Chapter 1422: Is This The Sichuan Tang Family? (2)

“All the weapons needed for throwing have been prepared.”

“Great Elder! The Illusory Poison Maze array installed by the Tang Family main gate has been checked. It’s operating normally without issue!”

“The forbidden-tier assassin needles have been distributed! The Elders will use them!”

Those who had rushed in urgently poured reports to Tang Wei one after another.

“We’ve summoned every branch family member staying at Tang Family extensions into the clan. Except for those we can’t reach, everyone is assembling without exception!”

It was a literal all-out war the likes of which one might doubt ever existed in the history of the Sichuan Tang Family. Not only the Tang Family’s direct line living within the clan, but even the branch families living at Tang Family premises were rushing in, ready to stake their lives.

Yes. This is what a Tang Family should be. I don’t know how great Jang Ilso is, but at least they will not be passively overrun.

“And the enemy?”

“They still need time to arrive.”

“Hmm.”

The distance from Emei to here was 200 km. For an ordinary person it would take at least four full days of running to get here.

So no matter how much the Four Sects Alliance wants it, they couldn’t arrive instantly just by deciding to. At least there was time until sunset today.

“Check every situation one more time. And…”

Tang Wei ordered firmly.

“Distribute poisons and needles to the family’s women as well.”

“G-Great Elder! That…”

The Elders flinched in shock.

This is the Tang Family. But not everyone here bears the Tang surname.

Those who belonged to the Tang Family but did not carry the Tang surname. Women married into the Tang Family were proud members of the Sichuan Tang Family, yet they could not touch weapons or poisons.

Not because it was too dangerous. The Sichuan Tang Family was a prestigious clan and a leading house in Sichuan. So those marrying into the Tang Family were inevitably women from notable houses.

Out of fear they might leak the Tang Family’s secrets to their houses, talismans and poisons had not been issued to them for centuries; it had become a tradition.

It wasn’t even a rule only for those married in. Even girls born with the Tang surname couldn’t touch poisons and weapons deemed ‘secret techniques’ in the Tang Family. It was a rigorously enforced protocol.

But now Tang Wei was ordering that protocol to be broken. He, who was the most stubborn and conservative within the Tang Family.

“…B-But to outsiders…”

Tang Wei coldly asked the Elder who mumbled that he couldn’t bring himself to hear such an order.

“Who is an outsider?”

Tang Wei glared at the Elders as he spoke.

“Everyone here has pledged their life to defend the Tang Family. Among them, who is an outsider? Are you calling someone an outsider just because they don’t use the Tang surname?”

At that, the Elders all fell silent.

Of course Tang Wei might feel differently inside. It’s hard to change a lifetime of entrenched thinking in an instant. But even so, no one could refute that statement in the current situation.

“I will take the blame for breaking the protocol. You merely followed my orders. So hand them over. You can’t expect me to tell them to fight without supplying weapons.”

“Yes, Great Elder. We understand what you mean.”

He would take responsibility. That was enough. Since Tang Wei said he’d bear the blame, Tang Gunak would not come to punish others.

“Hurry! The fate of the family is at stake. Recheck everything! If anything is unfinished, finish it by any means! Time is of the essence!”

“Yes!”

Watching the Elders dash off with grim faces, Tang Wei suddenly wavered.

“Koff!”

He covered his mouth with his hand and coughed several times. His body convulsed violently. His dry hand trembled.

“Oh my…”

It wasn’t that he had a particular illness. His body had simply become far weaker than before. A martial person whose dantian is destroyed can become so feeble they can’t compare to ordinary people. Tang Wei was too old to withstand that change.

To be honest, it wasn’t easy for him even to stand his ground here. Yet he straightened his back by force.

If any martial skill remained in him, he would fight the invading villains without regret. But now he had neither the internal strength to scatter poisons nor the muscle to throw talismans.

Still… he was the Tang Family.

Tang Wei stared blankly at the Tang Family pavilions. After staring for a long time, a murmuring voice escaped his lips.

“How absurd…”

At one time he had considered these pavilions monstrous.

Things that could have been his but ultimately never became so. His life had been a journey to bring these cursed things back into his embrace.

A life denied by his father, living in the shadow of his brother, now even punished by his nephew. It was this very Tang Family that had given him that life full of suffering.

Yet Tang Wei sought to defend this place to the end. Horrible as it was, it was his life. Everything about him was soaked into this place.

He might have been a failure. But if so, at least he’d remain the Tang Family’s failure. If ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) the Tang Family vanished, wouldn’t he truly become nothing?

‘They’re all the same.’

Because the Tang Family exists, everyone here has meaning. If the Tang Family disappeared, not only these people but also the blood and sweat of all who made the name Sichuan Tang Family echo across the world would be gone.

Therefore!

‘I will protect it. Even if I must give everything.’

Tang Wei bit his lip and shouted in a crisp voice.

“Bring more weapons! Don’t spare them!”

“Yes, Great Elder!”

“Tang Byeok!”

“Yes!”

“In the family lord’s office, at the back, is the family lord’s poison vault! Gather the poisons stocked inside and bring them!”

“G-Great Elder. But that place can’t be opened without the family lord’s key…”

“Break it!”

“…Are you serious?”

Tang Byeok asked pale-faced, and Tang Wei glared at him lividly.

“Do I look like I’m joking right now?”

“…”

“If you won’t go, I’ll go myself.”

“Ah, no, Great Elder. I’ll obey your order!”

