Chapter 129: Wronged Ghost Summons Calamity (6)

Resentment breeds obsessive attachment.

Obsessive attachment breeds fixation.

That was the way of the world Eunsong had learned by colliding with it until now.

Neither he nor his disciples were any different.

Because there were people they had lost, they resolved on revenge.

Because they could not bring the dead back to life, they vowed to make the other side experience the same thing.

That was how Eunsong had gathered his disciples, one by one.

But Cheonjeong was different.

He was not a disciple Eunsong had personally chosen...

He was a disciple entrusted to him.

“...Why are you bringing up my past now?”

“Do you remember the promise I made you that day?”

“...I remember.”

Cheonjeong quietly closed his eyes.

Even now, the memory of that day was vivid.

*****

It had been a rainy night.

Young Cheonjeong had been too young to know anything. ℴ

And yet even a child who knew nothing could tell that a dark cloud had settled over his home.

Because that dark cloud...

Had come in the shape of a cold, blue blade.

Cheonjeong still remembered that night.

An inn could not pick and choose its guests.

Especially not merely because a guest “wore a mask.”

And if the masked person was a martial artist with a sword at his waist, even less so.

Cheonjeong’s parents had run an inn that steamed and sold dumplings in the middle of a long travel road, with no village nearby.

They did not even stock expensive liquor or delicacies, so highborn people would not stop there no matter how hungry or thirsty they were.

Then one dawn, a masked person had come to that place.

He had simply asked Cheonjeong’s parents to serve him dumplings.

Dumplings and cheap white liquor.

It was a polite request, and Cheonjeong’s parents silently served him.

Masked martial artists were not rare, and they thought nothing would happen this time either.

A faint scent of blood catching at the nose?

Weren’t martial artists the kind of people who carried swords around and killed others by nature?

Whether that was righteous or not.

The man emptied a plate of dumplings and a bottle of white liquor, quietly paid, and left.

It was a day no different from any other.

Except that, at dawn the next day, martial artists of the Martial Alliance came.

“Was it you?”

They were martial artists on horseback.

Whenever high-ranking people came to a shabby place, disaster followed.

The couple knew that from experience, so they had hidden their child.

“W-what do you mean?”

“Yesterday, a man who looked like this came through here, did he not?”

The martial artist beside him unrolled a scroll and showed it to them.

It was a drawing of someone’s appearance.

There was no one in the world who left no impression at all.

Even if it was only the color of hair or the shape of the eyes, or the build visible beneath a mask.

And Cheonjeong’s parents remembered him.

“H-he went that way!”

“He went that way, did he?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Did he stop here?”

His father nodded.

“Yes. He stopped by the night before, ate dumplings and drank cheap white liquor, then left in a hurry. We have nothing, nothing to do with him.”

But the man did not seem to think so.

“Nothing to do with him?”

“Yes, nothing at all—”

“Wanted notices are posted all over town, and you recognized him, yet you served him a meal and claim you have nothing to do with him?”

Cheonjeong’s mother, his father, and Cheonjeong himself.

In that instant, all of them felt chills run down their backs.

A cold blue blade appeared at the man’s waist.

And with it, blazing Sword Qi.

“You are public enemies as well.”

*****

“That day, Master, you made me a promise.”

“Yes.”

“You promised you would create an opportunity for me to take revenge on the men who did that to my parents.”

Cheonjeong silently clenched his fist.

But it had not taken him long to understand how difficult that would be.

They were the One-Under-Heaven Corps under the Martial Alliance.

They were martial artists of the Alliance led by the strongest man in the Nine Provinces under heaven, the Sword Sovereign Namgung Ak.

Creating an opportunity for revenge against them?

By his master, who at the time had been a mere second-generation disciple of the Mount Hua Sect?

It was an absurd thing to say.

But Eunsong taught him in earnest.

And Cheonjeong had always followed that teaching in earnest.

On the smallest chance.

The smallest chance that the world fell into chaos again.

That the Alliance’s position and power were shaken.

That an age of turmoil came...

Then, at that time, an opportunity for revenge would appear.

Even if that opportunity never came in his lifetime, Cheonjeong intended to devote himself to training.

Because one never knew when or how an opportunity might come.

If that opportunity came right before his eyes, only for him to fail to achieve his purpose because his training was lacking...

What in the world could be more bitter than that?

“...But why are you bringing up that story now?”

“You know it too. For you to achieve your purpose, an age of turmoil must come.”

“Yes. But right now, the Martial Alliance is far too dominant.”

“...That age of turmoil will soon come.”

Eunsong spoke while looking straight into Cheonjeong’s eyes.

