Chapter 1423: Is This The Sichuan Tang Family? (3)

This included Tang Wei and the other Tang Family members; they all had no choice but to immediately understand.

Why this unquenchable blaze had flared up, and who had done such a thing.

Countless suspicions bloomed in everyone’s eyes and then quickly turned to resentment.

“Why…”

Tang Wei’s trembling voice pierced through the crackling sound of the flames consuming the wood.

“Why did you do this? Elder Divine Hand… Why?”

If someone else within the Tang Family had done this, no one would have questioned the reason.

They would first have shattered his whole body with lethal poisoning and only then begun.

But that could not be done now. The one standing before them was none other than Tang Jo-Pyeong.

Though age had eroded him and his consciousness was often clouded, he was still the greatest elder of the Tang Family and the head of its core workshop.

There was no one within the Tang Family who could raise their voice against him.

Not even Tang Wei, the former council head and great elder, was an exception.

“Why? Why!”

As Tang Wei asked desperately, Tang Jo-Pyeong slowly turned to look at him.

Tang Wei’s eyes, full of bitter poison-like grief, met Tang Jo-Pyeong’s cold, indifferent gaze.

Tang Jo-Pyeong opened his mouth.

“…I merely burned it.”

Grit.

Tang Wei bit his lips until they bled.

“Who is asking that out of ignorance after seeing it now!? Don’t you know what you burned, Elder!? Why on earth did you set fire to the Poison Workshop and the Furnace! To the place that was practically the entire Tang Family! Even using the White Furnace blood!”

“…”

“Why! Why! Why did you do this! No matter how cloudy your mind may be, aren’t you Elder Divine Hand!? Why!”

His voice seemed soaked in blood. Resentment and pain came through plainly. The Tang Family that had been his everything was burning. It felt as if red tears of blood would spill from his eyes at any moment.

But Tang Jo-Pyeong’s gaze remained cold and detached; it was impossible to guess what he was thinking.

“Elder Divine Hand, what on earth…”

Other elders tried to speak in Tang Wei’s stead, but Tang Jo-Pyeong’s calm voice flowed out as if to silence them.

“There is nothing here.”

“…What?”

“Not anymore. Nothing worth protecting or preserving remains.”

“…”

“So go. All that remains are halls rotting and decaying.”

The elders turned their heads and stared, stunned, at the raging flames.

Tang Jo-Pyeong was not wrong.

What they had tried to protect here was the facility—the source—that produced the toxic substances and hidden weapons the Tang Family boasted about across the land.

But if that place was all going to become ash, there was no reason to cling to it any longer.

The very reason to risk their lives fighting the Four Sects Alliance had vanished.

“What, what are you all doing?”

Tang Wei shouted in a fit.

“Put it out! Put that fire out right now!”

“G-great Elder.”

“What are you standing there watching for!? If you can’t put out the fire, at least get the items inside out! Now! Move!”

Tang Wei raged desperately, but no one moved.

Surely even a blaze kindled with White Furnace blood was not impossible to extinguish. If it were possible, White Furnace blood itself would have made the hidden weapon world sing of its name.

But even if extinguishing it were possible, it was extremely difficult. To suppress flames of that scale would take ages, even if everyone present threw themselves at it.

And by then nothing would remain. And even if they salvaged unlit furnaces and toxins, that alone would never be enough to rebuild the Tang Family.

Tang Wei knew this too. But he simply could not give up.

As the elders remained still, Tang Wei, who had bitten his lip, cried out.

“Move! I’ll do it myself…”

But then Tang Jo-Pyeong spoke.

“Is that something you are meant to do?”

Tang Wei flinched and glared at Tang Jo-Pyeong, trembling.

“…You are sane, then.”

He had wondered if Tang Jo-Pyeong had lost his mind and done this, but his consciousness seemed clear.

“…So, are you relieved now?”

A scathing cry that seemed to tear his soul burst from Tang Wei’s mouth.

“Are you satisfied now that you’ve reduced everything the ancestors guarded for centuries to ashes? Are you glad you’ve made the name Sichuan Tang Family vanish from the world? Are you pleased to have handed those who have lost honor and skill a mere chance to cling to life?”

“Tang…”

“Inside there!”

Tang Wei’s hand violently pointed at the workshop; his thin fingertip trembled.

“Everything Elder Divine Hand dedicated his life to is right there! Are you happy after turning it all to ash!? Both Elder Divine Hand and I have lived our lives and could die, but because of your unilateral decision, the remaining children of the Tang Family will live persecuted for the rest of their days!”

Living in the martial world meant carrying countless grudges on your back. Because the Tang Family was strong, those who had been holding back would surely reveal themselves the moment it weakened.

Now Tang Jo-Pyeong had pushed his family’s descendants into that cycle of resentment.

“How can you be so indifferent!? How can you be so cruel!? Is this really for the Tang Family? If you were truly a great elder of the Tang Family, you should have done whatever it took to protect it! How do you not understand that!?”

Everyone’s faces darkened at Tang Wei’s vitriol.

Though his words were uncontrolled and crude, the meaning behind them resonated with everyone.

“Why did you do something like this…”

“This place is…”

“…What?”

