Chapter 17
Run away, Young Lord
Dangon felt like he could understand Woon-hwi, yet at the same time, it was difficult to do so.
‘Is he really unaffected? It’s basically the same as being judged.’
Tang Gyujin was too kind of a person.
On the other hand, Tang Yuchang was too obsessed with ambition and had strong pride.
That’s why Tang Gyujin couldn’t bear the pressure of being “evaluated,” while Tang Yuchang always found it unpleasant.
No, it wasn’t just unpleasant.
He even flew into rages.
As a member of the Nine Dragons branch family, it was only natural, he thought, that everyone should follow him.
Even when Dangon did not support him, instead of trying to persuade, he would react with displeasure—and that was exactly why.
He wasn’t trying to prove himself through his own skill, but rather to validate himself through his innate status, and that was what made Dangon angry with him.
But Woon-hwi showed the complete opposite.
He accepted evaluation as a matter of course.
No, to be precise, he acted as if he didn’t care at all.
Look even now.
Even at the news that Dangtae and Dangjin had simply left, he wasn’t bothered in the slightest.
At first, Dangon thought maybe he was just acting unfazed out of pride, but since he had been watching him closely all along, he knew. It absolutely wasn’t that.
It was confidence—the belief that they wouldn’t be able to help but follow him.
The self-assurance that no matter what happened, he would inevitably score full marks.
‘…Perhaps the one who was truly conducting the evaluation here wasn’t us, but Young Lord Woon-hwi.’
Unhui said that even while he was busy dueling consecutively with the Tang Yuchang–Tang Gyujin siblings, he still kept an eye on them.
He probably couldn’t hear the words they exchanged amidst that storm-like roar, but he might have watched every expression and movement.
If he had formed his evaluation of Dangtae and Dangjin from that…
And if from there he gained the conviction that they would inevitably have no choice but to follow him, then this attitude was easily understood.
And then.
As far as Dangon knew, this was not something just anyone could possess.
It was a quality that only rulers who had once placed others beneath their feet and moved them like limbs could have.
Tang Hosan.
And the Dark Sovereign.
Why was it that the faces of those two came to mind?
* * *
“Arghhh! Aaaah!”
“Y-Young Lord! Please, calm down—”
“Get lost! All of you, get the hell out!!”
“Kyaaah!”
The Red Pavilion had become a scene of utter chaos.
After losing the duel with Woon-hwi, Tang Yuchang screamed like a madman, venting his rage on everything around him.
Furniture and belongings shattered, while maids and servants scattered in terror.
“Woon-hwi! Woon-hwiiii!! I’ll kill you, I swear I’ll kill you!!”
Tang Yuchang still couldn’t forget the look in Tang Hosan’s eyes as he watched him from the martial arena.
Emotionless.
It was the kind of gaze one might give to a stone lying on the roadside.
Tang Yuchang knew very well what that gaze meant.
No—it was the same look his father always gave the concubine’s son.
This couldn’t go on.
One day, he was destined to surpass the Nine Dragons branch family and become the head of the Sichuan Tang family.
So he could not remain as someone who had been defeated by such a lowborn wretch.
“…Sorcery! Yes, it must have been sorcery! Otherwise, there’s no way that bastard son could have beaten me! Otherwise it makes no sense!!”
Tang Yuchang bit his nails until they bled, then soon his face brightened as if he had uncovered a great secret.
“The ones backing that bastard son must have cast some vile sorcery on him. That’s the only reason he could have fought even my sister like that. To dare deceive so many family retainers right before their eyes! As expected, filth will always remain filth!”
Tang Yuchang racked his brain for a long time, thinking of how he could strip away the wicked mask Woon-hwi was wearing and regain his father’s attention.
But time was far too short.
The Dark Sovereign’s visit was less than a month away.
“I must send word to Mother.”
Namgung Sanyeong was currently away from the manor on some matter.
He had wanted to avoid troubling his mother with worries, but now he had no room to care about such things.
He quickly shook the bell to summon a maid.
* * *
At that very moment.
「Where on earth is this?」
The giant spider clung tightly to Namgung Sanyeong’s carriage as it ran nonstop for two whole days, finally entering a forest on the outskirts of Guryong County.
「Damn, we can’t go too far…!」
A wraith bound by a soul-locking chain could never stray too far from its master.
Otherwise, the soul-binding ring would snap, and it would vanish.
Just when the giant spider was fretting over whether it should turn back, the carriage finally stopped.
A shabby shrine deep within the forest.
It was a wonder it hadn’t already collapsed.
But Namgung Sanyeong stepped down from the carriage, straightening her clothes as if this place were all too familiar.
