Chapter 198. The Peach Garden Oath Didn’t Work.
We all rose and greeted the Sword Demon, who had brought liquor with him. The Sword Demon set the liquor down on the table, then looked at Sambok, the Third Young Master’s guard.
“Who are you?”
Sambok took a step back, dropped to one knee, and said,
“Sambok, guard of the Third Grand Duke, greets the Left Envoy.”
Without answering, the Sword Demon took the seat Sambok had occupied and said to the Lust Demon,
“Pour the liquor.”
“Yes, Master.”
As the Lust Demon opened the sealed mouth of the bottle and began pouring, the Sword Demon asked me,
“Why did you keep the guard alive?”
I looked at Sambok, who was waiting on one knee.
“I had him do some cleaning.”
The Sword Demon replied,
“The Grand Dukes may differ in temperament and ability, but they are not fools who would choose their guards poorly. A guard will not betray them. They must have made it so he cannot betray them, even if he wants to.”
I agreed as well.
“What meaning does betrayal even have? Hwangwija is dead, so the Third Young Master’s life is a candle before the wind. If this fellow fails to realize that and remains loyal to the end, then he can simply die alongside the Third Young Master when the time comes. Once the object of his loyalty disappears, who knows what he’ll be loyal to then. Perhaps he’ll become a gravekeeper.”
The Sword Demon nodded.
“I see. So you had him clean for the time being.”
The Sword Demon looked at Sambok and asked,
“It seems the Hao Sect Master had you clean even after grasping your thoughts and tendencies. You must have endured the training guards receive, so it would be difficult to hear the truth from your mouth no matter what torture you suffered. However, believers who try to play clever make me uncomfortable, so go rejoin the Third Young Master.”
Still kneeling, Sambok cupped his fist to the Sword Demon.
“……Thank you for sparing me, venerable Left Envoy.”
I watched Sambok slowly raise his head. His face had already gone pale.
Sambok cupped his fist to me.
“Sect Master, I will take my leave.”
I nodded, then took a silver coin from my money pouch.
“Sambok.”
“Yes, Sect Master.”
In any case, I treated him like a person.
“You worked hard cleaning and running errands. It is as Senior Sword Demon said. Since I did not kill you, Young Master Mong and Master Liuhap merely kept watch over you as well. If you live according to the doctrine from now on, you will meet death together with the Third Young Master. Only by throwing away the doctrine you believed to be the sole truth in this world will a new life await you. The choice is yours. However you live, I wish you martial fortune. Take it. The Third Young Master’s third confidant.”
A single common silver coin was not a particularly large sum.
I handed that ordinary silver coin to Sambok. Sambok approached, held out both hands, and caught the falling coin.
I looked into Sambok’s eyes one last time, then offered him words of farewell.
“Do not forget what Senior Sword Demon and I said.”
“Yes, then.”
Sambok walked straight to the entrance of the Thousand Li Inn, turned back, bowed deeply at the waist, and left the inn without another word.
Only after driving out the guard did the Sword Demon finally raise his cup.
“Thanks to the Sect Master, more people die, and fellows who ought to have died also come back to life from time to time. Let us drink.”
We drank the liquor the Sword Demon had brought, and it was far harsher than the liquor we had been drinking earlier.
The Sword Demon said,
“Sect Master, you are more cruel than anyone, and more merciful than anyone. Do you think living like this is the correct answer?”
Slightly drunk on the liquor, I replied,
“Where would there be a correct answer? I regret things more than a dozen times a day. I feel ashamed three or four times. I burst into hollow laughter two or three times. But about once a day, I also think about where the fellows I spared are now and what they are doing. The ones I spared are in Ilyang County, and scattered throughout Namhwa, Namcheon, Nammyeong, and Heukseon Fort. If I killed every fellow I disliked on the spot, then one day the words ‘Fourth Calamity’ would be attached before my title. I cannot allow that.”
The Sword Demon smiled, an uncommon sight.
“That is quite the grand ambition you have, Sect Master. The Fourth Calamity, is it?”
The Lust Demon replied,
“Indeed.”
The Lust Demon filled our cups again, and we drank once more. Since none of us were men who could pretend to be weak, we all widened our eyes and exhaled deeply.
I made a suggestion to the Lust Demon, the Ghost Demon, and the Sword Demon.
“Whether we are drunk or not does not matter. Let us speak as if drunk. The four of us have lived dull lives all this time. One of us lived a dull life like a monk who chose to face a wall in cultivation.”
I pointed at the Sword Demon.
“One man lived thinking mostly of revenge while he was alive and breathing.”
