Chapter 306

Kwak Yeon gave a faint smile at Hu Gae’s question.

“As always, Brother, you can see right through me.”

“That isn’t because I have some special talent for reading people’s minds.”

“...?”

“It’s because your face gives away everything you’re thinking. Sister Jin, wouldn’t you agree?”

Caught off guard by Hu Gae’s sudden question, Jin Cheongha answered with a trace of embarrassment.

“...Chief Secretary Kwak does tend to be rather guileless.”

“Guileless? And only rather?”

Hu Gae narrowed his eyes at her.

“Sister Jin, aren’t you being too generous because he’s Brother Kwak? Well, I suppose that does come fairly close to saying his thoughts are written all over his face....”

When Jin Cheongha’s cheeks reddened slightly, Kwak Yeon hurriedly changed the subject.

“Brother, haven’t you found anything strange about what has happened so far?”

Hu Gae’s expression turned serious in an instant.

“You mean it’s strange that those bastards behind all this have stayed quiet?”

“That’s right.”

Kwak Yeon nodded and continued.

“I expected them to make a move once we reached Baotou City, the gateway to the Gobi Desert. When nothing happened, I assumed it was because troops were stationed there. Then I thought they would surely reveal themselves somehow once we entered the uninhabited Gobi Desert, but that expectation proved wrong as well.”

“I also found it unexpected, but I’m not sure we can call it truly strange.”

Hu Gae glanced at Jin Cheongha before continuing.

“This may be hard for Sister Jin to hear, but the people behind this may no longer consider the Eight Demonic Venerables particularly important.”

Hu Gae was softening his words rather than openly suggesting that the Eight Demonic Venerables might already be dead.

“...”

As Jin Cheongha’s expression darkened, Kwak Yeon spoke.

“Brother, considering that they are still maintaining the Wind-and-Sand Formation, I don’t think that is the case.”

“You may be right.”

Hu Gae nodded, then turned to Jin Cheongha.

“Sister Jin, I was thinking too far ahead. Don’t take it to heart.”

Jin Cheongha quietly inclined her head.

“Sub-Branch Master, I haven’t taken offense in the slightest, so please don’t concern yourself.”

Kwak Yeon quickly spoke again.

“Brother, encountering the Wind-and-Sand Formation here only made the situation seem even stranger to me.”

“What about this formation bothers you, Brother Kwak? It blocks our vision well enough to make us lose our way.”

“That is precisely what bothers me—the way it blocks our vision.”

“Hm?”

“Could there be better conditions for an ambush?”

A chill ran through Hu Gae’s chest.

With the sand-laden wind blowing relentlessly, they could barely keep their eyes open, much less see five or six steps ahead.

The grains of sand striking from every direction also rendered their hearing useless.

If enemies had been lying in ambush under such conditions, the party would have been in grave danger.

“Now that I hear you say it, this truly is strange.”

Hu Gae readily nodded.

“So how do you interpret the situation?”

He knew Kwak Yeon would not have raised the subject without already having something in mind, so he listened closely.

“The fact that they laid a supreme formation drawing upon three energies here makes it clear that they do not take the Great Demon Prison lightly. Yet they posted no ambush within it. I suspect that is because they have already prepared defenses at the Great Demon Prison itself that they consider infallible.”

“...!”

“...!”

Hu Gae’s and Jin Cheongha’s expressions stiffened at his answer.

“We will learn the truth once we find the Great Demon Prison. I only wanted to warn you beforehand because we will need to exercise even greater caution.”

Kwak Yeon rose and brushed himself off.

“The wind has nearly stopped. It is time to move.”

The sun was sinking beyond the horizon, leaving only a sliver of a bloodred tail no larger than the tip of a fingernail.

As expected, the wind subsided, and the dense cloud of yellow sand began to disperse.

The problem was that darkness immediately moved in to occupy the space it left behind.

As the darkness deepened, the surrounding rocky hills became little more than silhouettes, making them difficult to tell apart.

“Damn it. We dodged cow dung only to step in dog shit.”

When Hu Gae grumbled, Kwak Yeon replied,

“It should improve once the moon rises, Brother.”

The moon rose shortly afterward and brightened their surroundings, but every rocky hill and stone mountain looked so similar that the situation hardly improved.

“Damn it. The Grand Strategist should have drawn a more detailed map. What are we supposed to do with nothing but a vague dot?”

On the map the Grand Strategist had given them, the route from the final landmark—a dragon-headed rocky mountain—was marked by a single straight line extending roughly seventy li.

“You saw the terrain as we passed through it, Brother. There was nothing distinctive enough to use as a landmark. Considering that, the Grand Strategist must have put considerable effort into making even this much of a map.”

Hu Gae scowled at Kwak Yeon’s defense of the Grand Strategist.

“I know he had his difficulties. I’m saying that since this rocky terrain stretches so far, he should still have found something to mark. Damn it, all these stone mountains look alike, and there’s no end to them. We could search all night and still find nothing.”

Then, when the morning sun rose, the Wind-and-Sand Formation would activate again.

Hu Gae was merely the only one blunt enough to voice his frustration. Kwak Yeon [N O V E L I G H T] and Jin Cheongha were just as troubled by the situation.

Taoist Cheongmu alone remained utterly carefree, though even he soon found himself in a predicament—for an entirely different reason from the others.

“Little Martial Uncle!”

Taoist Cheongmu, who had been following quietly until then, finally called Kwak Yeon to a halt.

“What is it, Brother Cheongmu?”

“Well... I’m thirsty.”

Hu Gae, who had stopped because he thought something important had happened, could only stare at him in disbelief.

