The safest place in all the martial world?
Joo Hyang-wol did not take those words as mere bluster or bravado. She understood them like this.
‘This man trusts his father so much.’
She knew what that felt like. Because she had been the same. To her, her father’s embrace had been the safest place in the world.
Like a revolving lantern, memories of her father rose in her mind.
His appearance teaching her martial arts when she was young.
Leading the martial artists of the Sword Manor with magnificent dignity.
His back as he stood alone in the courtyard, gazing up at the moon.
Even his appearance, frail from illness before he passed away.
In those many scenes, there was no sign of her stepping forward proactively. She had never taken the initiative to ask her father to share a meal, nor, like these people, had she ever taken the lead to ask him to travel.
There had been so many things she wanted to do with her father when she was young, but as she grew older, they gradually faded. Even if there had been something she wanted to do, she had likely postponed it. Because she had always believed her father would be by her side.
‘Father, I miss you.’
Her gaze turned toward the person who had made her miss her father so keenly today. Toward the one who had silently stretched out his hand to receive the agreement.
When she first saw him in front of the inn, some indescribable emotion had surged up suddenly before vanishing. A feeling she was experiencing for the first time. Had it all been leading to this kind of connection?
Then she realized she hadn’t properly conveyed her gratitude to him. She sprang up from her seat and expressed her thanks with a polite bow.
“Thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking the agreement.”
Geom Woo-jin raised his head and looked at her.
“It’s fine.”
It was a brief word, but it sounded incomparably steadfast and gentle.
Geom Muguk sensed that the gaze with which she looked at his father was extraordinary.
If he let this pass at a time like this, he wouldn’t be Geom Muguk.
—What would you do if you’re more popular with women than your son?
At Geom Muguk’s telepathic message, a scoff formed at Geom Woo-jin’s lips. Surprisingly, that scoff did not deny his son’s words.
‘Father is a man too,’ is that what you mean?
While he was looking on with such eyes, Joo Hyang-wol, who was beside him, spoke to Geom Muguk.
“It seems the young hero likes his father very much.”
“Can you feel that?”
When she nodded, Geom Muguk raised his voice toward his father.
“Did you hear that? The whole world knows how much I love my father.”
Of course, this poignant echo did not reach his father. Geom Woo-jin spoke to Hwi as if uninterested.
“Pass the tea over here.”
Hwi lifted the teapot and politely poured into Geom Woo-jin’s cup.
They were at the same table, yet the two seemed to be in different worlds.
‘Pretending not to see, pretending not to care, even though you read every line of the agreement!’
That was why every moment of this journey with his father was joyful.
“It’s enough that the young lady understands.”
“Come to think of it, I don’t even know your name.”
“I am Geom Yeon.” (劍煙)
He used the alias he always used, and added the words he always spoke when saying this alias.
“The yeon of smoke, not the yeon of fate. We met like this and shall vanish like smoke.”
Geom Muguk introduced his father and Hwi.
“As you may already know, that heartless man is my father, and this man is my uncle.”
At the introduction of “uncle,” Hwi flinched.
Having expected to be introduced as a clan martial artist or a bodyguard, how flustered must he have been to be introduced as his father’s brother?
He was bewildered, but his father wore an expression that said he had done well.
Uncle Hwi, you may be called an uncle. You are more than qualified for it.
“If there were a competition for taciturnity, those two would take first and second place side by side.”
At Geom Muguk’s words, Joo Hyang-wol smiled in empathy. Truly, those two were taciturn.
Especially the man introduced as uncle did not say a single word. However, she felt one thing. He was watching everything, and listening to everything.
“Of course, I’m speaking enough for the two of them as well.”
Joo Hyang-wol laughed. He certainly talked a lot. But then her expression soon grew serious. This was not a time to be sitting around laughing; she had been smiling thoughtlessly again.
In the meantime, the newly ordered dishes came out.
The new dishes were placed before Joo Hyang-wol, and Geom Muguk ate the remaining dishes he hadn’t been able to eat while talking earlier. His father and Hwi had separately set aside food for him.
Even though time had passed while they talked, the food did not cool and remained warm.
Geom Muguk could tell. That his father had warmed the remaining food with his Yang internal energy.
‘No one would believe it, but I think I take after that father.’
During this journey, Geom Muguk was gradually seeing new sides of his father.
Joo Hyang-wol ate silently. There was a strange comfort this place gave her, but worry lingered in her heart.
How could Geom Muguk not read such a heart?
“Are you worried?”
“To be honest, I don’t know what I should do from here.”
