Chapter 265: Hainan Island (3)

Yeah, it must’ve been a little over ten years ago.

It was shortly after she lost to Cheon Yura in the Young Cult Leader succession battle.

Back then, Cheon Yujeong had been thoroughly cast aside by the Cheon Clan.

Well, it was to be expected.

The Cheon Clan wasn’t the kind of warm place that would offer sympathy to a loser.

Especially not when she had lost in a situation where she absolutely couldn’t afford to.

The fact that the elders of the Cheon Clan didn’t force her to commit suicide could already be considered a lenient verdict.

Of course, that didn’t change the fact that Cheon Yujeong had become the family’s disgrace.

Ordinarily, it would’ve been one of the clan’s taboos.

And yet, no one stopped her from leaving the cradle—because no one acknowledged her in the first place.

In any case, Cheon Yujeong left the cradle and wandered aimlessly through the Ten Thousand Mountain like a ghost.

It was about a day later when she ended up in Miok Fortress, the most notorious pleasure district of the Cult.

Looking back now, the fact that she wasn’t assaulted while wandering around Miok Fortress with those empty eyes was almost a miracle.

No matter how firmly the Heavenly Demon Cult had become a class-based society centered around family, the underbelly of that world was crueler than most unorthodox sects.

What caught Cheon Yujeong’s eye as she aimlessly wandered the streets of Miok Fortress with her hazy gaze—

Was a man’s scream coming from a back alley.

“AAARGH!! M-my thing!”

“Y-you damn brat?!”

“…?”

Cheon Yujeong instinctively moved toward the thick scent of blood wafting from the alley.

And there she saw…

A man clutching his bleeding groin and choking on his cries.

Another man, dead on the spot with an axe embedded in his skull.

And finally, a man threatening a blood-drenched child with a dagger.

“……”

Cheon Yujeong immediately grasped the situation.

Three scumbags had tried to satisfy their vile lusts through a girl who looked about her age—only to end up getting their just desserts.

“Grrrrgh! Hrrrgh!”

Unlike the man holding the dagger, the girl had no weapon.

Still…

“Is this your weapon?”

Thunk!

Cheon Yujeong yanked the axe out of the corpse’s forehead and asked.

“……”

Just as the man with the dagger opened his mouth to respond—

“Y-you lunatic! Another deranged brat shows up?!”

He screamed in panic and charged at Cheon Yujeong, swinging his weapon.

Then again, even in the Demonic Cult, it wasn’t every day that you saw a ten-year-old casually pulling an axe out of a corpse.

Truthfully, the man was just unlucky.

The second brat who appeared—wasn’t what he expected. She had actually mastered a proper martial art.

Slash!

The thug, who wasn’t even third-rate, was beheaded on the spot by Cheon Yujeong’s lightning-quick draw.

“Guh! Guh-hhk!”

Ignoring the man who collapsed, clutching his neck, Cheon Yujeong walked toward the still-guarded girl.

“Doesn’t seem like you’ve trained in martial arts, but you’ve got some guts.”

“……”

“Where are you from? Why were you caught by scum like that in a place like this?”

At the time, young Cheon Yujeong didn’t yet understand the nature of back alleys. She assumed anyone from the Cult must belong somewhere.

The girl stared at her for a while, then began to speak hesitantly.

“I… don’t belong anywhere. Not anymore.”

“Nowhere?”

“I… lost a competition…”

“…!”

“Even if it’s in a place like this… I have to rise again.”

Cheon Yujeong felt an odd stir in her chest at the girl’s relentless tenacity and stubbornness.

Especially the mention of losing a competition—Cheon Yujeong felt a strange sense of kinship.

She didn’t know what sort of competition the girl meant.

But without realizing it, Cheon Yujeong reached out her hand.

“Come with me.”

The moment the girl’s eyes widened slightly—

Cheon Yujeong spoke from the heart.

“I, too, need to stand up again. I’m looking for someone I can entrust my back to.”

“…!”

“What do you say? At the very least, I’ll make sure you don’t go hungry.”

Without a doubt, it was an offer Cheon Yujeong would regret for the rest of her life.

