Chapter 20

Gwak-o flinched.

“That’s a lie. You didn’t go there. You don’t seem to trust me, but please believe me. This time, it’s really true. If you go there… no, let’s go together. Let’s go together and rescue the people of Hundred Flower Valley.”

Though Gwak-o pleaded earnestly, Jin Ja-gang cut him off.

“I told you I already went. There was a person with red hands there.”

“T-that, that’s…”

“I killed that person.”

In that moment, Gwak-o froze.

“That’s a lie… H-how could you have killed Bloody Hand…”

Gwak-o’s words, which suggested he knew Bloody Hand was waiting there, were themselves an admission that it had been a trap.

Gwak-o remained silent for a while.

He no longer begged or trembled with his voice. Like someone who had given up, Gwak-o sighed and spoke.

“The Extreme Poison Sect didn’t just attack us. Even if it hadn’t been me, our valley would have been destroyed anyway…”

“I don’t care about that. Where are our people? Are they alive or dead?”

Jin Ja-gang’s voice was naturally filled with killing intent.

“Answer me!”

At Jin Ja-gang’s low, sharp rebuke, Gwak-o flinched.

“I don’t know.”

“What?”

“The children are used as slaves, and the adults were tortured.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know the details. I think they were trying to learn the secret techniques of our Hundred Flower Valley.”

After pausing briefly, Gwak-o continued.

“Then I heard they were taken elsewhere not long ago.”

“So they’re still alive?”

“I don’t know. I just heard they were taken to some underground place. Saying they would never come out again…”

When Jin Ja-gang stopped asking questions, the conversation ceased.

After a long silence, Gwak-o cautiously asked.

“Are you… going to kill me?”

“…”

“You are going to kill me.”

Even in the darkness, Gwak-o’s trembling breath could be felt.

Gwak-o sat blankly for a long time as if in despair, then suddenly stood up.

“Alright. Wait a moment.”

Suddenly, Gwak-o rustled around. After fumbling about the room, he found the chamber pot and began digging beneath it.

He pulled something out from under it and tossed it toward where he thought Jin Ja-gang was.

Jin Ja-gang picked it up.

It was a thin book.

Brushing off the dirt, he looked at the cover.

In the faint moonlight, Jin Ja-gang could read the characters on the cover.

Hundred Flower Secret Scripture.

The only martial arts manual of Hundred Flower Valley, said to be passed down to only a select few heirs through generations.

He had forgotten, but Gwak-o was one of those few heirs.

And that heir had betrayed Hundred Flower Valley…

Jin Ja-gang felt a surge of anger rise again. Suppressing and holding back his rage, he forced himself to ask:

“Why this?”

“Take it. I’ve been hiding it all this time, enduring all sorts of hardships from those people. While others had everything taken from them, I didn’t let them take this.”

Gwak-o smiled bitterly.

“Anyway, it’s too complex and difficult, so I couldn’t learn it properly. Still, it’s the only thing I can give you now. You… you’ll be able to master the Hundred Flower Secret Scripture.”

Jin Ja-gang silently caressed the book.

The Hundred Flower Secret Scripture, containing everything about Hundred Flower Valley… he could almost feel the resentment embedded in it.

As Jin Ja-gang turned the pages of the book one by one, Gwak-o spoke again.

“Early tomorrow morning, people from the Medicine Gate will be transported from the Extreme Poison Sect to somewhere else. There are carts with those captives a little south of here. If you’re lucky, you might be able to escape from here by hiding among them. I don’t know what will happen after that, but…”

Jin Ja-gang spoke heavily.

“Why are you telling me this?”

Gwak-o sighed deeply.

“Do you know how much I’ve suffered all this time, even though I couldn’t tell you? Thinking about how the people of Hundred Flower Valley ended up like that because of one mistake of mine… I haven’t been able to sleep properly every night.”

Gwak-o was sobbing.

“It would be too shameless to ask you to forgive my past mistakes. I know that. But after I die, you’ll be the only heir of Hundred Flower Valley. You must survive and continue our tradition.”

Jin Ja-gang looked at Gwak-o indifferently.

Gwak-o spoke through tears.

“Now, kill me. If you have any old affection for me, please… sob… make it as painless as possible. Please. You’ll grant me at least that, won’t you?”

After remaining still for a moment, Jin Ja-gang said:

“No, I won’t kill you now.”

“…What?”

Jin Ja-gang slowly walked around the room. As if examining the interior, he touched various things.

Clink, clink.

He picked up and put down the few broken dishes.

As he did so, he said:

“It’s pathetic.”

“Hmm?”

“Live like that in this miserable, horrible house, suffering for the rest of your life. That’s the punishment most fitting for you.”

“Ja-gang…”

Jin Ja-gang didn’t respond further.

Thud, thud.

Limping with heavy steps, he simply left the house.

Creak, bang.

The door closed.

“Sob, sob! Sob!”

Gwak-o, who remained, lay face down and wept bitterly for a long time.

Then, after quite some time had passed, he finally raised his head.

“Ja-gang?”

“…”

“Ja-gang? Are you still here?”

“…”

Gwak-o fumbled around the room searching for Jin Ja-gang. Though his eyes still hurt and his stomach was in agony, he groaned as he searched every corner of the small room.

When it seemed no one was there, he finally stopped crying, but suddenly began to breathe heavily.

“This insolent brat, how dare he talk to me about being pathetic? Who does he think he is? How dare he speak to me like that!”

Gwak-o found the water jar, washed his face in that state, and then drank from it.

Suddenly, a sulfur smell tickled his nose, but since he smelled sulfur every day at the Mixed Spring Ground, he didn’t pay much attention to it.

