Chapter 112

“You… survived… didn’t you…”

Jin Ja-gang woke up with a start.

Suddenly he realized he had been unconscious.

Had there ever been a time since leaving the mine shaft when he had completely lost consciousness like this?

He couldn’t even tell when he had lost consciousness.

He hurriedly checked his body first.

Everything was pitch black in front of him.

He struggled to open his eyes with effort.

Thud, thud-thud.

His eyelids made noisy sounds as they fell.

Something was weighing down his eyelids.

He tried to raise his hand to brush it off. However, as he lifted his hand, his body trembled as if struck by lightning.

‘Kugh!’

Pain struck him like an awl piercing his shoulder.

He remembered his shoulder blade being completely pierced through.

Not just his shoulder, but his entire body ached as if his bones had been crushed with a hammer. There wasn’t a single spot that didn’t throb with pain.

Even with each breath, it felt like bone fragments were rolling around inside his lungs.

“Huff, huff.”

Jin Ja-gang gasped for breath while twisting his body to the side.

Enduring the pain, he propped himself up on his arm and forcibly tried to sit up.

Crash!

His arms and waist had no strength, so he collapsed while trying to sit up. His ribs felt like they were breaking and hurt terribly. Jin Ja-gang had to grit his teeth to avoid screaming.

Since both arms wouldn’t move as he wanted, Jin Ja-gang pressed the area around his eyes against the floor and rubbed vigorously. He forcibly knocked off what was stuck to his eyes. It seemed to be some kind of ointment.

His surroundings came into view hazily.

Inside a room.

On a bed in a small room.

What was going on?

While Jin Ja-gang was bewildered, he sensed someone’s presence outside the door.

Jin Ja-gang hurriedly looked around.

A weapon! He needed something to use as a weapon!

In one corner there was a side table and he could see a water bottle. He could break it and use the fragments as weapons.

But Jin Ja-gang couldn’t even crawl, let alone walk.

He had used up all his strength in the previous battle. His whole body had been beaten, scratched and cut by blades. His shoulder and hip bones had holes in them, and he had been doused with massive amounts of poison. It would be stranger if he could move normally.

His limbs were shaking. His body wouldn’t obey him as if he were completely exhausted.

Jin Ja-gang used all his strength to roll his body.

Thud.

He fell from the bed and continued rolling.

Roll roll roll.

He rolled across the floor and bumped into the side table. The water bottle on the side table fell and broke.

Crash!

At the sound of the water bottle breaking, the person outside the door hurriedly tried to enter.

Jin Ja-gang bit a sharp pottery shard with his mouth. He used all his strength to draw out poison. Due to using too much poison at Poison Valley, there was almost no poison left in his dantian.

All the ginkgo poison had been used up, and only two skeins of Four Emperor Divine Water remained. But even that was bound tightly like it was tied up and wouldn’t come out. He barely managed to draw out one gwangcheung and gathered it at his fingertips, stabbing the pottery shard to coat it with poison.

Then he rolled to the door with the pottery shard in his mouth.

The door opened.

Bang!

Jin Ja-gang tried to stab the foot of whoever entered with the pottery shard in his mouth.

Foreman Jang shouted.

“Hey!”

Jin Ja-gang was also surprised. He never imagined Foreman Jang would enter.

Jin Ja-gang was barely able to turn his head at the last moment and spit the pottery shard to the side.

Jang thought Jin Ja-gang was struggling in surprise and tried to calm him down.

“You fool! It’s me, me, the foreman. It’s okay, so calm down. This is our house.”

Jang put down the tray he was carrying and tried to help Jin Ja-gang up. Jin Ja-gang unconsciously flinched.

Because he had been in the middle of fierce battle where blood splattered, flesh melted, and bones shattered just moments before, Jin Ja-gang hadn’t adjusted yet.

“Why… are you… here…”

He wanted to ask why Jang was here, but the words wouldn’t come out properly. Because he had held acid in his mouth, his mouth and lips were a mess and he couldn’t pronounce properly.

“Oh my, you fool. Why did you come all the way out here instead of lying still?”

Jang soaked a white cloth in the water bowl on the tray and wiped away the blood while comforting him.

Only then did Jin Ja-gang realize that his body was naked but mostly wrapped in bandages.

“Poison… Valley is…”

A trace of fear appeared in Jang’s eyes. Jang swallowed dry saliva and spoke in a low voice.

“When I went there, there wasn’t a single living person. I found you collapsed in the main hall and quickly brought you back.”

When Jin Ja-gang was very late returning despite the time having passed, Jang became worried and came looking for him all the way to Poison Valley. That’s when he discovered Jin Ja-gang.

“That place… was really terrible… But it’s okay now.”

But Jang also seemed quite shocked, as his voice trembled.

“Just forget everything. Forget what you saw and heard. I don’t know what happened or why you were there, but just forget it. You have to answer that way even if anyone asks. That’s the only way you can survive.”

“Mr… Jang…”

“Rest for now. Don’t keep moving around. *Cough cough*.”

Jang had a dry cough, then lifted Jin Ja-gang and put him on the bed.

“I’ll clean up the room later, so get some good sleep. When you wake up, I’ll bring you some porridge.”

Even after Jang left, Jin Ja-gang needed considerable time to regain his sense of reality.

What had happened at Poison Valley?

Where did the remaining people go?

What about Hundred Fragrances Wei Zong?

Had Poison Valley and the righteous faction people perhaps mutually destroyed each other?

If he could move his body even a little, Jin Ja-gang wanted to go and check for himself. But now he had no choice but to wait.

