They had been deemed unfit for battle and thus selected as watchtower guards. Of course,
no one knew what had become of their families.
Most of their hometowns had already fallen into orc hands. For that reason, most of them took care of their meals and lodging in the guards’ barracks. Thus, they were greatly envious of Pasat, who had a family to return to. One soldier with an eyepatch over one eye grumbled.
“Damn it. That bastard had better not go around swaggering.”
“Well, what can we do? It can’t be helped. Shall we head back too?”
McMillan gave a bitter smile and led the soldiers. Guard Squad No. 57, with a single foreigner among them, finished their shift like that and was returning to the barracks.
Following behind McMillan, Dokgo Seong was lost in thought. The crude chainmail over his upper body clanked, but it did not disturb his reverie. As he walked after the soldiers, he unconsciously looked up at the sky.
“To think I’d end up playing guard, of all things…”
A bitter smile rose to his lips, but he forced his expression to harden. Since he had resolved to survive, he had to preserve his life by any means necessary. Only then would he have a chance to learn the art called magic in this place.
After winning his battle against the ogre, he had been bedridden for some time. During the fierce fight, he had taken a direct blow from the ogre’s hand and suffered the grave injury of four broken ribs. Only long after his wounds had healed was he able to meet Benitez, the only person with whom he could communicate.
“You will likely be assigned to the guard unit. Therefore, I ask that you do your utmost in your watch duties.”
Since there was no other way, Dokgo Seong accepted. And after serving as a guard for a full fortnight, he was at last able to rest.
As he walked, he quietly raised his left arm. Around it was a dark, dingy bracelet. Engraved with all manner of patterns, it fit snugly around his wrist, and it did not seem as though he could remove it with his own strength. Benitez’s warning surfaced in Dokgo Seong’s mind.
“This bracelet will allow us to find you no matter where you are. So I advise you to abandon any thoughts of escape.”
But Dokgo Seong had no particular intention of running away. To begin with, there was no need to flee when he did not know a single word of this place’s language, and moreover, he no longer possessed any strength with which to protect himself. Therefore, Dokgo Seong had decided to pretend to obey them while first learning the language of this place. To soothe his troubled mind, he opened his mouth in a low voice.
“For now, let’s think of nothing until I’ve learned their language.”
At the incomprehensible words that suddenly came from behind them, the soldiers’ gazes focused on Dokgo Seong. But they were all soaked in fatigue and paid it no particular mind.
“Must have been talking to himself.”
Glancing briefly at Dokgo Seong’s face, McMillan continued walking without a word. The guards’ barracks they had been heading for were finally coming into view before them.
Inside the narrow dining hall, soldiers dressed much the same stood in small groups of two and three, eating. On one side, where the serving counter was, soldiers stood in line. McMillan stopped and signaled for Dokgo Seong to follow him. The other soldiers knew the circumstances here well enough and did not need looking after, but the foreigner was an exception. As the nominal person in charge, he had to take care of the foreigner.
“Follow me.”
Whether he had somehow understood or not, the foreigner silently followed behind McMillan. Picking up a tray that had been set aside, McMillan grimaced. It had not been washed properly; filth clung to it, making it utterly dirty. But he was in no position to complain, so without a word, he handed one tray to the foreigner and went to stand at the very end of the long line.
The foreigner, too, silently accepted the tray and stood behind McMillan, waiting his turn. At the savory smell of soup wafting through the dining hall, McMillan felt his mouth water of its own accord.
“I don’t even know how long it’s been since I last had soup.”
When on duty at the watchtower, soup was something he could not even imagine. All they had to fill their bellies was dried-out bread and a piece of cheese. A short while later, after receiving his meal, McMillan took the foreigner and walked to a corner seat.
Slurp, smack.
Dokgo Seong glanced at McMillan, who was wordlessly absorbed in his meal, then brought the tray to his mouth. Whether it had not been cooked properly or not, a fishy stench stabbed at his nose, but he silently slurped down the soup. Of course, the food of this place, which was in an entirely different dimension, could not possibly suit him, but he did not care. He had already become accustomed to sleeping outdoors from the time he had carried out missions with the Guardian Demon King Corps, and in a situation like this, he had no leisure to complain about food.
In truth, back in the Central Plains, he had been something of a gourmand. After returning to Baegyo, he had taken up epicureanism as if compensating himself for his wretched childhood, and because of that, the cooks under his command had suffered no small amount of torment.
