force, there should be no request they could not resolve in a border region like this.
So why did they specifically try to bring him along too?
Yu Jeong-ui, who had been quietly watching Il-hyang’s puzzled face.
The timid uncle, who had only been silently sipping tea until then, carefully answered.
“In truth, Young Hero Il’s role is the most central in this request.”
“……Pardon?”
For a very brief moment, Il-hyang flinched in surprise.
Central?
Something was strange.
‘I’m certain I hid the fact that I’m a mage.’
A mage’s true ability should not be something that could be known from the outside.
So how did they know?
As Il-hyang’s eyes gradually narrowed.
One-eyed Hak In-bo, who was subtly playing the role of leader in this group, said.
“We need bait to lure out the kidnappers. That is why we thought you would be perfect for this matter.”
“Ah.”
Bait.
Il-hyang quickly nodded with a face of understanding.
Then he smiled faintly.
‘Not bad.’
A little kid around ten years old who could serve as bait.
Moreover, if he was a wanderer, he should know how to protect his own body to some extent.
Looking at it from that angle, they had found someone exactly suitable.
“You will divide the reward properly, yes?”
“Of course. We intend to divide it precisely into five equal parts.”
If five hundred silver coins were divided by five, each person could obtain one hundred silver coins.
It was a fairly large sum for the amount one could earn from a single request.
“You have a concrete plan, I assume? Let me hear it.”
When Il-hyang showed an active willingness to participate.
Hak In-bo turned his single remaining eye sideways, checked the situation around the noisy Vagabond Association, and then opened his mouth in a quiet, low voice.
“Then let us move somewhere quiet instead of here.”