This time, I pointed at the Ghost Demon.
“One little shit was mad for women, and yet never met a woman he truly loved deep in his heart.”
I pointed at the Lust Demon with my finger.
And lastly, I condemned myself.
“I spent about half my life mad. Perhaps because of that, as you all think, my personality is very poor. But among the countless people of the martial world, why is it that only a man mad with revenge, a man who lives like a monk, and a fellow mad for women can converse with me?”
Master Liuhap threw his head back and burst into laughter.
“Ha, ha…….”
The Lust Demon also laughed, his shoulders shaking a few times, and the Sword Demon smiled as well.
I warned the three of them.
“This time, you really will have to say something like a drunken man for me to let it pass. Who will go first? Liujia?”
Master Liuhap nodded.
“It is Liuhap. In truth, I once intended to kill you.”
“You did.”
“When I was captured by the Black Cat Gang, when I was lying down after being beaten by you, and even when I took the energy-dispersing poison Master Murong gave me, I dreamed of revenge. Then, after you returned from fighting somewhere, you flew into quite the temper and told me to get lost at once.”
I nodded.
“That’s right.”
“In truth, even though you could have killed me, you forgave me in your own way. That was how I took it. As I was about to leave the Black Cat Gang, Master Hoyeon stopped me.”
“What did Hoyeon Cheong say?”
Master Liuhap spoke with a sour expression.
“He simply told me to stay healthy and live well. In that moment, something like a knot that had been lodged in my heart vanished somewhere. It seems that was not my desire for revenge against you, but simply a knot that had accumulated from long before. Or perhaps it was a small monster born from vengeance that disappeared without a trace. After that, as you know, I came to say we should go strike down the evil and unorthodox together. Would this be enough to pass as the words of a drunkard?”
I nodded.
“That was good.”
The Lust Demon said,
“Master, in all my life, this is the first time I have ever seen such a bumpkin. The only thing he’s good at is fighting.”
The Sword Demon replied,
“So what are you trying to say?”
The Lust Demon gave a hollow laugh and said,
“Just a worthless fool. Like me.”
The Sword Demon agreed.
“True. I have never seen a man as properly worthless as the Sect Leader.”
I looked at master and disciple and asked,
“Are you drunk?”
The Sword Demon nodded and said,
“In truth, we are narrow-minded men. We are not broad of heart. If we fight, we must win. We are people who train so that we can win without fail. In you, I sensed a freedom unbound by anything. For some, that would be a state of mind they must pursue as if cultivating the Dao, but for you, it seemed to be your very nature. Whenever you visited from time to time, the tedium that had ruled my life vanished, if only for a moment. What about you?”
The three villains looked at me.
I said to the three of them,
“Right now, I couldn’t be happier.”
“About what?”
“That a man mad for the sword, a man who was mad for revenge, and a pants-shitting bastard mad for women are powerful men not easily met. In truth, we are men who are either mad or on the verge of madness. You can tell just by looking. Alliance Leader Lim Sobaek is the same. Women, subordinates, the Cult, revenge, martial arts…… Even if our interests differ, we are not men who use the martial arts we struggled to learn to torment those who have not learned martial arts. I like keeping that line. I’m saying this because I’m drunk, but I hope the three of you do the same.”
This time, I poured drinks for the three of them.
After drinking liquor that went down more fiercely and smoothly than ever, I revealed what was in my heart.
“My dream is to not go any madder than this. While surviving in the gangho, I realized that the maddest thing of all is not going mad. I killed the Butcher and the Woodcutter with my own hands, and their master is a fellow called the White-Clad Scholar. Senior Sword Demon, have you heard of him?”
“This is the first I’ve heard of him.”
I relayed my guess to the three of them.
“It’s only a guess, but that White-Clad Scholar was the one who once gifted me the Ice Art.”
The three of them looked at me in surprise.
“……Which means, knowingly or not, I was also one of his candidate test subjects. After handing me the Ice Art, he must have been waiting somewhere for news of me. Of course, I doubt there are only one or two people like me. The gangho is spinning this madly, but I have yet to cross the line. I think being mad only to this extent is about right. What do you think?”
The Sword Demon nodded.
“If you go any madder, you will fall into qi deviation.”
The Lust Demon shook his head.
“True. You’re already plenty insane as it is. Stop getting any crazier.”
The Ghost Demon asked,
“He was the man who passed you the Ice Art…… Are you certain?”
I nodded.
“It is only a guess, but yes. It was the same when I met the Cult Leader at the Blood Night Palace. He told me to keep struggling. When I think about it, they all seem like people waiting for me to go mad. I’m saying this because I’m drunk, but……”
I drank another cup of liquor.
