After letting the horses graze, we were sitting on a hill and resting.
My hair fluttered in the soft breeze. But in the heart of Extreme Evil Soma, it seemed a bloody gale was still blowing.
“How did you kill the Soul-Seizing Demon Venerable?”
I could only let out a wry laugh.
“You told me I was stubborn in pretending to be good, didn’t you? Your persistence is no less than mine, Lord Soma.”
“Do you not wish to boast? At the Second Young Master’s age, one would want to brag to the whole world. I killed the Soul-Seizing Demon Venerable! So lower those arrogant eyes in front of me! Do you not wish to stand above all others?”
“I do have a bit of bravado, but not to the point of pretending I did something I didn’t. That’s right. I’m strong. Strong enough to draw such suspicion. But I did not kill him.”
I denied it to the end. Saying something that could become a weakness to a man like Extreme Evil Soma was no different from handing him that weakness. If I spoke while swept up in emotion, I would regret it for a long time.
“Very well. Then let us have a match.”
In the end, I knew those words would come.
After seeing my skills against the assassins, he must have been seized by the desire to fight me.
As he killed the assassins, he had become a beast that had caught the scent of blood. The desire he had suppressed and suppressed had raised its head.
“I refuse.”
“Why do you refuse?”
“Because fighting among ourselves when we have a powerful enemy ahead is foolish.”
“Can’t we just fight lightly enough not to get hurt?”
“Once people start fighting, they are bound to get excited.”
“I will not get excited.”
“I will. If, as you suspect, I truly have the skill to kill the Soul-Seizing Demon Venerable, could you handle me once I’m excited?”
“That makes me want to fight you even more.”
He was boiling over, lava bursting out from within. If I wanted to stop him from causing a major disaster, I had to let a little of that lava flow out today.
“Let’s do it!”
“I refuse.”
“Many assassins died today. Would they attack again before even a day has passed? Realistically, it’s impossible.”
“There’s another reason I don’t want to.”
“What is it?”
“Whether I win or lose, I lose.”
“What does that mean?”
“If I win, you’ll want to kill me. If I lose, your interest in me will plummet.”
“What good does it do for me to be interested in the Second Young Master?”
“My purpose is simple. If you become my ally, Lord Soma, it will be a decisive force in making me the successor. I wouldn’t care if all the other Demon Venerables became my enemies.”
Extreme Evil Soma snorted.
“You say that now, but next time you’ll try to draw in another Demon Venerable, won’t you?”
“Is it that obvious? How did you know?”
“It’s obvious.”
He had a deep distrust of people.
“I’m sorry, but I cannot get into the same boat as the Second Young Master.”
“Why is that?”
“You know, don’t you? The demonic path the Second Young Master dreams of is not my demonic path. So there is no need to try to get on my good side. That Flattery Divine Art of yours is nothing but a waste of mental energy.”
“I’ll still try harder.”
“Why?”
“Because there’s nothing for me to lose by doing so.”
Extreme Evil Soma laughed. It seemed to be an answer that suited his heart perfectly.
“A very good reason. If you had spouted nonsense like ‘because I like you’ or ‘because I respect you,’ it would have had the opposite effect.”
How nice it would be if Extreme Evil Soma were a man of only this much, exactly this far.
But this was nothing more than his clothing. The shoes he wore, the mask he had on. His true nature began after this.
“So let us fight. In any case, we are people who will never become close.”
The places he had shown me and called the world were not truly his world.
I knew the true world of Extreme Evil Soma.
The moment his eyes rolled back and he could see nothing, the moment that madness burst forth so that no one could stop him—that was his true world. Only in that moment did he feel alive.
Right now, he was merely holding himself back because of his curiosity about me, because of my peculiarity in pushing him in ways he had not expected.
Originally, he was not the kind of person who pestered someone to have a match. He was the kind who charged in to kill and ended up fighting. I could not let him become aware that he was enduring too much.