This was also a statement that could tarnish the honor of the Joo Family Sword Manor. Such concerns were things she should have discussed with her mother or the clan’s experts upon returning.
But she could already picture what the situation would be like when she returned.
Her mother would loathe that the negotiations had fallen through, but if she admitted she had entrusted that important agreement to a complete stranger, it would cause an absolute uproar. She could picture her mother screaming and getting angry.
But her mother wouldn’t know. That the reason she had suspected the alliance with the Hwangdo Merchant Guild was a wrong choice from the start was because she couldn’t trust her mother.
That the distrust had been born from her habit of unfiltered emotional outbursts at her child.
This time too, that distrust had been accurate. Because her mother had misjudged the opponent. Moreover, though she couldn’t know their exact intentions, the situation was more serious than ever.
Because she felt that, she didn’t want to leave this place. The moment she rose from here, that serious situation would become her reality in full.
She wanted to rely on these people. Even though she knew she shouldn’t, she kept wanting to escape.
“Return and prepare.”
Joo Hyang-wol, who had been silently looking down at her food, raised her head to look at Geom Muguk.
“Your opponent has bared their fangs to devour you. Then you must prepare to fight.”
She should have drawn strength from Geom Muguk’s words, but worry took precedence instead.
“My mother won’t believe me.”
From that single sentence, he could guess what kind of relationship she had with her mother.
Geom Muguk, who had been gazing at her for a moment, spoke unexpected words.
“Parents don’t usually believe their children. Do you know why?”
“Why?”
“Because they’ve been through that time. Saying absurd things, insisting, lying, rebelling. They watched over our entire growth, didn’t they? How could they believe it when such a brat says they’ve finally grown up? Even if you said you mastered the world’s best lightness skill, wouldn’t your child be the one who makes you tell them to watch out for carriages when crossing the road? Because they remember us running forward without looking left or right.”
Joo Hyang-wol smiled faintly.
“You speak as if you’ve raised three children.”
“Parents and children are a two-way relationship. We keep forgetting that.”
Why was it? The moment she heard those words, Joo Hyang-wol thought of her mother.
Geom Muguk looked at his father.
“Our father doesn’t believe me either.”
It was something he had said before, referring to when he had stepped far back from a dangerous spot while training in the Nine Transformations Demonic Art.
Then Geom Woo-jin casually tossed out to Joo Hyang-wol.
“Young lady, don’t believe that fellow either.”
At those words, Joo Hyang-wol smiled without realizing it.
“That is too much!”
Contrary to his words, the gaze with which Geom Muguk looked at his father was soft.
You can slowly believe in me. After this journey ends, later, much later, it is fine even if you say you believe in me five years from now.
Geom Muguk spoke to her again.
“So go back and try talking with your mother.”
“I don’t have the confidence to persuade my mother.”
“The merchant who left earlier will also be persuading someone upon returning.”
“What do you mean?”
“Since today’s agreement failed, he will have to explain and persuade someone of this matter. To be entrusted with the task again. To say he will definitely succeed next time. Even your opponent, who is in a more advantageous position than you, is making such efforts, so why are you already trying to give up?”
“!”
It was a rebuke she had never expected.
“It’s because you’re thinking roughly, relying only on intuition. Don’t do that.”
Geom Muguk rose from his seat, went to the table where the Hwang merchant and she had been sitting earlier, and brought back the brush she had been about to sign with.
“Write it down. What words to say and how. How to begin your first sentence, and if your mother reacts this way, how to respond. Write it all down.”
Joo Hyang-wol looked at Geom Muguk in surprise. At first she thought it was a joke, but he was speaking in earnest.
“What if it still doesn’t work?”
“Write that down too. What you will do then.”
“!”
“It may look simple and easy, but nothing is as difficult as persuading people. Among them, persuading family is the hardest. It’s difficult precisely because you know each other too well. So don’t try to persuade her; do it with the mindset of having a long-overdue conversation. Have you ever asked your mother what is troubling her these days? Do you know if she is eating properly?”
Joo Hyang-wol could say nothing.
Because at some point, she had only been watching for her mother’s mistakes while longing only for her father.
Joo Hyang-wol rose from her seat. The words that the Hwang merchant would also be persuading someone, and that rather than persuading her mother, she should have a conversation. They made her spring to her feet.
Yes, it wasn’t the time to be fleeing. I will not become such a weak person.
“Thank you for the advice.”
She looked at Geom Woo-jin. Over his appearance, her father was superimposed once again. Father, I will be strong.
“Thank you so much for today.”
Just as she was about to turn and leave, she glanced back and spoke.
“But the safest vault in the martial world—you can find it when you want to, right?”