Dokgo Seong’s abnormally developed taste for fine food. Naturally, Sa Jun-hwan, who had his own schemes, granted almost all of Dokgo Seong’s demands. He even had the branch halls scattered across the land invite—more accurately, kidnap—famous cooks and present them to Dokgo Seong.
The Central Plains was, by nature, a place with a highly developed food culture. Depending on the region, a variety of dishes beyond imagination had been created, and their types were so numerous they could not be counted. Was it not said of Central Plains cuisine that, of things with two legs, everything but humans, and of things with four legs, everything but tables and chairs, could be used as ingredients?
As such, Dokgo Seong’s palate was truly out of the ordinary. In particular, once he found himself roaming the gangho together with the Guardian Demon King Corps, Dokgo Seong resolved to learn cooking himself. Simply put, one could not drag a cook around a battlefield where blood and flesh flew.
Because of that, through more than ten years of life in the gangho, Dokgo Seong’s cooking skills became no less than those of a first-rate chef, and on the rare occasions when the warriors of the Guardian Demon King Corps got to eat his cooking, they were so amazed by the taste that they could only click their tongues in admiration.
“It truly is the best, Commander.”
“It melts in the mouth.”
Dokgo Seong had grown used to such gourmet cuisine of the Central Plains. But at a glance, the food here was clearly not up to standard. First of all, it seemed to use pork as its main ingredient, but the gamy stench had not been removed at all. Moreover, the combination of seasoning was at a level that did nothing to bring out the flavor of the meat. Of course, in wartime, and in a dining hall where ordinary soldiers ate, there was no way a first-rate cook would be assigned. When a strange taste spread from the piece of meat he bit into, Dokgo Seong frowned.
“Then again, in my current position, I’m hardly in a place to quibble over the taste of this food…”
Glancing at McMillan, who was frantically absorbed in his meal, Dokgo Seong silently buried his head in his tray. For the sake of survival, Dokgo Seong had to put any sort of food into his stomach.
After finishing his meal, Dokgo Seong followed behind McMillan toward the barracks. The guards’ quarters were directly above the dining hall. When they went up the stairs, rooms stretched in a row along a narrow corridor. McMillan chose one of them and opened the door. But the inside of the room was already packed full of sleeping soldiers. The instant he opened the door, the stench of sweat stung his nose, and McMillan frowned and shut it again.
“We’ll have to find another room.”
After searching for quite some time, they finally found a room that still had space to lie down. McMillan pointed at the empty spot with his finger and looked at Dokgo Seong.
“It’s a bit cramped, but it won’t be cold. Let’s sleep here.”
Seeing the foreigner nod, McMillan quickly removed his armor, used it as a pillow, and lay down. Perhaps he was terribly exhausted, for he fell fast asleep almost immediately. Since he had been reduced to dozing off while leaning against the wall at the watchtower, even this sleeping place must have felt comfortable enough.
Snore.
Dokgo Seong silently looked at McMillan, who was even snoring, then quietly sat down in place. All around him lingered the stale smell of sweat. Picking up a blanket that was filthy with grime, Dokgo Seong lay flat on his back without even taking off his chainmail. The low ceiling came straight into view.
“How pathetic.”
Muttering in a low voice, Dokgo Seong tried to sleep. He tried to fall asleep by any means he could, but sleep would not come at all. In the end, Dokgo Seong had no choice but to wait with wide-open eyes for tomorrow to arrive.
The all-out Orthodox-Demonic Great War, which had drenched the entire murim in blood, was now entering its final stage. The war, which had originally been expected to favor the White Path martial world, overturned all predictions and proceeded in favor of the Demonic Alliance, a coalition of demonic sects.
However, because both sides had suffered tremendous losses in manpower and resources through the Orthodox-Demonic Great War, the leaders of both camps could not help but tacitly consider a ceasefire. The White Path sects belonging to the Murim Alliance could no longer bear their unexpected losses, and the Demonic Alliance had also achieved what it had intended, so there was no need to continue the fighting any further.
In the end, the Orthodox-Demonic Great War, which had lasted for more than ten years, was finally showing signs of its conclusion. But there was no need to say that both the White Path and the Demonic Path had suffered enormous damage from this war.
