Chapter 948: I Want to Watch (2)

Time suddenly slowed for Qing.

A masked intruder dropped straight down through the ceiling.

Then he vaulted forward, trampling the dining table as he threw his body into motion.

The table went—CRACK!

About half of it snapped clean off, and the violent rebound kicked it upward.

And if that happened to the table, what do you think happened to everything on it?

A whole roast duck drifted up in slow motion. Braised pork rippled like a wave. Red soup and white soup surged up like angry surf, spraying and crossing through the air, while chopped bok choy and cabbage swam between them.

Qing’s pupils narrowed.

Horror clung to her face—

and at the same time, an infinite grief welled up.

No. My food. My dishes. No—

Someone might say this.

How can a martial artist who’s reached the Harmonization Realm fail to stop a single uninvited guest falling out of the sky?

But Qing felt wronged. It felt like her guts were collapsing.

No—her guts had already collapsed.

No, seriously—Harmonization Realm, my ass.

I was just eating like a normal person. This isn’t some shady backwater inn in the middle of nowhere where you sit in a corner because everything looks suspicious. This is a city where basic security is maintained, and even among those places it’s a high-end inn.

And it’s not like I’m being hunted by some person or group where I have to worry about an ambush every second.

So what, I’m supposed to eat while constantly scanning my surroundings, tense as hell, thinking, Maybe someone will crash through the ceiling again... even here?

Still. Sad is sad.

And I have to do what I have to do, you bastard.

Qing made a teary face and flicked her hand.

Her long, pale fingers shot upward—

and suddenly clamped around a man’s ankle and yanked.

THUD!

“GAAK!”

With a croak like a frog getting crushed, the table-destroyer sprawled out flat on his back.

A young man who looked like he was in his mid-twenties. His face was gentle, harmless, even—except he’d just stomped all over a table that had carried someone’s dreams and hopes.

His ankle writhed in Qing’s grip—he clearly had some skill—but—

SHIIK.

A sword tip slid in and touched his Adam’s apple.

Following the blade upward with her eyes, Qing saw clothes stained in splotches, and above a face veil, a woman with meat, bean sprouts, and cilantro stuck to her head like garnish.

Moyong Juhee had basically worn an entire plate.

Her voice was colder than frost.

“Miss, should I kill him?”

“...Not ‘hold back.’ Just—should I kill him? Looking at him, he doesn’t seem like a proper person anyway.”

Qing made a low, thinking sound.

The young man blanched and shouted.

“Wait—wait! It’s a misunderstanding! A misunderstanding!”

“A misunderstanding? You flipped someone else’s table—what part is the misunderstanding? Did the table get startled and flip itself?”

“There are reasons—there are reasons for—”

—THERE! HE’S OVER THERE!

A shout cut him off, followed by a thundering rush of footsteps. A group of martial artists with pretty vicious-looking faces came charging in.

In that instant, Moyong Jun’s eyes sparkled.

Moyong Jun was new to the martial world. Sure, he’d “run away” a few times with permission, but that had been the mischief of Young Master Moyong Jun—not the adventures of a true martial artist.

This was his first real journey into the world.

So when chaos suddenly erupted, his eyes glittered and his heart pounded.

So this is the legendary inn brawl you only hear about in stories!

Moyong Jun looked back and forth between the gentle face of the young man being restrained, and the vicious faces of the men rushing in.

Maybe the young man had a story. Maybe he’d tried to wipe them out but was outmatched and decided to retreat, breaking through the floor to escape and fight another day. Maybe he had a grudge against them—his parents’ killers, his lover’s killers... or maybe his master’s enemies, or his sect’s enemies...

If Qing had heard that imagination running wild, she’d have said it sounded exactly like a kid who grew up on martial-world stories.

But Moyong Jun was a kid, and he had grown up on nothing but martial-world stories.

So while Moyong Jun drew his sword with a grave, determined expression—

the vicious-looking men who’d charged in skidded to an awkward stop when they saw the young man already pinned down.

Then they started trading looks, shoving silent responsibility at each other like, Go talk. No, you. You.

Yeah. Of course.

Qing let out a short breath, released the ankle, and stepped forward. She patted Moyong Jun’s shoulder twice—put the sword away.

“Huh? Why?”

“I’ll explain later. Ahem. From the looks of it, you’re here for this guy. But we’ve also ended up with a... personal grievance with him.”

As she spoke, Qing spread her arms.

Look at her.

White training clothes splattered with sauce, soaked with broth, wrecked with bits of garnish and debris.

Behind her, a broken table lay collapsed, and the floor was a complete disaster zone.

It wasn’t hard to understand what she meant by “personal grievance.”

“Still, he seems to be causing trouble in more ways than one. Would you mind telling me what’s going on from your side?”

The men glanced at each other. Then one stepped forward and offered a clasped-fist salute.

“We’re martial artists from the Mercenary Guild.”

The Mercenary Guild was the umbrella term for those broker groups that connected martial artists looking for work with paying clients—and skimmed a commission.

Meaning: We’re sword-sellers was the slightly more elegant way to put it.

A sword-seller was, literally, someone who sold their sword.

You could say that was just a wanderer—but even among wanderers there were ranks. The ones who proudly declared, I’m a wanderer, were usually skilled people who simply hadn’t settled down.

So if a sword-seller affiliated with the Mercenary Guild tried to swagger around saying, I’m a wanderer, they’d just get laughed at.

“To be honest, we’d just finished a night escort job and were about to have a drink when...”

Sword-sellers were the kind of low-level fighters who lived day to day while nursing a small, simple dream of Someday I’ll become a top master!

For them, a high-end inn like this was crushingly expensive, so the plan had been to hit some cheap place—pressed tofu salad, and some foul, watered-down liquor to wash off the fatigue.