“Wait here.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
When the bodyguards she had brought from the Namgung clan were stationed outside, the front gate of the shrine creaked open.
“The Divine Master is waiting inside.”
“How curious. I didn’t even send word this time.”
“The Divine Master is one who, while ever in his place, can see a thousand li away and glimpse a thousand days into the future. He already knew that Lady Namgung would soon seek him out, and so he sent me to receive you.”
“Hohohoho. Well, it’s because he is so gifted that I keep seeking him out.”
The one who opened the door was a servant boy, his face pale as death.
On his forehead, a red character glowed ominously.
‘A jiangshi! And not just any, but a living one!’
The giant spider was greatly shocked at the sight.
Living Jiangshi were those rare among the undead who retained their memories from life and the ability to distinguish right from wrong.
That was how extremely difficult they were to create—so much so that even most Daoist adepts avoided refining them.
And yet, this place was using a living jiangshi merely as a servant?
‘Just what kind of place is this?’
A heavy stench of danger filled the air.
The giant spider hesitated again.
Even just bringing back what it had seen so far would surely please the Young Lord.
But that would be the end of it. With only this, he would never break the soul-locking chain.
‘If I can at least find out who the people here really are…!’
So the giant spider resolved to take the risk.
Even extracting just a bit more information would be worth a very large stake.
Besides, in life, he had once been an elder of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.
Though his current state was wretched, this was no danger worth fearing.
Sha-sha-shak!
The giant spider kept just enough distance to avoid brushing against the senses of the living jiangshi, trailing quietly behind the two.
The place Namgung Sanyeong arrived at was the innermost hall of the shrine.
Jingle, jingle—
There, a middle-aged man with hollowed eyes and hair left hanging in a wild mess was shaking bells furiously.
“Grant me blessings, grant me blessings. Bestow upon me greater divine insight. Grant me brighter divine vision. Grant me blessings—”
“I pay my respects to Divine Master Jong.”
As Namgung Sanyeong bowed politely, the rattling bells suddenly came to a sharp stop.
“So, you’ve come again because something has gone awry!”
“Otherwise, why would I have come to see Divine Master Jong?”
“You’re far too greedy! The gods always watch over their devoted people, but those who only come suddenly when they need something, demanding blessings here and fortune there, are despised!”
“But then, what would the gods think of a devotee who pays offerings so great that ordinary folk could never even dream of affording them, each and every time?”
“Why, they would find her adorable! Uhehehe! Uhehehe!”
Namgung Sanyeong nodded as if satisfied, then jerked her chin toward the servant who had accompanied her.
Thud!
The servant dropped the heavily laden pack he had been carrying on his back onto the floor. Dust rose into the air with a loud sound.
“Now then, let’s see just how adorable the gods will find this, shall we?”
The man called Divine Master twisted his head in a grotesque way as he shuffled toward the pack.
The way he moved looked grotesque, like a puppet with broken joints.
The servant, face full of fear, quickly stepped back from the pack.
But Namgung Sanyeong’s expression remained perfectly calm.
‘Could he be of the Mosan Sect lineage? No… it feels darker, more sinister… perhaps some offshoot branch from there?’
The giant spider racked its brain, calling upon every bit of knowledge it had to try to identify the Divine Master’s true nature.
The skill to create living jiangshi, the arrangement of the formations placed all throughout the shrine—
A practitioner of this level would surely have a reputation known even throughout the martial world.
And yet, nothing came to mind.
Something tickled at the back of his head, as though he were on the verge of remembering, but the thought refused to surface.
“Oh gods, are you pleased? You are? Uhehehe! I’m pleased as well. It seems the gods are quite satisfied too.”
The Divine Master opened the lid of the chest placed on the pack and grinned broadly.
It was filled with silver ingots.
But—
Bang!
Namgung Sanyeong strode over and closed the lid with one hand.
“Then you had better do your work properly.”
“Even in the mortal world, when a contract is made, one or two parts of the payment are given in advance before starting.”
“If you succeed, I’ll add another chest like this one for you.”
“Uhehehehe! Well now, that makes things quite different.”
The Divine Master cackled madly for a long while, then suddenly stopped cold.
In that instant, a chilling light flickered at the corner of his eyes.
The limbs that had been moving erratically suddenly snapped back into place, stiff and orderly, and his back straightened, exuding an imposing presence.
All at once, it was as if he had become another person entirely, radiating overwhelming authority.
“What would you have me do?”
Namgung Sanyeong’s eyes gleamed.
Whenever the Divine Master showed this side of himself, it always meant that what she desired would come to pass.
“Do you remember the wish I asked of you not long ago?”
“Your so—”
“He is not my son.”
“Then let us call him your concubine’s son. In any case, the wish to cast brainwashing upon him is already underway, is it not?”
