Chapter 91: Same Bed, Different Dreams (3)

KRRRK.

The muscles of the arm drawing the bowstring swelled taut.

THRUM.

Thick veins bulged on the forearm choking the old man’s neck.

It was a razor-edged standoff. With Baek Gungcheon’s skill, he could target any exposed part of Yeon Hojeong’s body behind the old man.

The problem was that Yeon Hojeong wasn’t an ordinary expert either. If he even glanced the shot, the old man’s neck would snap that instant.

“......”

A heavy silence settled.

Baek Gungcheon, who had been glaring at Yeon Hojeong with a keen gaze, slowly lowered the bow.

Yeon Hojeong smiled.

“Wise choice.”

“Release the hostage.”

“So he does have value as a hostage. Then I absolutely must not let him go.”

Baek Gungcheon’s face twisted.

Yeon Hojeong spoke.

“What’s your name?”

“I’ve no name to tell the likes of you.”

“I figured. Then I’ll ask just one.”

“......”

“Are you with Muk Bi and the same gate?”

Baek Gungcheon still didn’t answer.

He had no intention of answering at all, it seemed. Yeon Hojeong tightened his arm.

THRUM.

“Grrrk.”

The old man’s face turned blue.

Baek Gungcheon’s eyes quivered.

“Who is Muk Bi?”

“You don’t know Muk Bi?”

“I don’t.”

“Your archery, your body method, even the way you drop your pre-aim stance by between half a chih and one chih before a precision shot.”

“......!”

“On top of that, you used Dragon Tooth Cannon. And you don’t know Muk Bi?”

Dismay draped over Baek Gungcheon’s face.

“You know Dragon Tooth Cannon—what are you?!”

For a moment, Yeon Hojeong was at a loss for words.

‘An interesting one.’

The destructive archery shown yesterday was truly tremendous. Archery at that level, combined with a waste-less body method, was enough to be called a peerless master under heaven.

But he was excessively straightforward. Born taciturn, yes, but his honest temperament showed on his face as it was.

“I’m the one asking questions. I’ll ask one last time. You truly don’t know Muk Bi?”

“......I don’t. There’s no such ghost archer by that name.”

He had let the words ghost archer slip without realizing it. But he didn’t even register that himself.

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes deepened.

‘An alias?’

That was possible. In truth, not many martial artists moved under their real names on the rivers and lakes.

“What is a ‘ghost archer’?”

Baek Gungcheon shut his mouth. Only then did he realize his mistake.

Yeon Hojeong continued.

“You killed men of the Beggars’ Union. The situation is already big enough. If you’re not thinking of making the board even bigger, you’d better answer meekly.”

“......Let the man go.”

“If I were going to let him go, I wouldn’t have taken him.”

“Have you no pride? With that skill, taking a powerless old man as a hostage—have the shame to know disgrace.”

“Save provocations that won’t sprout. This isn’t a contest match but a fight.”

Yeon Hojeong glanced at the old man.

“And a powerless old man?”

“......?”

“You’ve sealed away a decent inner force. The skin may sag, but the muscles are fairly firm. To maintain a body and inner force like this, you need quite a bit of training.”

“What...?”

“Seems you didn’t even check properly.”

Tuk.

Yeon Hojeong pressed the old man’s paralysis point. The old man’s body went stiff, numbed.

“Even pressing his paralysis point, the rebound force is considerable. If I weren’t using true energy above two tenths, it wouldn’t have # Nоvеlight # pressed at all.”

Baek Gungcheon’s eyes wavered.

He had seen the process of pressing the point with his own eyes. The opponent’s fingers had clearly hesitated. He had felt a strong resistance from the point.

To unconsciously generate that much resistance required first-class inner strength.

‘That much inner force? How?’

Baek Gungcheon looked into the old man Go Pyeong’s eyes.

Go Pyeong’s gaze shook as if an earthquake had struck. It seemed his mute point had been pressed when the paralysis point was pressed; his mouth couldn’t even open.

“......Old Go?”

The Go Pyeong he knew was an ordinary man who hadn’t learned even a fingernail’s worth of inner force. A famed physician unknown to the world who had devoted his life to medicine.

