Chapter 349

Before going down to the village, Woon-jeong did laundry in the river and hung his clothes on rocks.

Jin Ja-gang likewise washed his blood-stained clothes and hung them on nearby rocks.

Both came out to sit by the riverside, taking the opportunity to wash and dry themselves.

Woon-jeong glanced at Jin Ja-gang’s body sitting beside him and couldn’t hide his amazement.

Despite having fought countless fierce battles, Jin Ja-gang’s skin was incredibly smooth. From behind, he was so white and beautiful that one could believe he was a woman.

Woon-jeong sighed and said to Jin Ja-gang.

“I feel like I’ve had a really strange experience.”

Jin Ja-gang looked at Woon-jeong with peculiar eyes.

“…”

But fortunately, Woon-jeong’s words weren’t the strange story Jin Ja-gang had imagined.

“I thought Miss An Ryeong was a good person. I can’t forget her serious expression when she talked about heroism.”

“That’s what you meant?”

“Huh? Then what did you think I was talking about?”

“Nothing.”

Jin Ja-gang thought for a moment before answering.

“Sometimes there are those who commit evil acts yet believe what they’re doing is righteous. At least Miss An Ryeong was acting tough outwardly while feeling ashamed inside, so she’s better than them.”

“Then is Miss An Ryeong’s An family medical house on the side of bad people?”

Even Jin Ja-gang couldn’t readily answer that question. But he could share his thoughts if not the answer.

“When I was young, I heard many stories about the martial world. I thought the martial world had good and evil, and was accordingly divided into orthodox and unorthodox sects. But that wasn’t it.”

“When did you feel that?”

“When I saw with my own eyes that the one called the greatest hero of the martial world was scheming behind the scenes.”

Woon-jeong had heard this from Jin Ja-gang in passing before. So he nodded in understanding.

“But he was merely a villain. What I truly felt fear about was when I met the young lady from Zhuge family.”

“Zhuge family… that would be Brave Phoenix.”

“That young lady had already defined me as an enemy before we even met and came looking for me. Therefore, she didn’t hesitate to act recklessly in front of me. She didn’t even mind taking hostages.”

“That’s going too far. That can’t be called orthodox sect methods.”

“And she said that to prove my innocence, I had to go before the great hero and make my case.”

“Ugh, that great hero is the one you just mentioned and the mediator Baek Li-jung that Miss An Ryeong talked about earlier.”

“Correct. He’s clearly evil. But Miss Zhuge was unknowingly participating in evil acts as evil desired. At the time, Miss Zhuge seemed to firmly believe it was justice.”

“Ah. Oh dear…”

“But later I learned from a vassal warrior that she wasn’t actually believing it was justice, but had reasons why she had to believe it was justice even if it wasn’t.”

“What?”

“It was to succeed in the marriage proposal with the Baek Li family.”

“Ah… That’s sad.”

Woon-jeong scratched his head and pouted his lips.

“Whether she believed it was justice or wanted to believe it… either way is frightening. It means becoming devoted as if what you believe must be justice.”

“I think so too.”

Jin Ja-gang looked at the torn cloth piece Bang Muk had given him, repeating the characters ‘Shaanxi’ that An Ryeong had told him. There could be no other meaning.

Shaanxi was a regional designation referring to Shaanxi Province.

Woon-jeong looked at the cloth piece and used his brain to make his own deduction.

“Putting the stories together, it seemed like Physician Bell Healers and Miss An Ryeong knew what Poison Dragon was looking for. Poison Dragon was trying to confirm whether poison sects were collecting herbs related to epidemics, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Did An family medical house know why poison sects were doing such things? If they knew, they wouldn’t have said they didn’t know when or how it would start.”

Jin Ja-gang recalled when he had met King of Hell Tang Qing.

“I saw King of Hell directly. He wasn’t someone who would handle affairs so carelessly. I think An family medical house wouldn’t know the details either, but even if they did, they wouldn’t have told me. Because I didn’t accept their proposal.”

“Then the reason the deceased Bang Muk gave us this torn cloth…”

Woon-jeong thought with a serious expression.

“…”

“…”

“…”

After thinking motionlessly for a while, Woon-jeong suddenly said awkwardly.

“I’m not stupid, you know? But this… I can’t figure it out even after thinking. Hehe.”

Jin Ja-gang soaked the cloth piece in water to remove the blood and spread it on the ground, saying.

“It’s probably a merchant group’s flag.”

The cloth piece was shaped like a triangle torn in half. After removing the blood, small patterns embroidered with various colorful threads could be seen around the cloth edges. The cloth’s material itself looked good quality.

“You’re right… After removing the blood, it does look that way. Poison Dragon has never been to Shaanxi, so how do you know all these things?”

“I’ve seen such flags planted in merchant company or trading group caravan processions several times.”

“That’s so like Poison Dragon. You always observe your surroundings so meticulously.”

“It would have been good if we could have searched and investigated all of Grand Harmony Courtyard’s warehouses, but circumstances weren’t favorable this time.”

Woon-jeong, who had been admiring Jin Ja-gang, asked.

“Then… what will you do now? Will you go toward Shaanxi?”

Jin Ja-gang thought briefly before answering.

“Even if Shaanxi-area merchant groups are connected to poison sects, I can’t confirm to what extent they’re involved. If they only provided supplies, it would be futile effort.”

