Oh Jecheol’s brothers rose all at once, murderous intent pouring off them.
Oh Jegwang approached with his hand on his sword.
“I knew you were gonna act like this.”
For some reason, Oh Jecheol felt like he absolutely did not want to fight today. He sprang up and blocked Oh Jegwang with his body.
“You crazy bastard! I told you to shut up, didn’t I?!”
Oh Jegwang snapped back.
“You didn’t hear what this bastard just said? Sons of bitches?”
Oh Jecheol slapped Oh Jegwang across the cheek three, four times in a row.
“You’re really disrespecting me right now, huh? Huh?!”
“Ah, fuck—seriously…”
Just as the brothers were about to start cutting each other first, Jin Sohan’s calm voice drifted out.
“Duhyang…”
As he pictured her, Jin Sohan filled his cup with aged wine. A lonely sentence slipped from his mouth.
“She was a beautiful older sister.”
Something in that tone made Oh Jecheol’s skin crawl. He whirled toward Jin Sohan—
—and something flicked past his vision.
Then came a soft, wet thunk.
Startled, Oh Jecheol looked back at Oh Jegwang, the man whose collar he’d been gripping—
A chopstick was buried in Oh Jegwang’s forehead.
Oh Jegwang’s breath cut off in a single instant, and his dead weight sagged heavy in Oh Jecheol’s hand.
Oh Jecheol spoke to the limp body.
“Jegwang…”
His second brother screamed and charged in.
“Jegwang!—khk.”
Another soft, wet thunk.
The second brother, mid-run, had a chopstick driven into his forehead too. His head snapped back, and with a clattering crash, he toppled to the floor. One more corpse lay sprawled out on the tavern boards.
Oh Jecheol stared at Jin Sohan, eyes bulging—
but there was nothing he could do besides glare.
Damn it. I knew it. I knew this was coming…
His prediction had been right, and his brothers had died—absurdly, pointlessly fast. The thoughts crossed in a flash. But this wasn’t an opponent he could even dare to face. Oh Jecheol hovered between two choices: beg, or draw steel and die.
*****
Jin Sohan looked at Oh Jecheol, who was trembling all over, and topped off his cup with aged wine.
“Sit.”
With a gap like this, running was impossible. Oh Jecheol seemed to accept it. He carefully sat back down and spoke in a heavy voice.
“Young brother… no. Young Hero Jin. My brothers misspoke. My youngest… he used to like Duhyang. He said it to provoke you—just lies.”
Jin Sohan shook his head.
“Didn’t sound like a slip of the tongue.”
He reached out first and took Oh Jecheol’s broadsaber, turning the blade this way and that as he examined it. It was a heavy weapon—but in Jin Sohan’s hand, it moved lightly, like a chopstick.
A customer in the tavern stood up cautiously and spoke toward Jin Sohan.
“Um… Young Hero. Can we… leave now?”
“We have nothing to do with the Oh brothers.”
“We have nothing to do with the Blood-Whisper Sect either.”
Others rose in the same careful way, waiting for Jin Sohan’s answer.
Still studying the blade, Jin Sohan replied mildly,
“Sit.”
“Yes.”
Everyone who’d stood sat back down.
Jin Sohan wasn’t wearing an angry expression. He didn’t look excited, either. Somehow, he’d returned to the same state he’d been in earlier, calmly talking with Oh Jecheol.
Jin Sohan asked,
“The name of the man who brought comrades and helped the troupe—and whether he’s alive.”
Oh Jecheol swallowed hard.
“Chumyeongwi. Yes. They called him Chumyeongwi. He escaped badly wounded, and I heard the Blood-Whisper Sect still hadn’t found him.”
At some point, Oh Jecheol’s speech had turned polite.
Jin Sohan repeated the sobriquet once.
“Chumyeongwi…”
A word for an ugly face—then ghost tacked on top of it.
Even the name stank of poison.
