Chapter 238

The Martial Alliance established a committee to uncover the mastermind behind the assassination attempt.

They quickly agreed to form a Special Investigative Corps and staffed it with figures from the most influential orthodox sects.

Before long, the investigative corps advanced the case to a considerable degree.

They pursued and killed one of the men in black who carried out the ambush, and in the process secured critical evidence.

The first to rise to the top of the suspect list was the Sichuan Tang family.

The Tang family immediately dispatched a high-ranking representative to the Martial Alliance and issued a formal clarification.

The throwing weapons and poisons used in the ambush are indeed of Tang make. However, those were stolen after Poison Dragon and the man named Mang Ryo murdered a Tang artisan. After that, Poison Dragon fled to the Qingcheng sect, while Mang Ryo is confirmed to have headed to the Martial Alliance.

Poison Dragon was someone Mang Ryo introduced under the pretext of seeking a peaceful resolution to the Medicine Sect’s pill affair, and has no connection to our house. On the contrary, he bewitched our direct descendant Ha-ran, stole our treasure Soul Seizing Thread, and committed the atrocity of slaughtering all the prisoners in the underground prison. Accordingly, Poison Dragon is an enemy of our house.

Once word spread that Poison Dragon was a descendant of the Medicine Sect, people finally made sense of the Medicine Sect extermination in Yunnan years ago. From there, the claim that this incident was engineered to frame the Tang family became persuasive.

As a result, suspicion also fell on Mang Ryo’s movements afterwards.

Mang Ryo went to see the Martial Alliance Leader right after meeting Baek Li-jung. He received a letter of introduction there, which enabled him to obtain an audience with the Alliance Leader.

Naturally, Baek Li-jung ought to have fallen under suspicion. But Baek Li-jung was in closed-door seclusion. By sheer luck, he thereby managed to dodge the glances of suspicion.

Lastly, the Qingcheng sect where Poison Dragon fled.

Recently, Evil Sect figures had been gathering in unusual numbers at Qingcheng.

There were even rumors that Qingcheng was sheltering not only Poison Dragon but also the Shandong Enchantress.

There was no reason not to be suspicious.

The Martial Alliance committee officially demanded an explanation from Qingcheng, summoned its sect leader, and ordered the Shandong Enchantress to be handed over under escort.

Since the Enchantress was already the Alliance’s top-priority execution target, Qingcheng found it difficult to refuse.

* * *

“The calm lasted too long.”

Venerable Woo-am spoke.

Taoist Bok-cheon beside him had a face flushed with agitation.

“Sect Leader senior brother, does that mean…?”

“The jianghu settled into a prolonged state of stability. The Martial Alliance’s overwhelming might cowed everyone into keeping their heads down. They already knew. If they raised their heads at the wrong time, the sword would fall.”

Venerable Woo-am paused, then let out a hearty laugh.

“Judging by the strange rumors rolling through the martial world… it looks like the ones who raised their heads were us, Qingcheng. We just did not notice.”

“What did Qingcheng do wrong? They scorned us for years for not joining the Alliance, and now they order even the sect leader around as they please? What do they take Qingcheng for? I swear I will…!”

“Whatever the reason, any reason suits them. How would we know when they hold the reasons in their hands?”

“Sect Leader. So are you going to go?”

“Do not press me so hard. I am thinking in my own way.”

Venerable Woo-am scratched his chin with his fingers.

“Perhaps… if we rounded up the Enchantress Ryeong-ryeong along with all the Evil Sect friends loitering in our mountain and handed them all over, they might let us live.”

“Of course you will not do that! Could you even do such a thing?”

“Come now, you know my temper.”

Venerable Woo-am smiled.

“Of course I cannot.”

Taoist Bok-cheon looked up at the sky and exhaled loudly.

“Whew. That is exactly the problem. That is the problem.”

“It seems no better idea is coming to me.”

Venerable Woo-am turned around and bowed at the waist.

“So please, if any of you have a good plan, I humbly ask you to share it.”

Behind Venerable Woo-am, more than several hundred Qingcheng Taoists had gathered. At the front sat a dozen or so elders, the youngest around eighty and some well past a hundred.

The elders sat however they pleased, some sprawled, some lying down, and some even wore expressions of boredom. It was the very opposite of the tense faces of the younger Taoists.

One elder spoke.

“Just do it. Do what they say and be done with it. What is the problem? You dragged us all the way out here for such a trifle?”

An elder beside him clicked his tongue.

“I too came out of my cave for the first time in twenty years. You are not special. Anyway, the trouble is the seeds he sowed in his youth far and wide. That is the trouble, they say.”

Qingcheng Mountain’s peaks contain countless grottoes. Many Taoists, once old, withdraw to caves to cultivate, writing scriptures or making internal elixirs. Some never emerge again until death.

The longer those years of retreat, the closer Taoists draw to Wu Wei and Naturalness. All actions and thoughts return to nature’s original character.

Which is to say, each one’s intrinsic individuality emerges in its most extreme form. Hence the common saying that Qingcheng Taoists are eccentric and do as they please.

“Just take responsibility. If he has a son, bring him and make him a Taoist. I will take him as my disciple.”

“That is not it. We mean he sowed the seeds of affection.”

“Then did he spill his essence prematurely?”

“No, that is not it.”

“Madman. Even if one practices the art of returning essence to nourish the brain for life, one cannot know if one will ascend as an immortal. Why go sprinkling it everywhere.”

The elder who had been denying himself found it strange too, and looked at Venerable Woo-am to ask.

“Is that how it is?”

Venerable Woo-am answered politely.

