When Geom Mugeuk released the First Immortal’s mute acupoint, money that had not existed before suddenly appeared.
“I had forgotten. I have money I put aside separately at the Continental Money House.”
“How much?”
“About four hundred thousand nyang.”
“You saved quite a lot, didn’t you?”
The First Immortal also revealed the cipher for the Continental Money House. Gowol made sure to write that down as well.
Earlier, they had obtained eight hundred thousand nyang in funds from Immortal Stronghold, and now four hundred thousand nyang the First Immortal had saved separately. Altogether, they had already gained one million two hundred thousand nyang. At that, the Second Immortal blinked with an enraged expression.
They switched back to the Second Immortal.
“All this time you only gave us a measly fifty thousand nyang, while you swallowed four hundred thousand by yourself?”
Far from looking sorry, the First Immortal seemed as though he wanted to retort, but with his mute acupoint sealed, he could not say a word.
“The First Immortal has more assets. I know he bought gold and hid it away.”
The First Immortal could not hide his bewilderment. It seemed he had intended to feign ignorance about that gold until the very end.
When the Second Immortal scored points with his gold, the First Immortal blinked irritably. A war of blinking between the two began.
Back to the First Immortal’s turn.
“I was going to mention the gold too. Count that as my merit!”
“That won’t do. If you feel wronged, don’t forget things and make sure you keep track of them. Otherwise the Second Immortal might make a show of generosity with your assets again.”
The First Immortal gave up on his wealth completely. He decided that as long as he survived, he could gather as much money as he wanted again.
“I have some land I bought.”
“How many pyeong?”
“Quite a lot.”
In truth, Geom Mugeuk had started this to obtain information rather than assets, but the two of them were misunderstanding the situation. From Geom Mugeuk’s perspective, it was something to be grateful for.
Meanwhile, the more of the First Immortal’s assets came to light, the greater the Second Immortal’s sense of betrayal became.
“Brothers? You son of a bitch! You were hogging it all for yourself.”
Truthfully, he thought it was possible to skim some off. What angered him was that the First Immortal had done it without even saying a word.
On his next turn, the First Immortal retorted.
“Don’t you realize that you earned even that fifty thousand nyang thanks to me in the first place? If not for me, you’d be lying dead in some gambling den right now with a knife in your gut. Khaak, ptooey!”
It had been a relationship bound by loyalty, but once it collapsed, it happened in an instant.
In that way, the two even revealed all the assets of the dead Third and Fourth Immortals. All they could think about was somehow getting on Geom Mugeuk’s good side and surviving. As for the Second Immortal, he also harbored a desire for revenge, determined to have the First Immortal killed.
When there were no more assets to uncover, Geom Mugeuk pressed their sleep acupoints.
The two, who had cursed at each other whenever their turns came, fell asleep.
Geom Mugeuk said to Gowol,
“Tomorrow morning, take these two and go around to the money houses first. Recover every bit of their assets.”
“Yes, understood.”
Until then, he intended to let the two live. The First Immortal might have taught them the wrong cipher for the money house.
Geom Mugeuk asked the Pungcheon Cult Leader,
“Please help Strategist Go tomorrow.”
“Understood.”
The Pungcheon Cult Leader nodded obediently.
“I thought you would curse me out by the bucketful. Saying I’m squeezing money even out of these villains.”
“Do you know how much Gowol and I suffer because of the money you squeeze out?”
“I’m sorry.”
“I didn’t say that to show off. I meant that the money from those villains is being put to good use.”
Once the funds from Immortal Stronghold came in, it seemed the work of forming an intelligence organization might be more or less complete.
“I heard from Gowol exactly what kind of bastards those fellows are. Why are you letting those sons of bitches sleep? Hang them upside down!”
“Understood. When they wake, I’ll start by pulling out their fingernails.”
Of course, it was a joke. No matter how evil someone was, it ended with granting them death. That was Geom Mugeuk’s fixed iron rule. Not for their sake, but for his own.
After finishing his conversation with the Pungcheon Cult Leader, Geom Mugeuk approached the Fist Demon. As if he had no interest in what was happening over here, the Fist Demon was only looking up at the moon.
Geom Mugeuk stood beside him and looked up at the moon with him.
“Do you know what I realized while traveling this time? I lived a life too buried in martial arts. I spent my whole life training, and my whole life fighting.”
At some point, Geom Mugeuk had once said something similar to Ian. Not to live a life spent only on training. That regret was now being voiced by the Fist Demon.
“I realized just now. This is the first time I’ve ever looked up at the moon for this long. Does that make any sense? To have lived my whole life and never once looked at the moon even for a single tea’s time.”
Geom Mugeuk’s gaze was also directed at the moon.
“From now on, please enjoy life a little.”
“I intend to.”
If he could keep those words, if the Fist Demon could instead take one step back from martial arts… perhaps he really might be able to collapse that cliff. After all, only when life changed could martial arts change as well.