“...!”

Cheongmu had wolfed down all that jerky in one sitting. Of course he was thirsty.

“Taoist Cheongmu, if you’re thirsty, take the waterskin from your waist and drink. Surely you didn’t call your martial uncle over just to untie the stopper for you?”

Taoist Cheongmu immediately scowled.

“I’m not stupid like you, Big Beggar!”

Hu Gae silently repeated the word patience to himself and suppressed the anger bubbling inside him.

“Then hurry and take off your waterskin and drink, Taoist Cheongmu.”

“The water in it stinks!”

“...!”

Hu Gae was even more dumbfounded.

They had entered a desert with no water, so they carried their supply in leather waterskins, just like the people who lived there.

Naturally, the water would begin to smell after sitting in leather for some time.

In any case, they could not continue their search until Cheongmu’s thirst was dealt with, so Hu Gae removed his own waterskin and held it out.

“Then drink this water, Taoist Cheongmu.”

“I don’t want it. Big Beggar’s water smells even worse.”

Hu Gae’s brow slowly furrowed.

“Taoist Cheongmu, this place is called a desert. There is no water here. That means the only water we have is what we brought with us.”

Even as his patience neared its limit, Hu Gae explained as plainly as he could so that Cheongmu would understand.

“So drink from the waterskin. If you hold your nose, it should be tolerable.”

Hu Gae resolved that if Cheongmu failed to understand him one more time, he would give the Taoist a proper shouting.

“Big Beggar, why are you lying?”

Hu Gae’s eyes widened at the utterly unexpected accusation.

“What lie did I tell, Taoist Cheongmu?”

“You just said there’s no water here.”

Hu Gae’s brow drew tight. He was just about to shout, You idiot Taoist! Of course there’s no water—it’s a desert!

“But there’s water down there.”

At Cheongmu’s words, Hu Gae swallowed the shout that had risen all the way to his throat.

Ghk!

Kwak Yeon stepped past Hu Gae and questioned Cheongmu.

“Brother Cheongmu, what did you just say? There’s water?”

“Yes! Little Martial Uncle, I heard water flowing down there earlier.”

“...!”

Kwak Yeon felt as though someone had struck him over the head with a hammer.

Good heavens. How did I miss that?

The warriors guarding the Great Demon Prison would have needed drinking water. Rather than blindly climbing every stone mountain in search of the prison, they should have followed the valleys and looked for a water source.

Jin Cheongha had even mentioned an underground water vein while explaining the formation of three energies, yet he had still overlooked it.

I let the assumption that this was a desert blind me!

Kwak Yeon realized that a man trapped by preconceptions was no different from a blind man, no matter how wide his eyes were open. He looked at Hu Gae and Jin Cheongha.

“...!”

“...!”

After exchanging a knowing glance with them, he turned back to Taoist Cheongmu.

“Then let’s all go and drink some water, Brother Cheongmu.”

Cheongmu nodded, his face lighting up.

“All right.”

They followed him down the rocky mountain beneath the moonlight and found a pool brimming with water in a corner of the valley.

Someone had dug it to collect the water that trickled little by little from a crevice in the rock face.

A broad smile spread across Hu Gae’s face.

“We finally found it!”

This was unquestionably the pool the Martial Alliance warriors guarding the Great Demon Prison had used for drinking water.

That meant the Great Demon Prison was not far away.

Well, even dog shit has its uses....

Hu Gae marveled as he watched Taoist Cheongmu bury his head in the pool.

“Brother Kwak, just how keen are Taoist Cheongmu’s five senses?”

“I find myself astonished all over again.”

Kwak Yeon was genuinely amazed, though he had some idea how Cheongmu had done it.

Cheongmu held no preconceptions about deserts, so upon seeing a valley, he must have simply assumed there would be water there.

His thirst was also severe, which would have focused his five senses even more keenly.

With not a single distracting thought in his mind, he had been able to concentrate with absolute purity—and that had produced such an astonishing result.

A passage from the Honwonmusang Technique suddenly came to Kwak Yeon.

All life arises from being; being arises from nonbeing.

All things are born from being, and being is born from nonbeing.

It was a line from the Tao Te Ching and the martial principle that ran through the entire Honwonmusang Technique.

Ah! Nonbeing does not mean that something does not exist in the world. It means that it does not exist within my own awareness.

After gaining this unexpected insight and quenching his thirst with fresh water, Kwak Yeon followed the narrow trail through the valley with the others.

The path was barely wide enough for a single person and had collapsed or broken away in several places, but it nevertheless led them to their destination.

The moment they discovered a loess basin surrounded on every side by massive stone mountains, all three of them except Taoist Cheongmu knew that they had finally reached the Great Demon Prison.

White skeletons lay scattered around the ruins of buildings clinging to the foot of a stone mountain.

The bones glowed a faint blue beneath the moonlight, and rotted scraps of cloth and rusted pieces of metal lay all around them.

They were undoubtedly Martial Alliance warriors who had died while serving as guards in this distant foreign land.

The sight of them abandoned without anyone to recover their remains filled Kwak Yeon with anguish.

He silently recited a prayer for the dead, asking that their souls be allowed to pass on to the underworld.

I will do everything in my power to redress the wrong done to you. Please release your resentment toward this world and rest in peace.

Hu Gae watched Kwak Yeon’s silent tribute with a solemn expression, then raised his head and looked up at the stone mountain behind the ruins.

Thanks to the moonlight, he could make out the faint outline of a stairway.

The bottomless abyss of the Great Demon Prison had to be at the summit of that mountain.