Book 18 Chapter 14

Business disaster (災害)

-Amy, the manifestation of the legendary Goddess Awe

He was a man who put his heart and soul into his work. In short, he was very conscientious. It didn't matter that he had two eyes peeking out from behind his dark, shadowy cloak. The clothes he wore were designated as official work clothes because they were stretchy, easy to move in, and breathable. It helped alleviate the discomfort of long missions and kept him dry when it rained. Judging by how it felt against my skin, I could tell it had a pretty good lining. It's even sneaky enough to hide memorization so that you're very well prepared in the event of an emergency. What was even better and more awesome was that the coveralls were a supply that was entirely paid for by the organization. At the risk of sounding too snobbish, I'll paraphrase: free.

He worked very hard and diligently to live up to the expectations of the organization, even though the work did not necessarily guarantee or reflect the public interest and sometimes involved the removal of some limbs from the body. This was true even though the work did not necessarily guarantee or reflect the public interest, and even though it was not uncommon for some people to have some of their limbs separated from their bodies, and even though it was very often necessary to carefully open a large number of unspecified flesh with a rather sharp iron to see what was inside, this was not proof that he was not sincere in his work.

Moreover, he was not only sincere but also competent. His detractors claimed that no man could be both, but it was true, otherwise how could he have risen to the lofty position of chief pilot? And so, today, as he bent to his task of chasing down the elements, he could easily pick up the traces of his target. Even a master of escape was doomed if he caught them. It didn't matter where you ran and hid; he and his men were highly skilled at removing such obstacles. He was in a profession where he was not subject to manslaughter if he killed someone in the line of duty, and obstacles and targets always, without exception, feared him like the Grim Reaper. But today was different. Even though the targets blocked his path, they greeted him as if they had been waiting for him. After clearing up a few misunderstandings and summoning his men to threaten them, they showed no sign of fear. In his seasoned experience, it seemed necessary to make an example of the two children who approached him so fearlessly. But his attempt to rekindle his diminished majesty ended up being a mere thought.

It came with a hot wind.

A flash of white lightning accompanied the white gale. There was too little time to realize what it was; he was blown helplessly into the sky like a leaf in a gust of wind. His feet, surely treading the earth, were now scattering parting dust on the ground. The blinding sky filled his eyes, and something cold and sharp bit into his throat at the same time as a hot gust of wind.

The sky was very red the last time he saw it.

Whew!

In the aftermath of the ferocious gale, a strong wind swept in, a gust of wind so strong that for a moment they could only squeeze their eyes shut. The next moment, the cloaked figure standing in their way was gone.

"Huh?"

Zhang Wuyang's eyes widened.

"How did this happen?"

"I don't understand either, my lord!"

Representative Kang replied in a hesitant voice.

"Yu Dae-hyeop, did you see that?"

At Qin Xiaoling's question, Yoo Eun-sung shook her head.

"I only saw the white shape for a second."

It was lightning-fast enough to escape his blinkered vision.

"What was that?"

"I don't know, but I think we're about to find out."

Before they knew it, the forest was silent again. A heavy silence that seemed to insist that what had just happened to them was an illusion. No one spoke as if they had made a promise.

Poof!

A corpse, its neck snapped by a parasite, fell from a tree. It had already been torn apart by more than two-thirds.

It was an admirable, unapologetic pause.

Loudly, loudly, loudly!

A roar rang out, a roar that made even Tae-San shudder, a roar that seemed to shake even Tae-San's sense of security.

Aahhhhhhhhh! Loud, loud, loud!

Aahhhhhhhhh! Loud, loud, loud!

The roar seemed to resonate in all directions.

Hearing that, Qin Shaolin's face turned pale.

'This sounds like… no way…….'

It harbored an underlying fear that made her shudder, not consciously, but in the depths of her unconscious.

