SWISH!
Chwi Dugae leapt down in one movement and clamped his hand around the throat of the illicit salt merchant called Foreman Gi.
“Gkh—!”
Captain Wang and the other illicit salt merchants could only stare, eyes bulging, at Hu Gae’s ghostlike appearance.
“Anyone who wants to die where he stands, stay right where you are.”
CRAAASH-CRAAASH-CRAAASH!
At the Beggar Clan Hu Gae’s command, Captain Wang and the illicit salt merchants all flung themselves flat on the deck.
Still gripping Foreman Gi by the neck with one hand, Chwi Dugae jerked him up into the air.
“So. What was that about Poison Salt Sand, and tying a stone to my body and whatnot?”
“Gkkh—!”
“Why isn’t this bastard answering?”
“Gkkh—ehekk!”
Foreman Gi let out a strangled sound like a slaughtered pig.
Only then did Chwi Dugae realize he was throttling the man’s windpipe.
SWISH! THUD!
“Gyaaaah!”
Even after he slammed Foreman Gi down on his back, Chwi Dugae’s anger wasn’t spent, and he stomped on the writhing man’s solar plexus.
“I ought to crush you right here and now for the crime of trying to assassinate the Beggar Clan’s Hu Gae—but since you’re a worthless insect, I’ll leave you that paltry life. Instead...”
CRRRACK!
“SKKHH—!”
Chwi Dugae ground his heel down and snapped Foreman Gi’s right arm, then spoke.
“Now say what you need to say.”
“Ugh... say... what...?”
“This bastard really is the sort you have to show his own coffin before he’ll shed tears.”
“Gah!”
Only then did Foreman Gi understand, and he spoke in a rush.
“Thank you for sparing my life!”
“You bastard, your head’s as pitch-black as your heart—there’s not a speck of sincerity in you.”
“Eh...? Hu Gae, then what should I... say...?”
“Who gives thanks while lying on his back?”
FLURRY!
Forgetting even the pain in his dangling right arm, Foreman Gi scrambled up and flung himself down again in a full kowtow.
“Hu Gae, I sincerely thank you from the bottom of my heart for sparing this worthless life!”
In truth, Chwi Dugae felt pathetic for even wasting his hands on such pathetic trash.
But if he simply left this lot alone, they’d be scattering their filthy poison and disturbing Kwak Brother’s quiet contemplation, so he’d had no choice but to step in.
Now that he’d made an example of their leader, he didn’t even want to lay a finger on the rest, let alone look at them.
Even so, he couldn’t just leave them without a lesson, so he bellowed at the illicit salt merchants and Captain Wang.
“If it were up to my mood, I’d drown the whole lot of you in this lake—but I’ll take it as a moment of greed when you saw something tempting and let you live.”
“Thank... thank you.”
“We’ll never forget this grace as long as we live.”
“Truly, thank you.”
Not wanting to end up like Foreman Gi, the illicit salt merchants and Captain Wang smashed their foreheads against the deck, doing their absolute best.
“Now all of you, look at the sky.”
The men all jerked their heads up as one.
“What do you see?”
“Stars.”
“I see clouds.”
“Technically, that’s mist.”
Since they were trying their hardest to say anything that might help them live, Chwi Dugae couldn’t even summon up the energy to snap at them.
“You see those stars—but can you pluck them just because you see them?”
“Of course not.”
“To this Beggar Clan Hu Gae, Kwak Brother is a star like that.”
Their eyes went round. Then, little by little, the color faded from their faces.
To them, the Sub-Branch Master of the World’s First Great Clan, the Beggar Clan, was a distant, unreachable being. And that man had just told them that Kwak Yeon was a being even he could not reach.
They finally understood just how outrageous a plot they had been weaving.
“Captain Wang.”
“Yes, Hu Gae!”
“I’m sure you won’t have any more useless thoughts, so go and row. Rouse your men as well.”
“Understood.”
Captain Wang scurried off toward the stern, and only the illicit salt merchants remained.
When Chwi Dugae saw that every one of them wore a leather pouch filled with Poison Salt Sand at their waists and had green-hide gloves on their hands, the blood that had gone cold flared hot again.
“No, you bastards won’t do with just words.”
“...?”
“All of you, slam your heads down where you are. The one who’s slowest to put his head down...”
THUD-THUD-THUD!
Before Chwi Dugae could even finish speaking, every last one of the illicit salt merchants had thrown themselves down, foreheads pressed to the cold deck.
BANG! CRRRAACK!
