Chapter 394: There’s One Restaurant on the Plain Hill, and Two Hammers (1)

The disciples of Rooster Forest and Jangsan had set up formation in front of the Patrol Bureau, beheading every unorthodox martial artist the moment they stepped out. Some might have called it cowardly, wagging their fingers in accusation.

However, Rooster Forest and Jangsan’s official stance was this:

We came prepared to demand blood in fair combat.

But what could we do if they refused to come out all at once and trickled out piecemeal?

Are we supposed to sit around and wait for the enemies of our disciples to all come rushing out and form ranks before avenging them?

That’s not fairness—that’s idiocy fit for drooling halfwits.

And sure, one could press further about suspicious collusion with the local authorities.

But the official stance held firm:

Ever heard of the principle that martial forces are not to interfere with the government?

The Patrol Bureau made their own judgment. That’s why they didn’t release them all at once, but in batches.

These bastards had already caused a scene while packed together—why would the officials want to group them up again?

And really, what sort of power do a bunch of low-tier martial instructors have to be manipulating government offices anyway?

The truth that only a very select few knew was that Sect Master Kang Suyang of the Rooster Forest Sword Sect had received a royal decree from Prince Su Si.

Which meant that Rooster Forest hadn’t exactly done anything behind the scenes.

The prince simply bestowed favor, and they, being humble civilians, could only accept it with gratitude.

So in the days that followed, unorthodox business operations across Guangxi began rapidly disappearing.

The leading orthodox sects in every city of Guangxi suddenly went mad, yelling, Now is the time! Expand the business!, and launched full-scale offensives.

After all, every single combat division of the Unorthodox Alliance had already been blown to pieces, and it wasn’t as if the rest of the unorthodox factions didn’t know the Murim Alliance’s combat divisions were en route.

Add to that the fact that the bribed officials had suddenly changed faces, acting cold and merciless—and even those officials who had once been emotionally swayed (or blackmailed) were now whispering warnings:

The true high and mighty powers are backing the orthodox sects.

Now’s the time to hunker down and ride out the storm.

Or maybe just quit the unorthodox life altogether and quietly slip over to some gray-area group between orthodoxy and heresy.

With things like that, it was early February when word spread that Qing would be heading to the Jin Family Manor in Guangdong.

Kang Suyang nodded quite readily—though with a hint of regret.

“To think our sect’s benefactor is leaving before we’ve had the chance to repay her properly...”

“Come on now. Being treated like a noble guest only feels special the first couple of days. Keep it up and I’ll start thinking it’s normal. Then I might start pointing fingers and throwing tantrums like, How dare you treat the Heavenly Flower Sword this poorly?!”

Kang Suyang, having long since grown used to Qing’s informality—or perhaps it was better described as something closer to that of a beggar—only let out a chuckling sigh.

“Sect Master! This girl, Unaram, has something she must—!”

“Denied.”

The Head Disciple, Do Daljeon, cut Unaram off.

“Hrk! But junior still—!”

“You’re trying to say you want to follow the Heavenly Flower Sword, aren’t you?”

“Astonishing! You see through this disciple’s heart so clearly!”

“Sigh. At any other time, maybe. But the unorthodox bastards are watching for any excuse. Right now is not the time for a Rooster Forest disciple—especially the Grand Senior Disciple—to be traveling to Guangdong.”

“Yes, sir...”

Unaram’s shoulders drooped.

“Sister! Next time, for sure! For sure! For suuure!”

Cutting her off again, Do Daljeon bowed deeply.

“Lady Ximen, we are deeply in your debt. As soon as the Alliance’s support troops arrive, we’ll dispatch them to the Jin Family Manor. While the manor reportedly isn’t under direct threat at this moment, the unorthodox sects’ scheming is vile by nature. Please stay vigilant.”

Qing paid a visit to the Rooster Forest Sect’s most luxurious guest lodging.

To say goodbye.

“Hm? Leaving already?”

“I’ve thoroughly sampled all Guangxi cuisine. Time to move on to Guangdong cuisine. Isn’t Guangdong and Hangzhou said to be closest to the best food under heaven?”

The so-called Five Great Cuisines of the Central Plains were divided by region and not entirely based on taste. But if you asked people to name the best-tasting regional cuisines, even the most die-hard hometown chauvinists would still narrow it down to either Guangdong or Hangzhou.

