Chapter 530: Poison-Blade Uproar, Poison-Blade March (3)

If Hangzhou people had to pick a single word they hate most,

it would be Jiangnan.

Because “Jiangnan” lumps Hangzhou and Suzhou and the surrounding belt into one.

But Jiangnan’s fame springs entirely from Hangzhou.

The rest—Suzhou and the etceteras—made up that dastardly word just to ride Hangzhou’s coattails, or so they claim.

So of course Hangzhou folks hate the word Jiangnan.

And who could blame them—

The greatest pleasure quarter under heaven and on earth.

Everyone in the Central Plains agrees.

The most beautiful city in the world.

So judged, some four hundred years ago, by a Western official named Mahapara who worked in the yamen—strictly, from a Westerner’s perspective.

Back in Qing’s homeland they called this Western Mahapara by the crooked name Marco Polo.

At any rate, Hangzhou’s beauty is the world’s best—

an obvious truth on which East and West, the two civilizations, agree!

Is it only beautiful?

No.

Hangzhou’s population reaches one million three hundred thousand, making it one of the most prosperous mega-cities in the Central Plains.

So if a dozen people vanish in a day, no one so much as blinks.

With the crush of humanity, they say the street beggars alone number in the tens of thousands; plenty of folks won’t care even if some disappear.

Add that Hangzhou is the Central Plains’ greatest gambling city; hundreds end up on the street every day.

And though the population is 1.3 million, administration lags far behind; if someone goes missing, that’s that.

Someone’s missing? What, a commoner?

“You fool! If we tried to resolve every trifling matter like that, we wouldn’t sleep and still be short-handed—then how would we govern the realm!”

So if someone disappears, find them yourself.

“What’s that, Mr. Kim? Ah—we knew it when that bastard kept haunting the gambling house. He bolted in the night.”

“What? Mr. Kim? Which Kim? Hey, what was the name of that Kim we grabbed and sold last time? Ah—good, not him. We may be human garbage, but selling a friend of a relative’s friend—that’d be a bit much, wouldn’t it?”

So—where is that Mr. Kim?

“—huff—huhh—huff—”

“Ahh—my lord...!”

Amazingly enough, somewhere deep beneath Hangzhou, he was in the throes of bed-sport.

“Huhk!”

“Aaah...”

As Kim’s body shuddered, the woman pinned beneath him flashed a slick, impish light in her eyes.

Bedchamber Arts were originally a Daoist method: through coupling, circulate each other’s qi for mutual growth.

Some wicked types discovered that monopoly beat mutual benefit and twisted sex into a sorcery of monopoly—stealing essence.

But Kim’s member didn’t flag; it rose to the heavens for another round. So the woman’s art was not that essence-stealing sorcery.

Rather, qi flowed in a circuit, nourishing each other’s original vitality—hence the tireless, limitless pleasure of the Dao’s true Bedchamber Arts.

So the heated bliss went on.

Who knows how long.

Panting, Kim flopped to the side, pulled the woman’s head into his chest, and showed satisfied affection.

The woman set her hand on his pit of the stomach, over the heart, and stroked lightly.

Her fingertips circled, circled—then slid down, kneaded his plump upper belly, and at some point slipped into the skin.

“Heh—hah—it tickles—stop—Aaaagh!”

Kim’s chuckle broke into a death-rattle scream that rang through the stone chamber.

Well, if a living man’s belly gets an arm sunk into it, anyone would scream.

Kim thrashed, shoving and hitting her in a frenzy.

But the woman didn’t even pretend to hurt. She rummaged through his viscera, groping, until she seized the heart, pounding fit to burst.

Then with a long fingernail she carefully slit the vessels, and moments later she drew out a whole, intact heart.

“Gkk—krr...”

Heart in hand, she gave the foam-lipped Kim a blank glance, then stepped out through the iron door.

A corridor lined with many iron doors, each with a hand-span window, flickered past with little tableaux—

Coupling bodies; a jaw braced open while they rammed in gruel—forcible feeding as torture; a limbless one whose uniform said he’d been a martial man.

Past the long corridor, the floor at some point turned to white milk-jade, and red carpet unfurled upon it. At the opulent end—palace-like—a gigantic door stood revealed.

“Disciple Yeon Yul requests an audience with the Demon Princess.”

—Enter.

She opened the door and went in.

Before a huge tent embroidered, brazenly, with a phoenix, a single woman sat on a throne.

Any Central Plains onlooker would say they’d gone mad.

“Have these raving rebels built an imperial palace underground?”

This was entirely the taste of the Heart-Eater Demon Lord.

He even forced the Blood Sect to call him the Heart-Plucking Demon King; from that affectation alone, you knew he was deeply, irretrievably gone.

The Blood Sect adepts were aghast too—but what was one more madman in the Blood Sect?

A lunatic proclaiming himself king—one might even say he was mad nicely.

And if he at least didn’t proclaim himself king in public, then he was mad with a certain discernment.

In any case: Demon King.

And the Demon King’s daughter? Demon Princess.

Heart-Plucking Demon Princess Yu Ryang.

Yu Ryang took the heart on a tray, grabbed it with her hand, inspected it, and smiled, satisfied.

“Good. Premium stock. Gulp.”

Then she bit in, clamped it with both hands, and tore the tough heart to eat.

Chomp, chomp—chew, chew—gluttony you could see with your eyes.

Anyone would call it atrocious table manners—cluck their tongue and ask if the household had any elders to teach this brat.

Yu Ryang didn’t care.

Etiquette was what the weak showed the strong. With a Demon King for a father, Yu Ryang had no need of such virtues.

The woman swallowed hard, watching the meal.

Her eyes pleaded—translated: please, just one bite—beaming that will in sparkly darts.