“Heart-Settling Red as well.”

Baek Gungcheon looked back at Yeon Hojeong.

He had pressed the hostage’s paralysis point and sealed even the mute point. Even so, there was no opening. His forearm was around Go Pyeong’s neck; with the slightest strength, the carotid would be compressed.

“Since when did Heart-Settling Red become a poison that sucks a person’s vitality? Even among the gu-poison line, such a toxin is extremely rare.”

“......Are you saying it isn’t?”

“Of course.”

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes, glancing down at Go Pyeong, were terribly cold.

“Heart-Settling Red is a kind of sedimenting poison. It clings to internal organs and induces degeneration. Among them it acts especially strongly on the heart; that’s because it’s a property that appears after a poison derived from a mineral has been once improved.”

“......!”

“But it doesn’t work on those whose bodies are robust and whose inner-force dispatch is somewhat free. Before it can sediment in the organs, true energy expels the poison. In short, to a master who has cultivated inner force above a certain level, it hardly works—a middle-low grade toxin.”

Heart-Settling Red was a poison used only by the few even in the back alleys of the underworld.

In other words, even if one tried to find out, it wasn’t easy to uncover. Moreover, there weren’t many who tried to look into it.

Because there were countless poisons stronger than Heart-Settling Red. It might work on third-rate thugs or the forces of some commonplace underworld sect, but it didn’t work on masters.

Yeon Hojeong had even once had a whole ladle of Heart-Settling Red dumped over him.

He was fine regardless. The instant he inhaled it, Hong Heavenly Qi expelled the poisonous energy. What’s more, because of Vermilion Bird Qi, it couldn’t even touch the heart side and was extinguished.

And a master on Baek Gungcheon’s level was poisoned by such a middle-low-grade toxin? Nonsense.

“In short, I don’t know whether this fellow is a physician or not, but he isn’t the weakling you think he is, and you are not poisoned by Heart-Settling Red.”

Baek Gungcheon’s expression contorted.

He asked Go Pyeong,

“Is the young man telling the truth?”

His mute point was pressed; he couldn’t speak.

Baek Gungcheon said to Yeon Hojeong,

“Unseal Old Go’s mute point.”

“No.”

“What?”

Yeon Hojeong poured out cold words.

“I stripped away your delusion and told you the truth. But I’m not someone who bestows unearned favor on the unrelated.”

“......?!”

“What’s a ghost archer? Start by explaining that.”

Szszsz.

Killing intent rose off Baek Gungcheon’s body.

It wasn’t mere killing intent. An honest urgency was mixed into it. He begrudged even moments.

“This isn’t the time for word games! Release him, now!”

“You’re in no position to command me. If you don’t want to lose more time, answer my question.”

“Tch!”

“Immediately.”

He told him to hurry, yet there was no sign of urgency on Yeon Hojeong’s face.

His cold expression and insistence on an answer pressed the opponent hard. Even in a similar situation, what Baek Gungcheon showed was entirely different.

In the end, Baek Gungcheon opened his mouth.

“A ‘ghost archer’ refers to a new Yi God candidate of Sun-Piercing Valley.”

“Sun-Piercing Valley? What is that? A group that retains archers like you?”

Sun-Piercing Valley was a name that must not become known to the world.

But Baek Gungcheon’s heart was urgent. If Go Pyeong truly wasn’t the physician he knew, he had to find another physician as quickly as possible.

“Yes.”

“A sect I’ve never heard of.”

“Sun-Piercing Valley isn’t some sect of the rivers and lakes. It serves the Sun God, and at the same time exists to kill him, a God-Slaying Cult.”

God-Slaying Cult—literally, a religion that kills a god.

Yeon Hojeong knit his brows.

‘God-Slaying Cult...?’

He recalled Muk Bi’s words from the past.

‘Their god is base. That’s why I hate the Cult of Lewdness.’

It was one of the rare moments when Muk Bi, who neither spoke much nor showed emotion well, had displayed anger.

“So it isn’t a martial sect of the rivers and lakes, and yet it seems to teach tremendous archery.”

