Murim Alliance Leader Jin Paecheon stood in a pavilion in Cheongun Grove, his hands clasped behind his back.
As he gazed at the mist flowing through the bamboo forest, Geom Mugeuk walked up to the pavilion.
“Alliance Leader.”
“Welcome.”
Geom Mugeuk had sent word that he had something to report, and so they had met here in secret.
For a while, the two of them stood and watched the drifting mist. Jin Paecheon was the first to speak.
“That matter keeps troubling me.”
The Cheonae Geosa he had met had been no different from usual.
The problem was what he had newly come to feel. The fact that, in all the years that had passed, the man had never once been angry with him. The fact that he had never once revealed his true feelings honestly.
To say that was simply his personality, or that it was because of Jin Paecheon’s status—the years they had spent together were far too long for that.
“But that alone is not proof that he is an evil man.”
Geom Mugeuk answered calmly.
“I do not think knowing someone for a long time means you know them well. What matters is whether you made the effort to see them accurately. But friends do not make that kind of effort. They are friends because they do not have to. That is why he is the worst kind of man.”
Jin Paecheon turned to look at Geom Mugeuk. He was still convinced that Cheonae Geosa was evil.
“What happened to the experts who violated the Forbidden Demon Edict?”
At Jin Paecheon’s question, Geom Mugeuk widened his eyes and asked back.
“The Forbidden Demon Edict?”
Jin Paecheon stared at Geom Mugeuk. He was the one who had told him that news.
“There are no experts in our cult who violated the Forbidden Demon Edict.”
Then he grinned. From that mischievous smile, Jin Paecheon could tell. The old demons who had violated the Forbidden Demon Edict were already dead.
Of course, saying there had been no one who violated the edict was a joke, and Geom Mugeuk relayed what had happened as it was.
“They appeared at Myeongsim Clinic.”
In truth, Jin Paecheon had already obtained that information as well. The fact that So Jeongnak had vacated the clinic after meeting two old experts. And the fact that those old experts were demonic martial artists who had violated the Forbidden Demon Edict.
“They died in a secret chamber beneath Myeongsim Clinic.”
Geom Mugeuk deliberately emphasized the fact that there was a secret chamber underground there.
“Did you deal with them yourself?”
“Yes.”
Even after killing them, Geom Mugeuk stood perfectly fine, without so much as a scratch. This young cult leader grew stronger every time they met.
“Did Physician So die as well?”
So Jeongnak had truly been evil? He had spent so many years working for the people of Wuhan.
“Yes, he died too.”
Geom Mugeuk answered without hesitation, then explained why.
“So Jeongnak was trying to undo their restraints.”
And then he added the decisive words.
“He had been training in poison arts in a secret chamber beneath his residence. He selected patients with constitutions necessary for his experiments, conducted poison experiments on them there, and killed them.”
Cold fury flowed from Jin Paecheon’s eyes. If those words were true, then the man truly could not be forgiven.
If everything Geom Mugeuk said was true, that was.
Jin Paecheon stared at Geom Mugeuk. At this moment, if he did not believe Geom Mugeuk’s words, then all of this became a conspiracy fabricated by the Demonic Cult.
“Trust your instincts, Alliance Leader.”
“If what you say is true, then should I not distrust my instincts instead? I did not even know that an old friend was my enemy.”
“He is someone who deliberately approached you from your youth. Not you, Alliance Leader—no one could have known.”
His instincts told him to trust Geom Mugeuk. Even so, Jin Paecheon was cautious. This matter concerned not only himself but the safety of the entire orthodox murim.
“Let us suppose you are right. Was there truly any need to prepare for so many years? If it had been me, I would have overturned things several times by now.”
“That is precisely why.”
“Precisely why?”
“If it had been you, Alliance Leader, you surely would have produced a better result than this.”
After a brief pause, Geom Mugeuk spoke as though asking in return.
“But they are not you, Alliance Leader, are they?”
“!”
“Since they had to face someone like you, it could not have been easy. So difficult that even decades of preparation would not have been enough.”
Jin Paecheon could feel it. Just how highly Geom Mugeuk regarded him.
“To be honest, I had thought the person they were aiming for might not have been Ha Gun or Haryeong, but Cheonae Geosa.”
For an instant, Jin Paecheon flinched in shock. That meant Cheonae Geosa had intended to sacrifice his own life to ignite the Righteous-Demonic War.
“Why did you not tell me that then?”
“I thought it might make your judgment of your friend even more difficult. But thinking back on it now, I should have told you at the time.”
Geom Mugeuk bowed his head and apologized.
“I am sorry. Though I said I would tell you everything, I made that judgment on my own.”