Cheonjeong instinctively realized his master was not speaking empty words.

It was, in the end, only a conjecture.

But his tone was unmistakably that of certainty.

“...How can you be so sure?”

“Because we are raising a qilin that will bite into the sky.”

“What exactly is that ‘we’?”

Cheonjeong narrowed his eyes.

A faint smile touched the corner of Eunsong’s mouth.

“The Reverse Heaven Society. Led by me and Zhuge Yeon.”

“Reverse Heaven...?”

“A group created to shatter the gilded sky and drag it down.”

*****

Mount Hua Sect, Red Tile Pavilion.

A place only the Sect Leader and those granted his permission could enter.

At its center stood Jeongyang and Myeongjeok.

More precisely, the Young Cult Leader who had taken over Myeongjeok’s body.

“...The facilities are quite fine.”

“It is little different from the Sect Leader’s own residence. Yes, then...”

The Sect Leader tapped the sword at his waist and narrowed his eyes.

Right now, he was making a deal with the resurrected Young Cult Leader of the Demonic Cult.

He was not ignorant of the gravity of this matter.

Worse, the contents of that deal were...

A conspiracy of rebellion against the current ruler and sovereign of the Martial Alliance system, the Sword Sovereign Namgung Ak.

A conspiracy to call forth an age of turmoil and become the new ruler of a new world.

There was no way he would not feel impatient.

“What do you intend to do?”

“I told you not to be so impatient. And that sword... is not the genuine article, is it?”

“...You know the Heaven-Night Forged Sword?”

“How could I not know it, when I was struck by that sword myself?”

The Young Cult Leader chuckled and shrugged.

He looked relaxed and at ease.

All Nine Great Sects belonging to the Martial Alliance were enemies of the Demonic Cult.

And among them, the Mount Hua Sect was one of the most renowned and massive righteous sects.

Yet he could sit so leisurely at its very heart.

Feeling a subtle displeasure, Jeongyang sat down.

He thought that would be the end of it.

But the Young Cult Leader pointed at a cabinet with one hand.

Then, when he lightly crooked his finger, the cabinet door rattled and opened wide.

“...What are you doing?”

“The genuine article is here.”

The true Heaven-Night Forged Sword.

The sacred treasure permitted only to the Sect Leader of Mount Hua.

The Young Cult Leader smiled unpleasantly, but did not touch it.

Because he already knew what would happen if he did.

The Heaven-Night Forged Sword realized that intense Demonic Energy was nearby and slowly began to ring.

Jeongyang grabbed it...

But it still would not be drawn, and even its ringing did not subside.

There was only one way.

“...I will have to store it elsewhere.”

“You seem to have dug quite a few holes in this tiny mountain of yours.”

“Shut your mouth. You should be telling me how you intend to kill the Sword Sovereign...”

“Do you not know?”

The Young Cult Leader slowly rose from his seat.

Yes, in truth, Jeongyang knew as well.

To kill the Sword Sovereign Namgung Ak, who was said to have reached the far edge of the Transformation Realm...

There was only one method.

The only human who, while alive, had defeated the Sword Sovereign in his prime in single combat.

The greatest of all ages in the truest sense.

Though he had died after being struck by wave after wave of attacks from the righteous-faction alliance’s death force at the time...

He was the one who had plunged them all into terror.

The Demonic Cult Leader.

They had to resurrect the Heavenly Demon.

“...Do I have any guarantee that after you resurrect your Cult Leader, you will not strike us?”

“None.”

The Young Cult Leader smiled brightly.

Revealing every one of his white teeth, wearing Myeongjeok’s face, he made an expression Myeongjeok would never have made.

It was a chilling sight.

“Did we not promise only to kill the Sword Sovereign? After that, each side must fend for itself, Sect Leader.”

The Young Cult Leader tilted his head slightly, then glared at Jeongyang.

His eyes burned.

He had already been released, obtained a body, and could not be stopped.

“We are the Demonic Cult, and you are the righteous factions. A fight is inevitable. It is simply that you wish to become the foremost man of the Central Plains, even if only half of it... and after that, whether you become the foremost man of the new righteous factions is up to you, is it not?”

“...So that is how you intend to play it.”

“Naturally.”

The Young Cult Leader grinned, propped his elbow on the armrest of the chair, and rested his chin on his hand.

His eyes were no longer Myeongjeok’s black eyes.

They were the eyes of a beast, filled with a glossy, red-burning glare.

Jeongyang quietly looked down at him, then gave a faint smile.

Then he sat across from him.

“Yes, you are right. You are a Demonic Cult wretch, and I am a righteous-faction martial artist.”

“Yes. That is how you should be.”