The girl, as if she had been waiting for this, grabbed her hand.

“Alright.”

“What’s your name?”

Spit!

The girl spat out a lump of flesh from her mouth and said:

“Baek Ryeong.”

***

When she later found out that all of that scene, that moment—had been a performance…

When she discovered that the sister she had trusted to stay by her side for life had in fact approached her through an elaborate act, calculated from the start…

How utterly miserable must she have felt?

“…Damn it.”

Cheon Yujeong cursed quietly under her breath and opened her eyes.

***

‘I’m alive, somehow.’

Once again feeling the cool sound of waves crashing, I opened my eyes.

“Ughhhk!”

As soon as I came to, a devastating wave of pain surged through my entire body.

Considering that I hadn’t recovered at all compared to when I’d faced the Ancestors, that place must not have been a physical reality.

“D-damn ancestors. How hard did they push this body?”

Barely managing to lift my upper body, I soon noticed someone sprawled out nearby.

“G-Gu Chil?!”

Since he’d started his romantic life(?) his hair had grown quite a bit—Gu Chil was buried in the sand, completely motionless.

I hurriedly pulled him out of the sand and checked his pulse.

‘T-thank goodness. He’s alive.’

Judging by his steady breathing, it seemed the Indestructible Asura Demonic Art he practiced had steadily been healing his body.

When I was struck by the technique known as Illusion Demon Slaughter, unleashed by the Illusion Demon, I truly thought I was going to die.

“Ugh, ugh!”

At last, Gu Chil came to his senses.

“Gu Chil! You’re awake?!”

“Where is this…? Damn it, why is it so hot?”

Gu Chil grimaced and abruptly lifted his upper body.

Then, he froze in shock as he looked out at the vast horizon before him.

“T-The sea!?”

He whipped his head around and glared at me.

“Y-Young Master! Just where in the world… No, wait. I’m relieved you’re safe… I really am, but still—where the hell are we?!”

“Calm down….”

I pressed my fingers to my forehead at Gu Chil’s rambling confusion.

Honestly, it baffled me how someone like him ever earned a nickname with the word “ghost” in it.

I only opened my mouth once Gu Chil had finally calmed down.

“For now, all I can tell is that we’re somewhere in the southern region of the Central Plains. I have no idea how we ended up here, though.”

It was even hotter than Nanchang, a place famous for its heat.

And given the abundance of palm trees growing like bamboo shoots after the rain, it was clear we weren’t in the eastern regions.

“Just in case, let’s find cover first. There could still be remnants of the Heaven-Defying Society nearby.”

“Y-Yes, sir.”

While I had full faith in the Second Heavenly Demon’s power, there was always that slim chance of danger.

Gu Chil and I, with our aching bodies, searched for a place to hide.

Eventually, we found a cave and began properly recuperating inside.

About three days passed like that.

It had been six hours since Gu Chil, now fully recovered, had gone off to gather information.

“Y-Young Master.”

Gu Chil returned with a ghostly pale face, on the verge of tears.

“I think… we’re totally screwed.”

I gulped as I looked at him.

“W-What? What the hell did you hear that’s got you like this?”

At my words, Gu Chil collapsed face-first and began sobbing.

“This place… is Hainan Island….”

“…….”

My brain refused to accept the truth for a brief moment.

My mouth moved of its own accord.

“……Where?”

“Hainan! South of the southernmost point of the Central Plains! That remote exile island across the sea!”

“…….”

“It’s no joke—Gansu, where the Ten Thousand Great Mountains are, is literally a world away from here!”

I blankly started calculating the distance.

Ignoring all the mountains, rivers, and obstacles and going by a straight line alone, it was around 5,000 li.

Of course, that was purely theoretical.

Once all the complicated routes were factored in… it really would be about 10,000 li.

‘And if I have to carry out the ancestor’s commission while I’m at it….’

When I estimated the time it would take to return, I couldn’t help but curse out loud.

“Damn it, there’s no way I’ll be back before the end of this year.”

Gu Chil’s lips trembled at my muttered curse.

“W-What do you mean by that, sir?”

I sighed and told him about my agreement with the Second Heavenly Demon.