Jin Paecheon did not think it was something that required an apology. The young cult leader said he would tell him everything, but he himself still did not fully trust him. He had no intention of telling him everything.
There was still a wariness toward Geom Mugeuk in his heart. He trusted him, yet remained wary. Once again, he felt just how difficult it was to trust a person completely.
“Did you find out whom they were aiming for?”
“Yes. So Jeongnak said it himself.”
Geom Mugeuk added quietly.
“Their targets were me and Ha Gun.”
The moment he heard those words, Jin Paecheon felt an unbearable killing intent for the first time in a very long while.
The rage he had felt when he had merely guessed that his grandchildren might be targets could not compare to the rage he felt now that it had been revealed as fact.
It was not simple anger. It was a dense killing intent that wanted to slaughter the one behind this in a gruesome manner, a primal killing intent that wanted to inflict the utmost agony on the other party before tearing them to pieces.
At times like this, Jin Paecheon truly found the position of Murim Alliance Leader burdensome. He wanted to seize a sword at once and rush out. While shouting one sentence.
So where are they? Who are they?
This had originally been his nature. After becoming the Murim Alliance Leader, he had endured and endured again, and his temperament had changed.
But this matter was truly bringing out his original nature.
“Thinking about it one way, their target was my father. It seems they analyzed that if I died, my father would start a war. It was a judgment that showed they did not know my father at all.”
Jin Paecheon stared intently at Geom Mugeuk and said,
“They may have seen him properly.”
“Yes?”
He had not said it simply to make Geom Mugeuk feel better. The Geom Ujin he had seen at the tripartite meeting had clearly not lost his ambition. Whether he used the grief of losing a child as a pretext, or whether it was truly because of that grief, Jin Paecheon thought Geom Ujin might indeed start a war.
Yes, perhaps the true targets this time were not the young cult leader and his grandson, but the Demonic Cult Leader and himself.
“There is something else I learned while handling this matter.”
The most important reason he had come to meet the Alliance Leader today was to convey this information.
“There is an expert in soul-bewitching arts behind this matter.”
At the mention of soul-bewitching arts, Jin Paecheon’s expression hardened. The martial arts the orthodox murim hated most were poison arts and soul-bewitching arts.
So Jeongnak had used poison, and another mastermind was someone who used soul-bewitching arts. In other words, they had deployed the most troublesome opponents imaginable.
“Please prepare countermeasures. I have sent separate word to Captain Jin regarding soul-bewitching arts.”
Surely the Murim Alliance also had preparations against soul-bewitching arts and poison arts. If only to deal with his own cult, they would have put countermeasures in place.
“Understood.”
“As you can see, the person they fear most is you, Alliance Leader.”
With that, he gave the Alliance Leader strength once more. The most important thing now was for Jin Paecheon to stand at the center and remain unshaken.
“Lastly, there is one thing I must tell you.”
“What is it?”
Geom Mugeuk spoke cautiously. With anyone else it might have been different, but with this man, he had to inform the Alliance Leader beforehand.
“I intend to meet Cheonae Geosa myself.”
For an instant, Jin Paecheon flinched. He felt that what had to come had finally come.
“If you were me, what would you do?”
After pondering for a moment, Geom Mugeuk answered calmly.
“If I were in your position, Alliance Leader, I would ask myself first. What are you most afraid of right now?”
“!”
Jin Paecheon asked himself that question.
Was he afraid that his friend would be revealed as an evil man?
Or was he afraid of learning that he had lived his entire life deceived?
“Will you kill him?”
Jin Paecheon asked heavily, and Geom Mugeuk revealed his honest feelings.
“At first, I naturally thought you should be the one to kill him, Alliance Leader. It was for your sake. But now, I think it would be all right if I killed him. That, too, is for your sake.”
Geom Mugeuk did not explain the reason.
He merely bowed respectfully, then descended from the pavilion.
“First, I will find proof that he is the one behind this.”
* * *
When Geom Mugeuk opened the door and entered, Cheonae Geosa asked with a startled expression,
“Who is it?”
Geom Mugeuk had slipped inside quietly, avoiding the eyes of the martial artists guarding the outside.
“You already know, do you not?”
Soon, Cheonae Geosa nodded.
“I heard about you from the Alliance Leader.”
Then, with an expression of genuine surprise, he added,
“I did not expect you to come looking for me.”
Geom Mugeuk could understand why the Alliance Leader was so troubled. Nowhere in this man’s appearance could one find the feel of an evil man hiding his true identity.
“If I shout, everyone outside will rush in.”
“Are you going to kill them all? Ah, that was your original goal, was it not? To have Wuhan’s martial artists slaughtered by my hand.”