“Oh dear, Lady Qing. Can’t you at least spend some time together, just the two of you, before you go?”

“What, did I move to Namnyeong? Jayu has to go home too, anyway.”

“Ahem.”

Even Jayu couldn’t help but feel a bit hurt.

To show up suddenly, announce she was leaving, and drop a goodbye on him like that.

He’d known Qing was someone who treated meetings and farewells with incredible nonchalance, but still—she could have told him ahead of time.

“Well then, see you again.”

“See you again.”

And just as she stepped out after saying her goodbyes, someone came rushing up immediately.

“Ooooh, if you leave now, when shall I ever again gaze upon your brilliant jade eyes? Here, it’s meager, but please accept this humble gift to help on your journey—!”

But before Qing could even open the box, she was dragged off by Changye.

“This bastard keeps finding gold and silver somewhere and trying to bribe people.”

“I merely picked it up on the roadside! Please, pay it no mind!”

The mosquito’s voice faded into the distance.

When Qing opened the box—good heavens.

An extravagant jewelry set glittered in rainbow hues, featuring seven treasures and coral inlays.

A luxury item so rare, you couldn’t get it even with gold and silver.

Seriously, where the hell is he finding this stuff?

Was there some new divine power spreading through the Central Plains—like a “Divine Gathering” ability—that let you just yoink stuff from other people’s homes?

Qing snorted lightly through her nose and laughed.

No, of course not.

Clearly, Jayu had set this aside and asked someone to deliver it on his behalf.

Must’ve felt too awkward to hand it over himself.

“My big teddy bear. I’ll see you next time.”

“I doubt we need to.”

“The Sect of Divine Maidens isn’t far from Nanjoo, right? I’ll report to the elders first, then come back to you. My love.”

“I’m not your love.”

Nayangyeol hadn’t joined the battle just to protect Qing.

She was also the victim of harassment by the unorthodox bastards.

Though officially categorized as part of the White Path, the Heavenly Flower Hall wasn’t a formal member of the Murim Alliance.

So for the sake of her own and her sect’s honor, she had to join the battle.

Otherwise, it would’ve looked like she just stood back and let the Alliance protect her.

Along those same lines, following Qing all the way to Guangdong was a bit much.

Still—considering she’d gone so far as to join a separate escort team, maybe it wasn’t just courage but borderline recklessness.

Volunteering without knowing the strength of the palace guards... That level of love, reckless as it was, deserved at least some points for sincerity.

“Well then, see you again.”

Nayangyeol blew a kiss from her lips.

Qing responded by flicking it away with her fingers.

And with that, the goodbyes were done.

“Lady Ximen, please take care!”

“Come visit us again next time!”

“We’ve got to duel for the title of Guangxi’s Greatest Liquor again someday!”

As the crowd surged out to see her off, Qing gave a wave in return, then turned her back without hesitation and kicked off the ground.

****

The Jin Family Manor, Guangdong.

Though not among the Five Great Clans, this household—counted as one of the Ten Great Clans of the Central Plains—was, in terms of fame alone, in no way inferior to the Five.

All thanks to that famed martial art: Tai Chi Fist.

The founder of Tai Chi, of the Jin clan, never hesitated to teach it to anyone who knocked on the Jin family’s door.

That’s why even Zhang Sanfeng, the founding patriarch of the Wudang Sect, attained great enlightenment from Jin-style Tai Chi, leading him to create Wudang’s unique Zhang-style Tai Chi and the Tai Chi Sword.

Of course, the Jin clan didn’t pass down the true essence of Tai Chi in its entirety.

What they shared leaned more toward a Daoist health regimen than a practical martial art.

It was a miraculous form of calisthenics—drawing out the body’s latent strength, building flexibility and muscle, and through deep breathing, imbuing the body with internal energy.

Of course, it would take about ten years of steady training to see any meaningful result, so its effectiveness was modest at best.

Still, it spread so widely that even commoners could be seen morning and evening, slowly moving through the forms to stay healthy.

So when people heard of the Jin Family of Guangdong?

Ah—the Jin family, of Jin-style Tai Chi?

That was the level of name recognition they held across the world.

So then—why, despite such fame, were they never considered one of the Five Great Clans?

The answer lies in the limits of the martial pugilist.