He couldn’t send Jang to investigate Poison Valley’s situation. Right now he had to focus on recovering his strength as much as possible.

‘Let me rest when I can rest.’

Jin Ja-gang closed his eyes while taking long deep breaths to avoid stimulating his lungs that hurt with stabbing pain every time he breathed.

He closed his eyes and regulated his mind and body with Hundred Flower Valley’s breathing technique.

But.

“You… survived… didn’t you…”

The phantom-like sound remaining in his ears came to mind again.

He couldn’t tell when he had heard that sound. It might really be a hallucination, but it was too vivid and kept circling in his ears.

Each time it gave him chills.

A memory that seemed familiar somewhere, remaining in his mind.

But the ‘memory’ Jin Ja-gang was thinking of couldn’t be right.

If it were, Jin Ja-gang wouldn’t still be alive.

An unpleasant feeling he never wanted to recall crept up, making Jin Ja-gang frown.

* * *

“Cough, cough.”

Jin Ja-gang, who had briefly fallen asleep, woke up to the sound of coughing.

“Cough cough!”

The coughing continued from outside the room.

Though his whole body felt like it would break, Jin Ja-gang tried to get up. After resting a bit, he could at least move somewhat.

Jin Ja-gang held onto the wall and walked to the door with shaky steps. When he opened the door, he could see Jang in the yard trying to chop firewood.

At the sound of the door opening, Jang stopped coughing and turned around.

“You’re awake? Wait just a moment. To cook rice I need to make a fire… cough cough!”

Somehow the coughing didn’t sound normal.

“Ah, did I catch a cold? I keep coughing. When I was young, I lived without even knowing what a cold was, but *ahem*! What…”

He also had severe phlegm. Jang cleared his throat and spat out phlegm, then picked up the axe again.

Jin Ja-gang held onto the door frame and observed Jang carefully.

Somehow his face looked haggard and the area around his eyes was bluish. His pupils also had a yellowish tinge without any luster.

Jin Ja-gang’s heart sank.

It was the typical complexion of someone poisoned.

Jin Ja-gang had been unconscious after being doused with Hundred Fragrances Wei Zong’s poison all over his body.

Who had brought such a person back?

Who had brought him back, washed him, applied medicine, and wrapped him in bandages?

It was Jang.

Jin Ja-gang had been in a state where tremendous poison was applied all over his body to the extent that even he couldn’t regain consciousness…

Moreover, when the poison sect people fought with the righteous faction, they would have used considerable poison. Poison Valley must have been filled with poisonous energy.

Even if it had been washed away somewhat by the rain, Jang was an ordinary person with no martial arts at all. On top of that, he was in a considerably weakened state due to diarrhea.

Being exposed to poisonous energy in a weakened state, he could have suffered severe damage.

“Hmm… I feel strangely weak today. Is it because I had so much diarrhea… cough.”

Blood showed in Jang’s mouth as he coughed again.

“Really… I feel dizzy…”

Jang smiled awkwardly while looking at Jin Ja-gang, then collapsed just like that.

Thud.

Jin Ja-gang was momentarily seized by very brief terror.

He thought of Yong Myeong, the deputy sect leader of Medicine King Sect.

Yong Myeong had also been poisoned while caring for Jin Ja-gang just like Jang now, and eventually died in front of Jin Ja-gang.

Though it had been eight years, Jin Ja-gang vividly remembered that scene.

Was he going to experience the same thing again? This fear consumed Jin Ja-gang.

Jin Ja-gang’s chest ached.

His heart hurt. No, it seemed like he was preparing in advance for his heart to hurt.

Jin Ja-gang shook his head vigorously.

Back then he was young and had less ability than now.

Now…

Now it was different.

No, it had to be different.

* * *

Looking around the house, Jang was alone in the house.

Jang had been doing carpentry work while handling martial world affairs for a long time.

The moment he saw the scene of the disaster that occurred at Poison Valley, he realized that a tremendous incident had occurred.

What place was Poison Valley?

Wasn’t it a sect that dominated Yunnan’s martial world!

Moreover, it was when people from Yunnan’s poison sects had participated in large numbers in the assembly hosted by Poison Valley. But even they had become cold corpses.

On top of that, martial artists from other forces besides poison sect people had died miserably…

It was no ordinary incident.

A truly major incident.

He could tell that before long, a tremendous typhoon would sweep through this place.

Whether this was a conflict between forces or a scene of murder and extermination didn’t matter. There was no need to know. If even a spark flew, the lives of common people would die like mayflies.

So as soon as Jang returned home carrying Jin Ja-gang on his back, he hurriedly sent Rangrang and his wife to take refuge at relatives’ houses.

Because Jin Ja-gang was in such a critical condition that he couldn’t bear to abandon him. Someone had to stay and care for Jin Ja-gang.

Then he collapsed while caring for Jin Ja-gang.

As the price for bringing back Jin Ja-gang, who had been severely poisoned at Poison Valley’s massacre scene filled with poisonous energy.

“Mr. Jang really…”

If he hadn’t bothered to come looking for him, if he hadn’t brought him back even after finding him, if he had fled with his family instead… he would be living well and healthy…

That’s why Jin Ja-gang had to save Jang even more.

Jin Ja-gang brought Jang into the room with great difficulty.

“Huff huff…”

Not even a full day had passed, so his body couldn’t have recovered. He was already on the verge of exhaustion.

Still, Jin Ja-gang had to move. It hurt every time he moved, but pain wouldn’t kill him.