As if to show him, Cheonae Geosa rose from his seat, opened the door through which Geom Mugeuk had entered, and stepped outside.
Then the martial artists standing in the corridor looked at him. No one was dead, and no one had had their numbing or sleep acupoints subdued.
Outside the window, in the courtyard, countless martial artists could be seen as well. Geom Mugeuk had entered the room while avoiding all of their eyes. What mattered was that he had done so without subduing them.
“Is there anything you need?”
“No.”
At the question from the martial artist guarding the corridor, Cheonae Geosa shook his head, closed the door, and came back inside.
In the meantime, Geom Mugeuk was looking around the room.
“You truly are frugal, just as the rumors say.”
It looked as though he was only glancing around, but Geom Mugeuk’s eyes were sharply examining every corner of the room. A secret passage to escape through in an emergency, perhaps, or a mechanism to attack an opponent.
One might think, would there be such a thing when he had lived while hiding himself this thoroughly? But there was no knowing. As he had told So Jeongnak, perhaps at first he had been perfect too. But would there still be no gaps even now?
There would certainly be one somewhere. A hole no bigger than a finger that could bring down the dam.
“Could it be that somewhere in this room, if one enters a secret passage, a truly luxurious house appears? A house with a feast laid out and beauties waiting on the bed.”
He said it like a joke, but Cheonae Geosa did not laugh.
“Does your residence have such a secret passage?”
It was a way of saying, You do not have one, so why say such a thing to me?
“Would not those of us in the Demonic Cult live in such houses without bothering to hide it?”
After looking around the interior, Geom Mugeuk sat on the chair beside the tea table and opened the teapot.
“You use the cheapest tea as well. You should at least drink good tea.”
“My tongue is not so refined.”
Geom Mugeuk behaved calmly, but all his senses were focused on Cheonae Geosa. He did not let down his guard for even a moment. This man stood at the center of all these events.
Pour.
Geom Mugeuk poured tea into a cup and drank.
“To be honest, I drink anything well too.”
Cheonae Geosa silently watched Geom Mugeuk behaving as if he were in his own home.
“Has it not been difficult, living all this time while hiding yourself? Why not speak frankly with me? In any case, neither the Alliance Leader nor the orthodox martial artists will believe what I say.”
Surely he too must have a desire to reveal himself. He would want to boast about what he had accomplished for so long. Do you know how I endured and endured to come this far?
But Cheonae Geosa did not reveal even the slightest hint of such a thing.
“What is your purpose in doing this? What do you hope to gain by slandering me?”
Cheonae Geosa’s gaze sharpened.
“Are you aiming for the Alliance Leader?”
Amazingly, Geom Mugeuk nodded and admitted it.
“Yes. The Alliance Leader is my target.”
To Cheonae Geosa, who flinched in surprise, Geom Mugeuk added,
“My purpose is to protect the Alliance Leader from you.”
Realizing he had been mocked, Cheonae Geosa’s expression hardened.
“The young cult leader of the Demonic Cult has come to protect the Murim Alliance Leader? How amusing.”
“The world is full of amusing things. The Murim Alliance Leader’s oldest friend may also be his most threatening enemy.”
Geom Mugeuk smiled, but he did not.
“Why did you come to see me?”
“There is an honest answer, and there is a dishonest answer. Which would you like to hear?”
“I will hear the honest answer.”
Geom Mugeuk frankly revealed the purpose of his visit.
“To find proof that our esteemed Geosa is hiding his true identity.”
To drag out the man named Hwa Yulcheong, who was hidden inside the name Cheonae Geosa. For the moment when he would tear away the shell called Cheonae Geosa entirely.
“You are so honest that I have become curious about the dishonest answer as well.”
“Shall I tell you?”
When Cheonae Geosa nodded, Geom Mugeuk’s demeanor changed completely. With an utterly cold gaze that peered into evil, Geom Mugeuk said quietly,
“I came to kill you.”
As if he had expected it, Cheonae Geosa showed no agitation.
“Killing you first and cleaning up afterward. It is not such a bad method for dealing with someone as dangerous as you.”
Cheonae Geosa asked calmly,
“That answer sounds more like the honest one.”
At that, Geom Mugeuk loosened his cold expression.
“You are right. In truth, that is my honest wish.”
“Then why do you not kill me?”
Geom Mugeuk rose from his seat and approached him.
The two stood facing each other at a distance close enough that either could draw a sword and sever the other’s neck in a single stroke.
“Because I want to make you a proposal.”
Geom Mugeuk extended his hand to him and spoke. It was truly an offer he could never have imagined.
“Join hands with me.”
Absolute Regression, Chapter 653