Chwi Dugae smashed a wooden crate to splinters with the Tagu Staff and spoke.
“Keep your heads in that exact position until we reach the Gujiang ferry. You can cut corners if you like—but if you get caught by my eyes, I swear on the name of the Beggar Clan’s Hu Gae I’ll bust that skull of yours. Understood?”
The illicit salt merchants answered in one voice.
“Understood!”
By the time Chwi Dugae had lightly put down the “mutiny” on deck and returned to the bow, Kwak Yeon was still standing there, staring out at the heavy darkness draped over the lake.
Sigh.
Chwi Dugae let out a sigh in his heart, then started toward his original spot—only to stop.
After that noisy commotion at the stern, Kwak Yeon’s calm, that clear, quiet stillness, was surely broken.
Chwi Dugae walked over and quietly came to stand by his side.
“It’s hard, isn’t it?”
The question held many meanings.
And for Chwi Dugae, there was no way to ask it except in such a blurred, roundabout way.
If Kwak Yeon had sunk so deep into himself for so long, the breadth and depth of his torment had to be just as great.
“To be honest, I can’t say I’m at ease.”
At that frankly revealed answer, one corner of Chwi Dugae’s chest ached.
He could feel that Kwak Yeon had opened at least one room in his heart to him, clearly and fully.
Thanks to that, Chwi Dugae could speak a little more comfortably.
“Kwak Brother, I don’t know about anything else—but at least when it comes to how harsh the hearts of the world can be, I hope you won’t let that be what breaks you.”
Kwak Yeon turned his head toward him.
“Brother, that’s rather sudden.”
It was a question of why he would say such a thing out of nowhere.
Because he couldn’t bring himself to say outright, Don’t let Wudang Sect’s coldness weigh on your heart, Chwi Dugae had to talk around it.
“Seeing those base half-wits—total strangers to you—lose their minds at the sight of gold, I was afraid you’d end up disappointed in people themselves. And there’s nothing that makes a man suffer more than denying people altogether, is there?”
“So this is your own experience speaking, Brother?”
This time, it was Chwi Dugae who nodded readily.
“That’s right.”
“...!”
When Kwak Yeon looked at him in silence, Chwi Dugae asked:
“What, does this older brother look a bit different to you?”
“You do feel a bit unfamiliar.”
At Kwak Yeon’s honest answer, Chwi Dugae went on in an even tone.
“I find this weighty side of me unfamiliar too. It’s all because of you.”
“Now that sounds like the Brother I know.”
Smiling faintly at Kwak Yeon’s harmless joke, Chwi Dugae continued calmly.
“Master once told me: people look at others with two sound eyes, but when they look at themselves, they turn into one-eyed monsters with one eye gone.”
Kwak Yeon listened with a composed face.
“Master said that making themselves that one-eyed monster, even so, is how people cover over the wounds in their conscience. That people are made that way to begin with—and that’s why the world where people live together is a ‘secular’ world. The problem is when, among those one-eyed folk, there’s someone standing there with both eyes open.”
“...”
“When it’s only one-eyed people together, the wounds in their conscience they’d forgotten—or rather, pretended to forget—stay hidden. But when someone with both eyes shows up, those wounds are laid bare. That’s why they shun and envy the man with two eyes—and what’s laid bare that way is what they call the harshness of human hearts.”
After watching him a moment, Chwi Dugae spoke again.
“So there’s nothing to feel wronged or wounded about when the hearts of the world seem harsh. It’s the one-eyed folk you should pity.”
Kwak Yeon felt as though his head were clearing. And at the same time he dimly understood the reason for all the coldness that had been hurled his way.
The assistant instructors are like that, but it’s not your fault. It’s because they’re cracked bowls.
Now he fully understood Jang Noya’s words as well.
“Brother, thank you for the teaching. I’d been feeling vaguely stifled as it was.”
“What teaching, nothing... It’s just a one-eyed fellow running his mouth.”
“You’re not one-eyed, Brother. You’ve just been pretending to be.”
“...”
When Chwi Dugae looked at him, Kwak Yeon gave a bitter smile and went on.
“In truth, who is there that isn’t one-eyed? I only think it’s a matter of degree.”
Kwak Yeon himself sometimes wanted to close one eye and pretend not to see. There had been times he actually did so.
“A matter of degree, huh...”
Murmuring quietly to himself, Chwi Dugae shook his head.
“How is it you say the exact same things as Master? You really are an old man before your time. Tsk, tsk.”