For the young girls of Amifa, it's a sound they'll never forget. The roar of the White Tiger, the king of the beasts, the legendary beast that reigns in Amishan. Sometimes at night, the roar would send the girls scrambling for their blankets, shivering and crying, hugging each other to sleep, or running to their tutors. In some cases, they would urinate and wake up bleary-eyed. Ampah's disciples must have experienced this at least ten times.

"Bai Muhu's Lament (歎息)……."

An all-powerful majesty, a white meteor on a mountain peak, a pure white pride, a blazing golden majesty, a white thunderbolt. There are countless names for her. Two hundred years of time have given her many names. And as many legends as names have followed her fame, one of the most famous in recent times has been the name Empress Dowager. Being called by the same title as the first Empress Dowager of China, it's easy to see how powerful she was.

The adults did what adults do, they made up a bunch of stories to scare the kids.

"If you don't listen to me, the White Witch will come and take you away in cold blood. He loves the tender flesh of young girls."

For children, the words of adults quickly become facts, and for these girls, the scariest thing was the white nothingness of the moment. How could they resist the fear instilled in them by the adults when they didn't yet have the judgment to distinguish between fact and fiction? They had to be terrified every time they heard a roar in the deep night.

I thought I had grown up and forgotten. The occasional roar was something I could laugh off now.

But that wasn't true; what she heard was merely an echo from the far side of the distant mountains.

The Empress's roar, sounding terrifyingly close to the ground, was enough to bring out the mental trauma of her childhood. She instinctively shrank back and became afraid. It wasn't a physical scar, but a mental one, carved by the insensitivity of adults, and while it was invisible to the eye, the scar remained unhealed and deep in her soul.

Yoo Eun-sung was stunned. She'd never seen the normally confident Qin Shaolin so shaken. It was very rare to see her so visibly afraid when she was already considered a member of the Sword Family. He didn't know what was going on, but he knew he had to compose himself.

But the white tiger's roar had already frozen everything in time.

A thick blood incense began to rise.

Squeak!

The grass on both sides moved at the same time, with no wind.

"Everyone, don't move!"

Qin Shaolin nervously called out to everyone. His hand gripping his sword sheath was naturally strengthening.

"Huh!"

As everyone held their breath, they appeared. Stately strides, fur as white as snow, and green eyes that seemed to proclaim they owned the mountain. Bursting out of the grass was a great white tiger, flanked by two. It wasn't just one white tiger. Imagine that, coming out of the woodwork on both sides of a single road! Imagine what it must have felt like!

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven… and eight."

Someone less sober counted them. Eight in all. The street looked full as the eight distracted white tigers wandered out.

People watched with bated breath at this horrifying, yet strangely beautiful and fantastic sight.

"Eight winds!"

Qin Shaolin said with a sigh. He'd heard of them in rumors, but never thought they'd actually exist, but now that they were right in front of him, he couldn't deny it.

And then the white mountain that filled the road split to the left and right without a sound.

"Why is he doing that?"

In response to Yoo Eun-sung's question, Qin Xiaoling swallowed dryly and answered in a nervous voice.

"It's time for the real Empress to step up to the plate."

Was it because she was about to encounter a legend? A light shiver swept through her body. In the last fifty years, no one had ever experienced the legend for themselves.

Blah, blah, blah!

In the shadows of the forest, a pair of golden torches lit up. They looked twice as large as any of the white tigers that had appeared so far. A majestic gait, as relaxed and unhurried as the eight that had preceded it. With its golden eyes, dazzling white fur, long mane, and jet-black stripes across its body, It stood in all its majesty with overwhelming power.

He was the King of the Ten Thousand, the manifestation of the White Thunderbolt.

The two pupils on his pure white face shone with golden light, as if they were embedded in the sun. Qin Shaolin calmed his trembling heart and looked at the two suns.

It's a life that consumes space and freezes time. Even those who usually pride themselves on having big walls would be overwhelmed and have a heart attack in front of this powerhouse.

