Chapter 1044: There Are Sea Creatures in the Sea (9)

“How about taking a bath while supper is being prepared? From the look of you, it seems you went into the sea. Best to go into the bathhouse and at least rinse yourselves off.”

“Huh? You have a bathhouse?”

“If a town lives by eating salt, what would become of it without one? If salt stays on the body, the skin turns red and itchy, and the misery is no small thing. Leave it on, and sores break out, fester, and rot. Salt poisoning is that vicious. Once the day’s work is over, you have to soak in the bathhouse.”

“Oh...”

A bathhouse, literally.

Amazingly enough, this salt village—Sangga Village—actually had a bathhouse.

“So please don’t take it lightly yourselves, and do wash properly. A bath once a day clears the mind and makes you forget the day’s fatigue. It feels like being born again, and it’s good for the body besides. Don’t think it strange. This village bathes often by nature. Keh-heh...”

It was welcome news indeed.

The salt still itched on her skin, and every time she scratched at her hair, it rasped under her fingers as if bits of mud were still clinging there. It had been bothering her the whole time.

So Qing brightened immediately and headed for the bathhouse.

The only thing was, Peng Daesan naturally fell in behind the party as if he belonged there.

“What’s this, San? Hoping for a mixed bath? I didn’t take you for that. Pretty manly of you. Although if you wanted to be manly, you should’ve done it earlier.”

“I only mean to take a look at how it’s built. Seeing how it differs from the bathhouses in Hebei is part of traveling too.”

“Hm.”

Qing narrowed her eyes.

Then a deep, cave-like bass voice slid straight into her ear.

“Be careful. Their attitude is deeply suspicious. Friendly villagers? I’ve never even heard of such a thing. And with most of our party being women, for them to recommend the bathhouse so readily... I can’t help but suspect ulterior motives.”

It was not that she thought him entirely wrong.

Ulterior motives—something like peeping, perhaps, or barging into the bathhouse halfway through with some nonsense about how mixed bathing was customary here.

That was what he meant: he had come along to prevent that sort of situation.

Mm. Truly a commendable state of mind.

Though whether anyone would actually try such a worthless trick on martial artists was another matter entirely.

Still, it was not as if he had no point at all.

Gunyeong and Yoye were pretty.

And there really were bastards in the world who lost all reason the moment they saw a pretty woman.

Thinking of it that way... yes, it did seem suspicious.

Honestly, the friendliness had been suspicious from the moment they stopped guests who were about to leave and dragged them back in.

And yet—

Wasn’t it too bleak a thing, to suspect kindness itself?

Maybe this really was just simple country hospitality. Back in her hometown too, rural hospitality had always been generous and overflowing when it came to guests.

Of course, that only applied to guests. Let someone decide to move there and become a resident, and that same country warmth transformed into vicious local hazing. So if you thought, Wow, they’re so kind, maybe I should settle down here, you were liable to suffer terribly for it.

Following the guide, they came to a building outside the stockade on the opposite side from the entrance, enclosed by low stone walls.

The bathhouse.

Set right along the path people would naturally take when returning from work. So the village elder’s claim that they bathed once every day appeared to have been true.

Even so, bathhouse was perhaps giving it a bit too much grandeur. It was really no more than a widened basin cut beside a stream just outside the stockade, with water diverted into it.

But from the bathhouse the water was led onward again and drained out, so it kept flowing constantly. In that sense, it was almost more hygienic than the bathhouses in a city.

A bit of country wisdom not to be underestimated.

That said, perhaps because of the rain, there was water everywhere, and the water itself was not especially clear.

So with a slight sense of misgiving, they eased themselves into the bath anyway.

And a little while later—

Whether her worry had been pointless from the start, or whether it was thanks to Peng Daesan standing guard outside, she had no idea, but in the end they finished bathing without incident.

“So then? San ought to wash up too, shouldn’t he?”

“I’m fine. Go on back first and rest.”

“Hm. Well, I suppose.”

What would be embarrassing if it happened to a woman might be considered rather lucky if it happened to a man.