As Chwi Dugae clicked his tongue and turned away, Kwak Yeon suddenly spoke.
“Brother, since we’ve started talking, why not say a bit more?”
“Hm?”
“I’ve done all the thinking and qi circulation I can for now. Just standing here like this is getting a bit dull.”
“Dull, is it?”
At that, Chwi Dugae brightened at once and asked:
“Well then, what shall we talk about?”
“Let me think. Ah—tell me about Ghost Night Castle.”
“Ghost Night Castle?”
“We’ve already clashed with them directly, and yet I know almost nothing.”
Chwi Dugae nodded.
“That’s true enough. All right then—where would you like me to start with Ghost Night Castle?”
“First, I’m curious about their martial foundation. I wondered if the name ‘Ghost Night Castle’ itself didn’t come from the nature of their arts.”
Chwi Dugae bobbed his head.
“As the ones who style themselves lords of the night, they’re said to have some very peculiar demonic arts. Especially their hiding arts—they say their demonic stealth is the finest under heaven...”
At Chwi Dugae’s tale, Kwak Yeon’s eyes began to shine brightly as he listened.
The black-boat gang’s landing place was in an out-of-the-way spot, separate from Gujiang County proper.
By the time they reached the ferry toward dawn, the unloading work of the black boats that had arrived earlier was in full swing.
As soon as they disembarked from the illicit salt boat, Kwak Yeon and Chwi Dugae left the ferry, and before long they spotted a Dragon King shrine by the roadside.
The two of them waited there for the city gates to open, drying their clothes, damp with river mist.
When sunlight finally reached into the Dragon King shrine, Kwak Yeon slipped on his dried outer robe and rose to his feet.
“Brother, please rest here.”
“Hm?”
“With the °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° two of us together, we’ll only draw eyes. I’ll go into the city alone and hire a carriage.”
Knowing there was no hiding his beggar appearance, Chwi Dugae drooped his head and nodded helplessly.
“Do that, then. But will you be all right on your own?”
It was not that he was worried about danger. He simply wondered if Kwak Yeon, unfamiliar with worldly dealings, might have trouble arranging a carriage.
“Brother, even I’ve picked up a fair bit of worldly dust by now.”
“Well, that’s true, but still...”
He couldn’t very well tell him it felt like setting a child down at the river’s edge.
“Don’t worry. I’ll just quietly hire a carriage and come back. Ah, and I’ll buy you something to eat as well.”
Chwi Dugae’s face lit up.
“Well, nothing grand—just bring back a few meat buns.”
Once inside Gujiang County, Kwak Yeon asked directions to a livery and headed straight there.
“I’d like to hire a carriage.”
The owner of Great Plains Livery greeted him with a delighted face and asked:
“Where is the gentleman’s destination?”
“Wuhan.”
“Wuhan, is it—well then, that’s a long journey, so you’ll have to pay the round-trip cost. If we can’t find passengers for the return, the carriage will come back empty, you see. And there’s the driver’s wage as well... Sir, that’s how it is. Chartering a carriage, by nature...”
Guessing why the livery owner was groaning, Kwak Yeon cut him off.
“I’ll pay a generous advance.”
Color rose at once in the livery owner’s face.
“As it happens, we have just one carriage left. Must be it was waiting to serve such a kind-hearted customer.”
Kwak Yeon knew the man was quoting a steep price, but he didn’t mind and paid.
“It’ll take a bit of time to ready the carriage. For a long journey like this, the horses’ shoes need changing and...”
“How long will it take?”
“Give it half a shichen to be safe. If you’d care to wait here, I can have some tea brought...”
“Forget the tea. Just point me to a nearby bun shop.”
After stopping by the bun shop the livery owner directed him to and buying a generous bundle of meat buns, as well as a few supplies for the road, Kwak Yeon returned to Great Plains Livery.
Out in the yard, they were in the middle of changing a horse’s shoes.
TANG!
NEEIGH!
Whether a horseshoe nail had missed and scraped its skin or not, the horse laid on its side kicked and thrashed wildly.
“Grab its mane! Somebody hold down its rump!”
Kwak Yeon was just about to lend a hand when a young woman suddenly stepped in and pressed down on the horse’s hindquarters.
“Oh! Miss, thank you.”
“It’s nothing. It just looked fun, so I was hoping I could help with something.”
She was an attractive young woman in her early twenties, dressed in light gray martial robes.
“Coachman, may I keep helping?”
The black hair that had fallen across her pale forehead made the whiteness of it stand out even more.