But then—

One warrior stepped up and said, Don’t. I’ll pay. Let’s go, all confident.

Except—how? Every single one of them was a sword-seller. Bottom-tier lives. Where would money like that come from?

And then, unbelievably, it turned out he wasn’t a sword-seller at all.

He was a disciple of the Azure Dragon Gate who had come out into the martial world—

and not just any disciple.

He claimed to be Pyeong Goun, the sect leader’s son.

Would they believe something like that?

Of course they would. The Azure Dragon Gate was well-known as the top sect in this city, Tangshan.

At this point, Qing tilted her head and looked at Moyong Juhee, silently asking, Azure Dragon Gate? You know it?

Moyong Juhee shook her head. Never heard of it.

That made sense. Moyong Juhee was direct blood of the Moyong Family—famous across the world. She wouldn’t know the names of mid-sized local sects.

And Qing didn’t know that kind of thing to begin with.

But for low-level fighters, it was a famous sect. Those regional groups were the sort of names the lower ranks actually knew better.

If Qing put it in her hometown terms—major corporations and strong mid-sized firms.

People working at major corporations didn’t bother memorizing the names of companies that weren’t also major corporations.

But people job-hunting? They knew every solid mid-sized firm by heart.

Anyway.

Who would be insane enough to impersonate an Azure Dragon Gate disciple in Tangshan—let alone impersonate the sect leader’s son?

So the sword-sellers thought they’d hit the jackpot.

What luck! What does expensive food taste like?

They followed him, excited out of their minds.

And then—

“...He suddenly changed his tune. Said he didn’t really see why he had to buy drinks for us, and then he vanished by breaking through the floor.”

“And he ordered that expensive Phantom-Drunk Liquor and drank it all by himself! One bottle has to cost at least one gold piece...”

That last bit came from another sword-seller in the back.

Either way, they’d followed him because he said he’d pay, and now they were about to get wrecked.

So they’d rushed down in a panic.

And now—here they were.

Qing’s eyes narrowed.

No. Seriously. What is this. What kind of—

So if you summarize it—

A guy who’d been working day labor with them turned out to be a rich heir doing a “commoner experience.”

He said, You worked hard—I'll buy you a meal, dragged them to a high-end place where one serving costs a fortune, and then once the food hit the table he thought, Wait, why am I paying?—and ran.

After chugging the most expensive liquor by himself.

It was petty if you wanted to call it petty, and it was ridiculous in a way—but if you looked close, it wasn’t petty at all. Where were day-to-day sword-sellers supposed to get the money to cover a high-end inn bill?

From far away it was comedy.

Up close, it was tragedy.

“So basically, this bastard pretended to be the Azure Dragon Gate heir and scammed you? He stabs his comrades in the back just to eat expensive food? This piece of shit—this is a death sentence. Death sentence. He’s done. He’s seriously done.”

One sword-seller shook his head, grief-stricken.

“That’s... that isn’t it.”

“It isn’t?”

“He... he really does seem to be the Azure Dragon Gate heir. On the way here, several people recognized him, and we saw Azure Dragon Gate disciples bow politely to him. Unless all those people were in on it together, how could that happen?”

Qing turned and looked down at the young man.

“What the hell...? Seriously? It’s not an impersonation? He’s really the heir? Azure Dragon Gate’s heir?”

“If you knew, you could’ve moved the sword first. It’s embarrassing to keep lying here.”

The panic from earlier was completely gone. The young man—Pyeong Goun—lay there like he was relaxing on a summer lawn, answering calmly.

Qing’s face soured hard.

Wait. He’s really the heir?

Then what kind of dogshit situation is this?

A rich heir scammed day-labor sword-sellers?

“...Why?”

“There seems to be a misunderstanding. I was enjoying my travels while concealing my identity, so I didn’t have money on me. I only meant to briefly return home, but it seems that created this misunderstanding.”

“A guy who ‘briefly returns home’ crashes through a ceiling? You must’ve been in a hurry. Wanted to make the trip fast.”

“That’s also a misunderstanding. The floor was rotten and collapsed on its own. It just so happened the timing lined up, and now it looks like I fled.”

“No. You were trying to flee. And you did it over people’s heads.”

“That is also a misunderstanding. As you know, martial artists develop habits in the body. I leapt without thinking, and it coincidentally happened to be above your head. For that, I apologize.”

That was where the stories split.

Pyeong Goun insisted it was all misunderstandings.

The sword-sellers insisted he’d done it on purpose.

Qing’s eyes sharpened into something dangerous.

Oh, this bastard—

If you thought about it with common sense, the young man’s explanation sounded more believable.

He’d yelled “misunderstanding” from the start.

And why would the sect leader’s son of a successful sect stoop to scamming poor sword-sellers?

And between the claims of low-tier fighters who could barely say “wanderer” with a straight face, and the claims of a sect leader’s son from a famous sect... you didn’t even need to compare which sounded more credible.

But look at those sword-sellers.

They’d come charging down to chase a dine-and-dash criminal, sure—but that was all.

They’d seen someone break through an inn’s floor like it was paper. They couldn’t possibly have believed they could actually fight him. They’d probably planned to pretend to chase him, then run for their lives instead.

So when the dine-and-dash criminal was already absurdly subdued, they froze.

They couldn’t even bring themselves to say, Pay up, and just stood there awkwardly, trading looks.

You could tell at a glance.

And now what?

“It was all a misunderstanding”? “I was going to bring money”?

If you’re going to be evil, be evil properly. Kill someone. Rob someone. There are plenty of classic villain options.

But this?

What kind of petty, worthless son of a bitch does this?