Abolition of the Wicked - Chapter 102

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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#Episode 102

Two hundred and fifty-eight assassins moved without so much as a whisper of cloth.
All of them were first-class assassins.
They advanced silently toward Oseong Jang-won.
The moon lay buried beneath thick clouds—a perfect night for killing.
Through various channels, they had mapped the estate’s layout with flawless precision.
They hadn’t managed to identify the bedrooms of Hangju’s leadership or the stewards, but it hardly mattered—they planned to kill them all anyway.
Cloaked in black like shadows themselves, the assassins scaled the estate’s walls without sound.
Jo Dae-sul, lord of the Choreyong-dan, signaled his subordinates with a hand gesture.
Eighty men responded to his signal in perfect unison, spreading between the buildings like a coordinated tide.
“No sentries visible.”
Ga Du-myeong, his second-in-command, made his report, and Jo Dae-sul nodded in acknowledgment.
“It’s a brewery—guards would be the strange thing here. Finish it in half an hour and we’re done.”
If today went cleanly, this one contract would secure him wealth enough to live comfortably for years.
‘If only every job came this easy.’
The Choreyong-dan alone would have been enough for this work, but with the Hyeol-yeong-mun and Baekya-hoe here too, it was overkill—like fishing with a club.
An assassin must maintain taut vigilance in any circumstance, like a fishing line pulled tight for a catch.
But they were only human, and humans could not always follow protocol perfectly.
Kang In-gang, who had been an assassin for twelve years under the Choreyong-dan, crossed through the window with his guard lowered.
The long corridor was lined with doors on either side.
His keen ears caught the sound of snoring beyond several of them.
The order was to leave not a single one alive, so there was no need to discriminate.
He gestured to the four assassins who had crossed with him and was just reaching for the door handle when it happened.
Crack!
At the sickening sound of bone snapping, he turned to see two of his companions collapse soundlessly.
‘What—?’
He thought perhaps they’d simply mistepped and fallen.
The only presences nearby were those of his fellow assassins and sleeping targets. But seconds later, he realized their necks had been broken, and the hair on his spine bristled.
Unless they’d somehow twisted each other’s necks in some impossible mutual death, there had to be an enemy present.
Kang In-gang quickly surveyed the area around the two corpses.
Only one companion stood with him—the rest had vanished.
“Did you see anything?”
“No. I have no idea what just happened.”
The moment Kang In-gang’s gaze shifted toward the far end of the corridor, another sharp crack split the air.
He spun around to see So Seong-gil, the man he’d just been speaking with, crumple to the floor.
“Who—who are you?”
Kang In-gang prided himself as a first-class assassin. Yet someone had killed So Seong-gil right behind him without a trace of detection.
‘A ghost?’
This was no ordinary murder—no human should move this way.
“If you’ve disturbed the elder’s sleep, you must pay for it with your life.”
A voice came from directly above his head. When he looked up, something dark fell toward him.
Crack!
Kang In-gang heard his own neck break as darkness took him.
Nor was Kang In-gang alone in death that night.
The assassins, who should have slipped in unseen and out like shadows, instead slipped in unseen and died unseen.
Some had their necks broken. Some fell to a Vital Point Strike. Others had their throats cut by a blade, crossing the river to the afterlife.
Seol Jang-guk, lord of the Baekya-hoe, only recognized that something had gone terribly wrong when half his men lay dead.
In the corridor outside three empty rooms, seven of his subordinates lay sprawled across the floor.
“What sort of clumsy murderers are these? Spilling killing intent everywhere they go. This is why assassins like them hardly deserve the name.”
A bald man emerged suddenly from the darkness, closing the distance to Seol Jang-guk without haste.
There was no urgency in his bearing—as if Seol Jang-guk barely registered as an afterthought.
“Who are you?”
“You came to kill me without knowing my face? How pitiful. Oseong Jang-won must truly have seemed easy prey for you to send soldiers this careless.”
Memory surfaced quickly then.
“So you’re one of the five lords—the one called Ja-um Seon.”
Seo Seok-san, now more commonly known by his courtesy name than his birth name, had grown too weary even to speak.
“These inept assassins came swarming in — looks like my disciples will have their hands full.”
He couldn’t very well ask the workers to dispose of the bodies.
When Seo Seok-san moved, Seol Jang-guk drew his blade across his chest.
But that was the limit of any response he could muster.
With a hollow gasp, Seol Jang-guk took a Vital Point Strike to the chest and crumpled forward.
The lord of the Baekya-hoe, who had orchestrated fifty-eight assassinations without a single failure, fell without ever drawing his sword.
The slaughter was unfolding everywhere.
Of course, the dead were all assassins.
The Killing Intent radiating from them had roused the Bloodwind Four Lions even before the wall was breached, and Hang Ju-sa-byeon and Gwak Bong, though a moment slower to react, were quick to respond—and with Sang Nam-jae there as well, Oseong Jang-won was a fortress of iron.
Every time Se-hwa’s dart whistled through the air, another life vanished without fail, and Sang Nam-jae was himself a superior assassin to any of the intruders’ leaders.
Even without the Bloodwind Four Lions, this assault would have been doomed to fail; the hunted were unmistakably the assassins who had scaled the wall.
Not until more than half of the infiltrators lay dead did the first scream ring out—such was the overwhelming suppression the assassins faced.
Among the two hundred and fifty-eight assassins, not a single one accomplished his mission. Survival itself demanded they claw and struggle.
The bodies strewn throughout the estate belonged wholly to the assassins, and the failure was plain to see.
Cho Dae-sul, lord of the Choreyong-dan, and Dang Do-gwang, master of the Hyeol-yeong-mun, smashed through a window and fled the building.
