On my way back to my quarters, someone I truly had never expected was waiting for me.
Sitting in the very place where the Blood Heaven Blade Demon had waited was the One Flower Sword Venerable.
To my astonishment, she had even set out a table of wine.
“Second Young Master, you’ve worked hard today. Have a drink before you go.”
“Gladly, Senior.”
I sat down across from the One Flower Sword Venerable. As I had with the Blood Heaven Blade Demon, I smiled at ease, but inwardly I was tense.
“I thought you said you did not drink.”
“This wine is not for me, but for you, Second Young Master.”
“Thank you.”
She poured me a cup.
I drank without hesitation.
“What would you have done if that wine had poison in it? You drank without even checking.”
“I did not check, but I did prepare.”
“How?”
I spat the Poison-Repelling Bead out from my mouth. It could block poisonous fumes, but if held in the mouth while drinking wine like this, it could also neutralize poison inside the mouth.
“When did you put that in?”
“I slipped it in when I greeted you earlier.”
“How did it not show, even with a Poison-Repelling Bead in your mouth?”
“It is a top-grade Poison-Repelling Bead, so it is very small, and I also trained so my pronunciation would not leak even with it in my mouth.”
A look of admiration crossed the One Flower Sword Venerable’s face.
“Forgive my bluntness, but I know you do not harbor good feelings toward me, Senior. Under such circumstances, I could hardly gulp down the wine you offered without thought, could I?”
Because I had honestly told her I had been holding the Poison-Repelling Bead, she did not grow angry. Instead, she confirmed only one thing.
“Did you drink the Blade Demon’s wine with a Poison-Repelling Bead in your mouth as well?”
“I did not.”
In an instant, the One Flower Sword Venerable’s expression hardened.
“You trust the Blade Demon, but not me?”
“Many things happened between Elder Blade Demon and me before I drank that first cup.”
“We had things happen between us too, did we not?”
“No, we did not.”
At my firm answer, the One Flower Sword Venerable protested.
“I was the one who recommended Jang Ho again.”
“You did recommend Jang Ho, but that was not for my sake. It was to force me not to form ties with Elder Blade Demon. Was that a choice made for me?”
I did not merely press the One Flower Sword Venerable, who had no satisfying answer.
“I want to make many things happen between us, Senior. So that I may drink the wine you offer without a Poison-Repelling Bead as well.”
“Do not say things you do not mean.”
“Why would I not mean them?”
“Because your heart already has the Blade Demon in it.”
“If you were me, Senior, whom would you wish to be in my heart?”
As if to say it was her, I drank the wine without the Poison-Repelling Bead. At my action, showing that I trusted her, the One Flower Sword Venerable’s expression softened.
She was someone who rejected even being compared to the Blade Demon. She was also someone with the pride to believe that, if it came down to one of the two, I would naturally choose her. As for poison—of course she was not the sort to put such a thing in.
“Second Young Master.”
“Yes.”
“Tell me what you want.”
“Help me become the successor. Help me without the condition that I sever ties with Elder Blade Demon. That is all I want.”
“Second Young Master, in this world, help without conditions is something one should only expect from one’s parents.”
Having made her refusal clear, the One Flower Sword Venerable rose from her seat. She was about to leave when she asked, as if the thought had just occurred to her.
“Is it true that you gave the Blade Demon a birthday gift?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes wavered. She had asked as though it had come to mind just then, but in truth, she must have wanted to confirm this herself.
“May I ask what you gave him?”
I picked up the Poison-Repelling Bead that I had placed on the wine table.
“I gave him this.”
“You gave him something precious.”
“Because I received something precious.”
The One Flower Sword Venerable seemed to think for a moment about what she should say, but in the end, she said nothing.
“I will be having a drink later at Pungryu Tavern. If you think of it, please come.”
The One Flower Sword Venerable left without answering.
* * *
When I returned to my quarters to change clothes, there was another guest.
To my surprise, Father was waiting in the courtyard of my quarters. Following the two Demon Venerables, even Father. If I were to give today a title, it would have to be Encounters with Great Figures.
“What brings you to this humble place?”
“I came to see how you live.”
It was the first time Father had come to my quarters. The hunt had been a first, eating together had been a first, and now visiting my quarters was a first. With Father, there were many such firsts.
“Shall we go inside?”
“Why would I enter a stinking room where a man lives alone?”
“Then I will at least bring out a chair.”
“No need. I sat plenty today.”
“True. The Demon Physician once told me that sitting for too long is the worst thing for one’s health. He said you shorten your life by as much time as you spend sitting. Please do not sit in your taishi chair for too long.”
I went to Father’s side and stood shoulder to shoulder with him.
“Do you want to live long?”
“Of course. There are still so many things I have yet to try. I want to try them all before I die.”
As I said that, I looked back at Father.
“What about you, Father? Is there nothing you wish to try besides being the Heavenly Demon?”
“No.”
His answer was so firm that, to me, it sounded instead like, “There are too many to answer.”
“Someday, I would like to go out into the Central Plains with you, Father.”
Father glanced at me.
“Well, I am not suggesting we go to strike the Murim Alliance.”
Perhaps that joke, at least, amused him, for Father let out a faint chuckle.
“I mean we should simply look around here and there, at places where people live. What do you think? Later, will you go see the world with me? They say the Snowy Mountains are wonderfully cool if you go there in summer.”
Father gave no answer.
For a while, we watched the sunset in the distance.
“On my way here, I met the One Flower Sword Venerable. She said that if I cut ties with the Blade Demon, she would become my backer.”
I told Father exactly what had happened.
“Whom do you want to join hands with?”
“The Sword Venerable seems like she would be easier to deal with. But the Blade Demon has his cute side.”
