Ha Mok-ryeong carefully stepped inside.
Fidgeting like a child going to be caned by a strict teacher, he slowly closed the door.
‘What's going to happen to me now?’
He might end up just like those corpses sprawled across the floor.
The brief moment this door remained open felt like all the life he had left.
Perhaps because of that, Ha Mok-ryeong's hand closed the door more slowly than a crawling snail.
“How long do you intend to dawdle?”
At the irritated voice that stabbed sharply at him, Ha Mok-ryeong shut and bolted the door as fast as lightning.
And the moment he turned around, he dropped to his knees on the floor in servility.
“Lord! I have not laid a single finger on the Black Tiger Gang's vault!”
“.......”
“I do not know for what reason you have returned here, but I have heard nothing and seen nothing! I have not even beheld your noble countenance, Lord, so please spare this lowly life just this once!”
With his forehead pressed against the floor, Ha Mok-ryeong begged desperately.
He truly had not looked at the other man's face.
He had judged that not looking was the only lifeline he could grasp.
Thud—.
The sound of a heavy object falling to the floor echoed through the silent pavilion.
He must have tossed aside the last corpse he had been holding.
His whole body trembled like an aspen leaf in fear, but Ha Mok-ryeong desperately kept his forehead pressed to the floor.
“Raise your head.”
“But, Lord.......”
“Shall I personally grab your jawbone and lift it for you?”
At those words, Ha Mok-ryeong quickly jerked his head up.
Only then did the other man's face finally come into view.
A middle-aged man with cold eyes.
With his neatly combed-back hair and luxurious silk attire, he looked at a glance like a respectable merchant, but the aura lodged in his eyes was unmistakably that of a god of slaughter.
He was not Cheon Su-rin.
But Ha Mok-ryeong was mistaken.
He believed that this man was the very murderer who had wiped out the Black Tiger Gang.
‘I've crossed the wrong man. Badly.’
To think a master like this would show up at the Black Tiger Pavilion again.
He was an opponent against whom Ha Mok-ryeong could not even struggle with his skill.
The answer was clear just from seeing how the heads gathered here had been taken down without putting up a single fight.
“Who are you?”
“I am Ha Mok-ryeong, Chairman of the Azure River Society!”
“The Azure River Society? There was such a place in this out-of-the-way Clear Mirror Town?”
“It is a small sect of barely ten members, so it is only natural that you would not know of it, Lord!”
“I see. But why are you raising your voice loud enough to burst my eardrums? Is it to call the bastards downstairs?”
Ha Mok-ryeong's heart sank.
Just as the man pointed out, he had deliberately shouted loudly to alert his subordinates waiting below that something was wrong.
“H-how could that be! I was only doing my utmost to answer your questions without negligence, Lord!”
“My ears are very sharp. Shout one more time and I will tear that mouth apart.”
“......I will keep that in mind.”
His voice instantly dropped back to normal.
Come to think of it, even if his subordinates came rushing up, it would only add more corpses.
But even in despair, Ha Mok-ryeong saw a faint glimmer of hope.
Not killing him right away must mean there was something of value to be drawn out of him.
“It seems you do not know who trampled the Black Tiger Gang either.”
“......Was it not your doing, Lord?”
“It was not me. If it had been, why would I have said such a thing in the first place?”
“Then why did you kill these men?”
“I thought these fools had joined forces to bring down the Black Tiger Gang, siphoned off its wealth, and were deceiving me. What other reason would dark path bastards have to gather in one place?”
The man already saw through the fact that these were the dark path heads of Clear Mirror Town.
Ha Mok-ryeong carefully opened his mouth.
“I am also one of the dark path heads, though.......”
“The moment you saw me, you concluded I was the one who brought down the Black Tiger Gang and were struck with terror. That reaction was the surest proof that you were not the culprit. That is why I did not kill you.”
Ha Mok-ryeong inwardly breathed a sigh of relief.
The words he had blurted out carelessly in terror had saved his life.
“Do you want to know who I am?”
“N-no! I do not want to know!”
The moment Ha Mok-ryeong shook his head, the man's right hand moved at an invisible speed.
A powerful sound of splitting air grazed his cheek, and the heavy wooden chair behind him scattered into dust.
“I want to know! I want to know so badly it is driving me mad!”
When he answered as if screaming, the man lowered his hand in satisfaction.
