Clack! Clack!
Midnight.
The carriage was speeding fast as a woman was laid in the carriage with her beautiful red hair spread wide like a peacock’s feathers.
She was Baek Hye-hyang, the candidate to become the leader of the Blood Sect. There was someone looking down at her, it was Jang Ryong.
It was when they had moved long enough. Baek Hye-hyang, who hadn’t woken up for a long time, opened up her eyes.
“My lady! You are awake!”
The red eyes came to life little by little as words emerged from her mouth.
“I lost?”
As soon as she woke up, this was the first question she asked and at this Jang Ryong smiled, nodding his head and comforting her.
“The fault lies with the opponent.”
The opponent, being one of the 12 Great Warriors and the one ranked even within the top five.
No matter how gifted she was, the gap between them was too long.
“Do we know who he is?”
To her question, Jang Ryong replied.
“Sima Chak, one of Four Great Evils.”
Jang Ryong was worried about the woman, who hated losing more than dying. He did not want her to feel horrible.
“And why did he attack us?”
To her question, he answered.
“I think he was looking for someone but he misunderstood that the person was with us.”
“So?”
“Proving that, he withdrew.”
At Jang Ryong’s words, she frowned with a face full of displeasure.
“You mean he just gave up on the fight?”
The man had arrived by killing thirty first rate warriors without a single wound. It was natural for her to react like this so Jang Ryong cautiously added.
“Do not be too down. The Four Great Evils are monsters known as Chaos within Murim. Their actions are unpredictable by even the standards of the worst criminals. That is why they do not belong to any sect…”
“Strong!”
“Uh?”
“He is strong.”
As Baek Hye-hyang acknowledged the opponent, Jang Ryong was shocked.
“He is strong and I am weak. What was the result of fight?”
“Ah…”
Even if she lost, she was never the one to admit it and run ahead for another fight, but she calmly accepted her defeat?
“Fucking strong.”
“They aren’t called Great Warriors for nothing.”
“Will the First Elder be able to deal with them?”
The First Elder was currently the best within the Blood Sect and among them, he was the only one with a skill to become closest to the Great Warriors.
He was now in closed training but with his emergence, he might be on the same level as them.
“Come to think of it, the Elder has been helping me quite a lot.”
Jang Ryong didn’t deny her words.
The man was a servant to the Blood Sect and the Lord. It was even more strange for Baek Hye-hyang to take down Sima Chak when she couldn’t even take him down.
“There are 12 officially. No, it is 13 with the First Elder.”
‘Are you referring to them as someone who is stronger than you?’
It seemed like that, considering the manner in which she spoke. Actually, it was hard to argue.
It was clear that Baek Hye-hyang had no opponent in her age group as she was a lot stronger than them. There was no doubt that she was strong and belonged to the list of names describing the strong people in Murim. However the central plains were wide with countless warriors.
Someone stronger than her could continue to appear suddenly so it was meaningless to rank people based on their strength.
‘That… Wasn’t the monster with the golden eye like that?’
The one who suddenly appeared during the Great War and intervened between the Twelve Blood Stars and killed the First Elder from that era.
She tried to find his trace for over 20 years but she couldn’t as no one had any idea about him.
The instant she thought about it.
“I need to head back home.”
“Uh? Why?”
“I realized something when I fought him.”
“Realized something?”
Jang Ryong was shocked at her words.
He knew that she was growing but at this point it felt too much. Gaining something from a defeat?
“But my lady…”
“I shall come out within a night, no a month”
“Will that much be enough?”
“It isn’t a matter of internal qi.”
“Alright. Then the Blood Demon Sword…”
“Do it as I ordered. It doesn’t matter what method you chose.”
“Didn’t you say that you will persuade the Third Elder yourself?”
“You can do it. You do that and make it loud and clear.”
At that he sighed. In the end he had three tasks to perform.
‘Still, it isn’t so bad.’
Fortunately with this she was gaining something and all her attention would be on developing herself.
He was worried she would ask about a certain someone’s well being saying she would fight Sima Chak.
‘I hope that Wicked Moon Sword does his best.’
Just like he did to them, if he was acting in the same manner, then things would happen correctly.
A couple of days later.
Sichuan province, Open Moon Valley.
There was a small thatched house on the rugged mountainside.
Like a natural fort, it was difficult to even locate it as it was hidden by a high cliff and a thick forest ahead.
In front of this place were Hae Ack-chun, Seo Kalma, Han Baek-ha, Do Jang-ho and Baek Ryeon-ha. Everyone was busy searching for something.
Seo Kalma looked at Hae Ack-chun’s not so good expression as he said.
“This is the place where the Wicked Moon Sword hides?”
“I told you this is it.”
Hae Ack-chun spoke nervously.
It was a frustrating thing for them to have witnessed Wonhwi getting kidnapped from a river despite these many people.
It wasn’t enough to just search the place, they even knew the base of the kidnapper but they had been searching the entire valley for two days with nothing coming up and the house was being empty.
‘This bastard…’
Hae Ack-chun too had heard about this from So Wonhwi. But he couldn’t find any trace of it and it was frustrating for him. It was then, Do Jang-ho added.
“Isn’t it possible for him to move away from this place?”
“Move?”
“Didn’t the lady and even you say something earlier? You said that Sima Young was someone who had come to the valley.”
“Right.”
“Will someone as smart as Wicked Moon Sword remain at the same position after knowing his daughter must have spilled their location?”