“Of course. The only way to kill the Sun God is archery. Just as the mythic Hou Yi shot down nine suns with his bow, we too are those who seek to reach the heavens with archery.”

Yeon Hojeong shook his head.

‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’

Muk Bi had never once spoken about this. In any case, they, too, seemed to be a kind of religious group.

‘Hm?’

At a sudden thought, Yeon Hojeong asked again,

“Your numbers are few, aren’t they?”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m talking about the archers of the group you belong to—Sun-Piercing Valley. And what is an ‘Yi God’?”

The urgency draped over Baek Gungcheon’s face grew thicker and thicker.

“Haven’t I told you enough! Release him right now...!”

THRUM.

Go Pyeong’s face flushed a deep red.

Baek Gungcheon ground his teeth.

“......To become an Yi God of Sun-Piercing Valley, the ghost archers must compete against one another.”

“Compete?”

“I mean a slaughter match of kill-or-be-killed.”

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes flashed.

“The one who survives becomes that ‘Yi God’ or whatever it is?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t tell me you’re in the middle of that competition even now?”

“That’s right! So release him at once!”

A slaughter match to become Yi God.

‘Then Muk Bi...?’

Was he the one who survived?

But then why didn’t he return and become that Yi God or whatever it was? Was there some reason?

“I’ll ask the last question.”

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes sank flat.

Even in his urgency, Baek Gungcheon realized it. That this question now was the most important to that bastard.

“His current age is roughly... mid-twenties, I’d say. A tall man just under six chi, and like you, he mainly uses a horn bow, not a great war bow. His main martial art is......”

“Baek Hyang?!”

Yeon Hojeong’s eyes widened.

“You mean Baek Hyang?”

After a moment where he couldn’t continue, Baek Gungcheon stammered,

“You, you know Hyang?”

The tone was familiar. As if calling a brother, a cousin, a close friend.

“Not to the point of knowing... well, from what I’m hearing, it sounds like him.”

“If you mean that age and height, it’s Hyang and only Hyang. Among the ghost archers who entered this competition, the only one in his mid-twenties is Hyang. And Hyang uses a horn bow.”

“......Good. Then where is Baek Hyang?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“I don’t know the exact location. But the odds are high he’s near Eight Dukes Mountain. Since the competition began, the guy hasn’t moved even once.”

Staring silently at Baek Gungcheon, Yeon Hojeong let go of Go Pyeong.

Baek Gungcheon’s eyes flashed.

THOONG!

“Guh-huk!”

Go Pyeong expelled a rough breath. A keen finger-wind split the air and unsealed his mute point.

It was a high-level attainment in inner force. He wasn’t simply good at shooting arrows; his knowledge and training across the martial arts were at top-tier peerless level.

Baek Gungcheon lifted Go Pyeong. It was nearly akin to grabbing him by the collar.

“Is what the young man said true?”

“Khuk! Wh-why are you like this! Don’t tell me you think I deceived you!”

“......Enough, nothing else is needed. I’ll ask you only this.”

Baek Gungcheon’s eyes spewed fire.

An inexpressible emotion overwhelmed the one he faced. Go Pyeong’s face grew as stiff as it could be.

“You can fix Garyeong’s body, can’t you?”

“......”

“Why can’t you speak! I asked if you can cure Seven Yin Severed Meridians!”

Then Yeon Hojeong said,

“Seven Yin Severed Meridians?”

Baek Gungcheon looked at Yeon Hojeong.

Yeon Hojeong cocked his head.

“Seven Yin Severed Meridians? Not Nine Yin Severed Meridians?”

“......What?”

“Where does ‘Seven Yin Severed Meridians’ come from? Wasn’t it Nine Yin Severed Meridians—where excessive yin energy accumulates, the Eight Extraordinary Meridians all freeze, and later even life is cut off?”

“......?!”

“Only seven of the Eight Extraordinary Meridians freeze, picked out? Is there such a delicate illness?”

Baek Gungcheon glared at Go Pyeong.

Yeon Hojeong scowled.

“Isn’t he a pure con man?”