“I am Jo Jeong-tak, Head Trader of the Golden Might Trading Company.”
“The G-Golden Might Trading Company......!”
Ha Mok-ryeong was stunned.
The Golden Might Trading Company. A massive trading company that controlled the commerce of the eastern Central Plains, and in truth, a great tree of the dark path with countless dark path sects under its command.
“I-I greet the Head Trader!”
Ha Mok-ryeong bowed his head again.
A Head Trader of the Golden Might Trading Company was no ordinary merchant.
They were the core fighting strength of the Golden Might Trading Company, with martial prowess rivaling that of the heads of most sects.
Why on earth would such a big fish appear in a quiet backwater like this?
“......What brings the Head Trader of the Golden Might Trading Company to such a humble place?”
“I entrusted a job to the Black Tiger Gang. But word stopped coming, and when I looked into it, they said it had been wiped out overnight. So I had no choice but to come and see what happened for myself.”
“Could it be the matter of buying up the market district around Clear Mirror Lake?”
“Oho, you are rather quick on the uptake.”
Ha Mok-ryeong's eyes lit up.
To think the Golden Might Trading Company had been behind the Black Tiger Gang's frenzied hoarding of land deeds.
“There was a rumor that a grand drinking pavilion would be built on Clear Mirror Lake...... but selling wine does not suit the dignity of a trading company. Is the real goal not the harbor of Clear Mirror Lake?”
“......Go on.”
“Clear Mirror Lake is a strategic point connected to the waterways of the Yangtze River. You must be planning to secure a waterway trade route faster and cheaper than the land routes, and to widen your foothold into the central region.”
Ha Mok-ryeong rattled on as if excited.
He had always been better at reading the board than at fighting.
Jo Jeong-tak silently watched Ha Mok-ryeong with interest.
“I-I'm sorry. I overstepped again.”
Snapping to his senses at the cold killing intent, Ha Mok-ryeong pressed his head down again.
No matter how cleverly he used his head, the moment he displeased the other man, his head would fly off in an instant.
“You are of a different grain from the other riffraff. You are quick on the uptake, and your skill at scheming is rather good.”
“......?”
“How about it? Will you make a deal with me?”
“M-me, sir?”
“Yes. If you carry out the job properly, I will make you the one in charge of Clear Mirror Town. Of course, by then, you will belong to the Golden Might Trading Company as well.”
It was an offer he had never imagined.
A rope from a massive power that commanded the Central Plains had been lowered to the head of a tiny sect in the frontier.
Naturally, there was no reason to hesitate.
“I will serve you loyally down to the marrow of my bones!”
The door he had opened was not the entrance to hell.
It was the passage of a lifetime, leading to a golden paradise stained with blood.
***
In the morning, Cheon Su-rin visited the marketplace again.
“I had a feeling you'd come back.”
As soon as Cheon Su-rin entered the shop, Hwang Byeong-su held out a thick bundle of meat as if he had been waiting.
“You left it behind yesterday.”
“I was so distracted that I completely forgot.”
“That happens. Ah, don't get the wrong idea. This isn't the meat I cut yesterday.”
“You could have just given me that.”
“A customer should always be sold the finest cuts. Especially someone like you, Young Master.”
Cheon Su-rin smiled gently and nodded.
“Thank you. Could you possibly give me some more meat?”
“More? Is it someone's birthday today?”
“Well, something like that.”
In the end, they had adopted Bong Du-chil.
A new member had joined the family at the Heavenly Way Martial Arts Academy, so he intended to hold a small feast to celebrate it.
“Just a moment!”
Hwang Byeong-su excitedly wielded his cleaver and brought back more cut meat.
It was enough for even the disciples to eat their fill.
“Ah, I won't take any money.”
When Cheon Su-rin tried to take out his money pouch, Hwang Byeong-su waved his hand and stopped him.
“Didn't we agree that I'd pay properly starting today?”
“You didn't take the meat yesterday, so it's free through today.”
“Then at least take payment for the extra meat.”
“Oh, come now— I said I won't take it!”
“If you keep this up, I won't come here anymore.”
When Cheon Su-rin put on a feigned stern expression, Hwang Byeong-su laughed heartily, at a loss.
“It's not my money, it's my father's, so don't feel too bad.”
“Well then...... I'll gratefully accept it, Young Master.”
“I'd like to buy some vegetables too. What's good?”