Whatever the man looked like, he’d helped the troupe’s women. That meant there was a thread of warmth in him somewhere—or maybe he’d been captivated by a beautiful older sister and helped because of that. Either way, he was a far better man than the trash Jin Sohan had killed today.
Jin Sohan let the name sit in his mind for a moment, then asked,
“What else do you know?”
If he said “nothing,” it felt like he’d die on the spot. Oh Jecheol’s eyes darted to his broadsaber in Jin Sohan’s hand, and he blurted out in panic,
“Ah—th-the women taken by the Blood-Whisper Se—khk!”
Jin Sohan’s left hand shot out and clamped onto Oh Jecheol’s collar.
Oh Jecheol’s face started turning bright red.
Jin Sohan glared into his eyes.
“You unorthodox dogs… Damn it. I get back, and it’s exactly like my masters said.”
His mind flashed to the Venom Demon’s voice.
Would the Mystic Lunar Dance Troupe really still be standing out here in Unorthodox territory?
Then the Medicine Immortal’s voice.
If you go back, what’s waiting for you besides a bloodstorm? You still going?
So you knew from the start.
Of course, deep down, Jin Sohan had sensed it too. But hearing that not everyone had died—that some older sisters had been dragged down by things like this, by third-rate scum—made his insides flip over.
Jin Sohan muttered, as if answering his masters.
“A bloodstorm… is going to blow.”
With his left hand, he seized Oh Jecheol by the throat.
With the broadsaber in his right, he drove the blade into Oh Jecheol’s chest.
“Ugh—!”
Crushed by Jin Sohan’s grip, Oh Jecheol couldn’t even scream properly. He collapsed onto the tavern floor. For anyone who knew the Oh brothers’ brutal reputation, it was an even greater shock—how easily he’d died.
As if there was nothing else worth seeing, Jin Sohan tossed the shabby broadsaber Oh Jecheol used onto his corpse.
On the tavern floor, the men who’d called themselves the “Oh Three Ghosts” lay side by side, neatly sprawled out, while the witnesses couldn’t so much as part their lips.
Jin Sohan pulled a fresh pair of chopsticks from the holder, considering for a moment whether to keep eating his house noodles. Then—his appetite gone—he shoved the chopsticks back into the holder.
Somewhere, someone let out a long, relieved breath.
*****
Jin Sohan called out to Dogon, who had been peeking out from the kitchen with an anxious expression.
“Dogon.”
“Yes?”
Dogon startled so hard he answered in a loud, reflexive shout.
Jin Sohan crooked his fingers.
“Come closer.”
“Yes, uh—are you ordering something else…? We haven’t closed the kitchen yet, but… I can boil more noodles, or—”
Dogon rambled as he approached. Jin Sohan kept gesturing him closer.
“Let me get a good look at your face. Are you really the Dogon I remember?”
“Huh?”
“Come on.”
Only then did Dogon manage to look into Jin Sohan’s eyes.
Those eyes… Is he from the demonic cults?!
Forcing his pounding heart to settle, Dogon leaned in—
—and Jin Sohan’s hand moved. A sharp tap cracked against Dogon’s forehead.
“Ah!”
It was only a finger flick, but it made his vision flash white, like lightning bursting right in front of his eyes.
Dogon rubbed his forehead—and yanked Jin Sohan up out of his memory.
“Aaaah! You were Dream Kid—the one who used to do sword-dances!”
Back then, they’d constantly made bets out front by flicking each other in the forehead. There was no way he wouldn’t remember.
As Dogon blurted out Jin Sohan’s old nickname, Jin Sohan grinned.
“Yeah. Dream Kid, the one who used to do sword-dances.”
Still rubbing his forehead, Dogon said,
“You’re a completely different person now… Where have you been, what were you doing, that you’re only coming back now?”
Because Dogon was older to begin with, the two of them spoke casually without thinking twice.
At Dogon’s question, Jin Sohan let out a sigh.
How could he possibly tell it briefly?
He could only say it like this.
“I went through hell and came back.”