In just one month, the summer Tang Ha-ran had mentioned would arrive.

Seeing that there was still no news from Dan Ryeong-gyeong in Shandong, there must be no particular gains on that side either.

But it was also difficult to inform Yangtze River Sword Gate. Yangtze River Sword Sect might also be corrupted, and information could leak to poison sects.

Jin Ja-gang pondered all the clues so far.

‘How can I find out?’

Before long, seeing the clothes had dried, Woon-jeong picked up his Taoist robe and shook it out.

“They’re all dry. I roughly removed the blood stains too, so now let’s go to the village to eat something and rest.”

To obtain information, they had no choice but to move anyway.

“Let’s do that.”

* * *

“Hehehe!”

King of Hell Tang Qing laughed uproariously at the urgent news that had arrived.

When Tang Gui-ok went to the room Tang Qing had summoned her to, he was still laughing, with tears streaming from his small eyes.

Seeing Tang Gui-ok enter, Tang Qing threw the letter and laughed while holding his stomach.

“Hehe! Hehehehe! That guy’s really a talent, a talent. Every time he moves, he causes incidents that shake the martial world!”

Tang Gui-ok was startled seeing the first part of the letter, but soon calmly finished reading it and smiled warmly.

“Amazing. Our nephew-in-law.”

“Right? Right! I’m not laughing for nothing, am I? How can this happen every time he goes somewhere?”

The first line of the urgent letter was news that Shaolin Temple’s Breaking Sect had finally begun to act.

Tang Gui-ok also understood the significance of Breaking Sect leaving Shaolin Temple. That’s why she was surprised.

But the next news was even more surprising.

It was understandable that Breaking Sect’s warrior monks had swept away Grand Harmony Courtyard, Physician Bell Healers’ stronghold, but afterward all nine warrior monks had become corpses.

“Who did this? Surely our nephew-in-law didn’t eliminate them all?”

“There were collaborators, but they erased all traces. We have an idea who, but no evidence. It’ll be revealed soon but will take some time. Poison Dragon probably knows.”

Tang Qing continued.

“Actually, this move had very significant meaning for Shaolin Temple. It was the first step in proclaiming that Shaolin Temple had embarked on merciless righteous law practice toward the martial world, announcing to the world that Breaking Sect had emerged.”

“Especially attacking Physician Bell Healers, one of our Six Poison Cliques.”

“It was a symbolic warning that no one could escape righteous law practice. But the ones who came out died from the very start, so how embarrassing it must have been.”

Tang Gui-ok listened to the excited Tang Qing’s story and said.

“Brother likes that child too much, it’s problematic. I understand brother feels good because of our nephew-in-law, but Shaolin Temple won’t back down this much.”

“That’s right. Thinking of when they stepped forward to protect righteous law in the past, they ignored all side branches and stupidly smashed only the main body before passing through. No matter how much damage they suffered, no matter how the world evaluated and cursed them, they didn’t care at all. They would just silently do their job from start to finish once they began. That’s the frightening thing about Breaking Sect.”

“Moreover, brother, since Physician Bell Healers was hit, it’s not particularly good for us either, is it?”

“I know. That’s why I’m going to be in a very bad mood from now on. Though I planned to eliminate them later, it wasn’t time for them to disappear yet. Though they were hard to trust, with that position empty, one stronghold in Henan has disappeared. We need to create a new bypass stronghold.”

King of Hell Tang Qing frowned and remained motionless, leaning on the table for quite a while.

Lady Tang Gui-ok quietly drank tea while waiting for Tang Qing’s anger to subside.

Tang Qing stayed like that for nearly four-hours. Then suddenly Tang Qing picked up chess pieces placed beside the table.

“The current situation in the martial world is like this.”

Tang Qing grabbed a handful of thick wooden chess pieces and placed them on the table, saying.

“This is our Tang family.”

He grabbed another handful of chess pieces and stacked them carefully on top.

“And this is Indestructible Heavenly Sword’s Righteous Alliance and his followers.”

Tang Qing continued stacking chess pieces.

“This is Yangtze River Sword Sect, and this is Shandong Unorthodox Sects and other neutral factions. Roughly, the current situation is divided like this. But…”

Tang Qing picked up the container that had held the chess pieces.

“Shaolin Temple has entered the war.”

Tang Qing threw the container at the stacked chess pieces.

Crash.

The stacked chess pieces collapsed.

“In short, it’s become chaos. Now the era of Nine Provinces and Six Heavens is over. And whether it’s Baek Li-jung or Yangtze River Sword Sect, if they can’t surpass Shaolin Temple, they’ll all become dogs chasing chickens. No, they’d be fortunate if they don’t get completely destroyed.”

Tang Gui-ok, who had been watching quietly, said.

“But aren’t we already prepared to surpass Shaolin Temple?”

“Not yet. Shaolin Temple’s intervention was too fast. Starting from Henan, they’ll soon strike at the surrounding areas of Shanxi, Shaanxi, Huguang, and Anhui. Once rear safety is secured, they won’t care about trivial matters and will advance. The martial world will be devastated in an instant. No matter what we do, we’re one step behind.”

“We need time.”

Tang Qing shook his head vigorously.

“I’ve been watching the heavenly signs for several days recently. One month until the first raindrop falls, then half a month of rain period. We need to buy at least a month and a half more time.”

Tang Qing fell into deep contemplation again.

“But what method could stop those ignorant monks…”