“That is how you let your guard down and die.”
“He certainly has a knack for making people lower their guard, that old man.”
Father would know the Blade Demon better than I did.
“Why did you give the Blade Demon the Beyond-Heaven Divine Pill?”
“I once entrusted him with a certain task.”
Father did not tell me what that task had been. It was surely something that had happened when both Father and the Blade Demon were young.
“What do you intend to do?”
“I want them both. A blade on my left and a sword on my right, masters on both sides.”
Father turned his head and looked at me.
“This is not needless greed. My instincts are telling me this: if I bring those two sworn enemies along together, the results will be far better. It will be difficult at first, but later, it will actually be easier. It keeps whispering that to me.”
“Where does that confidence come from?”
“Could it not be the confidence you passed down to me in my blood, Father?”
By then, the sunset had reached its peak, reddening both Father’s face and mine.
Father suddenly said, “The Sword Venerable is someone with many wounds.”
I looked back at Father, but after saying only that, he said nothing more. Was he telling me to use that point, or was he telling me to be considerate because of it?
“When I first met the Blood Heaven Blade Demon, he told me that he had lived his whole life with misfortune, so it was best not to see him often. Yet these days, I see him almost as often as I see you, Father.”
I made my will to bring the two of them along clear once more.
“I have already clashed well enough with misfortune, so I will try clashing with wounds too.”
* * *
That evening, I drank at Pungryu Tavern.
I had told the Blood Heaven Blade Demon to come, and I had told the One Flower Sword Venerable to come as well. I did not know who would come, or whether neither of them would.
“Please try this.”
The owner, Jo Chunbae, brought over a dish and offered it to me. It seemed he had made it specially for me.
“Thank you. Sit and have a drink with me.”
“Oh my, how could I dare sit with you?”
“It seems you do not wish to drink with me.”
“How could that be?”
Jo Chunbae sat down.
I poured him wine. Jo Chunbae accepted my cup, crying, “Goodness, goodness,” over and over.
“There is no need to be so formal.”
“No, sir. I ought to be. Thanks to you, Pavilion Master, our lives have become so much easier.”
“Have they become a little easier?”
“Of course. Ever since the Yellow Springs Pavilion branch was established in this alley, the number of martial artists who drink and cause trouble has dropped sharply. And that is not all. There are far fewer people leaving tabs they have no intention of paying too.”
“That is a relief.”
“This is all thanks to you, Second Young Master.”
“From now on as well, keep an eye on things, and if anything happens that you think I ought to know, be sure to tell me.”
“I understand.”
After drinking the wine I gave him in one refreshing gulp, Jo Chunbae rose from his seat.
Just then, another person came over, bowed deeply, and left.
“Thank you, Second Young Master.”
He did not say what he was grateful for. Perhaps he too had received help from the Yellow Springs Pavilion.
When he hurried back to his place after only greeting me, someone walked toward me and said,
“You are popular.”
The person walking over with a huge blade strapped to his back was none other than the Blood Heaven Blade Demon. At his appearance, the entire room froze. The last time I had drunk with the Blade Demon, it had been early and there had been no customers, but today there were many.
For them, how could drinking in the same place as a Demon Venerable be comfortable?
I stood and said to everyone,
“The Demon Venerable is a man of unsurpassed character. So do not worry and enjoy your drinks. As long as you do not come over here and make a drunken scene.”
When I even added a joke, the tension eased.
As I sat down, the Blood Heaven Blade Demon said with a sullen face,
“Why lie?”
“It was a kind lie. They came to drink after paying their money; they should not have to drink while watching our moods, should they?”
“If you do not like seeing that, then leave.”
“If you are going to say that, please hand out money to those people first. Tell them, Take this and go eat somewhere else. And give the owner money for his losses too.”
“Putting on an act again.”
“It is not an act. This is basic courtesy.”
“Is that what you call a demonic practitioner?”
“Are demonic practitioners not people?”
“See here, Second Young Master. At times like this, I cannot tell whether you are a man of our cult or a man of the Murim Alliance.”
I did not think the foundation of my own identity was the Demonic Cult either. It could not be helped. In my previous life, I left the cult in my youth and wandered the Central Plains for the rest of my life.
During that time, I met many people. Not only in my days as a wandering warrior, but also in the process of seeking materials for the Great Art, I experienced every sort of human being. I was wounded, I felt anger, and I also learned what true human compassion was.
The values by which I lived had all been formed then, so in a sense, I could be called someone who belonged neither to the demonic path, nor the righteous path, nor the unorthodox path.
My desire to eliminate absolute evil and establish a new demonic path had also been born from that experiential background.
I raised my wine cup high in a buoyant voice.
“Now then, happy birthday. Since midnight has not yet passed, the congratulations are still valid.”
“Lower your voice.”
Though he was a man who treated everything as insignificant, it seemed a birthday celebration was burdensome even for him. Truly, since meeting him, it was the first time I had seen him this embarrassed.
Then again, who would ever have celebrated him like this? Of course, he must have received countless formal birthday gifts, but their meaning would have been different from this gathering today.
“Do not do such useless things from now on. What is so good about getting older that it deserves congratulations?”
“It is just an excuse to drink and enjoy ourselves like this.”
“You like wine more than you seem to, Second Young Master.”
“That is true. I am raising a few wine worms inside my body as well. Some raise their heads when it rains, and some raise their heads when I am depressed or suffering. Do you like wine, Elder?”
“I used to like it… but these days, I have cut down a great deal.”
It was right then.
A sharp, ringing voice came from behind us.
“So you still have not quit.”
When I turned my head, the One Flower Sword Venerable was standing a short distance away.