The number of small and medium sects that had been completely annihilated was beyond counting, and even the Nine Sects and One Gang, the core of the Murim Alliance, as well as the Demonic Cult, the main force of the Demonic Alliance, were struggling because they could not recover from the damage they had suffered in all-out war.
That was the situation, but if one were to name the sect that had benefited the most among them, people would undoubtedly choose Baegyo. Of all the murim sects that participated in the Orthodox-Demonic Great War, Baegyo had suffered the lightest losses.
Sa Jun-hwan, an outstanding strategist, had managed to preserve his elite warriors as much as possible even amid fierce fighting. It was an achievement made possible because, through meticulous calculation, he dispatched his warriors only to battles with an eighty percent or greater chance of victory, and sent warrior units of the scale that would minimize sacrifices the most. The extent of their losses could not be compared to that of the Demonic Cult or the Nine Sects and One Gang, each of which had lost more than half of the warriors counted among their elites. Since Baegyo had preserved its strength intact even amid the chaos of battle, it was only natural that its status rose.
However, the Demonic Cult, Hegemon King Sect, and others that formed the Demonic Alliance could not place any restraints on Baegyo’s conduct. That was because, externally, Baegyo’s role could never be disparaged. The Heaven-Splitting Blood Demon Dokgo Seong and the Guardian Demon King Corps he led—no one could deny that they were the group that had achieved the most dazzling military exploits in the Orthodox-Demonic Great War.
The invincible storm legion, the Guardian Demon King Corps. At its pinnacle stood the Heaven-Splitting Blood Demon Dokgo Seong, who had ascended to the ranks of supreme masters in only ten years. An iron-blooded fighter possessed of martial arts so great that, in one-on-one combat, he would not shrink even if his opponent were the leader of the Demonic Cult. Commanding a mere five hundred soldiers of the Guardian Demon King Corps, he destroyed countless bases of the orthodox factions, drastically weakening the strength of the White Path murim. Innumerable orthodox warriors had died by his hand.
There was even a common saying that even the warriors of the Demonic Cult, who formed the core of the Demonic Alliance, readily acknowledged his achievements.
Of course, among the orthodox factions he was depicted as the incarnation of evil, but to the believers of Baegyo, Dokgo Seong was an eternal absolute. Through the Orthodox-Demonic Great War, he had deeply engraved the name of the sect called Baegyo upon both the White Path and the Demonic Path. But as the saying went, the nail that stuck out was hammered down; there was no way the demonic sects, especially the Demonic Cult, would look kindly upon Dokgo Seong as his fame rose higher and higher. Yet even the Demonic Cult had no way to touch Dokgo Seong. To begin with, Baegyo had already grown so large that even the Demonic Cult could not easily lay a hand on it.
After all these twists and turns, the Orthodox-Demonic Great War finally came to an end. The leader of the Murim Alliance and the absolute ruler of the Demonic Alliance met and abruptly agreed to a ceasefire. Thus, peace returned to the murim. Though no one knew how long that peace would last…
Dudududu.
A line of cavalry was galloping toward Cheonsan, where Baegyo’s main headquarters was located. All of them were covered thickly in dust as they rode frantically. At the very front was a warrior of somewhat small build. Judging by his severely hunched back, he appeared to be a hunchback. Behind him, some hundred and eighty warriors followed like shadows.
Their identity was none other than the Guardian Demon King Corps. They were the iron-blooded fighters who had led the Orthodox-Demonic Great War to a victory for the Demonic Path. It could be boldly asserted that because they existed, the Demonic Path martial world was able to end the war in an advantageous position despite having somewhat inferior forces.
They were now on their way back to Baegyo’s main sect. Having continued their activities until just before the ceasefire agreement was signed, they finally sheathed their swords only after receiving word that the Orthodox-Demonic Great War had ended. And now, as a victorious army, they were returning proudly to Baegyo. After riding for quite some time, Dokgo Seong flashed his bloodshot eyes.
“It was a long war.”
His bloodshot eyes gleamed an especially vivid red. Along with them, an immense demonic energy spread from his entire body. A pressure poured from him in streams, so overwhelming that those who stood before him would not dare even breathe. By now, he had reached a position where he could rightly be called an absolute being.
It had been more than twenty years since he had escaped from Shaolin Temple. Those years had changed Dokgo Seong tremendously.