“There’s something I have to do in exchange for surviving. It’s probably going to eat up a fair bit of time.”

His face went even paler.

“B-But I have a foxy wife and a bunny-like child….”

“No, you don’t. Where are you pulling that crap from?”

“…I meant I was hoping to have them.”

Saying whatever comes to mind doesn’t mean it’ll fly.

Hmm. But…

I glanced at the weeping Gu Chil with a strange look.

‘A foxy wife might be coming soon? No, that’s not set in stone. Will she be a fox… or a viper?’

At the moment, the fox option seemed a bit more likely… but even just imagining a viper-like wife made me shudder.

Unless she’s like my Yura, soft and bunny-like.

Sensing something off, Gu Chil narrowed his eyes at me.

“…Young Master, I feel like you’re having some seriously disrespectful thoughts right now.”

I responded boldly, not flustered like last time.

“Hm? Is wishing you a bright future considered disrespectful now?”

“…What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What else? I was praying you’d get a foxy wife and a bunny-like child.”

“…….”

Gu Chil was looking at me like he wasn’t sure if I was being serious or not.

But I was serious.

I was hoping Myeong-oh would snatch him up.

As for So Soryu… just imagining it gave me goosebumps.

She seemed like the kind to smile sweetly while poisoning your tea just for making her husband lift a finger.

“In any case, if we’re really in Hainan, we have to get to Haikou no matter what.”

“Haikou…?”

“A city up along Hainan’s northern coast. It should have a government office at least.”

Though whether that office actually functioned was another matter.

Still, if such an institution existed, then it should mean there was an official ship route to the Central Plains.

“Whether it’s legal or not, we have to get to Guangdong somehow. That’s the only way we’ll have any options.”

“…Agreed.”

“There’s definitely a Mysterious Gold Trading Company branch in Guangzhou, Guangdong. We’ll contact the main cult through that. They must be worried sick about us.”

“R-Right! That’s why you’re the Young Master!”

Even in a strange land, Gu Chil was impressed by how smoothly my plan came together.

“Of course, there’ll be plenty of challenges along the way….”

I sighed and scratched my head.

Gu Chil clapped as if he’d remembered something.

“Oh, come to think of it—doesn’t that sect have a base in Hainan?”

“…Right. The Hainan Sect.”

A traditional faction of the martial world, one whose name often popped up among the Nine Great Sects.

Whenever one of the Joint Sects nearby the main cult—excluding Bukcheon—was weakened and on the verge of collapse, the Hainan Sect and Hyungsan Sect would usually be the ones fighting for the empty seat in the Nine Sects.

And the Murim leadership would often side with the Hainan Sect over the nearer Hyungsan Sect simply because the former was too far away to be a real threat.

Of course, that didn’t mean the Hainan Sect’s martial strength was to be underestimated.

If a place like that, which wasn’t even revered like the faraway Daoist Mount Kunlun, still made it onto the Nine Sects list, it meant their power was truly formidable.

“If we’re talking Haikou, it’s basically their front yard. Operating there without drawing their attention will be next to impossible.”

“Right… every local here is probably connected to the Hainan Sect in some way.”

Having carried out all kinds of missions as an assassin, Gu Chil immediately understood what I meant.

“Whatever we do, we have to keep it quiet. We’ll enter the city under the cover of night. If we can just deal with the Hainan Sect, getting to the Central Plains will be much easier.”

“I trust you completely, Young Master!”

Gu Chil declared confidently, despite his usual nonsense.

However.

My expectations…

Were completely and utterly wrong.

“A heretical cult… you say?”

A merchant in Haikou sighed and said,

“That’s right. Things had been quiet for a while, but recently a Saintess supposedly showed up or something? Because of that, the entire island’s on high alert—not just the Hainan Sect, but all of Hainan is in a frenzy. The Hainan Sect’s thrown their entire force into hunting down the cult, leaving their territory wide open.”

“T-Then what about ships heading to the Central Plains…?”

“All blocked. Both official and unofficial routes. The Governor of Hainan has sworn that not even a mouse will be allowed to leave until the situation is resolved.”

“…….”

“…….”

Gu Chil and I stared at each other in stunned silence.

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