* * *
The next day, Gowol went with the Pungcheon Cult Leader, taking the First and Second Immortals along as they visited the money houses. The cipher they had been given was correct. They recovered not only the money but also the gold that had been deposited, and they sorted out and reclaimed the other assets as well.
The First Immortal had gathered this much wealth in just a few years. It also meant there had been that many more victims.
The First and Second Immortals said all sorts of things in an attempt to win Gowol’s favor somehow, but Gowol did not respond to a single word. The one who spoke to them instead was the Pungcheon Cult Leader.
Of course, since he deliberately chose only unpleasant things to say, such as that they would go to the most painful hell among all the hells, or that he had made a bet on which of the two would survive, they pretended not to hear him.
After nearly all the assets had been settled, Geom Mugeuk seated the two of them before him again.
“Now then, I suppose it’s time to talk about the financier.”
The First Immortal thought his life or death would be decided by this answer.
‘I mustn’t tell him everything! But I also mustn’t show any sign that I’m hiding something!’
That was the key. The problem was that he did not know much about the financier.
‘How can I package this so I can survive?’
The First Immortal glanced at the Second Immortal beside him. Still, that bastard knew nothing about this at all, so the First Immortal thought he had to score points here for certain.
‘I can live. I offered up far more assets, and if I provide information about the financier too, I’ll survive!’
After taking a deep breath, the First Immortal opened his mouth.
“I saw the financier exactly once.”
“When?”
“When I first joined hands with him.”
“Do you know who he is?”
“I don’t. There was a curtain hanging between him and me, so I could not see his face. Still, there was one thing I could tell for certain. Judging by his voice, he was a man who sounded fairly aged.”
“I suppose from now on we’ll have to go looking for a man who sounds fairly aged. I wonder how many there are in this world.”
Flustered by Geom Mugeuk’s mockery, the First Immortal quickly added,
“The men the Fist Demon killed yesterday were the Eight Ghost Sword Hands. The Eight Ghost Sword Hands would never move for money alone, so the financier is not simply someone with a lot of money. He is certainly the master of a great sect, or someone who possesses great power.”
At that moment, the Second Immortal blinked.
The First Immortal quickly said,
“There is no need to release his mute acupoint. That bastard knows nothing about the financier.”
“That’s what he says. What should I do? Do you have better information?”
At Geom Mugeuk’s words, the Second Immortal blinked even faster.
Geom Mugeuk sealed the First Immortal’s mute acupoint and released the Second Immortal’s mute acupoint again.
Then words beyond expectation flowed from the Second Immortal.
“I spoke with that man directly. Somewhere without a curtain.”
At that, the First Immortal, whose mute acupoint had been sealed, blinked and groaned as if trying to speak. It was an intense signal that everything the Second Immortal had just said was a lie.
“Tell me in detail.”
“It was the very day the First Immortal met him. I was waiting for the First Immortal to come out from the driver’s seat of a carriage standing in the manor courtyard. A short while later, the financier came out first. But when he got into the carriage, I saw him bow his head slightly to the coachman. It was clearly an act of courtesy.”
The First Immortal struggled and groaned so fiercely that his mute acupoint was released as well.
“That’s a lie! Why would the financier greet a coachman?”
“It’s true. I definitely saw it.”
Once the two could speak at the same time, things became noisy.
“He made it up. If something like that had happened, he would have told me back then. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“What was I supposed to say? That you seemed to have been fooled like an idiot by a subordinate? That the real financier seemed to be the coachman? Then what do you think you would’ve done? You would’ve beaten me while telling me not to talk bullshit. Am I wrong?”
The First Immortal could not retort. Because that was exactly what he would have done.
“You son of a bitch! What kind of trick are you trying to pull? Do you want to live that badly, you coward?”
“Coward? Where did that word come from? From your filthy mind?”
I gestured for the First Immortal to be quiet, then said to the Second Immortal,
“Keep talking.”
“I even spoke with that coachman while waiting. He was an ordinary man. He had a round, good-natured look. Ah! He had a tattoo on his chest. I happened to see it when he bent over.”
“What kind of tattoo?”
“It was a golden pig tattoo. It was so strange to see a pig carved on a person’s body that even now, that tattoo is still vivid in my mind!”
Perhaps thinking he was about to provide some important information, the First Immortal stepped in.
“This bastard is skilled at lying. Do not believe him. He is spouting all kinds of bullshit to live…”
Puuuk!
The First Immortal, who had been in front of the Second Immortal, vanished. His face smashed in by my blow, he rolled far away as a corpse.
Startled, the Second Immortal looked at me. His shock soon turned into joy.
“I survived!”
He was overjoyed, as if he might fly away.
“In any case, that bastard was the worse one. It’s only right that you die after him.”
For an instant, the Second Immortal flinched. By “die after him,” surely he meant later, when he had grown old with age, that kind of later? But that was not it. The look in Geom Mugeuk’s eyes as he gazed at him was nothing but cold.
“Please spare me!”