Tang Jo-Pyeong slowly looked around.

He saw the Tang Family he had lived in his whole life: every small hall, every floor he stood upon—there was nothing untouched by his hand.

The Tang Family was his everything. Tang Jo-Pyeong was no different from Tang Wei in that regard. But…

“Is this the Sichuan Tang Family?”

Tang Wei bit his lip. What nonsense was this all of a sudden? Had he lost his mind now?

“Answer me.”

“Elder!”

“Am I not asking whether this is the Sichuan Tang Family!?”

At that moment a rough shout burst from Tang Jo-Pyeong.

Tang Wei flinched at the incomprehensibly fierce authority; poison flickered in Tang Jo-Pyeong’s eyes.

“You idiots! At best, they are just daggers and lumps of poison! At best a weapon that looks like it was forged from a lump of iron!”

“…Elder?”

“Is that truly the Tang Family? Is that really the Sichuan Tang Family? Answer me!”

“…”

“If there is no poison, it cannot be the Tang Family! If there are no hidden weapons, it cannot be the Tang Family! You idiots who don’t know what comes first and what comes after!”

At that moment Tang Jo-Pyeong roughly threw the hammer he had been holding.

Thud!

The small hammer that had been embedded in the floor bounced up and then fell back down.

As the noise subsided, the Tang Family was instantly swallowed by silence.

How much had that meekly tossed small hammer created? It was Tang Jo-Pyeong’s pride and the Tang Family’s pride.

And yet Tang Jo-Pyeong had just thrown away such a hammer.

“Risk your life to protect a lump of iron like that?”

“Elder!”

“If only people remain!”

Rage rose in Tang Jo-Pyeong. The frail old man’s body looked like a small furnace spitting forth red flames.

“If people remain, things like this can be remade endlessly! If only people remain!”

“…”

“Even if we never enjoy the same glory again, what difference does that make!? If keeping the Tang Family as the Tang Family requires throwing away all those lives, then such a Tang Family had better vanish!”

“You…!”

Tang Wei convulsed. The force of it was so violent that a startled Tang Byeok unconsciously grabbed Tang Wei’s arm. Tang Wei looked ready to lunge at Tang Jo-Pyeong at any moment.

Tang Jo-Pyeong, quietly watching Tang Wei, slowly looked around and spoke.

“Go.”

“…”

“There is nothing left for you to protect. If there is anything to guard now, it is only one thing: your lives.”

“…Elder Divine Hand.”

“So go. Time is urgent. Leave before the enemy arrives.”

His words finished, Tang Jo-Pyeong turned his body. Tang Wei’s desperate cry poured out toward his back.

“Do you think you could die and face our ancestors after this? What will they say to you!? You will remain as a sinner in the Tang Family’s history never seen before! No, all who carry Tang blood will spit on your grave and curse you! Elder Divine Hand! No, Tang Jo-Pyeong!”

Tang Jo-Pyeong simply walked in silence toward the burning workshop.

‘Everyone will spit and curse me…’

A faint smile, tinged with red, brushed his lips.

‘Then that would be a relief.’

At least it meant there would still be descendants of the Tang Family left to curse him. That was enough. After all, what he had sought to protect were the descendants—so in that sense he had succeeded.

“Elder…”

At that moment the craftsmen from the workshop who had been watching from afar approached him. Unlike before, there was distance and hesitation in their eyes. Tang Jo-Pyeong glanced at them and said indifferently.

“You should leave too.”

“…”

“And you, Elder…?”

He gazed quietly at the burning workshop. The workshop turning to ashes by the fire he had set.

“I will remain here.”

At his words, the craftsmen opened their mouths to speak but then shook their heads.

The route fleeing from the Four Sects Alliance [N O V E L I G H T] would be extremely arduous. Tang Jo-Pyeong no longer had the strength to take that path.

“…Be safe.”

The craftsmen bowed deeply to Tang Jo-Pyeong.

They could not all agree with what he had done, but they nonetheless paid their respects sincerely. It was their final tribute to the craftsmen who had protected the Tang Family.

Tang Jo-Pyeong, having received their respects, walked without answering toward a corner of the burning workshop. The workshop burned more fiercely.

The place where he had lived for over a hundred years. The place where he had breathed and guarded.

‘Dark Saint, grandfather.’

A mist of tears filled his eyes—pride at having honored his grandfather’s wish and the pain of having burned everything he had with his own hands.

‘Is this enough now?’

Perhaps, as Tang Wei had said, Tang Jo-Pyeong had severed the Tang Family’s soul. Perhaps they would henceforth live forever as the Tang Family in name yet not in essence, suffering always.

Was it still right? Was there truly no other way? Was this the best?

He did not know. He probably would not know until the moment he died.

But one thing he could be certain of.

‘Grandfather.’

His grandfather’s image rose clearly—the touch of Tang Bo’s hand gently smiling and stroking his young head. That hand had been warm and comforting.

If Tang Bo were here now, he would surely have patted his head once more.

-Well done.

A single tear ran down Tang Jo-Pyeong’s wrinkled eyes.

The old man, now white-haired, smiled brightly like the child he had once been.