Qin Shaolin shivered slightly at the pure life of the beast.

The flesh was as cold as ale, and his hands were scrambling to draw his sword. The pure white blade was already an inch from the scabbard.

Ding, ding, ding!

The scabbard flutters. It's a sign that you still control your body with willpower.

"Can I dodge that lightning-fast movement?

I missed the first move. There was no excuse for that fact. So what about the second?

"The odds are 50\/50.

It was definitely an adventure, just what she was looking for.

"Stop, because the moment you pull it out, he's going to jump on you."

It was the voice of an old man who had been sleeping on a cart ever since he entered the city. Even with the enemy of a lifetime in front of him, Qin Xiaolong looked away. The unthinkable had just happened. Fortunately, the white tigers were not about to take advantage of this golden opportunity.

"Ahhhhh."

With a thick yawn, the old man stretched and woke up.

The old man's face was still languid from a very good night's sleep. Slowly, as if in no hurry, the old man got up, then even more slowly, he got out of the cart and stood on the ground, and then, with a look of nonchalance on his face, he started walking. The old man's steps took him right into the middle of a group of white tigers.

"Mr. Nosabu……!"

Qin Xiaolong tried to stop the old man in his tracks with an urgent voice; in her opinion, it was nothing less than suicide. But Nosabu waved his hand once, as if to say it was okay, and continued walking.

The white tigers, lined up in two rows around the road, watched the old man pass by without moving. The onlookers watched, unable to breathe, until finally, Nosabu's steps stopped in front of Bai Muhu. A golden, glowing moat faced him.

Purr!

Bai Muhu made a gurgling sound, and the Labor Ministry laughed. And the people were forced to be witnesses to that terrible and shocking sight.

"Huh!"

Qin Xiaolong raised his flag. His cultivation had deepened to the point where he could no longer be swayed, but this time he was helpless.

Nosabu raised his hand and began to stroke Bai Muhu's head like a cat. Bai Muhu, the white brilliant man, the king of ten thousand years, the empress who had reigned in Amishan for two hundred years, did not go mad with rage, but purred to see if it felt good. He lost his body.

"Hey, hey, hey, hey, what's up?"

Bai Mu Hu nodded to see if he understood the human. He bent down to his knees to make it easier to stroke his head. Baekmuhu's body is so huge that a normal human would have to look up.

What came next was even more shocking.

The white tiger flipped over on the floor of the baladang. Then he began to joke. The eyes of the men popped out of their sockets.

"I can't believe it, Ba, Baladang! Baek Mu-hoo, the ruler of the mountains, is not even a cat……."

The old man knew what Bai Muhu wanted, so he stroked his chest hair a few times. The texture was harder than expected. It was so hard that it must have been used as a futon in the old days.

"Are you here because you're worried?"

Bai Mufu nodded once more at Nosabu's words. He was still in a baladang state.

In fact, he may have been more worried about his own safety than he was about the old man, who hadn't greeted him properly, and so he had come out of his comfort zone.

"Are you coming with me, white girl?"

Bai Muhu nodded. It was good to get out and see the world once in a while, and the prospect of expanding your power across the country was quite appealing.

"But there are too many heads to go with them all."

The old man's words fell on deaf ears, and Bai Muhu roared.

KHHHHHH!

Then the eight white tigers turned toward Bai Muhu and lowered themselves to their knees at the same time, facing Bai Muhu and the old man.

"What is that?"

In response to Qin Xiaoling's question, Yoo Eunsung replied with a look of disbelief.

"I think you're bowing."

The old man said as he received the Eight Winds robe.

"That's it. Go away!"

When they awoke again, there was only one horse and one man left, and the Eight Winds were nowhere to be found.

"The horses are scared when you're around, so I'm afraid you'll have to follow behind!"

At the old man's words, Bai Muhu bowed his head. The old man stroked his snow-white hair once more. The next moment, a fierce gust of wind raged once more, and Bai Xiaochun had vanished like a lie.