“No, it is not.”

Taoist Bok-cheon raised his voice, explaining with urgency.

“That is not it. We are keeping a woman of the Evil Sect due to unavoidable circumstances, and they are threatening us to hand her over to the Martial Alliance under escort. Else they will deem us complicit in the attempt on Taoist Haewol’s life.”

The elders were not particularly surprised.

“So Haewol is still alive. Even an Alliance Leader can be assassinated. Why get worked up over that.”

Most elders had long become indifferent to life and death, taking it lightly.

Taoist Bok-cheon raised his voice.

“You venerable uncles and grandmasters may have long turned your backs on the mundane world, but we have not.”

The elders grew angry.

“Look at that temper. Shouting at us like we know nothing of the world. We may not know the ways of the world, but we know well how the thirty-two heavens above rotate beneath Heaven’s Bell.”

“When he was a child and wet his bedding after waking, who changed it for him, eh? Wicked brat.”

One after another the elders scolded Taoist Bok-cheon in archaic turns of phrase not easy to understand.

Taoist Bok-cheon closed his eyes and could only endure the scolding.

“Sirs, honored forebears.”

Venerable Woo-am soothed the elders gently.

“That woman is not someone I can simply hand over or not hand over. She is someone I admired greatly in my youth.”

The elder who had mentioned the essence-guarding method wagged his finger and clicked his tongue.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Of all ties, a tie with a woman is the hardest to cut. You have not matured at all.”

“Haha, forgive me. How can I help it when my heart is moved without my knowing.”

“You lack cultivation.”

“Even with a hundred tongues I would have nothing to say. But since matters have come to this, what should we do?”

Taoist Bok-cheon, unable to bear it, cut in.

“Are you telling us to surrender to the Martial Alliance and kneel to protect Qingcheng? I absolutely object.”

Another elder muttered, disgruntled.

“The sect leader is useless because he is infatuated with a woman. What a state to be in.”

“Then shall we go and kneel before Taoist Haewol?”

“No need to kneel. If picking the sect leader was a mistake, that is our fault in the end. We must solve it.”

“Then what do you advise?”

Until then, the oldest of the elders had kept silent. Now he spoke.

The most senior elder spoke in a low voice.

“A Shura Path will unfold.”

At his words, everyone closed their mouths and a hush fell.

They understood that since the Martial Alliance had risen up, this would not pass quietly. To expand its power, it would shed blood, and to do that, it would seek a sacrificial victim to devour. To say that would lead to a Shura field was not something to be taken lightly.

“Can Qingcheng survive?”

“In a Shura field, it is not people who survive. Only Shura survive.”

The eldest elder suddenly picked up brush and paper.

Then he wrote four characters and tossed the paper.

Each Survive On One’s Own

Taoist Bok-cheon caught the paper bearing the characters and handed it to Venerable Woo-am.

“It says ‘Gak-ja-do-saeng’… Each Survive On One’s Own.”

“What does it mean?”

The eldest elder, back bent, sat and spoke.

“I saw signs of a bloody fate in the jianghu. When I cast lots in search of a character, I drew this.”

“‘Each survive on one’s own’…”

Which is to say, each must seek a way to live.

Venerable Woo-am pondered briefly and asked again.

“If we cling to a great raft, can we avoid the blood-fate?”

“Dolthead! If you do that, everyone on the raft will die.”

Though scolded, Venerable Woo-am showed neither anger nor offense.

“Then if we avoid the raft and just hold out, will that suffice?”

“Dolthead! More foolish still! When the levees burst and the Yellow River floods in a deluge, can you survive by refusing the raft and holding out on the shore?”

“Ah.”

Venerable Woo-am understood.

“That is why it is ‘each survive on one’s own.’”

Only then did the eldest elder smile on his wrinkled face.

“Now you understand.”

Taoist Bok-cheon frowned and asked.

“I still do not understand.”

The elders raised a clamor and scolded him.

“Explaining to you is like playing a zither to a cow!”

Playing a zither to a cow means doing a useless thing, teaching the uncomprehending.

“Even if we go door to door explaining until every household knows, there are always fools who still do not understand.”

Taoist Bok-cheon’s face flushed red and then pale.

He was about to protest when Venerable Woo-am spoke first.

“Please teach us a way for Qingcheng to live.”

The eldest elder spoke again.

“If you ask whether there is meaning in Qingcheng surviving, I will first ask you. Is there meaning in preserving the Taoist temples, scriptures, and scenery of Qingcheng Mountain that will remain one hundred and one thousand years hence, or is there meaning in preserving the disciples who will die and rot in less than one hundred years?”

Venerable Woo-am thought a moment, then said.

“I want to protect Qingcheng’s spirit, which forever changes yet never wears away.”

“Weeds, though trampled and uprooted, always sprout back. Even if they grow too tall and topple, or wither for want of growth, they sprout anew. The source of that tenacious life lies in the roots.”

The eldest elder once more lifted brush and paper.

“This is how Qingcheng’s spirit can be preserved.”

He wrote again, and tossed another sheet.

Venerable Woo-am, going by the sound, caught the paper. He then asked Taoist Bok-cheon.

“What is written?”

For a long moment, Taoist Bok-cheon could not speak.

After some time, he answered.

“Sal-sin-ip-jeol… Kill the self and establish integrity.”

Kill the self to establish integrity.

To sacrifice one’s body in order to set up unwavering virtue.

That is, to preserve Qingcheng’s spirit, someone must be prepared to offer up their own body and life so that the integrity and principles of Qingcheng may stand unshaken through the coming Shura storm.