“My enemies and rivals…… seem to be waiting for me to go even madder, so I will live like a normal person. I will protect those who have not learned martial arts, beat to death the Black Path bastards who harass merchants, and if the Martial Alliance Leader asks for help, I will head to the Martial Alliance as I did before.”
The Lust Demon, who had been listening, laughed and said,
“Are you a chivalrous hero? What an incredible chivalrous hero we have here.”
Taking advantage of my drunkenness, I blurted out harsh words.
“I am not a chivalrous hero. And I know full well that even if the three of you died and came back to life, you could never become chivalrous heroes.”
The Lust Demon narrowed his brow and said,
“What kind of insolence is that toward my master?”
The Sword Demon raised a hand and made his disciple shut his mouth.
I glared at the three of them, then snickered.
“……I say this with certainty: in this insane world, the maddest bastards of all are chivalrous heroes. They are on a different level from you three, who desire personal glory. Their mindset is different, and their attitude toward life is different. I’m saying this because I’m drunk. From now on, I hope the three of you do not become my enemies. And don’t ever lick the Cult Leader’s feet one day just because you fear him. I’ll beat you to death.”
In the middle of speaking, my temper flared, and I struck the table with my hand. The dishes of side dishes and liquor cups bounced this way and that.
“Don’t make me kill the three of you with my own hands. Got it?”
The Lust Demon suddenly laughed in an incredibly loud voice and said,
“You’re weaker than Master, so how could you harm him? Master, Zaha really must be drunk.”
The Sword Demon nodded.
“He is drunk.”
The Ghost Demon grabbed my shoulder.
“Sect Leader, stop drinking. You’re very drunk.”
Since I was drunk, I poured more liquor and filled the cups of the Sword Demon, the Lust Demon, and the Ghost Demon.
“Take your drinks, villains. Hehehehe, I feel truly good today. Let’s drink.”
When another cup of the strong liquor the Sword Demon had brought went in, it felt as if fire were coming out of my mouth.
Drunk, I held my hand out over the table.
“……Everyone, put out your hands. Hurry.”
“…….”
When the Lust Demon looked at the Sword Demon’s expression with a troubled face, the Sword Demon was the first to hold out his hand and place it over mine.
“I have held it out.”
Absurdly, once the Sword Demon held out his hand, the Ghost Demon and the Lust Demon had no choice but to stack their hands on top as well.
I shook the three hands piled over mine and said,
“The eldest brother’s title is the Sword Demon (劍魔). He is a man outstanding with the sword. The second brother’s title is Master Yukhab, but it does not suit his ugly face, so I shall give him the title Ghost Demon (鬼魔). From now on, the second brother’s title is the Ghost Demon. Third is the Hao Sect Leader, Lee Zaha—that is me. Taking after the titles of my two older brothers, I am the Mad Demon (狂魔). Fourth is Mongrang. Since you are usually madly fond of women, if you are not the Lust Demon (色魔), then who would be called the Lust Demon? You are the fourth, the Lust Demon.”
“…….”
“Though we were not born on the same day and hour……”
The Lust Demon suddenly shouted.
“Shut up, you bastard! Know when to stop! Is this the Oath of the Peach Garden?”
In the middle of speaking, I burst into laughter and began laughing while clutching my stomach. After laughing by myself for a long while, I said to the three of them,
“The Oath of the Peach Garden didn’t work. Can’t be helped. It’s because there’s no peach tree, so let’s move on.”
The Sword Demon said to me,
“Third Brother, if you brought it up, finish it.”
“…….”
For a moment, we stared blankly at the Sword Demon. This bastard was always a serious man, so he never let anything slide. I let out a short sigh, then cleaned up the words I had spat out to the very end.
“From now on, the enemies of you three are my enemies. Villains who beat villains to death. The Society of Villains (惡人會) is formed! For the peace and well-being of the gangho. Good.”
The Lust Demon pulled his hand away and sighed.
“A madman should know when to stop.”
The Ghost Demon muttered,
“A bastard who can’t even hold his liquor.”
The Sword Demon pointed with his chin at the messy table and said,
“Clean this up. I’ll be going first.”
Perhaps because it was a drinking gathering of men, the atmosphere was terribly awkward. But I was drunk, so it was none of my concern. Since drowsiness was washing over me, I dragged over a chair, propped my feet on it, and closed my eyes.
This was the moment when I should have taken out the Flash Dagger and planted it in someone…….
But once I was drunk, everything became a bother.
.
.
.
Flash Dagger, skipped for today.