I took the lead while Song Jwa-baek and Song Woo-hyun followed behind.
Tak!
“Did you call for us?”
“Come here all three of you.”
When we entered the main hall, we could see Baek Ryeon-ha and Hae Ack-chun along with Seo Kalma, Han Baek-ha, and Jang Mun-wong sitting around a long table.
On the table, there was a map of Jianghu spread out with several other open books littering the sides.
“…”
Song Jwa-baek’s expression stiffened with the heavy atmosphere. What was happening here?
“Commander Jang.”
“Yes, My Lady.”
At Baek Ryeon-ha’s call, the man finally spoke,
“Young master, there is an assignment for you.”
“Assignment… a mission?”
Song Jwa-baek seemed a bit excited at the word mission. Except for us, everyone else was focused on training.
So they were looking forward to hearing what this mission was.
‘Mission…’
But I was different.
Before ‘the return’, I was always worried when a mission was assigned to me.
Will I be able to survive the mission? One of the many concerns I had. And I didn’t even know what this mission was.
-Worried?
‘Of course.’
The duties of the Blood Sect varied in severity, but all of them were dangerous.
I was curious.
What was the mission that required them to hand it down to the most skilled disciples of one of the elders?
At that time, Jang Mun-woong held out two letters and said,
“These were sent by Third Elder.”
‘Third Elder?’
Third Elder, it had to be Gu Jae-yang the Blood King.
It meant that they sent a letter and this was the reply.
“And this is the letter from the Second Blood Star.”
The second Blood Star had to be Yu Baek.
Along with Seo Kalma, he was one of the best ones in the Blood Sect. From what I heard, among the seven Blood Stars, his martial arts were known to be on a superior level.
In order to secure an advantage, it was said that two people were needed.
-Then the third elder wasn’t abandoned?
It was almost like giving up.
Seo Kalma had said that he almost leaned toward Baek Hye-hyang. So he knew that this letter was just being sent with dulled anticipation.
“The contents of the letters are different, but coincidentally they both have the same requirements.”
Uh?
The same?
The fact that the requirements were written down meant that there was a possibility of tilting here.
However, the requirements were similar.
“What are they?”
“Second Blood Star said that only those with the necessary qualifications would be followed, and Third Elder said that he would recognize the person who inherited the Blood Demon Sword of the sect leader.”
‘…!?’
Blood Demon Sword?
That was crazy!
I was speechless for a moment.
Judging from what I had heard so far, did it mean that they would come over to our side if it was stolen back?
-Why are you so surprised?
‘If my prediction is correct, that is impossible.’
It could not be possible
Blood Demon Sword.
The God of the Blood Sect and a sword that only the sect leader could hold. I had heard that it was made from rare materials, and it required the blood of the wielder to work.
20 years back, the sword passed into the hands of the Murim Alliance after the death of the Blood Demon.
-And they want it back?
Even Short Sword looked surprised now.
The Blood Demon Sword was located in the core of the Murim Alliance and not in any other place. Even before the return, the Blood Sect had sent many people to reclaim it back, but none of them had succeeded.
All were dead.
And not just any death, but they were tortured and had to beg to be killed.
-No. What was the point of having one sword?
‘What about the history? Isn’t that important?’
-Ah…
Symbolism and purpose.
The title ‘Sacred things’ wasn’t given for nothing. The most known weapons in any sect weren’t short of being honored as treasures.
The Blood Sect, which had lost one of its sacred items to the Murim Alliance, had lost its symbol.
So, even before returning, many were sacrificed and I knew the sword hadn’t been reclaimed.
“Then, is it our job to find the Blood Demon Sword?”
Song Jwa-baek, who didn’t know about it, showed his will to attempt the task. Jang Mun-woong shook his head and said,
“The location of the Blood Demon Sword is well known. It is in the main base of the Murim Alliance.”
“Then, are we to take it back?”
Jwa-baek.
This enthusiasm was too much. It wasn’t so easy to do that.
I couldn’t even open my mouth at the bad feeling I was getting. Hae Ack-chun clicked his tongue and said,
“Yah. If it could be done this easily, we would have gotten it back a long time ago.”
Song Jwa-baek went silent at this. Thanks to this, I learned a good thing.