“From the beginning, the four of you committed deeds that made it impossible for you to survive. Be satisfied that I’m sending you off cleanly.”
“Keep your promise! You son of a bitch! Who the hell are you? Who are you to…”
Puuuk!
The Second Immortal flew all the way to where the First Immortal lay and died.
Geom Mugeuk had not hesitated in the slightest to eliminate them. He had not hoped for their repentance, nor had he revealed his identity to grant them the grand meaning of having died at the hands of the Second Young Master of the Demonic Cult.
When he turned around, the Fist Demon was walking toward him.
“Weren’t you planning to dig out the ones behind this?”
“I was.”
“Then is it all right to kill them all?”
“I found out who is behind them.”
A round body type, a golden pig tattoo on the chest. He was someone I knew well before my regression. At times he became a coachman, at times a laborer at a construction site, at times a waiter at a tavern. He enjoyed hiding his identity. And at the same time, he was an extremely greedy man.
“To kill him, I need Father’s permission.”
At Geom Mugeuk’s words, the Fist Demon was shocked.
“Who on earth is he?”
A single name flowed from Geom Mugeuk’s mouth.
“Chi Sheng.”
The Fist Demon immediately thought of one person.
“Don’t tell me. That Golden Pig of the Sado Alliance?”
“Yes. That is the man.”
“He is behind this matter?”
The Fist Demon’s expression hardened. It was not because the opponent was Chi Sheng. It was not because the opponent belonged to the Sado Alliance. It was because Chi Sheng was the loyal retainer of one man.
The person most favored by the Alliance Leader of the Sado Alliance, and the head of the Sado Alliance’s most elite organization, the Extreme Corps, which only took orders from the Alliance Leader.
The second-in-command of the Sado Alliance, Yelu Han.
Chi Sheng was one of the four hands and feet Yelu Han cherished most. It was said that those subordinates had sworn loyalty and each carved a tattoo on their chest, and Chi Sheng had carved a golden pig while swearing to bring in an endless stream of money for the rest of his life.
“That money was ultimately money going to Yelu Han.”
Geom Mugeuk felt as though fate had led him here. And it was not only because of this incident.
Yelu Han.
He was the enemy of one person. A person deeply connected to Geom Mugeuk as well: the Demon Physician.
When the Demon Physician performed the Divine Eye Art for him, the person he had asked Geom Mugeuk to kill someday was none other than Yelu Han. He had not yet mentioned the name directly, but Geom Mugeuk already knew.
Yelu Han had massacred the Demon Physician’s family before his very eyes. From that day on, the Demon Physician had lived solely for the purpose of killing Yelu Han. When Geom Mugeuk had heard the Demon Physician’s request, he had resolved that he would act once he was capable. Now, he felt the time had come.
The Fist Demon noticed that I did not intend to give up.
“Yelu Han is out of the question!”
“Why is he out of the question?”
“If we touch him carelessly, a war could break out.”
“There won’t be a war. There will be a disturbance and an uproar, though.”
“You’re serious.”
In the past, the Demon Physician had asked Father to kill him, but Father had refused.
Yelu Han, who enjoyed the absolute trust of the Alliance Leader of the Sado Alliance, was someone who meant more than a mere villain of the unorthodox factions.
“I considered the one behind this matter the vilest of all. He hid in the darkness and used underlings like the First Immortal to suck the lifeblood out of young people until they died. In a few days, Chi Sheng will probably be informed that all the Immortals are dead. Then Chi Sheng will create more Immortals and repeat the same thing. Even if Chi Sheng dies, another Chi Sheng will take his place and do that work.”
These were precisely the kinds of men they were. The absolute evil Geom Mugeuk thought of.
An evil even the righteous factions could not touch, and ordinary people could not even approach.
Long ago, Father had asked him what he thought the demonic path was. At that time, he had answered like this.
—I think it is our cult’s own conviction in striking down absolute evil.
To catch the great evils even the righteous factions could do nothing about—that was the demonic path he envisioned. Those evils should tremble at the words Demonic Cult. That was the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult he wanted to create.
“If I were an ordinary person, I would have to back down, saying there was nothing I could do. I would have to endure it. But we are not ordinary people, are we? We don’t have to endure it, do we? The reason I trained and struggled so hard was so that at times like this, I would not have to endure. Why should we endure? Those bastards should endure instead. They should stop tormenting people and stop fucking around.”
The Fist Demon silently stared at Geom Mugeuk. Geom Mugeuk silently looked back at him as well.
Considering the Fist Demon’s personality, he was the person this persuasion would work best on. Considering his relationship with Father, he was also the person it would work least on.
At length, breaking the long silence, the Fist Demon announced the end of the journey.
“Let’s return to the Cult. This slacking-off trip ends here.”
The trip that had begun suddenly came to an equally sudden end. But it was too early to be disappointed. Turning away with that broad back of his, the Fist Demon added words Geom Mugeuk had never expected.
“If we are to get the Cult Leader’s permission, all the Demon Supremes will have to step forward.”