Chapter 88. Sword Demon, Lust Demon, Mad Demon
Mongrang, the Left Envoy of Light from the previous life, spoke as he entered a house in a secluded place.
“Master, I’m here.”
The house was far too spacious for a man living alone, yet the yard, the wooden platform, and the area around the small well were all neatly kept.
Mongrang looked utterly wretched, but he had come prepared to be scolded. A short while later, when a middle-aged man appeared, Mongrang dropped to his knees.
The middle-aged man looked at Mongrang and said,
“What is that state of yours in the middle of the night? You are not even properly dressed.”
“It was difficult to go home like this, so I came late at night. Please give me a change of clothes.”
The middle-aged man came out into the yard and said,
“Change and come back out.”
“Yes.”
Sitting on the wooden platform, the middle-aged man waited for his disciple while trimming the wooden sword he had been whittling to pass the time. A short while later, Mongrang, having changed into a black martial uniform, sat down on the platform and let out a sigh.
The middle-aged man asked,
“What happened? It looks as though you fought. And it seems there is a smell of shit too.”
Mongrang sighed repeatedly with a troubled expression before saying,
“Master, did you not say there would be no one my age who could rival me?”
The middle-aged man chuckled and replied,
“How is that my opinion? You must have thought so yourself all along.”
“That is true.”
“And now a rival has appeared. The gangho is vast, so it is no surprise. Which clan is he from?”
“He seems like a mere country bumpkin.”
The middle-aged man set down the wooden sword and replied,
“Not from a clan?”
“No.”
“His skill?”
Mongrang recalled the sparring match and replied,
“I could not fully gauge it.”
The middle-aged man looked at the edge of the wooden sword and replied,
“Did he seem to know your identity?”
“I do not know. Will you meet him once? If I face him again soon, I too will have to go all out.”
“If you use ice arts in Baegeungji, troublesome matters will arise, so do not.”
“That is why I am telling you. He is someone I cannot deal with unless I use ice arts.”
“Is he a disciple of the Three Calamities? If he is a country bumpkin.”
“There is that possibility.”
After pondering for a moment, the middle-aged man said,
“Lure him to a secluded place and cross hands with him there. Do not reveal your ice arts in a crowded place. If there is truly no other way, lure him here. I will examine him.”
“Understood.”
“And.”
“Yes, Master.”
“Is it so strange that you have gained a single rival? If your heart is already filled with arrogance, it will be even more difficult to catch up to the masters who have gone ahead of you. Always guard your own heart. Go home and rest.”
“Master, can I not gradually become independent from the Mong family?”
“Consider it training for the heart, and observe the people of the Mong family well. Reading the hearts of all manner of people is as important as martial arts.”
“Understood. How is your body?”
“I am recovering step by step, so there is no need to worry. Unless the Cult Leader appears in person, even if the experts of the Cult find me, they will be unable to do anything.”
Mongrang stepped down from the wooden platform and bowed.
“I will take my leave.”
The middle-aged man stared at his disciple and then asked a question.
“That fellow you mentioned earlier. Is he one who should be killed? Or one who might prove useful?”
Mongrang answered,
“I do not know. For now, when I face him again, I will discipline him properly.”
“Do so. And what is this unknown, unpleasant stench?”
“I fell victim to that bastard’s laxative.”
Mongrang suddenly noticed the corners of his master’s mouth twitch for the first time in a very long while, and his expression turned sour.
The middle-aged man erased all trace of laughter and said to Mongrang,
“To think you fell for a country bumpkin’s scheme. Your opponents are not only the Demon Cult, but the masters of the entire world. I must have told you countless stories of those strong in martial arts being defeated in turn. Do not be careless.”
“Yes.”
Only after his disciple disappeared did the man called Master laugh, his shoulders shaking little by little.
“Foolish brat. To think he fell for a laxative. Tsk, tsk, tsk.”
The middle-aged man resumed trimming the wooden sword with a solemn expression.
* * *
I shut myself inside my lodging in Baegeungji and reviewed the sparring match.
It was deeply unpleasant that we had fought on even terms because of the Left Envoy’s diarrhea. As such, worldly affairs never proceed as one expects. Both of us had fought while concealing a fair amount of our strength, but if there existed a master of the Left Envoy whom I had not known about, then it was not incomprehensible.
In any case, the man I suspected to be the Left Envoy’s master was the Dugu Sword Demon, who fought the Cult Leader and broke away from the Demon Cult. The reason I knew the story of the Dugu Sword Demon was because he was the man who had tried to kill the Cult Leader before I did.