Everyone nodded as if it made sense, but Hae Ack-chun’s face only darkened. If they moved places then finding So Wonhwi would become impossible.
Swish!
Hae Ack-chun gnashed his teeth.
“Honestly even so, we need to find him at all costs!”
He was determined to turn the entire central plains upside down. This was his disciple and the Blood Demon.
But the others had different thoughts as Seo Kalma said.
“Hae hyung. We think the same. We cannot conduct a search on our own.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“All of our forces came together because we could deal with Wicked Moon Sword but we cannot waste power with a search on Sichuan or the entire land. If we are not careful we will end up exposing ourselves to the world.”
“Then disciple, no you want to give up on Blood Demon!”
“It isn’t that. This could get us all at risk.”
Hae Ack-chun who was angry at those words went silent as they were right.
Due to the incident with the Blood Demon Sword being stolen, the Murim Alliance must be searching all over the land.
And Baek Hye-hyang’s side too should have noticed that the Blood Demon Sword they have had was not real so they would definitely come after them.
“We can go through the mountains.”
Do Jang-ho sighed and continued.
It was really the worst situation where they couldn’t even move quickly nor could they bring in the sect.
It was like the Blood Demon and the Blood Demon Sword had vanished and Hae Ack-chun was in anger.
“Then the old man will find him alone!”
At those words, Han Baek-ha added.
“What would you do, Elder? The Young Lord, no Blood Demon has already been passed into the hands of Wicked Moon sword?”
“What!”
Clench!
An enraged Hae Ack-chun lifted her up by the robe and it seemed like she would be taken down but Baek Ryeon-ha intervened.
“Fourth Elder please!”
“My lady! But!”
“Think calmly. I do not want to wrong the situation either but the fate of the sect is at stake and all the variables need to be taken into consideration.”
Hae Ack-chun bit his teeth at the words of her and let Han Baek-ha go.
In his mind though, he wanted to smash everything.
But he had to accept the truth.
“Then does the lady have any ideas?”
Despite his asking, there was no answer.
If only the Murim Alliance had kidnapped Wonhwi, they at least would know the location to search but here, there was too much searching and no result.
Do Jang-ho decided to speak.
“Nothing else.”
“Are you giving up too?”
“It isn’t giving up. But I cannot deny the possibility of our forces getting into danger with this search.”
“Then what?”
“We have to deal with it accordingly.”
“Accordingly?”
“Lady Baek Hya-hyang must be convinced that we are in possession of the sword.”
“So?”
“So, the identity of the master of the sword isn’t known. Of course, she would think of it to be the lady.”
With that Do Jang-ho looked at Baek Ryeon-ha and he talked about the answer he could think of.
“I think it would be good to take advantage of this.”
“So you want to hide the existence of Blood Demon?”
“If she knows that our Blood Demon is missing then she will surely move.”
“…”
Right, no one would deny this.
“We hide the information about Blood Demon until we get a sniff of their whereabouts. For the time being, we need to continue and head back to the sect, act like everything is centered around the lady. That will be our priority, to get Third Elder and Second Blood Star on our side.”
No one disagreed with it. Do Jang-ho looked at Seo Kalma and Han Baek-ha.
Actually, they too thought of this but they couldn’t say it out with Hae Ack-hun angry and panicking as he liked So Wonhwi.
Everyone looked at Hae Ack-chun and now he was the only one left to speak.
He looked quite troubled as he thought and said in a disapproving voice.
“Until we find Blood Demon only.”
Hae Ack-chun looked up and mumbled.
‘Brat. Stay alive! If you die I will never forgive you!’
Swish!
It was the first time ever since I was born that I had seen such a place. The valley water descends from the waterfall through a large hole of about ten square meters.
The scene unfolding under the swinging bridge. The water being sucked into a hole of an unknown depth could not be measured.
‘Where is this place?’
-I can only think of Shaanxi.
‘Shaanxi?’
I was speechless at the words of Iron Sword. On the way, he gave us some rice balls or raisins and then would even let me pee.
That too was just once a day. Every time I wanted to run I wouldn’t move due to the long needle-like things he placed in my legs, arms and spine too!
‘Shit. It has been like this for 15 days.’
Even now, except for twisting the neck a little I couldn’t move the body and Sima Young had a pity face as she looked at me.
-Sima Young tried to get the long needles out of your body several times but her attempts all failed as that man woke up like some sort of ghost.
Short Sword chuckled with her words.
I could feel Sima Chak staring at me. All the way here despite the food and stuff he never once spoke to me.
But it felt like it would be possible now
At least I wasn’t all eating and pooping so–
“Senior, may I ask why you brought me here?”
Sima Chak, who didn’t seem to like me much, answered.
“Actually I was planning on killing you.”
I knew that. Why bring me here and not kill me?
“But what is so good about you being treated like this by her?”
Sima Young couldn’t even look at her father at this as she uttered.
“After the death of my wife, all I had was that child. Do you realize how precious she is?”
“…”
I couldn’t answer because I was scared I would say something stupid.
And when I was quiet, he added.
“I, Sima Chak have lived my life free from rules but I am not an ignorant fool.”
“I never…”
“I saw you risk your life to save my daughter”
Ah… The time when she fell into the river. Sima Chak spoke in a calm voice.
“That is why I am going to give you the chance to bond with her. You will accept it, right?”
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