"Mr. Nosabu, who are you?"

Still in awe, Qin Xiaoling politely asked, and the answer was extremely short.

"It's me, it's me, it's just me."

"That's too short, my understanding can't keep up."

Qin Xiaolong replied very politely, but firmly. He wants further clarification.

"Hmm."

The old man emitted a vague sound that could have been a short sigh or a groan. Was he in trouble?

It is very difficult to summarize oneself at an adequate length. The limitations of language are as obvious as the sun going down and the moon coming up, and there is no way to reflect everything in existence. I would have to leave out a lot of things about myself.

Nevertheless, it was a misfortune if ever there was a human misfortune, that language was the only way to communicate with one another.

The old man opened his mouth again. This time it was a little longer. But it was also much more complicated.

"Well, if I may add, he is a man of no thought, of no place, of no service, and of no species."

"……?"

But the old man raised his hand to stop the next question. The rest is up to you.

But here her doubts were compounded, not resolved.

"Master, that sounds like something I've heard before."

Yulan said.

"Oh, I know!"

That's when Yuunbi stepped in.

When you're in a position to make yourself stand out, you can't afford to be silent.

"What do you know?"

Four Hundred Eunuchs looked at Sajil with suspicion.

"…That's what they call a no-holds-barred meal!"

Kudos!

An unintelligible sound echoed twice in the people's minds, but the old man's mood remained unchanged.

"If you're going to call it that, call it nothingness."

Yoo Eun-sung said with a sigh.

"Isn't that the same thing?"

"Different!"

With a snap, something snapped, and Yoo Eun-sung, a four-hundred-year-old man, rushed out.

"Sin, I'm sorry, Mr. Nozabu."

He hastily apologized and glared at Sajil.

"Don't go around saying you're a Doga person. Because it's shameful."

"……."

"Is Mr. Nosa a person of the Taoist lineage?"

"No!"

The old man's answer to Qin Shaolin's question was sharp.

"……?"

"I thought that was a quote from Chuang Tzu?"

Unlike Liu Yunbi, she knew exactly where the phrase came from, and she knew that it referred to "things that are such by themselves.

"I don't have to be a Taoist to agree with him, do I?"

"Are you a Buddhist, then?"

"That's pretty interesting, but my hair is still intact."

Nosabu showed off her blemish-free silver hair.

"I don't think the value of pursuing that teaching is worth more than my hair."

The answer was no.

"Then what about the price of oil?"

The old man shook his head.

"Didn't I just say that I'm omnipresent and omniscient, that I dwell nowhere, that I don't fit in with anything, that I follow nothing, that I follow no one? Why do you think I have to belong to one system or another, and if I don't belong to one, doesn't that mean I disagree with it?"

"Well, that's……."

No one had an easy answer.

It went against conventional wisdom.

"Are you going to reject the truth because it contradicts your dogma? It may not seem like such a big deal because it happens so often without you even trying, but there is nothing more foolish than to commit murder under the guise of truth. The very act of doing so proves your own inferiority."

"Is it really possible to live without being bound to anything, without conforming to anything, and what would you gain by doing so?"

"Well, we'll get there, won't we?"

The old man replied, as if it were no big deal.

"So you got it?"

"Hmm, well?"

The old man didn't answer.

"Who is this old man?

The old man was one of those things that the more time passes, the more you know, the more you don't know.

"Now get out of here!"

Without looking back, Labor said.

"Yes?"

At first, neither Zhang Wuyang, Kang Jiaodu, Yoo Eunseong, nor Jin Xiaoling understood what he was talking about.

"How long are you going to stay hidden?"

The master spoke again.

Suddenly, a rustling sound came from the wagon at the back of the line, and the covered behemoth lifted. The rustling and creaking grew louder and louder until a figure emerged from it. To my surprise, it was a little girl who looked to be only seven years old. She was followed by a boy who appeared to be her brother.