What sort of man was he?
He was a figure of the Demonic Path who had even received an invitation from the leader of the Murim Alliance to join the Murim Alliance. His origins were certainly of the Demonic Path, but he had not particularly committed slaughter or accumulated evil deeds, so no one around the Alliance Leader opposed the invitation.
Of course, since he was a man who lived by his own stubborn will, there had never been any possibility that he would join the Murim Alliance in the first place.
Thanks to the Alliance Leader, he occasionally had exchanges with figures of the orthodox path as well, and what the Dugu Sword Demon said then became quite famous.
When asked why he had quarreled with the Cult Leader, the Dugu Sword Demon said this.
He had merely tested which of them was the truer Demonic Path.
For the master of the Lust Demon, he was a rather decent man, so I thought it was a strange combination that was hard to understand.
In terms of chronology, news of the Dugu Sword Demon grew scarce, and then the Lust Demon appeared, so it had to be assumed that some incident had occurred in the middle.
To call him a grandmaster of the Demonic Path, he was a man without a force of his own.
To dismiss him because he had no force, he was a man whose individual martial power was formidable.
To look down on him by lumping him together with the Demonic Path, his temperament was far too gentlemanly.
And it was difficult to view him as a kind and gentle person, since there were rumors that when he escaped the Demon Cult, he had brutally killed the cultists who blocked his path.
To begin with, in the Demonic Path, the epithet Sword Demon was not something one could easily obtain.
In any case, it meant he was a giant.
I pondered over various things, but no sharp solution came to mind, so I decided only on the general direction and sought sleep.
Whether it was the Left Envoy or the Sword Demon...
If I could not bring them into Haomun, I intended to kill them.
End of worries.
Of course, while doing so, I might be killed by the Sword Demon instead.
But a man who gives up the will he holds because he fears death—that is not me.
* * *
In my dream, I was invited to the Murim Alliance.
I dreamed I secretly slipped laxatives into the banquet of the Alliance Leader and the Murim Alliance’s masters. In the dream, I was running around laughing my head off when the Alliance Leader caught me and locked me in a dungeon.
Why do my dreams always end in misfortune?
While I was locked in the dungeon, that Alliance Leader bastard came to visit and brought me outside food. I ate it, got an upset stomach, and kept dreaming that I was shitting myself. When I opened my eyes, the sun had already risen.
“Was the theme of that dream karma?”
I roughly washed only my face, then headed back to the noodle shop where I had failed yesterday.
After ordering another bowl of noodles and waiting, the Left Envoy appeared, changed into clean clothes.
I naturally pinched my nose.
“……Ruining my appetite. You shitty bastard.”
The Left Envoy sat across from me, folded his arms, and said,
“You’re eating. Eat plenty. It may be your last meal.”
As soon as the waiter set the noodles down on the table, he asked the Left Envoy,
“Young Master Mong, what shall I bring you?”
The Left Envoy replied,
“Nothing for me.”
“Yes, sir.”
The waiter sensed the killing intent flowing between the two of us and retreated with his eyes wide open.
I took the Flash Dagger from my robes, stabbed it into the table, and ate my noodles.
The Left Envoy asked me,
“There’s something strange, so let me ask you one thing.”
I was slurping up the noodles with a loud hurrup when I glared at him.
“If that had been poison instead of laxatives, I think I’d be dead. What exactly is your goal?”
I answered as I had yesterday.
“I can’t tell you that.”
The Left Envoy asked me what he had been pondering.
“Did I perhaps steal a woman from you? If that’s the case, I can understand your actions.”
“Bullshit.”
“Looks like I’m right. Otherwise, there’s no reason for you to bear a grudge against me. You even sent that fellow with the broken arm to look into my movements. Am I wrong?”
I answered carelessly because I was annoyed.
“Let’s say you’re right.”
Even by the time I finished the noodles, the Left Envoy did not launch a surprise attack. I asked him,
“You’ve learned ice arts, but you weren’t using them properly. If there’s somewhere quiet, lead the way. I’ll make you understand the difference in skill I couldn’t show you yesterday.”
“Let’s go.”
Without another word, the two of us left Baengeungji and entered a small, quiet, secluded village.
The Left Envoy pointed at a house with high walls.
“Listen without misunderstanding. This is the house where my master is staying. I don’t know whether you’ll understand, but he is not someone who would interfere in a fight between juniors anyway. If you’re afraid, I’ll guide you somewhere else.”
I looked at the Left Envoy.