As for the limitations of a hand-to-hand fighter, the half-witted monkeys who can’t even use weapons always dare to bring up Shaolin or the Monk of Martial Virtue.

Didn’t they become the best in the world without using weapons?

That argument can be dismantled by science, logic, philosophy—hell, even mathematics.

Sure, some masters might spout that sort of nonsense, but the truth is, among martial pugilists, true masters are exceedingly rare. And even if you somehow survived a life-or-death trial—

Do you really need to ask which hurts more: an invisible fist, an invisible sword, an inner fist, or an inner sword?

To use “Righteous Fist Overcomes” techniques, do you have to cut off your own arms first?

But no—the true weakness of martial pugilists isn't that—

–they suffer unilateral losses when clashing against weapons,

–they can’t parry weapon strikes and must constantly evade,

–their range is so short that they keep dodging until they collapse from exhaustion.

It’s not any of that.

The real flaw is this: alone they’re weak, but together they’re even more useless.

One martial pugilist versus one swordsman is one thing.

But pugilists versus swordsmen en masse? That’s a whole different beast.

In one-on-one, if they manage distance well, dodge skillfully, and get in close to land solid blows—they might win.

But group combat is where the true nature of the pugilist is laid bare.

Stick together, and they interfere with each other’s evasion—so they get slashed.

Spread out?

In group combat, dispersing equals death.

So no matter how strong the individual fighters of the Jin family might be, their combat divisions couldn’t be rated highly.

Worse still, combine that with the large sweeping footwork of Tai Chi, and it turns into a total mess.

Frankly, the fact that they even made it into the Ten Great Clans despite such critical flaws was testament to just how much their fame was carrying them.

But even that reputation... wouldn’t last much longer.

****

When the Jin family members returned from the Martial World Assembly, all that awaited them at the estate were the rotting remnants of the household staff.

A house without people loses its vitality with shocking speed.

That’s assuming no one’s in it—if there are corpses left inside, the damage is far worse.

Tangled up with the Blood Cult as they were, even petty thieves had avoided the place.

The Jin Family Manor had effectively become a haunted ruin.

Still, the Jin family hadn’t collapsed.

It had been a grand outing to the Central Plains after a long time, and their direct bloodline members had all come out in force. The ones who’d died were tragic losses, yes, but survivable.

They’d just need to rebuild the tilted manor, take in disciples—not as a prestigious clan perhaps, but as a proper martial household—and regain their former prosperity.

Then the Unorthodox Alliance stepped in.

No matter how unorthodox they might be, even they wouldn’t storm into a manor that had already suffered a massacre at the hands of the Blood Cult.

Not out of pity or some last shred of conscience.

But because if they did, the orthodox factions would never let it slide.

So the unorthodox sects took a different approach.

It started when the laborers hired to rebuild the estate began turning up dead, one by one.

One day. Then another. Then three.

The laborers kept dying, and then suddenly the killings would stop—as if nothing had happened.

But as soon as repairs resumed, the deaths resumed too, as if someone had been waiting for it.

No matter how much gold and silver was offered, few people wanted to walk into a job with a death sentence.

And the Jin family, with their income stream completely cut off, couldn’t afford to offer anyone enough to risk their life for a construction job.

So what could they do?

Reconstruction halted.

And the Jin Family Manor remained a half-ruined shell.

Who would want to become a disciple of a half-collapsed martial household?

Sure, the fame of Jin-style Tai Chi still attracted a few hopefuls.

But just as expected, the unorthodox sects seized the moment.

They all began aggressively recruiting new disciples, running ridiculous promotions—“Join now and get one bonus technique and free elixirs!”—like snake oil salesmen on a spree.

No manpower to rebuild.

No new blood to replenish the ranks.

Even while occupying the most prized location in all of Guangzhou, the Jin Family Manor had become indistinguishable from a haunted house.

What people said now were clucks of the tongue and mutterings about how the Jin Family was finished.

These were the same commoners who once wouldn’t have dared to speak even the syllable Jin aloud.

And so the once-glorious name of the Jin clan began to fade.

The gold-leafed plaque above the gate tilted and cracked.

And everyone who passed by just clicked their tongues and shook their heads.

The Jin Family had become a punchline.

And in that very Guangdong—

A woman was crossing through.