“Very well, let’s fight.”
“!”
Extreme Evil Soma was startled by my words. It seemed he had not expected me to really agree to a fight.
“Good! Let us fight at once!”
Extreme Evil Soma laughed loudly. He was genuinely pleased.
“Lord Soma.”
“What is it?”
“Do you see that tree at the very end over there?”
“I see it.”
“First, let us compete in qinggong.”
Before disappointment could flicker in Extreme Evil Soma’s eyes, I quickly added,
“If you beat me in qinggong, I’ll spar with you.”
“Very well.”
A look of contempt crossed Extreme Evil Soma’s eyes. Since he was confident in qinggong, he naturally believed he would win.
“If I win, please grant me one request.”
“Say anything you like.”
“Have a drink with me tonight. You don’t have to take off your mask. You can just lift it slightly like this and drink.”
I lifted an imaginary mask and mimed drinking.
“Second Young Master.”
“Yes.”
“You want me to lift it slightly and drink? You, Second Young Master, are the one who is slightly mad. How can you be this persistent?”
At those words, I laughed like a madman. This was the method I had chosen to deal with a madman. He called it persistence, but this was steadfastness.
Strike, and strike, and strike the same place again. Where I was striking was his mask.
“Very well. If I lose, I will drink.”
“Then shall we begin?”
We stood shoulder to shoulder. It had truly been a long time since I had competed in qinggong.
Extreme Evil Soma asked me,
“Have you ever had a qinggong contest before?”
“Yes. Exactly once.”
“With whom?”
With you.
“I have. An old friend.”
“The Second Young Master is young, and yet you have an old friend?”
“There is one bad bastard.”
“If I saw him, I would have liked him.”
“Perhaps you would have. Or perhaps you would have disliked him because he resembled you too much.”
At my cryptic smile, Extreme Evil Soma looked at me strangely.
“May I run first?”
“Go ahead.”
“I’m going!”
As I ran out first, Extreme Evil Soma leisurely followed behind me.
Extreme Evil Soma caught up to me in an instant. As if teasing me, he ran ahead. Running far in front, he looked back and said to me,
“You challenged me to a qinggong contest with only that level of skill?”
“It isn’t over yet.”
I was unable to close the distance until we rounded the tree we had chosen as the turning point.
Of course, Extreme Evil Soma was wary of me. He knew well that I was not someone who would propose a contest I was bound to lose.
But no matter how he looked at it, it seemed he did not think he would lose to me.
With the finish line not far away, Extreme Evil Soma indulged in one last bit of leisure.
“So the Second Young Master had a weakness. Now you seem a little more human.”
“What did I seem like before?”
“A monster. You are so young that you keep making people lower their guard, but when one looks closely, you are a monster.”
“Like this?”
Just as he turned his head, wondering what I meant—
Whoooosh.
I suddenly accelerated and shot forward. In an instant, I caught up to Extreme Evil Soma. I had unleashed the Swift Step of the Four Steps of the Wind God, which I had hidden until now.
My Swift Step, powered by my extreme internal energy, was literally swift.
Belatedly, Extreme Evil Soma drew up his internal energy and chased after me, but the distance only widened further.
“Stop right there!”
Piiing!
Extreme Evil Soma fired a Blood Calamity Finger from behind. Since it was meant as a warning, it passed beside me.
When I had nearly reached the finish line, Extreme Evil Soma unleashed the Demonic Extreme Berserk Palm. Mad with the contest, he sent it so that it grazed my head, but even then, he could not bring himself to hit me.
The tree in front of me shattered and collapsed. As if congratulating me on my victory, leaves showered down over my head.
Extreme Evil Soma arrived late, killing intent rising from his body. He strode toward me as if he might strike at any moment.
“Are you going to lose twice in one day?”
Because I spoke calmly instead, it was effective.
Though Extreme Evil Soma was a wicked man, he was not petty.