“Lord Cho! Did you see where the enemy is?”
Even as Dang Do-gwang spoke, three screams tore through the night in succession.
“They’re everywhere in this damned estate! Must you see them with your own eyes? This is clearly the Jo Hwang Clan—that young fool of a lord has led us into a trap!”
Yet that young fool of a lord had come with them.
He stood at the most secure position, having entered through the Main Gate that the assassins had opened for him, his back against the wall that faced the courtyard.
Hwang Jo-gil’s grasp of the situation was slow.
When the screams began, he believed the men of Oseong Jang-won were falling, one after another.
“Die, every last one of you!”
Through bloodshot eyes, he saw a figure burst through a window—Cho Dae-sul and Dang Do-gwang.
“Why are those bastards crawling out? They should still be fighting!”
The two men rushed toward Hwang Jo-gil.
Without moonlight, he couldn’t make out their faces, but their movements seemed frantic and clumsy.
As their feet left the ground with a powerful leap, something dark flashed before them.
A soft rasp—
—and as if it were some cruel illusion, the heads of Cho Dae-sul and Dang Do-gwang tumbled to the earth.
The headless bodies sprayed blood as they fell limp to the ground.
“Go, try not to spill so much blood. The cleaning is going to be tedious.”
The speaker emerged with an assassin gripped in each hand. With a crack, he twisted the necks and both bodies went slack.
“It’s cleaner this way, isn’t it?”
“The ones you’ve grabbed are just underlings, Gal Ma-pyeong. These two are the real leaders.”
“Can’t you kill the leaders by hand?”
“Let’s just finish it quickly. Dispatch them, clean up, and be done.”
Even as they bickered, Go Seo-bang and Gal Ma-pyeong continued dispatching the assassins emerging from the building in rapid succession.
“Where’s Se-hwa?”
“Se-hwa is with the lady. Better keep her back—don’t want a stray blade finding the girl.”
Though screams punctuated the night here and there, for an assault of two hundred and fifty men, the matter was being resolved with remarkable (if not quite literal) peace—quiet enough that Ji-u slept on undisturbed.
“Wait, isn’t that the Jo Hwang Clan’s young lord?”
Go Seo-bang, who recognized him, approached Hwang Jo-gil. Gal Ma-pyeong bounded toward the Back Garden, calling out as he went.
“Finish it quickly and get back. Master will be cross with us.”
Go Seo-bang came to stand before Hwang Jo-gil.
Hwang Jo-gil found not a shred of reality in how events were unfolding.
‘How did it come to this?’
The assassins were supposed to slaughter everyone in the estate while he watched at his leisure, and then after some time had passed, he would personally sever a few lords’ heads.
That was the image in his mind, the outcome he had been certain would follow.
Go Seo-bang, who had opened his mouth to speak, realized he had nothing to say and resorted to action instead.
Hwang Jo-gil took a fist to the chest and collapsed where he stood. In the agony of a heart hardening like stone, he felt his pulse growing steadily weaker.
‘Useless dogs!’
His curse upon the assassins were his final words.
Not a single assassin who had breached Oseong Jang-won escaped alive.
Apart from a few workers who woke in terror and fainted from the shock, the only damage was some structural harm to a building or two.
“What about our senior?”
Seo Seok-san asked as Yeon Geum-hong emerged from Geom U-bin’s quarters.
“She broke the arms and legs of eight assassins.”
“She didn’t kill them?”
“It seems you don’t quite want to commit murder yet.”
“It’s the first time I’ve seen so many die right in front of me. You don’t seem shocked?”
“Not to that degree. I just felt unsettled by it all. But that’s a natural reaction from someone as conscientious as you are.”
Bloodwind Saja sent Hang Ju-sa-byeon to dispose of the bodies.
When they stepped out into the courtyard, they spotted Geom U-bin from behind and stopped in their tracks.
Geom U-bin was gazing down at the corpse of Hwang Jo-gil.
As Bloodwind Saja approached, Geom U-bin murmured almost to herself.
“Why did he do such a foolish thing?”
Do Pyeong-su answered at once.
“Because he was an idiot.”
Seo Seok-san pushed Do Pyeong-su aside and spoke.
“Because he had misfortune.”
“What nonsense? If he’d had good fortune, you’re saying these men could have killed us?”
“Fool! Even if these men’s luck reached the heavens, they couldn’t kill us!”
“So it makes no sense to say it was a matter of fortune!”
Seo Seok-san drew a deep breath and lowered his voice.
“That man has neither a Master as excellent as ours, nor brothers like us. That’s why his fortune was poor.”
“Ah, that’s true. If he’d had a brother like you, he wouldn’t have been allowed to commit such a foolish act.”
Geom U-bin let out a small laugh.
“Then I have good fortune too. Because I have such wise disciples beside me.”
Do Pyeong-su tapped his chest with an expression that said trust only him.
“Of course! As long as we’re here, you will never die!”
Geom U-bin offered a gentle smile.
Geom U-bin was hardly the sort to worry about death in circumstances like these. Yet somehow, to his four disciples’ eyes, he still appeared as a child. But what of it? He was still a child, after all.
Nearly three hundred deaths. His heart had not wavered seeing them fall.
Geom U-bin had already come to understand this clearly.
His Master had been Hwa Jeok-san, once the greatest of all the Murim. His disciples were the Bloodwind Four Lions, whose renown burned as bright as that. Which meant that whether he wished it or not, he was a Murim martial artist—and the karmic weight of a hundred years of the Murim had been passed down to him.
“So do I.”
Geom U-bin spoke as he watched the estate being gradually set in order.
“I will do my part to ensure my disciples do not die.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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