Yu Ryang smirked, then flicked the last big chunk with a finger—

The heart traced a parabola, and the woman sprang up and snatched it from the air with her mouth.

“Oh, right. Her—you know. The Heavenly Flower Sword. I hear she’s got three Five Great House brats stuck to her right now. And Young Master Ok Girin is there too?”

“Mmph—s-s’ry—gulp—you mean the most handsome man under heaven, Ok Girin?”

“Mm-hmm. That Ok Girin. How handsome can a face be, that everyone’s in such a tizzy? Aren’t you curious?”

“The girl is indeed curious.”

“Well, still—no comparing him to our Society Lord. You know what? If we pull off the Great Plan this time, he said he’d even consider marriage. Kyah—am I getting married?”

Yu Ryang kicked her legs on the great throne and let out squealy, scream-like cheers.

If not for the lower half of her face drenched in blood from gnawing a heart, one might have called her a girl in love.

“Congratulations, Your Ladyship.”

“M-m. M-m. Never thought I’d owe it to big sis.”

For a moment, the woman had to think who “big sis” was.

Until very recently, Yu Ryang had called her corpsesmith bitch, or that corpse-reeking bitch, or that creepy bitch, and so on.

A sudden promotion to “big sis” could be hard to parse.

Heart-Plucking Demon Princess Yu Ryang smiled and tacked on a warning—smile sweet, malice thick.

“My marriage hangs on this. So don’t screw it up. Unless you want your heart yanked out.”

****

With Gongsun Yo-ye joining up, the Short Blade & Twin-Swords Society had fully assembled.

Changbin had only ever put his name down—his participation rate was abysmal—so whatever.

Maybe because there were always women in Mucheon Pavilion’s front court, the woman-averse Changbin—should I try to understand him? Like hell. What, does he think the °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° women will eat him alive?

I’ll toss him into a gathering of only our lady members later.

After a simple breakfast, Qing took the lead to step out of Immortal Leisure Pavilion, the top inn in Taizhou—

Except?

—“Hey, please, just clear out, would you? We’ve got a distinguished guest staying—look, something awful could happen!”

—“Answer me—look, if you don’t want food and you don’t want money, at least say what you want. What are you doing in front of my shop?”

—“Are you listening? Ah, I’m going insane!”

From outside the inn came the bellowing of someone who sounded like the young waiter.

“Eh? What’s going on?”

Gongsun Yo-ye supplied the note.

“Oh—coming in earlier, I saw a beggar curled up right by the inn’s entrance. They begged us not to touch him—said he knew martial arts. Looks like he’s still there.”

“Ah, sister—that’s a trick many martial beggars use. They lie right at a shop’s door to block business. It’s a kind of extortion—demanding dishes or money.”

“I know that one. I’ve done it a few—hm. No—never mind.”

Qing had used the trick a few times.

Not outright business obstruction—more like hovering nearby if there was a banquet.

They said a plague demon clinging to your premises chased away fortune, right?

On a bad day you got a beating; on a lucky day they’d ladle a bucket of leftovers over you.

They couldn’t just hand over the bucket—the bucket was household property; a servant couldn’t give that away. Slinging only food made sense too.

Still, wasn’t that a lot more generous than clubbing?

Hmm. Thinking back—those absolute bastards—

Since this is Moryong territory, maybe I should ask Miss Murong to rough them up a little—no, not killing or crippling—just stripping some property—

No. Vengeance is mine. I do it.

When the Divine Thief strides forth, know that in Geonpyeong there will be no gap between rich and poor.

I’ll make true redistribution of wealth a reality.

She hadn’t forgotten her grudges and renewed her vow of revenge—and without borrowing another’s hand.

At last, Qing had become a proper Central Plains person.

“Still—you don’t get to throw a fit when an inn’s doing honest business. Who the hell is it?”

Qing’s voice sharpened.

Beggars were her old foe; she didn’t look kindly on them just because they were beggars.

“Your—no, Heavenly Flower Sword. Don’t. My men will handle it. Just wait a bit.”

“It’s fine. I just hate beggars who know martial arts. If you’ve got time to learn, why are you out here begging?”

Paeng Daesan shot her a look that said are you serious, but the flower-beggar had already passed into the annals of eccentric legends, so Qing was unapologetic.

Qing rolled up her sleeves—chk.

The moment she opened the inn door, she saw the small front court and, by the main gate, the young waiter.

“Look—we’ve set a tray for you. Please take it to a corner over there and eat, okay? We’ve got important guests inside; this could turn disastrous!”

Still, the fact they were setting out a tray said Immortal Leisure Pavilion was generous.

If people are generous, you say thank you—how much more was this leech trying to wring out of them?

Qing strode over in quick steps.

Let’s see what kind of beggar this is—let me see your face—

Hmm. A familiar face?

“Ah. Miss Seo Mun.”

“Ghh—Guryung?”

“No.”

A faint shadow crossed Seol Iri’s brow.

Murong Juhee, who’d followed Qing out and reached to hold her back, caught the rare sight of that unkempt silver hair and recognized her at once.

“My lady? You know her—hm? Isn’t that Seolhwa? What is this—why are you suddenly a beggar? Did the Ice Palace go under?”

“Yes. No—no.”

“So—it’s Seolhwa. Not a beggar. And the Ice Palace didn’t go under. Mm. Iri, then? But why the beggar getup—well, fine, being a beggar is comfy...”

“Wait—Iri? Iri? What are you two to each other? You—Qing—now that I think of it you’ve been asking around about Seolhwa.”

Tang Nanaa slipped right back into growly-toy-dog mode, eyes blazing.

But Seol Iri’s lips, in their own way, sank into those two small cracks at the corners—

the clumsy smile Qing hadn’t seen in a long time.