"Come here!"

At his beck and call, the brothers cautiously approached, their shoulders hunched in fear. Both looked as if they hadn't eaten or rested in days, and they were very tired. It was these children that the masked men had targeted.

"Poor……."

Compassion flashed across Qin Xiaoling's face, but it was something else that the Ministry of Labor wanted to know.

"Why did you hide in that cart?"

"It's not a cart with a sign on it."

The boy answered immediately.

"Huh."

Zhang Wuyang exclaimed.

"They're pretty willing."

Zhang Wuyang looked back at the wagon where the two children were hiding. The cart was loaded with food for the marksmen and sundries for traveling.

"How do you know?"

Yulan asked, unable to resist his curiosity.

"In the first place, the carts carrying the trophies are sealed with paper. The seal is stamped with the seal of the head of the troupe, so it can't be broken, and if you want to check the inside of the cart, you must leave a trace. There is also a seal placed by the customer himself, which is of course a device to prevent theft. It's only done under the supervision of the person in charge of the procession, so if you tried to sneak in there, you'd be found out. On the other hand, the grocery wagon doesn't have a seal like that, because it's used every day, and in a large procession like this, there's not just one wagon, there's three wagons like that. You don't open the next one until you're done with the first one. The one they were hiding in wasn't the first one that was currently in use, it was the one at the very back. Is that a coincidence?"

"Indeed!"

Only after listening to Zhang Wuyang's lengthy explanation could Liu Lan be impressed.

"Hmm, that's impressive, to think that at such a young age you'd think of using a country's flag as a shield."

Zhang Wuyang's eyes widened at Nosabu's words.

"Is that true?"

"……."

The child didn't answer, but the silence was a sufficient answer in itself.

"What a surprise, the Sichuan First Mark was just a child's shield……."

Zhang Wuyang was dumbfounded. But that didn't make her angry. Rather, she was more amazed that she could make such a judgment at such a young age.

"What's your name?"

"It's called management."

"U……?!"

As someone who lived in the shadow of Mount Ami, he couldn't help but recognize one of the local keepers, the Blue Dragon Silvermaster. He hadn't seen the children's faces because he was always on business, but he remembered their names.

"What, you mean you're the heir to the Blue Dragon Silver Pavilion?"

The child nodded sadly. The place he was supposed to be was nowhere to be found. Except in the boy's heart.

The old man was a little interested in the story, for he too had left behind some painful memories.

"What do you say, my lord?"

Representative Kang asked.

Zhang Wuyang was the one in charge of the show, so it would be overreaching and impolite to interfere too much with his decisions. Of course, Qin Xiaoling and Yu Eunsung's opinions could not be ignored due to their positions in the power structure, but going too far was something to be avoided, and they understood that very well.

"What can we do, we must protect these children in the Zhongyang Marking Bureau. They are the survivors of an important clue to the destruction of the Blue Dragon Silver Mine. They are also the loyalty of Sichuan merchants. What did you say about their identity?"

"My dad didn't seem to know either."

"Hmmm, how far were you going to go?"

"I'm going to Namchang."

"Nam Chang-el, you mean to tell me that you thought of traveling that far in that young body?"

Qin Xiaoling's eyes widened in surprise, and not only hers, but those of the others as well.

The boy nodded.

"He told me to go to Mazinger Daihyo in the Heavenly Martial Academy."

"It's no ordinary thing for Mr. Yu to say such a thing. Don't worry now. We, the Zhongyang Marked Bureau, will protect your brother and sister."

"Thank you, Lord Zhang!"

Yu Yongyu bowed respectfully. The boy's mature behavior brought a smile to Zhang Wuyang's lips. Zhang Wuyang mounted his horse again, and the old man returned to his sleeping quarters.

"Go!"

Zhang Wuyang's shouts brought the ranks back into line, and they hastened their progress.

And a month later.

Finally, Pyohaeng arrived safely at Namchang.