And anyway, what did it matter if something happened while a man was bathing? Even if he got attacked in the middle of it, he could just fight back while swinging freely in the wind, and where was the disgrace in that?

Of course, Peng Daesan was only a minor hand by Qing’s standards, but overall he was still above average. What was likely to happen to someone at the Harmonization level?

When they returned to the village, the damp air of the drizzling rain carried the rich smell of cooking straight into them.

Qing’s stomach began churning again.

Then one of the villagers approached, hands respectfully clasped, and spoke.

“Ah, you’ve returned? You must be very hungry, yes? We’re preparing a feast now, so if you’ll just wait a little, it’ll be ready.”

“Huh? A feast? You really don’t have to go that far...”

“Oh no, feast just means we’re putting out the tastier dishes at the hour when the whole village gathers to eat supper anyway. With honored guests such as yourselves having come, we have to do at least that much.”

Then suddenly, the villager’s eyes flashed.

For the briefest instant, a cold blankness crossed his face.

“But, ah... where has the hero in the conical hat gone? I don’t see him...”

“Oh, he’s washing up and will be back soon. We couldn’t bathe together, obviously. But why?”

“Ah, ah! No, nothing! He went out with you, but I didn’t see him, so—ah, I see! Right, of course! Since the meal will still take a little longer, heavens, I’d better go help set the table!”

Watching the villager hurry off, Qing’s brows bent downward while her eyes narrowed long and thin.

What was that just now?

That had been suspicious as hell.

Of course, Qing currently possessed a rather peculiar kind of eyesight—she could tell, just by looking, what sort of conduct a person had in them.

Specifically: red and blue numbers hovering over people’s heads that only Qing could see.

Bad karma and good karma.

That said, it only really worked properly on people who were committed to being evil bastards.

Ordinary people—meaning, people who were not especially good, but had not yet failed at being human either—were, in fact, most of the people Qing ever saw.

Bad karma above zero, below one hundred.

People who put themselves and their families first, and beyond that put their acquaintances first.

Just ordinary, ordinarily selfish people.

And in a closed society like this, a small village community living all bunched together among themselves, that distinction became even harder to read.

After all, even people who did terrible things to outsiders who came by...

The infamy of villages like these was practically common knowledge by now, and to begin with, how many outsiders ever wandered in over the course of a year?

So if they spent the rest of their days ordinarily giving and receiving help among themselves, it was entirely possible for those past evils to become diluted over time.

What Qing had come to understand, after living with this strange sight for so long, was that bad karma and good karma had nothing to do with a person’s intentions. They were only the results—the total sum of what that person’s conduct had produced until now.

Of course, good people tended to stay good, so they stood out in bright blue, and complete sons of bitches caused trouble everywhere they went, so their bad karma piled up endlessly.

But beyond that, the system only distinguished so much.

Which was why the villager’s fleeting expression would not leave Qing’s mind.

What the hell was that?

I didn’t want to suspect kindness, but now you’re making it genuinely suspicious.

People who were strangely kind.

And the expression that flickered across one of their faces when the only man—or rather one of the only two men—in Qing’s party was nowhere to be seen.

And yet.

The atmosphere of the feast that followed was...

“Come, come! A cup for the honored guests who have come all this way!”

Perhaps the village elder’s house doubled as the village hall, because a broad-floored room or main hall or whatever it was had been packed to the brim with the whole village, bustling and eating and drinking together.

Since the whole thing was suspicious to begin with, Qing had wondered if there might be poison in the food.

But Qing’s constitution was one that sensed poison.

She had, by pure dumb luck, acquired a state of complete immunity to all poisons.

And beyond even that, when she ate poison, she could immediately identify it by a peculiar spicy bite unique to it.

Qing herself had contributed not a single shred of effort to achieving such a realm. If people who trained in poison arts had learned of it, they would have wept tears of blood and cried out, “Ah, what a filthy world!” at the unfairness of it all.

So Qing tasted the food.

Mm. White rice.

Freshly cooked. Delicious.