“Gulp, gulp! Ah, I feel a bit better. No, it still hurts… now both my eyes hurt. Why does it hurt so much? My mouth feels so dry too…”

Clutching the jar and groaning, Gwak-o gritted his teeth again.

“Just you wait. Do you think I’ll let this slide? I’ll run straight to Elder Mang and report you. He’s been searching for you so desperately. The moment you’re caught, you’ll be skinned alive.”

Amidst his pain, Gwak-o twisted his face and laughed wickedly.

“By now, you’re probably heading to the cart where the Medicine King Sect people are held, right? Yes, you must be. If you’re found hiding there, I’ll ask Elder Mang to let me leave this place as a reward for helping him find you. I should ask for a house with lavish feasts and beautiful women. Hee hee.”

Gwak-o staggered toward the door.

“Ah, but it hurts so much. It seems to hurt more than before. Should I rest a bit before going? No, the sooner I go, the sooner he’ll make my pain go away. Ugh, ugh.”

Gwak-o even dry-heaved as he struggled to open the closed door.

But he immediately had to stop like a stone.

Though he couldn’t see well, he could make out the shadow of someone standing outside the door.

“Heeeek!”

Gwak-o was so startled that he fell backward onto his buttocks. He rubbed his eyes—which had changed from tears to pus—trying desperately to see clearly. But that only made his vision more blurry.

“J-Ja-gang?”

Though he didn’t expect an answer, the blurry shadow outside responded immediately, to his dismay.

“Yes.”

It was indeed Jin Ja-gang’s voice.

“W-why are you st-still th-there?”

Jin Ja-gang asked in return with a voice that seemed devoid of emotion, yet contained such intense resentment that it felt as if it were being suppressed:

“Don’t you know?”

Gwak-o trembled as he answered.

“N-no, I don’t?”

“If you’re not dead yet, I’m here to kill you.”

Jin Ja-gang was holding a broken piece of a dish that had been on the shelf in the room.

But Gwak-o couldn’t see that.

He simply didn’t understand what Jin Ja-gang meant.

‘He said earlier that he wouldn’t kill me, didn’t he?’

It was confusing.

‘Wait, why would he think I should be dead by now?’

Jin Ja-gang said:

“Your throat is burning and feels numb, and your stomach feels like it’s being poked with knives, doesn’t it? Your insides must feel bloated. Your eyes must feel like they’re on fire too.”

“H-how do you know that?”

“I did it.”

“W-what?”

“Soon your mouth will fill with bloody foam.”

Just as he said, Gwak-o felt something bubbling up in his throat with the smell of blood.

“Gak!”

Gwak-o fell backward, clutching his throat. But that didn’t stop the bloody foam.

“S-save me.”

Looking at Gwak-o, Jin Ja-gang said:

“About the Hundred Flower Secret Scripture you gave me.”

Gwak-o flinched. That was because it wasn’t the real one.

And soon, Jin Ja-gang’s next words made Gwak-o’s blood run cold.

“Where’s the real one?”

The situation flashed through Gwak-o’s mind.

Mang-ryo had given that book to Gwak-o, saying:

“Here, it’s a handwritten copy. Of course, it’s safer if I keep the original, isn’t it? But since you’re the only heir of Hundred Flower Valley in name, I thought you should have the Hundred Flower Secret Scripture, so I copied it myself for you.”

As soon as Hundred Flower Valley was annihilated and Gwak-o ended up in this state, Mang-ryo had taken the Hundred Flower Secret Scripture from him almost by force.

And in return, he had received a handwritten copy.

But how did Jin Ja-gang know that in this dark night when he could barely see?

“How did you…?”

“You never read it, did you?”

Gwak-o hesitated, then nodded. The truth was that after knowing it was a copy, he didn’t even want to read it. Moreover, in his current state, he had no motivation for anything, let alone secret manuals. He hadn’t even felt the need to read it and had just kept it buried.

Jin Ja-gang answered Gwak-o’s unspoken question:

“There’s nothing written inside.”

Gwak-o stiffened as if struck by lightning.

‘So it just has the title written on it?’

Anger welled up. Bloody foam pushed up from his mouth more violently.

“Grrk! Grrk! D-damn you, Elder M-Mang! You did this to me! Gak, gak!”

Trembling, Gwak-o reached out his hand toward Jin Ja-gang.

“Save me. Save me. I don’t want to die like this.”

Jin Ja-gang didn’t take Gwak-o’s hand.

A month ago, when Jin Ja-gang had reached out his hand just as desperately toward Gwak-o, Gwak-o had pushed him off the cliff.

The painful overlap of those images made Jin Ja-gang clench his teeth.

Gwak-o, seemingly knowing he was about to die, spoke with a vicious expression:

“I just made a mistake, grrk. But you’re killing a person for one mistake? You’re worse than me. You’re worse than me, I tell you! Grrk!”

After thrashing about wildly, Gwak-o’s limbs trembled like he was having a seizure, and then he breathed his last.

Jin Ja-gang’s heart grew very heavy.

Originally, he hadn’t wanted to witness Gwak-o’s death, which is why he had extracted realgar poison and put two drops in the water jar.

But in the end, Gwak-o died right in front of Jin Ja-gang.

Without ever admitting he had done wrong.

Jin Ja-gang silently looked at Gwak-o, then muttered to himself:

“You called it a mistake, but it wasn’t a mistake. You simply betrayed us. You sold out our sect, your brothers and sisters, and got them killed.”

Creak.

Leaving the memories of the past in that dirty, cramped house,

Jin Ja-gang closed the door.