Tang Byeok bit his lip. Tang Wei, having lost his martial might, couldn’t possibly break that safe himself. So if it was to be done, Tang Byeok should do it.

The Great Elder truly seemed to have no intention of watching his back. Perhaps he even had no thought of surviving beyond this battle.

If the Great Elder had resolved himself to that degree, Tang Byeok couldn’t simply back away.

“Use everything possible. If we can at least preserve the poison vault and the furnace, the family can be revived no matter what damage we suffer. Remember! At all costs protect the poison vault and the furnace!”

“Yes!”

Just as Tang Wei once again instilled his grim resolve into everyone,

“F-Fireeeee!”

A scream burst from behind. Tang Wei snapped his gaze around and looked quickly to his surroundings.

Fire!

‘Th-They already?’

Had the Four Sects Alliance already infiltrated the Tang Family? That should be impossible.

“Is it an attack?”

“I-I don’t know! The flames suddenly…!”

Now even Tang Wei could see clearly. The sparks once faint on the pavilion roofs had instantly swelled into tremendous flames.

That could never be a natural fire.

“Confirm if it’s an enemy attack! Quickly!”

“Yes!”

A few terrified Elders rushed to check the camp. While Tang Wei trembled anxiously, news that might ease him soon arrived.

“It… doesn’t seem to be an attack! There’s no sign of intrusion.”

“Ah…”

For a moment Tang Wei almost collapsed, but he barely steadied himself.

Then it was likely a fire that broke out during the emission of a fire-type items. It’s uncommon, but not impossible. It would have been better if it hadn’t happened, but it wasn’t an unmanageable accident.

“Tch. At a time like this.”

Tang Wei clicked his tongue unhappily and shouted.

“Quick, extinguish the flames!”

“Yes, Great Elder.”

Tang Wei, about to turn away because this wasn’t the time for trifles, paused.

‘Wait…’

Those flames…

“Where, where is it?”

“Yes?”

“The fire! Where is that fire burning?”

Tang Wei suddenly shouted as if screaming. The Elders, blinking at his words, turned pale in an instant.

“Y-Yang… Yang Hall!”

“What are you waiting for! Go! Put out the fire! Hurry, hurry!”

“Yes!”

Yang Hall. A name that feels gentle, but in reality it was no warm place.

A place that manufactured the Tang Family’s secret poisons based on countless toxins from across the world. All the poisons and toxic substances the Tang Family had gathered were stored in the laboratory at Yang Hall. It was literally the heart of the Tang Family.

Of all places, that was where the fire had started.

“This…!”

Tang Wei couldn’t just leave it to subordinates and ran at full force. His body was already not fit for running, but he couldn’t merely watch if Yang Hall was burning.

‘If we can extinguish the fire, that’s all. Fire is…’

He forced himself calm and ran, but the scene that met him at Yang Hall was more dreadful than he expected.

The Tang Family Elders had rushed in trying to extinguish the blaze, but it showed no signs of being contained.

“G-Great Elder! The fire won’t go out!”

“What did you say?”

Tang Wei’s face went ashen. And in that instant,

“Fire! The workshop is on fire!”

“There’s a fire in the Celestial Poison Repository! Hurry and summon people! This is not an ordinary blaze!”

Crimson flames leapt up from all corners of the Tang Family.

Yang Gall, where the poison research chamber was located; the workshop that housed White Furnace, which the Tang Family guarded with their lives; and the poison vault storing the secret techniques produced by those two.

Flames rose simultaneously in places that could be said to be the Sichuan Tang Family itself.

“Put it out, put it out.”

In that truly horrific situation, even Tang Wei looked stunned and half lost his wits.

“Put out the fire! By any means, extinguish it! Hurry!”

A hoarse voice burst out.

His Sichuan Tang Family — the Sichuan Tang Family he vowed to protect with his life — was burning at that moment. And the Four Sects Alliance’s blade hadn’t even struck.

“It won’t go out! Damn it! This fire won’t die!”

“We must collapse the building immediately!”

“Are you even being sane? If you collapse the poison vault, all the toxins will be ruined! You madman!”

“Then what do you suggest? The fire won’t go out! Are you going to let it burn everything?”

Even the Tang Family Elders who had lived as martial men with dignity and clarity all their lives lost their composure in this moment. Harsh words flew.

“The fire… won’t go out?”

A dazed voice escaped Tang Wei’s mouth.

If trained martial men couldn’t put it out, that meant it wasn’t an ordinary fire.

Tang Wei knew.

Of the single substance in the world that could create such flames.

“White Furnace… Blood.”

White Furnace’s fire must not be extinguished. Even after fulfilling its purpose, at least the embers must be preserved.

The white furnace that never goes out. It was the Tang Family’s symbol and its soul.

Therefore the Tang Family’s ancestors searched the world and produced an oil that could sustain an unquenchable flame.

As long as White Furnace’s fire did not go out, the Tang Family would not vanish. Thus it was named White Furnace Blood. That oil was White Furnace’s blood, the Tang Family’s blood. The quantity was so minuscule it couldn’t even be used as a talisman; only the clan’s greatest craftsmen were permitted to handle it.

“Why…”

The furnace that had been burning the Tang Family suddenly glowed white. Seeing that sight, a desperate roar tore from Tang Wei’s throat.

“Why! Whyyyy! Whyyyyyyyyyyyy!”

Amid the roaring flames, an old man carrying a hammer walked out slowly.

The Divine Hand, Tang Jo-Pyeong.

His eyes, usually dim, gleamed coldly with an unusually clear blue light.