Instead, he vented his anger at the sky. The Demonic Extreme Berserk Palm, filled with irritation, was fired into the air one after another. Thunder rumbled again and again in the clear sky.
I waited until he calmed his anger.
After he had relieved the surge of rage in one burst, Extreme Evil Soma asked me,
“What exactly is that qinggong?”
“It is qinggong I’ve kept hidden as my trump card.”
“I’m asking you what it is.”
“I cannot tell you. It’s my trump card.”
He refused to accept the result.
“Let us compete again. From start to finish with that qinggong.”
The fact that he had lost was one thing, but it seemed what angered him more was that he had lost because he let his guard down.
“Next time.”
I lightly mounted my horse and set out first.
Behind me, killing intent surged once more, then soon subsided.
Clop, clop.
Extreme Evil Soma followed a little distance behind me.
I could feel heat from behind. It was the heat I had wanted. Extreme Evil Soma’s lava was overflowing toward me.
Yes, your madness. Let even a little of it out that way.
That night.
Extreme Evil Soma and I made camp. Since we had traveled so slowly, the next village was still quite far away.
Beyond the campfire, Extreme Evil Soma watched me prepare the animal I had hunted. Since midday, he had not said a single word.
At least the good thing about a campfire was that it made no silence feel awkward.
I roasted the prepared meat and handed it to him.
“Please go into the carriage and eat.”
At that, Extreme Evil Soma finally opened his mouth.
“Why are you not telling me to drink? Is it because, even if you say it, I’m trash who won’t keep a promise anyway?”
I responded calmly to his thorny words.
“I will.”
At the unexpected answer, Extreme Evil Soma could not reply for a moment.
“Of course I will. I ran so hard and won, after all.”
“Then why are you not saying it?”
“I was going to have us eat first and drink afterward. You don’t seem to like alcohol all that much. You dislike drinking with meals, don’t you?”
“If you know I don’t like it, why did you ask me to drink?”
“Because it’s a penalty. If you lose a contest, you have to do something you don’t want to do.”
Extreme Evil Soma stared silently at me, then looked down at the meat I had handed him.
Then, suddenly, he lifted his mask slightly and began to eat.
I was startled.
I had not expected him to lift his mask so easily and eat in front of me. I had expected I would have to prod his pride a little before he would eat. This unpredictable caprice of his was beyond my control.
“It’s bland.”
“The salt is here.”
As I reached out, the salt lying on the spread leather rose into the air. At the sight, Extreme Evil Soma’s eyes flashed open. He knew that lifting countless grains like salt with Void Object Seizure was far more difficult than lifting a single object.
Shaaaarrrk.
The salt flew through the air and sprinkled onto his meat.
Extreme Evil Soma’s eyes trembled as he looked at me. The desire to fight me was rising in him once again.
“It’s still bland.”
“Without even tasting it?”
To him, who wanted to see more of my secret arts, I said with a smile,
“They say eating bland food helps you live long. The Demon Physician said so, so you may believe it.”
“Second Young Master, you truly are…”
Extreme Evil Soma started to say something, then stopped. What had he been about to say? A madman? Someone who irritates people? Or perhaps…
Extreme Evil Soma began eating the meat again. I watched him for a moment, then began eating as well.
When my hunger had been somewhat filled, I brought out the liquor. Since we often camped outdoors, our baggage was never without alcohol.
This time as well, Extreme Evil Soma lifted his mask slightly and drank. He had said he disliked it, but he drank just fine.
“Not even taking off the mask properly. It looks rather pathetic, doesn’t it?”
“It doesn’t look impressive.”
“You are finally speaking honestly.”
“That’s why I like it. Being with someone who tries too hard to look impressive is uncomfortable. You can tell just by looking at my elder brother.”
Extreme Evil Soma suddenly used the meat bone he was holding to draw a long line on the ground. Then he drew a vertical line at the place I had marked before.
“Where am I now? You said you would spare me if I came this far. Have I come this far?”