Though was the rice itself especially good? People did say island rice tasted better. Did rice grown near the coast come out this good?

Then grilled yellow croaker.

Mmm, delicious. A shame they were on the small side, but yellow croaker had always been the very symbol of rice-thief dishes.

And didn’t people say the small ones were the tastiest anyway? This really was good.

Then grilled flounder.

Well, flounder was always tender and good, wasn’t it? Mm. Since it was wild, the flesh had a bit more firmness to it. Though of course in this era everything was wild anyway, but still.

Then cutlassfish soup.

A clear soup made from cutlassfish—something she had never seen before, but what was there even to say? It was cutlassfish.

Then piles of steamed shellfish stacked up like little mountains.

Delicious.

Rehydrated dried sea cucumber stir-fried.

Delicious.

Shrimp, crab, squid, octopus—ah, all delicious.

And the cloudy liquor they kept pressing into her hands, suspicious as could be. They said it was just some unnamed grain liquor brewed in the village, and maybe because it was homemade it carried a slight sourness, so she could not quite call it a truly fine drink.

Still, it was drinkable...

Poison detection my ass.

She was sincerely, gratefully shoveling down the meal with both hands.

The sea lay just behind the stockade, and the feast table was packed with seafood so fresh that the grilled fish looked ready to flop if one was not careful.

Rough country dishes, but delicious ones, and cups of liquor passed around once, twice, three times...

Before long even the villagers had grown merry. They beat chopsticks in rhythm and sang, while young village women crowded around the female members of the Half-Sword Twin-Blade Society, chattering away—what was the secret to such good skin, had they really seen the Jade Qilin, was he truly that absurdly handsome?

The Jade Qilin in question was sitting right there, and the village men, wearing ingratiating expressions, kept hovering nearby and trying to say a word or two to him. From what Qing caught when she listened in, they seemed genuinely curious about the affairs of Murim.

Around Jayeo, all the village children had gathered too. And being children, they had become fast friends almost instantly, already up and running in circles along the corners of the room in a noisy mob...

So then, Qing’s overall assessment of the suspicious feast thrown by the suspiciously friendly suspicious villagers?

Mm.

It had been, truly, a very good feast...!

“What is this? It all seemed suspicious, didn’t it? But if it’s like this, aren’t they just plain simple, decent people? Or is it that people around Shanghai are naturally this nice? Yoye, what do you think?”

“Well, people from Jiangsu Province are famous for being kind, you know, famous for it. Everyone I know is extremely kind too, I mean... kind.”

“See? Even Yoye says so.”

Though really, what did Gongsun Yoye know?

Gongsun Yoye had spent nearly her whole life shut away in the clan estate doing closed-door cultivation, and the few people she had met would never have dared be rude to the eldest young lady of the Gongsun Gong Clan Estate.

And people of the Central Plains, by nature, were the sort who lost all objectivity about their home region and rushed to praise it in elaborate wrapping.

Ask a person from Jiangsu Province whether people from Jiangsu Province were kind?

Well, of course they’d say yes.

Which meant Gongsun Yoye’s answer was completely worthless as testimony!

In any case, Peng Daesan shook his head.

He still found it suspicious.

“No matter how I think about it, isn’t it strange? Perfectly milled white rice? That isn’t the sort of meal you’d expect in some remote countryside village, much less the sort of thing they’d set out so easily just because guests happened to arrive.”

“Maybe they’re richer than you’d think, since they’re a village that makes and sells salt? Salt brings in pretty decent money, doesn’t it?”

“Hm.”

Truthfully, if asked whether it was suspicious or not, Qing too would have leaned toward suspicious.

After all, how many times had she wandered all over the place and spent the night in private homes by now?

The generosity of simple people normally had a certain feeling to it—like they were making an effort, yes, but not pushing themselves too far. Something like that.

This, on the other hand, was different. Not just, they’re warmly welcoming people who came by, but... something else. Something alien about it.

Still, what was it exactly?

The hospitality was too earnest somehow. The whole thing felt off, but it was hard to point to any one part and say this is it.