Fortunately, this wasn’t a mission to reclaim the sword and Hae Ack-chun looked at me,
“What do you think?”
“What do I…”
“Why do you think the two of them made such a request?”
At Hae Ack-chun’s questions, everyone turned to me. Looking at this it seemed like they wanted to know what was the hidden intention behind these letters.
But there wasn’t much to be inferred from this alone.
“You don’t know?”
“… this disciple doesn’t seem so intelligent, and it must be difficult to grasp the meaning behind the two, but there are three things I can guess.”
“Three things?”
Song Jwa-baek asked. I didn’t care and continued to talk,
“The first that can be said is that they want to turn us down by putting us through an impossible request.”
A respectful manner to Bae Ryeon-ha who had the blood of the Blood Demon.
Seo Kalma and Han Baekha nodded their heads at my words. Looking at this, they seemed to have the same thought.
Baek Ryeon-ha said,
“Second one?”
“… giving The Lady a chance. This opens up a ton of possibilities.”
At that, Song Jwa-baek nodded his head as he had the same thought.
“Do you really think so?”
I shook my head at Baek Ryeon-ha’s question.
“Yes, in fact, this is the least likely. In the first place, Third Elder revealed his intentions to Second Elder. He could not easily change his mind with just one letter.”
At my words, Hae Ack-chun leaned back on the chair and smiled.
Does this mean this was close to the right answer?
Baek Ryeon-ha asked,
“Both of them make sense. Then the last one?”
“… a trap.”
At those words, Song Jwa-baek looked, me asking, ‘What the fuck does that mean?’
That was a natural reaction as the two options I had said were fundamentally different.
A few seemed interested when I said that it was a trap.
“Why do you think it is a trap, Young Master?”
This time, it was the Bloody Hand Witch, Han Baekha who asked.
The last one took a different approach.
Before returning to this new life, when I was a spy in the Murim Alliance, there was a saying one damned man told me.
‘Looking one move ahead is estimating how the opponent will come out from your point of view, and looking two moves ahead is estimating how the opponent will come to us from the opponent’s point of view.’
He did backstab me, but his advice was quite helpful.
-The back of the head? You mean…
-Right, it was that bastard who told you that. Baek Wei-hyang of the Murim Alliance.
As one of the three heads of the alliance, he was great at tactics. I took a breath and opened my mouth.
“That is because we cannot rule out the possibility that the two names have already been taken by Baek Hye-hyang…”
“Taken?”
“If I was on Baek Hye-hyang’s side, I would use this as a trap. It could be a ruse to waste our resources in other useless places.”
There was a possibility of this.
If we try to retrieve the Blood Demon Sword somehow to gain an edge in the power struggle, the other side’s power would definitely fall.
Well, I am not entirely sure of this. Guessing would be a lot easier if I actually got to read from the letter, but I could only come to this conclusion after listening to what they had told me.
A faint smile appeared on the face of Han Baekha,
“The insight of the Young Master is remarkable.”
“…?”
Everyone glanced at her. The others also nodded their heads when Jang Mun-wong asked,
“Such a brilliant Young Master. I didn’t think you could guess so much from the little information I had given you. The last option you gave is probably what we would have decided on if we had no further information.”
“What do you mean?”
“There is another letter.”
This time, he handed me the letter.
Song Jwa-baek put his head close to mine to read and Song Woo-hyun… he was too overwhelmed just listening to all of this.
After reading this, both Song Jwa-baek and I couldn’t help but frown.
“This?”
“This is the letter that Gu hyung sent to the elder,”
Said Seo Kalma.
This could be seen from the addressed greeting of the letter.
The letter was sent to Seo Kalma by Gu Jae-yang, the Blood King, and it was written that he would remain neutral until the Mid-Autumn Festival.
And it was currently three months after the festival.
It would have been difficult to trust it if this was the only content, but it was written that if Baek Hye-hyang took the sword first, then there would be no more neutral position.
“You mean Baek Hye-hyang is aiming for the Blood Demon Sword?”
I couldn’t understand this.
Did she have the force to enter the base of the Murim Alliance?
I was too puzzled when Han Baekha said,
“Just as lady Baek Hye-hyang put a spy on our side, we too put one on her side.”
I heard this and only then realized.