Kidnapped by the Venom Demon, poisoned into addiction—treated by the Medicine Immortal—
and repeating that for more than ten years.
He wanted to say it, but it wasn’t something he could dump on Dogon.
Dogon’s head was spinning too, old memories tangling together.
Dream Kid… the troupe people searched for him like they were losing their minds…
Dogon decided he had to say this, and he spoke with emotion in his voice.
“After you disappeared, the troupe people looked for you like crazy. Some said you’d been kidnapped. A lot of people said you were probably dead. I had seen something too, so I told them again and again, but…”
“What did you say?”
“That it looked like someone in black took you.”
“Right. That’s what happened.”
Uncomfortable talking about his masters, Jin Sohan changed the subject.
“Do you know anything about Siwol? Or the other older sisters?”
“Siwol? Ah—Siwol! Siwol’s definitely alive. No word yet, but she promised me that if she ever came back, she’d come to me first.”
“She’s alive?”
“Yeah. That day, I had a bad feeling, so I told Siwol—who was hanging around the tavern—not to go back to the troupe. We watched together. The Blood-Whisper Sect and the troupe fighting…”
Jin Sohan breathed out, the tension easing from his shoulders, and patted Dogon’s shoulder once.
“Thank you. After that?”
Dogon flinched at the gesture, then answered,
“She hid around here for a few days, then said she’d learn martial arts and get revenge… and she vanished from West Black Road completely. I didn’t see her after that. She said if she joined a famous sect, she’d be able to kill all those bastards.”
Partway through, Dogon realized he’d been speaking casually, but neither of them cared. This was how they’d always been.
“Ah…”
Jin Sohan let out a small sound.
Siwol was one year younger than him—another orphan the troupe had taken in. They’d played together constantly as kids, so hearing she was alive gave him a strange, quiet relief. Like him, Siwol had grabbed a sword the moment she could stand on her own feet.
In plain words, Siwol was relentless. Saying she’d learn martial arts and take revenge fit her perfectly.
Jin Sohan nodded.
“Then Siwol’s alive. That’s good.”
Jin Sohan pulled out iron coins and set them down as payment.
“See you. If you run into Siwol first, tell her I’m back.”
“Got it. But where are you staying?”
Jin Sohan looked across the street.
“I’ll sleep at the pleasure house. Moonlit Night Pavilion, was it?”
“No, that place… the Blood-Whisper Sect is the one backing it.”
“What does that matter? I’m going to sleep. And they don’t know who I am yet. Not unless you tell them. You and the people in this tavern, that’s it.”
For some reason, the way Jin Sohan said it made Dogon feel cold.
“You’re not saying you’ll kill us too, are you?”
Jin Sohan shook his head.
“Of course not. Just take care of these corpses.”
At that, everyone in the tavern exhaled all at once.
Dogon—unusually—raised his voice and barked at the customers.
“Hey. Help me clean up. You gonna leave this place stinking like blood in a shop you come to every day?”
A few people jumped up.
“Yeah. Let’s clean it.”
Someone said,
“Young Hero killed them good.”
“I always knew Oh Jecheol would die like this someday.”
They piled on with chatter as if they were matching Dogon’s rhythm. Someone snatched Dogon’s rag and wiped down the table; someone else scrubbed the bloodstains on the floor over and over. The frantic bustle was almost ridiculous.
In the middle of the noise, Jin Sohan said,
“If anyone asks about what happened today…”
As if it were something that happened all the time, the tavern people answered in a chorus,
“We don’t know anything!”
Dogon wore an awkward grin.
“I’ll keep my mouth shut. And these people—most of them are weaklings who get pushed around by the Blood-Whisper Sect too. If anything, they’d help you swing the blade.”
Watching Dogon handle it—even the part about Siwol—Jin Sohan thought the man had gotten frighteningly good, working as a server, at keeping people alive.
But honestly, Jin Sohan didn’t much care if someone ran and told the Blood-Whisper Sect anyway.
Because from here on out—
he planned to kill every last person connected to them.