So Qing stopped thinking about it.

Why?

Because was it really worth thinking that deeply about in the first place?

With Seomun Cheong herself, sitting here as a Transcendent Transformation, Ultra-Transformation monster, what was there to fear from some petty trick?

“Well, we’ll be leaving tomorrow anyway. As long as nothing happens overnight, that’s all that matters. And if we were wrong to suspect them, then we can just leave behind a generous bit of silver and be done with it.”

It was a clear and simple conclusion.

So what if it was suspicious? Was she supposed to search the whole village for suspicious evidence?

Or grab a villager and demand, “What exactly is your scheme, being this warm and kind and generously hospitable?” and start twisting him up for answers?

If they tried something, it would not be too late to act then.

And if it turned out to have been nothing but needless worry, then she could simply make up for the embarrassment by leaving them plenty of silver.

...or so Qing had thought.

Ah, damn it. Looks like we’re going to have to stay here another day...

After playing to exhaustion all day and then eating herself full, Qing had gone to bed early.

And since she had gone to sleep early, she woke up early—

No, she did not.

No matter when she went to bed, Qing always woke on her own schedule. Or rather, if she slept late, she got up late, and if she slept early, she just slept even longer. That was Qing.

The reason Qing woke up at all was simply because—

BOOOOM...!

A distant crash like thunder struck, and her eyes flew open.

Then once she came to, she heard it: SHAAAAA...

Though the room itself was enclosed, the sound of unusually heavy rain was coming right through the walls.

Qing quietly got up and stepped into the corridor.

SHAAAAAA—

The rain grew even louder.

Then she went outside and—

CHWAAAAAAASH!!!

With only slight exaggeration, the raindrops were coming down in thick vertical sheets, each one seeming as thick as a finger joint.

It was a true downpour.

The kind of rain that made you think, Yes, this is what the word downpour was made for.

Even with a borrowed carriage, there was no way they were forcing their way through weather like that.

So what else could they do? They would have no choice but to wait until the rain eased up a little.

Well, what could you do? It couldn’t be helped...

Qing scratched the back of her head hard and headed for the kitchen, thinking that since she had woken up from sleep, she might as well get some water.

But then, somehow, there came the sound of movement inside the kitchen.

Clink, clatter.

What?

Hadn’t they been told the whole house was being lent to them?

Maybe someone had only stepped into the kitchen for a moment to prepare breakfast, since the guests had to eat in the morning too.

Then, just at that moment, quiet voices drifted out from inside.

“What should we do? Should we catch them today? When do we kill them?”

“No, let’s keep watching a little longer. With the rain coming down like this, the guests won’t be going anywhere anyway.”

“Hah. Just when I thought we’d finally get to taste some fresh meat again.”

“Be patient a little longer. Tomorrow or the day after at most.”

Qing stopped short.

The sound of the conversation was not ordinary at all.

Catch what? Kill when? What meat?

Could this be that story?

The one about Cao Cao overhearing the household of Lü Boshe talking about slaughtering a pig, then arrogantly misreading it and massacring the whole family like the original patron saint of terrible human character?

Maybe since the table had been all seafood yesterday, they were planning to slaughter a pig today to serve meat.

But if so, what did the rain have to do with anything?

Did they postpone treating guests just because it rained?

What’s said by day is heard by birds, what’s said by night is heard by mice, what’s said by the Moyong Family is heard by Moyong Jun, and what’s said in the kitchen is heard by a hungry Qing.

Unaware that a hungry Qing was standing right outside listening, the villagers’ conversation continued.

“Right. Is that bastard still alive?”

“Of course. Lively as hell, that one. Kept glaring like he wanted to kill somebody too. But do we really need to keep him alive any longer? Can’t we just kill him now and bury him? We’ve got guests here now, don’t we? So doesn’t that mean we can get rid of him already?”

“No, we still need to keep him alive for now. There’s no telling how long the guests will stay.”

That... did not seem like the sort of thing one could innocently misunderstand.