Baek Hye-hang, who had known little of the power on our side, could easily insert a spy. However, our spy on her side, who was stronger, would drain the quality of the information.
“But why are you so sure of this?”
Baek Ryeon-ha answered my question,
“That is because my sister postponed the opening ceremony.”
The opening ceremony was an event to announce the resurrection of the Blood Sect to greater Murim.
‘Ah…’
Come to think of it, even before the return, the Murim Alliance and the Warriors Alliance had broken their alliance and then the Blood Sect officially declared their revival.
-Is this different from your memory?
It had changed.
From the point of view of the Blood Sect, they could not miss this chance.
So I didn’t understand why Baek Hye-hyang delayed the opening ceremony in order to get the sword.
-Don’t you have another thought as to why?
‘Still… ah!’
-What is it?
Why didn’t I think of this?
It wasn’t just the timing of the break up of the alliance which had changed with my return.
-What is it?
‘The power within the Blood Sect.’
Before the return, it wasn’t even known that Baek Ryeon-ha was alive. However, if my senses were serving me right, there was a high chance that Baek Ryeon-ha before the return had been rather cornered in the past.
-Right. That was because you ended up turning into a disciple of that man.
As Short Sword had said.
After becoming I became his disciple, Hae Ack-chun sought all sorts of things to get my dantian healed, and I ended up connecting with Baek Ryeon-ha and he then began supporting her.
As a result, Seo Kalma was also under Baek Ryeon-ha now.
This made it tough for Baek Hye-hyang to touch her carelessly.
-Can it not be solved with force?
‘No. She will avoid that.’
No matter how reckless Baek Hye-hyang was, that was too unreasonable. An internal war wouldn’t suit anyone other than the recently broken-up alliance within Murim.
They will avoid killing their own men and aim to rise high in prestige for now.
‘I see.’
And since Baek Ryeon-ha must have been killed in the past, there would have been no difficulty in uniting their force and taking the sword. And now, even if she had a low legitimacy she was still the blood of the Blood Demon
‘In the end, it was me.’
Everything changed because of me.
Baek Ryeon-ha looked at me with a serious face and said,
“Me and my sister have no choice but to bump into each other constantly. But there is one way to avoid this and unite our strength into one.”
“…the Blood Demon Sword.”
“Right. As long as we have the sacred item of the sect, all the people will have to follow the one.”
“Isn’t that the same for us?”
At my question, Baek Ryeon-ha had a bitter expression.
The same was true for the others around.
If the Blood Demon Sword fell into her sister’s hand, then everyone in the Blood Sect would have to follow her.
A person with a sacred item would become like the new Blood Demon.
“Then, how do we get the sword?”
“Look here.”
Jang Mun-wong unfolded a large paper. On the right side of it, in large letters was written that a Murim Tournament was being held.
Come to think of it, as the alliance fell down and some spies were revealed in the Blood Sect, the Murim Alliance held a tournament.
“What about this?”
Song Jwa-baek asked, a bit puzzled.
The Murim Tournament was literally a tournament where all sects will come together. It was then I noticed that something was written on the announcement.
“… are you talking about this?”
I pointed my finger at something and Jang Mun-wong nodded and said,
“The three of you must participate in this tournament and one of the three of you needs to win it at all costs.”
Ahh…
The ominous feeling we had before.
The winnings of the tournament were being put up by the Blue Dragon Leader, and a weapon of the Murim Alliance would be awarded to the winner of the tournament.
-No. So you’re saying that we need to win and bring back that sword?
It seems like that. Pure insanity.
-Was there a tournament like this before you returned?
‘Of course there was.’
-… then there was a chance then, so why didn’t the Blood Sect aim for it?
Short Sword pointed this out. To be honest, I didn’t know if the Blood Sect did retrieve it or not. Even if they had tried, then they must have failed
-Why?
Actually, it was likely this was a tournament where the winner had been decided.
-Decided?
In the alliance, a monster no one could defeat was sent to raise the morale of the people who felt scared after the alliance had broken up.
-A monster?
‘Monster. Because it was one of the Eight Great Masters.’
-A battle with one of the Eight Great Masters!
Short Sword looked shocked.
Even she seemed to understand the implicit problem; that only the main leadership of the Murim Alliance and I would know about this monster participating.