“We've got everything except what we don't have. Here, come inside and see for yourself.”
Just as he was about to follow Hwang Byeong-su into the shop, a sharp shout cutting through the middle of the market caught Cheon Su-rin by the ankle.
‘That voice.......’
It was Ha Mok-ryeong.
He was once again leading his subordinates and running riot at the same shop as yesterday.
“Pay it no mind, Young Master.”
Hwang Byeong-su said with a bitter expression.
“He said it himself yesterday, didn't he? To mind your own business and go your own way.”
Ordinarily he would have stepped in at once, but Cheon Su-rin could not readily move his feet.
Yesterday's words, that his goodwill could become poison to someone instead, were lodged in his heart like a thorn.
In the end, Cheon Su-rin bit his lip gently and went inside to look at the vegetables.
CRUNCH—!
Just then, an ear-splitting sound of destruction reached Cheon Su-rin's ears.
It was not the sound of a mere quarrel.
It was the sound of wood being crushed and things being smashed to pieces.
Cheon Su-rin put down the radish he was holding and ran out of the shop.
“P-please...... please stop!”
The owner's desperate cry rang through the marketplace.
As the owner clung to his trouser leg, Ha Mok-ryeong shot him a merciless sneer.
“Smash it all. So he can never do business here again.”
“Yes, sir!”
His subordinates swung their clubs and smashed the stall to pieces.
The goods that had been on display were trampled and ground into the dirt.
“Wh-what are they going that far for?”
Hwang Byeong-su was visibly flustered as well.
Even to the dark path, merchants were a source of money.
Laying waste to the market to this extent was no different from smashing their own rice bowl.
“That's just like.......”
“It's no different from the Black Tiger Gang. No, it's even worse.”
It was no mere threat.
The bastards were bringing down even the pillars and outer walls of the shop with their blunt weapons.
When the signboard finally fell limply to the ground, the owner screamed.
“Why are you doing this?! Didn't I give you one tael of silver as a protection fee?!”
“Who said one tael?”
“Yesterday you clearly......!”
“That was yesterday. Starting today, the protection fee in this area is a hundred taels of silver.”
“A-a hundred taels? Does that even make sense?!”
It had jumped a hundredfold in a single day. It was a huge sum, hard to come up with even by selling the entire shop.
“Wh-why has it become so expensive?”
“Because Clear Mirror Town is mine now.”
“Yours?”
“I mean I now rule Clear Mirror Town. So naturally, I should collect a bigger protection fee, shouldn't I?”
The owner wore a look of incomprehension.
So, was he saying the Azure River Society had subdued all the other dark path sects in a single day?
Realistically, it made no sense.
Everyone knew the Azure River Society did not have that kind of power.
“I-I'll find the money somehow! So please, just spare the shop......!”
“Can you pay it right now?”
“If you give me just ten days, I'll sell even my house......!”
“Fine.”
Just as the owner was about to breathe a sigh of relief at Ha Mok-ryeong's answer.
“We will make up for what you're short by smashing the shop. Keep going!”
His subordinates' hands moved again.
The building screamed as it collapsed.
Mad with rage, the owner rushed at Ha Mok-ryeong, but what he got back was a merciless kick.
Ha Mok-ryeong roughly stomped on the chest of the owner, who had fallen to the ground.
The people in the market averted their eyes in terror.
Hwang Byeong-su also clenched his trembling fists tight.
The man had said himself to leave him alone, but if things were left like this, he really looked like he would die.
“Uncle Hwang.”
Just then, Cheon Su-rin slowly walked out of the shop.
In his hand was a thick, hard radish.
“Please put this on my tab.”
“Pardon?”
“I just don't think I can look the other way.”
Cheon Su-rin hurled the radish in his hand with force.
Whoosh—!
With a sharp sound of splitting air, the radish flew like an arrow.
THWACK—!
The radish struck Ha Mok-ryeong square in the face and shattered into pieces.
Ha Mok-ryeong screamed and fell flat on his back, clutching one eye and bellowing.
“What son of a bitch was it?! Who threw this damn thing?!”
“Me.”
Cheon Su-rin, who had come right up to him before anyone knew it, answered coldly.
“You still don't remember my face?”
At the dense killing intent wavering in Cheon Su-rin's eyes, Ha Mok-ryeong was momentarily unable to open his mouth.