It was about the Young Lord.
The giant spider crept closer, trying to catch more of the conversation.
“You do realize that trick isn’t working properly, don’t you? I want you to strengthen it further.”
“Hm, so brainwashing alone is not enough?”
“That much won’t satisfy me.”
“Tell me more specifically.”
“Is a living jiangshi… possible?”
Namgung Sanyeong’s eyes gleamed with a chilling light.
Ever since her quarrel with Tang Gyujin, her thinking had completely changed.
‘I can’t just use him before the Dark Sovereign and then discard him! If Hua really tells that bastard son the truth… then I must make sure he can never escape from my grasp.’
What’s more, on the way here, she had also received fresh word from Tang Yuchang.
—That bastard son and the forces behind him used vile tricks to shake my position, to the point that even my own sister…
If that were true, there was no way she could let it stand.
“So you mean to exploit him for the rest of his life.”
Kkeol-kkeol-kkeol! The Divine Master burst into loud laughter.
‘These lunatics…?’
The giant spider spat curses under its breath and slowly began to back away.
That Divine Master’s true identity was still unknown, but it was certain he was someone of high rank.
Which meant that Woon-hwi, who had yet to recover his strength from his past life, might not be able to handle him.
If so, the danger had to be reported.
Based on what he had seen here, the Young Lord would surely be able to uncover the man’s real identity at once.
And then it would be much easier to prepare a countermeasure. After all, in this very field, there was no one more knowledgeable than him.
But—
Krurrr—
The giant spider’s spine tingled, and it had to stop in its tracks.
A beast’s cry flowed through the air.
It was not the sound of wolves or any ordinary forest animal.
It belonged to ‘creatures’ with a far more ferocious and sinister temperament.
‘Death aura? No, this is closer to demon energy! Then… could it really be a shoujiangshi!?’
A shoujiangshi, true to its name, was a jiangshi made from a dead beast.
Because various corpses could be stitched together like rags, it boasted a unique temperament, almost like a legendary monster.
It also ranked as high-level in jiangshi techniques, so few sects could actually create one… But if a living jiangshi could be used as a mere servant, then this seemed entirely possible.
The giant spider quickly scanned its surroundings.
In the shrine, where darkness lay thick, the presence of demons gradually became visible.
One, two, three…
The number of demons kept increasing until there were over ten pairs.
A stench so foul it made the nose sting wafted through the air.
Each and every one of them was staring straight at the giant spider, drooling.
Living jiangshi, shoujiangshi, the shrine, the Divine Master, the sinister atmosphere.
There was only one place that matched all of these traits.
Black Bone Ghost Valley.
A sect that began as a mere branch of the Mosan Sect, later submitting to the Divine Sect and serving as a loyal group for hundreds of years, but who recently caused a stir trying to secede from the Magic Dao Alliance due to conflicts with the Young Lord.
‘Damn it…! It wasn’t the Namgung clan, it was Black Bone Ghost Valley! Just as the Young Lord said, while possessed by a spider, their intelligence must have regressed as well. How could I not have remembered Black Bone Ghost Valley?’
Black Bone Ghost Valley was the place most specialized in using mystical techniques to control spirit beasts and jiangshi, even within the Magic Dao.
However, because they rarely left the Tianshan Mountains, failing to think of them had been a fatal mistake.
Moreover, it was said that the Divine Sect and the Magic Dao Alliance were in the midst of a civil war.
But if they were now discarding those restrictions and venturing into the Central Plains, Woon-hwi could be in immediate danger.
The problem was… there was no apparent way for him to escape from here.
He was already trapped among the spirit beasts.
Whether aware of the giant spider’s anxious thoughts or not, only the voices of the Divine Master and Namgung Sanyeong filled the quiet manor.
“As long as you pay the proper price for the materials, nothing is difficult.”
“So even after receiving all those offerings, it’s still not enough?”
“Offerings are offerings, and the cost of materials is the cost of materials, isn’t that so? Still, since Namgung Sanyeong is a long-time client, I treat you at cost, without any profit. What will you do? Will you accept it?”
“Fine. I’ll add another chest. Will that suffice?”
“That’s more than enough!”
The Divine Master smiled broadly.
“Then first, we must deal with the tail that Namgung Sanyeong has brought.”
Before the giant spider could escape, the Divine Master shook the bell in his hand.
Clang! Ker-ker-clang!
At that moment, the spirit beasts that had been waiting tore through the darkness and attacked the giant spider.
Each of them had a grotesque form.
「Run away, Young Lord…!」
Only the giant spider’s final words were weakly transmitted through the spirit to Unhui.
Chronicles of the Reincarnated Demon God
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