Geom Muguk accepted her first-ever joke with a smile.
“Judge for yourself by looking at that face. For now, I can’t open it.”
As if she were truly trying to judge that, she quietly looked at Geom Woo-jin, then politely bowed at the waist and left the inn.
Now only three people remained in the inn.
“Seeing that she has the composure to make jokes, I think she will do well when she goes back.”
Separate from that, Geom Woo-jin had a different concern.
“The Hwangdo Merchant Guild is not an opponent the Joo Family Sword Manor can face.”
This confirmed it. That the Hwangdo Merchant Guild was somehow connected to the mastermind behind this incident.
“That is likely.”
“Why did you provoke her when you know that?”
“We will take the lead in handling this matter anyway, but they need to change as well. If they don’t, they will be devoured by others someday.”
There, a frivolous joke was added.
“She is a woman who likes my father more than I do, so I must help her. I truly felt my father’s popularity this time. As expected, I am unmistakably my father’s son!”
As before, this joke did not land.
He seemed about to say, “Nonsense!” Instead, his father made an expression as if to say, “I was quite popular in my youth.” Anyway, no one could match that arrogant, self-satisfied expression.
“What will you do now?”
Geom Woo-jin asked his son’s thoughts first.
“They will probably come to seize the agreement first, won’t they?”
It was not a guess made because they were connected to the mastermind.
It was because of what the Hwang merchant had left behind earlier.
—“I am a man who is exact in matters of give and take.”
It was disguised with a merchant’s smile, but he was a man who could not stand being indebted.
“He seems cautious, so he will try to uncover our identities first.”
Predictions born from Geom Muguk’s vast experience flowed smoothly.
“Since we emphasized that we are merely merchants, he probably won’t act directly. Then he will entrust an information broker to ascertain our identities.”
It was absolutely impermissible for his father’s or his own identity to be revealed.
“I intend to lay groundwork with the information brokers first. So that our false identities flow to them.”
Geom Woo-jin silently nodded. Watching that, Hwi could feel it. That the Cult Leader was satisfied with his son’s judgment.
He had served the Cult Leader for a long time, but he had never seen him express his emotions as openly as he had recently.
Hwi understood this change in the Cult Leader.
Because he had always been by the Cult Leader’s side, he had heard all kinds of information about Geom Muguk. Where he had eliminated whom, and where else he had eliminated whom.
But the Geom Muguk he heard about and the Geom Muguk he experienced directly were completely different.
Through this journey, he was feeling it clearly. That the Young Cult Leader was a person whose process shone brighter than the results.
If he had heard only the results of this matter at the Heavenly Demon Hall, he would know only the fact that the Young Cult Leader had helped the Joo Family Sword Manor from the Hwangdo Merchant Guild’s hidden scheme.
Then these things would have been omitted.
The fishing bets made on the way here, the walks and martial arts training with the Cult Leader, the advice given to Joo Hyang-wol. Even the effort to find a place for himself, a mere bodyguard.
He would not have known of all those emotional exchanges; they would have been omitted. Had he not experienced them by his side, he would never have known how brilliantly they shone.
The Cult Leader was now experiencing such a son. The five years of time the Young Cult Leader had requested were flowing by even in this moment.
Until this journey, Hwi had thought it an excessive gamble for the Young Cult Leader. That the Cult Leader’s heart would never change.
But during this journey, he felt the thought that perhaps it might not be so growing little by little.
“We will disguise ourselves as the Gansu Seodo Sect.”
Whenever he used the name Geom Yeon, he had always disguised himself with that sect. Since it was a sect actually operated by the Heavenly Demon Cult, the more thoroughly they investigated, the more solid the disguise would become.
“An orthodox sect.”
As expected, his father wore a displeased expression, but.
“If not for this opportunity, when else would you try being the head of an orthodox household?”
Geom Woo-jin snorted and asked.
“What next?”
He looked curious as to what choice his son would make.
“Aren’t there people behind them that we need to find?”
As if those words were true indeed, Geom Woo-jin silently waited for the next words.
“Dealing with these fellows is easier than turning my hand over. But if we handle them rashly, the forces behind them will hide themselves thoroughly or prepare themselves.”
They had to approach them naturally and dig in. For that, the Hwangdo Merchant Guild could rather be an opportunity.
Geom Muguk revealed his plan.
“That is why I intend to make them write one more agreement. The kind of agreement that is absolutely favorable to the stronger side, I mean.”
In other words, it meant he would make them draw in the Seodo Sect, the sect they were disguised as.
“We will sign exactly according to the terms of that agreement.”
Absolute Regression – Episode 454