But even if this was a scheme, I couldn’t help it. It was hard for me to endure curiosity.
“Lead the way.”
If the Sword Demon was really there, and if he intervened in the fight, then I would have no choice but to run for it. But if he truly was the Sword Demon, I had a feeling he would not interfere in the fight, just as the Left Envoy had said.
When I entered the house with the Left Envoy……
A middle-aged man I had never seen before was sitting on a wooden bench, trimming a wooden sword with a dagger.
The Left Envoy said,
“Master, may we have a duel here?”
The middle-aged man glanced at me, then said to the Left Envoy,
“Do as you like.”
I did not know the Sword Demon’s face. It was difficult to guess the age of the middle-aged man sitting on the bench, but there were a few white hairs mixed in, and he had a very sharp, intelligent look. He seemed easygoing, yet also as if he had a fastidious side—a man with a complicated impression.
As though making the wooden sword was important work, he paid me no particular attention. In a way, he was a man who embodied “acting as if no one else were present.”
When I let out a short sigh without even greeting him, the middle-aged man said to me,
“I won’t blame you even if you kill him, so fight to your heart’s content.”
The moment I heard those words, I was certain that the Left Envoy’s master was the Dokgo Sword Demon.
It felt as though the Dokgo Sword Demon was looking down on me far too much, so I gently heated up the atmosphere.
“This fledgling can’t be my opponent, so I’ll have a bout with you, senior.”
The Sword Demon put down the wooden sword with a puzzled expression.
“With me?”
The Left Envoy said in an icy tone,
“Have you gone mad?”
With my hands clasped behind my back, I replied to the Left Envoy,
“Shitpants, shut up.”
Only then did the Sword Demon stare straight at me. Since he seemed to be examining my aura, I hid it as much as possible.
The Sword Demon narrowed his brow and said,
“Just what sect do you come from? There are few sects under heaven that I do not know.”
“I cannot tell you.”
In a calm tone, the Sword Demon spoke words so honest they felt frightening.
“If you devote yourself to training, you may one day be able to contend with me, but right now it is impossible. I, too, am recovering from an injury, so it would not be right to exchange blows recklessly. If you have no intention of fighting Mong Rang right away, come here and sit.”
The Left Envoy said in a flustered tone,
“Master?”
The Sword Demon said to the Left Envoy,
“This fellow has the face of one who knows no fear. You will cross hands often from now on, so there is no need to rush. Go bring some tea. In the meantime, I’ll try to guess the sect of our young uninvited guest.”
The Left Envoy was about to say something, but obeyed his master.
“Understood.”
When I sat on the wooden bench, the Sword Demon stroked his bristly beard and smiled.
“How perplexing.”
I’m sure it was.
What master in the world could possibly guess my sect?
But I, too, realized from the Sword Demon’s atmosphere, gaze, way of thinking, and tone that he was a truly rare madman. What was even more surprising was that this madman’s aura contained Daoist colors.
With me before him, the Sword Demon scratched his forehead and said,
“You have no intention of revealing your sect, do you?”
“That’s right.”
“I thought as much.”
Just what was this man seeing in me? My own mood was strange as well. After all, I had met a man who had fought the Cult Leader and survived.
Since I myself did not judge people by their origins, but by their overall degree of completion, the Sword Demon was an impressive man.
As if catching me off guard, the Sword Demon said in a dignified tone,
“That fellow has probably smeared laxatives, or perhaps a similar poison, on your teacup.”
“Why do you think so?”
The Sword Demon pointed inside with his finger and said,
“The time it should take to bring tea has already passed.”
“You have a point. But when the tea actually comes out, the teacup will be clean.”
The Sword Demon knew, yet he deliberately asked me.
“Why?”
“Because he must have overheard us and swapped the teacups just now.”
The Sword Demon nodded.
“Correct.”
A short while later, the Left Envoy, who had suddenly been reduced to running tea errands, set the tea utensils down on the wooden platform and said,
“There are no laxatives, so drink at ease, Master.”
The Left Envoy pointed at me with his finger.
“You drink at ease too.”
I nodded and replied,
“All right. You’ve had a hard time yesterday and today.”
The three of us first drank a cup of tea each. It was ordinary tea, the kind one drank on an uneventful day.
I looked at the two of them, then swept my gaze over the house, which seemed peaceful.
Then, taking a fresh look at the faces of those seated on the wooden platform...
We were the Sword Demon (劍魔), the Lust Demon (色魔), and the Mad Demon (狂魔).